On the mic in Detroit… Not singing.
One of the most interesting (and sometimes unpredictable) pieces of being an artist is the interaction you have with people who follow your music. Some folks call ‘um “fans”… others even get more personal and call ‘um “friends”… Whatever you wanna call it, to put it bluntly – the folks who listen to and support your shit. Anyway, I love this interaction simply because it brings me and my music closer to those who support it and vice versa – this is why I have no problem with stepping right off stage into the audience after a performance and shaking hands with those who put down their hard-earned money to listen to us share our gift with them. Hearing people tell me how they were first introduced to my music and sometimes even going into detail as to how it applies to their lives and daily activities is a blessing to say the absolute least. There’s nothing more humbling than to hear about how you have affected someone’s life for the better because of some music you have come up with in the comfort of your own home… It gives me goosebumps just typing about it. BUT, sometimes…. juuuuust sometimes things go way left during some of these excellent interactions with the posing of just one simple question…
“Hey, so… Why didn’t you sing tonight?”
*crickets*
Those of you who know me understand fully that I have a very silly sense of humor and more importantly, I never, ever take myself too seriously. I understand that not a lot of people know who I am, and that sometimes those who may be aware of who I am aren’t quite sure about what I do. Regardless, whenever I get asked about which song I’ve sung on or I get complimented on my “singing voice”….. It’s STILL funny as hell to me. In a similar instance that is way too hilarious to be left out of this particular entry, I can remember playing a show in Portland, OR last year with The Foreign Exchange and someone approached my brother Nicolay, a fellow Musician/Producer/Composer and told him that he was “disappointed” that he didn’t RAP during the show because he was “all over the Connected album.” We STILL laugh about that…
I’ll put it like this, I’m sure that if I practiced long and hard enough on vocals I may be able to do more than just “hold a note”, but to me holding a note isn’t good enough to be singing… in public anyway. I don’t sing because in my humble opinion… I CAN’T sing. I am a perfectionist with regards to what I release, on top of the fact that I feel the vocalists I have worked with previously are some of the most talented folks in the business, therefore I don’t have to touch a mic in the studio (this is the part where your ears should send me a “thank you” shout). Trust me y’all, if I started singing during a show, folks would get up and trample each other attempting to hit the exits. I only sing in two places: 1.) In the studio when referencing an idea for an artist, and 2.) In the car….and the ONLY reason I sing in the car is because I can have the volume turned up just enough so that I can actually sound good – meaning I’m drowning myself out. And now that I think about it some, let’s go ahead and make it three – Sometimes I’ll take advantage of the great acoustics of the shower and sing a little som’n in there. The splashing water is loud enough to create a sound diversion allowing me to “go in” on a song if I feel the need to do so. Honestly, I come up with a lot of musical concepts in the car and in the shower… Maybe I should strugglesing more often!!! ….Nah, I’ll pass.
Then, of course there’s the classic line…
“Well if <insert bad singing negro’s name here> is singing on records, you can do it too!”
Umm…Yeeeeah, well kinda… It’s pretty good logic on paper that I even joke around and use sometimes, but y’all ain’t gonna be out here adding me to some list I don’t want to be included on and talking about my non-singin’ ass either!
Alright… All BS aside, y’all REALLY wanna know the truth? Well, the truth is… I don’t even wanna hear the shit. And if I don’t want to hear it, I’m going to assume that you all don’t either. In the meantime, I’ll do my very best to continue to compose and play some good music for y’all… Just remember, if you hear a male voice over top of it… It’s not me!