About six weeks ago, I was contacted about teaching two workshops on writing to a group of High School kids. The person who contacted me had originally reached out to me a couple years ago, but for whatever reason we weren’t able to make it happen.  It looked more likely this time around since my schedule was clear; I had been at home writing my book for several months straight and had no plans to be on the road for a while.

After giving it some careful thought, I confirmed the date and started to prepare.  Admittedly, I was nervous about teaching, but since I had more time to prepare I felt confident I could put something together that the students and I would be happy with.

I got really excited while preparing the material and decided to talk to some friends about this great opportunity to teach some high school students on “the last Saturday in April.”  I’ve always wanted to share the things I know and inspire others, so this would finally be a chance to do both.  I was on vacation two weeks before my scheduled appearance and brought along some books on lesson planning to assist in writing up my agenda for the two workshops I would be facilitating (spoken word and recitation).  A week before the workshop I had completely written out my entire presentation for both workshops and was very comfortable with what I had.  I began the process of memorizing and practicing it for at least two to three hours every day.

On the Thursday before I was scheduled to appear, I exchanged a few emails with the teacher who coordinated the event to iron out some final details and answer some last-minute questions.  Then I ran through my entire presentation three times with hardly any errors.  I felt extremely confident.  I went to bed around 4am thinking “If I’ve got it this solid with all day Friday to prepare, I’m going to nail it Saturday.”  I planned on waking up around 10:30 to practice again, and then scheduling two more rehearsals: one in the afternoon and one at night.

Unfortunately, it didn’t go down like that.

On Friday morning, I received a phone call around 10:30 am from the teacher asking where I was at and if I was going to be late.  I was confused and disoriented because I had just woken up.  Then, to my horror, I realized the workshops I had been telling myself for the past month were happening on the last Saturday of April, were actually happening the last Friday of April.  They were happening at that moment and I wasn’t there because I wrote down the wrong date.

I had totally blew it.

Now, this wouldn’t be the end of the world if the workshops were taking place right across town.  If they were, I could have hustled over there in 30 minutes.  Unfortunately, these workshops were taking place in Toledo, Ohio which is about two and a half hours from Columbus.  This is when the weight of my error really hit me.  I felt sick to my stomach.  I told them I would head out the door in the next ten minutes.

I took the fastest shower known to man, got dressed, packed my notes, and left the house in about ten minutes.  I knew I had let down the teacher and those students who had been bussed in from area charter schools and it was extremely upsetting.  I pushed as hard as I could and got there in about two hours.

The students had just started giving their presentations when I got there.  This is when it really hit me just how much I had dropped the ball because I was supposed to help them prepare for their presentations.  There were about 80 total kids presenting and competing in different categories: persuasive presentation, original spoken word, and recitation.

I hadn’t been around that many high school kids since graduating, but hearing their presentations was one of the most inspiring things I have ever seen.  Some of those kids were truly amazing.  They were so positive and supportive of eachother.  During the moments where one of them would struggle at remembering their words, the entire crowd would rally behind them in support, telling them it was ok, while cheering them on.  There were about five or six kids that were talking about things so personal that it would almost bring tears to my eyes.  It reminded me of how jaded and guarded we become as we get older, and how important it is to keep our inner-child alive.

I was able to judge their competition, but I could only present about 5-10 minutes of the talk that I had prepared all month for, and had to do it right before they announced the finalists of the competition because everything was running behind schedule and the students had already been there all day.  I felt so embarrassed for ruining this great opportunity to reach so many bright kids.  I gave away a few copies of my book away to the finalists but it seemed like no consolation for what I was supposed to have done.

To make matters worse, the teacher who brought me in insisted on paying me for making it out there.  So not only do I have the guilt of being late, I’ve also got this check that I feel too guilty to cash that’s haunting me.

Needless to say, I did a lot of soul-searching during that 3 hour drive home.

How did I let this happen?

How do I make sure this never happens again?

How can I improve my organizational skills?

But the most important question that I asked myself was, “How do you respond to this failure?”

