#WCW Marie Carter of "The Classic Shoppe"

Keep it classic with this month’s #WCW Marie Carter the owner of “The Classic Shoppe”.

She’s an educator, a soon-to-be mommy, a business owner and did we mention she’s full of #BlackGirlMagic.

Born and raised in Milwaukee, Marie decided to go to Tennessee State University after her earlier education in the suburbs. Her experience in the the HBCU taught her how to embrace and appreciate her culture but also was where she first saw Black kids taking pride in their education and handling their business. It gave her a sense of pride and made her want to inspire others to gain the same new found strength.

Marie has her Bachelor's Degree in Elementary Education and went on to earn her Master's in Curriculum and Instruction concentrating in Reading. She’s currently teaching middle school in the heart of Milwaukee. Yes, this is part of her #BlackGirlMagic.

She started her company after realizing there was a need for this in the market. “She did not want to wear something with a band she never listened to or a face of someone that she really did not have that much in common with, just because the colors matched what was needed to complete an outfit. And when she did find a rare gem with a person or a quote with whom she could identify, it seemed like it was the same person or quote, just served up different ways.”

We all can relate to that.

The Classic Shoppe is her way of appreciating and putting her culture in the clothing she loves. Because like they said on their site:

“It all boils down to this: if we don't honor and preserve our culture, who will?”

Shop The Classic Shoppe to support the culture. Find it on there site here or follow their social media to get the newest part of your wardrobe. FB: The Classic Shoppe IG: @theclassicshoppe

Jean Kengz - Last Chance

You can spend your entire lifetime waiting for things to change but if a life changing opportunity comes knock at your door will you recognize it and be ready to embrace it ?  In order to tell us how to be prepared for anything, Jean Kengz recruits electro/R&B singer Farrah Mechael (Detroit, MI), and rappers Young L3X (Boston, MA) and Taywill (Seattle, WA) as they express on the willingness to not let go their "LAST CHANCE" for life, love and success! Let us know what you think!

Artists: Farrah Mechael - https://soundcloud.com/farrahmechael Young L3X - https://soundcloud.com/youngl3x Taywill - https://soundcloud.com/taywill-1 Produced by :@jean-kengz Mixed by : @mayeut-billy Cover art by :@lilrozzy

/Garahbrie

#CWEverydaySteez

This Weeks Style: "Hats, rangs and thangs"

/Vato

#WordPlayWednesday - Reader Submission: The Reasons I Won't Leave

Reader’s Submission: (name withheld)

Here are words taken out of context. Emotional identification of the push and pull factors of maintaining things that we want, when they are hard to keep. If these words were said to you, where would you find your rebuttal? Word strategy. Word Play.

The Reasons I Won't Leave

stay, because you make me happy
stay, because people aren’t perfect
stay, because I care about you
stay, because I crave you
stay, because you give me reasons to keep pushing
stay, because just like you need me, I need you
stay, because every since you been here I’ve been some sort of happy
stay, because there are possibilities
stay, because when I leave I feel weak
stay, because when I don’t hear from you I’m empty
stay, because I’m only fulfilled when it’s you
stay, because no one else compares to you
stay,  because I have faith in you
stay, because I give a damn

stay...because I want to fucking be with you.

/CopyWrite Connect

"I SAID WHAT I SAID" w/ Garahbrie: Marshall Twins (MT)

The Marshall Twins “MT” (@thereal_mt on Instagram) drop their new project This For The City and so we slid through a meet and greet Saturday to see what was up.

Pulling up to a completely crowded parking lot at Godfather Electronics, squeezing between two cars and hoping for the best, was definitely a thing. We get inside to a crowd of people waiting to get their copies and a photo with the twins, which eventually led to tears from one of their fans..... Yes, it was completely adorable.

We pulled the twins aside to see what all the fuss & buzz we keep getting word of is all about:

CW: Where did the Marshall Twins nickname come from?

