Hip-Hop Lives Here
Hip-Hop Lives Here
“Out the Box,” Mac Nif’s featured release off his Timeless album, is a showcase of his rap talents and a statement of the artistic vision he has created from his life experiences.
The track is a hip-hop celebration of Mac’s “unorthodox” life, personality and art. The simple melody is carried by chiming strings and snare drums with a fast bassline beat.
“‘Out the Box’ is a few things,” he said. “Me expressing my creative side and painting a picture of my experiences of being exceptional.”
The exceptional is more than art and music though expressed in his art. He was born and raised in Chicago but goes beyond that in his music and in his life. In other words, going out the box.
By no means does he intend to dump on his hometown and the talent in the city.
“We got singers, we got dancers, we got different types of rappers, but for a long time the drill scene took the nation to the point where people across the world want to imitate and emulate that sound. I was never part of that group of people.”
He created his style through his more educated vocabulary and by talking about his thoughts and beliefs on the world and his place in it.
“I’m not afraid to be original with how I think and how I carry myself in real life. That’s what I put on the track. The song is basically talking about how I’m unorthodox. I’m a little different compared to the average person in all those respects.”
From the chorus of “Out the Box”:
We be thinking outside the box
She say I’m unorthodox
Talking over they head in a helicopter
But I started somewhere on the block
Much of rap, he said, is trendy in the language it uses, much of it slang.
“And I come from an element where slang is normal. It’s a kind of language intimacy. But I expanded my vocabulary.”
Mac has earned an associate’s degree and is currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree in software development.
“Out the Box” was one of the songs Mac performed at a Fleet DJ competition, a performance that won him membership in the Fleet DJ’s coalition of more than 700 DJs, producers, journalists, photographers, models and artists.
“I ended up getting selected as the winner of the night, but I didn’t go into it with a typical thought process of this is a competition I need to win. I didn’t really care about winning at all, so just that itself was out the box. In my head, I won already — I had a good time.”
The song includes a kind of vibe travelogue from New Orleans, the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Colorado.
“Every chance I get to travel, I get a chance to adapt to the new energy.”
He began releasing music professionally in 2021 and recently signed a distribution deal with Empire Distribution, Records and Publishing Inc. He started rapping in high school, inspired by his friends and by artists like The Diplomats and the music of Cash Money Records.
His life experiences include overcoming the environment of his upbringing, the South Side of Chicago, “the quote-unquote ‘hood.’” Part of that overcoming is becoming the first in his family to earn a college degree.
“Out the Box” celebrates that as well.
He has set various goals for his music. He wants to hit a million views on his “Groovy Baby” video and has just released his first single under his distribution deal, a song called “I Go.”
In his career, he is working to build his following and his brand.
“I’ve opened up for artists, and I’ve been on showcases with big artists, but one of my next major goals is to really throw my own shows and bring out my full fan base. I want to be the main attraction versus me just opening for another person.”
And, “I just want to continue to make good music and new visuals.”
The philosophical goal is “to be of service to people, for people to be able to listen to my music and have a good time.”
“Music is a form of therapy,” he said. “When we go through situations, if we can find a song that we can learn something from, or at least connect and relate to, a lot of times it can deter us from being consumed in negative energy.”
Connect to Mac Nif on all platforms for new music, videos, and social posts.
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It’s Robert Smith‘s birthday so, naturally, fans of the singer are sharing what is commonly believed to be one of his greatest moments.
The musician, who is the frontman of The Cure, turns 64 today (Friday 21 April).
In 2019, he became a viral sensation on Twitter thanks to his hilariously deadpan response to an excitable reporter.
Smith was in attendance at that year’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, where The Cure were being inducted alongside Stevie Nicks, Janet Jackson, Def Leppard, The Zombies, Radiohead and Roxy Music.
The singer approached a chipper interviewer at Brooklyn’s Barclays Centre, who said to him: “Congratulations, The Cure – Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees 2019! Are you as excited as I am?”
Smith, without missing a beat, replied: “Um, by the sounds of it, no.”
The interviewer, brushing off the response, laughed in response, and asked him: “Oh, no, what are we going to do?”
Smith continued: “I’m sure we’ll get there eventually. It’s a bit early, isn’t it?”
The clip, which has been viewed more than 10m times, has been shared on social media to mark Smith’s birthday.
“One of my absolute favourite Twitter clips of all time. Perfect!” one Twitter user wrote in response.
In March, Smith hit out at Ticketmaster after fans sent him screenshots of the high fees they were being charged when buying tickets to see The Cure live.
The frontman used Twitter to express his frustration at the pricing system by the ticket site, which he says artists cannot “limit”.
“We had final say in all our ticket pricing for this upcoming tour, and didn’t want those prices instantly and horribly distorted by resale,” he wrote.
“We didn’t agree to the ‘dynamic pricing’ / ‘price surging’ / ‘platinum ticket’ thing…,” wrote Smith on the new higher tier system Ticketmaster has been trialling.
He later detailed what he meant by the tweet, writing: “I had a separate conversation about ‘platinum’ to see if I had misunderstood something… but I hadn’t!”
“All artists have the choice not to participate… If no artists participated, it would cease to exist,” he added.
However, when tickets went on sale, fans were reportedly hit by large fees that meant the cost of tickets was more than doubled.
Samith then announced that Ticketmaster would issue partial refunds to fans.
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