after two years as freelancer (and interviewing Astronautalis, Grieves, Brother Ali, Sage Francis, B. Dolan, P.O.S., Dessa, Cecil Otter, RJD2, Cage and more in the process), I'm doing my own thing.
After a bit of a flu/new job/holidays hiatus, I’m back and the first order of business is updating otherhip-hop.com’s tour calendar. And just in time.
Over the next two months, Atmosphere is all over Minnesota, Grieves and Budo are all over the mid-west (with Gym Class Heroes! And T-Pain!), Rickolus has some east coast dates, Doomtree is all over the whole damn country (and some of Canada too) and Astronautalis and Bleubird have a whole pile of dates across Europe.
Dessa and Grieves & Budo head to the East coast. Ceschi plays in Japan and Australia. Fellow Fake Four Inc.-er Bleubird also set to play Japan. Doomtree’s Blowout is looming, half of the Rhymesayer’s roster is heading to Europe and Seattlites Macklemore and Blue Scholars are each going coast-to-coast.
All these tour dates and more on otherhip-hop.com’s (recently updated!) calendar.
Do you have any expectations for the Vans Warped Tour?
Make it out alive.
How do you break up the monotony of touring?
I don’t know yet. A bottle of whiskey helps. My MacBook with every movie I have and Netflix. I watched a shit load of Breaking Bad last tour. Dexter has gotten me through several tours. A little Midi keyboard so I can make beats on the road.
Thanks again to art effect for the heads up. And doing this piece.
What is essential to have in the studio when you do lockdown?
It’s nice to have a runner that will go and get you food and stuff. It was nice to have a vocal coach to keep me from blowing my voice out. They had a dog there.A bouncy castle is required in all studios I go to. An aquatic petting zoo, I’d prefer it, but I’m not going to throw a big deal if it’s just a regular petting zoo. I don’t like goats though, all the other ones like mini ponies can stay.
What would you do for Budo?
I would jump in front of a school bus that was full of needles that were infested with AIDS.
What do you think he would say he would do for you?
Buy me an orange. I’m clearly the better friend.
Proving my point from yesterday: Interviews with Grieves are always enjoyable. On the other hand, a lot of hip hop journalism can be really unenjoyable. Props to art effect for the solid work in this piece.
To celebrate the release of the new album Together/Apart, Grieves & Budo will be having an Album Release Party in their hometown of Seattle at Neumos the day before the album drops!
Joining them will be their friends Mr. Lif, Sapient, and Type.
I just can’t believe how long it’s been since Grieves was just a kid pretending to be Grayskul’s DJ on Atmosphere’s “Everybody Loves A Clown” tour so he could have a two or three song set. He was passing out an Irreversible sampler that only had five tracks. At the time, I only took it because he told me that Lif was on it. There’s not too many times that you get handed a random free CD by a rapper that’s actually talented, but Grieves is up there.
And if you ever get a chance to interview him, take it.
