Locked In with Ian Bick - Clever Reveals How He Avoided Prison & Ended Up Working w/ Juice WRLD, Justin Bieber & The Kid LAROI | Clever

Episode Date: November 7, 2024

Clever shares his journey from a life on the edge to becoming an artist in the music industry. Known for his unique blend of hip-hop and rock, Clever has caught the attention of major names like Juice WRLD, Justin Bieber, and The Kid LAROI. But his path wasn’t always straightforward. Clever talks about his past struggles, including facing arrest and narrowly avoiding prison, and how he turned these experiences into motivation for his music career. He shares his story of going from small-town Alabama to creating music with top-charting artists. #CleverMusic #JuiceWRLD #JustinBieber #TheKidLAROI #HipHopJourney #MusicIndustry #TrueStory #OvercomingAdversity Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ Connect with Clever: IG: https://www.instagram.com/whoisclever/?hl=en YT: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCn-gIxT36zfTV0qWVPTzAng Listen to his music: https://lnk.to/Clever_EP?fbclid=PAZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAaYaKVpdXXXawNc8wr1jmbTFXu09qrCArebI4WbihLiSQMKZ9YPBMNJGUy4_aem_y16J6267ApCGofpNN0XwHA TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clever Presented by Tyson 2.0 & Wooooo Energy: https://tyson20.com/ https://woooooenergy.com/ Buy Merch: https://lockedinbrand.com Use code lockedin at checkout to get 20% off your order Timestamps: 00:00:00 Growing Up in Alabama 00:04:00 Southern Upbringing and Family Dynamics 00:08:12 From ICP Lyrics to Battle Rapper: My Path to Hip-Hop 00:12:31 Mall Shenanigans: A Universal Teen Experience 00:16:36 From Newspaper Courier to Radio Host 00:20:31 Pre-Recording Radio Shows: A Behind-the-Scenes Look 00:24:39 Arrest Story: The Beer Incident and Cop Encounter 00:28:40 Overcoming the Past and Embracing Redemption 00:32:32 Reflections on Survivors' Guilt and Lost Friends 00:36:48 Influence of Music in Prison 00:41:01 Alabama's Strict Laws and Luck in Legal Troubles 00:44:49 Struggles and Dreaming Big in LA 00:48:52 Navigating the Music Industry Post-Deal 00:52:45 Transitioning from Podcasting to a Traditional Career 00:56:41 Collaboration Challenges with Top Artists 01:00:45 Overcoming a Troubled Past 01:04:51 Organic Storytelling and Staying Present Powered by: Just Media House : https://www.justmediahouse.com/ Creative direction, design, assets, support by FWRD: https://www.fwrd.co Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Graham and Hemmy are registered trademarks of FCAUS LLC. Clever, welcome to Locked In, man. Thank you. Pleasure having you here. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me. Yeah, we're in an Airbnb right now. Let's go.

This is my first time filming in, like, an Airbnb. I thought this was your place. I was like, dude, I love the guitars on the wall and stuff. I thought this was your place. Oh, I didn't realize that you did. Okay, that makes more sense why you're compliment. Yeah, no, I like the backdrop. I like the wood here.

It's better than just, like, sometimes you go into someone's house to film and it's just like white walls. Right. So it's cool that we got a little backdrop today. That people will appreciate that. That's cool. So we are in Nashville, Tennessee right now. Are you from Nashville? I'm from Alabama.

Alabama. Yeah, baby. Sweet home. What was that like growing up? Well, it's beautiful. You know, the skies are so blue, didn't you know? You know what I mean? It's a beautiful place.

It's a beautiful, where I'm from, it's small town. So they try to keep it beautiful. They don't build a whole lot. They keep it green. you know, that sort of thing. But it's a, it's a, it's a good place to be. I'm still, I still live there now for the same, for the same reason. I've never been to Alabama. I got to. Oh, man. Yeah, you got to. Where are you from? I'm from Connecticut. I was born in New York City. Okay. I'm doing the most traveling I've ever done in my life now.

I thought you may have been Nashville based. Are you based in, you're based in Connecticut? This is my second time ever in Nashville. I was here in April for like a reentry conference. Okay. And I've just been, you know, traveling around. We're doing like nine interviews this week. You're our first one of the stretch. Wow. I'm actually, I live about three hours from here. So it's really just the same as Nashville. It's just not as, you know, big. But as far as back roads, you know, and the greenery and that sort of thing,

the hospitality, it's right in line. What was it like growing up with your family? Did you have both parents, siblings? Oh, yeah. Yeah, both parents. Great parents, very religious. and had two brothers. Both of us playing sports.

Me and my older brother, my younger brother didn't play sports, but, you know, just getting it in, having fun growing up summer Alabama. So were you the middle child? Mm-hmm. What was it? Was that hard growing up?

The favorite child? The favorite. Yeah. Is the middle child normally the favorite? In this case, just because I'm great, you know, no, I'm kidding. I always say that jokingly,

but the middle child, is fun, I think, for some reasons. I don't know. We do kind of get the short end of the sticks sometimes. The older brother, you know, you get the hammy downs of the older brother. They're very, like, cautious, you know, don't bump his head. But by the time a second one comes out, they're just like, whatever. They're throwing french fries on the floor for you kind of thing.

That's kind of how we get treated. Now, when you said religious, are we talking like you went to, you know, private religious schooling? No, just church. No, just in church. my whole life. Like just on Sundays, or was it multiple types? Sometimes on, you know, like Wednesday, stuff like that, doing youth, you know, stuff growing up.

What did your parents do for work? Were they middle class, upper class, lower class? My dad made great money. He was, he worked for himself. He had a construction company and he did a lot of different things. He was painting and stuff like that. He painted some roller coasters and stuff working out of Atlanta. He did a lot of different construction type stuff.

My mother was a housewife, just a mother, really the most important job, I think, being a parent. Who are you closest to, your dad or your mom? Both of us. Both of them are, we have a great relationship. So my whole family is very close. Even my wife, her side of the family, we're all very, very close. What were some morals your parents taught you growing up as a kid? Some morals? Well, you know, just to be kind to others.

you know, to treat people the way that you should be treated, you wanted to be treated, and to respect people, to respect elders, that sort of thing. I was raised to say, yes, ma'am, and, you know, no, ma'am, that sort of thing. And the normal standard, like southern upbringing, I think, in the South, you know, we say grace and we say, ma'am, the kind of thing. How do you think your brothers would describe you if we had them, here growing up what would they say about you um taller better looking um funnier you know what i'm saying faster jumps higher that sort of thing um no just uh good person i think deep down you know i i said

joke like that it's kind of a mask i think in a sense but i would hope they would think that i was uh was good i've looked out for them in some ways so we have a good relationship were you picked on at all growing up in school? No, I haven't grown since I was like 12. So I shot to like, I'm 6 to about 200 pounds. And I was this height and weight when I was like 12 or 13. So I got in fights with people that was a lot older than me that, you know, whose fathers would be calling my dad, like wanting to apologize,

thinking that we wouldn't, hoping we wouldn't press charges because I was way too young. But they thought I was the same age kind of thing. but I wouldn't say I got picked on. I helped some people that was getting picked on a couple of times. But I was cool for the most part. What kind of student were you? Did you take school seriously in high school? No, I was writing poetry and music lyrics all day.

