Wow, wow, wow. That may have been the best birthday ever. I had a blast, and returned from Hippieville to an overflowing inbox of birthday wishes from all of you!! YAY!!! Thank you all so much for making my life richer. Seriously!
I will post so much more about Langerado when I have the energy and time (if you want more right away, read the CrossFade blog written by my homies at the Broward New Times) I just got back last night and I have to hit the salt mines running at top speed. But I will say this for now —
1. PLEASE no spoilers for The Wire yet! I think I already know what happened =(
2. Arrested Development is back, y’all! They put on an incredible show. It was a beautiful moment to be a part of. At the end, Speech declared “17 years of positive hip hop! Please support our new album!” I did, and so should you! They were amazing and I was so proud to be there.
3. The Roots KILLED IT. Oh my goodness. I think that ranks in my top five live music experiences of all time. If you’ve never seen The Roots live, get yourself a ticket the next time they come around your way. You will NOT be disappointed! As soon as those Langerado vids start cropping up on YouTube (and they will), I will try my best to post their performance of The Next Movement. I can’t even describe its awesomeness in words.
I took the above photo on Friday afternoon, which was a gorgeous day at the fest. I asked this beautiful, radiant couple if I could take their photo for my site (didn’t get their names. Thank you for allowing me to photograph you!) Why, you ask? Because they looked so happy, so in love, homegirl’s dress was GORGEOUS, and also because I wanted to prove a point to a friend of mine, who was all like, “don’t you feel weird about going to a white-people hippie festival?” Huh? First of all, hippies come in all colors, believe me. There were lots of brothers and sisters out there moving and grooving amongst the sea of corduroy patchwork and tie-dye. Second of all, NO! I didn’t feel weird at all. I love live music, and I love meeting new people. I refuse to limit myself to attending events based on what I expect the audience will be like. I say go out, have fun, make some new friends, try something different for a change, get out of that ridiculous box you’ve put yourself in.
I got my birthday wishes, and then some! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend, and I’ll choose Creme of Nature winners ASAP. I’ll hit y’all with a fresh post as soon as I am able! For now, here’s a throwback from 1992. Does that make you feel old? WOW, that feels like a long time ago. But this song has aged like wine, and everybody — I mean EVERYBODY — was singing along at their show. Amazing!
Happy Monday to you all!
** editor’s note — I’m thinking the people who keep asking is the above photo is of me haven’t been regular visitors to the site. This is me. The photo above is NOT me, it was a beautiful couple that allowed me to take their photo. So once again just to clarify, the above photo isn’t me, and that isn’t my husband. But they’re gorgeous, right? Black hippie love. What a beautiful thing.
Hey Bella,i’m happy that you enjoyed your birthday, vacation,and the festival.I am one of those people who need to step out of my box.I like The Roots, Arrested Development,and The Opera.
Bella, I am glad that you had a great birthday weekend! I love, love, love Arrested Development and appreciate you getting my work day started with a classic! I’m going to the New Orleans Jazz Fest and hope to catch The Roots there – the lineups are so awesome I still haven’t decided which day I’m going to attend.
Happy Belated Birthday! I’m glad you had a great time at the festival. Thanks for giving us the 411. I agree with you about limiting yourself because of what people think. I like you, love live music especially music festivals. But I have ecclectic taste and I love everything from alternative rock to jazz, so I have gone to festivals and concerts by myself to hear music I love. If you did everything based on what people thought about it, you would not do anything at all. That’s why you have to do what makes you happy and sounds like that’s exactly what you did and it made you very happy.
Bella is that you and your husband in the pic? So beautiful! You seem happy and that alone is so powerful.
-MY
Happy belated birthday Bella!
Many many more! With Arrested Development starting this Monday morning, what could be better?
It’s a beautiful thing.
Happy Belated Birthday Patrice! You celebrated well. I wish you many more birthdays. The ROOTS are the TRUTH! YAY Arrested Development is back! Umm, about the dress homegirl is wearing, cute.
Keep the fab Bella postings coming.
Happy Belated Birthday Bella! I’m glad to see you had a good time. I thought that was you in the picture with your husband but realized it wasn’t. Did you get a chance to ask her where she got her dress? I’ve been looking for dresses like that for a while now! Anyway, you should never have to explain who you are or the music that you like to other people. I love listening to live music and love different types of it, from alternative and rock to jazz and hip-hop. Man, I wish I was there, I adore the Roots AND the Beastie Boys. Maybe next year I’ll go when I don’t have any d**n exams to take. =[
Welcome Back and Happy Belated Birthday. My mommy’s bday was this weekend too!
