So a couple different people have been asking me to post a new blog.  I finally deiced to stop being a lazy turd and do it up.  A few months ago I went to Chicago for "Meeting Of The Styles".  I was brought into it all by my man James aka "NERD" of the infamous X-men crew.  I kicked it with him a few days and apparently he is the nicest guy in graffiti.  He wanted to do some sort of "Japanamation" inspired production.  I suggested Akira and he was like PERFECT.  He also said "That's gonna SNAP." I learned that in Chicago the word "Snap" is used A LOT.  We gonna Snap, Yo dat shit SNAP.  I like it.  Im going to try and bring int to the midwest.  Anyways we banged out this lil Akira jammer:

While in Chicago I had the pleasure of spending some time with my man Weed Wolf.  I've known this dude for years and years.  Even before he wrote graffiti he was doing some weird shit.  He used to go out on New Years Eve with bolt cutters.  He would hang out in the alley way behind the biggest club he could find and cut the lock on the giant power breaker lever.  He would lounge around a bit, and then, …..right at midnight….he would just kill all the electricity.  I have been on quite a few lil adventures with this kid, never a dull moment.  

For those of you that don't know, when it comes to bombing, this muther fucker is like a one man army.  You LITERALLY could not walk fifty feet in Logan Square OR Wicker Park with out having a Weed Wolf sticker smack you in the face.  This is the type of dude that doesn't just put one sticker on a a news paper box.  He covers the whole box end to end and top to bottom.  Then he puts a sticker inside each paper that's inside that box.  

EVERYBODY knows who Weed Wolf is.  He makes the news and shit.  I haven't seen someone so up since "ASET" in Denver in 1998.  Back then if I took a shit there was a good chance it would have "ASET" tagged on the side of it somehow.  Come to think of it I took a shit in Chicago……then saw this in the toilet...

Among some of Weed Wolf's cooler toys was an old refillable fire extinguisher.  For those of you that haven't seen one of these in action they are nuts.  You can refill them with paint and then it will blast that shit in a nice thick coat for like 100 feet.  They look like this...

Weed Wolf also had this super sweet extendable ladder.  It was made even sweeter by his meticulous use of camouflage tape…

Weed Wolf is clever and very very secretive.  In one of his more genius moves he finally decided to release a photo of himself while being interviewed for the local free Chicago entertainment paper.  The Chicago Reader is a lot like the Alibi in Albuquerque or the Westword in Denver. This is the photo, and for the record it is NOT him:

Every body thinks it's him, and several forum posts from girls and guys alike seem to be incredibly disappointed.   Well don't be people, Weed Wolf is not some crazy tatted up gun toting mexican psychopath.  What he is…..is fucking with you.  That is what he is good at.  All of this is printed with his permission BTW so quit thinking I'm selling him out.  My blog doesn't get a massive amount of traffic so it wouldn't matter much if I did it without his permission anyway.  I'm pretty sure even he doesn't read it.

Upon my return to Denver I met up with my home boy Dread.   We decided to paint my good friend Matt's bar.  He is a huge Star Wars fan and so am I.  Naturally this lead to a nice Empire Strikes back production…..

I sketched this one out straight up, a very difficult task at that size. You can't see shit while your on a ladder. Notice how many times I got the size of the Walkers wrong.  The dark blue is the final correct outline.  

I have painted a lot of street level art but I have never been complimented so much as when doing this one.   It's nice to know Star Wars is still a fan favorite;)

I meant to post this blog like six months ago but whatever.   I was recently (six months ago) granted the monumental opportunity to have a private lunch with Run of RunDMC fame.  Run was flown out by the local hip hop congress to give a lecture at the Auroria campus.  Myself and a few other local Denver cats, all with a great degree of skill in some hip hop element, were slated to have lunch with the legendary emcee earlier that day.  I was one of the first on the scene as I was helping to set up the SIX turntables that would be in the room.  Being that I was there early I got some one one one time with Run.  

Needless to say I took the opportunity to rap battle is ass…. and served him…. hard.  JK relax dude, that didn't happen.  We did start a conversation that he seemed pretty attached to though.  I asked him what rappers he was the most into these days and his response was not what I expected.  He said Lil Wayne along with some other hella toy shit.  I was like " Your kidding me, that dude is sooooooooo fucking wack".  That lead to the age old debate of hip hop vs mains stream rap and whats dope and whats lame.   The thing is this time I was engaged with one of the founders of hip hop.  The other members of the community assigned to this luncheon started to show up and I was starting to feel pretty stressed having this debate with Run while like fifteen other people where listening in.  How do you argue or make points with a dude who pioneered the subject matter your discussing?

Along with feeling a lil short stacked on clout to debate with, I was also feeling like I didn't really want to dominate the conversation so much. I wanted to let the other guys get their questions in.  At one point, to my great satisfaction, somebody chimed in with another question.  I don't remember what it was but it was indeed fairly cookie cutter.  Run responded with "I'll actually field questions like that out on the floor if that's cool, right now I would like to get back to this debate about Lil Wayne".  So it was cool that he pretty much justified my hoarding of his attention but at the same time I was kind of wanting out of the conversation.  So on that note the debate continued and I had to bring it.  

