December 11th, 2009. That's me with one of the hardest working bands in the area right now, The Shields Brothers. The Shields Brothers have been taking the DC area by storm with the release of their album and single, "Shark Attack". In fact, radio station D.C. 101 called the song "Shark Attack", the song of the summer. Tristan, Devin and Rory definitely are in a class by themselves when it comes to entertaining. But, the question is.....how did I meet this trio? Well, for that, we have to take a journey back about two years.
It was April 2009, two days before Easter and I was walking home from seeing some friends of mine put on a show at the W.A.R.F. center, when I stopped by Molly's Irish Pub to have a drink. When I got inside, the place was packed wall to wall and people were gettin' down to the sounds of The Shields Brothers. I was amazed by their performance and the music was totally on point. A week and a half later, at a little pub named McMahon's, the group was playing again and the party was kind of lacking. How to spice it up? I had an idea. I was gonna make it rain....dollar bills, that is. Long story short, I walked up to Tristan(or was it Devin?) and said, "Hope you got an umbrella". He didn't hear me. So, I had to show him what I meant. I took three steps forward, whipped out the cash and.....made it rain. The band goes crazy, the place goes wild. I go back to the bar, grab a cocktail and continue to lay low in the cut. The band went on break shortly after I made it rain and Rory, sporting a white lab coat and carrying a clipboard, came up to me and shook my hand, while telling me that he had never seen anyone do what I did. Tristan came up and I'm quite sure he liked what he saw, he was smiling from ear to ear. Needless to say, so were Rory and Devin. He asked me what my name was, I told them, "They call me Trae Nice". I made three new friends that night, but little did I know what was in the cards for me in the future.
In July of 2009, I was hanging out with the guys at this little hole in the wall bar, when I told them that I was a rapper. It was then that I dazzled them with my rapping genius. With Devin keeping the beat on his iPhone, I did a quick 16 or 24 bar piece for them, which blew them away. I believe that it was Tristan who suggested that I do a track with them. I happily accepted the challenge. At the time, I was looking to branch out and collaborate with any artist or band. I saw the reaction that they were getting and I thought that it would be awesome to do something with them.
That August, I jumped onstage with them for a song, which had the crowd going crazy. A month later, Tristan asked me to come to their studio and work out a track. Needless to say, I quickly said yes. I arrived at their quiet farm home in Rixeyville, a rural....area here in Northern Virginia, where I was greeted by their parents, who I must say are very cool people to know, and their two(now three) dogs, Belle and Figaro(who did nothing but bark at me. That dog must not like me). The boys were hard at work on songs when I came in. It was a very fun session, most fun I've had recording. I got a chance to see how they live and they live such a happy, yet peaceful life. Two weeks later, I performed with the band and made magic. Since then, I still talk to the guys, whenever our busy lives allows us, and we've all become friends. I consider them to be the most intelligent, down to earth people I've come across and I am very happy to have gotten the chance to meet them. Who knows if we will ever make another track again. If the chance came up again, I would jump on it without thinking about it.
