GRIMACE LOVE
The Zig Zag Man
Earwaks recently had a chance to sit down with Toronto MC Grimace Love, aka. the General of the legendary Monolith crew, and spoke about everything from the years gone by to the making of his new video "The Zig Zag Man", directed by none other than Earwaks head video editor Mark Valino.
How long have you been making music for?
My whole life basically, bro. My mom put me in drum lessons when I was really young. I started of with a conga set and then I worked my way to a full drum kit.
When did you start freestyling?
I started playing around at the age of nine I was in my first group then did some things at school, nothing serious. It wasn’t until high school that I got really serious, probably around 15 or 16. That’s were I hooked up with a lot of the Monolith guys back then we had a crew called Lyrical Coalition. I didn’t start releasing music til ’98. First project was the Monolith "The Long Awaited..." EP.
How has the landscape of the Toronto hip hop scene and music changed in your eyes?
I’ve seen it change in a lot of ways even before I was in the hip hop scene. I was a fan of Canadian hip hop, Maestro and Michie Mee were a big influence. From that timeframe to now there been a lot of stages up and down, a lot progression, regression, also eras of stagnation. The Canadian hip hop music industry hasn’t achieved a level of commercial success yet, but I’d say what’s changed most is the music media. Things like the introduction of digital media have also changed the scene alot.
I don’t want to call out no names and start a fuss, but things like Flow 93.5 and Much Music have changed the Toronto hip hop scene in good and bad ways. I used to tape things like Rap City back in the day and watch them religiously. Now, the popularity of reality TV has changed the way a video gets viewed. We put a lot of Canadian videos on Much Vibe which is on digital cable, not regular cable, so artists aren’t getting the exposure like they did in the past. I remember when I was a youth watching Rap City, you could see the all Canadian artists, and that built up their star status, it built up their fan base. Now, kids aren’t seeing Canadian artists, they’re all watching BET and getting exposed to American artists, not seeing Canadian artists in the same light.
Flow’s dope because it’s a commercial station and a lot Toronto artists get played on Flow. A lot of people complain that they play music they don’t want to hear but hey, it’s a commercial station so they play commercial music. But the introduction of Flow affected collage radio. People started listening to Flow instead of going to the collage stations for their hip hop. College radio is huge for playing Canadian music. A DJ has the freedom to bust a new artist buy playing his music or have the artist come down to drop some freestyles and flows. A DJ on a commercial station doesn’t have that freedom. So that’s changed how independent artists music gets heard. But hey man, things have changed a lot since I became an artist, things are still on the rise. There’s way more artists in Toronto, way more producers in Toronto, and they’re also talented. I remember back in the day, you could count the good rhymers on your hands. Today, I hear about sick cats all the time, young cats, older cats from all across the GTA. So definitely, the artist base and the skill base is on the rise. Artists have also taken it upon themselves to get their business skills in check. Instead of waiting for labels to find them they started there own. All big changes over the years.
What was it like working on producing a video with Mark Valino?
It was dope man. Me and Mark had been talking for a while on working on a project together it just had to be the right project. He had worked with Dan-e-o in the past. The shoot itself went great, smoother then any other video I’ve been in. We had a good chemistry on set, the models where great, Mike Palma was there taking pics. Mark is a good director and he put together a tight video.
One final question. I’ve heard that you’re sitting on a stockpile of your music, and I know that you’ve released tons of mixtapes. Where is the album?
That’s a funny question because I feel like I’ve been caught into this net that all Toronto artists get caught into. It’s the “coming soon” net. “Dropping just now” is probably a better phrase for it. I always hear i“its dropping just now” back in the day. I used to think he’s talkin shit cause I would never see the finished product, but I’m artist so now I know how the industry works and there’s always something getting in the way. But my album’s called Perception, and its droppin this summer. It was supposed to drop last year and its been in the works for a little while. I had to revamp it because a lot of things, I’ve gone through some changes in the last couple years of my life. I started my own record label Whole Wheat Brothers trying to bust my own music. Before that, I was working with a lot of different cats on a lot of different projects and it wasn’t going at the speed or direction I wanted, so I thought I’d just do it on my own. Because I had to re-establish my business focus, it took a little longer to manifest then I wanted it to. Also, I had a son, he was born last year and he past away. His name was Zende. I want you to write this if you can, he changed my world he changed my life forever. I’m a new person for the fact that first of all, blessed with a son. and the fact that he passed. I had a hard year last year because of his passing and everything thing went wrong. I was still writing down words on paper but I couldn’t get down with them until my head was right, until I accepted that everything happens for a reason. I have track now called “Destiny” which addresses that nothing is coincidence. The things that happen to people, the things that happen to you and me happen for a reason. His passing is something I look at that motivates me so much more. He was born premature and was alive for six months. Zende is Swahili for strong. My son has made me ten times stronger because I saw the whole six months he was fighting, fighting to survive. That’s changed my whole focus. I’m still focused on the same things, but it has given me so much more determination to fight for anything I believe in and anything I want in life besides just music.
COMMENTS
nice pic Grim
Posted 4 months agoADD COMMENT