King Green (RDGLDGRN, The King Green Show)

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Music.

(00:12):
Welcome, welcome, welcome to a new episode of the State of Flux podcast.
What a treat it was to get to pick the brain of my friend King Green this month.
You may know him from fronting Red Gold Green or his work as a solo artist,
but he also recently launched the King Green Show, which I absolutely love.
He's had a super interesting career with Red Gold Green, from getting 100,000
organic views in two days on their first song, to working through the major

(00:35):
label system and collaborating with Dave Grohl and Pharrell,
and back to taking control of their career as independent artists.
Tons of great stories and lessons to be learned there, but my favorite part
of the podcast was getting deeper into his philosophy on music,
work ethic, and technology.
So excited for you guys to hear this one, so...
Are you ready? I'm doing good. I was just saying that I wasn't being Hollywood.

(00:58):
I can't find my record glasses and these are prescription.
Future's so bright, you got to wear sunglasses inside.
All right. I'll be blind while I look at you.
All right cool well i think a good place to start here
is going back to all the red gold green stuff before we
get into all the awesome stuff you're doing with the king green show now
so one thing i did want to ask what is

(01:20):
the origins of the name red gold green and is there any tie
back to the culture club lyric on karma chameleon no
we have no tie back to the culture club lyric even though
everybody talks about that we were in a band locally that
was doing really well called the five one and we had some viral type of moments
in the blogger and stuff like that and the five ones represented the 51st state

(01:42):
because we were from the dc area we heard of how the roots were like this backing
band in the core of all that philly scene when they were coming up even.
Jill scott by doing stuff they would all jam and play together and all that
and play shows and all that and we were trying to be that and was that for the dc area so like,
Every rapper that came out of DC that became anything, we did these open mics

(02:06):
where they would play, but we were the backing band.
And then we would play our songs in the middle and we would be playing like
weird ass, like Vampire Weekend covers, but with rap verses.
It was weird as shit. So that was us. And we developed a fan base.
It was red, blue, green, and gold, the four colors in the band.
And we represented the 5-1.
Blue left. So this entire area knew us as The Colors.

(02:29):
So we would continue to have that love from our area, but we had that name.
So it was just that simple.
What was with removing the vowels? There was all these bands at the time that had no vowels.
And we thought that that might be cool instead of just saying Red,
Gold, Green, because we wanted to separate ourselves from reggae identity or
the Pan-African identity, because we wanted to kind of have our own...

(02:50):
When you think of Red, Gold, Green as us, you think of R-D-G-L-D-G-R-N,
which was dumb as hell, but it worked at the same time. But it's a stupid ass thing.
It works though, man. You hear Red, Gold, Green, you think about you guys,
but the spelling of the conversation topic, it's interesting.
It's not like your name is like The Boys, where there's 8 billion other bands

(03:11):
named that, and you Google it and God knows what shows up.
If you Google us, it's just us. Yeah, that was kind of our whole thing.
And we were Like if we put in the work and because of our ambition and I would
say somewhat of our talents,
it was able to work out for us at a high level, but we probably would be more
successful earlier on if we didn't have that name, I guarantee you. But it don't matter.

(03:33):
Like the head of Universal asked us, he goes, why don't you change the name?
Like once we were about to drop our record, he stopped into the meeting and
just goes, y'all haven't thought about changing the name? And then in my brain,
I'm like, yeah, if the hell Universal said that, maybe we should change the
name. In the end, it's cool that it is what it is.
You mentioned how the five one was 51st state, DC, DC, DMV, that whole area

(03:56):
is very much ingrained in you guys. You guys rep it really well.
A big part of that I find super interesting is the way you guys incorporate.
The gogo sound yeah and i feel like a lot of people don't
know about what gogo is right so
for the people who do not understand and to be 100 honest i
have an idea of what it is but i probably don't even

(04:17):
know exactly what it is you know so yeah what is the gogo sound and how did
you guys factor that in right from the beginning gogo is something that started
i would say late 70s 80s when hip-hop started in the dc area and you got the
forefathers like trouble punk and chuck brown and these bands, or E.U.
With the song, Doin' the Butt. That was a big song.

(04:38):
And a lot of people in hip-hop borrowed from go-go sound. Even New Jack Swing
could be considered a sub-genre of go-go almost, even though some people might
think that's sacrilegious.
But go-go started at that time and grew mainly in the D.C., Maryland, and Virginia area.
There's been spurts when there was a pop song by a producer from D.C.
Who put a little go-go sound within a pop song, but it It's never became a worldwide

(05:01):
genre, but it's always been in D.C. And that's something that is just beautiful.
Being in Virginia, if you listen to the radio, go-go's on at night, right?
So we all are being like indoctrinated with this music and this culture from this area.
So it's something that we just loved because it was only us.
And when you started thinking about your high school life and your high school

(05:22):
friends and everybody listening to this or going to a go-go,
like you actually go to a go-go. Like that's a place where they're going to
only play go-go music at the time. They were hella violent.
It was like the realest place in the, in the world. And you had some of the
best times of your life at a go-go. So it's something ingrained in us.
So we took a lot of styles and rhythms from that music and put it on our own.

(05:45):
And we never wanted to consider ourselves as a go-go band, but some people actually
even think of us in that way.
And a lot of real go-go artists give us respect for taking these rhythms and
putting it in rock and pop music and rap music.
Was that the scene that you guys came out of then? When you were playing as
the 5'1 and you were a local DC band, was it mostly playing with other go-go stuff?

(06:05):
Not at all. We were hybrid, but it was really hip hop and rap because at the
time, Wale was just bubbling up.
We're talking blog era, right? That's when we started the platform.
So we were doing our thing, doing the blog era, and it was all in this hybrid hip hop situation.
We just had these go-go elements because we came from the area.
There's even like Wiz Khalifa had these YouTube vlogs or whatever that he was doing at the time.

