An Update and the Rest of the Story

So about that whole "I'm going camping" thing...I decided I wanted to get further away than that...much further. I decided to just point a direction and go that way...I happened to point south, so thats just what I did - I headed south. About midway through Alabama I stopped at this rest stop and decided I needed some directions. I asked what the best spot to relax was around the area. The guy I was asking (rest stop attendant) told me if I wanted to relax, I needed to go to a beach. I figured why the hell not and asked what the closest beach was. I got the choice of Gulf Shores, Ft. Walton Beach, and Panama City...I took Panama. 12 hours later I was there, got the cheapest motel I could find (42 dollars) and slept. I woke up the next morning and went to the beach. It was really quite an experience. There is more to it than that but I'll tell you that later, I want to finish the story of how I got to here. Ok...

So we left off with my senior year of high school and finally having success with my album 'One' produced by my dude Keynon Moore. Alright so ya, it was big in my eyes - the fact that I was on iTunes was huge to me, as was the radio play I got in Los Angeles, Montreal, Houston, etc.

Many different things happened as a result of the CD, but one of the biggest results was a call I got from Jonathan one day when I was in New Orleans. I hadn't talked to him for a good two years at this point so it wasn't something I was expecting. I said that he was now a counselor at a camp for troubled kids and that one of the kids in his cabin had one of my songs on his ipod and he was absolutely stunned and amazed. He figured it was a sign and he called me. He told me his entire story from drug deals to doing number runs in Mexico to moving to New York and almost getting arrested numerous times to finally seeking shelter and finding God. Its a pretty amazing story that I may write up in more detail at some point.

As all this was happening I applied to only one college - Belmont University. It seemed like the perfect fit for me; it had everything I wanted in terms of music, size, education, extracurriculars, etc. I was accepted and went in August (after the CD release on March 28th) where I met Brian Bachmann in a computer class. We talked and I said he was a rapper and he said he made beats, we tried working together on a few songs, and it evolved into an entire CD - the one I am about to release: "Unorthodox". Through that we got to know each other too and we got to be good friends. It all added up to the album we have now and through a bunch of works and connections we have around 80 radio stations rostered to play at least one song off the new CD (with most of the college stations putting the whole CD into rotation) and over twenty magazines (online and hard copy) lined up to do album reviews for it. This CD is setting up to be far bigger than my last endeavor and I am really excited about the way it looks like it is going.

That's all I got for now. That's the story. I'll post back later.

Be good.

Tre

Interruption! I Quit.

Allow me to interrupt the story for a second. I'm too stressed to deal with any of that today. I'm up to my neck in this CD, schoolwork, and life generally. A bunch has happened recently for all three - some of the things really exciting while others are just some shit. The CD is one song away from done. Everything is recorded (and has been for at least 2 weeks) and we have one last beat to master down and we have our final copies. Thats great news, but this whole last week has been stressful mixing and mastering vocals with Jake (Vocal mastering engineer) and Brian (Beatmaker/beat mastering engineer) in the studio and I'm so tired of it. Its so much stress cause I'm already up to my balls in (5) papers for class. I wish I had three separate weeks to do everything I need to do next week. And on top of all of this some major, major, major drama comes around...ya just cause I need more shit to stress about. But I have a solution...

This weekend I'm leaving. I quit. This weekend I quit school, I quit music, I quit drama. Tomorrow I'm going to drive one way or the other from here in Nashville and find a campsite and camp this weekend. I'm turning my phone off. I'm turning my laptop off. I'm going away until Sunday. 

AND YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE SUCKS (Sorry to go back to this but it just hit me again) I'M BROKE AT THIS POINT!!!! 75 Dollars for bumper stickers for promo, Brian put in the same money, 550 from each of us for CD Pressing (total of $1,100) AND we don't even get money for selling 100 of those CDs because we are sending them to God knows how many radio stations (Ok, like 80) and magazines (40-ish?) that want a copy. Ok but back to my solution...

So ya, just checked the weather and its gonna be beautiful Saturday, so I'm gonna head out east I think to go camping at Rock Island State Park or somewheres around there for Friday night. It sounds relaxing...so I'm gonna do it...alone.

