Black punk! AfroPunk takes over Brooklyn

Last night the fam and I attended the AfroPunk Festival at Commodore Barry Park in Brooklyn.

The festival, which started yesterday, is a two-day music festival and skate competition, which brought together some of the hottest acts in the afro punk scene (and some of the illest BMX riders and skaters in the game).

The festival line up included Erykah Badu, Gym Class Heroes, Janelle Monae, Das Racist, Skindred, Toro Y Moi, Reggie Watts, Spank Rock, Ninjasonik, The Memorials, Bad Rabbits, Gordon Voidwell, The London Souls, Cerebral Ballzy, Phony People, and Body Language, among others.

AfroPunk 2012 was sponsored by Nike, Vitamin Water, and media sponsors The Fader and WNYC.

If you’re not up on AfroPunk, let me give you a short primer.

AfroPunk is a movement devoted to the Black Punk scene in America.

It’s start can be traced to the 2003 cult film Afro-Punk, by James Spooner, whose film highlighted the growing alternative universe that is the Black Punk movement.

Yesterday’s event was particularly special because last year’s concert was cancelled due to hurricane Irene, and even with the sporadic rain fall, cats were not deterred.

By the time we got to the festival, around 6:30 pm, the line to enter the park was almost a mile long!

There were two main festival stages, a skate park, vendors, and food trucks out the wazoo.

AfroPunk had a contest to meet Erykah by Tweeting #Afropunk.

The highlight of last night for me, by far, was Erykah Badu, who closed out the show.

Even though I was near the back of the park, and Erykah looked like a plastic figurine from where I stood, her distinctive voice and songs, were all I needed to get my party on.

The park was packed with folks of all sizes, shapes and colors, all grooving to Erykah’s music.

I’ve been attending AfroPunk events for years, and this was, by far, the biggest event they’ve produced to date.

It was really special to see how much this niche brand has grown over the years.

If AfroPunk still perplexes you, I’d suggest you check out their website, or their Facebook page, which includes a butt load of photos from the event.

Get your punk on!

SoLoMo Profile: WeMakeCoolSh.it

The final company which will be presenting at ScenePR’s Starters+Startups: The Future of SoLoMo & You, is WeMakeCoolSh.it (whose name alone is cool).

I started my research on them, by once again, visiting their website, which is also very cool.

The WeMakeCoolSh.it website is way cool.

Being presented with a number of different thumbnails from which I could select, I opted for the top left box, where I learned about Matt+Mark, WeMakeCoolSh.it’s founders.

FYI, theses guys are BEASTS.

Their combined resumes are a veritable Who’s Who of agency luminaries, and include stints at Pepsi, Sony, Philips, IBM, Nike, American Express, DHL, MoMA, LEGO and TiVO (Matt) and R/GA , Organic, Tribal DDB, Ogilvy, Disney, CNN and Adobe (Mark).

From there, I headed back to the home page and clicked on the L Train Network box, which took me to the video where they talked about the pirate network they built for the L train in New York.

Since WeMakeCoolSh.it may be talking about their L Train project, I decided to dig a little deeper and check out more of the related content they offered on the site.

So I checked out the flyer they made to promote the L Train network.

This is the flyer that WMCS made to promote their pirate network.

I got lost on a few Sony Ericsson Xperia Studio videos, especially, this one:

After I perused a bunch of additional entries on their site, I decided to see if they had any apps in the iTunes app store.

They don’t have any.

But they have created two apps in the past (while with other agencies), one for Staples

This is an app created in a former (agency) life for the WMCS crew.

and another for XBOX.

This app isn't available any longer.

I looked for these guys on Facebook (and couldn’t find them) and on Twitter (and found them).

But I get that these guys ‘get it’ and won’t hold the failure to (be like sheep and) have a Facebook page against them.

I’m really looking forward to this presentation, and if I haven’t invited you yet, please try to come through and check out all the presenters on Wednesday, January 25, 2012 form 6:30 to 8:30 pm, at the Showbiz Store & Cafe, 19 W 21st Street, NY, NY 10010 (ground floor).

You’ve Arrived! Tips on Setting the Stage

A large part of branding involves setting the stage.  Creating the environment within which the impression of you will be made is a crucial part of managing your brand, and shouldn’t be overlooked.

Which entrance more positively impacts your brand:  showing up at an event and stepping out of a Mercedes Benz or showing up at the same event stepping out of a hooptie?  Clearly, unless you’re a clown, stepping out of a Benz is the more impactful entrance.

Each day, we make entrances.  Whether its what we wear, our hairstyles or our personalities, the way we ‘arrive’ helps to shape other people’s perception of us.  Since our entrance or arrival is something over which we have singular control, it bears some discussion.

If you’re going to a function, for example, its best to orchestrate your arrival, presence and departure, in such a way as to create the proper perception of you.  You’ve undoubtedly heard of the term ‘fashionably late,’ which, as you might image, has its roots in the practice of not showing up to a function until most of the guests had already arrived, ensuring that the maximum number of eyes would be on the entrant upon their arrival.  The guest who bore this moniker was two things: (1) fashionable (what good would it do to show up looking shabby?); and (2) late.

On the flip side, its best to always depart from a social engagement, prior to the balance of the other guests.  Having ‘another engagement’ to attend, is a sure way to create the impression that you’re in demand (whether its true or not).  Its also useful to extricate yourself from uncomfortable situations (such as showing up to a function that’s crap, and not wishing to stay a minute longer).

Be sure to tailor your appearance so that its signature.  Wear unusual articles of clothing, a pocket square or ascot, for example.  If everyone is rocking Kangols, you wear a fedora.  If everyone’s in Nike’s, grab yourself a pair of Greedy Geniuses.  Stay fashionably ahead of the curve.  Now this doesn’t mean that you should drop duckets simply to rock the latest gear (because that’s not fashionable, is it?).  But acquiring a choice piece of apparel every once in a while, to augment your collection of signature pieces, is a wise investment in you.

Know your audience.  SunTzu, in The Art of War, advises that before engaging in battle, one should know the terrain upon which the battle is to be fought.  Make it a habit to check out wherever it is you intend to go, in advance.  Get a feel for the place.  Is it a resturaunt? What’s their Zagat rating?  What have other diners said about the food? Service?  What are their specials?  How does one get there?  You should also have ‘dossiers’ prepared if you’re going to be meeting people, and be familiar with their personalities, etc.  This is especially true where you want to make a particular impression, and need to assess how you’ll be received.

Setting the stage may require a little bit of work, but the returns on your overall impression are well worth it, so do it right!