My career will include the following…..
Chris Anderson, editor-in-chief of Wired Magazine predicting my future career plans? In a recent Amazon Podcast he said the following; paraphrased;
“I give away my writing to sell other stuff. I don’t really care about money off book sales. What I care about is propagating my ideas. Why? To market myself. Which I will then sell in various ways. I will sell by sort of having brand equity accrue to Wired magazine from which we make money on advertising. I will also earn on speeches and side projects (including consulting)….”
After hearing that I was like wow! That is definitely one of the things I want to do. Amongst a slew of other things I would like to achieve, this harmoniously puts everything together. The business ventures, the music, and the writing. My key business idea could be “ME” and my personal brand.
Learning From The Greats
A few days ago, I decided to start checking the charts and take some time to study what the big guys are doing production and songwriting wise. Not to imitate, but rather to have a foundation from which to innovate. A lot of successful artists I have noticed learn and master all they can from the greats who have come before them and then they “innovate” and add their own flavour. A classic example of this is Michael Jackson who was greatly inspired by James Brown. Check out the video at 1.37.
“Little mike…he did a lot of james brown steps, but then later on, he got his own steps. And that’s what its about. God bless a child who’s got his own.” James Brown
Mistakes
On the one hand, a team has to be ever-vigilant against mistakes, because any mistake–no matter how insignificant it may seem at the time–can cost you the game. On the other hand, you can’t have players who are simply playing to avoid a mistake. They must be conscious of mistakes but not paralyzed by the possibility of making one.
Quoted from a book titiled, “The Essential Vince Lombardi“
Michael Jackson vs Sonic The Hedgehog
Casino Night Zone Remix by AfriqueDeluxe is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at here.
Do What You Love
When it comes to choosing a life path, you should do what you love — because if you don’t love it, you are unlikely to work hard enough to get very good. Most people naturally don’t like to do things they aren’t “good” at. So they often give up, telling themselves they simply don’t possess the talent for math or skiing or the violin. But what they really lack is the desire to be good and to undertake the deliberate practice that would make them better.
Taken from New York Times
Random Jam
I was bored, and needed to JAM! So I made a quick beat and did some random solo over it. Plenty of mistakes and weird ass notes but as Ronald Jenkees recommends, I had FUN with it and I hope it inspires other beat makers to just have fun with music, no matter what level they are at.
Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow (AfriqueDeluxe Remix)
Captivity of Negativity
If anyone has watched Prison Break, you will recognize the title of this post, which T-Bag often spoke of while he worked as a salesman at GATE. I found it quite cheesy and funny whenever he mentioned it. But while it cotains tints of personal development malarky, I was reminded of its wackness yesterday.
But you know what, we have a choice. We can choose to be negative or positive. No one, nothing ever by force turns us into captives of negativity. We have the choice, even amidst people or circumstances that may inspire such a decision, to be free of negative thoughts or behaviour.
New addition to discography
Co-produced track 11, with Myx Quest.
Sonic Remix Album - Summer Project 2009
Last summer (2008), I did Birth Of A Star. This summer I am working on something better and much more interesting. It is challenging for me as an artist, but I realized I wasn’t challenging myself enough musically so this is going to be one hell of a journey!
The plan is to remix a selection of Sonic songs and have a dope album at the end of it all. Will have 2 versions of the album (more on this later). For now, be sure to check out the lead song “Green Hill Zone Remix” and join the fan page if you would like to follow my progress.