Interview with artist Michael Jones, music from Baby Huey and others

🎵 What's up, loved ones? Neighborhood Love Radio. My name is Johnny Scott Gramercy. I'll be your selector for this evening. Your selector and host. I come to you this Sunday as I do every Sunday. We are the musical extension of neighborhood-love.com. Tonight I got some great music for you from Baby Huey. I got the Lafayette Afro Rock Band. I got some Smooth Beans. And I also have the incomparable, the enigmatic Michael Jones in the chair as a guest this evening. What's up, man? What's up, man? What's up, man? And Michael Jones is a... We're going to attempt to quantify what kind of artist he is. He's definitely productive and positive. So thank you so much, Michael. And thank you, loved ones. Let's get it started. Hey, Chris. Is that Will? Check this out. Check this out. No Will's got the roller skate. Why you got roller skate song? We had a day off. No, this is the roller skate part. I guess I should have known. I thought I was going to startane. I thought I was going to startane. I thought I was going to startane. I thought I was going to startane. I thought I was going to startane. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah If you're feeling evil vibrations Deep within your soul I believe something's trying to tell you That another love's out gone And if you're feeling evil vibrations All in your mind You better change your way of thinking To better all mankind Come on, come on, say Feel the vibrations in your mind Yeah, to better all mankind Ah Ah Ah Ah Ah Ah Ah Ah Ah I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Baby Who and the Babysitters, Mighty Mighty. Kind of an interesting dude, man. I forget where he's from originally, but he started to hit really big early in his life. He was a big, big fellow, like a big, fat guy. And when he started to hit success, he took advantage of a lot of the negative things that come with it, you know? Anyway, a tragic death at 33 years old back in the 70s, maybe Huey. Prior to that, we heard Buzz People Express. As I mentioned, they're from Germany. That's actually a pseudonym. They're actually The Poets Rhythm, and The Poets Rhythm like to release a lot of different music under pseudonyms. And that would be one of them, the Buzz People Express, with their tune Augusta, Georgia. That's available as a 7-inch from Daptone Records if you want to look them up. Prior to that, the first song on the set was The Mighty Riders with Evil Vibrations from their one LP. As far as I know, they just have one LP back from the 70s, or 78, Help Us Spread the Message. You can find that on a variety of different websites and labels. I particularly got mine from Ubiquity. I'm here with Michael Jones. What's up, dude? What up? I've been trying to get this guy in the chair for a while. He's busy, always grinding, every single day, day in, day out. And what do you... So I got you here. What do you got to say for yourself? Wally, happy to be here, man. I really appreciate it. Man, what's been new with you? It feels like it's been ages since I've seen you. Yeah, for sure. It's been at least a year or so. You're... You're a lot more buff, a lot bigger than last time I saw you. I'm trying to work out, man. A little bit more ink. Thanks for noticing, because I was almost done with working out. Didn't see the results. Loved Ones' Michael Jones is a contemporary artist. Different... Different medias, paint. But, you know, he'll mess around with some other mediums and stuff. What... What... You do art every single day. Would that be accurate? Yes, sir. Yeah. What'd you do today? Let me put it that way. Today, I was working on this lottery astronaut painting. It's about, say, two feet by two feet. And then I was working on a lotus, or not a lotus, it was a rose. Mm-hmm. Kind of like a rose stencil with a little poem inside of it. And I was working on one more thing. I can't remember. Oh, the Dream Bigger, the huge seven-footer that I've been trying to bust out. Taking forever, but hopefully get it done. That's cool. And, yeah, I noticed you like to use... Now, you don't use a lot of figures. Like, you'll do the occasional portrait or something like that. But who's that guy? Chuck Yeager? Chuck Yeager. He seems to come in a lot. What's the identity there? The backstory behind that is my mom was in the Air Force for 20 years, so that kind of surrounded me. And that's what I saw every day as a kid growing up. Meaning what? So I was always fascinated with pilots and aerospace. Where? What do you mean? Where? You said your mom was in there? No, she was in the Air Force. Oh, she was in the Air Force. She was in the Air Force. Oh, cool. So I was surrounded by it every day, and then I just applied it to my art. Those were your early