Donno: We went to school at Marshall on 64th and Hope, we played basketball there for four years and then we graduated and we stuck with the name, everyone was calling us Marshall Twins from basketball

Dexxx: ---Shortened it up to MT

CW: This For The City, what does that mean to you?

Dexxx: Everything is for the city. It's a lot of bad stuff happening in our city, we just wanna bring light to it and bring out everything. We want to bring out all the problems that are actually happening in the city and talk about it.

Donno: Right, we’re not just doing this for us, like, we wanna do this because, its a lot of good artists, and good engineers, tattoo artists, anything, we wanna put out for the city to bring that attention, to bring everybody out so we think we can do this, with this (T4TC), and everything else we’re doing right now.

CW: Where do you see yourselves say a year from now?

Both in unison: Hopefully somewhere on tour!

(They’re hoping to hit spots like Georgia, New York, Nevada, California and North Carolina.)

CW: Do you have anything you want to say? What do you want people to know about the Marshall Twins?

Both: We’re coming, we’re here to stay and we plan on changing the world, we want to be icons.

Be sure to pick up a copy of This For The City today.  They plan on taking a slightly different approach by waiting to put it online until early December. (When you get it, tell them CopyWrite sent you!)

Then, of course, no interview is complete without a photo opp, so we went out into the cold and took photos because, why not?

/The Intern

All visuals for this interview were shot by Michelle McAdams (@lotusvalentinevisuals on Instagram)

Local2Local - MosaicoX, the curators of Austin's Local

“If you’re throwing a function and you don’t have proceeds going somewhere right now, you’re doing it wrong.” -AH

Meet the ladies of MosaicoX, the curators of Local (well Austin’s local).

Ashley on the left, Claudia on the right

MosaicoX or Mosaico Experiencia is a women duo featuring creatives Ashley Hicks or known by her DJ name as Adzua-Gette (from The House of Shakur) and Claudia Aparicio-Gamundi or  Mazapan (de Puro Chingón Collective). The two DJs started Mosaico Experiencia a year ago as a way to support Black and Brown women and self-identified women artists. And basically to listen and play any music they wanted in a club environment. (Disco Trap anyone?) 

So what does the Experience do?

CAG: “So the name became because we wanted to create experiences for people to have a safe place for everyone to just come and have a good time.”

MosaicoX creates “little festivals” specifically curated to the different vibes they want to showcase that night, whether that’s a poetry event, music event or an event for healing. They’re using their connections to grow the Black, Brown and women community of Austin. 

CAG: “...We not only have performances and music. But we also have a community of women that have their art for sale [in a marketplace environment.]”

The events and markets primarily support and prioritize women of color and self-identified women directly in response to the venues being hard to access for artists.

AH: “It’s a network for Austin, because we know a lot of people and artists. … It’s really just a space to bring people in and give them a platform to share.”

The platforms they create are often quick turnaround but well curated events that give an open forum for people to network and showcase their talents while giving back to a charity and their community.

“It really is just … a disruption of whatever ‘Scheduled Programming’ is.”

And we love disrupting the norms at CopyWrite.

Focused on event planning, curating and connecting artists with PAID gigs in safe environments, MosaicoX is creating a more consistent and concise way to keep the party going.

AH: “We started this for Black and Brown unity, because we just don’t see a lot of Black and Brown link-ups in Austin.”

Though they separately work in different collectives that target their own culture (Ashley of The House of Shakur and Claudia de Puro Chingón Collective); they thought ‘Why not merge who we are?’ to create a bigger impact and more visibility to the movement.

Connect with them on Instagram at @mosaico_experiencia or email them at mosaico.experiencia@gmail.com to experience an event or link up with them to plan your next event in the Austin area. They’re working and open to collaborative efforts to grow the culture and your passion. (Maybe you'll see a CW x MosaicoX event soon? **insert thinking emoji here**)

“Don’t start no shit, won’t be no shit.”

So lastly, what do you want people to know?

CAG: “Continue to support POC business owners.”

AH: “...And let’s be conscious of how we want our entertainment in our lives.”

