March 2004

Chapter 3.  The GasFase, The Grimace and the Phoney Grin:

The battle of food and finance versus authenticity and growth

You know how they say real artists are hungry and that’s how they stay on the grind and get ahead? Sometimes it is not a metaphor. Sometimes us indies are literally hungry. Hell. I hear sometimes signed artists are hungry. The flyers, the websites, the postcards, the CDs, the books… it all costs money. You know how we do – we spend the grocery money first. Light bill second – because the light bill powers the computer, and the computer is our lifeline. Shoot. You might even spend your rent money before you spend the light bill though… cuz you figure, that way, you have 30 days to pull it together. Right?

So here is my dilemma: Paying gig vs. non-paying gig. Seems easy right? Especially since the paying gig is a worthy cause. I can get paid and help the people. So really it’s Paid Gig with a Purpose vs. Non-paid Gig. If it was that simple, I wouldn’t be putting it in this essay. Here’s the kicker: the non-paying gig is a chance to present a Legacy Award to Sonia Sanchez. I have four bank accounts totaling less than $2000. I sold some CDs this weekend, so maybe I’ve got something a little less than $150 in cash, too. But I also have a car, a house and an empty refrigerator. Yea. It’s that deep. I’m so stressed about it, I’ve got nature sounds playing on my computer right now to keep me calm. (y’all need to help a sista out and buy a t-shirt or something.)

I’m at the crossroads and Elegba is laughing his head off.

Recent experiences – I’m talking last week – should have told me my moment was coming. As I have been on my soapbox telling other folks to ‘keep it tight’ and ‘put the art before all,’ now it is time to pay the piper. Take my own advice. All that.

First, a very good friend of mine – an artist, of course – had his car repossessed last week. Every struggling artist needs two things: talent and a ride. He was really going through it, and me, being my sugar and light self, was telling him to keep the faith. No one can replace his art, right? It’s just money, so let’s prioritize the art, right? We love you; we’ll drive you around, right? True. But things like car repossessions are faith killers. I had to put this brother on the ‘death’ watch – death being getting a 9-to-5. I mean I know I’ve got a 9-to-5, but folks that don’t are my heroes. The last thing I need right now is to lose another hero.

So then, I’m talking to my girls. We are all poets and we are talking about some other poets we know. (Shhhh. It happens.) I have had this conversation about this set of poets several times before. The moral of the story is always the same: having to eat off you words on the circuit makes you bitter, callous and calculating. Bitter, callous and calculating people don’t make good poets in the long run. These particular cats are surviving off sheer talent and God’s good will but they are still functioning way below potential. Too much grind. Imagine: You are a poet and your job is too uplift people, save a nation – or maybe just move one person. But as you look into the audience, your stomach is growling, your car payment is due, your rent is in arrears. So what do you see? Every pupil becomes a dollar sign. Every handshake needs to have a checkbook in it. You’re moving the crowd, all right, but you’re moving them to their wallets, not to the revolution. Damn. Gotta eat. But in the meantime, what are you feeding?

And I can’t hate. I am totally sympathizing. When they come for my car, I am out of the game. Puh-lease. I have a bonified six-figure-creating education – probably one of less than five black women with my credentials. It is all well and good for me to sit up here putting blood to paper and heartbeat to bassline as long as they don’t come for my car or my house. When it gets that deep. Game over. So I can’t hate. Can only be but so mad at you for grinding in unscrupulous ways. I cuss all the time (well, not really because I don’t curse… but you know what I mean) about how folks don’t ever want to pay anybody – especially poets. Did you just pay the band $600 and tell the poets all you can give us is a free meal? See. That’s why I got a band now.

But that’s not really me. Most of the time I am my usual sugar and light self, fighting the good fight. I take folks to task on the regular for not sharing contacts or skills or resources with other struggling artists. I already told you: this is a network and we all have to participate and remember where we come from. Don’t forget the people. Don’t forget the message. Surrender to your destiny, the Master Plan, karma, whatever. Sometimes you got to get out there for free because there are more important things. I take this mission, nation-building, positive energy stuff very seriously.

But I am not kidding myself. A few years ago at the FYAH conference, Sonia Sanchez was speaking to us and said this: Everybody writes. The only thing special about you is that you have been blessed with the opportunity and the luxury to do so.

Amen.

See? She even speaks to my life. And my purpose. That’s why I have to present the award.

So the non-paying gig wins out this time. It usually does. That’s why you’ve got to have faith. I believe that for every non-paying gig I take for the right reasons, my guardian angels get more brownie points to use on my behalf to get me some high paying gigs down the line. Call it ‘karma,’ ‘what goes around comes around,’ ‘energy is neither created nor destroyed,’ or just ‘blind luck.’ If you stay authentic, you don’t have to rationalize it.

The bottom line is this: When I was thinking of taking the paying gig – cuz I really am experiencing some extreme brokeness at the moment – my heart sank. When I came to my senses and accepted the opportunity to present to Sister Sanchez, my heart rose so far back up it got stuck in my throat – and there it sits exactly where I need it to be in order to do this spoken soul thing. And that’s what’s most important, right?

(right.)

One,

jahipster