Christmas Wish List

Dear Santa,

I've been an Audi admirer ever since my roommate from college, who's a mechanical engineer by the way, stepped into the Audi Family. I Love the new Audi Holiday commercial where the parents peel off with the Son's A6...hilarious.

Now Santa, I probably broke even this year on the Naughty vs. Nice scale, but I can't receive without asking, right? That being said...

I really would like an Audi R8. Black on Black. Manual. I'm not a huge fan of convertibles, but if on Christmas Morning there's a topless R8 in my driveway, I'll be fine with that. I can leave as much milk (skim, right?) and as many cookies as there is space on the kitchen table.

Seasonally Yours,
Damon Hamilton (yes, I still believe in you)

Halloween 2011...

Halloween man, never really been into it. All of my people from UPENN Track & Field have always been SUPER serious about the whole experience. I mean, cats spent days/weeks/months constructing their costumes prior to the 31st, and I must say, there were some pretty impressive get-ups...I just couldn't be bothered. I think my favorite was when Laethe & Joshua Coleman went as Spy vs Spy. Shit was hilarious. I think at the end of the night Laethe got into a fight and his white costume ended up with blood stains...ah, the trouble we used to get in towards the bottom of the bottle...

Anyway, so, because these people were my friends I, a) wanted to hang with them b) loved to witness other people's reactions to their costumes and c) had to somehow participate so that I wasn't the odd man out every year.

So, the first year i tried to get down with these people, the closet was my only place to pull from. It was the evening of, and I got the invitation to some Wharton party at some armory...Now, I have to be totally honest, the only reason I REALLY got a costume together was because you needed that in order to have free drinks all night...to hell with the peer pressure!!! - So, the BEST costume I could come up with...wasn't a costume. It was a color coordination that was supposed to resemble the character. So I got some white sweat pants...okay, true, no dude has white sweatpants. They were grey, but they were kinda white-ish on the inside so I turned them inside-out....The fact that I'm mentioning that, and mentioning it first, is to prepare you for the ridiculousness that was my halloween costume...I got a blue t-shirt, which was also inside out because of the white writing on the front. I got a white skully, and since this just wasn't enough, I pinned a stuffed sock onto my head...When all was said and done I looked homeless fo sho!
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any guesses? Right...I was a smurf. Since the costume was nothing short of retarded, I had to make sure I had my story straight when people so kindly asked "what the hell are you supposed to be?". Little did I know that despite the many laughs I got from telling the story, there was mostly silence as a form of reception...So, here's how it went...and it was a mixed crowd, but a fair amount of white folks, i mean, who could tell with all the masks and stuff anyway!!!

THEM: Who the hell are you supposed to be?
ME: Me? I'm nigga smurf
THEM: WHO?
ME: I said... Nigga Smurf!
THEM: Um, ooookay.
ME: Well, it would make sense that you wouldn't recognize me, the Smurfs came on during a time of racial discrimination, so, much like all black people used to die first in the movies, nigga smurf was excluded from most of the episodes. hahahahaha
THEM: silence...discomfort...scorn!

After a few drinks and a tip from one of my white friends, I changed it to Homey Smurf. I still kept to the story and as a result of changing my ways, I got a bunch of laughs, probably because people's minds went immediately to Homey the Clown...after all I did have a stuffed sock on my head...

So, the years went on and I started to improve my joints as a form of redemption. Now, understand, I'm a procrastinator, which really just means I work better under pressure, so most of the following outfits came together the day/night of Halloween:

'05 - 2 Pac 
- I had a flannel shirt. I had jeans. I had a bandanna. BAM!

'06 - Morpheus 
- I had a black trench coat. I had a lime green tie. I had sunglasses. BOOM!

THEN, i started to plan & buy my outfits, especially because those prior years, I just went to parties...but since '08...the DHP has been booked for halloween gigs each year, so the pressure continued to build. NOW, i actually have to plan a little bit in advance, etc... The motivation now is i can;t just walk by somebody unnoticed with a whack costume, I actually have to be on stage, and sing songs, and all that....so, i should probably come correct!

'07 - Mummy
- c'mon, mad easy, i just got wrapped up.

2008 - Steve Urkel...til this day, probably one of my best costumes, not that that's saying much. People always say I look like this dude anyway, so it's not like I had to become something else...lol

- tight, "high-water" jeans. Greenish/Brown Chuck's. Suspenders. Sweater vest. Nerd Glasses. BAM!

2009 - Lucky the Leprechaun...my 2nd best costume. 
- Red bolo hat with the 4 leaf clover attached. Green suspenders. Green Guiness T- shirt. Green Chux...Box of Lucky Charms - and i was eating them all night! - my 2nd favorite cereal behind Cap'n crunch, btw.

'10 - ???? - I actually cannot remember what my costume was last year....Isn't that crazy. Well, I remember the costume, but it was a gag/theme costume, and i can't remember the concept...so, until that comes back to me, we'll just leave it at that.


