Happy Black Friday: My 'Mixed Chicks' Product Review

In celebration of Black Friday and good old-fashioned American consumerism, I decided to write a product review for today's blog post. The product I'm reviewing is the Mixed Chicks Leave-In Conditioner.

This post may qualify as the most superficial one I've ever written, but here goes:

A few months ago, I decided it was finally time to replace the bottle of Infusium 23 Color Defender Leave-In Conditioner that has been sitting on my bathroom sink since 2011.  I use it every time I wash my hair, but because I have such short hair, the 16-ounce bottle lasts forever - longer than it should. I don't know if hair products have an expiration date, but I thought three years was long enough.

For some reason, Infusium 23 Color Defender is very hard to find on store shelves. I like it because it doesn't have sulfates, which can dry out your hair if you're of African descent like me or another ancestry in which coarse, curly hair is a common trait.

During my futile search of several drug stores for this inexplicably rare brand of Infusium 23, I stumbled upon the Mixed Chicks Leave-In Conditioner.  The description on the bottle hooked me in:

Finally, a curl defining formula designed for "us." Whether you're black, white, Asian, Latin, Mediterranean, or any glorious combination of the above, you'll love the way this alcohol-free, non-sticky, lightweight product leaves your hair inviting to touch as it defines and locks moisture into every curl. Be a proud part of our multi-racial movement, show your curls and radiantly roll with "Mixed Chicks."

Since my hair is a sometimes stubborn mixture of straight, curly, kinky, wavy and frizzy, I thought Mixed Chicks would be the brand for me. However, at first I had sticker shock and was a little taken aback by the $19 price for a 10-ounce bottle of Mixed Chicks, since a 16-ounce bottle of Infusium 23 Color Defender runs about $8 or less.

I reasoned that Mixed Chicks must be a salon-quality product, and quality is worth paying a little more. Plus, by buying Mixed Chicks, I would be supporting a movement I very much believe in: celebrating and being inclusive of people of different backgrounds. 

In my bathroom, applying Mixed Chicks.

But in all honesty, I have to say that after a couple of tries with Mixed Chicks, I was unimpressed. The product fell flat, along with my hair. Mixed Chicks made my hair feel limp and weighted down.

While I applaud the company's mission of a product specifically designed for people of color and multi-racial individuals, it simply didn't work for me. Maybe my hair is too short and thin and the product works better for people with fuller, longer hair? Or maybe it's specifically designed for women?

So I ended up going back to my trusty old Infusium 23 Color Defender, which I finally found online at Amazon. And that nearly $20 bottle of Mixed Chicks? It's been sitting on my bathroom counter, where it may end up staying for the next three years.   

Reliable ol' Infusium 23 Color Defender 
is hard to find but worth the search.

What I'm Thankful For: My Interracial Family And All It's Taught Me About Diversity

I had planned to write a blog entry about my family at some point this week, which happens to be National Family Week, an observance designed to celebrate family and community connections.

This blog post about my family has taken on a special significance, given the Ferguson grand jury's decision not to indict white police officer Darren Wilson in the fatal shooting of African-American teen Michael Brown. This case has drawn a renewed focus to the simmering racial tensions in this country.

The fact that so many of us are divided along racial lines gives me a greater appreciation of my family's rich diversity. It truly is a gift, as overly sentimental as that may sound.

Me and my brother Doug in the late '70s

Both my parents are African American, and after their relationship ended, they both married white people. I have a white stepfather and two white stepmothers. I also have a brother and three sisters who are biracial.

Here's what growing up in an interracial family taught me:

To deal with people as individuals. Whenever I had a disagreement with my stepfather, race never entered my mind. That's not to say that I don't ever encounter racism, but my diverse background has enabled me to see beyond people's skin color and look at their individual personality traits.

To appreciate other cultures. I like all different kinds of music, from R&B to hard rock, and have a natural curiosity about other cultures. I've always been drawn to Latin American music and culture and am learning to speak Spanish.

To have friends of different races. I have friends of many different backgrounds, from politically conservative white males to liberal black females and almost everything in between.

To incorporate diversity into my writing. In my journalism, I'm naturally drawn to diversity issues. In my creative writing, coming up with characters of different races is totally natural to me.

I know it's corny and trite to say what you're thankful for on Thanksgiving, but I feel it's nonetheless fitting to do so.

Ferguson Fallout: 3 Things That Need To Happen Right Away

In light of the Ferguson grand jury's decision not to indict police officer Darren Wilson on murder charges in the Aug. 9 fatal shooting of unarmed teen Michael Brown, many of us are left shaking are heads, wondering when race relations are going to improve in this country and feeling powerless to bring about any real change.

The Ferguson case has shed new light on just how far apart blacks and whites still are in the way we view racial issues. Twenty-two years after the Rodney King beating at the hands of L.A. police and the ensuing riots, nearly 20 years after the O.J. Simpson verdict, and six years after the election of the nation's first African-American president, blacks and whites remain worlds apart.