(06:29):
And he was at South by Southwest when we were there.
And we were like jamming to go go in our little van.
And it's in his vlog because we was like in the middle of the streets going crazy.
And even the people who were like filming the vlog were like, yeah, I know about go go.
They were talking about the genre because we were wild at the time and we were
in the streets just blasting go go in South by Southwest. up with.

(06:52):
So it was not so much in the scene, but just showing our appreciation for the
music, no matter where we went, which is still what we do.
And with that local scene, obviously you guys had a little bit of a reputation before you guys broke.
You guys had the song. I love lamp that puts you guys on the map.
You self-produced, self-directed the video.

(07:13):
And you just put it up on YouTube and it got 100,000 views in a matter of days, right?
Yeah, it was like a day or two. YouTube and Facebook were like TikTok now, right?
So back at that time, we just were sharing the video with all of our friends on Facebook.
We literally was listening to Juicy J, Who The Neighbors.
We sat down, the three of us at a table and shared it with every single person that we knew.

(07:37):
The next day, they shared it with every single person.
It just kept on going. going like we shared it all
and since it was good everybody started sharing it and
then the third day the video was out i
wake up on red's mom's couch and got an
email from every single label in the universe and then we
took down the video because they wanted to re-put the video under

(07:57):
their thing then they took down the video again like the video
right now should have like 10 million views if we
didn't take it down because of stupid label shit and
was that kind of expected for you guys when you put out the
video what was your expectation of how it would do
we thought people locally would know it that's it we
just wanted the fan base like we were bringing 700 people to

(08:18):
a show in dc so that's pretty good right we wanted those 700
people to still fuck with us that's it that was the only goal and we had a ning
site which is basically like your own type of myspace and we had like 1500 people
in this community so discord before discord We had like 1,500 people that were
in that thing, and we were building a community,

(08:39):
which is what we're trying to redo again now.
Because all these things came out, and you thought you were building a community on Instagram.
You think you're building a community on Facebook, and then they're just like,
no, this is our community, and you're paying for it.
And so we had our own. We just wanted to service those people. That was it.
Do you think it was the community that made that I love lamp video viral?

(09:00):
Community is always what makes, I think, anything bubble.
Nowadays, because of how the algorithms change because of TikTok,
you can have no followers at all, put out something and then go viral, right?
But it doesn't last because there's no community behind it.
When there's a community behind it, that's when it actually can last and actually
become something, I think.

(09:21):
So that's what I always felt was important. And we just like treat people good.
We treat people like friends because that's how I see it. Your fans and supporters as friends.
You know what I'm trying to say? More so than like this weird hierarchy thing
that seems like been going on.
Like people really think it was like, oh, I love my fans in a way that it's
like they're beneath you.
Where it seems like they're the most important part.

(09:44):
You know what I'm saying? It's like you didn't stream your song a million times.
You know what I'm saying?
A million people streamed your song. and now you're and so they're
actually the most important part and that almost seems cliche but
that's like the reality and people just don't even think about it that's
something else i really love about what you're doing the king green show too a
lot of the videos you put out it's kind of unprecedented the amount of access
you give your followers to your process and to the music and everything so you're

(10:09):
continuing that today but again before we get into the king green show i want
to stay on the red gold green stuff for a little bit so i love lamp comes out
goes viral huge moment for you guys, the label start calling.
You end up getting the chance to record at Sound City, which in itself is something
special to have the chance to do that.
But then you're in there, you're recording with Kevin Agunis,

(10:31):
and you end up with Dave Grohl on your debut album.
You end up with Pharrell doing tracks with him. Was the label involved in that?
Were the label opening doors for you or was it just you vibe with these people,
you connected and they ended up on the record? No.
The music business is incestuous. Who was our label? Who was our management?
It's a very interesting thing.

(10:51):
So we signed to a management AAM, which is usually production and songwriter
management, big songwriters like Dr.
Luke and things like that. So we signed to them as one of their first primary acts.
So they didn't have that many artists on their roster.
So they were using all their production and songwriter pull to hold us down

(11:11):
as an act. So one of the producers that they had signed to that management company was Kevin Ngunes.
And Kevin Ngunes put himself in position to have a sub-label under Republic
Records, the Universal Republic, the record company that Drake and Weeknd's on.
On so kevin heard about us
being signed to this management company was like these guys are dope

(11:34):
because they're bringing rock and and hip-hop
together they're doing something new and i want
to sign them to our label we're like we already
got major labels trying to get at us so like what's good
with you he's like well we are a major label but we'll keep working
like an indie blah blah blah we had to sound like an nda
because someone who's signed to our management company was also our

(11:54):
label head so think about that right so we
sound like an nda it was very like i
said incestuous and and that was that type of situation so
within that since kevin agunis owned sound city or what used to be sound city
dave grohl was doing that documentary kevin agudas was told us when he came
over to rest in virginia to sit with us to try to get a sign like it was old

(12:16):
school that we really want you to be a part of this label type so he came into
our areas we sat at dinner He was like,
I'm thinking that we can have a great day gold drum on this shit.
You're talking to three guys from Virginia. We're like, I don't know what the
hell you're talking about. You sound like you just it.
But whatever, bro, like that. And then he sends us an email of him sending the
song to Grohl and Grohl sends an email back and says, oh, yeah,

(12:40):
I'm busy working on FF right now, but I love this song.
Let's do something. And we're like, everything sounded right.
The people at the management group X was working there at one point.
And so we had those good people around us and good energy.
So we decided to go with them. That led into us meeting Grohl, working at Sound City.
Since we were signed to Fairfax Records, which is Kevin Laguna's label,

(13:02):
which is a subsidiary of Universal Republic, Universal Republic, we met with them before.
They were sharing our songs to producers and people because they're like,
oh, these are new artists that we have.
Pharrell was in the building in a meeting getting all these new artists.
So out of all those new artists he saw, he was like, I want to work with them.
I want to make a whole album with them.