See, the technical parts of failure are easy to identify and fix, but the emotional part of failure is probably the most important to address.  If you don’t address the emotional part, you will have a hard time bouncing back.  How we respond to failure determines whether that failure brings us down even more, or whether we will use it as an opportunity for growth.

I knew this one was going to be tough for me.  I had already beat myself up over it quite a bit and I hadn’t even got home yet.

I decided that my first response to this failure would be to try to make up for it.  There was a teacher there from Columbus that mentioned she would like to get me in to speak to her kids and I would like to do it no questions asked.  I have to follow-up and make it right.  Otherwise, this situation will haunt me and emotionally drag me down.

Second, I have decided that instead of looking at this as a one-time opportunity to speak and teach, that I should continue working on the material I had prepared and make it something that I can offer at any time.  That way I won’t feel like my work was in vein and there will be no anxiety if I’m ever offered another chance to present.

The third thing I have decided to do in response to this failure is to make teaching kids more of a priority.  This was not the first time I have done workshops or taught, but this was the biggest one.  I have been offered many opportunities in the past, but have had to pass because I have either been on the road or didn’t have enough time to prepare.  No more of that.  I need to empty my head of all this information and knowledge in a way that allows me to always be prepared.  From beat-making, to DJing, to creative writing, to performances–I have learned a lot and have a lot of things in my head. I need to make a conscious effort to write these things down and get them out of my head because they can help others.

I’ve realized that if I don’t take action on these things, this failure will haunt me, and I might feel so discouraged that I may never try to teach kids again.  I’m determined to not let that happen.

Everybody experiences failure.  It is how we respond to it that determines our strength of character.

Word is Blog.

p.s. please feel free to share your experiences of failure and how you bounced back in the comments section.

For all my friends who have Kindles (or Ipad’s with Kindle Reader apps), the E-Book version of The Making of Adventures in Counter-Culture is now available on Amazon.com for $5.99.  Click HERE or the cover to purchase.  Audiobook version will be available later this month.

Thanks for the support

In the spring of 2010, while I was on tour with Killah Priest, I had the idea to write a book about the making of Adventures in Counter-Culture.  I started jotting down thoughts and memories, emptying my head of everything that I could recollect about the process and everything that went into the creation of the album.  I wasn’t sure if I would ever finish it, but It was a cool activity to keep me busy during the long drives.

The album itself wouldn’t come out for a year, so my initial idea was to finish the book before the album was done so it would be available on the album’s release date.  Unfortunately, that didn’t happen.  I was able to write up about three or four pages of notes but that was it.  Sadly, the initial idea for The Making of Adventures in Counter-Culture book was filed away along with all the other ideas that I used to talk about but never finished.   I had a bucket list just like everybody else, which included items like sky diving, write a book, and make a movie, but during the two year period that I was drinking heavily nothing really seemed to get checked off of it.

Things started to change shortly after that 2010 tour with Killah Priest.  I stopped drinking a month after I got home and started to gain a greater optimism about my future and life in general.  I started reading more, spending more time with my art than ever, and slowly but surely, things started getting done.

I’ve been a big fan of hip-hop videos since I was a little kid watching Yo MTV Raps and Rap City.  In fact, I still have a bunch of VCR tapes from when I would record my favorites music videos just so I could watch them anytime I wanted to.  I had always been interested in video production, but never had the balls to try it.  My degree was in computer science and I was too scared to switch to something I had more passion for so soon after college.  Deep inside I felt like doing so would have invalidated the years I had already spent in college.  I didn’t want to feel like I had wasted my time so I pressed on trying to make the degree I had work, without much success.  Eventually, the clarity that came along with sobriety allowed me to start reading about what I had a passion about for so long. I started dabbling in it, applying the lessons that I learned.  My hope was to learn enough to do something that was as solid enough that I could make my friends who were really good at video feel proud about all the stuff I’ve learned from them.  Plus, video production gave me a great outlet that wasn’t directly tied to my music career.  For the first time since I had been a full-time artists I had a real hobby.

