Summer Tour '09

It's a long, tedious process. The album isn't finished yet. It's the price you pay for free studio time. It's a blessing & a curse. However, we can not let it stop us from moving forward. Trek on, we do.

Hype & I have decided to begin booking for the 'Sex & Co.' tour before the release of the actual album. It'll be kind of weird playing without the CD to sell, which is why we've come up with the idea to release a demo of 3 rough mixes from 'Sex & Co.', plus a 4th unreleased track.

The tentative title for this limited edition demo is 'Ghetto Whispers: The Sex & Company Demo'. We don't plan on selling this for long (hence the 'limited edition' thang), since we want to get the album out as soon as possible & shortly following the release of the demo. Our deadline is June 21, so we have a little time ... but very, very little time ... so, the pressure is definitely on.

Hopefully, this will hold us over for the time being. It'll be nice just setting up shows & performing. The demo will be something to sell afterwards for now & with a price of only $1! Cheap shit. It should be ready within the next week & shows will be posted on our Myspace page shortly after booking. Stay tuned.

Peace, Party

Samples from the South

I was listening to the rough mixes of our album tonight/this morning & I was remembering when I collected the samples for the beats. Its fun listening back & forgetting some stuff but then suddenly recalling it crystal clearly. Some samples were from Middle Eastern records Andrex gave me, jazz records, reggae records, classic rock, soul, etc etc etc ... I threw in a few guitar parts & some keys @ the Studio with Gumshu to give it some color.

I especially enjoyed hearing the samples that I gathered on my trip to Costa Rica @ the end of 2007. I was very excited when I found out I was going (for many reasons), but I really think the biggest reason was I knew I was going to be coming back with music from a country other than this one. I made sure I got plenty of stuff too. A lot got put on The Wine Thieves record ... one major one was cut however (a small clip of it is on an old JBTC promo on YouTube).

By the way, the pictures above are what got me to thinking about all this. The first one is of this very old looking house. It was really a garage with a room on top ... but it looked in place. The one below was in San José, Costa Rica. I went through this long enclosed market that was still outside ... if that makes sense. But, these guys were dancing around in the middle of the street wearing these gigantic heads of famous pop culture characters. I know one of them was Freddy Krueger, knife fingers & all. The rest are a blur ... but it was an interesting sight. Everyone gathered around to watch these guys. This homeless guy (in the photo) seemed to be doing a ritualistic dance with these human bobble-heads. I should of asked where to get what he had.

- party

P.S. The 3rd photo is a giant fish (obviously) that this dude from the long market held up for me after he saw me taking pictures of everything. It was bigger in person.

Instrumentals & A'ccapellas

Hip hop is an interesting genre of music. Besides the fact that you can explore & get lost in so many forms of it, you can go about as a free, true musician. Jazz cats got it. It was all about trying new things & exploring trails with a variety of people. But, at the same time, you always come back to that group, the tribe. The ones you clicked with from the get-go.

Hip hop applies these same principals. Emcees work with many producers & vice versa ... and that's just part of it. But, you'll always come back to the originals.

After reading back just now, I've come to realize how ripped I am. Rolled me a champion, baby. But, none of this is relevant. Here's what is:

The covers above are: The Wine Thieves ('Sex & Co.'), Party.picasso ('Sex & Co.': The Instrumentals, and Emcee Hype ('Sex & Co.': The A'cappellas).

All 3 albums will be sold @ The Commune
(www.fuzzhugger.com/thewinethieves)

(www.myspace.com/thewinethieves)

Albums can be purchased @ future performances as well. The release date is coming very, very soon. I'd say, 87.8% chance it'll be July 21. Talk later.

Peace

Party

The Old Days

I love reminiscing. It's fun. Sometimes it can be a little depressing since you know you can never get those times back. But sometimes it's refreshing to remember.

The top photo was taken back in 2005 by my girl, Fabiana. This was when Hype & I lived in Florida (read blog below for our awesome history lesson). That was The Brix era.

The photo below that is Hype's fly kicks. It's him recording vocals under the stairs of my dad's basement in Pennsylvania. We kicked it ghetto style back then cause we didn't have the luxury of recording in the glorious Bennett Studios like we do now. It was still good times, though.

Just thought I'd post some oldie but goodies for you people. "Sex & Co." is still coming folks, so fear not. More to come later. Be easy.

