SUPPORT

I don't think there is anything greater and more moving than support.  I think I've changed my mind about the whole love is greatest.  Sometimes love is not enough.  There are clear signs of many of my friends divorcing and/or having difficulties in their marriages....women are bouncing like a mu'uh fucker.  So love...yeah...I get it.  But I think support is so major.  I'm excited to pieces that my BFF is moving to LA.  Just the fire I needed to motivate me.  Even the biggest cheerleader needs a cheerleader.  In fact....maybe more than others since we're always expected to be a cheerleader.

I love cheerleading.  I was a songster though.  You know, the black girls who danced better than they did high kicks or back flips?  Yeah.  Me. Connie Mockenhaupt, a fiery 50 something red head who wore leotards in memory of a former body shape and her tits to her chin, was our cheer coordinator.  She said my arms weren't straight enough to be a cheerleader.  I told her she was racist.  I dunno. I was probably wrong.  I'm not that coordinated.

Bottom line is....I'm gonna be producing and managing my ass off.  And I can't wait to get this party started.....what a way to start my birthday season off!

And it's a Wrap

The last day...the sunniest....the best show....I even got on my hands and knees for him to do Untitled yawl but they pulled the plug on us.  We were ROCKING!  Not a better way to end a run...no better than I know.  And we are smooth.  All of the wardrobe is together, the receipts are finished.  I've been in this hotel room all of 3 hours.  I've repacked, showered and had a cup of tea.  Lobby call is in 22 minutes and the first leg of my flight leaves in 3 hours.  yes...I am on my way home.  Gonna see the pup, the other pup and maybe fry some fish. I dunno.  I have a nail appointment at 5pm when I land.  I flicked off all of my Tiffany Blue gel polish.  Turns out...and this I forgot....the man don't like color finger nail polish.  And you'd think...eh he's singing on stage, he's playing the piano, he's strumming his guitar.  He ain't got time to worry about my colored nail polish...do he?  Rox told me though....funny.  So I changed it and fronted him about me changing it.

What else?  I dunno.  Too much child.  I have a filming fire under my ass now though.  I made trailers of the trip.  I planned a scavenger hunt for my boys birthday, i created a travel book.  I had a truly productive two weeks out here.  And now I'm headed home.

Can't wait til I land!

COLOGNE - SHOW 2

I was mad.
We were late.  Yes yes technical difficulties.  Hiring and firing.  Horrible hotels and moving whole groups ....taking 4 hours in total.  Misunderstandings with travel agents who's ass I'm forced to kiss.  Fucking Cologne sucked.  And so I took a nap.  DURING the show.  Like a pouting 8 year old.  Anyone who walked in the dressing room I just frowned, grumbled.  So passed out was I...until I heard a sound I rarely here....JK's falsetto "send it off, send a clueeeeeee....".  Tonights show was a regular show.  NO festival times.  No quick ins and outs.  Were they doing a full set?  I rolled over not impressed...still upset from the late sound check...but then.....the full harmonies of "Lady" woke me up and I had to go.  I truly had to go upstairs.  Wiped the eye boogers, ran to the side of the stage, and as if I'd never been asleep, partied with the background vocals - dance steps and all.  D put on a full show.  Everything we've all wanted to hear...including the Brown Sugar encore.  Praise Jesus!  I didn't even need drugs to get that high!  So happy that the power of music still has.....well, power.

NORTH SEA JAZZ FESTIVAL OFFICIAL - DAY 1

What can I say about Essence?  Yawl saw the reviews.  Fuck Essence.  I don't feel like digging up that dead old ass horse.

But tonight....we are in our element.  We have the PRIVILEGE to have Janelle Monae as our warm up music....we are getting HYPED in this dressing room!!!! I'm telling you...it's finna be a show!

But let's just talk about the stress of movement....for one moment.  No one is happy with a flight to Europe.  I usually write, or catch up on movies...I generally cry on every movie, but thankfully I turned those ones off before I got started.  It was harder than usual to leave this time.

I remember when the reigns got handed to me by the Roots former tour manager.  I came in as a happy-go-lucky assistant...we were on our way to Nancy, France...opening for Femi Kuti.  I was thrilled to be able to show off my French for my favorite group.  FINALLY...I was using all that I knew - psychology, music, french....what could be better?  I had Hubs bass on my back, Kamals guitar in hand, I was ready.

Then Toya showed up in flip flops and a gift bag.  This was pre 9/11 so she walked to the gate.  Gave Black Thought a gift.  Said her good byes and looked at me and said "I'm not going.  you got this."

Huh?  Mind you...I hadn't been on tour with the Roots solo ever.  I was a groupie...a "Band Aide" even.  I was a young girl with a Delta Buddy Pass.  I met them everywhere  - Elysee Montmarte in Paris, Grosse Freiheit in Hamburg, Ancienne Belgiqie in Brussels....I took trains, snuck on the back of buses, but nothing prepared me for actual tour management but my own instincts and my big mouth.