This racial divide is represented in the way blacks and whites view the Ferguson case, with many whites believing there is no cause to believe Wilson acted inappropriately in shooting Brown and the vast majority of blacks believing Wilson should be brought up on murder charges.

However, it's important to note that the protests that have been taking place nationwide since Brown's shooting include people of all races.

However you may feel about the Ferguson grand jury's decision, many would agree that the problem of excessive force on the part of police, especially when it comes to young males of color, needs to be thoroughly examined. The Ferguson decision comes on the heels of yet another incident: on Sunday, Nov. 23, Cleveland police fatally shot a 12-year-old African-American boy, Tamir Rice, who was carrying a toy gun on a playground.

To prevent tragedies like this from continuing to happen, here are three things that need to happen right away, in my opinion:

President Obama should convene a special federal commission to examine excessive force by police, especially in minority communities. The commission could include a diverse group of legislators, community activists and legal scholars such as Michelle Alexander, an Ohio State University law professor and author of the best-seller The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.

A national law should be introduced to require standardized, intensive cultural sensitivity training for law enforcement. Maybe this is something the Congressional Black Caucus could take up.

A cultural diversity curriculum should be introduced in schools nationwide. There's been a lot of talk lately about the pros and cons of the "common core" method of instruction, but there should be a national, standardized diversity curriculum that students of all races should be required to take.

This diversity curriculum should increase in levels of complexity each year, like language learning. Students should be tested in cultural competence at certain stages, such as upon graduating from elementary school, middle school and high school.  

Preparing children to enter a diverse world and get along with different people is the only way the future is going to be better than the past or present.

Adventures In Social Media: What To Do When Tragedy Strikes... Someone Else

The timing of this blog post is totally accidental, although it's very timely. Is that a tautology?

Last week when I was concluding the latest installment of my "Adventures In Social Media" series, I randomly picked a topic from a long list of ideas I've been squirreling away. It was just by chance that I decided this week's topic would be on what to do when you find yourself in the very sticky situation of how to use social media when tragedy strikes - someone else.

 

I mean, is it okay to post good news or some random pop-culture trivia morsel on Facebook when some big, tragic event is in the news? Should you continue with your frivolous post if a friend, family member or acquaintance has posted about some personal tragedy like the death of a loved one?

It's ironic that as I write this blog post, the nation is holding its breath waiting on the decision from the Ferguson grand jury on whether police officer Darren Wilson will be indicted for murder in the Aug. 9 shooting of unarmed African-American teen Michael Brown.

Here's my dilemma: as an African-American male, I would be remiss to not blog about the Ferguson grand jury's decision. But it hasn't come down yet. And if the grand jury announced their decision on Monday, my latest "Adventures In Social Media" post might look like I'm avoiding the controversial Ferguson issue and merrily continuing to blog about silly stuff, oblivious to important things going on in the world.

So, after some soul searching, I decided to proceed with caution and do exactly what I'm doing: mention that I plan to blog about the Ferguson grand jury's decision when it's finally announced.

Now that I've addressed that matter, on to the rest of the topic of this blog: What to do when you're logging onto a social media site like Facebook to announce some good news or post some trivial item, only to see that someone has posted bad news: the death of a loved one, a job loss, a family member or spouse has been diagnosed with a serious illness, etc.

Say you've just seen Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part I and are eager to share your review with Facebook friends and get their reactions as well. But when you log on, you see that a friend has posted that his grandmother has just been admitted to the hospital with some kind of serious condition. Is it insensitive to go ahead and post about your moviegoing experience?

I don't think so. I'd say the proper etiquette would be to comment on your friend's post, letting him know you're thinking about his grandmother, and go ahead and post about Mockingjay. In general, I think people understand that life is not going to come a grinding halt for everyone around them just because they're experiencing a personal hardship.

This experience actually happened to me recently. I had planned to blog about a road trip with my grandmother to a cousin's wedding in, of all places, St. Louis, not far from the ongoing protests in Ferguson. I posted about the pending trip on Facebook and let everyone know to look for my blog posts.

Unfortunately, the trip was unexpectedly cancelled when I had to rush my grandmother to the hospital with a severe headache. My Nanaugh Pearl is doing just fine now, thankfully, and I certainly don't begrudge anyone who continued posting about anything and everything on Facebook after I announced my grandmother's hospitalization.

As much as I love my Nanaugh Pearl, I realize that the world doesn't revolve around me, my family and whatever issues I choose to disclose on Facebook. And so should everyone else who uses social media.

In the next installment of my "Adventures In Social Media" series, which I plan to publish on Monday, Dec. 1, I'll explore the dangers of fishing for compliments - and comments - on Facebook.

 

The NaNoWriMo 'Write-In' That Never Really Was

This past Wednesday, Nov. 19, I ventured to a library branch near my home on the east side of Columbus, Ohio. The occasion? An evening-long "write-in" for National Novel Writing Month, which challenges participants to write every day in November until they have a complete - or mostly complete - manuscript.

