May 19th 2009

First of all...you have no idea how much all your support means to us. In a day and age where you are really taught that you are not allowed to believe in yourself, you guys have believed in us.

Thank you my 3rd EYE Ninjas!

It's been an ridiculously incredible 30 days and I really feel like I should do a little blah blah blog about what we've been through. The challenges and rewards of doing live music consistently with the ultimate hopes of one day doing it professionally for a living is a beautifully double edged emotional rollercoaster. All I can say is that personally, I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world.

Let's start with Bass Invasion @ Area 51...HOLY SHIT!

For those who could not make it, let's go ahead and fill you in: Imagine HUNDREDS of people gathering at the TOP of the Santa Cruz Mountains (you could literally see Watsonville - Santa Cruz and Monterey) 2 sound stages, and one extensively impressive line-up of music-making madmen (and women). I have no idea how we pulled this one off with Undefined Productions (Mad props out to Shug Mike and Jasper and anyone who helped out!), but it was a night that will firmly remain locked in all of our ever-increasingly faded memories. We had one of our best sets ever and the crowd was pumping us with this electric energy that I can only describe with one word: RENEGADE!

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Vibrant EYEris took a bit of a show Hiatus to work on some new material after Bass Invasion. Our next show was at Coaster's in Santa Cruz, we were quite excited about this one because we actually had a chance to make some decent $$ on this one. The NOV8RS opened up and DAMN SON! This cats got some great flow and bumpin ass beats, it was quite a pleasure performing with these guys. Speaking of dope cats to perform with, A.T.S. (Against the Spread) also played with us that night. I have been a fan of and a homie with A.T.S. for a bit now and all I can really say is...if you haven’t heard em...go check em out.

It was looking like NOONE was gonna come to see us at this Coasters show...we luckily had a last minute rush right before we played (you rock Sugar for a Dime!) and got down to it. Well...we tried to get down to it. I'll just say this...we had one of the worst sets of our entire musical careers (even in my 3 year solo run). It was most likely a faulty cord that fucked it all up but regardless...it sounded like shit. You couldn't hear The Enthusiast's beats and all you could really hear is my incessant attempt at rappin over his samples, no bueno. We rocked through it anyways and did the best we could.

Funny things is, we were bummed no one really came so we didn't get paid shit, but we we're really glad no one came cuz we sounded like shit. Funny how that works sometimes. Live and Learn, these things happen when you perform live.

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So the Sunday after Coasters, we had the ultimate chance to redeem ourselves at The Red Room downstairs rockin with Sugar for a Dime. Illy D, and J.O.B - Now hold on...downstairs at The Red Room? THAT'S RIGHT! Never once since I have lived here in Santa Cruz have I heard of a show downstairs at The Red, we were quite excited about the unique opportunity and we were not about to waste it.

Here's how it went...it was ILLADELICALLY AMAZING!

Illy D got the vibes going with some REAL SMOOTH Hip Hop, I mean the kind of Hip Hop that is probably reasonable for a lot of baby making (intense baby making). I could not stop dancing and that would continue until 2 in the morning (Illy D also closed up the night after Sugar for a Dime). Mad props to a dope DJ.

Then we took our sorry asses up to the stage...keep in mind we were still licking our wounds from Coasters. We were NOT about to let this show go down the gutter, so we brought our intensity level up to about 200%.

After our first song, we knew the Vibrant EYEris was fully open and wide awake. DAMN THAT FELT GOOD! The reciprocation of energy from the crowd was All We Needed to make this one of our BEST SHOWS EVER! The place was packed, tons of people were dancing feverishly to our non-stop constant stream of consciously elevating Hip Hop (remember...Hip Hop don't Stop!). My god, we even had Judi, the bartender who HATES Hip Hop getting down to our grooves.

As you can Imagine, this stark contrast to our Friday show was what I like to call, our weekend's version of Live Show Performance's Yin & Yang, straight up night and day. We proceeded to cash in on our good luck and get drunk as fuck on the house (THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU Red Room). Then it was time for the climatic finale...

SUGAR FOR A DIME! YES! I was blown away by a massive psychedelic mushroom cloud blended with Punk Rock, Ska, Reggae, and umm...damn I don't even know what to call it...just good fucking music! I could not stop moving, epically when they played a cover of Black Flag's "6-pack"...brings me back to my adolescent days of hating all forms of authority (I still hate most). Their original tracks were in my mind, Santa Cruz Classics...they epitomized the exact vibe I get from this beautiful town.

And...it's gone. Yup, after that the rest of the night was a faded memory of....truth is I forget...but I do imagine we had quite some fun in celebration of well played redemption.

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Damn....this thing is way too long...you're STILL reading this? Crazy...you must really like us. Well...we got TONS of shows coming up including The Awareness Tour in July and Bat Country in June. Of course it's all on our myspace...but just for fun check out our reverbnation profile...