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In terms of song structure, I was really inspired by Kanye West, Common, Lupe Fiasco and Mos Def — that type of rap where there can be messaging and maybe some political themes, but the song is pretty standard in terms of hooks and bridges. A lot of sung choruses, that kind of a thing. I tend to like writing hooks that are catchy. I really like catchy-sounding production with thoughtful lyricism. That’s what I tend to gravitate to.
I have this very vivid memory of my mom playing “Late Registration” in her Nissan Pathfinder when I was a kid, and just being in the back seat, listening.
And then when I wanted my songs to be a little more deconstructed, Jay Electronica and EARL SWEATSHIRT. “Eternal Sunshine (The Pledge),” that tape from Jay, I’ve never heard a rap album sound like that, or someone attempt to rap to a movie score. That was very eye-opening to me, in terms of what the genre could do. Same with MF Doom, “Madvillainy.” I had never heard anything like that. “Oh, rap could do this?”
At the time, I wasn’t really a hip-hop head. When I was a kid, I was probably listening to Michael Jackson and Avril Lavigne. I was listening to a lot of Bow Wow, actually. Like, a lot. Teenybopper hip-hop. “Doggy Bag,” 2001 — wow. He definitely had a moment. That was my childhood, as far as rap was concerned. It was not exciting.
A lot of the stuff that I was into was based on what I could listen to. My mom wasn’t really allowing me to listen to too much. She was like, “You can listen to this Michael Jackson and one Kanye album.” And whatever’s playing on the radio. It was that vibe. I would go to my friend’s house and they would be listening to WAYNE mixtapes.
I’m just now starting to become a real music fan, where I can listen to a lot more genres and styles. Stylistically, in terms of pockets and playing around with language, my generation doesn’t really do that that much, just across the board. And that’s the type of hip-hop that I think I like the most. I’ve been going back to Slick Rick and Big Pun, Big L, stuff that’s either punchline driven or people are just hitting very crazy pockets. As far as new rappers, probably Boldy James, billy woods, Silkmoney. You know Babyface Ray? I liked his last tape.
I’m kind of late being a musician. I don’t know why I make the type of music that I make sometimes. Because it’s truly not really popular. I feel like everyone is trying to stay away from the type of stuff that I do because they want money. They want to sustain themselves. Not even trying to be self-deprecating, but I really don’t hear folks making kind of weird poetic like this.
Although hip-hop wasn’t my entry point, being in organizing spaces — Black radical spaces where folks are thinking about leftist politics and ideologies — I was able to find rappers and hip-hop artists that actually do make that type of music. I guess it does lead back into hip-hop, which I didn’t realize. Aspects of it were in the Black radical tradition. I wish that aspect of it was a bit more to the mainstream, but it is what it is.
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~~~~~~~~~ "This is the streets, and I am the trap." � Jay Bilas http://www.popmatters.com/pm/archive/contributor/517 Hip Hop Handbook: http://tinyurl.com/ll4kzz
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