#RookieOfAtlanta Interview w/ @druggofchoice

1) Where are you from?

- Born in St. John's, Canada. Grew up in Forsyth County, Georgia.

2)  When did you fall in love with rap?

 - About 5 years ago.

3) How did you start rapping?

- I've always been into hardcore, metal type stuff because that's what my older brother listened to and I just adopted the taste and charisma it came with. My brother and the OG neighborhood crew had a little band my 7th-9th grade year playing pretty much only playing Taking Back Sunday and Hawthorne Heights covers. I played guitar. I got into some hard drugs and ended up in an outpatient rehab type joint the summer before junior year where I resorted to writing journals and poems to release the stress. Hanging around some of my brothers friends freestyling all the time, I found I could flow and recited the poems to a beat in my head. I wrote for about a year before I even thought about recording my voice. One day my best friend Zach and I got high as shit and recorded a song on garage band in his room. That's when it all started.

4) Who supports your career in music?

- Pretty much everyone I put on to my music shows a lot of love and support. What means most to me are the closest people in my life. My homies support. My girl supports everything I do. My parents support the passion and talent. My siblings send me videos daily showing people my music. It's a lot of love out here I'm grateful for.

5) What made you buckle down and take music serious?

- When I realized how much it will take to make a career out of music is when shit got serious. I've always had the passion to write and as a natural entertainer, I created a vision for myself and it grew parallel to my ability to make good music. Seeing my people eat is what really made me buckle down and hit the gas. It's never really been about the money for me, just making a life for myself and the people I'm doing it with. 

6) What movie describes your music and life?

- Lords of Dogtown. It's just me. I smoke daily and drink often. Long hair, black clothes, flying down a hill or a set of stairs on some type of skateboard. I live a crazy life and I see a lot of crazy shit happen. As far as my music, I like to rage. I make music based on what I've done, do, and will do. 

7) What was the first rap song you ever heard?

- Holy shit. I want to say the Monsters Anthem in Space Jam by Busta, LL Cool J, and Method Man. Hit me high I think it was called? That was my shit. Chingy and Bow Wow were the first artists I followed.

8) What was the first song you ever wrote?

It was called Shaolin Freestyle. If you catch me drunk with the homies I can normally still piece together the verse. Barrett actually still has that recording on his phone. Shit was so fye. 2009 I think.

9) What type of beats do you like to rap over?

- Shit, I really don't know this answer. I can snap on anything. It depends on the vibe really. What's in my system. Time of day. What color my boxers are... I like making the song with my tone, pitch, syllable scheme, etc

But to answer the question, I draw to beats I can see the producer telling a story in through the sounds. Not so much going on but the right instruments at the right times.

10) What type of artist are you?

- I'm a story teller. Just listen to my music. I do hype shit for the crowd but sit down and listen to the words, I'll keep you wanting more. 

11) Where did you get your name from?

- When I walked into the rehab counseling room, the first question he asked me was "What's your drug of choice?" Two years later a stage name became a necessity. Drug of Choice just stuck with me.

12) What producers fit your sound?

- Creative ones. Pierre Bourne and E Wonder provide sounds for me right now. Idk about bigger name producers really. It's a lot of trap bullshit floating around.

13) Your name is different. How did you come up with it?

- I did a lot of drugs, went to rehab, left rehab with an acknowledged ability to write. Everything else just kind of came together and what got me through it all were the drugs. Typically people would look down on this tendency but I have portrayed my art as a medium to reach out to those who feel they need to take the same path I did and use [my] music instead. "Let me be your Drug of Choice", essentially.

14) Are you ready for the next step in your career?

- Yes, mentally. Physically, I feel my movement is taking the right steps at the right times so I'm not as concerned about my present situation as I am about the future. The next step is approaching quick so I am really just moving as efficiently as possible and motivating my family to push with me.

15) How long does it take you to record?

- This is a grand question because every producer asks me this. The answer is 'I don't know'. It depends on the complexity of the song, the sound, and how I'm performing it. Some songs need more Ad libs to catch the ear, some snap without anything extra. Sometimes I have to finesse my voice to get the sound I envision when I'm singing or doing something out of my original style. I guess it takes me as much time as it takes to get it the way I hear it in my head. The homies used to get Impatient with it because some songs take 4 hours which consists of 50 takes to get a verse right at times...but after hearing the music in its finished form they have all learned to just let the process happen.

16) What do you want your legacy to be?

- Success. Motivated young people. Defeating the odds. Plain and simply, I want to leave behind a trend of pursuing your dreams. The hard work and dedication is what has gotten me where I am and will continue to push me but the confidence I have in myself and my team is what fuels it all. I want to show people you can go through what I have gone through and turn it into a positive chain of events. I want people my age and younger to see the struggle does not last forever, but only as long as you let it before you do something about it. The legacy I want to leave is not that of a destructive generation.

17) Has someone ever killed you on your own song and you had to come back and fix your verse?

- No. It's never happened. Although, I think Tommy may have snapped harder on trillmerica (a record due to drop with my new project) but I won't go back and do anything to my verse cause they're both hot. I just personally feel Tommy sauced on the shit.

18) You just dropped a project, is there going to be another one dropping soon?

- I see a bit of foreshadow in the last question. Yes and no, i am working on a new project, low key, but unless fans are reading this interview, they will not hear about it until i am ready to release it. I want people to pay attention to new singles I put out and visuals for Smokers Only tracks. I'm also working with a lot of artists right now so the tape isn't a priority this quarter.

19) Which is more important, a street presence or an Internet presence?

- They are both equally as important to maintain as an independent [currently] underground artist. As I gain new fans and followers, I see the urgency to be relevant on the internet but I have also come across a lot of artists who are big in the city and growing but have no online presence. But times are different now. It's not like it was when hip-hop was pure. Everyone is connected through some social platform so an Internet presence is all of a sudden mandatory.

20) Is what you're doing now going to benefit you 10 years from now?

- What I'm doing now is going to feed myself and my family for the rest of my life. The way I make music and my passion for it allows me to grow by the minute. I may have the money I envision now in 10 years but I sure as hell won't be done. I won't stop til everyone is full.

21) What experiences in your life have made you who you are today?

- I went through a lot of hard break ups, kicked out of schools, lost scholarships, fired from jobs, and got popped for possession on campus in college. Shit like that. Through it all, I dealt with mental issues and fought with psychologists til I couldn't speak anymore. It's just been a lot of shit up to this point. But just as the question states, it made me who I am today. The music I make only portrays what I have done, do, and will do in light of the two.

22) When everything is said and done, what do you want GOD to say to you?- That he's proud. That all the fights he and I had were worth the time because if he didn't challenge me like my earthly father and mentors did/do, I wouldn't be where I'm at today...musically, mentally, physically, emotionally, etc. I am constantly looking for reassurance that I'm on the right path toward the goal I've set and he always give me the right advice to do so.

23)  What skills/attributes are most important to being successful?

- I think the skill that benefits me the most Is the ability to learn. Nothing ever goes as planned, or maybe it rarely does, so I find myself innovating [wingin it] more often than not and that's when I create at my best. The more I learn, the more I know, the more i can paint on the canvas I give to my fans/followers. 

24) Who are you?

- I go by Drug of Choice, Drugs, D.O.C, Christian, Cdub.