wanted: platinum plaque certified by local barbershop

i struck a little deal with a friend of mine who owns a barbershop for him to sell some of my cds at the shop. i cut him a deal on buying 10 of them. i've yet to see cash from it, but he's a man of his word, so i'm ok with that. however, i went in on friday to get my edges lined up and while i'm in the chair he just passed me word that my cds were "not going platinum". forthrightly i replied, "i know man, what did you expect?" when i recorded you are here, i had a completely different audience in mind and now the people who would have well received the product are mostly long gone from me.

this barbershop has a really cool atmosphere though. the clientele is mostly funneled in from the nearby college. 20-25 year old black men and women comin' through, some to hang out and play pool, some for hair appointments. but the vibe they have goin' on is cool and pretty predictable. they're always playing gospel or other clean urban secular music, erykah badu, musiq, kim burrell, lisa mcclendon, usher, alicia keys, amel larrieux, and the like. definitely within a certain mold that appeals to the certain people that come through. so i was not surprised that despite my man's hypin' me up among his clients, the cd has failed to show itself a worthy investment.

at this point, that doesn't sting so much. i've given my cd the most scathing reviews it could get having run the gamut of being completely in love with it all the way to being fully disenchanted with my own songs. the album i did is mainly dance pop formulated to appeal to fans of mainstream artists like justin timberlake. but now that crunk rules the world and hip-hop IS the new pop, what i have to offer is not currently en vogue. i'm ok with that, and i've known that i would have to go back to the drawing board for awhile. albeit discreetly, hearing that my art was not being well received among this niche sub-culture of a few folks down at the barbershop had a challenging effect on me. it's as if he was telling a husband that according to the grapevine he wasn't "taking care of business at home". of course that's not what he meant, but that's how it felt. of course, i'd like to prove that idea wrong. so now i am on a cyborg mission to make their heads bob if i have to grab the back of their craniums and do it myself.

"somebody said you'll never make it / that's the thought you're keeping / don't let that be the reason why you're sleepin' / time is of the essence, so you better believe / you can do anything" - out of eden, "this is your life"

so, for my next feat, i'd like to target an urban crowd. it's practical anyway. i made music for the environment i was in before, and now i'm in a different environment. so i want to don the appropriate clothing.

even though i have no intentions of becoming a strictly R&B stalwart, i'd like to know i can rock it if want to, even though i really don't. it is my goal to get those ubercool few of 20-25 students to nod their head to something i had a hand in. phase one's already begun. i collected some tracks from a friend of mine who produces tracks for some really big name neo-soul artists. now i'm entreating God to help me write lyrics to them that will fit the people i'm supposed to speak to and the style i'll be presenting it in.

the caveat will be to make sure the goal of making heads nod doesn't subvert the more important task of continuing to represent Christ to the fullest. the attention is supposed to be on Him primarily, and i'm not supposed to be the only reason i'm singin'. but he's been most kind and gracious to negotiate with me on things that i want. so we'll see what He will and won't allow.