Man, Russ, man, what's good, man?
What's good?
It’s been a long time coming.
You know, we’re here now, with KidSuper.
Brooklyn, right under the J train.
Fresh ass spot.
He hand paints all this shit, man.
Crazy shit.
All hand crafted.
He’s just got a super cool, one of one, unique, style.
Complete fucking genius.
This space is very, very influential to you during your come up, right?
I would stay here for like weeks on end. I would just stay in the basement.
This is a classic staple of the KidSuper store and basement studios.
Behind the M&M’s is a magical world.
I would just stay trapped down there, like locked in there for days, man.
This is the guitar I did the "Cherry Hill" shit on.
And where’d you sleep?
Right here.
This is it.
Mad nights spent on this couch.
I’d be fucking, there was no routine.
I’d be going to sleep fucking 11, be waking up at 8 p.m. at night.
So many times I would wake up, go upstairs and it’s dark out.
When did you first get inspired to do music?
I think like seven. I was listening to like 50.
What was it about 50 Cent that spoke to a seven year old Russ?
I don't know.
I think maybe because like before that I was listening to a lot of melody based music.
50 and Eminem are some of the most melodic rappers.
So I was moving around a lot.
But I did my formative years like 8th grade, and beyond in Atlanta. So that's when I started
making beats.
At 14 years old when you're producing, are you aspiring to be an artist as well or is
it just making beats at that point?
I think subconsciously I was.
Because even when I was just producing, like for my boy Bugus I would be like, "Yo, maybe
you should do this flow, or something."
I would be doing hooks.
There was always something drawing me towards getting on the mic, so it was just a matter
of time I think.
You had a song called "El Jefe" or he had a song called "El Jefe" that you produced.
The beat is still fire.
Still hard.
Facts.
That landed you guys on MTV pretty early.
Yes, absolutely.
That was a crazy moment.
That was 2011.
Some people think now, "Oh Russ is cocky now that he got on."
It's like anyone that knows me, like from 2010 my first twitter handle was @Imakeclassics,
so it's like I been feeling like this.
I've known you for a few years so this is just how I've always known you, but where
do you find that confidence from?
Because a lot of people could get further in life and accomplish their dreams if they
had that unwavering confidence.
You know where else it came from was basketball.
I was always playing basketball since I was like five. And I was always the smallest one,
and people would always be doubting.
I always had that chip on my shoulder from like my basketball years, so I think that
that kind of mindset.
You know basketball it's like it was always about proving yourself on the court.
It's that chip on your shoulder athlete mentality just trying to ball out and prove yourself.
So there's parallels with it.
Before this album, your fans know about the 11 mixtapes.
Right.
The grind that you went through.
Right.
You're telling me after mix tape six, maybe after Colorblind, that you were like you know
what I'm off of this?
No, nah.
I was going so hard. I would put it out, and be like alright onto the next.
Because I was never that attached to the results.
I was more attached to the idea of making songs.
I fell in love with the game, not the points.
I think I say that in the booklet it's like success to me is bouncing from failure to
failure without losing enthusiasm.
With each mix tape did you think like oh this is the one that's going to get us signed?
Yeah, every single time.
Every single time I was like oh this is going to blow.
Because we'd always be in the basement, and be like, "Yo, this one is going to get a million
plays, this is going to get a million plays."
We used to always just be saying that, a million plays, a million views, and it’s crazy that
it ended up happening to a lot of the stuff.
Ooo, the Russ shrine.
This is like a bunch of ideas for the album covers.
This is fucking legendary bro.
This is, once again, all hand crafted by KidSuper.
What’s that?
That’s in the album?
Yeah, this is the album explanation.
“The wolf represents success and me blowing up.
I was constantly the boy crying wolf to everyone telling everyone I was gonna blow up, telling
everyone the next song or next album, or next video was going to blow up and it would never
happen.
So, now that its happened, it’s like, "Oh fuck, there’s really a wolf."
There’s Really a Wolf.
When does the process of making this album begin?
Because it feels very fluid to me.
It started before I got on SoundCloud.
I had 11 projects out.
After the 11th one I was like alright, I'm going to make the 12th one now.
But when I was starting to make it I was like alright I can't just put out another one,
and it just be on deaf ears again.
I got to do something to get a fan base.
What They Want was a big one for you.
Yeah.
Very popular on SoundCloud, millions of plays.
How did it feel to hoist that platinum plaque for What They Want?
Bro, it's super surreal. It's really surreal because like I said all those conversations
in the basement where it was like, "This is going to get a million plays," or "This is
going to get a million plays."
You drop it, and it gets 100, and so it's like from getting your first million plays,
and being like holy shit it really happened to doing your first sold out show to all
that.
Then getting a platinum plaque, it's really wild.
The thing I'm most proud about is that it's all original.
I feel like I didn't go platinum. I feel like my mixing went platinum. My high hats went
platinum. My fucking snares went platinum, my reverb went platinum.
There's a lot that goes into it.
This is super cool too.
This is a painting. This is the back cover of the album.
This is a painting of my mom.
Like I said, I knew from the second I knew I was doing an album, I was going to get into
design.
Just the whole shit.
‘Cause I knew it would be some fresh, fucking like, crazy, crazy shit.