I'm not currently writing a novel, but I am co-authoring a nonfiction book with Chicago businessman Raymond Lambert about his legendary Chicago comedy club, All Jokes Aside.

I figured being among other writers in an environment filled with books would spur my creativity. Unfortunately, when I got to the library, there were two only people in the room that the library had set aside for  the write-in. And rather than aspiring novelists, both of them looked like students toiling away on homework.

Despite the absence of my fellow writers, I fired up my laptop and got to work. But after a half-an-hour, any sense of motivation I had when I walked in had long since disappeared.

It wasn't so much the fact that I was the only writer in the room that got me, it was   fatigue from not getting much sleep the night before. 

I guess I was a fool to believe I could be productive in such an exhausted state. But at least I got a little bit done. To quote the classic Doobie Brothers song "What a Fool Believes": "What seems to be is always better than nothin'..."

Author Zadie Smith: On Race, Writing And Parenting

Zadie Smith, the award-winning, Afro-British author who is known for bestsellers like White Teeth, spoke about her literary influences, being a mom and race relations during a Nov. 13 appearance at The Ohio State University’s Mershon Auditorium.

White Teeth portrays contemporary multicultural London, told through the story of three ethnically diverse families. The book has been translated into more than 20 languages and was adapted into a movie for British television in 2002.

Smith’s second novel, The Autograph Man (2002) won the 2003 Jewish Quarterly Literary Prize for Fiction. Smith’s third novel, On Beauty (2005), won the 2006 Orange Prize for Fiction.

Smith was born in North London in 1975 to an English father and a Jamaican mother. She graduated from Cambridge University with an English degree and is now a tenured professor of creative writing at New York University.

Smith has two children with her husband, Irish poet Nick Laird.

You can read complete coverage of Smith's Ohio State visit in the current edition of the Call and Post, Ohio's oldest and largest African-American newspaper.

Here are some "outtakes" of Smith's insights that we didn't have space for in the newspaper article:  

On why it's important as a writer to read the classics but develop your own writing style: "If you're going to write, you need to do something new. ... I thought, 'I'm going to write [stories that were influenced by the classics], but I'm going to insert my people in them."
 
On her diverse literary influences: "It's great to read Jane Eyre, but what's she got to do with me? .... I tried to find [literary] models [to emulate], particularly Kafka, whose writing seemed more like reality in a strange way."

On trying to pass on her feminism to her 4-year-old daughter: "[My daughter tells her friends], 'I don't have any Barbies, my mother doesn't believe in Barbies.' ... I'm not like my mother. I wear makeup and heels. That's what parenting is, realizing you're a hypocrite every minute of every day."

On her fascination with Jewish culture when she was growing up - even though she has no Jewish heritage: "I was preoccupied with other people's cultures ... [My brother and I] had a preoccupation to be of a different faith or a different culture."

On racial segregation in America: "I thought of my own neighborhood in England as more easily mixed."

On how the concept of social class in America compares to England: "One advantage of American life, it's not this kind of complicated history [of royalty and nobility]."

On how to bridge the gap between rich and poor: "You can put your kids in the same schools. ... Not private schools, schools where kids have a mixed experience."

On the history of slavery in the United States: "At the moment, I'm reading a lot of slave narratives... The thing I feel is that it is a miracle that you're all sitting here, given this total horror. ... It's created so much complexity between black women and white women, between black men and white men. ... It's as if you abused a child, you would expect that abuse to carry on for six, seven generations. It will take a very, very long time [to heal]."

On whether race relations will ever improve: "I'm both optimistic and despairing. I can't put it any other way."

 

Finally: A Movie That Challenges Stereotypes About Homophobia In TheBlack Community

One of the best-kept secrets in my hometown, Columbus, Ohio, is the Columbus International Film and Video Festival, which is currently going on and continues through Nov. 25.

One of the best aspects of the festival is that it promotes cultural diversity, featuring films from around the world made by and starring people of many different races. The festival also includes films that address LGBT issues, both in the United States and other countries.

The festival even included an evening of screenings this past Sunday featuring short films dealing exclusively with LGBT issues.

My favorite short from that night was Swadhisthana, an uproarious comedy which portrays African-American parents coping with the discovery that their teen son is gay. This film shatters the stereotype that blacks tend to be more conservative than whites when it comes to homosexuality because of religious and cultural factors. 

Rather than reject their son for his sexual orientation, lecture him about the error of his ways or try to "pray the gay away," the parents in Swadhisthana go overboard to show their son that they accept him unconditionally. At one point, the parents even dress up in ridiculous costumes and put on a skit in the living room to educate their son and daughter about tolerance.

With the mother wearing oven mittens on her head to represent a flower and the father wearing a black and yellow hazmat suit to look like a bee, the parents' skit conveys the message to their reluctant children that it's okay for flowers to be with other flowers and bees with other bees and they can still have "a life of honey."

Alessandra Pinkston and Stevie Johnson, the actors playing the parents, have excellent on-screen chemistry and very believably portray the parents' bumbling yet well-meaning antics. The son is played by Tyler Parks, whose understated performance challenges another stereotype: that gay men are effeminate and flamboyant. Parks' character is anything but.

