Author: nikkie

From an early age, music has been an influential force in Nikkiesha’s life. From the time they discovered Michael Jackson and wanted to sing and break dance like the King of Pop, to being so consumed that Nikkiesha and their siblings performed talent shows in their living room while their parents were both audience and judges, they knew the importance of music. Nikkiesha (Nikkie) grew up with music around them! In addition to countless talent shows, their home was literally seconds away from a panyard - Panosonic Connection Steel band Orchestra’s panyard. On many late nights, when they should have been asleep, Nikkie’s parents would find the seven year old perched at their bedroom’s window listening to the orchestra practice for the largest steelpan competition in the world: Panorama. Nikkie’s older brother played the tenor pan for the orchestra. It was witnessing their brother practice which ignited their mesmerized obsession with the instrument. Nikkie took any opportunity to try and play the song their brother was practicing. They didn't care how much noise they made, or how many times they got into trouble for beating their brother’s tenor pan. Nikkie couldn't resist the pan’s allure. Their love and passion for the steel-pan never died after the age of seven, as twelve year old Nikkie, determined to be a part of the steel-pan culture, began running away to the panyard, and giving the rehearsal director hell - picking up the orchestra’s panists’ sticks and beating any of the unattended steel-pans. At the time, they were unaware of the difference between beating and playing the pan or any other percussive instrument. The rehearsal director started them off on the Gurndig - better known as the Double Guitar. The Gurndig is similar to the rhythm guitar in a rock band. He told Nikkie if they can learn and master how to play the Gurndig well, they could then move onto their desired pan: the shiny chrome tenor, the soprano, the lead pan in the orchestra. Knowing they weren’t going to stop running away to Panosonic's panyard, Nikkie’s dad decided to become the orchestra's manager. As Nikkie got older, they began listening to R&B, Blues, Jazz, Rap/Hip-Hop and Rock music. To their great enthusiasm to hear and experience different forms of music, after migrating to the US, Nikkie was exposed to sub-genres and even more diverse sounds. Inspired they began to play different instruments: acoustic guitar, the congas, and the drum-kit. Eventually spending more time behind the drum-kit, Nikkie began playing with various rock and punk groups. Most notable, the woman fronted rock trio Telenovela Star whose single, "Car Song" was the theme music for The N Channel’s Beyond The Break. After many years of playing behind the drum-kit, Nikkiesha is bringing all that they have learned to create and produce their first album, which is a tribute to their late mother and brother.

Behind God’s Back

Where, the best foods are to be discovered
Because we can’t afford your shantytown paradise
where, you pay more money than a Baltimore family
where a school teacher could buy two houses on our poverty-line
Oh did you forget, just because we walk through Williamsburg
with our new kicks, fresh press skirts, we think we own something.
Then, don’t come to our parts of God’s back, don’t even say Jesus sent you
because both God and Jesus will relocate once your ass discover that corner.
You never wanted to be that close to Culture! you just wanted the food, and to be
to be a spectator of a spectacle, like a museum artifact, you can afford to walk into and claim
as your own, and talk about such and such from a distance, from a distance I watch you fall
from your own peneplain… Walking away, I’ll remember this moment and always wear a hemlet.

Chosen

Yeah, make my own sonnet tonight
Yeah, make my own history tonight
make my own dance tonight, make
make, make, make, make my bake
flour and water, I wrap my dough
Yeah, make you jump in the holy ghost
feelin it eh, feelin it eh in dis power
you clap, and sing til the morning
Yeah, make you catch de devil
ha, ha, make you lose yourself
in your own laughter 
mek you tink in different verses.

Delicate Window

My eyes are bigger than the sunset now
incapable of feeling the delicate window

Dreaming, inside my romanticized state
organized neatly, compartmentalized ellipsis

I will not pretend to be a writer now, with arms fold
brooding over a wilted ole maypole 

with intent want, I won’t watch myself depreciate
in a rhyme that doesn’t fit.

Broad Strokes to Warm Up Your Holiday Spirit

As we near the close of twenty ten, there is a lot to reflect upon and be thankful for. Twenty ten was not an easy year for me, at the very beginning I felt troubled and lost, displaced would be the best word to describe my state of being. All it took was one phone call to change my gloomy direction. No, I didn’t discover Jesus, nor was it love or a new type of elixir…

I got a call from Magnetic Island (MI), saying that they wanted me to collaborate with them on a music project. I’ve always held MI in the highest of esteem as musicians, so much so I felt a tinge of intimidation after I had agreed to work with them.

