In early January of 2011, I was able to interview Billione! We talked about his life, love for music and his most recent book of poetry Centric. PeeP This.
Jus Buckingham: Where are you from?
Billione: I am a native Detroit-er, born and raised within the city limits. It irritates me when people from places outside of the city say they are from Detroit because no one ever heard of their town. There’s a certain energy that comes with being from a place like Detroit. Yes, we know economic strife, blight and political corruption, but we also know good music, the Heidelberg Project and how to make it through.
Jus: What do you do?
Billione: This is consistently one of the most difficult questions to answer. I tend to get philosophical about it, but that rarely, if ever, offers a good answer. So, I’ll answer it this way. I am a creative energy whose goal is to the leave the world better than when I found it. I want the world to be better for having pushed me through. I use writing to make things happen, for myself and others.
I am often asked what my purpose it. I don’t know what my purpose is. I don’t think anyone truly does. However, if there is a purpose for me, it is simply to exist. That’s what I do. Exist.
Jus: When did you start getting in poetry?
Billione: Poetry is simply a method of expressing what I feel when songwriting and other creative outlets are too restrictive. So, it’s not really something I got into, but a tool I consciously chose to deliver a particular message. Poetry for me is an opportunity to share information without becoming a part of the beast. I look at society and wonder how we made it this far. In 2011, women and children are still seen as second-class citizens, we still don’t have a grip on racism and homophobia is America’s middle name. So, poetry gives me a voice in a system that would rather I go away. Somehow, creativity is given a pardon that is not often afforded to young, gifted, black, opinionated, vegetarian, gay boys from Detroit.
Jus: Tell me a little bit about your singing and song-writing.
Billione: I would describe music as my first love. When I was growing up, Michael Jackson was the biggest star on the planet. There was nothing like him before, or since. The first music video I ever saw was his Billie Jean video. When I saw him walk, and the ground lit up, I knew what I wanted to be… Michael!
I didn’t know or think of him as a real person. I just knew that when I saw him I felt something move inside me and it came out as music.
So, I sang, recorded and performed music for many years from the early nineties until around 2001. The music industry changed several times and somehow I lost my drive. I couldn’t believe some of he things I was hearing.
There was a point where industry leaders wanted me to be an ultra-masculine, six foot, sexy crooner with a six-pack and S-curl. I’ve never been that and have no intentions of trying. The music industry became a beast I no longer wanted to tangle with. So. I let go. I tried here and there to recapture that hunger I once had, but other creative methods filled the void singing and songwriting once filled. Poetry was the primary method. I like poetry a great deal but I still love music. Your love for music seems to bringing me back to it. I’m writing lyrics again thanks to you. Your music makes me want to sing again. This time my music will be under my own terms and is only limited by my imagination.
Jus: Tell me about your most recent work Centric.
Billione: I can’t really talk about Centric without talking about things like astrology, fractal geometry and friendship, which makes it a weird project. Centric was born out of many heated discussions between my friend Ryan and me about the world and what it all means. He was born under the zodiac sign of aries, I under libra, which are opposites. So, quite often, we disagree about how we should approach life, but we find balance in the fundamentals. Our discourse is often intellectually beautiful, much like fractal geometry, where mathematics meets art. Our friendship is at the center of that. Centric is the literary of expression of all those things.
I began writing Centric in 2007 and had intended to have it completed and published in 2008, but it wasn’t time. I would even say that I wasn’t ready to have people know me in the way that Centric allows them to. This collection, if anyone really notices, tells more about me and my personal philosophy, spirituality and political views than anything else I’ve ever done. So, I was a little afraid to give birth to it.
With poems like “God: By Proxy”, “Anthem and the Hearts of Men”, Centric addresses many things, like religion, politics and homophobia in a way that is solution focused, but not prescriptive. I don’t want people to read my poetry and live by it. I want them to read my poetry and discover why we should live at all.
Centric also features Dartanyon Jonez, who I consider one of the most creative energies on the planet. We met many years ago, and have a special friendship of which our love for words on the page is the cornerstone. I wanted to share his work in Centric, because others should know that in addition to the art of slam and performance poetry, words on the page is still of great value.
