I’m a jackass.
I met Geneva White back around September of 2017 at her then PR company’s office for a video interview.
I was intrigued by her soulful singing and the stylistic diversity of her songs.
There was also something very soothing about her speaking voice. I remember telling someone I can probably listen to her talk for hours.
I admired her genuine passion for music, whether it be hopping on stage to jam and vibe with people she never met or just checking out a show unplanned because something caught her ear.
She hit me up on DM few months ago to tell me about her latest track “Working It Out.” We also chatted for a bit about what was going on with her music career.
Geneva had been going at it alone without management or PR, and sounded like she was getting a little jaded with the industry.
She hit me up the next day and apologized for being down the day before. Of course she didn’t owe me an apology whatsoever but it tells you a lot about the type of person she is.
The truth is, I am the one that needs to apologize.
Last night I happened to be looking at her IG and although I usually like all her posts there was one I had missed. It was a post from about 2 months ago right before the new year.
She talked about her crazy month and how she wrote to over 100 blogs and publications about “Working It Out” only to hear mostly no or not get a response.
She also heard plenty of nos from A&Rs and reps, but the post wasn’t a complaint about her situation. It was about how she felt grateful about some of the good things that have happened and how she was happy to be playing music.
This story reminded me of when I first started Highlark with Co-Founder and my best friend Mitch Setbon. We emailed 100s of artists and PR companies for interviews who said no or didn’t answer.
We were denied passes to shows. I would spend hours preparing for interviews, then more hours editing and producing the videos as well as writing the articles. Many times the bands didn’t even share the piece, most likely because we were not a big enough publication.
Geneva’s IG post reminded me of those times but also of the great things that happened for Highlark. How we can now pretty much get passes for any show, the growth of the site, our amazing team, how we are bombarded with 100s of emails from PR companies on a daily basis.
I also remembered some of the artists who were encouraging, supportive and had told me how much they loved my interview.
Geneva White by the way, was not one of those artists that didn’t share my work.
The reason I need to apologize to Geneva is because when she told me about “Working It Out” I thought about writing a piece on it…. but I didn’t.
I shared the news on my personal and Highlark’s IG stories and that was it.
What a jackass.
I had actually not written on Highlark in a long time and in all honesty I just felt lazy.
I could have just written a short paragraph about it and it wouldn’t have even taken me that much time to write. I genuinely love that song and I had an opportunity to do the right thing but I didn’t.
This is why I need to apologize.
So I’m sorry Geneva for forgetting to do the right thing.
You are already a great artist and I believe you will blow the fuck up. So please continue to fight through and put out your art.
Thank you for inspiring me to write my first piece for Highlark in almost a year and for putting me on to Chef’s Table. I don’t know why but that show is super inspirational.
And for everyone else, listen to her songs. She is so dope. Personally my favorite tracks are “Surface,” “So Good To You” and “Working It Out.”
[+] GENEVA WHITE
[Instagram] [Twitter] [YouTube] [SoundCloud]
