BrothaRic Patton

There comes a time when you gotta quit waiting on the music industry to call your name like they giving out winning lottery numbers.

Man, fuck that.

I done watched too many good musicians grow old staring at their phones waiting on streams, playlists, labels, managers, blue checkmarks, and industry folks who don’t give a damn whether they eat or not.

Meanwhile the songs just sitting there dying on hard drives.

That’s a tragedy.

So I made a decision.

I quit waiting.

What I’m doing now is direct-to-fan…

I had a birthday coming up, and during one of my livestreams some of my folks started whispering around in the comments.

“Hey… let’s get Ric something for his birthday.”

Now see, I thought they was joking at first. But behind my back, my VIPs and fans got together and started cookin’ up something special. And I’ll tell you what — there ain’t nothing sweeter than watching good people come together for somebody they care about.

Cap’n Dennis Ruley.
Miss Biscuit Head outta Arkansas.
Dr. Moto.

Man… they were…

Every time I look at this picture, man, it makes me smile.

That’s my brother from another mother right there. My brother Spider.

We first met back during those hard COVID days over in the Juke_9:30 and the Smokehouse zoom Juke Joint. While the world was falling apart, a bunch of us came together through music, laughter, and friendship. Spider became more than just a supporter — he became family. He’s been one of my loyal patrons for a long time now, and I’m thankful for him every single day.

The funny thing…

I just wrapped up the weekend, 3 shows, and now I’m starting to see everything come in.

Pictures from the shows. Messages from folks who were there. Somebody even sent me a link to a newspaper article, and then there was a video from a Delta news station.

I’m just sitting there looking at my phone, and it kind of hits me… I’m watching myself on TV. Ill be damn ! That’s wild.

Then I see —Brotha Ric—doing his thing, Delta style we brought all weekend. Real, raw, no pretending.

I had to watch it more than once,…

Some things don’t come from thinking.
They come from somewhere deeper… somewhere older than you.

This piece been following me a long time.
I didn’t sit down one day and decide to write it. Truth is, it showed up on me — same way a memory does when you ain’t looking for it.

I remember being a teenage boy, out there working on a car with my daddy. Grease on my hands, sun beating down, just trying to figure things out. We found some chains — heavy ones. Didn’t look like much to us back then. We used them like they…

Sometimes people ask me about the pieces I wear in my beret.

They look at it like it’s decoration.

It ain’t. 

That’s a black onyx cabochon. Smooth top. No sparkle. No shit
The kind of stone that don’t beg to be seen—but somehow always is.

I got it from my grandmother.

She was born in 1910. Came up through the Roaring Twenties, back when folks say everything was loud and wild.

But where she was… it wasn’t about noise.

It was about survival.

Her and my grandfather built something down here in Alabama.
A juke joint.…

Yesterday was Easter.

Yeah… the day we talk about getting up.

Not just in some faraway, holy-story kind of way—but that deep, soul kind of rising. The kind that come after you been knocked down, counted out, left laying in the dirt longer than you should’ve been.

Resurrection.

That ain’t just about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. That’s a mirror if you brave enough to look in it.

Because if you really sit with it…
that story ain’t just His.

It’s yours too.

It’s mine.

It’s all of us.

See, I been thinking… a whole…

I been sitting with this thing… letting it roll around in my head like a slow blues on a scratched record.

My mama… she was just a young girl when she made up her mind about something that most folks back then didn’t even question much.

She wasn’t picking no damn cotton.

See, I don’t even know if I was born yet when she told me about it, or maybe I was just too young to understand—but I hear her voice clear now. She said she heard about some work out at Redstone Arsenal over in Huntsville Al. Didn’t know much…

I been playing a long time. Long enough folks start asking the same tired question like it’s part of the setlist:
“You ever played with B.B. King? You ever met him?”

And I always say, “Nah… don’t think I have.”

But truth is… every time they ask me that, my mind don’t go, It goes somewhere else. Somewhere strange as hell.

I met this woman one time—this real, I ain’t dressing this shit up none.
She told me she was B.B.’s girlfriend. Said they had a place he used when he came through this part of the country.

Now I…

You ever sit there staring at a blank page like it done stole something from you?

Yeah… me too. More often than I care to admit.

Writing ain’t never been my strong suit. Truth is, half the time I don’t even know why I bother. But then again… I do. It’s therapy. Plain and simple. Get it out your chest before it rots in there. And maybe—just maybe—somebody stumbles across these words one day and feels a little less alone. That’s happened to me before. Somebody else’s words caught me when I was slipping. So I…