On that positive note, I'm out.

I wanna do something. Something that doesn't require money...that I don't have.

Be good.

Tre Houston

Please Allow Me to Continue...

So we left off on Jonathan and rap. Well around the 9th grade, Jonathan (After changing his name to Monty) became a pretty successful high school drug dealer so, naturally, by the end of I think his 10th grade year he had been kicked out of every school in Houston and was doing number runs on the border of Mexico every weekend while staying at a boot camp on the border during the week. We had a falling out sometime around there. He rebelled at the boot camp too; it was in his nature and eventually his parents flew him out to NYC and left him there for good. We will pick back up on Jonathan later.

Anyways, 6th grade Jonathan introduced me to rap and I took it and ran with it. I grew to love the music, especially when I was eventually introduced to both Tupac and Eminem. I began writing my own rhymes right around then - it is in my nature to emulate things I think are cool. I was that kid that made his own claymation videos after I saw Celebrity Deathmatch and pretended to be Power Rangers and Mortal Kombat characters. Anyways, started rapping and I wasn't HORRIBLE, but I wasn't good. I do remember though that one day in the 6th grade (at Pershing Middle School) I was rapping and some 8th graders heard it and thought it was awesome. They brought me to our P.E. coach who called me White Chocolate from then on. I didn't get it at the time. In fact, I didn't even think about it until maybe last year and it clicked.

In the 7th grade I decided I was going to make a CD...so I did. I made tons of beats (using the amazingly simple Hip Hop Ejay programs) and wrote songs to 7 of the beats and released it on burned CDs under the title 'One More Word'. My prepubescent voice gave a convincing allusion of Alvin and the Chipmunks rapping. I also had to record 2 lines at a time because of latency issues with the program so it was also quite choppy. I had good lyrics though...it was that year that I started to have good lyrics. 8th grade I did the same thing again - 7 songs, prepubescent voice, choppy flow, and all. This time I called the CD 'You Dun Noe'...I was experimenting with slang, sue me. I went through all my friends call a 'wigger phase' during that time. I guess I did...I had only jerseys and wore a ton of New Era fitteds. I also talked with a slur that couldn't possibly have come from my upper middle class white home - I watched a lot of TV and listened to a lot of Dr. Dre. 

When I reached high school I decided that I was going to make a new name for myself...I was going to take my music seriously - and I wanted to start it all with a controversial bang. This bang came in the form of a song titled 'F#*@ Um All'...it was about all the ways I would have sex with most of the girls in my grade...by name...graphically. So as you might think, once I released it word got to school administrators...the school really went nuts for a day. I went to a laptop school so someone (Parker) had emailed it to everyone by the day. I remember coming out of class 4th period and the entire hallway was filled with people that had just heard the song (I had sold the CD the day before). They all shouted and went nuts...I loved it. I did not, however, love getting suspended, having to meet with all sorts of school officials, writing apology letters to parents, writing I think 7 essays, and all the other punishment they wanted to throw at me. The only reason I didn't get expelled was because Dean Eades basically told me what to say. He knew what he was doing and I appreciate it to this day. My life would have been far different if I have been kicked out of school. 

I kept a low profile after that (one of the conditions of my suspension being that if I didn't get in trouble again it would be taken off of my record). I made songs on my own but I never released them anywhere but on Soundclick. I was a part of hip-hop message boards (first Mun2, then Lyrically Gifted and then The Flow, with a brief stay at Future Producers). That is where I really developed as an artist...I stopped listening and writing so much commercial music. I started to use what I found in life and politics in my music. My mind opened to the range of music. At the same time, Lil' John was just starting to be successful and I was/am a huge Anti-Crunk type of guy. You can dance to it but I really just can't find a reason to listen to it on my own.

My senior year, using mostly connections that I had made on message boards, I released a legit CD for the first time in my life (on iTunes, getting real radio play, etc. etc.) and made some money...finally I was making money on my dream.

Alright, I'm going to continue this again later. We are getting closer to now though and I'm anxious to bitch about all of the shit that I'm doing right now.

Be good.

