It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was a time of great triumphs for a king, and a beating down of a young prince on the rise through the ranks. It was days of wine and roses, and nights of whining and neurosis, and it kind of sent my head spinning to the point where I just don't know anymore.
I just don't know anymore.
Let's start with the high points.
BUN B'S 2 TRILL IS IN STORES NOW, IT'S A CLASSIC, AND THE MAN'S FIRE IS BURNING LIKE NEVER BEFORE! A man who has faced so much adversity, so many hard, trying times. A man who has brought us classic after classic. A man who has suffered tragedy after tragedy in the name of this music. Often just before or after a major triumph. I'm personally hoping he can ride this 2 Trill wave for a long time and see some positivity in 2008. Cuz the man deserves it.
Tuesday night I drove up to Houston for his official release party at Bar-Rio. Close to 3,000 people packed into the massive club on Richmond Ave., just past the cheesy part of the strip, to celebrate the release of his magnanimous opus, 2 Trill.
This is the line after the club was already sold out. Hard to really see but there were at least 500 people milling around outside who did not get in.
Streetboy
Domo DJ'd for Bun
My dudes!
Coty Mo rocked the stage just before Bun came out.
And man did he come out...
The vibe was incredible, the energy was just flowing through the air, and when Bun hit the stage on this particular evening, you could feel the roof raising up off it's hinges just a lil bit. The dude BOUNDED out on to the stage with reckless abandon. Harder than most of the times I have seen him live.
And the crowd was quite happy with this...
Riflman from Dallas was in the house.
The lovely's Meshah Hawkins and Stacey were in the house!
My boy Big Push and Xxzotic. Blofly was standing right next to them, but I had just switched to my super zoom lens and somehow didn't fit him in. I really couldn't see through my viewer either. Ugh.
Billy Cook just released a new album as well. Look out for this man!
Anyway, Bun was on stage for well over an hour, and at the end, during the encore Lil Wayne came out and they did a few songs together. Shit was RAW. But I kind of snuck out during all this cuz I hate being in the mess of folks when the club actually does let out. I had no need to um, parking lot pimp as they say. (Said parking lot cost $20 to park. FUCK ALL THAT BULLSHIT!)
Anyway, then I passed out, got up, drove back to Austin and met Bun at his Music Mania In-Store. They said 360 people showed up for it and he signed CD's and posters for every one of them.
Da Bus
Hezeleo in the place. I finally got me a Pimp C Forever shirt. Lookout for Hezeleo this summer Austin, we are gonna do something together soon.
The man O.G. from Luxury Mindz in the house documenting everything. See some
INCREDIBLE shots of the in-store and concert here.
ALSO SHORT DISCLAIMER! I took some shots at the in-store but did not have my camera at the concert so the ones tagged with Luxury Mindz were taken by O.G. Bootleg and the ones with no tags were taken by
D Tha Sandman of Southbound. Thank's y'all. Sorry to jack your work but I neeeeeeeeeeed it.
Anne Harris, daughter of Thomas Harris, gave Bun a book signed by her father. She's a Bun B Super Fan!
Read about her experience HERE.
And the lovely Rory was in the house to make sure thangs went smoothly. She gave me a dope Heavy Metal 4 CD box set and promises to send me all the Black Sabbath re-issues. This is very important to me. As Co-CEO of Sabbath in the Park, LLC and such.
These dudes were outside trying to pull the 3-Card Monty Scam. They tried to get Anne involved but I pulled her away.
People do still fall for this shit apparently.
Ladies in the place.
Then concert time came. I was nervous. Would the hood come to Emo's? We booked the show nine days in advance, had flyers 6 days in advance, I recorded the radio commercial with Rapid Ric and sounded like a big dorko, I was not sure what was going to happen.
But of course it popped. Shit was packed and the crowd was diverse and enthusiastic like how I like to see.
Rapid Ric killed it all night, as did DJ LL!
Kriminalz wrecked!
Southbound killed it...
Dred Skott are VERY important to this scene down here IMO. They are gonna lead a whole new musical revolution, I can tell.
Seriously, very important.
Pimpin' Pen is really holding things down while his partner K-Paul is away.
FREE K-PAUL!
Lowkey and Gangster Boo Barbie. Um, before the extreme, police beat down.
Gerald G put on yet another inspiring performance. Now THIS DUDE has fire. He's gonna come up real soon, alongside Mrs. 512, Staci Russell. Who is also utterlay amazing.
Mike Mo from Beltway 8 says Austin has the best rappers in the state right now, and he is not lying.
Staci Russell on the rise.
Yes this is Staci too. (not sure who took the photo)
Kinfolk Thugs are a new group on Rap-A-Lot from Memphis. Look out for them.