Peace,

Party

Florida Daze to Jersey Bound

Before Hype & Party were stealing fine white wines, they were sinking ships, stacking hardened blocks of clay and trekking towards the great Garden State. These journeys through trial & error are what made the dynamic duo we know today as The Wine Thieves. Without these fundamentals, "Sex & Co." would not exist. It all started with some pop-punk & a little balls-to-the-wall, rip your throat out hardcore ... in a "budding" university known only as William Paterson.

Known then by their government names, Jason & Ryan, the duo met through a mutual friend, Aaron Gagnon (AKA Gumshu, the Wine Thieves sound engineer). At this point, the two had no idea of one an other's love for rhymes & beats, but a friendship was formed almost immediately. Both fellas were playing guitar for two separate bands at the time, but the two started free styling outside the Willy P parking lots & sidewalks not too long after meeting. The rhymes were clever & goofy, and the duo realized their mutual love for the absurd & dislike for societal restraints.

It didn't take long for J & R to quit their bands & start a group of their own, along side with Gumshu. The trio called themselves "Watershipdown". At first, all three members (known as Emcee Hype, Dryzzl & DJ Gumshu) were on the mic, with production credits going to NJ deejay Exxtrah. (sidenote: Yes, Party was once known as Dryzzl, get over it.)

But then something magical happened...

The musicians in Hype, Party and Gum became restless. They were no longer happy to just freestyle along with beats constructed by other artists. It was a mutual artistic realization: they need to create their own canvases. Gumshu, previously the lead guitarist alongside Hype in Jonny-o's punk rock band, started to tinker more with Cool Edit. Party started to cut up records and crash beta versions of Fruity Loops and shitty quantizers. And Hype scoured the sprawling yard-sales of the salvation army for vinyl and keys and things that make noise.

After two albums--The End of the World and The Dead--Watershipdown retired. Gumshu enrolled in Full-Sail in Florida (just south of Georgia) and Party and Hype bought a van, dubbed 'The Mystery Machine.' Sadly, The Mystery Machine would later emit it's last carbon monoxidic breath in Georgia (just north of Florida). They explored the inner sphere and once, in a parallel universe, a transformer exploded like a supernova. Once, with the trolls, Party saw a green-square friend of ours and Gumshu grew a thousand feet tall. And in Florida there was a store where you could play video games with your friends, each with your own TV and lazy boy, the lights perpetually dimmed and the gaming just as the dimmed lights: perpetual. Wicked shit, I assure you!

But--as happens--Hype and Party got bored with the notion of education, and bid Gumshu a momentary farewell. They packed up The Mystery Machine and got as far north as Georgia before the automobus's motor went to shit. So they hitch-hiked back to Blossburg, Pennsylvania where they made a record under the nom de plume, The Brix. Some thought that the name was actually an acronym for 'Totalitarian Hated Erasable Break Replaceable Idiosyncratic Xenophobes' . It was not. The record was called, Minding the Fort. It served as a head-bobbing reminder that someone, or some two at least, was watching the farm. The album saw Party.picasso taking over as full-time beat maker, armed with an MPC1000 he got in trade @ a local pawn shop in Orlando before they left. Hype was of course on the mic, spitting into a home-made pop filter & dabbling in Cool Edit with Party. As lo-fi as it was, the magic was there.

Gum graduated with flying faders and volume nobs cranked to the red and came back to Jersey, where the newly named Jersey Bound Trunk Crew was simmering. Hype and Party had literally arrived minutes before that monumental reuniting, after hitch-hiking a third of the way to Denver (the wrong direction... this is before civilians had GPS) and back again. So, immediately the trio records 'Get Down Dirty Disco' in a tiny Chatham room over the coarse of the summer; Hype on vocals; Party on beats & Gum on the boards. Momentous indeed! Even the wigs tried to pick up on that shit! Critical raves (with E and glow-sticks, I'd imagine)!

And then... The Wine Thieves... born out of soot and vile bile... hitch-hikes and looking glasses... distortion and reality in the same central cortex vortex... like two-be-headed-heads of John the Baptist, screaming into void of inner-wilderness... no, no, I'm getting ahead of the story... I should stop. For now. Keep yourself posted though ... you'll start to understand. We're already much past the plutonium phase... well on our way to the waxing-waning alignment. We'll talk.