CAG: “PAY ENTERTAINERS… Gawd Damnit.”

F*** EXPOSURE. (... said every artist ever.)

And lastly (for real this time):

AH: “I just want to plug my band… Mamis.”  Where Ashley is the guitarist killing it in the band and their EP is dropping real soon. 

We hear you Mosaico. 

/Syn for Austin

---

Photos by Whitney Devin. Follow her on Instagram and see her work on whitneydevin.com 

#CWEverydaySteez

This Weeks Style: Posted Up

/Vato

Check out The Local - Oakland Cafe

Check out our new favorite chill spot on Milwaukee’s Eastside, Oakland Cafe!

If you need a place to duck off at any time of day, this should be your go-to place. A few blocks from UWM campus ( 2979 N Oakland Ave, Milwaukee, WI 53211) Oakland Cafe serves breakfast delectables, Bomb smoothies, hot chocolate that is to die for, and all your Colectivo coffee favorites!

But here's the twist, they also serve Hookah!!! (Woot Woot)

So when your day is over and you just want to “hit the pipe” they have a great vibe and all the flavors for just that. And shockingly enough, their music selection is also lit ( a few members of the CW team checked it out last week...was that a little Kodak Black? Some Sza? Hmmmmmm.)

So next time you're in the neighborhood go out Oakland Cafe, and tell them CopyWrite Mag sent you!

Hookah Break anyone???

/Dirty

#WordplayWednesday - September 11th 2016 4:30pm

What's the momentum behind the hand on the clock of society’s ideals? What are the reasons pushing us to behave and move through life in the ways that we do? This piece was one I wrote after leaving an abusive and toxic relationship. I was relieved to be free of that grasp. But in the same breath I was angry, bitter, vengeful, and broken over our falling out. This poem was the first of many that I have written on the road to catharsis and heart mending. It  was really a winning moment to create this piece and have a taste of peace within a dark space. Poetry truly helped save my life.

September 11th 2016 4:30pm

Today would have been seven years had you not found a new host
Today would have been seven years had I not had the courage to speak your truth

Today would have been seven years had I not had the strength to stand for my spirit and push you the fuck away
My day is melancholy and my aura, nostalgic
I find myself wondering if your thoughts are with me  
If you miss me
If late at night you find your pillow soaked with tears in my name
I wonder if you find yourself preoccupied, speaking my name in vain
With a deep sense of loss and pain lingering in the wrinkles of your mundane brain
Sometimes I wonder the level of impact my soul has left in your life
What memories have imprinted themselves in your cerebral?
Sometimes I wonder if I've left any strife
Behind
Have you repressed it all?
The smell of my breath hanging off the corners of your lips
The feel of my skin
The taste between my legs and the sensation within?
Does my face greet you when you close your eyes?
And drift to the place where you left your lineage deep between my thighs?
Do you wake up from the nightmare of realizing how great I was?
Do I haunt your dreams
Am I hovering in and out of the realms
Of your temporal lobes?
Is your life unraveling at the seams?
When you turn over in bed and her eyes meet your gaze,
Do they pierce your system like rays of gamma beams?
The way my own did
Do you find yourself lost like a kid
Yearning for my presence
Yearning for my warmth
Reminiscing in the scent of my existence
I hope I torment your every decision
That late in the night I plague your beleaguered visions
I hope I trigger your skin to break out in lesions
At the remembrance of my touch
And every memory of when we fucked leaves you dried
in desolation
Buried deep in destruction and disoriented in a profound depression
Gripping the air for my hand and the vivacity I was once gave you
I curse your vigor with the venom of my ancestors
Generations deep
I curse your aspirations to drown in a spiritless lackluster four score deep
And every place you creep
Fills with a void of desperation and the moves you make fall into infinite hibernation

I often find myself wondering if your thoughts are with me
I know they are, you will never be rid of me
No matter how forcefully you try
No matter how often you peer into the mirror and convince yourself of the lie
The will of my being has clipped your wings and you can no longer fly.