They are great musicians, they passionately live and breathe music. I know that for a fact, because I witnessed this passion the morning that we were set to record Subterfuge, the MI single that I sang, played the drum-kit, and also played my steelpan on.

I had spent the night over at MI’s place, and the first thing they did the next morning, after breakfast, was grab their instruments: Lisa was on her guitar running through scales, and Sue was on her keyboards with headphones on. They taught me so much, or better yet they gave me so much hope…

Twenty ten brought me closer to my friends, family and also made me realize how important it is to have a really awesome boss: one who is generous and thoughtful, very rare and special.

At the curtail of this year, I was reconnected to how spiritual I am, thanks to a special lady, who probably doesn’t know how much of an impression she made. I’m so touched to have met her.  

These are all the things I’m thankful for this Christmas: friends, family, new beginnings… On and upwards!

I’d like to dedicate my last radio show for the year to all the peeps that made twenty ten a year full of laughter, growth and endless possibilities.  So prepare yourselves for a winter experience full of surprises on the next Broad Strokes broadcast!

During the intermezzo, you can listen to my show from last month HERE! showcasing most of the bands that played the Washington Heights Free Radio (WHFR) fundraiser/my bday party.

Playlist
The Shore by Magnetic Island formerly known as Renminbi
No One Cares by Object
Dr. Who by Telenovela Star
Clumsy by Coyote Eyes
Siren by Magnetic Island
End in Bender by Magnetic Island
Genius by Telenovela Star
Summer Phase by Magnetic Island
Yellow Red by Coyote Eyes
Fight Song by Magnetic Island
Subterfuge by Magnetic Island
Blue Chameleon by Object
BLMHYL by Telenovela Star
Just For You by Object

Bringing you stories, live events, and much more, WHFR tries and remains independent of any corporate sponsorship.  So, if you like what WHFR is doing, you can donate by contacting us at info@whfr.org.  DIY forever baby!

Also, if you’re in a band or know someone who is, and would like to be on the show, please email me at roarplanet@gmail.com.

A Land Made Of the Sound Of Her Laughter

Will lead a way, through these buried lives in me
the seeds will come alive again with your dirty earth
my avoidance only shapes your loitering, waiting there
in the shadows of enlightenment, a secret world of flowers
a rest, a lost so I can remember the corners of discovery.

The Corner of Razor Blade

There’s a junction I don’t want to re-visit
It’s a junction that lights all that’s missing
But I think about the gospel, I think about the blues
you brought to me and I stop and rock from side to side
stomp my feet, and praise my last taste of cheap wine.

Sheep

Protect me now, because I’m careless and would fall over the edge
I need my shepherd’s satellite ligthing my way through these last sunsets
I might fall, oh I might fall, oh I can feel it, as I take another step
when I’m only looking at the birds through the window, a hope in my eye
only a sheep would feel this ease, only a sheep gets caught as road kill…

Green

Well she’s walking through a crowded dream with a smile just made for me
if I were to describe her now it would take away from the wonderful
that is her laughter, lingering long after it has left the room
if I were to describe a moonstruck, I’d have to dive deep into her eyes
and pray for the courage to swim as fast as the climate of her pupils

one day to want more than wanting you
one day of knowing beyond the surface
that’s how she just, just how she appears to me…

Lover

the air just arrived from your breath, because at first I inhaled with giddiness
my unexplained thoughts, my wild pulsation meditates on our last embrace
so sure, my spirit danced with nothing left, and couldn’t bare the stillness  
no longer in flight, I want to return to the comfort of your arms
your healing touch that I can barely resist surrending too
afraid of letting go, I won’t let myself expect anymore…

PsychoKinesis

The mind is undiscovered, just like your lip gloss
leaving a message on my lips, what exactly will happen?
I am yet to discover the true meaning of kinesis.
Thinking about you makes all my hairs stand to attention
I hope you can  feel my gentleness as it kidnaps, clings to me
like cosmic static, electricity sparks a harmonized hope
to bring to you, everytime I transmit a message.