I mean, I would listen barely. You know what I mean? I'd flip through, you know, but I'd be over here kind of ducked off writing some stuff to the side all day long. and, you know, I was big in sports, but, and I would, you know, try to focus for the most part on that, but once I got some scholarship offers, I ended up, you know, just skipping out on it anyway and focus it on music. So I think school is important. I don't think that I learned quite what I needed to learn or wanted to learn in school.

I don't think that school actually teaches you what you need to know. For me, I made a lot. good grades, but I wasn't trying to. You know what I mean? I didn't focus or do homework or stuff like that. I just kind of got by. So you had already known by the time you made it to high school that you wanted a career in music. Absolutely, yeah. I wanted to do baseball. I wanted to play sports at one point, and it changed once I started kind of putting it out there. I made some records that started making some noise. I started doing some freestyle battles and stuff when I was like 14 and I started making a name for myself around town, around my school rather, and at some point

started making some noise around town and ended up, you know, pursuing it further. Once you go so far, you know, if there's no turning back, you have to just keep going, you know what I mean? And I think that's where it was for me. At a very early age, you know, I knew what it was and what I wanted it to be. And I think, you know, even up to this point, I get a lot of questions about a transition, but I think even at a young age, first starting, even up to this very point of this interview, our life is just a rough draft up to this point. You know what I mean? It's still being written. So I think the music transition is the same. You know what I mean? It was just a rough draft at that point. It's still kind of growing into what it has become. But I have known it all along for sure.

first discover that you wanted to get into music I feel like a lot of kids growing up they want to be a rapper or musician or whatever but it doesn't it's not like a serious dream but for you it did become one well I realized that was good at it at some point and that it could make an impact on people's lives unfortunately the first go around I I'm sitting there I was writing poetry already I had a buddy that had an album an insert cover of an ICP album and I was reading the lyrics and I was like, this is trash and I can outdo this type thing. So I, and this was at, you know, a very young age and I thought I can outright these dudes. And I became a battle rapper.

You know what I mean? And it was kind of true to my beginning, I guess, and just me wanting to outdo somebody lyrically. So I started writing based off of that, but my first go at it, Somebody was like, had a little bit of a smart tone with me about me doing hip hop per se and being this white, you know, guy kind of doing it. And so I wrote like this disc record that ended up getting turned in and I got suspended and all this other different stuff. And it was like, from that point forward, I think I was locked in. I was like, this is my thing. I can turn pages. I can like make moves with this thing.

You know what I mean? And I still look at it like it starts with a piece of paper. and you create it. It starts somewhere. It ends up here, you know, doing this podcast in Nashville, Airbnb. Did you have someone you, like, looked up to or idolized in the music world at that young age? You know, I grew up listening to Leonard Skinner, Allman Brothers.

I looked up to people like that and only at a very young age. At that age, you know, you're listening to what your parents has put you on at that point. you start to kind of dig into your own sense of who you are musically and what you're going to get into my first go was like it went corn and like limp biscuit first and then it kind of swayed into lead zeppelin and listening to some of the stuff my dad you know listen to and my mother was more of a gap band earth wind and fire and my music fell right in the middle somewhere I was making some hip-hop, but it was like rock-inspired. And you really never know where to put it. Nobody knows what to call it. But I would say Jay-Z was a huge influence of mine. Rhyme scheme-wise,

a little Wayne at some point, which was dope because I've got a record with Wayne now. So it's like, you know, you can, it's a full circle moment at some point. But so did kids, you know, I know you said you weren't really bullied much, but did they make fun of you because you were so passionate about music? No, you know, I wouldn't say make fun. People could be jealous at times or, you know, I'm sure people would mock me behind my back. But, you know, it was kind of wild. So I don't, they wouldn't have said it without, you know, some kind of repercussion, I guess. But sure, because you are big.

Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I don't want to come off as an intimidating, you know, person. But, yeah, I can be a little at times. but, you know, I don't think that's the goal, right? Now, in high school, were you getting in any trouble at all? Besides, like I know you said, the lyrics and the disc track, and you got suspended for that. Right.

For sure. I mean, with skipping school, same old regular thing, you know, smoking pot and stuff like that. Skipping school, going to other people's school, and other people's school, like egging people's school, stuff like that. That's the typical high school thing. fighting, you know. I used to run through the fountain at our local mall. They had this huge

fountain and the security guards would like chase me through JCPenies and different stuff like that. That was always fun. At the mall, it would be like a hundred, you know, our small town, you either at the mall or you're at like a parking lot, you know what I mean? So, and that's really all we got. So it's like a lot of parking lot of just chilling and hanging out. A lot of fights go down, you know, stuff like that. A lot of it gets rough. And a lot of different schools, you know kind of linking up in my town it's very I mean we're talking about 30,000 people in total right and maybe five or six different school all rivals you know that all link up at some point hang out in the same spots and then different things go down so you know I was fighting a lot growing

up it was a lot of you know testosterone going around you know it's funny that um you said like the egging and and the running through the mall like you're all the way in Alabama growing up and we're in Connecticut doing the same thing. Right. In a different time period because you're older than me. Right. So it's just like it's so interesting how that stems from somewhere. And it continues.

Even like last year on TikTok in my town, it was like going viral. Kids were running through the mall, the fountain. Right. And then they had to drain the fountain. They stopped doing it. Oh, wow. Yeah, it was a whole thing. Yeah, that was fun.

I saw a guy do it when I was young, when I was very young. But he did it in front of like maybe two or three people total. you know, and it was very funny, but nobody saw it. When I was, there was like maybe 200 people hanging out around this specific fountain. And so, you know, running through it, you could get away fairly easy, and people would actually help you, you know, set up walls kind of thing for you to run through. You could hide through the crowd, but of course, you're the only one that's soaking wet. But, yeah, I've had many times running through different shopping, you know,

like stores and stuff with people chasing me around through. them all around my high school years. Did you feel like you had a lot of anger in you at all? Because you mentioned the fighting. Yeah. You know, in high school, not as much, I wouldn't say. It actually came more in my mid-20s. I'm quick-tempered.

But, you know, I was very happy, go-lucky, happy-go, you know, just fun, energetic. And I think more towards my mid-20s is when, and my temper really started to kind of let loose, which was in line with, you know, drug usage and that sort of thing. Were you using drugs at all in high school besides weed? For sure. Well, you know, experimenting, yeah, well, just with a lot of things. But I think for the most part it was just weed, yeah.

