Friday, August 22, 2008

Welcome to the Center of the Universe

dudes, this is totally going to be my facebook/myspace page, and it's going to be awesome. LOLZ. I'm going to post all my videos and pics, and sometime I'll show you this thing I did with some loops. I played it for my friend, and she was all like OMG.

Sometimes I won't have anything to write about, because I've been spending most of my free time looking at myself on the internet. WTF, my Xbox is getting all dusty. LOL. But I'll answer all the friend requests, just give me a minute, because I'm totally trying to figure out how to get my videos up on youtube. LOLZ.

Sometimes I go out and hang with real people, but I get kind of bored, so I'll pull out my blackberry and check my friend requests. LOLZ.

K, peace out.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Am I the only one that feels sorry for Jesse Jackson?

For two weeks in a row, everyone has had their panties in a bunch over things Rev. Jackson said when he didn't realize that his mic was live. Poor bastard. Imagine, Jesse Jackson is human. There was a time when the press understood this. They all knew that Jack Kennedy was fucking every skirt he could get his hands on, including Marilyn Monroe, and they kept quiet about it. That was his business. They took care to never photograph FDR in his wheelchair. Can you imagine any of this happening today?

Poor Jesse. When he thought no one was listening, he talked like a real person. Like a black person. Oh, the horror, the horror! Well, of course people are leaping on this as a great hypocracy, because the Reverend Jackson has been one of those that have campaigned against that particular word, creating something called "the N word." Fuck that. Fuck is the F word. Fuck that, too. Words are just fucking words, and trying to ban them just gives them more power.

It used to be an insult to call a gay person "queer." Then gays adopted the word themselves, and took all of the sting out of it, up to the point of having a TV show called "Queer eye for the straight guy." They should do the same with faggot, or fag.

Nigger, please.

Friday, July 4, 2008

Feeling Kind of Pavolvian


I always felt sorry for Pavlov's dog, but thanks to him (or them) we have the word Pavlovian. This, I have realized, is what is paralyzing my musical output now. It's a Pavlovian response.

It's true that I never set out to be rich or famous with my music, and I accomplished both of those goals, I am neither. I worked with a lot of famous people early in my career, and I saw how success was a double-edged sword, and I didn't covet it. Of all of the facets of my musical career, pianist, composer, song writer, my favorite was producing records. It was a perfect way to express myself without having to try to be a teen idol or even compromise myself.

So for years, I was quite content in my obscurity, and always felt lucky that I was able to earn a living doing it.

Something changed along the way. I got poisoned.

Although I worked in pop music, I never thought of money when I was creating, I was doing it because I love pop music. I had to fight to get paid sometimes. A lot of times. The music business is not for the weak of heart. Don King tried to promote concerts for awhile, I was part of them with the Jacksons tour in '81. He later said that he was going back to the boxing world, because the music biz was too tough for him. Imagine that! Think about that for a second. I still am amazed by that.

But I always carried on, because I loved it so much. But now, after all of this time, I am getting worn out. Lately, I have been struggling to get two companies with whom I have been doing business to pay me what is due. Just what they owe me. I've sent emails everyday, I get the runaround, and I'm running out of patience.

You see, I've been doing this for over 25 years. Just trying to get paid. The music I've made in this time has made millions of dollars, but I assure you that I am no millionaire. Just the music I've made with Mamborama has made over a million dollars at least, and I haven't seen but maybe ten percent of that in eight years. And I OWN the recordings! You just can't win in this business.

Insult to injury, people no longer feel the need to buy recordings, as they are easily available to download, so now the public takes my music without compensation as well. It used to be that just the business cheated me.

Maybe now you can understand why at this moment, I have NO desire to create music. None whatsoever. It's a Pavlovian response, I've been abused, and I don't want to go there anymore. It's a shame. I'm no genius, but there have been a lot of people over the years that enjoyed my music and encouraged me.

Am I whining again? I don't know. I think I've just been fucked with too much. Do you like to work for free? If so, come on over and clean my kitchen, it's a mess.

Friday, January 4, 2008

So Much For "Supporting The Artist"


Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails posted some extremely disappointing results of his experiment giving away the album he produced for spoken word artist Saul Williams.

In case you're not aware, he made the album available for free at a low (not bad: 160) mp3 rate, and asked a measly five bucks for higher quality digital tracks. I myself decided the support the idea, and coughed up five bucks without even listening to it first. It wasn't my cup of tea at all, but I certainly didn't feel ripped off; it was my choice, and I was intrigued by the idea. What's completely sad and depressing, is that hard core NIN fans made up the bulk of people downloading the thing, and only about 18% paid for it. Come on, people! Five bucks! This is utterly disgusting.

To me, it just proves what I have long suspected: despite all of the rationalizations, people just want something for nothing. If they could download concert tickets for free, or a happy meal from McDonald's, they'd rationalize that as well. I just wish they would be more honest about it, and quit trying to justify it.

At this moment, I have no desire to make music anymore for these parasites. Fuck 'em, let them make mashups and push around loops in Garageband. It's a shame.