And Bulletproof is a killer MC from Shreveport. Very happy that I actually got to see his set this time around. He's bout to release a serious one on Rap-A-Lot.
I guess I missed the Gerald G / Dred Skott Freestyle.
Dammit.
Then Bun B came out with that same fire he had the night before. Only without the list of guests or whatever, I suppose he had to cut this set short. Many say it clocked in at 28 minutes. Which is good and bad I suppose. He left them wanting more as they say.
But he fucking killed it, from what I could see at least.
Because at one point during his set I had to run out the front door to see what the hell was going on with Lowkey from Southbound. I'm not going to get into it too tough here on the blog, cuz I'm definitely gonna be a witness for the boy when he goes to court and don't want to fuck that up, but in a nutshell...
From what I was told, Lowkey was walking out of the club with his drink, the bouncers say it was multiple times, he says it was once, I'm going to assume that it was somewhere in the middle of that. Supposedly he was told that he could not come back into the club and when I came to the door he was being told by the man, James Dean, to just calm down and go home, forget about it. Things seemed to be o.k., and James went in to find his girl and I went in to find his brother. I guess when we left he tried to get back in the club (I didn't see this part) and one of the bouncers punched him in the face and knocked him to the ground.
I came out the door a few seconds after this I guess cuz he was standing up, sort of dazed, and definitely mad. Which is understandable, sucker punch me for any reason I'm gonna at least want to get back at you. That's all there is to it.
But he didn't. His brother and I convinced him to leave just as four police officers arrived on the scene. I was standing literally one foot away from Lowkey and one foot away from the officers. I basically said "Lo, look, the police are here. The only thing that is gonna happen if you do anything is you will be arrested." He agreed and he and his brother walked away peacefully toward I-35. At this point, when they were about 20 yards away, one of the cops said "It's the one in the blue and white shirt?" And another cop said "Yeah the one in the blue and white shirt." They then took off running behind the two brothers.
What I saw was this - one cop grabbed Lowkey from behind and he turned around startled, as any normal person would. When he turned around the four cops POUNCED on him, they tased him continuously.
The Austin American Statesman reports - writer Joe Gross was an eye witness to the entire thing as well - that he heard the taser go off three times. I personally did not hear the taser stop and this melee went on for about 3 minutes. The entire time I heard that evil CLICK CLICK CLICK going into the boys mid-section, and the four officers beat him in the head and legs with billy clubs and punched him repeatedly with all their might.
It was one of the most vile and ruthless beatdowns I have ever seen in my life. Four horrible police officers, pummelling the shit out of a man on his stomach who's arms were for the most part behind his back. If there was any resistence, it was probably in hopes of blocking one of their vicious blows to his head. Maybe it was because he had electricity shooting through his body. I don't know. But when I say that this was the most ruthless and vicious and disgusting attack I have ever witnessed in my life, I am not kidding.
It was utterly horrid. If I could sue those fuckers for emotional distress I would, because I am fucking distressed. But I mean, these motherfuckers can pump 51 bullets into the wrong man and get off without any problems whatsoever - except with God, who will make them pay when the time comes. Fuck all that shit.
Anyway the photos and the Youtube below are not all that clear. We need more footage. There were other people with cameras and video phones on the scene. If you have ANY footage please contact me at the austinsurreal address at the top right side of this page. We already know that there will be no justice in this case whatsoever cuz the police can run rampant and do anything they want (Willie D said to me "Imagine if you could just kill or beat down anybody you wanted at any time for any reason, just cuz you have that uniform. Imagine that.") But I want to at least expose this shit for what it is. Vicious Police Brutality.
It was utterly horrid. And I'll be in court next to my dude. I can't get the image of him face down on the concrete, taking baton blows to the back of his head while the taser goes off out of my head.
And yes I know that this type of shit goes on "everyday in the hood." But I saw this shit with my own eyes. Less than 5 feet away.
They seemed to enjoy the show. They did nothing to help the poor kid while the savages tried to kill him. Seriously, that's what it looked like to me.
Hello, My Name Is...
And here is some youtube footage. This is actually after things had calmed down quite a bit. You can still hear the taser going though. MOTHERFUCKERS!
LOCAL ARTISTS DA C.O.D. ALREADY RECORDED A SONG ABOUT THE INCIDENT CALLED "NOTHA ONE" DOWNLOAD IT HERE NOW AND GET IT IN THE MIX ASAP!
I hear that there's cameras all over 6th Street that record everything. Can we subpoena their footage? I need to find out. Only thing missing from this shit was a horse trampling his head. I'm telling y'all, I'm disturbed. God Bless America. We need it.