How did your parents feel about your career dreams and aspirations? In the beginning stages, of course, it's, you know, to be realistic, you know, have something to fall back on. but always, you know, encouraging as well. There was a time when I remember doing shows and my dad was like doing the clicker, you know, counting heads as they came in to make sure that I was getting all the door cover.

So, you know, they've been very supportive at the same time and a big inspiration to it too as well. That's what my dad would do when I own the club, but I'd have him working at the door some nights and he would be shooves in with the fire marshal and saying, yeah, you know, we got this many people in there, but it was really the X amount. You had the double clickers.

Right. Making sure you're getting, yeah. Yeah, that's so funny. So do you end up graduating high school? Yes, I did, yeah. And do you go to college? I went, did some basics, and it just wasn't for me. I couldn't find what I wanted to be in that.

And I already knew what I wanted. So I went almost thinking it would be the fallback, you know, potential fallback kind of thing. But it was very short-lived. What was the major you went after as the fallback? I don't think I even had a major. at that point. I started doing some basics just kind of to get started. I didn't even go to those and would just like hang out at the auditoriums and different things and act like I was going to school, maybe pop in for a minute, pop back out, get the grant money and not buy any books and that sort of

thing. What about experimenting with more drugs in that college time period? Did you have any experience with that? No, same old thing. I went to a community college briefly. that was in my hometown. So it was the same old people, same old drugs. Okay. So when you leave college, what happens next? And how old are you? I mean, I literally went for a semester at best and didn't even go for that.

So I started working. I worked at manufacturing plants, a couple of different warehouses, Buffalo Rock, the Honda plant for a little bit. Anywhere I could get a job, bartending was one for a while. I delivered newspapers at one time. in my life. You were hustling. You had to do what you had to do. It's true. It is true. I used to sling newspapers and then bartend at night. It was basically Batman. And were you living with your parents during this time or are you off on your own? I'd stay with friends from different times. At different

times, I had roommates here and there in high school. Of course, I stayed with my parents. I was out by college for sure. Okay. So how does your career start to progress after that or, you know, your life in general, you're transitioning into becoming. Well, I started making some noise coming out. I did 106 and Park in 2006, like a freestyle Friday thing, and I had a little bit of a name around my hometown. And they eventually double back wanted me to do my own radio show. So I used to do live radio on the air.

You can't tell because I am not good at this anymore. But I used to sit here and just like beep up. I would even do accents and stuff like that, just joking around the air, but I had my own radio show for a long time. And actually, a funny story, I had pre-recorded for like a Thursday, Friday, and got arrested. And it was the only radio station that you could pick up in the county. And so my show was playing and my pre-recorded voice is playing on the radio as if I'm on it. And I'm as I'm getting locked up, you know, and I'm walking in, like dragging a boat behind me that I'm going to sleep in the freaking floor of this

full like sell right and and my voice is playing in the background and they all know who I was because they've been listening to me all day and I was like it's a small town so you go on 106 and park I mean I was known around town they all knew me in there and they was all listening to my show because they would call in and I would shout them out over the air and get in trouble for taking the collect calls and stuff like that but I just kept doing it but well you're taking the calls from prison when I was on the radio okay yeah The prisoners were calling in. It's funny. Yeah, the county.

They, they, so one person called me and, you know, would shout out somebody in their same unit, right? And then it became a thing because they'd get one phone call at some point. Then it became a thing for they would use that call to call me and shout out somebody else. Then they started shouting out units down below and girls from, like there'd be a girl unit that would be calling and shouting out people from above. And then it became all the girls that were outside, out, you know, on the. on the outside, out in the real world, would be calling to shout out some dude, you know, that they was, you know, sending commissary money to, you know what I mean?

And it just became a thing. It was like everybody was shouting out everybody. Of course, when you're locked up, it's great to have your name in circulation. So it really became a thing. But then once they started getting the bill of all the collect calls, I started getting hail from all the program directors. But I still kept doing it because it was such a way. popular thing. You know, everybody kept calling. So I just, but I was also very popular when I got

locked up. So you know, that's fascinating. Yeah, that these collect calls because that's what they do now, but they have contraband phones. Everyone's going live or they want shout-ups. Like, I have so many people that you can still use the. Yeah, but it's less and less. When I was in prison, we, you used the pay phone just to make it look like you're using it when really you have a contraband cell phone. so you would go on the wall phone like a couple times a day or something just to get your calls and so it doesn't look suspicious like oh why all of a sudden is he not talking to anyone on the wall phone right right that makes sense it makes sense yeah i mean i have guys that write in say hey i'm in prison i listen to your show so i can imagine that's what it was like for you oh absolutely

yeah i was getting letters and stuff you know from people outside you know that was being real supportive i think once you go to jail especially if you're trying to do something in the spotlight A lot comes with that. Some people can really relate to it. Was it normal in that instance to pre-record, or did you just get lucky that that show was pre-recorded when you got locked up? Sometimes I would pre-record just so I could record music while, you know, in the studio. I had a late-night show, so there'd be nobody there,

and I would be, you know, like, chief and out in the car and come back and forth. But I would pre-record sometimes just so I could get in the booth and record some stuff or just, you know, being lazy. And what was the general topics of the show? It was a mixed show. It was like, so, I mean, it was music. So it was like mixed radio. It was called 102.9.

I had the Clever show. And I would say, it's Alabama's best mix of music mix. 102.9, you're listening to The Clever Show. Never Fear Clevers here. I came up with all these little slogans, which I still use today. And it was mixed music. It was like anything from Britney Spears to Little Wayne to Pearl Jam, you know. and they would have all these songs in rotation,

which I didn't understand why those songs were in rotation and that they were some, you know what I mean? And I'm removing songs and putting stuff in and, you know, just changing the whole thing. I was playing songs off of YouTube that they didn't have in the rotation and had like ads popping up sometimes on air. I was doing all kind of just goofy stuff

that I ended up losing. I mean, going to jail is what, you know, ultimately lost the job, but it was such a fun time. I loved doing radio. I loved doing this. Yeah, you definitely have the voice. Oh, thank you.

And when you do it really quick, like, I can't talk that quick. Oh, yeah. With the whole, like, you're listening to this, this, this, that. Oh, right. Yeah, yeah. That's so cool. You could get it if you had a, you know. I got, I don't know.

I can't do it. You got like that voice, you know, it's really cool. It's like that's a musical voice, I guess. Yeah, that's what it is. So the name clever, how did you get that? Because you had it during that time. Right. I was battle rap.

And when I was 14, there was a battle rap. I was actually going by my last name, which is Huey. and I was 14, so it wasn't too young to change my name just yet, but in this specific battle, it was like a $50 Friday battle, mind you, and like a little rinky dink hole in the wall kind of get together. But I'm 14, and I got challenged to go there, you know, from somebody that I had battled at school that was like actually had an album and stuff. I respected him.