'11 - Akeem, Prince of Zamunda...not sure where this ranks, but I put a little more work into this than any other - jeweled necklace of styrofoam shapes (spray painted gold). Lion scarf assembly. Bought the King Crown...I'm just sayin...I came a long way! Can I get an amen!

Lady Gaga - Paper Gangsta

I’ll be honest, I didn’t even know who this chick was. Her name was being thrown around every which way in the media, but I didn’t feel like I had any insight as to why. Discovered by AKON. Taking the pop industry over. The new Madonna. What kind of name is Gaga…??? I guess that if people use your name enough, it doesn’t really matter…Truth. Come to find out…she’s DOPE! Great voice, crazy image, something different. Just dance? HOT. Poker Face? Crazy. Paparazzi? Bananas. Normally, if I like 2-3 of your songs, it’s enough for me to buy the album…Album is solid. My favorite joint is track 11:Paper Gangsta…

So, it’s confirmed. She’s a bad chick. Super pale, but she hangs with Beyonce and everyone jams to her tracks without hesitation. “you’ve been a bad bad girl gaga!” She’s racy, and she’s got this Grayson Chance kid on the map, who, by the way, should have a hard time knockin’ Justin Bieber off of his reign on the top of the virtually empty ‘tween pop market. Just my opinion.

The Sounds of South Street

Saturday Night. South Street. 4^th street intersection. 2^nd Floor. DHP. Venue windows open to share the sound with the neighborhood. Summertime…from 2 blocks away you probably only hear the bass guitar and the drum kick, from 1 block away, you begin to hear the electronic keyboards. As you approach Lickety Split, you are subject to the entirety of the DHP crew: keys, bass, drums, guitar, vocals, MC, and the synchronized hand claps.

It’s not JUST the DHP that has brought in the people who support live music: Guest appearances from Lydia Rene (www.myspace.com/lydiarene), Shon Penn ( ) accompanied by Range, and the hip hop live soul elements of Skizmatics, led by Emcee BX (www.myspace.com/skizmatics) are all the contributing factors to the growing population of people on 4^th and south street Philadelphia.

Lickety Split, a great little spot to rock out. Because of it’s storefront exterior speaker system, we were able to capture the attention of passers by, and add to the volume, yes, pun intended.

Congregation of live music lovers.

The best part of playing at this venue is that it’s 1 block away from Lorenzo’s, the BEST Pizza spot in the city of Philadelphia…hmmmmmmmm – the perfect reward for putting on an excellent show…

The DHP Logo: Version II

I don’t know what it is about anagrams and monograms, but I’ve always admired those kinds of graphic structures and arrangements. When I thought about designing a DHP logo in ’08 (when the band decided to officially title ourselves), I had letters in mind. I knew from my marketing background that in order to build a brand and have a comprehensive presence in any given market, it helps to be able to appeal to as many of the 5 senses as possible; We’ve got the ears part, now what about the eyes?

So, back in middle school and high school I always admired people who could draw, so I would try and get my sketch on during history class because that was, by far, the most boring subject for me. Anyway, I learned a couple of things here and there in a few art classes, but not enough to call myself a graphic artist. I did, however, pick up a knack for monograms. If I could scrounge up some of my old marble notebooks I’d post up some pix, but I’m sure they are long gone, along with my number 2 pencils & trapper keepers.

So, when I first started thinking of letter concepts, I came up with a few, found an actual graphic designer and the put it into digital motion. There seemed to be an element of satisfaction from myself and the band about the logo as it evolved into the 1^st official version (The image at the TOP of this posting), but L.A.Y.K. just didn’t entirely like it. He let us use it for almost 2 years, but always said that it needed something more. Something a little more Gothic looking. Some flourishes, some texture, SOMETHING. But we tried to build accents and other elements in and onto the old logo, but nothing really matched or jumped out. So after what I thought was an exhaustion of possibilities, I was randomly showing our awesome web & graphic Designer, Lori Menna (www.lorimenna.com) how to recreate the file and the design, and in doing so, I looked at it from a different angle and tried to alter it a bit…

SO…without further adieu: The NEW and IMPROVED DHP LOGO!!!!!!!

What Do July 4th, Idaho Falls, & Ludacris All Have in Common?

Never in my wildest imagination could I see myself spending any amount of time in Idaho, but as a groomsman when you’re invited to a bachelor party, you kinda have to go. As a black man headed to the middle of the wilderness, I can’t say that I was looking forward to the weekend with any considerable amount of excitement, but I allowed my twisted mind to find comfort in the word play of the most Traditional activity of ID4, FIRE-CRACKERS!!! (i'm just sayin', i would account for the entire minority population within a 500 mile radius of this place)

BTW - Who the hell knew that a ticket from the east coast to Idaho Falls would be upwards of $600!!! C’mon…what the hell could possibly be out there that airlines can inflate the prices to that degree?? I’m confused, and I’m black, so none of this is really easy for me to accept.