(13:24):
That's what he said to them. And then what actually happened is Pharrell hit
up Kevin Agunas telling them that, yo, you want to work with us?
Kevin came with us to work with Pharrell.
After the first day we worked with Pharrell, we found out that Pharrell wanted
to produce the whole album with us, which we would prefer over anybody else in the world, right?
So we kind of got blocked from that situation is what I'm trying to say by the label.

(13:47):
So then we worked with Pharrell, did one song.
He hits us up again and says, love the song. Let's work again.
And we go to another studio in LA and work with him for like another couple of days.
Shit was great. He was telling us about Miley Cyrus was there.
The few days earlier, he was working with, what's his name?
The big songs that he got sued for. Blurred Lines, he was working with Robin
Thicke. He was working with Chase Cthulhu.

(14:09):
He's like a doctor going from room to room, just making hits at this time.
And then you saw how it was working and that work paid off like a year or two
years later. He had Happy, Blurred Lines, Get Lucky.
We saw the work and then it was crazy just to see that growth because his mindset
was just, yo, let's just get it. That's how all that shit happened.
It just being shared within the industry, street that's

(14:32):
where we were known more than within the in the streets like we got
people to listen and view it and it was
before streaming that was our issue we were
just two years before or two
years later we'd have been straight it was before streaming no one knew what
to do it was all blog errors like oh we're gonna get all the blogs to talk about
you and all that type of stuff it needed a plan but we were just in the industry

(14:56):
people just sharing the music and even after you left the major label system.
You maintain that fan base.
And something you just said that I think is super interesting is you talked
about Pharrell, just working his ass off going room to room.
And you know, you saw that pay off. So as you guys were transitioning back to
independent artists and taking full control of your career,

(15:19):
what were those lessons like that work ethic you learned from Pharrell that
you're just like, we can do this on our own.
And this is how we're going to do it. Yeah. You can do anything if you put the work into it.
I've seen anytime I or we have actually worked, because when you're with a team,
all of you guys got to work, right?
When we all work, the fruits come. You have to have the skillset,

(15:42):
you got to have the ambition, and you've got to put in the work, and then it'll come.
Now, a lot of times, work harder than smarter, but it's there.
I saw that with Pharrell, I saw that with other bands.
I saw that with foo fighters like seeing
them live and what made them a great live band it's not
like they're not supposed to they're not great musicians it's not like

(16:04):
they're over here doing the greatest musical feats in
the world but that performance and that connection with the crowd i haven't
seen ever actually live anybody play like the foo fighters play and have that
connection with the crowd that's the most important thing about a live show
is how do you connect with 80,000 people or 80 people?

(16:26):
I've seen them in a room of 800 people and I've seen them in a stadium, 15, 20,000 people.
Probably like, it was more than 15, 20,000 people. It was like,
our kid was probably 40. But anyways, yeah. And it felt the same.
Felt like girls talking to you, feels like the band's playing these songs that
you love because you love them and it's a conversation.

(16:47):
So that's an important thing. I think I learned more than anything thing and
seeing the work ethic. I remember the first time I saw you guys play live.
We'd been working together when I was working for Rob Stevenson and you guys
were in town. One of my best friends is cousins with your tour manager.
We were just chilling and we hung out with you guys. Shout out to Sid and Reggie.
But I remember being backstage at Irving Plaza watching you guys and didn't

(17:13):
know exactly what to expect because I had never seen you guys before.
Four and the second you guys hit the
stage it was just an explosion and watching the
crowd react and i still have a video that i
say from that when you guys i think it's million fans
when you go you guys go down into that little like dance breakdown yeah
yeah yeah yeah or the one we you guys do
this step the step that you guys oh i'm

(17:36):
doing oh doing the most yeah yeah yeah yeah but just
watching the fans and you guys were such a young band at
the time watching the fans react to that and just go fucking nuts
was insane and that's another thing that i think has carried
you guys is just how great you guys are at connecting in
the live show that's very much our identity was
for before the pandemic because the truth is like the last four five years we

(17:58):
just haven't been a band so we're just getting back into it and what beautiful
about is all that work we did do for seven years of being a touring live act
or whatever that was our business it shows how much people loved and cared about us.
And even people, when it comes to booking us, they still would want to book
us. Like we got playing Cannabis Festival this weekend.
It's because we're known as an energetic, great live act.

(18:22):
And that being something that you actually broadcast to the world and show and
people experience is so important.
And it energized us to be like, we can do this well into our 40s and 50s.
You know what I'm saying?
It's like, you could be a great band and you You don't have to have the biggest song in the world.
You could just be a great live act and build that and build that business and

(18:45):
build your audience and that relationship that we're talking about.
Foo Fighters, do they have the most monthly listeners?
No, but all those monthly listeners probably seen them live where that's you
can't say the same shit about like, anybody feel like that's a more sustainable way to build a career.
They always talk about your super fans, like the people who actually care enough to
buy tickets buy merch stream your

(19:08):
record and a live band you're forming that
genuine connection with that audience while you're doing
that whereas if you just have a big pop hit and it gets you know 100 million
streams on spotify but nobody thinks of you outside of that hit that's not sustainable
what you guys did was sustainable yeah yeah yeah and for us in our perspective

(19:28):
we're on like a rebuilding process like it's like you know i'm saying it's like
your muscles deteriorate and now you gotta like eat the protein and
lift again and it feels good to try to like do that
even though now obviously there's still people who love us and we can
go play shows but it's trying to build that and be like
how can this be forever long term and how does it feel now that you're back
in the saddle with all that feels great i mean i just got off a call we got

(19:51):
some shows a little little run in october we got a dc event called red gold
green weekend that we're doing in june so that shit should be dope we have two
shows in one day this Saturday.
Does it feel different being on stage now than it did pre-pandemic?
Are you re-energized because you had that long break from it?
It's definitely a re-energizer. I mean, being older feels different.