So I went and did it, and there was this guy throwing out L. like lines at me every other line it was like i'm going to give you an l i'm going to hand you an l it was l this all that and um i said or no i'm sorry he was he was throwing w lines and i was throwing him l lines so he was going to take the w this that the other and i so all of my l lines i and one of them i said you can call me clever because i won't see an l ever right and after the show this guy comes up to me and he's like what did you say your name was clever and I was like, no, my name's Huey. And he was like, oh, I thought you said, you can call me clever or something like that.

And I remembered the line. And I was a big fan of common, the rapper, and it reminded me of common. It was a very common word, just simply clever. And I was like, no, but I liked that. And from that point forward, I went by Clever at Fort. I was like, even at that age, I thought I'm at an age where I'm not too young to go ahead and change my name now if I change it now. Have you changed it permanently to Clever? Is that like you're legal?

No, no, no. But that is what everybody calls me. Okay. Even my mother. Oh, that's great. Yeah. So that arrest, was that the first time you got arrested? Which, to lose the radio gig?

Yeah. No. No, I got arrested young doing a few things, just drinking young age, you know, stuff in parking lots and stuff like that. Actually, I got arrested. My first time getting arrested, me and my friends were just. drinking in a parking lot of a grocery store. And my buddy, we're in the back of his truck, and he's got one of those toolboxes that go at an angle to the floor, but it looks like you can kick shit underneath it.

And he is taking his beer and like trying to kick it underneath there, but he's just smushing it. And the beer goes down the grooves of the truck bed and it's like dripping out the tailgate. And so when the cops pull up, and he's flashing the light around. And of course, my friend, Goofy Lee. like was like them ain't ours before you even ask any questions he was like i didn't ask you though you know he starts so there was two cop cars they arrested like six of us and they stuck four of us in one car me being in the four and two of us in another car because obviously they can't count

and i'm in the the first one to get put in the car of four people and there's all these you know parking lot people sitting there just watching us that was there also hanging out and i remember I was so drunk joking. I was putting my face against the glass and like blowing out and making these big old cheek things and everybody was laughing which my mother like scorned me for it later on after she found out.

But we got arrested but we just sat in like a holding cell kind of thing got booked. You know, we was too young to really sit. Was that a felony or just a... No, just a little slap on the rest I think. I was too young. But when I started really getting in trouble

in 2012, I got arrested nine times in the same year, but a lot of it was investigative holds for 72 hours. A lot of it was getting indicted on the same charges and going back, not just doing, you know, dumb shit nine different times. But yeah, I got arrested nine different times, a couple of times for a month here, a month there. You know what I mean? And what were these arrests for?

What were you getting into? Basically just assault charges. like, I got to break in an entering charge with an assault for just kicking in this day's door. And that was, we had some issues. I used to get in fights a lot. I'm not proud of that. I've come a long way from those days. Do you think that that could have been, you know, avoided later on if you got maybe

a little help in high school? Because that violence was starting to show a little bit in high school. Yeah, you know, I don't know. I mean, I think my days were great. In my mid-20s, I started to slip and just kind of lost sight and kept going and didn't care to change at that point. Now, when you say, you know, getting into fights with people, are these random people, are these your friends? It just depends. I mean, you know, I'm quick to pop off at somebody, so you never know who you're going to run into.

If it's somebody that's willing to just sit there and spat with you if they want to throw, then I'm always willing to throw. So, you know, of course, dealing with growing up, you get in fight over girls, you get to fight over all kinds of stuff. I get in a fight a lot of times for my brother or, you know, a cousin, a friend that got jumped or something like that, you know, a lot of things come up. Were you trying to keep up with like a persona for the fighting, you know, rapping, music, fights? No, I think you just get into fights, you know, even in sports.

I mean, you're liable to run into fights, even at practice with your own teammates. I mean, just being around a lot of men, you know how it is. I mean, fights just happened. So that time you got arrested when you were recording and you went to jail that night, tell us that story. I'm sorry, what did you say at the time that I was recording, like pre-recording? Yeah, you pre-recorded and you got arrested during that show. So there was, I was pre-recording. I got arrested.

I want to say that was when I started getting arrested, like, the nine times. That was the first arrest. lost the job first. I didn't know how to deal with my anger back then. You know, it starts somewhere. Everybody goes through it, you know. We all have these mountains to climb, right? You've been there. You've been to prison. You're out. You're doing your thing. You're sitting in Airbnb's just like me in Nashville, right? You have tattoos and stuff. We've been through the thing. So, you know, I think it just depends on how you come out. You know, I'm not part of my past. Like I said, it's a rough draft.

But who I am today, I am proud of. And I'm not done, you know. So I don't necessarily love to focus. I know, you know, a lot of the locked-ins that I've seen, it's a lot of that type of redemption type story. And that's what I want to say is you can overcome it, you know. So I don't want to smack all over this microphone. You can overcome it, you know.

We all deal with the same fire. We all go through the fire. and you either burn or you become the flame. And we all have mountains. You know what I'm saying? Some mountains are higher than others. You know what I mean? Some currents are more calm for some people,

but you have two choices. You know, you either die on that mountain or you become the guide of that mountain. And I think as creatives, and that's why I love what you do, and I was so happy to take this interview is because I feel like it's your obligation as a creative to create things just like this

to lead people into a better direction to show them where they need to go by showing them where they've been. You know what I mean? I think it's your responsibility. It should be mandatory if somebody like you that's as good as what they do at this. You know what I mean?

To do what they're doing. I think it's very important. So I just wanted to say that also. Yeah. No, I mean, I realize, like this start, this podcast started about my story and it started about me. But then I realized, like, the power is in being this creative person to put the story together.

Like, that's why my face doesn't go on the thumbnails or I, you know, try to just make it all about the guest, you know, when possible, some interjection and guide them. And it's about getting those stories out. Because, like you said, about the news articles, if someone Googles you, right, and they see those articles, there's never the redemption article. Unless you've blown up, like a Robert Downey Jr. or any of these people that went to prison that get the redemption article. articles. There's nothing good. So this is an opportunity to give them. Yeah. This is my negative news articles. This is my Robert Downey. This is I'm becoming Ironman as we as we sit here. But it's a screwed up world that they don't, you have to pay, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars to get your press done or changed or this and that. All the people that can't afford a publicist

or a news organization or write. Absolutely. That's a beautiful thing. This is just easy access for people to come on and share that. Absolutely. It's a beautiful thing. You know, I'm sure it inspires other people to do the same thing and also, you know, inspires a lot of people to overcome. Thank you. What's something that could have helped you with that anger back then that you know of now? That could have been a good tool for you. And there's a lot of X.