Peace,
The Thieves

***addressing the tree of life demos...(Hype rapped in the 90s!?)***

((Ryan lost his government name when he was christened 'Hype' in 1999. Aptly named, it seemed, as Hype was both hyper-active (from the high chair) and spoke in gross hyperbole, like Christ and parables. Consequently, or inconsequentially, Hype released his first two rap demos that same year. The pair of demos, now as missing as the Ark of the Covenant and D.B. Cooper, was an ethereal hip hop two-act, now known only as 'the tree of life demos.'

As the artist-formerly-known-as Dryzzl (get over it), Party, explained... Hype's hip hop pursuits were momentarily shifted to the back burner, as he didn't have a deejay or a producer or a group or beats or a record. But he did have a guitar. So he played it. Meanwhile, and unbeknownst to the other (and unaware of each other's very existence) in a parallel and yet intersected universe, citizen Jason strummed and strat and screamed his guitar. When Davinci ran out of ink he designed spacecrafts... it was the same sort of thing.

It's the vibrations that bind the duo. The music. And so it was that the sound of music (not the movie) that brought them together... wait, wait... you know what, it was also 'The Sound of Music' the movie. God, Julia Andrews and Christopher Plummer... like a Von Trapp vocal extravaganza! Glorious, I say, glorious! Speaking of which, did you know 'The Sound of Music' soundtrack was released in 1965 by RCA and remains one of the most successful soundtracks of all time!? Wikipedia, check it.))

Introducing ...

Chuck Treble: More than a man, he's a champion.

I remember it like it was yesterday. I was hanging around Newark, New Jersey with my buddy Andrex, waiting for a friend of his I was yet to meet to show up. His name? Tony Walgrins, promoter extraordinaire. The Italian Stallion. The Man.

He was late and I was out of cigarettes. Needless to say, I was pissed. But, just before I was about to snap on the sidewalk, he arrived ... and he looked like a maniac, but ALL business. Drex introduced the two of us ... and with one handshake, I knew we had made history.

The three of us went out on the town. Ate some sushi, drank some nasty, smoked some classy and partied like we do. Six shots of Jack deep and it was time to head to the 20th Floor. For those out of the loop, the 20th Floor is an infamous spot in Newark where independent artists of all kinds go to be interviewed for all the Internet world to hear. Walgrins booked the slot for Andrex to promote his new EP, "The Bombs are Smellin' ... but Least I'm Not" over the airwaves. On the way there, a bum stopped us to ask for loose change, but he asked Tony for cash ... I guess he had the radar for dirt poor and rolling in dough. He nailed it.

When we arrived, the vibe was buzzin'. Tony seemed to know everyone and they seemed to know him. It was hilarious to watch. The guy could sell paper to a tree. We didn't wait long downstairs and before I knew it we were @ the 20th Floor studio. There was a quick meet-and-greet with the shows bats in the belfry host, J-Spocc. He was way out there ... a little cocky, but that's expected from a radio host (ask Stretch).

I wasn't on the bill to be interviewed, so I just went along for the ride. Tony & Drex ripped it up. I grabbed the mic @ one point for a little freestyle action, which we killed. Key Grip Keith popped in for a few, which was a bad idea cause all they did was bust on him. It was fun times. However, during the interview I couldn't help but notice that Tony kept texting someone on his cell. He didn't seem like the type to be distracted by nonsense, so I knew whoever was on the other end of the phone was an important client.

The interview concluded and it was time for more JD. After hours of bullshitting about anything & everything, I finally asked, "Yo, Tony! Who you talkin' to, brah?" He grinned, took a shot of that sour mash and lifted his eyes from the bright screen saying, "Oh, this be Chuck. Chuck Treble. The Mix Tape Man." I was immediately intrigued. Who is Chuck Treble?

We started to fade fast. The Jack was gone. The kush was gone. The conversation was coming to a stand still and I was itching to freestyle, so we headed towards the Colonnade Apartments ... Andrex's spot. The beats were bumpin' out the speakers and we started knockin' out some rhymes. Tony was kicking some shit I didn't think promoters could kick. Punch lines galore. I was impressed.

It wasn't til after the festivities that I heard the mix tape Tony played for us. It was a Chuck Treble CD. He played a few tracks from the "Gimme More Bass, Chuck Treble" mix tape. Shit was fire. We were jammin' with every single song. Good stuff. It was at this point that I realized I had to meet this dude. I wanted to get the self-proclaimed "Lost Son" of Newark affiliated with The Commune. It was as simple as asking the man, Tony Walgrins. He hooked it up. Chuck wasn't too far away to begin with, being that we were chillin' in Brick Town. And like a drug dealer making rent, he got there in nine minutes.