I set small goals but eventually wanted to direct a music video for myself that was good enough to stand next to the stuff that I considered dope. As my work on smaller video projects got better, I gained more confidence and eventually gave it a try shooting the music video for “Go Hard or Go Home.“

That video made its debut this week, and has gotten some amazing feedback and almost ten thousand views in it’s first day.  I didn’t win an oscar or anything, but I feel really proud.  It’s one of those moments where you can actually look back and see that the hard work you put in really matters.  When all the little intangible things that you have been committed to for so long come together and form something real that you can be proud of.  Today is that moment for me.  I feel like all the shit that I told myself to push through the moments of self-doubt were right.

It goes even further.

About two years ago, I told myself that I was going to try to become a better writer.  The first step was to start writing more on my blog.  I made a commitment to use my blog as an outlet for things that I care about and as an forum to improve my craft.  I figured that if I ever got good enough at writing on my blog then I could one day revisit the idea I had to write the book about Adventures in Counter-Culture.  It has been a very humbling process, to say the least.  I’ve written some things that I’ve been extremely proud of and some things that I wish I could do over again.  But no matter how I felt about the people’s response or my execution, the act of writing made me a better and more confident writer.

I used to think that writing was more about the art of saying things as eloquently as possible, so it’s no surprise that I was always hesitant about entering the field.  However, when I started getting into the process of writing I soon found out that writing isn’t about saying things as beautifully as possible, it’s about telling your story as honestly as possible.  Some people are able to tell their story using language that is more eloquent that others, but the writers who really stand out are the ones that are the best at being themselves and capturing something that is profoundly human, thus relatable.

That realization, along with the regular writing I did on my blog, gave me the confidence to pick back up the book idea that I had all but abandoned two years ago.  My biggest problem was that I initially thought I should write the book to tie into the release of some music, or a tour.  That was a big mistake.  I realized that I needed to write the book because I needed to write the book, not because I had a tour coming up.  Writers write because they love to write, not because they see an opportunity to capitalize off their art. You’ve gotta do it for the right reasons.

So last fall I started working on the book again, and by the time we got to Europe in November i was in full-swing.  I started a routine where I would read & write in my bunk for the first few hours of the day and after each show.  When I got back home in December I continued to push, writing almost every night, seeing if i could finish the book.  There was a point where I got past the point of feeling like I had to write to finish the book and got to a point where I enjoyed writing just to write.  Previously, that was a feeling I had only experienced with writing rhymes.

In four short months, I had completely writing my first book.  It wasn’t easy.  For the past two months I have not went to bed prior to 5 o’clock in the morning, and have been putting in no less than 10-12 hours per day on the project, taking only one day off per week since February.   Also, the process of having your words edited is very humbling.  It’s a constant reminder of how far you’ve come and how far you’ve got to go at the same time.

Well, today I received the first batch of the first book I wrote, The Making of Adventures in Counter-Culture in the mail and I felt overwhelmed and really proud.

I had a moment last night where I realized that the book, the video, the one year anniversary of the album were all hitting around the same time.  In addition, next month will be my two year sober date.  When I quit drinking I chose to fill my time doing things that I was passionate about, but wasn’t sure if they would ever be anything other than hobbies to keep me occupied.  I had no grand plans, but I definitely worked hard.  It’s no coincidence that all these things are coming together.  But it’s very important to understand that getting things done is about more than just checking something off your list.  It’s also about living a lifestyle that puts you in the position to finish your goals.

I guess I’m writing this to tell everybody to stay encouraged because there is nothing that you can’t achieve.  I’m not technically an author or a video director, but if I can do what I’ve done then so can you.  A dream is only a dream if you’re not willing to work towards it.  Once you’re willing to put in work, it changes from a dream to a goal, then from a goal to a reality.  The momentum of achieving that goal will push you to take on more ambitious things the next time around.  It’s a great cycle, but it starts with you.  Be willing to work on the things you’re passionate about, even if it’s just a little bit every day, and know that the time you put in towards those things isn’t wasted.  Every minute of it is worth it.  Chip away at your goals.

I don’t know what my future in video or writing will entail, but I can say without a doubt that the small goals I’ve achieved with each has made me a more confident person and encouraged me to push further.  Don’t be afraid to chip away at your goals little by little.