(20:15):
But that's more so if you're in shape or not. But it's more so I feel way more energized.
I think the band in general feels way more energized because we just,
you know, we're doing like.
196 shows in a year before
you know so it just felt like this is
what we do like it didn't feel it felt great
every single time but it didn't feel like it did in the beginning

(20:36):
and it feels more like you're more excited do you think you guys will go
back to playing that 196 show a year schedule a
lot of that isn't smart to do when you think about
it but we would if if it makes sense
if it's profitable and it makes sense but sometimes you're
playing shows or you're doing a whole tour and
you want to get in this situation you know you're doing

(20:58):
different opportunities one thing we learned about touring just gotta drop
gems because we're talking is you have to play your own headline shows
even if it's one person at that place because you're
never going to build your headline numbers without playing
headline shows so we played a lot of opening gigs
and only did like one nationwide tour
where we were headlined so that was a thing where

(21:20):
a good good supporting act it seemed like a lot of people like yo
come on the road with us yo come on the road with us but sometimes you'll be
like nah we're gonna do our thing and then we'll go on
the road with y'all you know what i'm saying so i think that yeah it's the reason
why you wouldn't play 196 shows because you went open for seven people in a
year type shoot and i know you were still doing your your solo stuff through
that pandemic and everything and you've had a great career so far as a solo

(21:43):
artist as well and you've had a lot of high profile collaborations songs.
That did really well but if i'm not mistaken you don't really
play solo shows as often right
no not at all i think i played i opened up
for joiner lucas i played a festival with like post malone amigos and stuff
like that i feel like i'm gonna play my first show when i have 500,000 monthly

(22:05):
listeners that was a goal of mine i might do something but it's like i'm with
the band anyway so maybe i'll just open for myself you know what i'm saying
or even like somehow do the
King, like when I really put out the King Breeze show,
like on YouTube or something like that, somehow do a bridge between.
Podcast thing and a show something like that it's like
i want to do the do the show but my favorite version of a

(22:27):
show is having a band on stage so i feel like no matter
what it be the same but also i just want to i kind of want to build
a fan base of people who care and love the things
that i do when it comes to everything that i you know i'm saying and then build
off of that i love that i doing the live podcast combined with the show i think
that's really cool i think that's a perfect transition here then let's go back

(22:48):
it's covid obviously you guys have to come off the road what happened during COVID,
what led to you jumping on TikTok and then kind of get into what you've been doing since then.
We made an album really focused on songs that would get us licensed and playing
live, right? That was 2019.
We played another 180, 90 shows that year, right?
And we were kind of pushed and heralded into this American Cali roots reggae scene,

(23:14):
because that's the only scene in America that's kind of like touring based,
like they build their fan base from touring and so we
were playing all these shows while getting like sings or shit
being video games tv shows just to
make sure we're generating income and getting our songs out there and at the
end of that year we're like all right let's break out of this and really do

(23:35):
our national headline tour the second time around and focus on building our
own numbers that was planned for like 40 dates starting March 13th, 2020.
March 13th, 2020 is literally the day the World Health Organization told the
world that it's a pandemic.
And basketball, everybody went home. I remember seeing LeBron come off the court

(23:58):
saying, oh, we can't be playing this.
So we canceled our entire tour and did a live stream what we were going to play
on tour to give everybody a show and tried to generate some income.
So that happened. So now I'm moved away from Miami because Florida was crazy
during the pandemic. I'm sitting in Virginia at my bro's crib and I'm like.
Like what do i do you know i'm saying i'm still you know

(24:20):
i'm writing songs and trying to get shit in film and tv and all that type of
shit but it's like what do i do i
go on tiktok and start making tiktoks about making songs and rapping and i start
understanding tiktok and have building a community and turns into the king green
show and the king green show is really just this concept of this is all the
shit that i'm into and if you fuck with me this is the king green show you know

(24:43):
i'm saying this there's no like you don't go to this channel and get the
king green show you don't watch this piece of content and that's the king green show
it's like i am the king green show that's like the whole the
whole thing what i kind of understood what tiktok was and what
the internet was is like this is your own tv channel so here
it is so then i just started doing that started making content for money and
working with amazon working with google working with microsoft getting deals

(25:04):
and shit like that and then still doing songs for tv and film as well as making
songs on my own showing people the process that was really the thing i I was
into showing people the process because I make songs every day.
So I was like, let me show how I make songs every day. Then those songs started going viral.
I had a couple of viral moments on Tape Talk and people listening to it and
I had like millions of plays on songs and I put out a mixtape.

(25:28):
And the mixtape does okay and then i signed a deal because of the mixtape and
that was the first like i'm like what 33 or something like that at the time
and that was the first time i ever put out a rap project is at 32.
And it's all and it's all kids listening to my so it's like,
made me kind of understand the scope and vastness of music and what it really

(25:49):
means nowadays and how much being a creative person matters more than what's
been sold to us as far as like what an artist is like.
They told you what an artist is and told you an artist needs to be at one time
needed to be mysterious.
Then they told you an artist needs to show you their entire life.
I need to know who you're dating and all that type of stuff.
They keep telling you what an artist needs to be after artists naturally do

(26:12):
something and become successful.
Now they're like, Oh, that's what an artist is because look how successful they are.
When an artist is just an artist. Once you decide to do some shit, that's what you are.
If you become successful or not, that's just the luck of the draw type shit.
So that's kind of where all that started and where the King Green Show started
is I had shit nothing to do and I wanted to talk to people about rap. That's literally it.

