After a week of interviews, partnerships and relationship-building at CBCF’s Annual Legislative Conference, an afternoon in the streets of D.C. reminded me that some of our most important connections happen when there is no agenda at all.
We planned.
And planned.
Bruh… and when I say we planned AND planned some more.
Before Black With No Chaser arrived in Washington, D.C., for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s 55th Annual Legislative Conference, our team spent countless hours in meetings trying to anticipate what we would need, what could go wrong and how we wanted to show up.
And after all those meetings, there were still some things we didn’t get right.
That’s OK.
Because one of the things I’m most proud of from our time at ALC 55 wasn’t that everything went according to plan.
It was that when something didn’t, we figured it out.
We adjusted.
We created workarounds.
We solved problems.
And we got the job done.
CBCF’s 55th Annual Legislative Conference brought elected officials, advocates, entrepreneurs, professionals, students, influencers and others to Washington for conversations spanning policy, leadership, culture and community. The 2026 conference was held under the theme “Rooted, Ready & Rising.”
For Black With No Chaser, it also represented another opportunity to prove what we could do.
And when I look back at the week, I’m proud of how we showed up.
We Came to Work
Our presence on Media Row and throughout the exhibit hall felt elevated from the last time we attended. (Learn more about our set up via Black Tech Revolution’s IG)
We secured partnerships with major brands like Blackmagic Design, Sandisk, NearStream and EMEET. We started conversations around potential projects that may not fully develop until months from now.
And from our studio setup, we talked with visual artists, authors, social media influencers, actors, organizational leaders and elected officials serving at levels ranging from local government to Congress.
But something interesting happened along the way.
Even though we were there handling business, very little of it felt transactional.
An interview might end, and the conversation would continue.
Someone would sit down in front of our cameras to talk about their work, and 20 minutes later we would be discussing who we could introduce them to, how we might collaborate later or what they were trying to build back home.
We exchanged information.
We made introductions.
We laughed.
We learned.
Some conversations felt natural.
Some felt intentional.
Some felt like they had been waiting for us before we even arrived.
Maybe that’s what good networking is supposed to feel like.
Not:
What can you do for me?
But:
What are you building, and how might what I’m building connect with it?
By the time we started packing up, I was tired.
But I was also proud.
Proud of the team.
Proud of Black With No Chaser.
Proud of the fact that when people asked who we were, we had something real to show them.
Then someone told us about the H Street Festival.
And Washington had another lesson waiting for me.
Before H Street, There Were Tacos
Our brother Tyson has lived in D.C. for years and knew about H Street Festival, but somehow had never made it there.
So this would be a first for all of us.
But before heading to H Street, Tyson took us through part of his normal Saturday.
We stopped at his favorite coffee shop, Cool Coffee, in Brookland to meet up with Cirilo and his family—his wife, daughter and mother-in-law.
Everybody ordered their drink of choice.
Then we made our way over to the Brookland Arts Walk for tacos from a tent that Cirilo’s family regularly visits.
This was their ritual.
Nothing fancy.
No media credentials.
No itinerary.
No VIP access.
Just Saturday morning.
We ordered tacos.
Drank lemonade.
Laughed.
Talked.
Learned more about one another.
Built stronger bonds.
And for a little while, nobody needed anything from anybody.
We were simply together.
There is something powerful about that.
Music Has a Way of Remembering for You
While walking through the Arts Walk, I stopped to talk with a brother and sister who co-own a record shop.
They told me about their business, and naturally I started telling them about my friend Phillip “DJ Young Venom” Rollins and OffBeat in Jackson.
That’s how my mind works.
I meet somebody doing something interesting, and almost immediately I’m thinking:
Who do I know that they should know?
While we were standing there talking, the O’Jays started playing.
And suddenly, I recognized something.
It was the original record my friend Dolla Black sampled for his song Let Me Be Great.
Just like that, I wasn’t only standing in Washington anymore.
My mind went back to when Dolla released the song.
Then it jumped again—to his performance at the YARDBOY Block Party during Tougaloo Alumni Weekend.
That’s one of the things I love about music.
A song can collapse geography.
One second, you’re standing in a record shop in D.C.
The next, you’re back in Jackson.
Then Tougaloo.
Then wherever you were the first time you heard that record.
Memory doesn’t always travel in a straight line.
Sometimes it has a soundtrack.
Then We Got to H Street
The official H Street Festival took place Sept. 19, filling the corridor with music, food, vendors and crowds.
On the drive over, Tyson told us something.