heroes. Yes, Chuck Yeager. I had an opportunity to meet him like three times, and he was a pretty cool dude to me. No shit. Some people think he's kind of an asshole, but, you know, it's not here or there. It's okay. This is the internet. You can curse if you want. Oh, I can? I can sack the mug, huh? Yeah. That's interesting, yeah, because I see that theme come up a lot. And which is kind of interesting because there's a lot of juxtaposition between more like more abstract or emotional works, you know, more a lot of fluid movement and jagged, and not necessarily always fluid, but sometimes jagged as well. Is there a specific tie in there? Not so much. I like to mix it up with doing like kind of figures that are positive to me. And with my abstract, I kind of just, I base that on how I feel like on that day when I'm painting it and when I step to the canvas. Like nothing's ever premeditated. So just when I go to the canvas, I just rock out and just let all those emotions out on the canvas. You listen to music while you do your thing? Always, always. Like what do you got going on usually? Right now? Or lately? Mac Miller. I've been on him for like at least two years. I remember the previous show that we had did before I had one song, Best Day Ever by him on there. I remember. So I just got more into him and more into him. He kind of inspires me. How so? A lot of the messages that he is talking about kind of applies to what I'm trying to do. Inspire the world and just kick out that positivity. This world is like negative enough so I add to it. Okay. And yeah, if you were a musician, do you think it would come out kind of like what he does? Yeah, similar, similar. Not so much rap because my voice, I don't know how it would sound. Rapping. Maybe like a piano or something like that. Some nice little tunes. Other than being a painter, what other creative trade, expression, what have you, would you like to do? Mainly, I like to hang out with my kids and act goofy with them. You know, let them piggyback on me and wrestle them around, you know. Usually when I'm not painting, I try and spend time with them or with my family. That's important to me. Especially since they're getting older and to that age, you know. Yeah, for sure. Start discovering things a little bit more. What other type of art venture would you like to do? Other than what you've accomplished already. That's a hard question to really ask. Yeah. Because it's, I've been marking my, or making my list, my bucket list and marking it off. And right now, I don't even know what's next. I've just been enjoying the ride. No kidding. Yeah, that's pretty cool. I would, you know, I'm actually envious of that because I'm, I make too many plans. You know what I mean? And I just don't get to them all. I don't even get to, I wouldn't even say I get to 75% of them, you know. Yeah. I would love just to be in the moment and I'm pretty envious about that and I feel like that's a better way to be. Loved ones, by the way, if you want to check out like some of the works that we're talking about, you could, the best place to go is a Facebook page. Michael, Michael Jones has a Facebook page called Abstract Art by Michael Jones. So that would be facebook.com forward slash abstract art by Michael Jones. And it's spelled, you know, in common spelling, Michael Jones. Mike Jones. And, you got, what do you got coming up as far as a show? I think you're doing, aren't you doing some sort of large public wall at a Valencia mall? I can't leak too many details at the moment, but it's in the works. It's going to be probably mid-September that the wall is going to be organized and established at the Town Center Westfield Mall in Valencia. And what it is, is just kind of a memory for, I'm not even saying a memory, a memorabilia for veterans to, you know, represent them and give them the credit that they deserve because they fought for this country at one point. At one time, they should be just discarded, you know? I mean, just because they're not in sight doesn't mean we can't really focus on what they did for us and what they did for the future generation. So, that's something that I took, I think, a liking to doing and something that I wanted to do. So, I got right into it and I'm glad it's an opportunity that I can uphold. Yeah, that's awesome. Very big credit. Yeah. And that's going to be, at some point, that's going to be, I think, yeah, we don't have a date nailed down, but I know it's going to be like mid-September, I think. Yeah. At Westfield Town Center in Valencia. And also, too, I have a gallery in Wynwood that represents me, too. If you want to check out them, the URL is www.artplacewynwood.com. Artplace Wynwood? Yes, sir. Yeah. Where is Wynwood? It's in Miami. Okay. Technically, they call