(26:33):
It's like, I had nothing to do. It's like, I'm thinking all these thoughts about
rap songs are coming out.
I was like, yo, let's talk about music because I got nobody to talk about music
with. It's just me and my bro on the crib.
But I feel like it evolved into more of that. It's centered in hip hop,
but you're talking about more than just hip hop now.
You're showing more than just the process, right? Right. At what point did you
say the King Green Show is more than just me showing people my process and talking about hip hop?

(26:57):
Just like in music, you like listen to a band or artists you like and you start sounding like them.
You know, as a kid, you're listening, you're like trying to sound like them
and then you find yourself or you mesh or blend things together and find yourself making content.
At first, I was just making other people's content.
And then I realized when I started to frame it as the King Green Show,

(27:18):
I'm just talking wherever I feel like about the day or that time.
So there's no plan in it, because if I start trying to niche myself down,
you might grow quicker, but people can get sick of you quicker.
When you are just the guy that does this, they're like, oh, that's the guy that does this.
The one thing I realized, what I'm even driving more towards even now is being

(27:40):
the rapper version of Gary Vee.
That makes more sense to me than anything else, because I love hip hop culture. I love rap.
It's just the love that I have for it. And then music in general is something I'm fascinated by.
Technology and marketing. All those things are like the things that I'm fascinated

(28:01):
by, but it's because they all kind of play into each other.
All those things are kind of the same thing to me.
I was talking to a friend the other day and I was telling her that a rapper
is a sociologist by nature.
A rapper has to assess the world where it's at.
Talk about the world where it is and understand human nature

(28:21):
and how a society works and then
implement themselves within that society and the better they
are at that the more listeners they get because they're speaking to this society
right and that's how a rapper is so integral to now more so than the past or
the future raps about now and like how the world's working now right and so

(28:41):
is a marketer a marketer is a sociologist they need to understand what people are thinking
how people are moving, understand trends and hive mind and communicate to them so they could sell.
And I think that's the interesting part to me.
Same thing if you think about a technologist, even though a lot of technologists
are just looking towards the future and future, but if you're trying to sell

(29:02):
your technology and you're thinking about what people need now.
For sure. I think that kind of ties back to something that I've been saying
for probably like a year now.
I feel like as creators, as technology is advancing so quickly,
it's that much easier to have like a professional studio at your disposal,
whether it's visual, music, writing.
But on the flip side of that, all the fans and consumers are so used to a million

(29:25):
different new things a day that everything's kind of shortened in terms of the
cycle of relevancy for each piece of content.
And so we're almost in like a renaissance man error.
You know what I mean? where you've got to be able to produce content so quickly
that maybe you're not just a singer or a rapper or a writer.

(29:46):
You have to be able to do all these different things because you have to be
able to put out content constantly without burning out.
No, I completely agree with you. It's like the whole world has changed like that.
I think about the idea of a Starbucks or a coffee shop.
Places are these one-stop shops

(30:06):
for all these experiences that is how
an artist needs to be the same way that even working at a company they
expect you to do so much more now like when i talk to my corporate friends and
stuff like that there's like they expect you to be like this well-rounded person
the same thing of going into college it's like oh did you play sports and were
academically successful it's like the idea of a well-rounded jack-of-all-trades

(30:30):
human being is in all facets.
But now speaking art in general, one thing I don't like is when people are like,
why can't we be musicians anymore?
And I understand that statement in the sense of that there's obviously a problem
with streaming and songwriters being compensated.
And there's these singular roles in the music industry that got created that are losing their value.

(30:53):
Or there's less positions in that situation.
But at the same time, there was more positions in recent times in that space than ever before.
When Motown was making hits, it was a group of guys making those hits and then
they're putting artists in that space.
And that's it and you couldn't you ain't really breaking into
that system and those are the guys making hits or you weren't
breaking into the music industry very easy at all back in

(31:16):
the day it's the easiest time to be in the music industry ever so.
To push back from so i agree with that shit's hard
and fucked up when it comes to streaming money and certain jobs are
being gone and a lot of this shit's going to hell but the
point of but the point i'm saying is like it started
that way it started when frank sinatra
is in a movie he's he's singing the a song he's

(31:37):
acting you know i'm saying he's a he's a full-on
artist these rap pack guys are full-on artists
back in the day you were a you were everything you
were just a creative an artist and you could sing and you're gonna you're gonna
dance you're gonna do all that that's what happened back in the day if
you want to go even back and further before we could record music you're
playing shows and you're almost like a court jester you're like

(31:59):
you got to do anything to get somebody's attention and you're
competing with the circus a traveling tour
was a show of comedians and anybody who performed right as
industries got changed and and moved around like
in the 50s 60s that's when things started getting separated
and categories got made and why genres even got made right to categorize things
make people understand things so only thing i push back on that about you've

(32:23):
got to be a renaissance man it's like that's what if you really think know yourself
as a creative just like you you're a creative person and work in a creative
industry you can do a lot of shit.
Everybody who's creative can do a lot of things. You are never just one thing.
The industry made you categorize you and said that you're a songwriter.
What is a songwriter? It means you can't be an artist because you're a songwriter.

