Barbequing, Drinking And Partying: An Interview With Wax

No one who truly loves music has gone without a noise complaint. Be it your parents, friends, or the cat lady next door. It’s only natural to up the volume and bass, allowing the sound to blast out in bold streams, always wishing we had that stereo from Italian Job that knocked ladies clothes off. Wax knows this better than most, as the Def Jam representative and his frequent producer EOM got the boot from a California house while creating Wax’s new project, aptly named Eviction Notice. We caught up with Wax while he was on the road to hear about the new record, his Youtube success, and hobbies, or lack thereof.

Hit the skip to read the full interview.

PIMB: You just dropped a new record over at DJ Booth, Eviction Notice, tell us a little bit about that?

Wax: Yeah, it just dropped this last week, I had been workin’ on it for the last half of this year, and its got 15 tracks. The title is inspired by me and EOM (producer) getting kicked out of our house for being too loud. I got a record deal, moved into a nicer neighborhood, then he moved out here to the west coast with me, and just started getting malicious complaints and police were comin over. We ended up getting evicted. Most of the music off Eviction Notice got us kicked out of that house. The first song we put out was called “Too Loud”, and that’s about the particular incident. Its just a collection of songs, most of the production is by EOM, I produced a track, got Nobody Famous on there, Quickie Mart, The Fyre Dept. Then I got some features from my brother Herbal T, my boy Dumbfoundead, Gotham Green is on there, and Jes Hudak. You know, just some feel good hip hop ranging from partying to girls, and life in general.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KehlpMzoX3o?rel=0&w=640&h=385]

PIMB: How did your approach to Eviction Notice differ from your last tape, Scrublife.

Wax: With Scrublife, I had been putting out videos on Youtube for the past few years and a couple albums, then I got this record deal and I wanted to put out the mixtape before the initial album. With Scrublife, I recreated in the studio a lot of the freestyles I had done for Youtube videos. There is a lot more bars in general on Scrublife, it was a lot of random stuff I had over the years. Eviction Notice is more of a collection of songs than a mixtape, its not as much just four minutes of me rapping.

PIMB: You really garnered attention through Youtube videos. Was that just something that worked for you specifically, or is that a route you think is a viable option for aspiring artists?

Wax: I mean, more everyday its becoming what is the music video, its where you go to watch any music video. You wanna watch the new Lady Gaga video, you go to Youtube. When me and my brother started making our videos, there was MTV and there was Youtube, those were the two sources. Now its just all wrapped into on, it’s a mainstream thing. You look at Youtube four years ago, all the top videos were these random people makin’ videos at their house, but when you look at it now the top 50 is Eminem, Rihanna and Shakira. I think it’s a great avenue, if you’re an aspiring artist, you’d be crazy not to use it.

PIMB: You even made videos that weren’t just of you rapping, too. Was it as much about creating a personality as the musical base?

Wax: I think that’s very true. I think the way it happened for me in particular, it was all accidental. A lot of the stuff we were doing, we were doing just because we enjoyed doing it. In the past years I’ve been takin’ that to another level because we actually document my life, like a reality series. That is a little less accidental, we want to put me out there. In the early days, it was really just haing fun with it, but then it was like ‘Holy shit, we can quit our jobs and do this for a living.’

PIMB: Who are your Youtube influences?

Wax: What really got us into making the vidoes was Vibe Magazine had a contest in 2007 called Vibe Verses, and my friend put on this contest where you videotape yourself rapping then upload it to Vibe Magazine website, then all these people watch the video, comment and rate it. The contest, you could win $10k, and I didn’t win it, but I placed 4th or something. That was when Youtube kinda first started, and like the sensation of having people all over the world watch your videos started poppin up, we just thought ‘we should just make our own channel on Youtube’. We did that, and as far as the people actually on Youtube when it first came up, and people doing real good like the Smack DVD type rappers, I watched a lot of those videos.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IBooA5ijj4?rel=0&w=640&h=385]

PIMB: You signed with Def Jam last spring, how has that directly affected your career?

Wax:It definitely affected it, I have a lot more people watching, a lot more people trying to help me now. Its interesting, it might even be too early for me to answer that question, because until now, they’ve been letting me do my thing. These days, its like you gotta develop yourself as an artist, do that independently, I’m not some pop dude who can just come out with something, but we’ll see what happens in the next year.

PIMB: With all that attention you’ve gotten, is it tough to keep the humble personality in your music that was present when you are making the videos in your car or in your room?

Wax: What definitely tricked me was that I used to make music because that’s what I do, that’s what I’d do when I got off work, the way I would express myself, and creative relief. When you start to do it for a living, whether you’re signed to a major label or not, sometimes it gets in your head, that you have to take into account what all these other people think about what you’re doin. Especially at one point this year where I was having a little creative difficulty. I think I’m back in my groove, I pretty much have the attitude of ‘You know what, I’m just gunna make shit how I used to and do what I wanna do’.

PIMB: As an artist, how do you gauge when to make the jump from putting your music out for free, to charging for a retail album?

Wax: The plan as of right now is to put out something in 2012, an official type album. Dude, trust me, if I wasn’t signed, I’d be puttin’ together somethin to make money. Right now, I’m not gunna put out an album through Def Jam until my buzz, my popularity, my fanbase are truly worthy of that. I’m just trying to build a fanbase, and as of right now, the best way to do that is to put stuff our for free. I think people appreciate the free stuff, they might not buy CDs, but I sell mad t-shirts online, and it translates into concert ticket sales. More and more, you can get any music for free.

PIMB: What have you been up to away from the mic?

Wax: I hang out with people in my area, I live out in Los Angeles. I guess my hobbies aside from music include barbequing, drinking and partying. I like to hang out. I got a new nephew, by brother just had a kid out in San Diego, so I like to hang out with them. I used to actually do physical activities, like I used to skateboard. I’m pretty well focused on music, that takes up a lot of my time. I don’t have a lot of hobbies besides drinking. That question really made me think though, God damn, maybe I need to be doing some shit. I need to start rock climbing or something.

PIMB: With the mixtape out, what’s the next step?

Wax: The whole time I’ve been signed to Def Jam I’ve been working on the album. It’s about 50% done, I mean shit, if I took stuff from the mixtapes I could make an album now, but what I’m focused on right now aside from writing and recording is shooting some stuff for [Eviction Notice], I want to come out with a few official videos, a few low budget viral type videos, a few performance videos, and that’s what I’m working on right now. I’m also on the road right now, so just doin shows and making videos.

PIMB: With all of your videos, you’ve ranged from singing and playing guitar to rapping, is rap the main avenue that you are currently focused on, or will you experiment more?

Wax: The stuff that I have done right now, is all of that and more. The songs I’m thinking of, I rap on them, I sing on them, play guitar, they got mad instrumentation, stuff like that. What I want to do is focus a lot of that stuff into one. I know what my strengths are, I can play the guitar and sing, but my main thing is gunna be rapping. As far as what people expects, everyone has their own thing they want. Some people want me on an acoustic album, while some say I should never play guitar again. With the internet, you get access to a wide variety of what other people think you should do. I don’t know what the fuck my fans want me to do.

PIMB: Just do you.

Wax: That’s what they tell me for the most part, just do whatever the fuck you want.

PIMB: Anything else we need to know?

Wax: Naw, just download that mixtape, and the only other thing I have to plug is my website, http://www.waxdotcom.com. Thanks for doin the interview, I’m mad familiar with y’alls site, I check that shit out mad times.