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Welcome to my outlet

Still think it’s a game?

I’m excited for new developments that have come up due to this weekend.  Thanks to those who participated in some way.  Whether you bought a ticket or showed up to the concert.  The 10 toes down outlook definitely makes me feel better about the music I make and perform.  I’m sure videos and pictures will be popping up on facebook and twitter.  My range will be expressed in every show from now on.  But no matter when/where I perform, drinking and driving will be on the menu.  That’s my favorite song to date so ya’ll will just have to deal with it.  Did you fuck it up for yoself at Flyfest?……..most likely.  Follow me @renzeeo.  New developments underway.

Sandbox Theory

At first, everybody was on the same playing field. Then, a small group of people noticed that another group of people had no clue what they were doing. But, they couldn’t disregard those people because there were to many of them that could be put to good use. So what did they do? Build a sandbox for them to play in until they needed them, or until they climbed out by themselves. In the sandbox they had all kinds of toys that they created for them like fancy cars, nice houses, groups to join, clubs, pool halls, clothes, promotions, thug life, 2.5 kids and white picket fences, money, and other things that they could occupy themselves with while the people outside the sandbox handled business. Of course a small part of that business is creating more toys for the sandbox, but the main business for the folks outside the sanbox is living THEIR dreams. Not anyone else’s….theirs. So the theory goes like this, understand that there are people who are in the sandbox that love to be in the sandbox, and there are people who have made the sandbox along with all the different toys in the sandbox. All sandbox’s look different and some are bigger than others with more fancy toys. But a sandbox is a sandbox.

Every song has a purpose.  Here is an example.  Before I got involved in church, the Bible, or any of that.  I just kinda drifted along doing whatever made sense to me.  And even though I’m a pretty smart guy, I didn’t make good decisions when it came to being a mature man. I won’t go into too much detail but the bottom line is that it felt like I was lost in the Wilderness.  The Jews wondered around in the wilderness for 40 years on their way to the promise land from Egypt.  It was 100% there fault and they could have been there in 2 weeks had they been mature enough to listen and make good decisions.  I felt just like them.  I had plenty of entertainment while being in the wilderness though.  Mostly alchohol.  I got so used to going through the bullshit that it became second nature.  Then I was introduced to the Bible and how all those people turned there life around by following Jesus, and I was in that thang.  I was whole on the inside, so it made the hard road ahead that much more easy.  Here is the song about that experience.

I hate you new singers

You know what I miss, singers that had something to sing about.  It seems like the singers of today think it’s good enough to sound good and do pushups.  They forgot about writing the damn song. 

Weak ass songwriting example #1: Miguel - Sure Thing.  Have you heard the words to this song?  I can be the ____ you can be the _____.  This is some of the laziest writing that ever existed.  If you’re going to do this kind of writing, you should at least make it interesting.  I can be the door…..you can be the knob is not going to help me get my wife in the bed.  Although the hook on this song is amazing, the verses suck like shit.  And shit sucks if you didn’t know.

Weak ass songwriting example #2 Frank Ocean - Novacane.  Song starts off very strong.  Excellent verses, wonderfully laid out hook.  Then it’s like he decides…..fuck it.  “Novacane, Novacane, Novacane…etc.”  If you don’t have anything else to talk about in the song, don’t say SHIT.  You can let the hook play out and do runs in the background but don’t repeat yourself over and over again.  I bet when he was recording the last part of this song he was looking like he was watching a badminton game.  Eyes rolling everywhere searching for inspiration.

Music was meant to touch people and inspire emotion.  You don’t always need words to do that but you ALWAYS need to cherish the ones you use.  Do you think Luther Vandross, Keith Sweat, Sisquo, R. Kelly, Mary J. Blige, John Legend, Anthony Hamilton, Jill Scott, and anybody else who is successfull sit back and says “They don’t give a shit.  As long as I’m singing on it, the song is going to be good”  Hell naw.  Every song has a purpose.  If the purpose of your song is to sound good, get someone to play a saxaphone over other instruments and shut your fuckin mouth.  If it’s going to touch someone, then make sure that your words are worth something when your mouth opens.  I can be the keyboard you can be the usb slot. GTFOH.

Do you love it?

The career of an artist seems very sad after a while.  You work for years and years to be hot for about 5 yrs and die off.  Of course you make a bunch of money, tour, party with all the famous people.  But after your hot years are done, it seems like a pretty weird lifestyle to have. You hang back in the cut, ration your money off from the golden years and drop mediocre albums. Every now and then you get together with some friends and have a mini tour with the newest hot artist in the name of “cosigning”. I can see how it would be fairly easy to go crazy in a situation like that.  One day you hop on stage with 30,000 people staring at you, the next year it’s 1000, the next year it’s 200.  Ask Boyz II Men. People with regular careers move slowly into their twilight with grace.  All I’m saying is if you doing this shit full-time, you better make sure you love this shit.

