I, Christian: Connection!

Greetings Boys & Girls,

This past week was a good one. It had adventure, sickness, gigs, etc. Let’s jump in!

I’ve been on the sick side of the coin for over a week now. At the beginning of last week, I was under the impression that I’d be feeling well enough to do the show at The Hunter without a problem. However, I realized during my rehearsal on Sunday or Monday that that wasn’t going to be the case. My voice was spotty at best, my breath control was terrible, yadda yadda. So, I decided to take myself to the doctor and get a few shots to kick my recovery into overdrive.

If you’ve followed this humble blog of mine for any length of time, there’s a good chance you’ve seen me say this before about The Hunter. Every time I have the opportunity to perform there, it always feels special. Scratch that, it always IS special. On this particular go round, I was accompanied by my bandmates Zowie Boyd and Jessica Nunn, and once we got rolling, I think we did a great job of filling the room. One of the greatest things aside from bringing the material to life is that we, as a group not only continue to get better, but we grow closer together while we’re performing, and that’s an amazing feeling.

After the performance, several people came up to talk to us, and I was really overwhelmed by the response. A few days prior to the show, I spoke with a friend from Florida who worked with the radio with me as well as started producing music with yours truly. He'd listened to my EP and asked that if my material isn't going to get airplay and because poetry has a very definite ceiling for opportunities (right now), where did I see myself going next. I told him that I really felt that with the band, we offer something unique, resonant, etc. and that if we can continue to just bring people into the work and atmosphere, we can carve out our own lane. The Hunter performance truly felt like a small affirmation towards that.

Friday night, I was asked to perform in a fundraiser for Equality Everywhere and for two young bands. It was a really interesting night and bill. There was indie rock, there was a little dabble of drag, and there was me. I haven’t performed at JJ’s Bohemia in a while, and I’ve always enjoyed being on that stage. It was a lot of fun to rock out in front of a room full of people who’d largely never heard of me.

I reached back and did some older pieces that I don’t get to perform that much anymore, and everybody was hip to it, man. It’s always great when that happens. When I jumped off the stage, a guy came over, and we started talking. He said that he was surprised that spoken word resonated so much with him. I replied that regardless of the medium, on some level, that’s what every artist hopes for. We hope that whoever experiences our work and regardless of their background, there will be a point in time when everything gels and you truly connect. Every time I record something or touch a stage, that’s legitimately what I strive for. As a matter of fact, I even frequently quote Brother Ali’s, “There’s no me, there’s no you/There’s just us” at the beginning of my sets because it is the PERFECT perspective for where I’m at as an artist and a person.