Jus: What drives you?
Billione: More than anything else, to be better than I was yesterday drives me. Who I am right now is all that really matters. Sometimes I get so focused on the moment that it takes me a moment to even remember what happen yesterday. Quite often, people ask me how my weekend was, or what I did last night, or something that happened a few days ago and it knocks me off my axis a little. It takes me a few moments to remember the past because the now is so important to me.
I am also driven by my family. I want to help shape the world so that my family no longer has to struggle for the basics. Not just my immediate family, but my world family as well. We live in a world where simply getting clean water, food and shelter is a major undertaking. People all over the world, including the United States, are struggling for the basics, some of us focus on things that don’t even matter. Who cares about Lindsay Lohan, Chris Brown and the Jersey Shore when children on Mack and Bewick can’t find peace?
Jus: Who are some of your favorite writers?
Billione: I’m constantly reading, so I have many writers that I love. It’s difficult to name them all, but Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, Zora Neale Hurston and Maya Angelou are staples in my library, as are E. Lynn Harris, Ekhart Tolle, Daniel Quinn and Paulo Coelho. In fact, the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho and Ishmael by Daniel Quinn are two of my favorite books of all time. I love writers who take risks and write characters into existence who seem able to live off the page. I also love poets like Adaora Bandele. She is a phenomenal writer and friend.
Edgar Allan Poe and Shakespeare are two of my favorite writers as well. When I was growing up, I was told that black folks didn’t read Poe and Shakespeare. I had the pleasure of seeing Maya Angelou speak a few times and after she revealed that she reads Poe and Shakespeare, I didn’t care what anyone thought of me reading them.
Jus: What are you listening to these days?
Billione: Every morning since late September 2010, I wake up playing Shine by Boog Brown. It’s from her Hip-Hop album entitled the Brown Study, produced by Apollo Brown. Shine makes me feel empowered in a world that wants to defeat me. Though every day has its challenges, I have to continue shining my light on the world.
In addition to that, I pretty much listen to what my parents listened to: Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Nina Simone, Prince, Sade, people like that. I don’t listen to the radio much, but folks like Maxwell, Jill Scott, Erykah Badu and Janet Jackson are always playing on my iPod.
Most recently, I’ve been listening to artists from Detroit. Some people don’t know that Detroit still makes powerful contributions to music. Artists like Boog Brown, Monica Blaire and so many others are keeping music moving in Detroit.
Jus: Any advice for upcoming writers?
Billione: When it comes to publishing or sharing your creative works in any way, do it yourself, or as much of it as you are able. Technology has made it so simple to create and share your works without being slaves to industries who seem to be anti-creativity. This goes for music, literature, art everywhere creativity is bought and sold. Control as much of the process as you can. This allows us to control the creative process and not be exploited. This also allows us to tell stories and give voices to those the industries fail to take chances on. We should tell our own stories rather than have them told for us.
Jus: When it’s all said and done, what do you want people to say about you?
Billione: I catch a lot of flak for my personal opinions, spiritual beliefs and choices I make for myself. I believe what I believe, but I remain flexible. Who knows if any of this is true? All this stuff we put out into the world: religion, philosophy, astrology. All of it, theories we hope people buy into. But, when it is all said and done, I hope people say that I was fair.
Jus: What’s next for you?
Billione: In addition to promoting Centric any and everywhere, I am writing a play called the Birth of Mars that I hope to have completed in 2011. It is a series of monologues that explores masculinity and ponders if there is an inherent flaw in men that causes us to destroy the world.
After hearing so much of your music on your website, I would love to write and record music again. You’ve been releasing music so frequently that I’ve been inspired to get back into the game. I hope we can get together on a few collaborations.
Also, I am hoping to publish a few other poets, including projects from Dartanyon Jonez and another phenomenal poet and creative energy, Charlie Martin. She is indeed one of the best writers and performers I have ever seen.
Catch up with Billione at:
http://billionemultimedia.com./
Photos courtesy of Ken Anderson Photography.