De-Con-Des-De-Con-StrUction

Mine, mine, mine, mine
all of this is mine
and I won’t give you an inch
of what is mine even if you cut
yourself building my inch

I want all of it
I want all of you
to build me a dynasty
that won’t crumble
but will kill you as you make it

I’ll subtly dance around your endevours
gracefully I’ll lure you into an infinite lullaby filled with pain and medicine
as you forget your ideas that fleets away, so go to sleep my darling, rest now.

HOROSCOPE

Tripping on Gods that will never cease to be
having them have me, wanting my love
when my condition only drifts like an abandoned
matrice miscommunicating empty bags 
dancing aimless on this dancehall
singing: making sure The Nigger is clean.

Daggers

the things we tell our friends
just so they can win our side
even when you know you’re wrong
the secrets we keep from friends
that’s what I’m interested in
but when will the daggers reveal themselves
when will they say to you as you stand delinquent
loitering with too much knowledge and you know it:

when will they say to you all the bad things first
and then I love you after. We cry for an intervention.

Maybe when we’re adult enough to die in truth
Maybe when all the alcohol has ran out, the betting on lives has died
and all that is prohibited is a bitter run home hiding behind masks
since the house that warmed this apathy burns
throbbing with my search for acceptance, throwing it to my face
the ashes of utter disappointment.

Wasted on BMB

Easier for you to rip me out
rip me out, out of history
replace our ghost with
how long it takes a device
to catch my pulse.

You say I’m foolish, uncomplicated
when I saw you crystallized far further than your catalog chatter:
bringing the world up to speed to your gospel.

Lives

propel me towards the shade where it’s cool
I stand there looking relaxed for the earth’s surface
when I’m used for rejection, to what use to be
your nose raised shunning the soil that made me
you laugh a scandalous laugh, when you gave me too much rum
and distorted my start on the world
we’re good at saying goodbye to what created us and destroyed us: equally.

But this infinity is like a boomerang living right now in our lives:

dem, dat I see dem display as I walk to work
dem dat deir lives dat I left behind

their bodies prematurely bowed, and walking slow
scaving the ground for opportunity, saying how else
how else can you see.

Double Dose of Broad Strokes

Last month I did my radio show, Broad Strokes,  on Washington Heights Free Radio (WHFR), and it was a lot of fun.  I spent probably three hours listening to my collection, trying to find the right songs to play. I hope you enjoy what I came up with, listen HERE.

 

 

 

Playlist

 Sun by Caribou
Tightrope by Janelle Monae
Sprawl II Mountains Beyond Mountains by Arcade Fire
Hell’s Bells by Cary Ann Hearst
Maximalist by Baths
Sung (Not Said) by Magnetic Island
Normal by Envy
In the Fall by Future Islands (Featuring Katrina Ford)
Would Know by Mount Kimbie
Sleepless In Silver Lake by Les Savy Fav
Just For You by Object
Natural Selection by UNKLE (Featuring The Black Angels)
Aminals by Baths
Lady Daydream by Twin Sister
Junveniles by The Walkmen 

In August, I invited the experimental noise band The Boy With The Ice Cream Face to play an acoustic set, and they were fantastic. There’s banjo playing involved. You can listen HERE.

I’ll be on the radio again this coming Wednesday, October 27 at 8:00 p.m. with special guest:

She Keeps Bees

Rock duo from Brooklyn. These guys are awesome, I completely recommend tuning in. To listen go HERE.

Bringing you stories, live events, and much more, WHFR tries and remains independent of any corporate sponsorship.  So, if you like what WHFR is doing, you can donate by contacting us at info@whfr.org.  DIY forever baby!

Also, if you’re in a band or know someone who is, and would like to be on the show, please email me at roarplanet@gmail.com.

ScareCrow

I watched and learned too many times…

Because I have a friend who knows all about death
saw it with my own eyes, as we poked the body
“it,” said disgruntly let him win on things we argued over 
over gender, over sexuality as the waste made
the body morph into the unrecognizable.

What mattered to me, as we stared at the dismemberment of a self being lifted out the river, was holding somone’s hand. I didn’t want to hold his when I have on several occassions. On days we’ve kissed, on days our parents thought we were so cute together, because his hands were as filthy as mine, and he wanted to keep a namesake, when I had let go of all traditional. 

As I ran through the swamp, I ran home to my mother hoping she would recognize me
tell me who I’m from, who I followed, I found that she was perplexed as me and that I should ask her father about her origin.  She had forgotten he was dead like the rest of them.