No, I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Because there's a lot of angry people that, you know, are going to be listening to this. Sure. So remind me again, why didn't you just run a truck and move yourself? Well, been there, done that. Just once, wound up with a squashed couch,

stiff neck and my brother ghosting me for six months. I get it. I'm steering in a mountain of boxes and suddenly realize bandaging this move is my entire life. That's why we moved with Mayflower. They handled everything. The packing, loading, timing, no guessing, no chaos, no trips to the chiropractor. But isn't hiring a mover kind of pricey? Not when you factor in truck rental, gas, time off work, and your stuff getting messed up. With Mayflower, we had a move coordinator and actual professionals. I slept the night before

moving day. Sleeping before a move? Sounds very grown up. Right? It felt like, okay, we've got this. So doing it yourself may be simple in theory, but Mayflower is common reality. Is that it? Exactly.

Moving? Trust the people who've been doing it for generations every step of the way. Get a free quote at mayflower.com. We're in your, or are in your shoes that you were back then? For me, religion, you know, and that's not what everybody wants to hear, but that's that's what I, you know, that's what I turned to. That's what changed my whole life. It's just not living for me anymore, but having a deeper purpose. Do you wish you took religion more seriously in your younger years? Absolutely. You know, there's a lot of people that say,

are you a big Christian? And the term, it's funny, I just started thinking about it, but, you know, there's really not, I don't like the idea of a big Christian or like a half-ass Christian. You know what I'm saying? I think you either are or you aren't. And I think the more I become in touch with that, the better the results I see of my day-to-day and just how I feel and how I handle my emotions. I'm not the same person I used to be. And you know, you get caught up, you get guilty by association. I was associated with so many guilty people. The majority of my friends are dead. You know what I mean? From some of the stuff, the way that we was growing up, a lot of the drugs and stuff that we were doing. So I would say the majority of my friends are dead,

you know um i may have one or two that i've hung on you know and say for a lot for 20 years you know what i'm saying so um you know i just think you have to come out of that you know what i mean and and you have to find you have to find your way do you feel like you have survivor's guilt at all no no i mean yeah maybe to an extent yeah because what i know now and what i didn't know then you know i wish i could I guess go back and change some things. I had a friend that died in a car accident and was slung from his own vehicle and he was drunk driving. And the last two of the last three times I saw him, he was drunk.

And he was driving and like dancing out the car, you know what I mean, drunk. And I laughed, you know. And dude, you're going to kill yourself. That's kind of the way I reacted to it. I regret that every day. Yeah, I mean, life is, you know, so short. And you never know when's the last time you're going to be with a person. And I think about that more and more so often, you know,

and it just puts life in perspective. So friends that I was friends with in high school, you find out they passed away. And there's no closure ever. And it's like, wow, all that time, you know, went past and we went our different lives. And why do some people live and some people die at these young age? Right. It's like juice, you know. When I met Juice, I have guilt towards Juice because I had already been down that road of drugs, you know, and I saw it. I overcame it and didn't say anything. You know, Juice had this, it was like Elvis. You know what I mean? You couldn't tell him or people were scared to tell them more so, you know what I mean, in fear that they wouldn't be there anymore. No, when you say juice, we're talking about Juice World. We have an older demographic that I'm sure doesn't even know who this is.

Right, yeah, Juice World. And you would meet him later on in your story? Okay. Around 2018, I met Juice. He was just about to really pop off, Alucid dreams, was just going nuts. And he was in Airbnbs in L.A. when I met him. The first time I ever met him, they saw some of my clips on Instagram and reached out, Juice and Baby, little baby, and his brother, G. Mani.

all Chicago based, but they, little baby would go on to sign me and Juice and Kid Leroy and Season. And some others at this point, he's done a few more. But at that time, that's all it was. But anyway, when I met Juice, he was quoting my lyrics. That's the first thing he ever said to me. He quoted my song, which is loyalty. It says sometimes loyalty comes with a lawyer fee.

And he said, hey, you know, sometimes loyalty comes with a lawyer fee. and I'm like, yeah, you know, and that was like our first interaction. And then after he said that, he was on a dirt bike. It was like not cranked. And after he said that he didn't cranked it and then was like trying to walk it and couldn't, didn't really know even how to ride it, but he was still trying to walk it. And I just thought this dude is, you know, he's insane.

I was, we just walked by, you know, in passing. And he knew who I was from that. And then I ended up meeting with little baby in them, which was tied to Jews. And, I mean, he was, the first day I met him, he was sitting on Kitchen Island popping champagne bottles, you know, Tintasian. I didn't get to meet Tentasian, but I met like his whole camp. And that was not the first night. I'm sorry, that was a different night.

But I was going to say he would have been right there. One of the first nights, I remember really hanging out with juicing and getting linked up Tintasian had just passed. I think that might have been later on, actually. But I met him, like late 2018. I was signed to him all through 2019. It's so interesting, you know, hearing this perspective because these are people that, like, my demographic idolized. Right.

And or my age group, you know, like I remember first hearing about them when I was in prison and their music was very popular in the prison world and demographic. Right. Who's that? Who exactly you speak? Speaking of? Juice World.

Oh, right. Yeah. Yeah. And the prisons, yeah. Yeah, very big. I actually had, when I was in New Jersey, there was a lot of guys from Philadelphia there. And Meek Mill would like face time into a couple of them and make sure they're good, taken care of. It was a very, you know, close-knit community.

That's cool. Yeah, it was a really cool experience to like see all of that happen. For sure. Yeah, it makes cool. So after you got caught with the, you got put on probation for that? I did, yes. I got locked up for a little while and ended up getting out doing some community corrections type stuff. I was actually on federal probation for about four years and then did about another four years of community corrections.

And that was all while you were getting those other charges too, or did they combine that into one deal? They combined it all, yeah, at some point. Okay. And when you went to that jail, you went to a county jail? I did, yes. What was that experience like with being around all these people that knew you and looked at you as like a celebrity? It was cool. You know, I think I was getting some treatment that maybe some people didn't.

I had shot a music video. The day I got arrested, we were actually editing the music video. We had just shot in Panama City, Florida. And we had come back to Alabama. And I was there a day, and they were just waiting on me to get back, basically. But I was able to actually watch the music video from my cell, just from my square, because one of the guards let me, because they were actually a fan of my music.

So do you think that that could have derailed your music career? Like when you were in that jail cell, are you thinking I have all this stuff going on? How could I be so stupid? I think it did. Yeah, it helped me back. I held myself back several different times. I think I was really making some noise when I got locked up and it helped me back.

And eventually started making some noise again, got into a bad contract and was stuck for like four or five years. And then, you know, created a buzz and kind of, you know, fell back a little bit. Now I'm trying to climb back out again. I feel like a lot of actors, musicians, celebrities, you know, they get into these dilemmas where they kind of hold themselves back by their own fault.

Why do you think that is? Like holding themselves back. You know, I don't think it's like self-sabotage. I think you're going through some things and you try to cope. And some things just happen to interfere with what you need to be doing. Yeah.

