Photo by Paola Angelino.

First thing’s first, we love exciting artists. Born is exciting to us. Venturing into new, refreshing and explosive areas of hip hop & electronica from the flows to the instrumentals. When we listen to Born I Music, it’s as though Tupac Shakur has passed and been reborn as “The Born Identity.”

We’re not all that spiritual, but Born I Music inspires us to get our meditation on more and to truly “meet ourselves.” We think that if you took Shakur, Ghostface, Kanye, Kid Cudi & The Clipse, put them in a blender and applied some of what Born’s production team (Godfather Sage, Imani Beats, & several others) calls “Afro-Asian Electro-Hop”, you’ve gotten a taste of what this man is doing.

On the heels of his latest release “THE BORN IDENTITY MIXTAPE” which you can download free here. We sat down with Born to learn about the man behind the music, his dad’s cooking and how Born manages to create bass-heavy, spine-tingling songs that just make you want to max out your car system and bob your head. Get Familiar.

Born I Music: You rang? Yo. What’s poppin’ G?

Hipsterwave: Not too much. I’ve actually been listening to your new album for like the past few hours non-stop. We also tweeted about it.

Born I Music: [laughs] Cool. Okay, no doubt. You caught it to the end?

Hipsterwave: Yup. Yeah, man.

Born I Music: Oh, okay, nice.

Hipsterwave: Yeah man it’s good! Usually if an album isn’t good, it won’t get multiple listens.

Born I Music: Word.

Hipsterwave: But there are a lot of stand-out tracks or winners on the record. I think I can sort of tell who was producing what just from the sound… But hey, why don’t we start getting into the questions before you start answering them.

Born I Music: No doubt. Hey one thing before we get this started though, right now I am standing over a pot of boiling water and I’m about to cook. [laughs] It’s probably one of the funniest dishes in the world but when I was younger, I really thought my pops was sort of like a chef, like he’d be whippin’ up all sorts of meals and desserts and stuff like that. But man, he had this signature dish and it was macaroni and cheese with pieces of hot dog cut-up in it. Dude. That might sound questionable, but it’s heaven beyond heaven. He’d do that and he’d put some broccoli on the side, and it must just be a throwback to my youth, but every once in a while I just get a craving for macaroni and cheese with hotdog chopped-up on the inside, so I got a big ol’ smile on my face getting ready to jump into that as soon as we’re finished with this interview. But yeah… [laughs]

Hipsterwave: Oh okay. [laughs] Yeah that sounds interesting, I’ll have to try that.

Born I Music: Yeah man it’s a treat man I’m tellin’ you man. Trust me, it’s a real uh, blue collar delicacy.

Hipsterwave: Is there any kind of macaroni in particular or can you just…

Born I Music: Yo yeah, yeah. You gotta do the Kraft Deluxe, the joint that comes in the box with the cheese sauce. Yeah, like you can’t just do the Cheesy Mac or anything like that. It has to be the Kraft Deluxe that has actual cheese sauce and you just get some chicken hot dogs, or whatever your flavor is, and just chop that up and toss it in there…

Hipsterwave: So it’s not a powder, is it actual cheese?

Born I Music: Nah, Nah, it’s actual cheese, not the powder that you mix up. That shit is nasty to me man, but it’s the deluxe one, so it has the rich flavor. Velveeta type. You squirt it on, mix it. Chop up your hotdogs. Toss that in there. You are in heaven dude. I’m tellin’ you. [laughs]

Hipsterwave: [laughs] That’s what it do man. I’m gonna have to try that.

Born I Music:: Yeah man.

Photo by Jammie Patton.

Hipsterwave: Okay so the first question is what are you influences in music and how did you develop your flow style and method of delivery?

