- Room full of mirrors represents reflection.
- Each individual artist is different,
but it's a piece of each individual artist in all of us.
So ARFOM is a statement record.
It's like a record to let you know
that we're here, because we are here, nigga.
- What made me decide to
want to bring everybody together was,
I enjoy putting people in certain positions
and try to maximize the stress.
And I knew everybody individually, you know what I mean?
So I knew what everybody strong points was.
I just wanted to see if we can build something,
make a record, make a album, form a platform.
- In a nutshell, what he said was,
he went home and he put on his X-Men cerebral thing.
(group laughing)
And like, like mentally called all of us.
- For sure.
- Like we all showed up to the studio
and Jerry shot a beam through the microphone
and I froze the refrigerator.
I got some like, wild ass individuals.
X-Men, suicide Avenger squad.
- Professor punch.
- That's pretty much what he said in a nutshell.
We are damn sure.
I'll show you how to do it on your own.
I'll show you how to get it on your own.
You know what I'm saying?
I'll show you how to grind
and really make it happen when you believe in yourself,
when you have faith in yourself.
Childhood, like you know when you think
of certain games, you know,
I think of UNO, Monopoly, checkers, chess.
So I just kind of thought it would be cool to
kind of correlate them you know what I'm saying?
Kind of tie into each other.
The whole red car with peanut butter brown interior,
I've just always liked this since I was a child.
So peanut butter on the inside
strawberry jelly on the outside,
Punch looking at the Rollie, you know, he's Punch.
You know, you boss man so
you're looking at the Rollie, you're like
"yeah it's our time nigga."
And it's our time to shoot.
I mean, you know, we're here.
it's a shoot called 'Time is at a Certain Time'.
Carl Thomas, Summer Rain was a record that he did.
Back in the day, I went to a visit
my mom's family in Mississippi, in the summer.
And it was the first time I've ever
experienced rain in the summer.
It stayed a vivid memory forever
because that was the first time I ever experienced it.
So when I was writing that line,
I immediately thought about that moment.
Me being on the block and Watts,
that's like the first layer.
But then also like, staying on my square.
It's my square because Will mentioned the chess board.
So I'm still piggybacking off Will's chess board.
Even in the terms of, you know
"boxed out the game like hopscotch"
like it's two ways to look at that.
Like you can look at the child game, you know
jumping over the chalk boxes,
but then as you get older, like we got to
step over the chalk on the ground
and a dead body is considered a box too.
So, you know, it's a grown up game
of hopscotch that we play,
and it's a child's game of hopscotch we play.
So all that's tying back into the square.
God said "let there be light".
You know, it's biblical.
That's a biblical phrase just for the start of existence.
When you do the etymology of my actual real name,
which is Davone, it means 'light'.
Like my name itself, the whole breakdown,
every acronym, every syllable, it pronounces light.
So, you know, I just kind of look at it like
I was born in Watts.
The whole idea of watts, watts is a form of power,
electricity, light, that whole tie into
just me living in my divine purpose.
I have this disability that has became my greatest ability
and that's misspelling shit.
I think how I found out 'art form'
was a complete misspelling.
I was like, oh.
I was writing 'art form'
but I left out the 'T' on some fast writing shit.
And it's like, yo wait 'art form',
Like 'art form', 'art form'.
Oh, 'hard for him'.
Oh. And everything just start like, Tetris
like the whole Tetris of ideas start coming down.
But then that still lives in the form of blocks
going back to the beginning of the verse.
Going back into that line, you know,
"just bought a yard farm, filled it up with max goats".
And I look at that as my group, like you know,
in A Room Full Of Mirrors.
You know, punch said the best
like I sell goats, you know?
And this whole group is full of 'art form',
'yard farm', 'max goats'.
We in here.
(bleats)
Tell them that it's Showtime, you know?
And that's just movie references,
like tell them that it's Showtime, homie still Cinemax.
But it's like, you know, even that,
like yeah it's a movie, but don't get it fucked up.
Like, yeah, we might be here in Holly
but don't get it fucked up, it'll still come.
It's like a open bar, like kind of 'fill in your idea' bar.
So it could be slacks.
It could be the company, Slack.
It could be like I'm not gonna slack off the job at all.
However you perceive it, it's up to you.
Even the last line it's like "get intact sharp lines"
but a tack itself is a sharp line.
So, shark time, you know, the verse ate after that.
I don't know, I keep my head focused on the true art.
You know what I mean?
Like it's always been clowns.
They always been around.
They'll always be around.
That's the thing, I mean, it's all drugs.
It's just a new form of it.
You know what I mean? A new strain.
I'm referring to A Room Full Of Mirrors when I say that.
This is new based on this era.
So this whole thing, it's a whole new strain.
I was referring to what we did with TDE.
You know what I mean we changed the whole game.
But then you get, you know, newer guys coming up
and, you know, they get to feeling in themselves
and, you know, a couple of people like their songs
and they start to forget, you know what I mean,
who the real guys are.
When you go into the heritage, like it's double fold.
Like my uncle was Mike Concepcion.
He's one of the original Crips.
And then on my father's side, my other uncle is Big Hank.
He's one of the original Bounty Hunters.
So it's like my heritage, I mean, it runs super deep.
So I'm saying check that before,
you know, those rap lines go a little too far.
This is in reference to people chasing likes.
Doing stuff so people can like it or clout that whole thing.
So that was a direct reference to that.
Like you chasing likes man, we trying to secure our future.
I just thought it was a pretty cool and clever way to play
on everybody say, you know, smoke, smoke.
It's like I don't want no smoke.
So if I put the muzzle on, it's no smoke
but that don't mean I'm running from the issue.
Whatever that problem is, we're going to get it done
but you know, it's not gonna be a big fuss.
I just wanted to point out that
fame for the sake of fame is insanity.
Stevie's one of the most, you know,
proficient writers of our times.
So when I wrote that, I wanted to
speak on that type of foresight.
He reflected the current state that he was experiencing
and even spoke on it in a way that made you feel
you were actually there, present.
It was kind of one of those lessons you get
by seeing someone else mind their business
and not saying shit while you may have needed a yell or two.
So it's one of them lessons that you learn in the dark.
You know, that's where we're coming from.
Oh, so the devious stares, basically there's so many 'mes'.
There's no possible way you can tell yourself
that you know me enough to hate me or to love me
outside of the sense that we are all human beings.
Whatever you see and that you don't like,
maybe you need to sit down and look within a little bit.
I mean, these are the greats we're talking about really.
And again, the entire theme of what we're doing,
the entire theme of the song,
and what I really wanted to put in
is that we're all a collection of reflections.
And these artists knew specifically
that art, music is to reflect art the times.
You know what I mean?
Nightmares on Elm Street, but lyric Michelle Street.
I'm around the corner nigga.
Y'all thought that this shit was scary?
Nigga I was raised in the darkness.
Freddie, I see you out here, you know,
messing with these other motherfuckers
but, you know, I'm the girl of your dreams.
I'm the one, or I'm not the one
depending on, you know, what you're looking for.
- We got some merch.
(group laughing)
- Yeah. Aroomfullofmirrors.com.
You better go get that merch.