When you were on probation, were you continuously getting into trouble? Or is that when you kind of started to change your life around. I started to change my life sitting in a courtroom. I was looking at 10 years and I had a one month old child that was sitting in the same courtroom. And my son's 10 now. So if I had done 10, I wouldn't know him. You know what I mean? And not like I want to. And it was eye-opening, to say the least. How did you get that second chance to avoid the 10-year sentence? Just all that I'd been through, you know, all that I'd already had some time served, I'd already, you know, done some, the community correction stuff and kind of pissed clean for a long, long time.

There's a lot of different things that I did that kind of helped the case, I think. Now, when you say community corrections, what is that like? Basically, just like a color code type deal. You're going in, meeting with somebody, they check it on you once a week, you pee in a cup to make sure. you're not doing anything you're not supposed to do. And if you do, you get locked up. It's kind of like this is a chance for you to get out, but you still have to report without necessarily having an ankle monitor type deal.

You can run. Why, but you still have to check in? So it's not like you're actually having to work or like work on the side of the road or anything like that. It wasn't like a work release. No, no, no. Interesting. Thank God. Now Alabama is kind of like I feel like it's the tough on crime state

Do you feel like you got lucky in that sense about that about that? For sure, for sure, because they can be a little close-minded to a lot of things. I mean, I'm lucky I didn't have any marijuana charges, you know what I mean? As much as I was smoking growing up because they're strict on a lot of things, especially that. Do you think you would actually ended up serving time if it was drug-related charges? Probably, yeah. Yeah, I put you under the, the jail for marijuana. Yeah. Wow. So your music career, when does it start to pick up again?

I mean, you have that lag period when you're going through the criminal justice system. How do you get back on your feet? Well, through actually getting in some trouble and getting put all over the newspaper and be in a radio personality, I started releasing songs, kind of leaning in on the whole thing. And it actually helped, you know, it didn't hurt me around town. but I was stuck. I couldn't leave the state. So they wouldn't let me leave the state for a couple of years, and I was just milking the city and doing surrounding areas as far as I could get permission for my probation officer to go. And at some point, my manager spoke to, you know, and I was like writing songs for people. You know what I mean? I wrote songs for like Snoop Dog and corrupt, and some of these people do way back when.

And so she's telling these people that, you know what I mean? Like he does, he's like, he's really doing some stuff, you know? And so she, my manager got permission for me to go to L.A. And I had never met her before. And I was putting her off. You know what I mean? For a year and a half and I finally went out there and they swapped my probation over there. So I went to L.A. and started doing it over there.

How old are you when that happened? This is probably, gosh, I don't know, 10 years ago. I was, I'm in my 20s still. So, no, there's no way you're still. your 20s now? Yeah, now, yeah. You're still in your choice now. Okay, that's somewhere in there. Okay. So, maybe now. Um, by that point, you were already running for Snoop Dog. When was like your first, you know, big break then? Oh, man. I don't know. I, um, I, I had done some stuff with a freak nasty. Do you know who freak nasty is? They did the handle on your hip. When I dip, you dip,

we dip. Yeah. When I was like 15 or something like that, I had written some, some songs for them. Oh. Yeah. I'm sure that was played at many of my high school dances. I was like 15 doing that. And how do you, how does that even happen? Man, I, how do you, there's no social media. Right. When I started doing the battle rapping at 14 at 14-ish, I might have been 13-ish, 14. I had a radio personality from Birmingham, Alabama that was on a clear channel radio station

that just took a liking to me because I was young and was doing, you know, all that I was doing. And he wanted me to actually come to a segment. So I had to get permission to go and work on this radio station for Clear Channel and I was taking phone calls live on the air, just freestyle and battle, and people that would call in to freestyle battle me on the air. So, and it became this thing, this funny thing that he would do, and people would call, and, I mean, I was 14, you know what I mean? And, and, but it gave me a lot of experience.

It was, it was exciting. The radio station was like overlooking all of Birmingham, Alabama, and it was just, so I felt like I was talking to the scene. You know what I mean? And it was, it was, it was. Looking to start 2026 with an unforgettable getaway. Fiji Airways sale is on now. Fly nonstop round trip to Fiji from just 748. Or enjoy a sunny Fiji stopover on your way to Australia with round trip fairs starting from 839.

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Yeah, if you check the news, it's always bad stories. Everybody wants an overcoming, you know, story. I think for the majority of people resonate with it as well, even if they don't go through the same exact thing. I think people resonate with just being down and maybe even living through them overcoming it. Okay. So you make it to LA. That's like everyone's dream that's in music acting, you know, to live there. Were you already kind of successful by that point

making money or are you kind of struggling? I had done some things but no, yeah, I was always struggling, you know, still struggling. So, you know, I just barely everyone's always struggling. It's always a grind. It's a it's a grind. No, it's been a, it was a struggle there at that point for sure for sure for sure what were you doing for work um writing for publishing companies different things linking with different producers sitting in on camps and stuff like that i was stuck in a deal so you know i would go back home and do shows i used to do these paint parties where and this show this venue got me into it when i first started doing shows like legit my own shows and putting them

together. It was this place called Dr. Feel Goods. It's not there anymore, but they used to do these phone parties, right? And I used to love their phone parties and they had these wet t-shirt contest and all this shit. So I was like, I'm going to go down there and see, Phil let me do a show and do like a wet t-shirt contest, him do the phone party. It would be insane, right? So I go down there and I'm like, dude, just give me a Tuesday, just give me a Wednesday. Like I've got a fan base around here. What's the capacity in this place? And it's a small place, like 300 people capacity, right and he was like 300 and i was like dude i can pack this join out you know i'm saying like i swear i can and if you'll just give me the door cover or something like or he actually said he would

give me the door cover which he regretted and the next time around he gave me a flat fee because i sold the place out but um he uh basically you know through this whole get together and it became a thing to be a part of my shows early on that it was going to be this wild thing it wasn't just going to be me performing but it's going to be like foam and you know ways and you know t-shirts and all kind of like jelly wrestling jello wrestling and stuff like that and so this other club reached out to me in Birmingham and wanted to do a paint party and paint parties became my thing for the next like two or three years we did them all over town all over Alabama and basically it was washable neon paint and everybody would come in like all white and we would just be

spraying everybody in the in the clubs and getting it all over the place One time I did a show in my hometown at a local club that's like been there for 50 years. And a buddy of mine bought the wrong paint. And we ended up spraying paint all over the pool tables all over the TV with paint that wouldn't come off. And I regret that to this day. Sorry. Dude, that's an incredible hustle. I really do.

I'm so sorry. I did the same thing when I was running when I started off doing teen parties. And you came before like day glow and life in color like happened. But then when that faded out, I was doing. like these, we'd go to Michael's craft store and get the washables. And when they ran out of the, you know, watercolor, water based or whatever, you'd mix it in with the real one hoping that diluted it.