Be encouraged.  You will see results.

Word is blog

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The official music video for “Go Hard or Go Home” will debut next week, on the one-year anniversary of the Adventures in Counter-Culture album.

Word is Blog!

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As writers, we tend to beat ourselves up over it.  The longer it lasts the more we start to question everything that made us unique, how we got this far, and if we’re really cut out for this field of work.  We worry that maybe we just ran out of “stuff” to write about.  Maybe our lives are just boring and we have nothing to offer.  But following that line of thinking only leads to the most obvious solution, which is to go do something interesting so we’ll have interesting things to write about.  This sounds good on the surface but don’t be fooled.

I’ll explain.

I’ve been reflecting on the past few years of my artistic career lately – but not in terms of significance – in terms of productivity (i.e. how much music I’ve done).  I remember many bouts of writer’s block, lasting anywhere from one month to a year, and I remember trying to jump-start my writing by doing a bunch of different stuff.  I would always change a couple things in my life, like where I was hanging out and who I was hanging out with, figuring that if I did something new and had some new experiences I would have interesting stuff to write about and the writing would flow.  So I did more stuff, and waited, and then did more stuff, and waited some more…but nothing came out.  I was just as blocked as I was before, except now I was tired from adding all those extra activities to my life.  At the time, I thought I was fixing my writers’ block, but looking back now I can see that I wasn’t fixing it, I was actually making it worse.

I used to define writer’s block as something that happens when we don’t have anything to say or cant come up with any good ideas, but now I believe it’s the opposite.   I believe writer’s block is what happens when we’ve got something to say but haven’t organized our thoughts enough to express it.  Even more than that, writer’s blocks is when we can’t say anything because we haven’t fully processed and reflected on our experiences.

We need time to reflect.

Life is intense, so it’s natural to get caught up in the details.  Many times we’re so busy living life that we haven’t taken the necessary time to process what we’ve been through.  It’s not easy, but it’s necessary.

It’s no different than soldiers suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) after they return from combat.  When they were living in the middle of the war zone their only thought was survival, not reflection.  But once taken out of that environment they were finally given the time and space to reflect on the experience, and what they saw was horrifying and deeply traumatic.  Living is the easy part; putting what you have lived into perspective is not.

This explains why writer’s block affected me for such long periods of time.  Instead of giving myself time to reflect, I kept adding onto the experiences, and giving myself more and more to process.  The more stuff I did, the less artistic output I had.

The cure for writer’s block is to do less, not more.  Give yourself the time to process what you’ve already been through so you can express the lessons you’ve learned and the perspective you’ve gained.

Imagine your creativity as an elevator ride.  The first floor is your starting point, and the top floor is your destination–the place where your ideas flow naturally and you can fully express yourself.  You would like to make it to the top floor as fast as possible so you press the top floor button and start your journey, but every floor in-between the first floor and the top floor represents an experience.  Therefore, the more experiences you have, the more floors you have to stop at, and the longer it takes you to make it to the top.

Take the necessary time to reflect on what you’ve been through, and what you’ve learned, and you’ll have the perspective necessary to escape writer’s block.

Word is Blog.

Yesterday I bought a used Roland TR-606 drum machine from craigslist.  For those that don’t know, the Roland brand of drum machines are synonymous with most of the music released in the 80′s.  You would be hard-pressed to find a record from that era that wasn’t made using one of the Roland drum machines; the most popular being the TR-808 model.  This model is so popular that people just refer to its sounds as the 808 kit, and an “808″ is now slang for the really deep bass kick that’s used all over the place.  Even if you didn’t know what it was, you’ve heard it a million times, especially on southern rap records and 80′s music.  The TR-606 I bought originally came out in 1982.

Even though I experimented with the 80′s sound on Adventures in Counter-Culture, I never owned any vintage gear, so I had to work from memory and studying those styles more than actually owning the gear they used to create it.   I would’ve loved to own some vintage gear in the past but it’s usually pretty expensive, and I didn’t know if I would be using it enough to justify the purchase.  Luckily, I saw the 606 on craigslist for a price that was in my budget, so I went for it.  I spent a few hours last night going through the user manual and learning how to use it, and while it hasn’t even been 24 hours since I brought the TR-606 home I’ve been reminded of something that was starting to get a bit lost.