Been sick and shit

If you haven’t noticed, I been sick like a muthafucka.  And muthafuckas be gettin sick all the time.  So if I’m sick like them, you know it’s bad.  My wife been nursing me back to health on this little hiatus.  I hate that I missed one of the most important Turnin’ Headz’ last week.  I heard everybody was in that thang finding out what’s goin on for SXSW.  But I had to do the right thing and sit my ass down so I can get better.  It felt good taking some time off from recording, hosting, etc to just sit and talk to my wife about the stupid shit that the cough syrup was making me come up with.   We’ll find time to enjoy the weekend.  Thanks for the get well messages.  I’ll be back to it soon. Dueces.

10 toes down

If you’ve been keeping up with things then you know my best friend Roy. We met at TSU back in 2002’(That rhymed). We ended up being roomeates while in college. I used to sit back and teach Roy how to rap. He loved the 1995 flow and he still rap like that to this day. People used to bring their friends to the apartment in the middle of the night so they could hear me rap. We also used to host freestyle Fridays, where anybody that knew how to rap would freestyle for hours. It was mostly me though. There wasn’t any singing goin on during this time, just rappin. No funny shit…..just rappin. They would watch me go through all these different beats and come up with crazy rhyme schemes during these sessions. People would be like “What the fuck did he just say”. “Ya’ll niggas fall quicker than most of these tall niggas…” etc. It was the way that I got out my aggression so I would say some of the wildest shit.

When I first got on the Houston scene, I went to the Turnin’ Headz freestyle sessions and did the same thing. I just looked down and rapped my ass off about whatever came to my mind. I was back at freestyle Friday chewing up beats. But I noticed something different. I don’t know if it was because of the stage or because I was in a mixed crowd, but I was isolating myself by rapping so aggressive. I even remember saying something like “I don’t give a fuck about nobody in the crowd” and everybody was like “AWWW”. So this caused me to try to soften up my flow and get a little more involved with the crowd. I made more of an attempt to be funny instead of being a lyricst so they can be a part of the show instead of being scared of me. I kept this in mind when I started performing my songs and tried to perform the more light hearted songs. At Flyfest, I performed the fun/funny songs “Gimme dat Microphone” “Bye Lance”, and everybody was having a good time. But then I also performed “Hear Me Now” and the mood was changed. I was Big Ren from Acres Home then and everybody came wit me. No more smiling, no more laughing. I eventually lightened the mood with “Drinkin and Drivin” but everybody was staring at me when I performed like I just shot somebody. I didn’t like that. So I stopped performing that song and tried to keep my whole set lighthearted from then on.

I know it’s a lot of information, but it’s important so stick wit me. Roy has been to a lot of my shows since I started performing in 2010. He came to my show for DNN’s release party where the set was Jon Black, D-Risha, Knesecary(prolly fucked his name up), Rocko Steady, DNN, and myself. Rocko, D-Risha, and Knesecary perform as lyricst, while DNN and myself concentrate on songwriting, and Jon performs as both. Everybody had a good time but Roy was concerned about my perception. (Paraphrased) “You did good but you need to start letting these niggas know you can rap.” etc. I even notice that everybody thinks I’m a singer when I rap circles around people all the time at Turnin Headz. People think I’m a comedian because they only know the funny songs. All my songs ain’t funny though. People don’t take me serious because of it. But the only people that know that are the people are real fans of Renzo. They have the CD’s and respect me as an artist, not just a comedian and singer. (And I’m not the most amazing singer but I sing better than you muthafucka so shut your face).

To summarize. From now on, you finna get everything. You finna get my more aggressive shit along with my lighthearted work. I have to stop worrying about your reactions to my music and just do what I love to do. I hope I don’t lose in you during the course of all this. But then again, if I do then you never liked my shit anyway. It’ll be Roy’s fault anyway so fuck it. End Transmission.

Off Season

Everybody’s a rapper until it’s time to rap

Everbody’s a rapper until it’s time to rap “Why is everybody a rapper until right now” This is a direct quote from an event that I was at recently. It was a battle rap competition. Battle rap is like MMA for wrestling. It’s not hype, it’s just can you beat this muthafucka. Not your crew, your rep, your swag, just you. Most rappers, and MC’s, are afraid of this kind of competition because they can’t hide behind something. Nobody gives a fuck about chunkin up the H when you get a chance to see somebody get rediculed in public. I like these kinds of events because they do well to weed out the people that are all talk. Bottom line, where are all these emcess that say they can rap better than everybody? Bring that shit to the Reserve Lounge at 9pm so we can really see if you can beat somebody.  Hell let’s see if you can beat anybody.  There’s nothing wrong with sitting back saying that you don’t battle rap.  But you can sit back and say that you’re the best if you don’t battle rap.  How you gonna be the best unless you compete against somebody.  When I say that I’m the hookmaster it’s because I mean that.  I’m always stocked full of songs that nobody can fuck with.  If you don’t believe me, test me.  I can talk about people too but battle rap is not the thing that keeps me connected to music. (Which is why I’m the host).  If you think somebody writes better songs than I do, please point them out so I can look at their resume and laugh at it. 

Now we’re getting somewhere.

Now we’re getting somewhere.