But that was a great hustle. You can make like 10, 15 grand the night. Heck yeah. It was nuts. This club already was doing the paint parties and just saw that we were doing some kind of crazy stuff and was bringing people out to a nearby city and reached out to me,

wanting me to do it. And they were like, we do all these paint parties. And I didn't know what it was. And they had these big, like, super sokers. and I'm just like drilling folks in the face all night long while you know performing. So when you got to L.A., are you still getting into trouble or is your life like, I got to stay on this track? No, I was very straight, narrow.

In fact, you know, I cut my hair. I like changed my name. It was very nickel back. It was like, I'm just kidding. No, I, I basically like tried to wash myself clean. But you grow the hair back out. Yeah, yeah. So bring us, walk us through, you know, now you're in 2018.

and how do you meet some of these contacts getting signed to a major record label everything like that what's that look like when i got out of a bad deal i ended up putting out it took me a while to get out of the deal for one but when i did i was so eager to just put out new stuff that i was i mean i sat for a month me and a buddy of mine put together like 30 records and i was i started shooting videos and we started putting out snippets on instagram you know just me trying to be me again and not writing for other people. And it was a, it was a learning curve. And I actually learned a lot about my voice and about my writing ability, you know, having to write for other people because I wrote everything under the sun. I wrote, you know, I translated one song from Hebrew to English for a Tel Aviv duo. You know what I'm saying? I've done like gospel music and birthday songs and Christmas songs. I've done like insane. Like,

it's a very broad, you know, thing. But I, um, I, um, I, I, I, I, was very eager to put out my own stuff you know i've written country songs but i had never written one for myself so it was always been a learning thing to write you know this specific moment for for me and having to kind of so i don't i don't love to write for other people for that reason but anymore you know i mean i don't do it as often anyway but um not that i wouldn't but um once i started putting out snippets again and kind of doing my own thing it started making some noise and everybody started kind of coming around I was getting a lot of traction on Instagram, which would eventually, you know, bring my mixtapes,

got involved, string cut based out of Atlanta, wanted to do some stuff. We ended up working, and eventually Juice World came into the picture after hearing a few records. Do you feel like your music was being influenced a little bit by your past experiences? Were you putting that life experience into your work, essentially?

Yeah, I think that's the point, you know. I think that's what you go through it for. You're meant to deal with that so that you can crawl under that same rubble that you're familiar with and free people from that same debris that you know so that you can lead people to the light. Do you think your life would be different

like your work now if you didn't have those negative experiences? No, no, I think you're meant to go through it to be who you are. I think you have to in order to to be that guy, you have to fall down that mountain. So you needed those essentially experiences. Absolutely. So you're in L.A. when you get that new record deal in 2018?

Yes, 2019. No, I'm back and forth. So I've got full custody of my son. But he stays in Alabama for the simple fact that he goes to his mothers from time to time. So it was a lot of bouncing back and forth. It's always been flying around, flying back to go. go back home. Does having a son when you're in the music industry kind of make you want to, you know, work harder and have a reason to keep pursuing it farther? And at what point do you say,

I have to go pack it up and get a real job? Like, was that a rare thought? Sure, I think, but at some point, you know, you go too far to turn around and go back. You know, you can't just go work at a grocery store. You know what I mean? Yeah. And there's still money there. So I don't think you're ever done, you know, you can do something else if a podcast don't work. workout you do you you you go from that and you bridge to something else if music doesn't work i might start doing a podcast you know what i'm saying so i think um having a child definitely makes you want to go and get it more you know you you now owe it to some other life form that to to take care of them and you're not just feeding yourself anymore and you you want to set

good examples to them by showing them good work i think yeah i feel like how to like i'm i'm i'm building this platform how do I leave this like if say podcasting failed or everything goes belly up sure how do you go back to a normal job from that you don't you can't like there's no going back you're a creator so you're it's mandatory and there's so many people like that and I also I there's like a lot of people that have been the criminal justice system that want to get into music or are aspiring artists you know and they're kind of in that limbo of do I go all in on it or do I you know what do I do I do I quit and focus on something else it's hard. Yeah, you have to, though. You have to go all in. There's no, you know, you can half-ass it, but it's going to look half-ass. You know, it's not going to work. It's not going to do what it's

supposed to do because you're not doing what you're supposed to do. You have to, for me, it's, especially, I don't know about everybody, but in music, I mean, it's not about being in the right place at the right time. It's about being in the right place all the time. You have to be there. Like, I mean, it's so oversaturated that if you slip up for a minute, you're fading. Now, the concept of writing music for someone are a lot of, like, these big artists using a writer and what does that look like? What's that process? Absolutely, yeah. I think a lot of people use writers, and it can be fun at times to have somebody in the room sitting here throwing around ideas,

but a lot of it is scratching your head at first, especially if you don't have chemistry with somebody. If you do, the process would be, you know, what do you think? What do you want to write a song about? And then we kind of come up with a concept, what do we need, depending on who it is. If it's for me, you want to put it in a specific direction. Now, I personally write all my lyrics.

I take pride in that. But I do enjoy writing some songs. This one song I did, Train Rec, that we have, we're working on. It's coming out soon. I wrote with David Ray Stevens, Kelly Sheehan, and Ned Cameron, and it's really the first time that I'm putting out a record here recently that I let somebody tap into the lyrics,

but it was David Ray Stevens and Kelly Sheehan. So it was like, yeah, I'll let them dive in. But you have to trust those people. They have to be able to do what you do lyrically, and some people don't. Some people are not as good on, camera as you are not as good on a mic or not as good as editing so you have to let you know you have to do um what it is i forget um where i was going with that but i um i don't know you take it from here i just

do you ever write a song and you're like it has to be this person that's singing it or or using these words like write a song specifically for somebody or maybe you write it because it's what you know you you feel it in you you you write it and then you figure out who the person is it's going to be for or do you have to figure out who that person is before you even write it? You know, it's never the same process. So I think it happens that you're writing it for someone specifically, of course. And then it also happens that it starts into something. But, you know, whether you're trying to make it about them, it's slowly becoming them

because they're a part of those experiences. After Juice World passed, did that affect your deal and everything you had going on? Absolutely. Yeah. It was crazy the way it happened, actually. I, so I was with Juice already, and, you know, we'd been touring and doing all kind of stuff. He had dropped an album. I was featured on it. I linked up with Post, and we just immediately hit it off and Post wanted to be a part of it. So it was a deal between, I mean, I was with Post and Juice, you know, in a combined deal under Republic. And I signed the, I signed the, you know, I signed the, you know, deal and juice died the next day. Wow. So it was devastating and it was never a good time to say, hey, when we're going to get started again.

My whole team was, you know, devastated. And it was a lot of just sitting and waiting. And the moment that, you know, we started kind of putting our pieces back together and trying to get back to work, it was like COVID hit and all the videos and stuff. We were trying to shoot, was getting shut down. Chris Brown didn't show up for a video. I was going to do it. I did a song with Justin Bieber and Post Malone.