I knew I was gonna like this guy the minute he walked in the room with a giant bag of weed under one arm and a box of Dutch Masters under the other. We have a heavy smoker on our hands, ladies & gentlemen! Chuck could roll, too. Best blunts on the east side, hands down. 45 minutes it took to take that thing down. I got blasted. After re:uping the high, we got down to business.

For an unknown, Chuck's done some crazy shit. He's worked with some of Newark's finest underground producers, emcee's and singers (ie. Omar Pillz, Cash Flow, Mr. Speedball, Grey Citizen, Georgia Sundri and many others). He's sold a number of copies from his mix tape series "Gimme More Bass" along with two full length albums, "Ma'fuggas" & "Where's the Beef?" Chuck has the respect of Newark's extremely critical underbelly and he's still climbing the ladder ... never missing a beat.

The night flew by after hours and hours of talking hip hop. Pounds & phone numbers were exchanged and we all stumbled into different directions. I had to hit up Hype immediately, even though it was 3am. To my surprise, Hype knew of him! He had caught a Treble show a year back when visiting Newark for a pot run and was stoked to hear I chilled with him.

Hype & I met up at my place and headed into the studio about a week later to continue work on our now-nearly-finished EP, "Sex & Co." Chuck called while Hype was spitting in the booth so I stepped out for a much needed cigarette. I called Treble back and as it turned out, Chuck was in the Englewood area to settle an unpaid parking ticket (Englewood takes that shit very seriously). I asked him to stop by the studio afterwards, which he was very happy to do. I think it got his mind off the $200 he was dropping for over staying his parking welcome outside a Dunkin Donuts.

3 hours later, Treble arrived. In true Wine Thieves fashion, we smoked up before anything. Hype got to meet Chuck for the first time and the two remembered the glory days of The Fat Boys & the new rush of finger boarding. It didn't take too long til we got Chuck to collaborate with us. Hype & Treble jumped right in the booth and busted some rhymes over an old Travis Biggs beat I cut a year back on my MPC. It sounded tight. And everything most definitely clicked. The track never saw the light of day (since it was a practice joint to begin with), but the seed was planted for future growth. Treble was a part of The Commune. And the sky is the limit.

Until the release of "Sex & Co." you won't be able to hear any Thieves/Treble tracks, but that will change. Later this year, we will be releasing a few tracks on Myspace with Newark's Lost Son. If you're the impatient type, head on out to MLK Boulevard in Brick Town & ask for Tony, he'll hook you up with some mix tapes to wet your pallet. Otherwise you'll have to wait!

I suggest you don't though ...

More to come in 2009.

Peace,

The Thieves

Pennsy Penmanship

Glorious Honey Holes. That's right, it's not what it sounds like. Honey Hole, Pennsylvania. HickLand. The Old Country. The only place you can be the manager of a hotel, a permanent resident, just chillin' for the night and homeless all on the same beautiful day. The Promise Land.

Also, the unofficial Wine Thieves meeting grounds, well ... at least it has been lately. So, I met Hype at a less-than-welcoming Wendy's around 9:15pm on Friday night. I could smell the bacon ... and not from the restaurant (side note: lovely "dining room"). After a few laughs, one or two cigarettes, many looks behind my shoulder and a couple hicks with shotguns mounted on the back window of their pick-up truck, we headed out for the search. The search for the spot.

It didn't take us nearly as long as expected to find the place. A quick drive up Route 309 & Hype recognized the dead end road that leads us to the woods we've grown to know so well lately. After parking in the middle of nowhere, we exited the car & entered the dark woods. It was at this point I started to feel the spray weed kick in (too scientific for me to explain, ask Hype). But, it is tradition to still smoke that shit. So, we did.

We didn't talk about the album too much. Of course, we touched on the subject, but I think everything that could be discussed about it has already been said. So, we kept it lighter this time. I caught up on the happenings of Hype Jr. They grow up so fast. We talked more about our weird sitcom we're gonna be doing in between shows. And of course, some good old-fashion reminiscing.

It was a good time.

Last thing's last: I'm heading up to Covington some time this week to chill with Hype & shoot our "Sex & Co." release-promo video. We also may book an interview with DJ Stretch @ 104.5 The Buzz. More on that later. Til then, be easy.