it Wynwood, but I mean, it's 305. Hopefully, I don't offend anybody with that. No problem. Excellent. And so, being that you're in the moment as far as creativity goes, what would you like to, goal-wise, you know, not being too specific, but goal-wise, what do you have to do in the next three months? I just want to just inspire people to do better for themselves. That's, kind of, how the whole Dream Bigger movement came about. Uh-huh. Giving something, putting something out there for people to really look at and think about it. Like, Dream Bigger, I mean, those words are pretty powerful if you really think about them. That's kind of your tagline at this point, right? It's what you're known for? Yes. Yeah. Hopefully. Do you own Dream Bigger? Not yet, but we're in the process of owning it, though. We have to own it. We have to own it, man. Yeah, but I mean, that's, I mean, that's your thing. That's your riff. Yeah. For sure. Actually, last week, I tried to get it trademarked. I'm in the process of trying to do that, so we'll see. Excellent. Hey, you want to stick around for a little bit? I want to hear some more music and I want to come back and talk to you a little bit more, too. Is that cool? Of course, brother. I got some music queued up, coming up here. New artist. Not really anything solid out. Just been on a couple collections. New reggae artist called Black M.I. He's back to, like I said, there's nothing really, there's only a couple songs to find, but he is backed by Damien Jr. going Marley right now, so that for sure means there's some stuff coming up around the band. The artist is called Black M.I. Samson Strength is the name of the tune on the collection set up shop by Ghetto Youth International Presents Ghetto Youth Records. That's out earlier this year. Check it out. I'm in a Babylon I'm not prepared by night I'm in a Babylon And that's a game is straight for Bella And that's a game is straight for Bella And that's a game is straight for Bella Well, well What's this? Some sister and money no build up I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got Lord Samson Strength money double dot I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Oh, yeah When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got And I'm a give a ball see, there's a way It man give a call I'm a row fly high With distance I be tall but I want to drive by And stand defeat white gold put down the boom bike Human get a like a leopard who will always sleep its pot? It is now with heart melt in the cool that we've got Ten times I'm child some despair I've seen a lot Who that I am for my evil just to hold it to them chat Yo, Samson Strength money double dot I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Oh, yeah When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got Lord Samson Strength money double dot I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Oh, yeah When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Let's rid oneself from pollution Get the notion and be real Make it as a resolution Mass destruction Realize There's no need for these defies Natural disaster Kill us but hungry still are customized Survival gets so critical No love when it's an integral Evolution man gets tactical Word theory and practical Misbehave like my mama's suit Think your status stands resolute like your attention Exit and you'll be the best in the world Samson Strength money double dot I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Oh, yeah When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got Lord Samson Strength money double dot I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Oh, yeah When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got Those who sat to work at a crowd island like a water you walk in a file down them a break bit rather rest them but mine traverse but know how you a step it Look out feel and mind My feeling and them willing tell them put the war aside The rock to Libya it spread reach far and wide Just think men just know this side and let's fight the genocide Kill and rest suicide so make that short for your side Tell them Samson Strength money double dot I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Oh, yeah When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got Lord Samson Strength money double dot I'm a give the young a rise and more to build up Oh, yeah When time I write up like a polka dot See, there's nothing for the damn so polka got so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write so hard to write I'm a country street farmer say Run come, say bring the sensei come I say bring the chalice pipe and make me smoke it till it burn Run come, say bring the calli come I say smoke the calli weed until the chalice come I say strictly sensei me now we