stage name: archangel
age:25
ethnicity: Puerto Rican
Home town: Amityville, Long Island
Occupation: MC, Producer, Artist
when I was younger (high school), I would just write rhymes to get my anger out. Take out my frustrations I would get from home, school, my niehborhood. That’s how I got into battling. I would battle anybody any chance that I could. From every cipher I saw to every hosted battle I could enter. . I ripped a lot of people, but unfortunately, long Island didn’t have the same scene as the city, where your rep could get around.
Hip hop was around every corner. Dave from De La soul grew up and lived on the same block as me, and around the corner was prince paul, and Milo, the DJ from leaders of the new school lived a couple of blocks away. But the scene was still small.
Back then I only rhymed, so I needed beats. At the end of high school, I hooked up with some semi professional cats and made a deal that I would do logos for their crew and they would give me beats. I would watch how they did things. How they used their equipment, how they sampled, how they recorded. Little tricks here and there. Whatever I could pick up. After a lot of work and time, they never came through with their end of the bargin, so I convinced the main producer to lend me one of his keyboards. He never heard from me again. In college taught myself how to produce. it took a couple of years and a lot of college loan money spent on equipment, but I finally to the point where I could produce my shit, write my shit, record my shit and design my own shit. I didn’t need anyone for anything. All the while I was battling dudes on my campus. I ripped everybody. People started to take notice, but I was getting weary and bored with the battle scene. Same people saying the same shit, doing the same things. Between taking some poli sci courses , drawing on my dads radical political influence on me, and my experiences from my neighborhood. I just started writing about some real shit. Things people could relate to. Things I actual saw and was disgusted with. It was like I started battling a new and greater opponent. Like I was battling life, the government, poverty, oppression, ignorance. I wanted to be as far away from all the bullshit I was hearing on the radio, hip hop seemed to become lifeless.
So that brings me to where Im currently at. I make music I feel. Music that matters. I make my own beats and write my own lyrics. I just write about things that affect me. I really don’t care to be categorized as a “conscience” rapper, because that shit is just another image. Im not one of those dudes screamin revolution every chance I get, im about the real, true, positive progression of my people. No fake dreds, no che shirt, no fist in the air. I don’t think my music really fits in just one category. It is definitely hip hop, but that has grown to encompass so many different directions these days. But my music is definitely aggressive. I think I bring that much needed edge thats absent from all that candy ass shit out there.
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