(32:43):
They can't even say that you're a producer or you're that.
And then you start making money off of it. So you go around saying, oh, I'm a producer.
That's just a category that this industry created. What are you talking about?
You're a creative person and you just found out a way to make money with one
of your strongest talents. That's just it. I love that.
And it also brings up another important point about this is people say like,

(33:04):
why can't we just be musicians anymore?
But if you think about it, the way things are now, it's easier to make more
money as a musician now than it was ever before.
Because all, yeah, for everything that you, you still have to have a massive
team of 400 people doing each individualized task.
Now you're looking at it and you're like, well, I could do this,

(33:26):
this, this, and this all by myself. And I could put it out through this method
and I'm going to take all that money.
I don't necessarily need the label. I don't need this. I need that.
I could just do all this myself. Exactly. That's exactly.
It's like the idea of being an artist right now is people are fighting against
an old idea and the reality of what a creative or artistic person is.

(33:50):
This title content creator has a bad rap because the word content doesn't mean
art, even though So it's a business term for art, like movie companies have
been calling movies content since the 50s. Right.
And it just got broadcasted and massively adopted.
Right. But you're really just an art creator. You're just a creator.

(34:12):
The fact that it's content means that it's valuable. You're creating catalog.
So however, that content creates money. You should be OK with it as a creative
is how I see it, because money is you just need money to live.
Right. And money to buy the things that you want. But to say you're like,
yo, I remember when an artist could be an artist or a musician could just be

(34:32):
a musician. It's like, when was that?
I don't remember. When you had to make music videos and be on MTV,
you were just being a musician?
When you had to travel the world so people could... Touring used to be the only
way you sold records before. Right.
Now, after that, you're talking about when you had to have payola to get onto radio.

(34:54):
So wait a minute. All those times are way harder to make it than now.
Right now, I know kids personally who've made songs on their phone that have
more plays than I may ever have.
Like on one song. Do they have like huge fan base? That's a different thing.
But kids that make songs on their phone, the beat from YouTube,
they put a headset in and they rap into a band lab and got millions.

(35:18):
Of plays and get a deal and now they got three hundred
thousand dollars in the bank account like what are we
talking about this is the easiest time to make music a lot of
times people who thinking the old way are looking
at and being like this is hard it's like oh i can't get my music out one your
music might be old your music might not make sense for who you're trying to
present it to so you may have to present it to a different audience or in a

(35:42):
different way you know what i'm saying that's one thing two i mean if you're
not an extrovert and don't like making content,
maybe someone else should be making content for you.
Or maybe you're thinking about content in a different way.
And who says you need to be the content? Be creative and figure out another
way for people to get used to your music, your work, or interested in who you are as an artist.

(36:04):
Getting people interested in you as an artist has been a task since the beginning
of time, since there was court jesters, basically having to convince the rich
and the royalty that their shit was valuable, like Mozart and all of them.
It's like they're getting backed by all these monarchs and real money at the
time. Same way we've been doing it now for a while.
But now you can actually create all this bullshit yourself.

(36:25):
The money could come straight to you. You just have to put in the work.
And any success that I don't have, I could look at all the things.
There are factors and things that can push you back.
But there's also opportunities that you can get yourself.
So if you focus and work on those opportunities and make that the way you get
bread or become successful or break out, do that.

(36:45):
Yeah. And you have always been technologically forward.
You've always been open to new things. And I know you dropped that real slash
TikTok the other day about AI music.
So that's another topic that I love talking about because I look at AI,
it's a tool to have in your tool belt to help you do things that maybe aren't
your strong point and to supplement what you're actually doing.

(37:08):
What are your thoughts on AI in general as text to prompt sort of a tool to create art?
And what are your thoughts on AI music and how you see it factoring into your own career?
Being able to tell AI to make some drums would be great.
What if I told AI, which I kind of already did, I tell AI to make a 60 soul

(37:29):
song about modern dating or something like that.
Then I sample that song and make a hip hop track out of a sample that I had AI do, right?
That's dope. That's a dope use case for AI.
Now, companies using AI and take up space within the world of music and streaming

(37:50):
and all that type of stuff and sync licensing, I don't like that at all.
But there's also nothing I can do about that other than creating my own space in that community.
So it's a double-edged sword, but I see technology the same every single time.
I'm just one of those people. Before, you made music and you had to play it
live. The only way people could hear your song was live.

(38:11):
Then the record got created.
Now they could listen to your records. What, in the late 20s or something like
that? Now people could listen to your records.
After that, it turned into compact cassettes, compact CDs.
From there, it went to digital MP3s, then to streaming. All those technologies
changed how the music business works and how people perceive music.

(38:32):
But at the end of the day, great songs always won. in
any of those times the great songs always
won not the greatest maybe we don't know
but great songs always win in those times and a song's always
gonna carry over so humans are always going to
matter as long as humans exist when humans don't exist
then like and the kids

(38:52):
like kids are like they're into digital cameras just 20
year olds and college age kids are taking digital cameras
out and taking pictures rather than using their phones
because they like the aesthetic they love the time they like
the like realness of it to them that's real right or
vinyls are like the most bought physical
good even if they don't listen to it because the aesthetic and

(39:14):
the vibe of it is and humanity is really what they're
into so i think that's the same case when ai music comes along is that will
the new ipod commercial maybe have an ai song or your local gas commercial have
some ai music under it that's guaranteed it's already happened so that's cutting out people's bread.

(39:35):
But the real songs like Nelly's Hot in Here, I don't know why I brought that
song up, but it came out of my head. Nelly's Hot in Here. I'm glad you did.
You know what I'm saying? I had to pull something like that. How are you bigoted?
But anyway, Nelly's Hot in Here is going to guarantee going to be in some food
commercial at some time because of the person who's picking a song for it understands

(39:56):
the relevance of Hot in Here, who Nelly is,
and who he means to the culture and the people that we're advertising to,
which is people our age right now.
Right. So when we hear hot in here and then we see Taco Bell,
we're going to be like, oh, we're going to pay attention to whatever that ad
is or if it's on the Super Bowl or whatever.
So humanity and the reality of that situation is what's being brought out of that.