Diana Reasonover, the young actress playing the daughter, is also a standout, delivering each line with the biting sarcasm and disdain for her parents appropriate for a girl her age.

Written and directed by Joel Mahr, the 20-minute Swadhisthana plays like a sitcom episode, but confronts serious subject matter head-on. The title, by the way, comes from a Hindu term referring to the second chakra and is represented in the form of a black lotus flower with syllables written on each petal in the color of lightning. 

I'm not exactly sure what the time means in relation to the plot, but the movie is definitely worth checking out if it ever comes to DVD, YouTube or some other distribution format.

A Little Movie With A Big Message

"I think that's the most healing thing to do, write something personal from your own experiences."

This quote is from acclaimed African-American filmmaker George Tillman Jr. speaking about why he wrote and directed the 1997 landmark movie Soul Food, which starred Vanessa Williams, Nia Long and Vivica A. Fox and went on to become a hit Showtime series. Making Soul Food helped Tillman move on after his first film, 1994's Scenes from the Soul, was shelved indefinitely by a studio that went out of business.

The fact that Scenes from the Soul never found an audience was especially painful to Tillman, since he financed the indie film on a shoestring budget of $150,000 that he painstakingly collected over the course of two years from everyday people who donated anywhere from $500 to $5,000. This was before the days of crowdsourcing sites like Kickstarter and Gofundme.

"These investors that we found were not investors who were doctors or lawyers," Tillman said in an interview featured in the excellent book Why We Make Movies: Black Filmmakers Talk About the Magic of Cinema. "They were investors like plumbers and guys who did regular jobs."

Having been vindicated by the success of Soul Food, Tillman has gone on to direct such critically acclaimed films as 2000's Men of Honor starring Robert De Niro and Cuba Gooding Jr., 2009's Notorious (the life story of rapper Christopher "Notorious B.I.G." Wallace) and the 2010 action movie Faster starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.

I recently came across Tillman's most recent movie, a delightful little film called The Inevitable Defeat of Mister & Pete (2013). It's a simple, well-made, coming-of-age story about two boys of different races whose unlikely friendship endures despite enormous obstacles.

Click here to watch the trailer for Mister & Pete

Mister & Pete tells the story of a street-smart African-American preteen named Mister (Skylan Brooks) and an innocent, baby-faced Korean boy named Pete (Ethan Dizon ). Pete's mom is abusive and he comes to stay with Mister and his mom, but when the police raid the apartment and arrest Mister's mom for drug possession,  Mister and Pete are left to fend for themselves over the course of an entire summer.                  

The movie has powerful performances by American Idol alums Jennifer Hudson, who is almost unrecognizeable as Gloria, Pete's meth-addicted single mother, and Jordin Sparks, playing against her squeaky-clean image as Alice, whose path out of the 'hood is by having an affair with a wealthy married man who showers her with gifts. Jeffrey Wright (The Hunger Games: Catching Fire) and Anthony Mackie (The Hurt Locker) have memorable cameos as a homeless man and neighborhood drug dealer, respectively.

Both Brooks and Dizon are skillful beyond their years, making their characters and the predicaments they find themselves in seem very believable. Brooks especially stands out in portraying Mister, who is unfortunately wise beyond his years because he's been exposed to way too many adult things.

Mister wants to be an actor and is convinced that he's going to be cast on a TV show that's shooting in Beverly Hills and he'll be able to rescue his little family from their hellish New York housing project.
 
One of the most touching scenes is when Mister is trying to make breakfast, but there's not enough cereal or milk. He looks momentarily depressed, but soon perks up when he notices the Eddie Murphy/Dan Akroyd movie Trading Places on TV. He recites every line by heart. This scene shows pop culture is the great equalizer, providing normalcy even when you're starving.

Another poignant scene is when Mister sees his mother shooting up and angrily tells her, "You're disgusting. I wish you would just die already."

Gloria looks hurt, and after a long pause, replies, "At least we got that in common."       

Mister & Pete is a bit depressing at times, but it has an inspirational ending and an important message: no one can make it on their own. It's a movie every filmmaker - especially filmmakers of color - should see.
          

Adventures In Social Media: Monitoring The Metrics Can Drive You Mad

Since I resumed regularly blogging on this site in August after more than a year of inactivity, this blog has logged more than 2,000 visits, for a total of more than 5,200 visits since I started the blog in 2011.

When I say "visits," I should clarify that I haven't yet figured out how to distinguish between "unique visits" and "page views." For example, one person could log onto the site and click through a dozen different posts. When the person first logs onto the blog, that's a "visit," and each time they click onto a different post, that's a "page view."

Figuring out how to use social media metrics such as these is one of the hardest parts of blogging. As with any creative endeavor, the act of creating is the fun part, while marketing what you've created is the hard, scary part.