Amazingly enough, I'm a natural.  The power of a psych degree, the ability to speak with people, and enough berating to get anyone in shape...got me to where I am.  Some of the people I train say I'm super mean....I agree.  I got a lot of it from my now family who put a foot in my ass and straightened out the sculiosis in my spine....so it's true.  I give it out.  Like a scarred animal who knows the consequences of his actions.  My dog does it every time she sees my eyes and my lips pursed.  It's that type of consequential action needed to get on this tour management horse.  Logic goes out the window because you're dealing with people.  If we were selling cups this would be no problem.  We'd pick the color, the size and the material.  Would anyone talk back?  hell no....but PEOPLE?  Artists???

And I'd like to say that when they aren't that good, they're even better.  Geniuses got problems.  Why?  Cuz they spend all their days being geniuses.  This other stuff is just for shits and giggles.  Like...oh, time...eating, remembering birthdays, costs of any fucking thing....and the ones who are successful?  Well let's just say they have a better balance and a different motivation.

I don't know what's best....but I know I'm drawn to the crazy muthafuckas.

Tells ya  little bit more about me , huh?  Like you didn't know.

TOUR SEASON AND BALANCE

The inevitable question...do I eat or do I have a life?  I made space for a life and it gave me a surprise that I hadn't intended.  It's  a big birthday year for me and I haven't started a family...so while in the stages of making space...someone started a family without me.  Ha.  See how the jokes always on you when you think you planning something that God may or may not have in store for you?  So....while life goes on, I am having these unnerving emotions that I am not accustomed to having.  Jealousy is not my forte and it rather sucks. But it is what it is and I feel what I feel. I get a lot of young fabulous women who want to start in this business and I want to tell them the truth and at the same time encourage them.  Truth is....there's nothing encouraging about being a tour manager.  There's no 401 K, no insurance package...and mainly you give up the fun part of your life to someone else entirely.  Then you wake up old as shit like...whoops! My bad.  Let me get on that family shit.  Then....what the hell do you know about creating a family....all you know how to do is hit and run.  But man my passport is FAT!  ooh weeee. Bonus.

And here we are.....funny, we try so hard to get into male dominated businesses to flip off our middle fingers and let them know they can't get the best of us...and then BOOYOW! Wrong again.

ew. this was not supposed to be such a depressing entry.  Actually my play sister and her WIFE are preggers and I was inspired to write about them and introduce their blog.  tres interressante...one of them claims to be less femme than the other but I don't know how that works for them...ha.  I don't know the difference so I cannot say.  I CAN say, however, that my niece is going to be super fly and I am going to call her Tina even if no one else does.  Check out MORE THAN A RAINBOW  I find the perspective of the "butch" preggo chick new and promising.  Not ever heard from.  Love it.  Love them!  Love my niece.

CONSTANTINOPLE a la Josephine!!

I never dreamed that it was going to be so incredible.  I also didn't know that the promoter I cursed out would end up partying til 7am lobby call with me.  A must return.  No doubt the rest of my artists will be taken care of on trips to Istanbul.  Holla.

But this Bosphorous and this Grand Bazaar I did in 3 hours and truly need a week there. 

The concert site is outdoors on the sea...the European side.  Istanbul is like Kansas City, divided on the Asian continent and the European continent.  The area it's divided by is called The Bosphorus...which is the straight connecting the Black Sea to the Marmara Sea...which leads to the Aegean and then to the Mediteranean.  Blah blah blah...shit was tight.  We took a boat ride and enjoyed views of million dollar homes from old old old Ottoman money.  The dopeness.  If that wasn't dope enough, those damn Turkish rugs will be the death of me!  Had I had another hour a mortgage or two may have suffered  Seriously.

If there's one thing I learned from Josephine and Eartha is that the foreigners truly know how to make a black feel good.  I'm a sucker for someone telling me I'm gorgeous with an accent.  Particularly since the only other black people I saw in Istanbul were Macy Gray and the band.  Seriously....it was live.  And the hairy darkness and swarthiness of it all....why (tears up) reminds me a bit of my other motherland Brazil....and we know how that tour went....the beauty of anonymity...brilliant.  Of course I truly have to sit my ass down before I get pneumonia or something.  I was supposed to be on my way to a hospital Saturday, not back to back all nighters....Who the fuck do I think I am?  Tina Farris circa 99....grow UP already!

WATCHED THE THRONE

The show in Brussels I thought was cool.  I love Ancienne Belgique and I love the Belgian crowd.  In fact Brussels cracks off.  Funny thing is my body has been lethargic since I arrived.  And this time I was ready to go to the hospital.  However it was just my 2nd show and I just don't feel right missing it.  I was pale, the band was telling me to go , the promoter had a car ready for me...and yet...I couldn't peel myself away from the sound board.  So I agreed to sleep on it and go the next morning.

As luck would have it, my girl Rebecca Pietri - owner of hommepourfemme is out on the road with Jay Z as is Renelou Padora with Kanye....so what's a girl to do when she's only 80 minutes by train from Gare de Nord....Paris.....I tell you what, she grabs her artist and gets the fuck on the train (shot out to Thalys my Amtrak away from home).

It was hollywood up in that piece...as I believe all Paris shows are.  So hip hop.  So Adrian Brody, Adam Levine, Stephen Hill, models, producers, ME...I dunno.  Kanye stopped by and kissed Macy on the way to the stage.  The VIP is practically ON the stage.  It was a royal battle.  Just when I thought Kanye crushed Jay , Jay came back with something so classic it shut me the fuck up.  It was wonderful.

Stay cool with heads of security and tour managers.  They always have the most power.