Switzerland
Switzerland
6/2/11 5:00PM
Let me paint the picture for you. It's been a hot day. My tee shirt is wet from sweating. It's crowded. I'm feeling a little headache-ish. And I have plenty of music/work to do when I get home. My flight leaves at 8:15PM. Its now 5pm, so I have time to kill. I'm going to sit down somewhere and reflect. That always makes me feel good. Speaking of feeling good, I spoke to Pamela Williams manager today and it looks like she's going to do a song on my cd. Who's Pamela Williams, you say?? She's a saxophonist that plays smooth jazz. Well known in that world. But if you remove the tracks and put my/our type of music under her, she will kill it!! I'm not a huge fan of smooth jazz, but when someone is good the genre no longer matters. I'm very excited about what's going on. I'm doing house music still but I can hear myself maturing musically. The boom boom boom is becoming less and less significant. The sad part is you need that if you want to make money!!! But I'm taking a huge leap of faith. I will let the music lead me. My heart says "let it flow." My bills say "you better not forget that boom boom boom!" Decisions Decisions. LOL
5:15pm
Been sitting here for 15 minutes and forgot how much I love people watching. I'm looking at a black couple in their 70's easy, wearing color coordinated outfits. I will let them get a pass. They're older. But they deserve to get slapped for that. Yeah yeah. I know it's cute but orange and green??
8:03
It happened. I didn't think it would but it did!!! I'm standing in line, all 6'3 tall 286 pounds of me is standing there like everybody else. When this older man with a southern accent stood right in front of me!! Jumped the line!!! If I didn't say anything he would have stayed there. LOL. Why does this ALWAYS happen to me? Am I really that unnoticeable? Crazy!!
8:12pm
Sitting next to this tween blonde chick on the plane who's talking on her cell way too loud and her mother who's next to her does the same! Her mother just asked her who she was talking to. Her response was "No one".
I'm not racist but let's just say that would never happen if that mother was black. It's blowing me away how this girl is talking about "getting stoned" and drinking. Her mothers sits there and says nothing!!!!! Amazing.
8:19pm
Bout to take off. Do I want to sit next to this mouthy chick and risk getting arrested for voluntary manslaughter? Not to mention I'm the only brother on this plane. Great!
10:22am
Check this out. Somebody on the plane must have been super important. They had a few Mercedes Benz's waiting for him and his party on the Tarmac!!! Never seen that before.
I'm in Munich about to catch a connecting flight to Zurich. And the rudeness begins. The stares, the looks. I get it. I'm a big dude. But this is ridiculous.
10:45am
Ya know, everytime I come to Europe I always say that I'm going to get in the gym. It never fails. I think it's because most people here are in shape. I have to get it together.
10:59am
You know how you get on the bus that takes you to the plane waiting on the Tarmac?? Well, I'm on the bus now. This older couple are speaking to each other about my crocs. Sure they look like two flat tires, but is it not rude to blatantly discuss this is ones face? I'm slowly loosing my cool. I'm not usually so race alert. But when I'm in Europe I'm always reminded that I'm looked down upon by those that live here. It doesn't hurt, but it angers me. Funny thing, in just a few hours I will be in the spot light. Admired by the children of these people who treat me so rudely.
11:10am
On the plane to Zurich. When I tell you that none of you could handle the rudeness I'm experiencing, I mean it. The pushing the shoving. The plane isn't leaving anyone. We all have assigned seats. Unbelievable.
Off the subject....... Everybody is talking about this politician named Weiner who is accused of sending pictures of his buldging crotch to someone. Who really cares? Don't we have bigger fish to fry? America is looking so stupid and divided. Like someone straight from the ghetto with a lot of money and power. For example, we love Lil Wayne the entertainer, but we don't respect him in a way that we want our kids to grow up and be like him. America is like that. She has power and money but she lacks integrity and was founded on lies and deceit. She's a whore and can't mind her business. But she's so attractive. Our president is being disrespected by his own country. The racism is so painfully obvious. From the Donald Trump, birth certificate thing to Joe Wilson(I think that was his nane), the man that called our president a liar while he was speaking. Never has any president been called out this way. It's embarrassing. Anerica, the big buffoon with money and power. Other countries are laughing at us. On to happier things.
11:27am
I would love a cold beer, a double of Patron Reposado, and a Sushi Platter right now. And a good massage would be nice. I never get enough massages. When you hit 40, some things should be mandatory. Regular massages would keep me focused more.
11:31am
Random thought. Have you ever been friends with someone and didn't know them? I've done that for many years. Ever so often I think about my friend that wasn't. It'll stick with me for a long time. Usually when you make the discovery, something bad or even devastating happened. There is a scene in the movie Braveheart, starring Mel Gibson, that when the lead character discovered that his best bestest friend and brother was the enemy, he was so hurt he wanted to give his life away. His joy and passion had been stolen from him. The richness of brotherhood was sold for a few dollars. The pain was immeasurable. He just laid down on the ground in the middle of war. I know that feeling all too well. God is still good and faithful. He has healed me from any pain that I had about that situation and moved me to a place that I never imagined being. If you know God why don't you say amen....
If I start thinking of how good God is... When I think of where I should have ended up.. I can only give him praise.
2:55pm
Junior picked me up and everything went smoothly. I'm at the soundcheck. The club is an old ship. Very nice!
I'll be using DJ Deeps mixer.
9:27pm
After a few hours of snoring I'm up and ready to go. Junior will meet me downstairs. We're having dinner and then the club.