I use Blogger.com to create this site and when I log into my account, the first thing I see is a number and a graph indicating the number of visits since I last logged on. I always close one eye and try to overlook these metrics, because I find it distracting to have numbers swimming in my head when I'm about to create a new post.

I've worked at newspapers for many years, and I can't imagine how any reporter would be able to do his or her job effectively if, when they walked in the newsroom, they were immediately bombarded with how many copies the paper sold the previous day. If the number was low, it would be depressing and make you wonder if all your hard work was in vain. If the number was high, it might give you a false sense of security and cause you to become a bit complacent.

I also recently discovered that when I log into my Blogger account, each post has the number of page views it has received listed beside it. I also try to ignore this number, which is sometimes embarrassingly low.

If I paid attention to the page views, it may discourage me from continuing to blog. Was it really worth the hour of my time and effort that I poured into writing that movie review if only five people clicked on it?

Another "metric" that I have decided to overlook, for the time being, is whether readers leave comments to my posts or not. So far, the only post that has generated a significant number of comments is the one I wrote on July 17, 2013, after a jury found George Zimmerman not guilty in the death of unarmed teen Trayvon Martin.

Obviously, the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case is an emotional topic that a lot of people have strong feelings about. I felt compelled to express my views about the case, but in general, I tend to steer clear of controversial subject matter. I tend to think it's far too easy to blog about hot topics just to drive traffic to your site and get people to leave comments.  

It takes at least 100 readers to generate just one comment for a given blog post, according to Problogger.net, an excellent site that offers tips for bloggers. Most people are passive readers, myself included, and usually don't comment on blog posts or news articles they read. 

So, obviously, if only five people read one of my blog posts, the odds of one of them leaving a comment is pretty low. The solution is, of course, to write posts that attract more readers and/or better market my existing posts. Easier said than done... 

I know savvy users of social media are supposed to constantly track how many hits their posts get and tailor their content to attract the highest response. But I've found that monitoring the metrics can drive you mad.

So I've adopted the mindset that, like the age-old tale of the tortoise and the hare, slow and steady wins the race. I'll continue blogging as a way to steadily build a readership over time.

I'm hoping those who enjoy this blog will also be interested in my various long-form projects, including my novel, The Chloe Chronicles (currently available on Amazon - shameless plug!), the documentary Lady Wrestler I made about little-known African-American female wrestlers (currently putting on the finishing touches), and the book I'm co-authoring with Chicago businessman Raymond Lambert about his legendary comedy club, All Jokes Aside.

This blog post is part of a series on "Adventures in Social Media." In the next installment, which I plan to publish on Monday, Nov. 24, I'll explore the very sticky situation of using social media after some tragic event has occurred - to someone else.

Prince Protégées Who Deserve A Second Peep

I recently came across a very interesting site on the blogosphere: The Beautiful Nights Blog, created by K. Nicola Dyes. As a lifelong Prince fan, I find this site to be a treasure trove, since it features interviews with many of the talented artists who have worked with him over the years. 

The name of the site, of course, is taken from Prince's infectious party jam "It's Gonna Be a Beautiful Night" from his '87 Sign o' the Times album.

Reading through the interviews on the site got me thinking about all the talented artists who have been deemed "Prince protégées" over the years. Many of the artists had a couple of minor hits, but never really broke out and became big stars.

A common theme among many of the artists is that their music is a hybrid of so many different styles that it was hard to market to a particular demographic. Their hard-to-categorize music had record execs and radio deejays scratching their heads and wondering, "Is it R&B? Rock? Pop? Who will listen to it? Everyone? No one?" 

Even legendary percussionist Sheila E., a working musician long before and after her time with Prince, has said she didn't like being forced to pick a "bin" for record stores to file her music in when she made her solo debut with '84's smash hit, The Glamorous Life. But Warner Bros. convinced her that she needed to pick the R&B bin, even though her music has such a heavy Latin jazz influence.

(You can read my review of Sheila's excellent new album Icon at this link: http://chrisbournea.blogspot.com/2014/08/icon-sheila-e-releases-new-album-memoir.html, and my review of her memoir, To the Beat of My Own Drum, is available at this link: http://chrisbournea.blogspot.com/2014/10/some-beats-about-sheila-es-memoir.html)

Here are a few of my theories on how some of the talented Prince protégées could have reached a wider audience:

The Family. This group never gets proper credit for their original 1985 recording of the ballad "Nothing Compares 2 U," which Prince wrote and Sinead O'Connor covered in 1990. O'Connor's version, of course, was the one that became a huge hit.

 

The Family came  together after The Time broke up when Morris Day decided to pursue a solo career, having garnered much-deserved attention for stealing many a scene in Purple Rain. Time members, singer/percussionist Jerome Benton, drummer Garry George "Jellybean" Johnson, and singer/keyboardist Paul "St. Paul" Peter joined saxophonist Eric Leeds and singer Susannah Melvoin (twin sister of Revolution guitarist Wendy Melvoin) to form The Family.

