Guess where I’m at now? Yup, NYC. The concrete jungle where dreams are made of. Or at least according to Alicia Keys.
I’ve been here for a week now and I’m already in love with the place. Got a sublet in the beautiful East Village and will be calling this city my home for the next 2 months (until I head back to the west coast to prepare for Burning Man!).
So what’s my travel purpose while in New York? It’s going to be one thing and one thing only: music.
For the 2 months I’m here, I want to live, breathe, and eat music. I want to go to as many shows and events as possible. I want to make friends with musicians and other music lovers. I want to create more shitty music and hopefully get less shitty at it.
And I think this is the perfect city to do all that in.
Speaking of creating music, just to light a fire under my ass, I decided to give myself a specific goal while I’m here: create a 5 song mixtape before I leave.
Man, I struggled so much with whether or not I should do this challenge. A ton of doubts entered my head: How am I gonna make a mixtape when I haven’t figured out my genre/style yet? Shouldn’t I wait til I’m better? If I put my full effort into this and it comes out crappy, how f*cking embarrassed will I be?
But for all those reasons and more – that’s why I need to do this. It’ll give me something to work towards. A tangible goal, instead of just making songs randomly. It’ll give me practice in creating full-length songs, not just little snippets.
It’ll put some pressure on me to make songs that I can be somewhat proud of. And that pressure will force me to step up my game. Make better music. Learn more. And if that isn’t the point of this whole thing, I don’t know what is.
So…I’m doing it. Look forward to a hopefully-not-horrible mixtape at the end of July.
In other news, I’m loving the city so far but it’s been absolutely NON-STOP and this poor California boy is trying my hardest to adjust. Some first impressions:
People everywhere. So much energy. It’s bustling. Things are happening all around you. Feels like the polar opposite of LA, where people are hidden in their cars with their AC and radio turned up. Not here. This city and it’s people are all around you.
Restaurants and bars everywhere. Seriously, it’s gonna be crazy hard not to blow my entire budget on food and alcohol. Must…stay…strong.
Shit to do everywhere. On any given night there’s about a million plus one things to do here. Whatever kind of music you like to listen to. Whatever kind of trouble you like to get into. It’s all here and all within a few train stops.
I’ll leave you with a few pics from my first week. Now I gotta go run and pick up a keyboard off Craigslist. New York, I’ll try not to let you down.
Warehouse rave on my 2nd night there. Even the go-go dancer was getting a lightshow.
Any fire escape becomes an instant balcony.
Hanging out with my old roommate, now a Broadway star. Go see him in Catch Me If You Can.
Virginia’s first burger ever. Don’t blame her, she’s from Italy.
Xaphoon Jones (of Chiddy Bang) blowin up the spot.
People crowding the streets to get a shot of Manhattanhenge.
We got to witness T. Berry, the world’s greatest storyteller. And indeed, he was.
Hanging out with my new roommates on our sick rooftop. I have a feeling this rooftop’s gonna be key over the next 2 months.
