From the Desk of Excel Cruz

ULM's Recording Artist Excel Cruz Blog's for URBZLYFE.com


Waddup world!

I recently finished mixing Chike's debut mixtape "Truth Be Told Vol. 1". Here's a link for the free download.
DownloadI was lucky enough to finish it before my family from out of state came in. Maaaaan did they get me effed up!!! One day I actually threw up the next morning on the street! We went drinking 3 of the 5 weekdays they were here. Not a good look for me... Vodka will get the best of me :(.

Anyways, back to the music tip. My parents had told my cousin to talk to me about my career plans. My parents have yet to see the profits of being a rapper / audio engineer (in monetary terms, I really haven't either). I know they won't understand how to gauge progress in this career, its just a different beast, a different industry (both are accountants). I completely understand them though. When they were growing up in the Philippines, money didn't come easy. Financial security is a big thing to them. Though there is great pressure from them, at least so far audio engineering pays for my health insurance and phone bill. That's a victory for me for now!

Maybe a music video will show my parents the type of progress I've made in the music industry? Well either way, I'm doing one for "This Is Yours" (DownLoad) and a snippet of "Love Life, Live to Love" with KinemaGroup (www.KINEMAGROP.com). Justin Capadocia has great talent when it comes to videography. "This Is Yours" is the perfect storytelling track to showcase his strengths and creativity. He and I will be co-directing this. So far, we are scheduled to start shooting October 21st. I believe this will please my producers, The UrbanLegendz.

Now let me tell you how lucky of an artist I am. The Urban Legendz and ULM have ultimate trust in me. I mean, they have to, a track that we have been working "Love Life, Live to Love" ft. TeLuv has taken two years now to complete, and it's still not fully done. Let me take this time to let them know how grateful I am that I am one of their artist. THANK YOU!
Anyways, they are waiting on me to pump out a big hit for them. Before I thought they wanted a whole album, but its more about crafting that one career defining song, I'm at it... Slowly, but I really don't know how long their patience will last. The drama will unfold slowly. All I know, is for a team to work, communication and trust is a must!

I know they do like the fact I have been getting on blogs for "60 Bars (The Only One)" (Video). With the help of @KV_Rap, I've been on GlobalGrind, RockTheDub, PumptheBeat, The Beowolfe, and a French blog called RapCypher. I'm hoping to use that momentum to then push my remix of "21 N Up" with Chike (@chikethatruth). Blogs are an interesting outlet for new artists. It helps in that, at least it gets people to see that other people like your music, but in the end, the impact is little in the grand scheme of things. I don't know of any artist that has gained blog hype then got signed, its usually they get signed then all of sudden appear on all the blogs... Maybe I shall change that? [insert evil laughter sfx]...Cues The Urban Legendz Tag...

What do I have coming up?
I'm finishing the mixes and mastering for Aerias (@AeriasTheEmcee) sophomore album. A talented MC from Chicago who uses diverse beats. A lot of the beats are Rock and Blues infused. It's been a challenge but very fun to mix. I also am working with Yes Yes on his unnamed mixtape. While I'm doing this, my longtime friend, PJ Fournier and I will be making another Fournicasian project, titled, Foreign Relations. He's had his parts done for a while, I'm playing catch up. Hopefully I'll have this all done next time I post!

PEACE and LOVE ALL

-Excel