I definitely managed to hold my own as I have had this debate a thousand times.  Also a lot of the local heads were supporting my side of the argument and making occasional points for me.  I cornered him pretty hard when I asked if he let his children listen to these artists.  He said no and had to admit that Weezy's influence was definitely not healthy or good.  He also pretty much countered that point by stating that just because something isn't good doesn't mean its bad.  I would agree.  He made lots of good points actually.  My best moment was probably when I made the point that one could find a rapper with all of the pro's of Lil Wayne (decent lyrical skill, great production, etc) but none of his cons (like his blatant ignorance, narcism, and stupidity).  Run seemed to think that if he had to "look" for a rapper then then they weren't worth this time. 

It was pretty mind blowing how narrow his taste was for someone I would have thought would be more into the underground.  This is what he had to say about rappers like Atmosphere (Slug) and  Sage: "I have no desire to go looking behind a tree for rappers, oh hey looky here I found a rapper, No…if they aren't on the radio, or TV, or right in my face then why would I care".   All I could think of was: because there are way better all be it less known or popular rappers than Lil Wayne.  Anyways I eventually felt the conversation had no where left to go so I changed the subject.  I asked a question I had wondered for years.  

I asked why RunDMC never did a track with the Beastie Boys.  His response was… he had no idea, it just never came to be.  Then he said something that made everyones jaw drop.  Apparently he wrote both Paul Revere and Slow and Low.  That was one hell of a "fun fact".   Paul Revere is probably one of the Beasties most known songs. It is also my personal favorite to rip on karaoke.  Anytime I have spit that half the bar sings along.  Not long after that Run went to address the public.  

While in the auditorium someone in the bleachers was handed a mic and asked Run what he thought of all the lame mainstream hip hop.  Run smiled and looked around for me (I was near by) saying "oh I just had that conversation with the dude in the white cap".  I slumped down in my chair desperate to avoid his gaze because I absolutely did not want to resume that conversation in front of like 2000 people.  He never spotted me. 

So last weekend was no JOKE.  Friday was the graff event "Real Kings Do Real Things"  which bled into Saturday's "Breakin Hearts" event.  Both joints had HUGE turn outs.  In fact Breakin Hearts was at capacity for about an hour and that took place in a GIGANTIC WAREHOUSE. I was honored to be a participant in both jams.  I was allowed on the "Real Kings" wall with some straight up NM legends.  It was also great to perform some rappity raps at BH9.  Here are some photos:

This was NOT easy to paint, I kept underestimating how much paint I needed and it was a bitch climbing up and down scaffolding to do it.  Also it's impossible to tell what your doing while your doing it because of the scale.  My respect for the "Mac"  (elmac.net) has officially tripled....

Lots of heads came to check us paint, thats always cool.  On the lower left is a "Farm" piece.  That is by freight legend "Sug".  When I say freight legend I mean LEGEND, he has crushed more trains than most the heavy hitters.  Meeting that guy has been a goal of mine for a decade plus. To top it off he was hella cool.  That dude once fought off THREE men with guns who were going to cut his fingers off in a bathroom (so he couldn't paint anymore).  I had heard that folk tale a million times here and there. I can now tell you it's a confirmed true story. He's got a scar from a bullet graze on his dome.....WTF. Apparently the incident was for the best as he has been drug and liquor free ever since.  Dude is a lawyer now, apparently a good one.  

Did you notice the King 157 in the upper left....you didn't did you... cus your slippin!

This is difinitely one of the largest things I have ever painted.

Again working at this scale is a BITCH, but the pay off is worth it.  The impact of the shear size is really nice.

Scalffolding = pain in my ass

Rappity Rap Rap

It's fun rappin to a bunch of breakers...gives you something to watch from the stage

Here is some new ish:

This was a lil paint gig for the "Colorado Meth Project" at a big ass chili festival.  The idea is that we draw interest to their booth... thus helping to educate the world on how WACK meth is.  Check the video, its cool.

Painting with the legendary Emit....this muther f*cker is sooooooo good. That piece only took him four hours.

We will also be painting a beast of a production soon.  It will be over two stories high and have like fifteen different writers working on it.  It has been approved by the city of Albuquerque.  Now its just a matter of securing and ass ton of paint.  I look forward to this very much.  Thank you 508 (and 505 I suppose). 

Also won a lil graffiti battle with this one.  Actually made some decent $.

Look at all the peeps lining up to see us.........well and the other bands I guess. 

Even legendary heros come to see our shit.  I love how this Robin's eye holes are totally mismatched in size. Dude how could you not notice that??.....nevermind its way better that way. 

Get a load of this guy.....

Nice on the mic....

Remember these dudes?

Nekst....this dude is EVERYWHERE and by that I mean I see his shit in every city I go to. 