don't wanna fuck I'm a man is a ruster me no deal with fuck I say run come, say bring the calli come I say bring the sensei me now we smoke it till it burn Run come, say bring the calli come Bring the calli come make we hame some fun I'm a country street farmer say I say run come, say bring the chalice pipe and make me smoke it till it burn I say strictly sensei me now we don't wanna fuck I say strictly sensei me now we don't wanna fuck I'ma need some rest, I'ma run down the Amlapo We say run, come, say bring the candy, come Cause sweetly said, say me, I make me smoke it till the brown, brown, brown, run, come Say bring the chalice, come, brrr, bound the chalice pipe until the jar, jar, come We don't want no infama, brrr, come, we say load, we say fama Brrr, come, we don't want no infama I'ma say come, we say load, we say fama We have to run from gate to berth, yet we no give up Sexy have to burn, have to burn We have to put the sense in media, we have to smoke the chalice Brrr, blaze up the chalice, brrr, give thanks and praise unto Jar Jar Bang, darling, bang, bang, bang, blaze up the chalice Brrr, come, we say chant to scripture I'ma say come, we say load Brrr, come, we say bring the sense, say come We don't strictly call the weed, I may say have some fun Brrr, come, we down your knife and your gun Say smoke your cally weed and make me have some fun Frank and Joe and Trista Palmer. Next up is Bank Robber by Smooth Beans. Clash cover from the Clash Go Jamaican record. Only available on vinyl from Spanish record label Golden Singles. No mp3s yet. My daddy was a bank robber He never hurt nobody He just loved to live that way Love was still your money Some is rich and some is poor And that's the way the world is I don't believe in lies I'm lying back and say how bad your life is So we came to just see that Never love a shovel Break your back, earn your brain And don't forget to grovel guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo Everyone machine is ten times worse than prison Imagine if all the boys in jail Would get out now together What do you think they want to say to us While we were being clever? Someday you'll need your rocking chair Cause life's worth what it's paying There's no point to what you call your hair When it's grey and thin My daddy was a bad brother But he never hurt nobody He just loved to live that way He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money He loved to steal your money stuff that you hear today is man i can't even make sense of half of it cars jewelry bling i mean it's nice but i mean is that all yeah i don't know it's just a i think it's a but i don't think my theory is this that it's not like they're all super into it like like i might be into stevie wonder or so and so might be into uh slayer or whatever um i think it's an emperor wears no clothes thing you know i think it's just suggestive of a party to them and so that's what they like about it you know as they don't they don't you know to me i like to i like to listen to music i like the hum the tune you know all that very true and just music is man i hope it gets better it's just i love dubstep from a certain to a certain extent but i mean it's just too much when everything's electronic there's no realness in music well if you yeah if you listen to like a lot of like cheesy commercials or or weather reports or traffic reports you hear what was considered electronic avant-garde like 10 12 years ago that's what dubstep is it's empty background music and it's it's and in 10 10 or 12 years you're going to be hearing that behind the weather reports we have been warned it's here anyway um so tell me a little bit about uh your you said you're you got part on ownership in a gallery out in germany right my excuse me sorry my dad uh he got a house and there just happens to be a gallery in front of it so he turned it into um it's called brothers finest art gallery um and he said oh we're gonna do some stuff and have a fellow artist named philip davad which is he's he's pretty well now uh known in germany and he's gonna be uh doing part of the show this weekend actually because this opening uh it's gonna be tomorrow so so i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought i thought is a military after my parents divorced he stayed over there and just ended up living over there and he does public relations for the military air force excellent yeah um and that's in uh rammstein germany right yes sir yeah and you haven't had a chance to visit the location just yet not yet but i have visited germany it's an awesome town really okay and uh what part you visited that that part yeah i actually used to live there uh in swybrook which is about 45 minutes away from rammstein mm-hmm then that base shut down so we moved to