"When the Time disbanded, we all felt bad, because, they were a bad-ass band. But, everybody wanted to play and Prince wanted to hear people play," Melvoin told Beautiful Nights.

"He was also in a place where he was fertile with music. He said, 'We're like a big family here... I'm going to get [Peterson], because, people don't realize what a bad-ass singer he is. You guys will be the lead singers in the band. We're gonna do this, we're gonna play together. How about that?'”

The group released their 1985 self-titled debut album on Prince's Paisley Park Records and scored a minor hit with the song "Screams of Passion." After the group disbanded in '86 after just one album, Prince incorporated several members into an expanded version of the Revolution, which is featured in the music video for "Mountains."  

The Family could have gone on to greater success if they had stayed together and opened for Prince on his world tour for Parade, the soundtrack to the movie Under the Cherry Moon.

Good news for fans of The Family: the members have reunited in recent years under the name fDeluxe, released new albums, Gaslight and AM Static, and have been playing live dates (check out this video of the group performing "Screams of Passion" in New York City). For more information, visit http://www.fdeluxe.com/.

Mazarati. This group scored a couple of hits from their self-titled '85 Paisley Park album, including "Player's Ball" and "100 MPH." Mazarati's music was primarily played on BET and R&B stations, but the group's sound was a unique hybrid of Dazz Band-style funk and '80s "hair metal" similar to Quiet Riot ("Cum on Feel the Noize").

 

Mazarati could have experienced greater success if it had teamed up with other groups who fuse rock, funk and R&B like Fishbone and Living Colour. A world tour featuring these unique acts would have been a real treat for the legions of overlooked black rock fans around the world.  

 

Jill Jones. My fellow Ohio native has a long history with Prince. She can be seen singing background in her lingerie in his "1999" music video alongside keyboardist Lisa Coleman. She also played the First Avenue Club waitress in Purple Rain and one of "The Kid's" love interests in 1990's Graffiti Bridge (which was kind of a sequel to Purple Rain).

In 1987, Jones' self-titled debut album was released on Paisley Park. Prince's distinctive production style and even his background vocals can be heard throughout the album on the funky "Mia Bocca," jazzy "Violet Blue" and, of course, her cover of the sentimental ballad "With You."

(Prince originally recorded "With You" for his self-titled '79 sophomore album. It's a rarity in that it's a Prince song with a bit of a country flavor to it, similar to Madonna's "Crazy For You.") 

 

Jones could have reached a wider audience if, instead of an R&B artist, she had been marketed as a pop/rock singer in the style of Pat Benatar, The Bangles lead singer Susanna Hoffs, and Patty Smyth, lead singer of Scandal (known for hits such as "The Warrior" and "Goodbye to You"). Jones' strong rock influence can be heard on songs such as "All Day, All Night" from her Paisley Park album.

Jill Jones told Beautiful Nights that her mixed-race heritage is partly why her debut album didn't catch on with the public - she wasn't "black enough" for black fans, nor was she "white enough" for white fans.

"It was a really ace album, but, the timing was way off. I don't think everyone was ready for it. Radio wasn't looking for it," Jones said. "There's a rap convention in Atlanta that I went to and people came up to me saying, 'You're black? I didn't know you were black! I would've played your record.' I just came back to Prince, like, 'Should I just get a tan?' White people somehow knew I was black and they said, 'I'm not playing that house Negro on the radio.'"

This is an interesting dilemma, since Prince has always been able to seamlessly blend musical styles, cross racial boundaries and appeal to people from all walks of life. But somehow, this transcendent quality didn't translate to the artists he tried to groom for success.

 

Random Thought Of The Day: Coping With Boredom

Random thought of the day: When you're at an event listening to someone drone on and are so bored you'd rather be watching paint dry, use that time to meditate on what you really want out of life:

To not be so bored that you have to meditate!

Here's Why The '90 Minutes For 90 Days' Challenge Didn't Help Me Finish My Book

I recently embarked on a challenge I came across on the self-improvement site Life Hacker: for 90 days, devote the first 90 minutes of your day to the project you feel most passionate about. (Here's the link to the article: http://lifehacker.com/work-on-your-passion-project-for-90-minutes-every-day-f-1624864678)

I got really excited about the challenge, thinking it would help me complete the last few chapters of the book I'm co-authoring with businessman Raymond Lambert on his legendary Chicago comedy club All Jokes Aside (You can read my most recent update about the book at this link: http://chrisbournea.blogspot.com/2014/09/all-jokes-journal-avoiding-predictable.html)

I'm still working on the book and the "90 Minutes for 90 Days" challenge really didn't do a whole lot to help me with the project. Here's why:

Like many people in modern life, I'm juggling countless work responsibilities with trying to have a personal life. I'm single, have no kids and I don't date very often, but I have a large social network of family and friends. So my perpetual struggle is how to make adequate time to pursue all my writing and other creative pursuits while balancing a full-time job and a couple of freelancing gigs with staying in touch with everyone. It ain't easy.

