Music and Priorities: Part 1

My life is not as complicated as I think it is. I promise folks. I have this bad habit of thinking speaking in incomplete sentences. I start off with the thought in my head and finish with a verbal interpretation. This, of course, tends to confuse and frustrate my lovely wife who has learned to work around or deal with it in the years that she’s known me. I admit, it’s an odd quirk…A crazy flaw that I has been dormant in my psyche since childhood. The fact is ladies and gentlemen…I’m weird. I’ve been quite eccentric for as long as I’ve had an imagination. I think it comes from years of being antisocial and creating my own little imaginary world. I’ve grown to love and hate it……I swear I’m going somewhere with this…..Just hang in there with me folks.


Lately, as I’ve said on countless occasions, my life has taken a bunch of twists and turns. Everything came to a head when my son was born and I went through all types of crazy hell and emotional pain, blah, blah, blah and a Lifetime movie! Well before this happening I was in the process of completing a long awaited album called “Open Wounds”. Now to some friends this is merely a mythological album conjured up by rumors, false promises (Ex: Open Wounds Coming Soon!), and pure shit talk. I had been working on this project for the better half of 2 years at the time. Most of the delay was due to lack of funds, inspiration and resources. So It’s March 2008 and I finally finished the album. Everything seemed to be finally coming around full circle. I just got signed by a friend to a seemingly cool humble label deal and BAM…wife goes into early term labor and my whole life changes. I’ll spare you the theatrics but in that time I stopped thinking about music. No more…we need to get this music done, no more MC dreams and to be frank I was quite fine with that. I guess I went into survivor mode. All I wanted to do is see my son survive, make my wife happy again and provide for my family. Perhaps the most fruitful part of all dark periods in life is the lessons learned. I realized who my real friends are. I gained a huge amount of respect for my wife and I came face to face with some of my ugliest demons. I learned to have faith, to forgive, and to be forgiven. This all took time. While living in my own world I sort of forgot about the world around me. Which is why I can understand the frustration of my label heads that were wondering why I didn’t produce more product, or a plan, or money. Meanwhile, my frustration grew with them because I felt that they didn’t understand (or empathize) with my current situation. Some would say, “Well, how could they? They have no children”. Others would say, “Well, they should have known better and should have been more supportive.” I honestly wasn’t thinking about hip-hop for the longest but as an artist you have to write. Even if you say, “I quit” you still find the urge to be creative. My label had found other projects to do and were clearly busy which I thought was great. Besides I’m all the way in Chicago and they are in New Orleans. They were creating so much and after a while I felt out of the loop. Plus, as I said before, I was mainly focused on family. As things got more intense with my son’s situation the more depressed I got. I needed an outlet. I needed support…from someone or something other than my wife. I found myself so busy worrying about if she was ok that I forgot to check on myself. Not to say she didn’t help me out greatly but sometimes you have to step outside yourself to find yourself or at least try to rekindle that spark of happiness inside. So I did some soul searching. I stopped listening to hip-hop. I focused on different hobbies such as freestyle writing (such as now), and listening to folk music (an old love). I found solace in the calming melodies that reminded me of my innocence. I focused on spiritual strength. I spoke to my father more often who gave me a bunch of wise words to live by. In essence I went “back home”. I started writing rhymes again but this time in a different light. It felt different. I feel stronger. Only thing is my dreams of being a “rap star” were dimming. What was more important to me was my job, which was bringing consistent money into my house thus paying bills and feeding my child. Not to mention the plethora of medical bills that came along with my son’s unique case. Being a husband and father was way more important than hip-hop. See, in my mind “Cutta” died sometime ago only to resurrect as Chris Blount: working father and husband. I now could careless about how many records I sold or who was the best emcee. I just wanted to be the best “me”. How the hell am I supposed to rap now?