(40:18):
Whereas some random AI song in a trailer for a video game that we don't even
like because that game is the same as the other game that we just saw 17 times,
we're not going to really care about.
Another thing that all of those technological advancements in terms of the release
of music have in common is that people pushed back when those different forms of music came, right?

(40:40):
So like, I even remember for myself, the big one for me, because I was old enough
that I was ingrained in CDs,
I had 1000 CDs, and then the iPod came, fuck that, man, I just I had this wall
of CDs that I'm so proud of, but I'm not getting an iPod.
And then I gradually went to it same with streaming.
I was like, Why do I want to stream I have all my songs on Napster or my iPod or whatever.

(41:03):
Why do I want to download Spotify? And now I live on Spotify all day long,
not just for music, but for podcasts, audio books, you know?
And you don't own those podcasts. You don't own those songs.
You're just getting access to listen to them. That's the interesting part.
We gave up the idea of owning music. That brings back to another thing that
you mentioned that I really related to, and that's people love buying vinyl

(41:25):
and they don't even listen to it.
I have a vinyl record collection that I love and I look at it,
but I look at it as art and it's a connection to the band or the artists that I really love.
The other thing that I was going to say about AI is, it's just the evolution of the artist.
It's the evolution of what an artist can do. When hip-hop came out,
people were like, They're sampling records.

(41:46):
You're taking money out of guitarist's pocket or a drummer's pocket.
And then there's all that pushback.
Even Bob Dylan going on stage with an electric guitar. And everybody was like, what is this guy doing?
This is sacrilegious. And what it comes down to is you can adapt and move forward
and be a part of that movement.
Or you could hope that you're a big enough artist in the way you're putting things out,

(42:09):
that that legacy artist who isn't going to adapt because they're too old,
that they're still gonna fuck with you in the way you're used to you know
putting shit out that that's the dope point about bob dylan
bringing a an electric guitar on stage and people
being like what the hell is this why don't you have an acoustic guitar or just
like electric guitars in general or npcs and sampling it's like as technology

(42:33):
comes in the old school people are going to be like that's not real music they
literally said that they said an electric guitar it's not real music.
They said an MPC is not real music and people are going to say AI is not real music.
And obviously, as we know, it's about how things are used.
It's about the humanity behind it, from my perspective.

(42:54):
And when I said the humanity part, when I said as long as humanity exists,
I'm not almost even talking about some nuclear warfare and us not having resources.
I'm saying if artificial intelligence is actually another intelligent thing
competing with us in society, that's an interesting thought.
King Green's putting out a song, and also King Purple, the AI,

(43:15):
is putting out a song who thinks for itself and is creating art from
a new place and not just copying other artists
art that's a possibility right but looking at
technology as this is a tool and how
can i use it has always been my perspective looking at
music as a forever growing organism and not thinking about time periods and

(43:38):
and what real music is and what real music isn't is just how i was built because
being a hip-hop artist it's like hip-hop is a post-modernist art form where it's about,
dissecting the reality around you and saying that there's not an actual truth so sampling things.
Is literally there's no genre attached to hip-hop you take lou reed and you

(44:00):
make a hip-hop song you take disco you make a hip-hop song anything can be hip-hop
and that's why i love it and why i can never really die that like spirit and
understanding of hip-hop culture a lot of times times when you're talking about
even taking hip-hop aside,
a lot of times when you're talking to songwriters in any genre,
it's like, well, how'd you come up with that song?
It's like, well, I had the chord progression from this other song and then I

(44:21):
just switched it like this. Everything is in a way derivative of its influence.
That's the point I'm saying of hip-hop in the culture.
It's about acknowledging that versus saying you're making something spontaneous
and this is its own thing.
It's acknowledging the fact that all this is the same. It all comes from the
same place, and it all can be one thing.

(44:42):
I think that's actually one of the things that makes music so special,
because it's not just like these little staccato, unconnected things.
Everything is one big lineage.
And when you come up with a piece of music, and it's good, and it fits into
that lineage, you're part of something bigger.
You know what I mean? I think that's such a cool way to look at it.
100% agree with that. I always felt that way.

(45:02):
When you work in the music industry, or
you meet someone on music especially earlier on it's like
oh you you make music too or you're into music and
they could be into a whole different genre of music but you
guys are connecting on that love for it and then
now they put you on like i remember being in middle school
or something like that and seeing sublime cd and incubus cd and it was ingrained

(45:28):
in my brain like that sublime logo and i didn't know nothing about sublime then
they could play santaria and all these other songs and And I'm just full-on hip-hop, Wu-Tang,
Mos Dev, everything hip-hop.
Every rapper in the world at the time I'm listening to. And I'm like, yo, this shit's dope.
And I'm listening to beats like, yo, that beat's kind of like a hip-hop beat.
Or I remember, what was that band? Oh, my God. Fred Durst.

(45:51):
Limp Bizkit. Limp Bizkit. Limp Bizkit, hearing like Nookie and listening to
the verse part and being like, yo, that's a rap beat.
And then it goes into this rock part. I like the chorus because I didn't like
the sound of distorted guitars at the time. I remember that distinctly.
I was like, distorted guitars make no sense to me. And now it's like my favorite sound in the world.
So it's like, that's such an interesting thing where I saw myself become into

(46:14):
different genres. And I remember those moments where I started deep diving into
genres and why from other people connected to them, being around them and all that type of shit.
And that CD case, I saw the sublime CD and the dude's full on CD case.
And since I have a CD case full of hip hop and he has a CD case,
we switched in CD case and looking
at our CDs and that shit that's dope in like math class or some shit.