Creating art should be simple.

There are only 7 sounds on the TR-606.  Comparatively, I’m used to hundreds of drum sounds to choose from when I make a beat.

There are only two ways to modify the those sounds, volume & accent.  No pitch, no envelopes, no filters, and no effects.

It’s a machine you can learn how to use in an hour.  In the past I would spend weeks and months learning the basics of any software I used for beat-making. For example, I’ve watched two Ableton Live DVDs, read two Ableton Live books, and have had the software for six or seven months, yet still barely know how to make a beat that I like on it.  You can spend hours auditioning and tuning sounds before you even make a beat in Ableton and other software programs –  but not on the 606.  The 606 user’s manual is less than 50 pages, and half of those pages are tutorials where they show you examples of how to program beats on it.  There’s probably less than 10 pages of actual instructions.

The thing that immediately drew me to the TR-606 was its drum sounds, but the sounds aren’t even the biggest selling point of the machine – the biggest selling point of the machine is its simplicity.  You turn it on, you push some buttons, you hear some sounds, and it sounds dope.  No matter how advanced beat-making gets, there will always be a demand for simple ideas and a simplified process.

This entire thing has made me see that sometimes technology can get in the way of creativity. I’m guilty of it myself.  By no means am I a gear-junkie that has to have all the latest gadgets, but I’ve definitely let the tools detract from the process and remove the instant gratification and spontaneity that comes along with being creative.  It’s funny that it took a a 30-year old drum machine to teach me that, but I’m so glad I can see it.

Keep it simple.

Word is Blog

http://www.divshare.com/direct/16817130-01d.mp3

Shout outs to Chi Town Luke and the crew for having me on again.

2012 marks the tenth year that I’ve been a full-time artist. Without a doubt it’s the most rewarding career I’ve ever had.  It’s also the most challenging, although in completely different ways than my previous jobs.

I remember when I was considering resigning from my job back in 2001, I went around getting advice from other self-employed people, in hopes of getting encouragement or advice before I made the leap.  One of the people I spoke to was named Todd Buck and he ran an in-home studio on the west side of Cincinnati that I would routinely use for mastering the first few albums I ever released.  He had just made the decision to move his studio and business out of his basement and to a larger one on the opposite side of town.  He had only been self-employed for a year at the time so I asked him for some advice.

The first thing he told me was that the biggest difference is the freedom you will get and learning how to manage it.  Then he told me something that I will never forget.  He said “the biggest difference between being self-employed and unemployed is what you decided to do with each day.”  He went on to say “if you sit on your ass and don’t do anything then you’re not self-employed, you’re unemployed.”

Out of all the advice that people have given me over the years, this is the one piece that has always stuck with me.  So much so that when other artists ask me about making the leap, I tell them this quote.  I took it to mean a couple different things.  The first is that a lot of people claim to be self-employed or full-time artists, but if they’re not making any money then they’re not, they’re just unemployed.  The second thing I took it to mean was that once you’re self-employed each day that you do nothing is a day that you move towards being unemployed, regardless of what you tell yourself you are.

About a year later I resigned and became a full-time artist and was able to experience exactly what he was talking about.  A lot of people think that being a full time artist means that you just sit at home high all day and write rhymes, and while it is that to some artists, it’s also a lot more than that.  Being an artist has taught me more about people and the human experience than any other thing in my life, enriching me in a way that is sometimes hard to describe.  Throughout the years I’ve managed to stay as productive as possible, but it is truly a daily struggle to stay motivated when you work alone and the job isn’t exactly a team sport.  I did have a stretch from 2006 to 2011 where it seemed like I wasn’t releasing any music because I hadn’t put out any solo albums or Soul Position albums, but even then I managed to release smaller projects like Blueprint vs Funkadelic, Sign Language, two Greenhouse EPs, and even produce an entire album for Columbus artist Envelope.  I’ve had my good days and bad days as far as being inspired goes, but i think that’s just part of the job, and the process of making music is always challenging and exciting.