Born I Music: Okey dokey. Influences in music, I think this is like a standard answer—you have to say this—that like my parents are my influence as far as music is concerned. It’s really true, like my father is not an artist, but my father’s art was his love and appreciation for other artists, you feel me? If you made music, you would love to have my father as a fan because he really gets into the music. He gets into like the personality of the artist, you know. So I’d just be in the car and we’d be goin’ to like the pizza spot or just running an errand or whatever and he’d just give me like these crazy long history lessons about like how John Coltrane and Sonny Rollins were going neck-and-neck to see who was gonna be the greatest tenor saxophonist of the time. Also, you know how John Coltrane played in Miles Davis’ band and then branched out on his own and then Wayne Shorter came in and filled his shoes and – my dad was a big Coltrane fan, by the way, so I got like a huge Coltrane lesson. Like every day was a Coltrane lesson. My pops was also really into the great soul-singers- Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, Aretha, James Brown – and then as we both got older, his musical taste just got more and more diverse, so like at any given time—you know my family is from Ghana—so at any time we’d have like Ghanaian highlife playing in the background or we’d be listening to like the local like public radio station that had all like the fresh jazz on there or it would just be something from my father’s like infinite jazz library. And you know then he started branching out into Brazilian music, which he got really into, like Astrud and Jao Gilberto and all that other type of stuff. Then, even Japanese cultural music, Shakuhachi flutes and all that. My house was always really, really diverse as far as the music was concerned. So, that’s like a ton of subconscious influences that you don’t really know you’re being influenced by it until you sit back later on in life and say “Okay, well this is how it all started happenin’.”

Hipsterwave: Yeah, right? Word…

Born I Music: From like a young age, yeah you know, you get older and you just start to reflect on it like “Okay, this is the type of person that I am, and this is why” but, my father, it’s not like he was a musician, but he was and is such an intensely devoted listener and appreciator of art and music that it was almost like growing up with someone that actually played music. Oh, and I definitely would be remiss if I didn’t mention my Frank Sinatra education, which I really appreciate to this day. I dunno what happened, when I turned 17, I just started looking through my dad’s collection and then he had this one record of Sinatra when he was on the Reprise label and pardon my language, but man I ate that fucking thing up. And man, just for like years I was just like deep, deep into Sinatra and like it didn’t help that my father painted the whole picture of what Sinatra was about and what he meant to the game. I think it was also because he saw that I was really deep into gangsta rap, so he’d be like “If you really wanna know what a thug is you need to research Frank Sinatra. [laughs] Frank Sinatra was the thug of all thugs. All these other dudes you see runnin’ around, they never thugged it out as hard as Frank Sinatra.” You know, my dad talked about Sinatra, like just as being an American icon, and also what he did for race relations, to make people bow down as far as Sammy Davis, Jr. was concerned. So yeah man, I just developed this crazy appreciation for multiple dimensions of music and then came rap and it was like Nas and Wu Tang and Biggie, Mobb Deep, Black Moon. And I’m not gonna front, shit, Snoop, Dre, Bone Thugs. All that had me goin’ just comin’ up, but my mind really just started to explode once I heard Illmatic and 36 Chambers, the Infamous, Doe or Die and Enter the Stage—that first Black Moon album—that’s when all my extracurricular activities started taking a backseat and I would just be coming home and listening to music, period. [laughs] But yeah, I know you asked about flow and delivery too so…

Hipsterwave: Well, I know Dilla’s in there too for that…

Born I Music: That’s crazy right? Like it pains me to say that I was one of the people that appreciated J Dilla’s production without even knowing some of the stuff that he had produced, like the shit from Pharcyde, etc. I was also a pretty decent Tribe Called Quest fan, but my awakening into hip hop came slightly after the mega Tribe Called Quest era. And I came into hip hop really during the height of Biggie, Nas and Wu Tang era. But even those Tribe Called Quest hits that Dilla produced on, I really appreciated them, but I wasn’t checkin’ for the producer back then, you know what I’m sayin’? So it wasn’t until like Slum Village came out and Godfather Sage–my producer—was really tryin’ to put me on to him and then I started takin’ more notice to the production and then started taking more notice to the lyrics and you know listening to “Welcome To Detroit” and all that other stuff. So I don’t think that people give Dilla as much props as he deserves as far as his emceeing is concerned, because he was a fucking surgeon when it comes to the emceein’. So I would throw him in there too, almost as like a subconscious influence, definitely. I mean this dude said “Whole body blingin like 3-P-O, nigga” [laughs]. But as far as flow is concerned, one of the very first people I tried to pattern my flow after was Nas because to me he just connected the dots in a really, really crazy kind of way. As much as I respected Raekwon’s flow, I never really tried to duplicate that, but I definitely, definitely was a Ghostface fanatic as far as his whole approach on the mic. There’s this song on the first Cuban Linx called “Wisdom Body,” right, it’s like number 13 on the disc, it’s Ghostface’s solo song and the whole song is about him like approaching a female: that song right there? Gave me all my game right there. All the swagger I needed to pull any chick, came from “Wisdom Body.” [laughs] Number 13 on the first Rae album, but that, I mean it was something else that let me know that you have to have a certain kind of presence. You can’t just flow it out. You really have to create an atmosphere with your lyrics. The RZA was a big influence when I was a kid, just because he packs so many words and so many syllables in this real “I don’t really give a fuck how it lands on the beat” style, and, just being able to cram all those syllables into a short space was something that I was really into all the time also. So, I’m pretty sure that all those things come out in what I do.