10:53pm
Having dinner with Junior and I notice a group of people chillin on the street. I mean sitting down in a circle. Literally on the street talking, laughing out loud, and drinking. I love it. I almost feel led to go out there and join them. Gloria's family is like that. Moses and I are like that. You know that's my brother. I say this in a lot of my blogs. Friends and family should get together for no reason. One bottle of wine or one plate of something to eat together. Not a big production. We need to do this as a people.
Anyway....... On to the rest of the night.
11:50pm
Walking back to the car on one of the main strips. There's a lot of restaurants and clubs. EVERY single one was playing house music. I mean soulful house music. The kind we love. How is it that most of us are broke?
12:13am
I'm at the club now. It's a nice vibe here. I bought myself a couple of starbucks mugs and I realized that the American dollar is at an all time low!!! LOL!!! I just spent $43 on two mugs. Man that's crazy. Needless to say I won't be making any more purchases here. LOL!!!!!!!
1:16am
It's kinda sad to say but this club is sooooooo empty! I'll keep you informed but it ain't looking good at all. Junior is playing. He's the 2nd DJ up and there's maybe 2 people on the dance floor. Yikes!!!
1:33am
OK. There is hope. It's picking up. I'm looking at maybe 30-40 people. LOL!!
My man Junior B just played a Pevenn jam that's on fire!! Whew!!!!!!!!!
I'm feeling kinda impressed that he's playing mostly vocals!! Wow. But the culture here is the same as home. When it comes to our own soulful parties we don't wanna pay. And we don't buy drinks. Here they at least buy drinks. LOL.
1:40am
By the way. Did I ever mention how much I hate the "booth"? Let the DJ rock. Why are people standing all over the DJ while he's working? I can't stand it! Junior is killing it but the people don't seem to get it.
2:07am
I'm about to go on and it's emptying out before I even play my first record. LOL!!!!!!!
3:07am
I played to an empty club!!!!!!!!
June 4th 3:22pm
Feeling a little annoyed. But learned a very valuable lesson. I played to an empty club and the promoter didn't make money. He paid me half up front but wasn't able to cover the second half. Now please understand this, I really like Junior and I will come back and do this again, but never again will I do a gig and not get fully paid up front. This is my fault. I'm too nice of a guy. I should have collected before I played a record. But you don't want to come off as a money hungry person and leave an unpleasant taste in anyones mouth. Bottom line, business first ALWAYS. People say all the time "man you should know better" but I believe in relationships. This man was trying to do something good but it failed. I could have been hard nosed but I'd rather take a loss of a few dollars than ruin the relationship. We already know that the loss of money was not my problem. But in the end he needed my help. So I choose to be a friend. You never know who you'll need in this life.
Sigh........
5:04pm
Ok. I suppose I'm over it. But I took a $500 hit and times are really hard out here. Y'all know!!
Anyway. Being in Switzerland, you see a lot of watch advertisements. My brother Joaquin had a nice Rolex on and Louie wears a fancy something or another. I think it's a Rolex also. Well I think I want a nice timepiece. Not a bad idea. It's a good look right? LOL. As soon as I can tell my brain that I'm spending $3-4K on a watch, something my phone can do even better, I'll get one. LOL...
Man I want some sushi and sake really really bad right now. Oh yeah, and a massage!!!
7:47pm
Paris is always beautiful. Had a decent flight. Trying to decide am I going to just chill or go to DJoon tonight. Random thought..
There's gotta be a way for a house artist to make it better than this. I had a number 1 record on traxsource for 2 weeks and I'm not at all feeling like I had anything out. Am I ego tripping?? I'm definitely feeling like my little 2 week stint has gone unnoticed. South Africa is really showing the song a tremendous amount of support. It went to #4 on the Top 40 radio chart. I was on regular rotation on a major radio station there. That's huge!!!!!! But I live thousands of miles away. It's difficult to feel the love ya know? I am super grateful though. Didn't have to be this good.
9:21pm
Of course I get to the hotel and nothing is taken care of. Now I'm calling Junior which is an expense. Of course he's not picking up! This is the kind of headache that make artist charge so much money. Why should I have to go through this?
10:00pm
We finally got it straight. And the redeeming factor is that the room is extremely nice. I was on edge for real. Now I'm jumping in the sauna and ordering food!!!
7:04am
Would you believe they were still trying to charge me?? After all we went through last night.. Anyway, I was the last person to get on the little shuttle bus to the airport and said "Good morning everyone" you'd think someone would say something back.... Sheesh!!! Is that racism? Or fear? Or both? Am I menacing? A bus full of people and nobody could respond? It's not like they couldn't understand. Everybody understands "Good Morning" in many languages. Ah well...
7:43am
I know I keep talking about racial differences. But this is one incident I should mention. I got through the gate and this white American dude is pissed. He had something that they didn't allow him to bring. Whatever it was, I don't think he was able to keep it. They must have discarded it. Here's the thing. He's cursing and kicking in this place. I'm hearing swears that could only come from an angry white dude. LOL. ....... Wait a sec!!!!!! This just in. It's a can of sardines. He's pissed over a can of sardines!!!!! SARDINES!!!!!! He just went back to confront the French Security about the issue. Here's the lesson. Black people. Stand up for what you believe is right. We're too passive as a people. We get overcharged and walked over a lot. We don't say anything because we don't want to validate the stereotype of being the angry black person. This guy, although he is way wrong, is ready to go to jail over a can of sardines. That's classic. I love it. He believes in his heart that he was wronged by the security people. LOL!!
I suppose this is a good note to close on.
Thanks for hanging with me.