Peace, Party

FOR SALE!!!!

in the present state of the world, amidst a shaky-at-best domestic economy... no, no, no... how about this for an introduction: in a super-down-size me, post-bush-regime global and economic implosion... no, that wasn't quite it either. i'm going to take it from the top. in fact... new paragraph.

within the poor-folk-pudding-filled pie, beneath an ever-thinning glittery crust of upper-society's 'them' to our 'us' (their pasty-gay-poorly-acted-reality show to our northern exposure) lies a dream (in all their heads down there): get rich or die trying. what you thought some fool named fiddy came up with that? you can stop reading.

they all dream it (down there in the pudding, they all dream it). some dream it in technicolor, but outside the vcr's magnet-scrambled-tape-means to the end. some play the proverbial (and cliched) game. there are rules, yes, like all games. and you can do what you want ("freedom") within the social-federal constructs of the fabricated game. you can learn (from them), thru education. the merits of education: . and the meritorial prowess... (it's simply sexual). learn and be educated, they will confirm you and your confirmation paper (education is not green) will be the skeleton key to your treasure closet. then you can play more! it's fun! you can win things! money! power!

play, they say. play!

but he won't play. and he can act, so there goes the reality show. and he can think, so there goes the game show. and he doesn't believe in lotto-winners (let alone that we went to the moon), so that's just out. and so it seems, he clings to the cliches and wives-tale-wisdom of the past. for it was then-then that it hit him: give and you shall receive.

and so in riveting, rousing, rolling non-sensical parting i ask you to bear this cross (in the name of cross-removal):

buy this replica of obama's first joint!!!!

Powerlines.

As Hype would put it: We're "taking the pre-summer to get back in touch with nature's vibes." I guess that's the best way to put it, because that's what it feels like. At a time like this, it's best to do ANYTHING to keep ourselves distracted. Although, I must say, this "pre-summer" that is spring completely blows so far. I don't know where you are (our beloved readers), but in the NJ/PA area it's rained just about all spring. I've heard of the April showers-May flowers bull, but this is ridiculous. We're almost half-way through May, kinda.

On the business end, we're trying to get in the studio tomorrow together. If that doesn't work out I'm gonna try to get in alone next week. Either way, we HAVE to finish this album by June 21st, the first day that it's not pre-summer, ha. Way before that date is preferred, but that's THE deadline for us. A full summer to book shows is a must. So, let's keep our toes crossed.

The rough mix of our first single, "Powerlines", is still posted on our myspace page ... so if you haven't taken a listen yet, do so now. We're taking it down as soon as the album is deemed "finished" by the two of us. After that we're not posting any finished tracks until we set an official release date. At that point we'll put the completed version of "Powerlines" up. More tracks will follow after the actual release date comes.

That's about it for now. We've been churning these blogs out on a daily basis lately, mostly to keep sane, so there's not much to update. I'll let you know how tomorrow goes when it comes, til then ... keep safe & enjoy the rest of this pre-summer we're having!

Peace, Party of the Thieves

Beetlejuice

i'm in album-purgatory... not like major-label-purgatory, signed-contract-nothingness purgatory or anything, thank god... but i'm waiting...

i know party's waiting too. ..

this is the worst part of the process... the vocals are finished, the mixing is 85% done... but any way you look at it, the album is not done.

...so we pass the time doing other things: talking about playing chess, joking about death, clubbing orphan seals... i'm also going to catch a pirated copy of Hotel for Dogs tonight. i've been waiting on that joint too!

box of nerds and a coffee
(hippy speed),

hype

Final stretch ... not home yet.

Things aren't through yet. I'm honestly starting to get antsy. We still have one more visit to Englewood to make til this thing is a wrap. So, right now, we wait ... wait for some studio time to sneak into with Aaron.

Hype & I are becoming visibly more tense about the situation. I've been smoking more cigarettes than ever, personally. Not to say it is solely as a result of this, but I'm gonna guess it has a lot to do with it. We are planning on kicking off a few little summer tours, but the album has to be done before that happens. The deadline we set for ourselves can still be met, but the clock is ticking.

I think the main problem is we have very little cash, rent & a strong love for weed. That's a lethal combo ... a common combo, but lethal nonetheless. I'm dying to perform too. Which reminds me, we need to get at least 10 vinyls printed before we do shows. That's not a huge problem though ... yet.

I'm confident, however, that we will finish this thing before summer. Then, the real fun begins. The part we've been waiting to get to for over a year. I don't even know how long it's been to be honest. That will probably make the experience a fuck lot better. We'll see. Catch you next time.

Party