For those of you that don't know, we just rocked a show in the mighty New York City.  It popped off hella nice.  A large and responsive crowd considering we were headlining and it was 2:00 AM  by the time we even started set up.   So thanks to you fools for sticking around.  Notably among the crowd was  Captain America and Robin (who the ef dresses up as Robin??!).  How many of you can say super heros show up to your rap shows?  None of you...so shut up.  More notably amongst the crowd was MC Lars.  He seemed pretty into our shit.  Afterwards he gave me his contact info and was pretty adamant about doing a track together.  So keep your ears out for that one down the road....cus I will definitely be calling that guy up.   

Out side of the show NY as a whole was a blast. I didn't get to bed before 5:00 AM for the most part.  I stayed in the Brooklyn YMCA with Shifty P (Mr. beats) and his boy Alex.  Both of which are 20 year old bad asses visiting from Montreal.  Hanging out with them was mad fun.  Drinks at the bars are retarded expensive in that town so I was more than happy to wonder the streets sipping rum and cokes with these underage hip hoppers.  They know their graff so checking the NY throw ups was much more fun than usual (cus usually It's me having a dialogue with myself as none of my other friends give a shit).  

You know what's a damn good time?...Roaming up and down Bedford Ave drunk.  In NY, and in that hood, there is always someone to talk to.  We would basically just chill on stoops, ask each other which stance we looked cooler in, and then start dumb conversations with female passerby's.  Eventually we came across a group of three ladies chillen on a stoop of their own.  

Two of them were hot as hell and the third not so much.  So needless to say I was pretty shocked when the third called me over and offered to let us SUCK her tits for 60$.  The others chimed in with "or you can see all of our tits for $60 but no sucking on them".  All I could think of was that "Peaches" song " Fuck The Pain Away" that's like: "Sucking on my titties like you wanted me, calling me all the time like  Blondie".  We were pretty much like "Well...have fun in jail later, or at least trying to repair your damaged souls".  We talked some more shit back and forth then split across the street. From there we continued to do our thing while occasionally getting heckled by the slutty girls from across the street.  We met more people here and there, eventually I got minimally fresh with some random, equally drunk, Brooklyn girl. She was cool.. that's about all I can say about that, my mind was getting hazy by then. Then we called it a night. Photos later prove she was not as attractive as I remembered.  I mean she wasn't super busted but I was still kinda like...wait what;)  

Getting up the next day was hella painful.  Shifty puked his face off.  We ended up chillen across the street from the hostel (which is a police station).  We chose the spot cus it had a good rail to sit on and more importantly was in the shade.  After everybody split I got the idea to tag a cop car (retarded I know, but then sometimes I am).  Now this isn't my usual mode... and make no mistake ...my bombing days are for the most part behind me.  I have not dropped some illegal graffiti or even caught a tag in quite some time.  Thing is I needed this shot for a video I was working on.  

So once everyone left and I was the only one in real danger I waited for my opportunity and took it....think what you want.  I can tell you this....while it might not be the smartest thing to have done, it was worth the rush.  I had to make my move with a cop sitting on the station stoop due to heavy foot traffic in the area (also I was behind the vehicle from his perspective).  It was admittedly fucking slick as the window of opportunity was so minimal. So later I got the video I needed.  Now your thinking "why would you admit to this on the net"???  Cus honestly, in reality, it doesn't fucking matter....that's why.  There will be no man hunt, there are bigger things to deal with.  You may also be wondering how that affected my karma.  Well it must have affected it pretty hard cus I got pretty fucked later that day.  

I hop on the G line and use my metro card which was in my wallet.  My wallet goes right into my backpack pocket (noob move).  by the time I get off the E and try to buy a street vendor taco (phenomenal by the way) I realize my wallet is gone.  That's right folks in the most classic NY cliche ever my pocket was picked on the muther fucking subway.  In a weird way I sort of had to grin even though I was hella screwed.  At this point I have a flight to catch in two hours and I have no ID or money to get the rest of the way to La Guardia.  I figure I can retrace the path I took to get to Roosevelt station in hopes of experiencing the miracle of finding my empty wallet (with ID) in a trash can or under a bench.  Problem with that plan is I find myself taking the risk of hopping the turn style with not 1, but 2  security officers roaming around.  

Fortunately (because I am strong with the force) a large crowd entered the station.  I was able to mesh into it, kick by bag under the bar, simultaneously hop over the bar, and snatch everything up in an incredibly fluid motion. In fact I am pretty sure the people to both my left and right didn't even notice.  It was a pretty fucking "Jedi"  move if I do say so myself.  

So lucky there, not so lucky in finding the wallet.   An hour later, defeated, I called my Aunt who biked over and leant me some cash.  From there it was straight to the airport.  Getting through security with out an ID is a bitch.  They went through files on my computer and searched the shit out of me.  In the end the receipt for the hostel was the tipping point that got me through.  After that it was a second missed flight and stand by through to the third.  A rushed connection in Dallas and then FINALLY home free.  Thanks NY for the good times.  Have fun with my eighty dollars cash and canceled credit card.  I'll be back for it.