He doesn’t really like crowds.
But he said he would be fine because he was with us.
Then we arrived.
Thousands upon thousands of people.
And somewhere in the middle of all those people, Tyson said something else.
He felt good.
No anxiety.
He was with “his people.”
And this time, he wasn’t just talking about us.
He was talking about the people surrounding us.
We were in what he described as Chocolate City—the D.C. he knew.
And everywhere I looked, I understood what he meant.
Mothers.
Fathers.
Aunties.
Uncles.
Cousins.
Nieces.
Nephews.
Mims.
GiGis.
Grannies.
Young people.
Old heads.
Everybody.
The soundtrack changed from block to block.
Go-go.
House.
Amapiano.
And we experienced three DJs who reminded me why I fell in love with this craft in the first place.
Shout out to DJ Ty One, DJ Paul Howard and DJ Mobu.
There were moments when the whole thing felt cinematic.
The closest comparison I can make is imagining the dance sequence from Sinners—minus the vampires—colliding with the feeling of T’Challa walking through the streets of Wakanda in Black Panther.
Music everywhere.
Movement everywhere.
Blackness everywhere.
Not staged.
Not explained.
Not translated.
Just existing.
No Goal. No Finish Line. Just Be.
Maybe that was what I needed most after ALC.
At the conference, almost everything had a purpose.
Be here at this time.
Interview this person.
Check this equipment.
Meet this partner.
Capture this footage.
Solve this problem.
Make this connection.
Then suddenly we were walking through H Street with no assignment.
No interview list.
No schedule.
No finish line.
We walked.
We ate.
We drank.
We listened.
We looked.
We were simply present.
No goal. No finish line. Just be.
There is something restorative about existing in community without having to accomplish anything.
And strangely enough, some of the connections that happen in those moments can be just as meaningful as the ones we schedule months in advance.
I Started Taking Pictures
Of course, I had my camera.
Eventually, I started doing what I do.
I saw couples who looked interesting.
Families.
Men.
Women.
People whose energy made me stop.
And I started asking:
Can I take your picture?
For the most part, people said yes.
Maybe they could tell I was genuine.
But when someone wanted to know where the images might end up, I could pull out my phone and show them Black With No Chaser.
Here’s our work.
Here’s our page.
Here’s what we’ve built.
And I realized how good that felt.
Not in an arrogant way.
In a grateful way.
Because there was a time when BWNC was just an idea.
Then it was a page.
Then a platform.
Then an audience.
Then interviews.
Then events.
Then partnerships.
Then Media Row at one of the largest gatherings of Black political and civic leadership in the country.
And now I could stand in the middle of H Street, hand somebody my phone and say:
This is what me and my boys have been building.
Two Washingtons That Were Really One
At first glance, CBC ALC and H Street Festival seem like completely different experiences.
One happens inside a convention environment filled with policy conversations, organizations, elected officials and professional networking.
The other spills into the street with vendors, DJs, families, food, fashion and music.
But after experiencing both, I’m not sure they were that different at all.
Both were about connection.
Both were about relationships.
Both were about Black people building things.
Institutions.
Businesses.
Art.
Networks.
Families.
Culture.
Opportunity.
At ALC, I saw people exchanging ideas about what our communities need.
On H Street, I saw the communities those conversations are supposed to serve simply living.
One was more formal.
One was more spontaneous.
But both reminded me that Black power is larger than politics.
It exists in our institutions, yes.
But it also exists behind vendor tables.
Inside record shops.
On DJ turntables.
Around taco stands.
Inside family traditions.
Within friendships.
Across business networks.
And in that almost instinctive thing many of us do when we meet someone:
“You know who you need to talk to?”
That’s infrastructure too.
We Got Motion
I came to Washington prepared to tell other people’s stories.
I left thinking about ours.
About this team.
About the mistakes we worked through.
About the partnerships we developed.
About the people who trusted us enough to sit in front of our cameras.
About the strangers who let me photograph them on H Street.
About old relationships growing stronger and new ones beginning.
About being able to confidently tell people what Black With No Chaser is and then show them what we’ve built.
We still have work to do.
A lot of it.
There are things we can execute better next time.
Relationships we need to nurture.
Ideas we need to turn into action.
But I’m proud of where we are.
And I’m even more excited about where we’re going.
Because our future is bright.
Our children’s future is brighter.
And if this week in Washington reminded me of anything, it’s this:
We are building.
We are connecting.
We are creating.
We are getting better.
We got motion.
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