My Interview

Bay Area Songstress Cooking Up Hot Ish on Her new Album--"A Taste"....

You may have seen the highly talented Bay Area artist, Siaira Shawn, perform at various venues around the Bay. Well now you have the chance to bring her music into your bedroom—by purchasing her new album, A Taste!

We were able to sit down with Ms. Shawn and talk with her about her new album, her background, and her thoughts about the music industry.


Aida: Where are you from?
Siaira Shwawn: Frisco baby!

Aida: How long have you been singing
Shawn: All my life, since like 3.

Aida: When did you begin to sing professionally?
Shawn: Hmm..I guess like 3 years ago.

Aida: Which musicians and what types of music influence you the most?
Shawn: All kinds, I'm really influenced by vocalist, people who can really sing and have fun with their vocals, also people who are individuals and not afraid to be themselves in their music, so someone like Nina Simone to Jill Scott to Santogold.

Aida: What is your best performance experience?
Shawn: Off the top of my head, I performed at sfstate(my alma mater!) almost a year ago at this youth turf dance event and it was packed with mostly teenagers and I performed one of my songs and I got so much love after and when I was singing these girls in the audience were already singing my hook and dancing, so that was really fun. I fed off the audience, so I had a great time.


Aida: What is the name of your new album?
Shawn: The album is called A Taste.

Aida: What is the theme of this album?
Shawn: The theme is kind of the arc of a relationship, from the start to finish and all the things you can go through and it's just a small taste of me, my voice, my words, I have alot more to give!

Aida: Who produced the album?
Shawn: I had about 3 producers, these young men out of oakland- Mr. know-it-all produced the most, TK, Bracy

Aida: Did you work with any other artists on this album?
Shawn: Well I wrote everything, but I have one feature, this fresh poet/rapper Talia on my song "intimate" and it was mixed by the producer Mezmetic.


Aida: What are some of your favorite tracks on the album?
Shawn: Hmm..prob Be Brave, Rip It Out, What would you do, and Settled, Fall Back, and Intimate..lol..I'm pretty satisfied with them all.

Aida: How do you feel about state the hip hop music industry
Shawn: Well hip hop specifically, I think indie and underground hip hop is flourishing and doing really innovative things. Mainstream is faltering and not making music that is touching people or truly relevant,there's a lot of dysfunction and ignorance being amplified a lot of the artistry is lacking, but production wise, I'm loving the experimentation overall.

Aida: What advice can you give an up and coming artist trying to make it as a singer?
Shawn: Work hard, believe in yourself and your art and do for self, don't wait for anyone to help you or give u a chance, cause you will be waiting awhile! But, when you start doing for yourself, things and people start to come to you.

Aida: Anything else you would like to add?
Shawn: My music is based in love, so everything I do, my art, my activism, my life is based on putting out positivity and love and trying to make change. And I'm trying to raise literacy with my lyrics so listen close!lol. oh and check out bgcamerica. blogspot. com, its my little blog.


You can check out sample tracks of A Taste on Ms. Shawn's myspace page. There will also be a record release party for the album at Eve, Saturday June 7th at the Velvet Lounge in Oakland. Make sure to go check her out and get "a taste" of a Bay Area treat!

New Jersey 4

Case that happened awhile ago, but finally some results and a little more attention is being paid. Like the Jena6 and SF8, these women were persecuted and wrongly accused by "the law", but they did not get nearly as much attention or public outcry for justice. I'll let you wonder why....

GOOD NEWS! Renata Hill and Terrain Dandridge have had their convictions reversed on appeal! Please see the discussion board for continuing updates on their situations.

In the summer of 2006, seven young Black lesbians from New Jersey—Patreese Johnson, Renata Hill, Venice Brown, Terrain Dandridge, Chenese Loyal, Lania Daniels, and Khamysha Coates—were hanging out on the pier in New York City's West Village when Dwayne Buckle, a man selling DVDs on the street, sexually propositioned Patreese. Refusing to take no for an answer, he followed them down the street, insulting and threatening them: “I’ll **** you straight, sweetheart!”

It is important to understand that all seven women knew of another young woman named Sakia Gunn, who had been stabbed to death under very similar circumstances—by a pair of highly aggressive, verbally abusive male strangers. At least some of the seven had known Sakia personally.

During the resulting confrontation, Buckle first spat in Renata’s face and threw his lit cigarette at her, then he yanked another’s hair, pulling her towards him, and then began strangling Renata. A fight broke out, during which Patreese Johnson, 4 feet 11 inches tall and 95 pounds, produced a small knife from her bag to stop Buckle from choking her friend—a knife she carried to protect herself when she came home alone from her late-night job.

Two male onlookers, one of whom had a knife, ran over to physically deal with Buckle in order to help the women. Buckle, who ended up hospitalized for five days with stomach and liver lacerations, initially reported on at least two occasions that the men—not the women—had attacked him. What’s more, Patreese’s knife was never tested for DNA, the men who beat Buckle were never questioned by police, and the whole incident was captured on surveillance video. Yet the women ended up on trial for attempted murder. Dwayne Buckle testified against them.

The media coverage was savage, calling the women such things as a “wolf pack of lesbians.” The pro bono lawyers for the young lesbians would later have to buy the public record of the case since the judge, Edward J. McLaughlin (who openly taunted and expressed contempt for the women in front of the jury all throughout the trial), would not release it. As of late August 2007, the defense team still didn’t have a copy of the security camera video footage. And after the better part of one year spent sitting in jail, four of the seven women were sentenced in June 2007—reportedly by an all-white jury of mostly women—to jail terms ranging from 3 1/2 to 11 years. The oldest of the women was 24, and two of them are mothers of small children.