oklahoma and then oklahoma to california yeah i've heard um oh love uh i've heard like black dudes like over there it's just like super exotic it's like being david beckham over there yeah or david beckham over here over there like it's nuts i'm not supposed to say that black dude he's like whatever what's the proper what should i say you gotta say uh no don't make a mistake me say that that's why she turned her head she's like be careful on your words yeah uh dark dark green we used to call them in the military we used to call dark say dark green for real yeah because we were all green oh you know um no i don't know i just it's a general term i don't really know you i mean somebody could be dominican somebody somebody can be from you know their their lineage can be from nigeria i don't know it's just a general term black dude that's what i said i was just giving you a hard time that's my job because you can you can't give somebody a you can give away dude a hard time on that stuff because what can we can't say anything about it make you sweat a little bit i like paula dean man but uh man talk about the food that's what i would love i've never been in germany but i would love to go back and eat in germany it's awesome uh i'm i want to go to japan and try some of that sushi i want to i want to see what the buzz is about man yeah anyway hey check this out this is the uh harlem youth uh percussion group are you percussion group welcome to the party is the name of the tune some 60s new york latin soul check it out left ones left ones so so Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Take me to my bed, please. Then tears are not easily appeased My own flinching nerve I'll hear the sound of my chivalry Oh, you can't draw My state train was right here on the side Be good to me One foot on the floor for me The evening rolls up from the mountain In eternity Travel right down through the company A feast of Down on this pit for so many So many chance to be And easily be torn and torn from me I'll have the shots and chases of And I'll have them again And we ought to survive A legion of serving men I'll hit the fumes and vapors And soar towards the mistletoe marching And pound each dove And we reckon back on a stand Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh Philip Owusa. Good luck trying to find Too Much by this guy. I'm only aware of a couple songs online off of his Bandcamp site, but definitely, definitely worth checking out, and rumor has it that he's supposed to have an LP up sometime soon. And Philip Owusa, he's Danish. The drum, he played all the instruments on that tune, except for the drums, which were by a dude named Francis Osi, and I love the drums on there. Good, fat, live drums. Michael, thanks so much for coming, man. You're welcome. Thank you for having me. Always a pleasure, sir. Once again, loved ones, you can check out Michael's work at facebook.com forward slash abstract art by Michael Jones. Abstract art by Michael Jones. Be on the lookout for that. Big-ass wall over there at the Westfield Town Center in Valencia. And if we got any loved ones out in Germany, check out the Brothers' Finest Gallery in Ramstein. Ramstein. Ramstein. Yeah. Blessings and plage. And loved ones, as always, you can check out the website, neighborhood-love.com, and you can see the latest in interviews, graffiti pics, neighborhood hotspots, me personally, yours truly, has got something, going to be doing some write-ups this week about some neighborhood places to eat, you know, empanadas, burgers, and the such. That's at neighborhood-love.com. And we're going to wrap up the show. Thank you so much, loved ones. Jeremy the Hammer Hanson over there in the booth. Thank you. And we'll see you next week. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. to 9 p.m. Pacific time at www.skidrowstudios.com. We discuss issues that's relevant to the Skid Row and downtown community. Tune in and check us out. Hey, y'all. It's Thursday night, 9 p.m. Pacific Standard Time. You done wasted your whole life already. You got nothing to aspire to. What else is another hour gonna take away from you? So tune in Thursday night, 9 p.m. Nestorius Public Radio. I'm Nestor Rodriguez. This is Simon Kaufman with Nestorius Public Radio on skidrowstudios.com. We're huge, bro. We're blowing up. We got a Facebook fan page, dude. Check it out, yo. Nestorius Public Radio. Thursday nights, 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. Go to iTunes. You know what to do. Look up podcasts. Look up Nestorius Public Radio. Subscribe. You know what I'm saying? Just do it. We're gonna have our own video game soon, bro. It's huge. It's blowing up. We're trending. We're trending. iTunes, new and noteworthy. That's right. I'll send it out. I'll send it out.