To try and cut costs, I flew into Salt Lake City, UT and rented a car. I got the car with the biggest engine in case I had to out run the Klan. Yes, that's my ignorance speaking, but better safe than sorry in the event that such an assumption is true. I made it from Utah into Idaho with no real problems, mainly because I made sure that I stayed well under the speed limit. Getting racially profiled and then arrested for driving while black was not an option. No offense to anyone from Idaho or Utah, but c’mon…how often do you see black people in person outside of maybe some professional teams around those parts…???

So, I pulled up the dirt road after winding through the mountains and valleys to a place that had no nearby neighbors other than a roaming grizzly and maybe Bullwinkle. This place, wasn’t your typical log cabin. I never knew that a mansion could be built out of logs. Literally a log-cabin mansion. 12 individual rooms throughout the place. Unreal.

Fast forward, I had to add some flavor to the weekend so instead of the ipod full of green day and pearl jam, (obviously this was a trip organized by white boys) I popped in my new Luda CD: Battle of the Sexes which, unbeknownst to me would serve as the perfect soundtrack for the entire weekend. It was a bachelor party, so that’s really all I can say about that.

Abracadabra!

June 26: Abracadabra

Bam! Just like that. The DHP jumps onto the scene with our first single. How do I feel about it? I’m hella EXCITED! It’s been a supa dupa long road yadda yadda yadda, but most of all, we FINALLY have a polished product that I am more than proud of. So proud, in fact, that it’s difficult to hear it and realize that it’s something that we created. We = D.O. Music Group. If it’s one thing that I’ve realized in life, it’s that nothing great can be accomplished alone.

Lucky for me, which btw was the name to the original “track”/ background music to “LUCKY” our next single, I have the best producer on the planet: L.A.Y.K. This guy is a friggin’ genius, and the chemistry that exists between us when we work in the studio is dynamic beyond boundaries. I listen to the original track for Abracadabra, for which I cannot remember the name, but I hear an astronomical amount of growth between then and now (both for him musically & me vocally). I want to say that the original track was written in ’06. I wrote the lyrics and vocal harmonies in ’07. And we’re releasing it in ’10.

Man. Nuff said. This process is crazy! It’s taken THAT long to release a single??? Wrong. It’s taken that long to "perfect" it. We could have released a single at the time that I first wrote to it, but for many reasons, that would have been not only a terrible idea, but also a poor display of our creative talent. We don’t need people to see the potential of our work, which was immature and premature up until this point; we want people to see the best end product possible. All of our creative and entrepreneurial efforts. All of our passion and emotion. All of our hard work and determination. Abracadabra: the beginning of a display of all these things. Welcome to the DHP, presented by D.O. Music Group…

The Grind: Equivalence

I'm a man driven by analogies. Not sure if that's because I don't always have the most elaborate of explanations when it comes to verbally expressing myself in a non-creative fashion, or because my perception of what I'm saying and what you're hearing is one of miscommunication. Either way, as we come closer and closer to completing this project, I realize more and more the importance of this so-called "GRIND". It applies to the universal process of accomplishing anything of importance. Analogy: Weightlifting/Strength & Conditioning. We can build strength by pushing weights repetitively OR by holding them in place. Your resistance is still gravity.

Right. So, anything that's worth anything will rarely come easy, and f it does, it's called a blessing, and should therefor be counted at least once a day. Now, when we're talking about music especially, it seems that the most common GRIND includes approximately 20 hours per day of labor...let's go

A Day In the Life of an Aspiring Songwriter

Wake up. Wash the face. Brush the teeth. I totally don't feel like flossing, so...maybe next time. Breakfast: Home made bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich. On lazy days, Dunkin' Donuts is right up the street. (as if finding my keys, getting my wallet, walking all the way down 26 stairs, getting in my car, setting my ipod nano to the necessary listening track, driving up the street, buying the supreme omelette on a croissant, driving down the street, walking back up 13 strairs, turning on the TV, finding the necessary morning breakfast programming, setting my tray up, and sitting down to eat requires less effort than just taking the few minutes to make some oatmeal or fry some eggs and bacon.) Check email for possible messages from Alicia Keys or Sony/Columbia Records...nope just plenty of spam and smut site solicitation. Probably tomorrow though. Vocal warmup. Sometimes scale exercises, sometimes singing female artists' songs way outside of my range. A lot of the time, a song that I know the chords to. Practice some finger scales on the keyboard. Weighted keys of course. As close to piano keys as possible without having a functional piano to play on. I have two piano's. One's a baby grand, and the other is an upright, neither can hold a note yet, but they look great as furniture in my house...more on that later. I also have two keyboards to electronically make up for their disfunction. Finger exercises, scales, playing classical and jazz songs I learned growing up. Love Bach, he's the man. Time to practice the songs that I've already written. Over and over and over again. If it's hot and I don't want to pay a whole homes worth of AC energy, I'll open the windows and plug in a fan. My practice spot in my living room is streetside in hopes that some record company or artist or fan hears me through the windows and rings the doorbell. Well, yeah, i play publicly too, but I'm just saying.