🥳 Art For Justice Announcement
Dear Die Jim Crow Supporters,
near and far, out here or inside, wherever you are,
Yesterday was "Giving Tuesday," and you may have been asked by some awesome non-profits to donate to their cause. With respect to those orgs, BL and I thought we’d give you a break with one less fundraising email. 😭 That’s because this year, we have some great news that only requires you to "Give" your focus; a few minutes of your time to take in something I’d like to share with you as our founder. Earlier this month, the Art For Justice Fund announced that DJC was 1 of 7 organizational granteess* in their Fall 2022 grant cycle! 🥳🥳🥳🥳
*Congrats to our cohorts: Summaeverythang, The Hive, Fountain House, National Black Theater, Groundswell Action Fund and Force Detroit.
This means a lot of things for DJC: foremost, we'll be able to bolster resources for our artists, setting them on an even stronger platform of high-quality art and wide reach into the world. We've also exceeded our benchmark for revenue in 2022 with by far our best year yet in fundraising, and as a result, we're on track to pay our staff what they deserve after years of piecemeal, part time, and volunteer hours. For me, the latter is a life changer. I'm proud to say that for the first time in the nine years of working on Die Jim Crow, I will be fully paid for my work.
Maybe it's a chip on my shoulder, something to prove, or I just want to state for the record, but I've been doing this since 2013 mostly as a volunteer. This is not because I am an independently wealthy person who decided to start a record label because I was sitting on reserves, or because I felt guilt for my position in the world as someone privileged. It is because I have a passion.
Though I consider myself lucky — I come from a solidly middle class family, I had access to a progressive public school education here in New York, and overall I had a pretty good childhood — I’ve always thought that the biggest privilege I had growing up was an exposure to art. My dad was an artist, I’ve always been an artist, and my appetite for creating is pretty much insatiable. When I got into activism and got the idea for Die Jim Crow, it was first and foremost an artwork that I NEEDED to see out in the world: an epic double album entirely written and performed by formerly and currently incarcerated musicians about mass incarceration and racial injustice, multi-genre and cinematic in scope. It was too great a concept to not go to the ends of the earth to execute. That passion has changed forms over the years, and now that DJC is a “real job” I am forming new ways to keep that passion burning — but the love for the art, especially the music — has always been the core of it. (To learn more about the birth of the Die Jim Crow, check out this presentation I gave at Katonah Museum of Art this year ⬇️ )
When I started this in 2013, Die Jim Crow was one album, and I was working as a set fabricator at Sets & Effects as a means to pay for our expenses. I did this for six years, and when we officially transitioned to a label in 2020, I began taking about 14% of what will be my salary in 2023 -- or 3% of the average salary for an Executive Director in New York City (source: salary.com).
While I’ve been running on volunteer fuel for so many years, I had the support of certain benefactors who enabled a lifestyle that allowed me to pursue my passion while keeping a roof over my head in New York City. In the pre-label days, my former boss Dave Jones of S&E allowed me to take off long periods at the woodshop to go record in prisons across the country or with musicians getting out. In 2019, when I decided to transition Die Jim Crow into a label and work indefinitely as a volunteer, I knew I wouldn’t be able to afford rent in NYC, and my parents let me move back to “the nest” without charging me rent, with the faith in me that this wild idea-turned-start-up label would one day get me back independent. In a city like New York, there is absolutely no way I could have devoted the countless hours to pursue my passion and build out what has now become a job for not only myself - but also for our hard-working staff and volunteers - without the support of my parents, Lee Brozgol and Alizah Brozgold.
“Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer.
And let faith be the bridge you build to overcome evil and welcome good.”
– Maya Angelou
Moving on with another thank you (you thought I was done...?!), I want to thank YOU. Thank you for believing in us. In me. In BL Shirelle. In our artists. I know this year has been slow on new releases, but it's really been a year of getting our shit together. And we have. We have so much more to go, but it feels like we are starters now, like we're on the path to keep burning and share a lot of good — no, great — music and art with the world in a more consistent way. We've been a grassroots effort for a long time, and we’ll always have that in our core, but we welcome this evolution. Thanks to Art For Justice, we’re continuing the path we’ve always been on, a little more sturdy down the road.
I hope we carry the passion of volunteer founders for years to come, but with the focus and zen of seasoned veterans. Hopefully we get to surprise you guys with a new release before the year's end. Trust me, we're shooting for it.
Fury Young
P.S. You are always welcome to donate to the cause. This year, we just wanted to give thanks. Don’t worry, we’ll be hitting you up later 😭 …