That was supposed to have a video to it. We didn't shoot it. It was supposed to be like the frontrunner song. A lot of things happened, but I think things happened for a reason. You know, maybe I wasn't supposed to pop off back then doing that type of stuff. Still, it was still a rough draft at that point. Did that song with Justin Bieber ever come out? Yeah.

What song is that? It's on his album. It's on the Changes album. called forever. And you wrote that or you could? I'm on it with him and post. Yeah. When you say like on it, what does that mean? I mean like I've got a verse on it. I've got a, I'm the third verse. Okay. Yeah. You know, Kidler Roy kind of sounds a little bit like Beaver and some like when you listen to some of it. Is that kind of your style too? Or, you know, no, I wouldn't say so. Okay. But I love Kidleroy. Yeah. Yeah. And he's got a hot girlfriend now. Oh yeah. Who's his girlfriend? What's her name?

who's blowing up right now sings the song X's. I wouldn't know. Oh. Yeah, the Blonde girl. Tate. Yeah, Tate McCray. Is with Kid Leroy?

Yeah, they're dating. Okay, cool, cool, cool. You see them going to hockey games and stuff. Kids are such a good dude, bro. And so talented. I've known him since he was like 13. His onstage energy is, you know, incredible. Oh, yeah.

He's insane. Yeah, lots of energy. I got to go to a live show with him sometime. Have you seen it? Not in person. I've just seen, like, TikToks and videos. Oh, yeah. If you watch it from backstage, I think it's even crazy.

You've seen them from backstage. Oh, yeah. Wow. Yeah, yeah. I mean, me and Kit came up together. When I signed in 2018, 2019, they already knew who Kip was. And he hadn't come. He even got to America yet.

He had a song in Australia that was doing something. It was called Blessings. Look it up. Count My Blessins. It's a banger. And he's like 12, 13. His voice sounds like a child, like a real kid. Ed Leroy.

But it's a great song. But yeah, they already knew him before you even got here. It's like one of those things where it's like if you're meant to blow up, you're going to blow up. And like what you were just saying,

like if all those things had happened with the music videos and this and that, you know, and if he didn't pass away, Juice World, you know, you don't know, but something you think about,

what would have happened if those things did happen? Right. Yeah, I, you know, the kid Leroy, when I say everybody already knew him,

the record, I already knew him. You know, they were ready to sign him the moment he got over here. And he was just, I got in the studio with him, I want to say he was 13, and I had him on a song with no cap. And he didn't flinch. He just went right in. I knew then, you know what I'm saying?

That he was, he was ready. So how do you rebuild your life after Juice World? When do you get back on your feet? You know, I had signed a deal, and they gave me a lot of money up front. So I had to continue, you know, making songs and stuff. It wasn't the best time in my life. I wouldn't say I had writers block, but I was definitely in a weird place, you know what I mean?

And they won't up-tempo songs, and I wasn't writing. You know, I wasn't happy. So it was a very weird time, and I don't know that I ever quite bounced back, you know, where I was. It took me having to kind of revisit who I am and becoming a little more in touch with who I am. And what have you discovered about yourself in that process? What have you found that you didn't necessarily know was in you back?

Well, you know, I think I've always knew I don't have an option. I'm going forward, you know what I'm saying? I don't know that I've learned anything new other than, you know, how far I can go. But I know how far I'm willing to take it, you know what I mean? How has your criminal record affected yourself in the media? music industry and life in general. How has that affected you? It slowed me down a lot. You know, there was a time I couldn't leave my state. Like I said, that I was very milking it, you know, my hometown and stuff doing shows only there. I was limited to where I could go.

People may or may not work with you based off of your criminal history, you know, because you don't want a hothead or something like that. Or, you know, you might have a publicist that don't want to respond to all of your insane stories that you so gladly. spoke about on a podcast in front of everybody. But, you know, it's, you, you learn from your mistakes, you grow from it. I think for the most part, it's been all pros, no cons, but it's been tough just holding you back.

You know what I mean? The time in general, just sitting there and then the probation held me back many, many of times. Are there people that judge you from your past without really like getting to know you and understand you? Sure. Sure. Yeah, I think everybody gets judged for their past regardless. How do we change that? How do people change that?

And how do you get people to know the real you before, you know, what they see in an article? Well, I think, you know, they need to look in the mirror first. It's really people focus too much on other people's flaws and not enough on their own. And I think, you know, you change that by focusing on, you know, minding your own. business. What was the follow-up? I forgot. You were on a... Yeah. You're doing well there. So what do you do now? Tell us about what do you have going on now? Well, what's life like now? Right now I am recording and recording, just writing. I feel like I'm on fire. So I'll get in these grooves where I'm, there's pockets where I'm just strictly doing social media content and so

focused and then there's i'll have these months where i'm really diving into the music side of it and just writing and writing and every day right now is just trying to write 10 more songs that i love awesome what do you think i've been the biggest life lessons you've learned throughout your whole entire journey um that you you know you want the audience to take away from your story just that you can't overcome you know that that you're not you're not stuck in this whole you know that there is a way out. I think a lot of people, it's easy to get to settle for what it is and not overcome.

And people need hope in this world. And I think a lot of people turn to music for it. Do you think that you'll embrace your past story more as you continue to grow in the music industry and not necessarily shy away with it like some people in the industry do? Yeah, I think, you know, it's important that you do tap into it. one to know, I mean, the more you talk about it, the more you even learn about yourself. But the more you put yourself out there, I think the more cut, you know, the cloth is defined

and to see who's cut from it that, you know, that matches you. What's your relationship with your family now? Great, right. It's always been great. But, you know, I was just wow. So I made it hard for them. But I think we've always had a great relationship. Do you think if you didn't have a supportive family, it would have been harder to kind of bounce back?

Absolutely. Absolutely, family's very important. Yeah, there's a lot of people that don't have that support of family. They cut them off, especially coming from a religious family, when you get in illegal trouble and stuff like that. Sure, sure, that happens from time to time. I think a true Christian, you know, wouldn't. But that goes back to the, are you a big Christian, you know, or half-ass Christians. Absolutely.

Well, Clever, thanks for coming today and sitting down with me. Thank you. I love talking you, man. Absolutely. It was great. You're so good right off the top. You remember all those questions right off the top of your head. Yeah. Well, you know, when I first started, I would write down notes and, you know, have like a hundred questions hyped out. But then every time the person gives the answer, you're looking at it and you're in your head too much. Yeah, true, true. You've got to just go through the story organically and talk to the person. I had witty one liners before I got here, but you lost them all. Yeah. You had a couple good ones in it.

Oh, yeah, cool. But yeah, man, you know, keep in touch and thank you for doing this. Yeah, thank you. Same to you, bro. Let's do it again. Definitely.