As for the Roots? They are amazing live. So glad you had a great time.
Happy belated birthday ‘Bella. As an original Hippie, I hear ya’ on the festival – I know it was a lot of fun and good music. Glad to hear that Arrested Development is back!
Happy Belated Birthday Bella! As a HUGE fan of live music, me thinks you had THE perfect birthday 🙂
I saw the SJ& The Dap Kings earlier this year and posted video and a concert review on my blog. They are AMAZING. As are The Roots. I also got video of them during the Hip Hop Honors Tour with MC Lyte and Big Daddy Kane. What a show indeed! Black Thought is the illest! Seeing him rhyme with Big Daddy Kane…no words. I fell back in love with REAL hip hop that night.
I saw THE Bella, Jill Scott this weekend in Philly. You want to talk about an out-of-body experience. There are no words for this woman’s live show. I’m still high. Snuck some vid of that in too 😉
Again, glad you had a great time! *hugs* That pic is beautiful!
SO glad you had a great birthday. My friends call me a Hippie. We come in all colors and shades. The festival sounded heavenly.
I’m so glad you had fun! Aren’t The Roots great? I wish we had more artists like them. Maybe you could do a post on Estelle?! She’s great singer, did a track with Kanye and is from England.
Happy Belated Birthday Bella! I’m glad you had an awesome time. I love me some live music. The Roots and the Beastie Boys. I love the BB, especially their latest CD which is so cool to have playing during my yoga practice. I might have to make that festival next year. Love, peace, and lip gloss.
hey bella,
glad you had a great time.
i’m with you, hippies do come in all colors! we miss out on a lot of wonderful things thinking we’ll feel out of place.
You never know til you get there, and if you do leave =)
Hey Bella! I am glad to see that you had an awesome birthday!!!!
Thanks for the throwback Arrested Development…that songs still gets me grooving!! Have a great week!
I’ve not been here in a while. I love your new blog look. That couple looks so radiant indeed. Happy belated Earth Day. I thought you would talk about trini carnival 🙂
Blessings!
Hi Bella, long time no post! LOL!
Happy belated birthday! And thank you for Arrested Development throwback. Great music never gets old!
Happy you had a good birthday Afrobella! I can’t wait to see the Roots and Arrested Development at the Beale Street Music Festival in Memphis the first weekend in May. I have seen Arrested Development in concert and was completely in awe. I am SO excited! The video is a great throwback. What is your favorite Roots song?
WOW. I was just talking about Arrested Development with my mother the other day, wondering where they were…
The concert sound like it was a lot of fun.
Happy belated birthday, Afrobella! You look so beautiful and happy in this pic.
I was just listening to my Arrested Development CD (the live one they did for MTV unplugged) and was wondering what happened to them. I will check out the new CD, for sure.
Welcome back and happy belated birthday, Bella!!! I’m so glad said what you did about getting out of the “ridiculous box.” There’s more to life than commercial hip-hop and R&B! I miss Arrested Development… to this day I love Dionne Farris’s solo cd which came out years ago. Her voice is golden.
Bella, I’m glad you had an awesome weekend. The Roots will be in the Seattle area soon, and I can hardly wait to see them. I hope more of the old hip hop comes back. I love going to Hippie Festivals. I took my Mom to one in Vancouver, BC and we had a blast.
I almost thought the lady in the photo was Kimora Lee Simmons.
Hey Afrobella!
What an exciting way to spend your birthday 🙂
I noticed on the Langerado website that admission for kids under 10 is free. Is this truly a “family” event? Perhaps hubbie and I will load up the family and come down to Florida next year for the event. How far is it from Kissimmee (Please pardon the spelling :-))?
I was there covering it for our newspaper as well and I’m curious as to what you thought of it. Glad you had a good time.
HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY, BELLA! Mine is today. March ladies are just fabulous, end of story. 🙂 I’m glad to hear you had a great celebration. I so wish I could have been there to take part in what sounded like a beautiful event!
Many blessings.
Another happy belated birthday! And thanks for posting the photo – what a great looking couple. Glad you had a great time, and yes “hippies” do come in chocolate! (bippies?) Thanks for representin’.