Tre

I Finally Bought into Blogging...On the Advice of my Management

So my new album ('Unorthodox') is coming up and I've been sitting in a small work room with Brian Bachmann (the man making the beats behind me on the new album who also acts as my management in many ways) for hours and hours contacting upwards of 20 magazine, 100 radio stations, and God knows how many regular every-day people (mostly friends in other cities for promo). Apparently music is more about marketing than actual music these days.

Anyways, with all of that said, I now have a blog more just to fill my time than actual promotion. But hey, maybe someone will come read this and say 'Hey, he's an alright dude, let's check out his music!'. That would make this a successful blog. But I mean hell, if that doesn't happen maybe ya'll can at least get to know me better. I would be fine with that.

I think I'm just gonna tell you some random things about me.

I am Tre Houston to most of you. I am a connoisseur and performing artist of the hip-hop music genre. I love it. My real name is Rowland Wickes Folensbee, III. I got this name from my dad who got it from his dad, but my mother (Flossy) hates the name so she dubbed me Trey (III = 3 = tres = Trey...which later becomes Tre). I cut the 'y' off of the name in the 6th grade because I was bored one day and I really have always been fond of changing things around and doing things just to get people to ask me why. I have two brothers and a sister: Tyler, 17; Matt, 13; and Meredith, 9. They support me in all I do.

At a current height of 6'4, I am going to be the shortest man in my immediate family. Tyler is going to be at least 6'5, Matt is supposed to wind up somewhere around 6'7, and my Dad is 6'6. I may not be short but I feel like it in my home. My mom is only 5'6 and my sister is supposed to be around 5'5. At a comfortable weight of 285 lbs I am, however, the biggest man in my family. We are all big guys though, and I pity Meredith's first boyfriend - we are all flying home to be at the door holding guns.

My parents are both intrigued by the brain (Dad is a psychologist and Mom is a psychiatrist). We have had our entire lives video taped by our parents so that they can then use those videos to show developmental stages in babies, children, and adolescence. I hope none of you every see these videos - I was way too cute to be me now. I think because I grew up in a home so aware of 'feelings' and emotions I gained an ability to dissect character pretty well. It also helps with my music more than I can explain. There are thousands of songs inside the stories and emotions people have...I want to find and write them all down and perform them.

My parents both being doctors of sorts also led to my parents being at work a whole lot. This is where my first Black influence came into my life. Mama Nell (Warnell Clay) came to work with my family when I was 3 months old. My mom needed to return to work and did not want to put me into daycare so Mama Nell was hired to watch over me. She wound up doing a lot of raising me as well. She became a part of the family...my parents (being younger than Mama Nell) ask her for advice and talk to her before any major decision comes in any of mine or my siblings' lives. She is a second mother to me who still is with us today taking care of Meredith. Mama Nell introduced me to Black Culture in a very subtle way. We didn't watch BET (She can't stand most of it) or anything along those lines...it was food and music. Al Green, fried chicken, Marvin Gaye, mac n cheese, Barry White, meat-loaf, Luther Vandross, and some damn good corn bread. At the time I didn't associate any of these things with 'Black Culture' but rather just the music and food I heard and enjoyed. I think this is what left me open to hip-hop later on in life. Damn I love Mama Nell.

From the time I was 4 until maybe the 9th grade, my best friend in the world was Jonathan Emmons. Jonathan was brilliant...maybe he's smarter than I am. He introduced me to hip-hop. His brother David was a big fan of old school rap, NWA, Eazy-E, Grand Master Flash, Run DMC, all of them. This rubbed off on Jonathan, which then rubbed off on me cause his Napster account was full of all these songs that he would burn and play when I was at his house. To be honest, I didn't like them in the beginning. It was just noise to me. It grew on me though...and we began to try to rap ourselves. I guess I should mention that Jonathan and I were always super competitive as well. One of the main reasons I stuck with rap for those first years was simply because it was really the only thing that I was better than him at.

This story is nowhere near complete but I have class in like 4 and a half hours and I need to sleep. I'll continue this soon. Post up and tell me what you think. It doesn't matter if I know you or not. If I don't know you, I will soon enough.

Be good.

Tre