All MC's are extroverts by nature, regardless of the personal missions that lead us to grab the microphone and stand in front of others. At the heart of it all, we just genuinely want to be seen and heard. I overstand my personal mission as a cumulation of my family heritage: Preachers, Civil Rights Activists, Engineers, Community Developers... and I'm the first of direct lineage to be born of the Hip Hop Era. It took some time, but I learned to retroactively connect the dots, as late-great Steve Jobs suggested.
I discovered The Spark inside of me in 8th Grade, reciting the now-classic rhymes of that day and studying The Best of Gil Scott-Heron cassette tape my Father used to ride out to. I played with ideas and fed my mind with Music Industry books (at the behest of My Infamous Mentor). After getting booted from the 1st group I assembled due to "Irreconcilable Differences", the spark had become a small campfire and Ted Roe was christened in my Senior year of High School. There was no Wikipedia at the time, so the process by which I discovered the person and the kindred parallels was truly provided by The Most High. If anything, I have been evolving into the moniker as countless hours pass into days, then weeks, then months, and now 9 long years of seeming inactivity.
In those years, I've wanted nothing more than to make the crowd unanimously respond to my call. Instead: I've loved women, lost the men who preceded and guided me, and completed paths of educating and medicating myself and others. However, the mission was never sacrificed for life's roller-coaster. Exploiting the opportunities that were provided, I learned about the music industry from the counter of a independent record store, carrying crates and holding mics for my city's best DJs, and then from the boards and back room of a forgotten college radio station. Some time during my second trip to SxSW, surrounded by people I humbly considered career colleagues, I could feel I was in the right place.
After obtaining my Bachelor's Degree, I realized that my job in Debt Collections was a deviation from the path. Of course, it was necessary to pay rent, but the random thoughts and rhymes I was jotting took on a whole new significance. In our system of Capitalistic Wage Slavery, I understood the the forest fire I'd been feeding with education, love and life experience was Harriet Tubman waiting to manifest herself for me and my loved ones. Ever since that day, I've been trying to find the most efficient way to funnel flammables into Ground Zero.
I wrote this because that is how it all started: writing on my father's typewriter, even predating a working literate vocabulary. I've tried to suppress these thoughts for over a year, and they've only snowballed. They usually bubbled to the top of the cauldron in times of deep depression and frustration. In response, I manned up and covered the pot. First, because bubbling over always causes a mess. Second, I didn't want those hopefuls without recipes to see what I was cooking.
Nonetheless, fire needs oxygen. Art is created to be expressed. I understand that my "bushel-hidden" days are close to behind me. #Grams is 3 features and a mix down away from being on the market. I thank everyone who've given hate, misdirection, spurn, and scorn to the process. Keep blowing on the greased flame.
"This little light of mine..."