I found that the "90 Minutes for 90 Days" challenge just gave me something else to feel guilty about: I haven't talked to my mom in over a week and I didn't get up early enough to get my 90 minutes in before reporting to my day job.

I think the "90 Minutes for 90 Days" challenge is more suited to people who have the time but are lacking the motivation to start some big project like writing a novel or movie script, composing songs for an album, or starting a scrapbook. And I think the challenge would work best if at least two people take it on together so they can check in with each other every day to make sure they logged in their 90 minutes.

I started the challenge on Sept. 15 and was supposed to continue through Nov. 1, but pretty much abandoned it by the middle of October.

Here are a couple of my journal entry from the beginning of the 90-day challenge: 

Monday, Sept. 15, 2014
Came home from day job and fell straight asleep, woke up around 10:30 [p.m.] and managed to get in my 90 minutes, working until shortly after midnight on the All Jokes book and updating my blog.

Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2014
Got in my 90 minutes, but spread [them] throughout 10 minutes of my lunch hour... and working throughout the evening, laying down and resting a lot in between working on the All Jokes book and blogging. A late-night trip to the corner Speedway store to buy Hot Tamales candy got me through.

Here's an entry from the middle of the challenge, when I was starting to lose steam:

On Friday, Sept. 26, I didn't get in my 90 minutes. But I worked pretty much all day on the All Jokes book on Saturday, Sept. 27, and Sunday, Sept. 28, so do those countless hours I spent working on these days [make up for] the days that I didn't get to the 90 minutes?

On Monday, Sept. 30, I came home and was so tired from deadline pressures [from my day job and freelancing gigs] that I fell asleep before 8 [p.m.]. This was pretty much the pattern all week, through Friday, Oct 3.

On Saturday, Oct. 4, I got all of 15 minutes in on the All Jokes book, although I have been blogging each day, so does that count? I caught up with my mom, niece and nephews, went to a movie [The Equalizer with Denzel Washington] and out to eat at Chipotle.

Sunday, Oct. 5
For the past week, I basically have been off track with my 90-day challenge. ... [But] I feel like I'm getting back on track with my 90 minutes, although I had to skip church again and it's been about two months since I've been and I don't like feeling like I'm neglecting the spiritual part of my life. Maybe I'll start going to Wednesday Bible study when time allows.

What the "90 Minutes for 90 Days" challenge did do for me is got me in the habit of waking up earlier, between 4 and 5 a.m., to start working on my various projects. And that has been a tremendous help, so I did get something out of the challenge, after all.

'Outrageous' Film Documents Life of Show Biz Legend Sophie Tucker

My hometown of Columbus, Ohio, may be "flyover" territory, but my city is host to several important film festivals that bring top talent from all over the world to the heartland.

One of those festivals is the Columbus Jewish Film Festival, which is going on now and continues through Nov. 16. During the festival, I happened to catch an excellent documentary about a fascinating woman who was one of the biggest show business legends of the 20th century: Sophie Tucker.

The Outrageous Sophie Tucker opens with a vintage clip from the early '30s of Tucker warbling a jazz number. My first impression was that her delivery was surprisingly soulful for a white woman.

As the documentary goes on to relate, Tucker, although she was Jewish, was known for singing jazz in a style popularized by African Americans. Black performers would tell her, "You know you're black, don't you?"

Interestingly, Tucker began her career by performing in blackface, imitating African-American singers. Because her voice was so strong and infused with soul, she was known as "the best of the coon-shouters."

Thankfully, Tucker soon outgrew this racist tradition and went on to become not only world-famous, but an open-minded individual who had friends of all races and wasn't afraid to stand up to racism. When Josephine Baker received bomb threats when she was scheduled to open for Tucker at the Copa club in Florida, Tucker spoke out and said she fully supported Baker, so they may as well bomb her, too. The show went off without a hitch.

Watching The Outrageous Sophie Tucker, it's easy to see that many female entertainers who have gained fame since her death in 1966 at the age of 80 owe her a debt of gratitude. Tucker was the Madonna of her day, a shrewd businesswoman and savvy marketer who endorsed products and gathered the contact information of everyone she met so that she could send them personal invitations to her concerts when she played their town.

As Tucker once famously said, "Success depends on your ability to make and keep friends."

Tucker was also known for bawdy humor that influenced the likes of Bette Midler, who appears in the documentary. A sample of Tucker's naughty wit: "I believe in tit for tat. And someone owes me a lot of tat."

As an unashamedly voluptuous woman in an industry that has always placed an overemphasis on being thin, Tucker was also a forerunner of women like Queen Latifah, Adele and Mo'Nique who aren't ashamed to celebrate their curves.

The Outrageous Sophie Tucker is just one of the outstanding films featured in this year's Columbus Jewish Film Festival. For more information, visit http://columbusjcc.org/cultural-arts/film-festival/.

Why Is Fortune Fleeting For Some Who Are Famous?

I was surprised when singer Shanice Wilson and actor
Flex Alexander came on The Tom Joyner Morning Show recently to talk about how they're working their way back from the verge of bankruptcy and homelessness. They're documenting their journey to rebuild their lives, careers and finances on Flex & Shanice, their new reality show on Oprah Winfrey's OWN channel.