But now I feel like I have reached a different point in my career, where instead of having years with very little output, I think I’m on the verge of having almost too much music on my hands. In the past this was never really a problem, but I’ve found that since I stopped drinking I get music finished a lot faster, and without so much second guessing.  Time that I used to spend wondering whether a beat was good enough to rap on is now spent actually rapping on beats that I know are good enough.  Time that was spent out at the bar is now spent trying to make a body of work that can stand next to any great artist, and as a result I’m on the verge of having a lot more music than I’ve ever had before.  I’m not there yet, but in a couple months I will be, and I’ve been finding myself a little unsure about having a plan for releasing it.

I’m sure that many would consider this a problem of convenience; the musical equivalent of a man with five attractive women who want to date him and claims to be stressed about the decision he must make, and I get that.

So I guess this ultimately leads to the question of what to do with all that music?

Well, I’m going to start releasing it, little by little.

And I’m going to release most of it myself, here on printmatic.net, and directly to you.

Some of it may make it’s way to digital retailers like itunes, but don’t count on it.  I would rather start right here with the people who have been reading this blog for the past two years faithfully, all the people who allowed me to take five years off between albums and still have a music career, and all the new fans that I have picked up along the way. I would like to interact with you all directly.  There’s so many projects that I put on the backburner while I was working on Adventures in Counter-Culture and I think it would be an injustice for these projects to never see the light of day.

So consider this a heads up about what’s about to happen here at printmatic.net.  I hope you will support me in this effort by picking up one of the projects or subscribing to my e-mail list.

Thank you.

Printmatic

As many of my friends know, I’m a pretty big fan of Mixed-Martial Arts (MMA).  I think I started watching it about four or five years ago, and have been into it pretty heavily ever since, as proven by my MMA-related tweets whenever there’s a big event on.  Hell, a lot of my time in the studio is spent watching classic fights that I missed before I was a fan of the sport.

Well today I get to take my obsession with MMA to a new level because I was invited to call in and talk MMA on the internet show MMA Uncensored, which will be on from 7-9pm Mountain Time.  I will be on there at 8pm Mountain time (10pm Eastern time), talking about the upcoming UFC on FX show that’s going down tomorrow night, previewing the matchups and just talking about the fighters.

As a person who’s definitely a nerd about the sport, but doesn’t really get to chop it up with people about it to often, I’m pretty excited.

So, if you’re a fan of MMA (or just curious about my thoughts and knowledge of the topic) and free at 10pm Eastern Time / 8pm Mountain Time, please tune in.

Here’s are the details:

Date: Thurs Jan 19th
Time: 8pm Mountain Time / 10pm Eastern Time (the show actually starts at 7pm Mountain time. I’ll be on the 2nd half)
Website: http://www.gomilehigh.com/home.cfm (click on the “Listen Live” button)
Twitter: @printmatic and @mm_uncensored

UPDATE: Here is the audio of the interview:

Word!

Please check it out here: http://orlandoweekly.com/music/under-the-radar-1.1245038

Here’s an exerpt:

In 2005, Al Shepard stopped by the headquarters of Power 107.5 FM, a radio station in his hometown, Columbus, Ohio. Shepard had ties to hip-hop, and so did the station, but each had a vastly different idea of what makes the genre great. Traditionally, Shepard raps over self-made beats as Blueprint, keeping his work low on coolness and flash, and heavy on honesty. Slang doesn’t play into his verses much and he’s consistently willing to experiment with different moods and sounds in his beats. (He’s had albums issued by stately indie hip-hop label Rhymesayers.)

On the flip side, Power 107.5 FM’s tastes lean toward bombastic hooks and larger-than-life characters; a cursory look at the station’s recently played tracks turns up Beyoncé, Lil Wayne, Nicki Minaj, Wale and Drake. Around the time Blueprint’s 1988 was released, according to Shepard, the two entities butted heads (CON’T).

Word is Blog