Hipsterwave: Okay, alright. So I just heard that track “One In The Chamber”, and that killed me when I heard it, so I was wondering what the production process was for that one? And it sounds like Godfather Sage, but what was the process?

Born I Music: [chuckle] Okay, so I’m sitting at home and the way that this whole process has gone with recording my album, “Tomorrow is Today” alongside “The Born Identity Mixtape” has just been like, I’ll just go into the studio for like a week straight just record maybe four or five songs a night. Then I come home and share it with everybody who is in my immediate circle, get feedback, and then spend the next week going over the newest submission of beats. You know, during the time I’ve been in the studio recording, I’ve still been getting more beats from more producers. Then I’ll spend the next week out of the studio, just in my crib, or you know just sitting on the road just writing, and then I’ll go into the studio the following week and just knock all that stuff out. And so, with that track “One In the Chamber,” it wasn’t that much different, but to be honest that track was meant for like another artist Godfather Sage aka GFS produces for, and I was just on the road and he was just playing it for me over the phone—like yeah, yeah check this out—and I almost crash the car! I was like “Yo dude, I don’t care what’s going on with that right there. I don’t care who you had slated for that. Come on man. Fam first! Man, family first!”

Hipsterwave: Right. Family Comes First man.

Born I Music: Yeah man. I really give my producers a guilt-trip kind of, because I know they wanna work with other artists and I’m not trying to completely ransack all of their best tracks before they let other people hear them, but at the same time, of course I am [laughs]. I mean I’ve been doin’ this shit with them for like almost 10 years, you know what I’m sayin’? So, I got a real F-U attitude towards anybody else that’s not me when it comes to the best production I can get my hands on. So, basically after almost committing vehicular suicide/homicide after hearing that beat over the phone, and GFS’ tracks are such that you can—like I get a lot of beats from a lot of other producers—and I’ll play ‘em on my little laptop or whatever, and you know you can’t hear the bass on those little speakers really, but I can hear the bass from a Godfather Sage track through the telephone, through the weakest clock radio type speakers ever. So, that shit was boomin’ through the cell phone, and I was like, yeah okay—so—I really need to do this track. But, I had no idea how I was gonna come on it, what I was gonna do with it, et cetera. And like, now, I see how a lot of these dudes who claim they don’t write, you know what I’m sayin’ – I see how they process goes. Because eventually with a lot of the stuff I wrote on this album I’m like either driving or just on the road period and so I don’t have a means or even the time to actually write anything down, so I just start going through the song in my mind, and I’ll just come up with like the first couple lines or eight bars or whatever and then I’ll just come down and you know commit it to pen and paper later on. But, the first line came to me in just this really odd way for “One In the Chamber,” and then that first line, that “hallelujah,” and then the lines that followed-up right after that were so over the top, I was like “Naw, I can’t say that,” and then there was like another mini me on my shoulder like “Well, you know, why the hell can’t you say that?” And so, [laughs], that’s how that track started.

Hipsterwave: Whatever works, huh?

Born I Music: Yeah, yeah. And I think that’s pretty much what I think I’ve let guide my writing process on these projects. Because for me, it used to be really important to be that I’d get the recognition of lyrically destroying the track. You know what I’m sayin’?

Hipsterwave: Yeah.

Born I Music: And on the Born Identity Mixtape there’s still some of that going on [laughs], but what’s more important for me right now is to actually just make a good song, and so I’d rather just be like another instrument on the track—whether I’m like a melodic instrument or a percussive instrument, or somewhere in the middle of both—it’s more important for me that I just really create a good experience for the listener as opposed to me, you know, feeling like egotistically satisfied that I really murdered the track. You know what I’m sayin’, so if anybody wants to hear me like pack 800 words into eight bars [laughs], I got stuff like that—you know just send me an e-mail—and I can send you the old stuff. Go back an study the first Shambhala album “The Lotus Of…”. But, what’s important for me right now is creating an enjoyable musical experience for as many people as possible. So like, whatever just kind of erupts from my mind as a result of listening to the beat, I just kinda trust that and just go with it. I get to mumblin’ and hummin’ and the track writes itself [laughs].