I was surprised by Flex and Shanice's financial woes because I'd assumed they have enough of a body of work between them that even if they haven't been in the spotlight in recent years, they could live off royalties.

I never actually watched Alexander's sitcom One on One, which aired from 2001-06 on the now-defunct UPN network. But I thought since it ran for five seasons, enough for syndication, that Alexander and the show's other breakout star, Kyla Pratt, would receive healthy residuals from reruns.

And I've been a fan of Shanice since my freshman year of high school in 1987, when her debut album was released and the songs "Can You Dance" and "No 1/2 Steppin" got heavy rotation on BET and R&B radio. And her Grammy-nominated "I Love Your Smile" is one of my favorite feel-good songs of all-time.

Flex and Shanice's career struggles exemplify how fickle the entertainment industry is. Those who are savvy use the notoriety they gain during their brief moment of fame as a launching pad for other enterprises.

For example, Carol Burnett related in her memoir This Time Together: Laughter and Reflection that Lyle Waggoner, her handsome co-star on The Carol Burnett Show, always had a nose for business and would charge for autographs.

Subsequently, when acting roles began to dry up in the late '70s in part because of being typecast as a heartthrob, Waggoner became a businessman. In 1979, he started "Star Waggons," which serves film/TV companies with rental trailers.

Flex and Shanice were also savvy to come up with the idea for their reality show and pitch it to OWN. I hope the show enables them to gain financial security for themselves and their two children. If nothing else, with 14 years of marriage under their belts, they can be proud of having one of the most successful marriages in show biz.

Adventures In Social Media: Was It Something I Said?

I sat on a park bench eating lunch in the luminous sunshine, enjoying a beautiful late October day.

As I chomped into my sub sandwich, I noticed a friend walking by. I took a swig of water, preparing to say hi to my friend as she walked by. I smiled and began to raise my hand to wave hello...

And then the funniest thing happened. Not funny ha ha, but funny odd. My friend kept walking by as if she never saw me.

It was possible my friend didn't see me. I wasn't sitting in her direct line of sight. And since this was lunch hour during a weekday, she could have been preoccupied and simply didn't notice me in her rush to get back to work.

But I couldn't help but wonder, was it something I said? More to the point, did my friend ignore me because of the comment I'd made to her Facebook post the previous day?

So that I don't actually offend my friend if she comes across this blog, I'll just make up a hypothetical Facebook post. Let's say my friend posted about how great the Internet is because you can watch pretty much any movie for free. And let's I responded with a snarky comment like, "Yeah, isn't illegal downloading convenient?"

In my mind, it was clear that I was just joking. But maybe my friend thought I was being a goody two-shoes, sitting in judgment and accusing her of piracy.

First of all, why post about a given topic if you don't want to spark a debate? It's silly to expect everyone's opinions to agree with yours.

With my comment to my friend's Facebook post, I didn't intend to come across as judgmental, just funny and sarcastic. But you never know how people are going to respond to a comment, especially in print or online. When you're conversing face to face, you can pick up clues from someone's facial expression, body language and tone of voice that they're joking. But if you were to read a text of what they said, all context would be totally lost.

Those of us who venture onto social media walk the fine line of expressing ourselves freely and being cautious to censor ourselves so as not to offend. This is especially true for writers and other creative types and entrepreneurs who use social media to try to engage potential readers, customers, etc.

You can't engage people if you're being totally safe and boring. On the other hand, you run the risk of alienating people if you're too outspoken and are always sounding off about your views on race relations, politics, religion, abortion and other controversial issues that people often avoid in "polite" small talk.  

And the dilemma over what and how much to say online is compounded by the fact that many employers these days do social media searches on potential and current employees. So one un-wise post or comment on Facebook or ill-conceived Tweet could cost you a job.

That's not to say that we should live in fear that "Big Brother" is watching us, but putting some thought into what you post on social media sites - and how and if you comment on what others post - is absolutely necessary if you want to remain gainfully employed.

As cowardly as it may be, there are certain Facebook posts that I won't comment on with a 10-foot pole. I'm constantly amazed that some people think it's okay to post racist, sexist or homophobic jokes, extremely partisan political rants and foul language on Facebook and other sites.

I've known people who have gotten in hot water because of complaining about their jobs on Facebook. Perhaps it's wrong, or at the very least childish, for coworkers to tattle about an employee's complaints about the company on Facebook. Venting in public may help you blow off a little steam, but it could also compound the stress you're already under by putting your very livelihood at stake.

I haven't seen or spoken to my friend since that gorgeous fall day in the park a few weeks ago. But I'm hoping that when we do see each other again, she won't hold anything I said online against me.

This is part of a series on "Adventures in Social Media." In next week's installment, in a blog entry I plan to post on Monday, Nov. 17, I'll review the experience of maintaining this blog since I began actively posting again in August after nearly a year of inactivity.