(46:35):
You know, that's a part about CDs in that time.
Whereas now you might share playlists, like the sharing of music became interesting.
Interesting it's still there honestly but it's definitely different
everything ebbs and flows like that i feel like and there will
be a time where there's going to be something that gives a
visual representation like you're talking about where you
know you sit down in math class and you see somebody's got like some piece of

(46:59):
technology or something that even attached to their digital profile and you're
going to become friends with that person because of that yeah yeah i think that's
the it was the interesting thing and still the interesting of like blockchain technology and NFTs.
Like I always said, when NFTs came out, people are going to have NFTs and not
know it because once they're connected to a physical thing, like your wallet

(47:20):
and your identity within this online universe is going to be more connected.
Just like how someone goes to Instagram and it's almost like your resume.
You know what I'm saying? Like, or if you have a YouTube, that's a job,
right? You, people think that, oh, you're a YouTuber. You have a career.
You're a TikToker. It could be like a career.
You're not an Instagrammer, right? Instagram is just

(47:41):
your actual resume it's
a cv to people it's like your social cv for online
i think when that becomes connected to your
identity with like what you purchase and all that type of stuff i think that's
when what you're talking about is really going to exist i wonder how it's going
to be because it's like i don't know when physical and digital are going to

(48:03):
be merged where they're closer to the same thing like when everyone's walking
around with glasses and seeing things Things are not there. Yeah, Neuralink.
Yeah, I don't know about that. That's a technological step, never going to do.
Yeah, I'm in the same boat with you, but I know we've only got a couple of minutes here left.
So just in closing, any notes for independent artists, people trying to make

(48:25):
it now, or anything you want to push that, where people could find you and that sort of a thing?
Yeah, yeah. I'm a firm believer is you got to make the content that you want
to make and people will find you, right? Promoting yourself is almost senseless in 2020.
Like the old concept of promoting yourself is like, hey, I got a business over
here. Hey, I got a business over here.
We're here. We're open. That seems very important.

(48:48):
Like if I open up a restaurant, the first thing I'm doing is having social media
presence and showing people the experience.
My favorite understanding, like the luxury brands and Nike.
Luxury brands don't tell you when new things drop with commercial.
They just attach a brand or lifestyle or identity to their brand and realize

(49:12):
that that's going to make people understand what type of brand that they are, right?
So it's like, oh, let's put the most famous movie theaters with our cologne.
So when they walk through the airport, people are like, oh, that's Brad Pitt.
Oh, he did this ad for Dior. That makes Dior look more prestigious, right? Right.
Which even people understand that more so now so that when they see something

(49:35):
that simple, it seems like it seems like an ad, but they still might love Brad Pitt.
It still puts those two identities together.
And now I feel like you showing who you are, what you are and giving a story
to whatever you're doing is going to bring people to whatever you're selling, what your product is.
They'll find it on your own. The number one thing is that you just have to have the product.

(49:56):
A lot of times people focus on the content and there's no product.
If you don't have a product, no one's going to go, no one's going to buy anything.
And that's the thing with when you put me on the sub stack and building a community
and stuff like that, the community part is part of something that can be a product.
If you're interested in doing that, as well as just having content as catalog,
just like movies, you got to think of yourself as a studio.

(50:19):
If you have a YouTube page and you have all these videos, all those videos are
things that people can rewatch and you should think of yourself as Seinfeld
and you need to like sell your videos to this streaming place or you own this
catalog or the series, right?
And if you're same thing with your album, if you own your albums,
now you own this catalog, you could sell these albums for a million dollars.

(50:39):
So to thinking about independent artists and thinking about where I'm at and
what I want to achieve, it's about creating value, the products that I'm putting
out there and just being myself through my content.
And I think everybody should do that, whatever that is. And art,
being yourself through your art, because it's content when you talk about business,
but when you're making it, you need to think about it as art.
When I make a video and post it on Instagram and TikTok, I'm a grown ass man.

(51:00):
I have to love what I'm talking about and care about what I created.
I made a video, edited, talked.
You know what I'm trying to say? You're like acting, it's performance media, not social media.
So it's like, I love doing that. If I didn't, I wouldn't do it.
So if you don't like doing it, find somebody else to do it for you.
And it's a King Green show.
That is a perfect point to end on if you're doing it for the wrong reason,

(51:23):
because you think it's going to make you an influencer or famous, then don't do it.
You're not going to be able to. Not even, yeah. Why would you want that?
I want to be an influencer. That's a weird thing to want to be.
Same thing as wanting to be famous. It's like, what do you actually want? You know?
Yeah. It's about the journey of being able to create. It's not about,
well, one day I'll be famous if I do this.

(51:44):
Cause what is fame? You know, like, what does that really give you?
None of those things are actually real things. Whereas wanting to be an artist
can be a thing, but you're an artist.
Once you start creating art and wanting to make money off your art is a whole different other thing.
So you need to think about it like a business that's perfect wanting
to like make money off your heart that's a perfectly sensible thing
to want to have but wanting to be famous that was always

(52:05):
weird to me even wanting to be a rapper i know i'm still going on a ramp wanting
to be a rapper seems always weird to me do you love rapping do you love writing
or want to just be a rapper you know what i'm saying yeah that's a huge distinction
that don't think i've ever really thought about that like do you
want to be a rapper or do you want to rap such an important

(52:26):
distinction it's a it's a huge distinction like
being an emcee a writer or the rapper archetype
is like i am i have to wear these chains i have to look this
way get all these women i make money there's this archetype that people think
of a rapper and someone wants to be that or do you have a love and desire of
this music and this culture and and writing raps and that's what you love you

(52:50):
know i'm saying my whole life I've never cared about that rapper part and always loved rapping.
Well, dude, I appreciate you so much for being on this podcast.
That was a great interview. I'm very thankful. Dope. Thanks for having me.
Music.

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