Hipsterwave: Okay, so the next question is—I hear some influence from other cultures in your tracks—and I was wondering what your thoughts are on other cultures, and you already mentioned Ghana, but the whole question is how do other cultures play an influence in your everyday life?

Born I Music: Well, my mixtape is a bit more straightforward as far has hiphop/dubstep, etc. I just wanted to really demonstrate what I’m capable of lyrically. But you’ll really hear that musical diversity on the album. Like I mentioned my father would play a lot of music from a lot of different cultures and that was probably in the back of my mind influence. But my overall philosophy as an artist is to try to highlight and celebrate the differences amongst people and to then really expose the things that make us all the same at the end of the day. So, it’s like unity within diversity. So, on the one hand I like to try to pull music from a bunch of different cultures to celebrate the diversity of humans. Right, and then I put it all together to say “See, we all love to dance, we all love the drum and we all love a good melody. So there’s no reason why we should feel separate from one another. – We’re still the same family at the end of the day” You know what I’m sayin’? Now, my spiritual background is Buddhist and coming from an Asian spiritual background, that has just opened up my world to a lot of Asian music and the obviously my cultural background is African, and African-American, so that all opens up a big window of music influence and musical exposure. So, when I set-out to do this album, I wanted to do something that would be like Afro-Asian-Electro-Hop. You know because I love electronic music, I love music that comes from the east, I love African music, and hip-hop is basically the culmination of all African American music—you know over the centuries—so I kinda wanted to put all of those things together and make an experience out of it. So yeah, the music of other cultures really plays a big part in what I do. I don’t like the term “World Music.” I think that’s corny. I just feel like right now with the Internet and the world just getting smaller in general, the idea that you should sound like you come from certain coast or a certain region, all of that is about to be obsolete. Really, we should really start looking at it like all of these different cultures are brother and sister cultures, so there’s no reason why we can’t reach out and use those things like they’re our own.

At the same time, I like the idea of being able to take really ancient deep-rooted sounds and then mixing them with some really futuristic shit and then just going for it. I’m all about putting opposites together and making something happen.

Hipsterwave: Alright, cool. So what do you think some of the rewards in music have been for you?

Born I Music: Being able to fly around the world just on the strength of my music is definitely a huge blessing and a wild head trip. When I was a part of Shambhala, we toured in Asia numerous times and it just an unbelievable experience. And money, who doesn’t love money? [laughs] Its a rough grind in this game but when the paper is good, the paper is great [laughs]. Making music that you know will stand the test of time is a big reward, developing a fan base, having people you don’t know come up to you and tell you that something you did changed their lives or helped them through a rough time, nothing beats that, man. Making “The Born Identity Mixtape” while making “Tomorrow is Today”, working with so many talented producers, engineers, tastemakers, friends – its all just beyond words…I can tell you being a musician, and as somebody who practices meditation, meditation is always about taking a good clean look at yourself over and over and over again until you can really see as clearly as possible. And, being a musician is a big part of that because it’s like one gigantic meditation. You’re always digging into yourself to see ‘what else is there’? ‘What else can I speak on’? ‘What other perspective can I introduce to the world’? What have I been through that I can share that would be of value to myself and others?’, et cetera. And so, just on a personal level, as somebody that believes in past lives and future lifetimes, and all that other stuff, hopefully I’ve been able to knock off a couple of future rebirths by just paying attention to myself as deeply as its required when you’re an artist [laughs].

Hipsterwave: Last question – whats coming up for you?

Born I Music: THE BORN IDENTITY MIXTAPE just dropped so everyone go to bornimusic.com and download that asap! The official single for my album is dropping early this summer. Its called “Conga Drum” its one of the most unique and catchy songs to drop in a long time so be sure to go to www.bornimusic.com for the track and the video! My new blog is up, everything from music to video to pics of fly girls, me, me with fly girls, etc is on there [laughs] so everyone go and check out bornimusic.com now! My album “Tomorrow is Today” will drop once I have the right situation so until then, I’mma keep dropping singles, videos and releasing collab projects with various producers. I’ve got a project called “Dolce & Beretta” with my producer Axiom coming up, a bass-heavy concept EP with GFS, an electro/dubstep thing with Aligning Minds and of course touring with The Hoodfellas and providing vocals. I’m gonna be busy man [laughs]

Download Born I Music’s “THE BORN IDENTITY MIXTAPE” here!