Vic Mensa
Meet Victor Mensa better known as Vic Mensa, the up and coming Chicago rapper. The 21 year old just got signed to Roc Nation this week, and has a lot to say about his choice with the label and working with big artists. American rapper and former member of the group Kids These Days, gained fans after releasing his mixtape INNANETAPE in 2013. The tape was downloaded iin high rankings for it's first month.
'INNANETAPE' was named one of the best mixtapes of 2013. It featured appearances by Vic's good buddies Chance The Rapper and Jesse Boykins III, Rockie Fresh and TDE's Ab-Soul. The vibe of the mixtape had 80's funk and R&B to it along with Rap.
Vic Mensa is a part of XXL's 2014 Freshman Class. Every year, XXL picks a group of up-and-coming rappers to be a part of its Freshman Class. Photographed above is Vic in the XXL cypher.
When interviewed by Complex, he was asked about his music influences and here's what he had to say...
"Who was your favorite rapper when you were first getting into rap?
2pac. I always loved 2pac. I just connected with him emotionally. I was a young kid, you know. When I would have my petty problems in life, I felt like it related to me. Getting suspended from school and shit and just hearing 'Pac like, "suspended from school, I was a fool," just had me like, "Man I know. I know what that feels like."
What were your raps about, once you started writing?
Similar shit to what they’re about now. Raps I wrote when I was 15 are on the Internet. Also just being a graffiti kid and a hip-hop kid and general asshole. I was all over the city, as opposed to kids who might’ve stayed more in their neighborhood. I used to ride the trains just to ride the trains. I went to the end of every line and witnessed those neighborhoods and ran from the police and got arrested and did a bunch of shit by the time I was 14, 15.
My raps were about neighborhoods, the city, community, disparities and injustices and shit. They’re really about the same shit I write about now, with the exception of having traveled. But I had already traveled with my family, so honestly, like a lot of the earliest Kids These Days verses from their first EP Hard Times, I wrote those when I was 15 years old. I used to just write all the time on paper. Not even to beats and shit. I used to just write raps.
At this point, were there rappers you wanted to emulate? Whose styles did you learn from?
Jay Z [and] Nas. Nas is a person I can really really remember truly, truly trying to be like. Also Pharcyde and Souls of Mischief. But Nas I can remember—I used to have these exercises I would do down in my basement. I would take a Nas song like “The Message.” And I would print out a sheet of the lyrics, and write a rap next to it with the same patterns, but change all the words. I clearly remember counting syllables a lot, too, as a younger rapper. There’s somewhere between 10 to 15 syllables, 11, 12, 13 syllables in most lines that I would spit. I wonder if that’s still relevant. But that was then. I took Nas’ raps and put them on a table and emulated them to the syllable."
Read or watch the whole interview here.
The Signing...
It was said that getting Vic to sign to a record label was a struggle due to the fact that he wants to do something with his music and let's face it many label just want the money that artist will produce for them, but after signing with Roc Nation, Vic explains "I Got a Lot Of Faith and Belief In How They Do Things at Roc Nation". Label executive of Roc nation was the one who actually reached out to Vic about signing and here's the core of it.
From Lenny's Instagram post after being signed he posted
"... I sat w/ all of em in LA & I told them every reason y ROC was perfect for em. They didn't care about the hype, $, offers etc. They cared about making a connection w/ music/culture & partnering with a company who understood their vision/art. Same thing Roc believes in..."
Keep up with Vic and check out his work through his Soundcloud and Twitter below.
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