People don’t really give a fuck anymore about album covers like that in booklets and
shit.
I give a fuck about every aspect.
In your credits you talk about this one Eminem and Dr. Dre interview that kind of really
changed your mentality.
Yeah.
Talk about that.
It was an old interview with them, and I forget which one of them said it, I think it was
Eminem.
But they were saying like a lot of times you can think that this certain song is going
to be the single, but it's not really up to you.
The people pick the single.
With the SoundCloud approach it's like it's basically throwing a bunch of shit at the
wall, right.
Inevitably some of it is going to stick, some of it is not, but like it's cool because the
fans will tell you what it is.
It makes picking a set list easy, it makes taking songs to radio easy.
It's like, “Yo, you need a 20 song set list, pick the top 20 on your SoundCloud.”
"Cherry Hill" was just one of those ones where I recorded it, and I was like, "This is way better than
all this shit. It needs to go on the album."
And it kept making the cut every week.
When I put out songs it’s like, “This is not fucking with "Cherry Hill." This isn’t
fucking with "Cherry Hill.”
It just made the cut all the way until now.
There's a wild debate going on right now on the internet.
I know.
Some people go it was Cherry Hill, New Jersey.
Right, right, right.
I know someone was like, "I always knew I fuck with Russ, but now he's mentioning Cherry
Hill, New Jersey.
Definitely fucking with Russ."
It's like, yo, I hate to break it to you, bro, but it's not about that.
A girl I was involved with, and I took her to New York for the first time, and we went
to like the middle of Central Park on some romantic shit, whatever.
The first verse is kind of talking about the wolf. It's kind of talking about the idea
of growing up, and me just like being the only one who think it's going to work.
Feeling lonely in this room since I was 17.
Really other dope relationship with a woman that was kind of instrumental in your career.
You rap about her on "Got This."
You say, "Hope you catch that Kylie showing love on Snapchat."
Okay.
That's hilarious because "Got This" I made, you can tell by that line hopefully, I made
that right after I think she played me on her Snapchat for the first time.
Going back to the album, the album has a lot of melody on it.
It's a mixture of things.
Some of my favorite tracks "I'm Here."
Yeah.
Because it's just rap.
Just bars.
Talk about that side of you, that MC side of you, that competitive side of you.
Well, I mean bro that's the thing, like I really be rapping.
I really try and like I wanted to make sure ... I knew, from the second I was making the
album, I knew the first song, and the last song had to be straight bars.
Because I like making those songs anyway.
If you go on the SoundCloud there's songs where it's straight bars.
“Tsunami”, “Longevity”, all types of shit.
But it's like I knew that people's perception of me might be like he be singing, he be doing
all these melodies, and shit.
I knew I wanted to come through with like all right the first time you fucking press
play on the debut album you're getting chomped for four minutes, so that there's no more
... Like after this point I don't think that there's going to be anymore kind of like,
"Oh, Russ doesn't rap."
MVP.
Yes.
MVP ends, it's funny because it ends with a cliffhanger.
I'm going through the album, and MVP comes on, and I'm there.
The lyric I was talking about you say, "Up at the studio."
I already know, yeah.
"Drake is just a room away, maybe I should barge in, maybe I should wait.
It's going to be a funny story a couple months from today when I tell it and it's like ..."
There was a picture that Future put up on his Instagram, and it was like him and Drake
in the studio.
Now me and Bugus like we recognized the picture, because it was at a studio 10 minutes from
where the spot was at.
Tree Sound.
Shout out to Molly.
I call up Tree Sound I'm like, "Yo, you got to get me a session tonight."
Because on the off chance I run into Drake and Future, or some shit.
He got me a room, and so we pull up and it's mad like militant. Like you can tell that
those motherfuckers are in there.
We're literally just sitting there for two hours just trying to figure out how are we
going to make this happen.
Should we like fake walk in there.
Bugus is Nigerian, so I was like, "Bro, maybe you should just like walk in there, and act
like you're not from America just be speaking some different language.
Be like yo, my fault."
I was like I don't know maybe we'll catch them on the way to the bathroom, or some shit.
I don't know.
We literally sat there for two and a half hours drinking and smoking, trying to figure
out what the fuck we should do.
Then we ended up doing nothing, and we just left. But it's back to that whole just trying
to just get on.
Now that you're on, now that you're here, you are on, you're officially on, the album
is out.
Yeah.
What's next for you? Are you still fighting?
After fighting for so long, what are you fighting for? What's next for you?
Has it shifted your mentality a bit?
Has it sunken in that it's really real?
A lot of people they get on, and they want to all of a sudden start like hanging out
with celebrities, and rappers, and shit like that.
That's shit is cool, too. It's just like I got my friends. At the end of the day there's
a clear vision in my head that I'm not going to stop until I get it, and I just want to
go down as the best, you know what I'm saying.
I just want to go down as number one, and I'm not going to stop until I get there. And
if I don't get there I'm going to die trying.
Like the great reverend 50 Cent once said.
Absolutely.
Well, man, yo man I definitely just appreciate your time, and your energy.
Thank you.
This was a long time overdue.
Absolutely.
I'm super excited to be sitting here with you man, so thank you.
Yeah, bro, it was only right.
It was only right.