100+ New York City Stories: Unscripted conversations with artists, entrepreneurs, small businesses and everyday people. Filmed, interviewed, edited & shared by LaRon Batchelor.
Detroit Inspired. NYC Executed. The initial stories I filmed in my hometown of Detroit have grown into over 100 NYC stories. This is a mix of clips from 12 stories I filmed btwn February 2010 to July 2011. Motown to Grotown (a conversation @Detroit hospital is the impetus for www.mysmallstory.com) , Schott Free (former LOUD a&R, think Wutang, MoBB Deep), Stacey Mckenzie (Model/Entrepreneur told she was “too ugly to be” the supermodel she is today), Steven Mark Klein (New Yorker), Georgia (Family Beauty Business), Omar Dubois (Culture writer, traveler), Beans (Music artist@Label store), Openhouse Gallery (NYC’s #1 pop up space/experimential marketing), Uplifting Men (Homeless Activist), Samia & I@World Cup (unbeknownst to us, samia is 2-3 weeks pregnant with our daughter Chloe), Hussein Warmack (Founder, Nu South Lemonade) and Amel Larrieux (music artist loved by many, I first met Amel while filming the making of GURU’s Jazzmatazz).
I visited Label clothing store in NYC to film Vincent’s (the owner) story but he said he had a better story. Welcome to the wonderful world of BEANS, aka Mr. Ballbeam. Hip-Hop rebel. Wordsmith extraordinaire. Sonic architect. Fashion renegade. Published poet. Culture star. Raised in White Plains, NY and first picked up on in the mid-90′s as part of the mythic Soup / Boom Poetic collective, the word began to spread. Having achieved his widest acclaim as one-third of the legendary NYC progressive rap crew, Anti-Pop Consortium, BEANS continues his grand experiments in music and life with releases on Warp and Thirsty Ear.
