GrooveOn speaks to Classified during his Australian tour…
One of the most recognizable acts in Canadian hip-hop, Classified, finds his way Down Under to celebrate the release of his eleventh album ‘Self Explanatory’. With almost 15 years of writing, producing and performing under his belt, he is easily a veteran in his field and is known for his diversity and versatility. Amidst the busy schedule of a nationwide tour with the Hilltop Hoods, the easy going, down to earth artist takes the time to have a chat with GrooveOn…
GO: Hey there, how are you doing?
Classified: Im Good, how are you?
GO: Excellent! Thanks for taking the time out to have a chat with us!
Classified: Not a problem, thanks for hooking it up!
GO: So how has the tour been so far?
Classified: Well, we did Bondi on Friday night and the show with Hilltop on Saturday and then we did the show in Newcastle on Sunday, so it’s been cool, you know, we’ll do the small club shows and then we go do the shows with Hilltop with like two three thousand people, so it’s a good balance of getting the whole vibe of the club scene and getting the hip hop scene with Hilltop, so it’s been good.
GO: And what do you think of the Australian crowd?
Classified: So far so good! They seem to really like hip hop music and they seem to really be into hip hop. For me, I’m into hip hop that I consider the golden age or the classic sounding hip hop, like the mid nineties or the late nineties, and I find the fans over here really appreciate that type of music and that’s the type of music that I try to bring over to my music, so it’s great man, the people here appreciate real hip hop music so I like that.
GO: And what do you think of the Hilltop Hoods? What are they like on tour?
Classified: Well, we got to play with them for the first time on Saturday, and they were down to earth guys man, really chilled. You know, they said they appreciate what we were doing and we are bringing them up to Canada and they agreed to bring us down here and so for us to come down here for our first time and to play in front of two-three thousand people every is great you know. It’s a really good opportunity for us to make some fans of people who are already a fan of hip hop. You know, my values and my music, the music I make, I think is very similar to the music Hilltop makes. We kinda come from the same place so I think it is going to go over great and it’s been great so far!
GO: For those who have not yet seen you perform live, what can one expect from your show?
Classified: Umm energy. A lot of ups and downs. I don’t like to go hype hype energy the whole time and I don’t like to have a boring show. I like to put a show where the crowd gets involved, and we try to get the crowd involved. Sometimes we make beats live on stage and it’s just a good vibe. We came with four or five guys from Canada, who tour with me up there and we really try to have a party on stage. It’s not one of those acts where we go stand in the middle of the stage and I rap at you for five minutes and the next one goes in. I really try to keep it moving, keep the energy up and just get the crowd involved.
GO: Sounds like fun!! OK, so your new record “Self Explanatory” – can you tell us a little bit about it?
Classified: Yeah that’s my eleventh record. It’s the first album I ever did on a major label. I have been independent for a long time and been doing it that way and this year Sony picked it up and kinda let me do what I wanted to do, creativity wise they let me make the music I wanted to make and they let me do what I wanted to do and they put a team behind to push it, so I spent the last fourteen months in my home studio working on this. I make all my own beats and produce it all, write it all and engineer it, so, you know it’s self explanatory. What you hear is me. I’m giving myself to you in the music and yeah I think there is a lot of refreshing stuff on it that a lot of people might not really hear in hip hop. You know I come from a small town with small town values and I really try to represent who I am in my music and people seem to relate to that.
GO: Well, you’ve just answered my next question about the significance of that title! So, since you write your own music and your own beats and lyrics, what motivates you to produce the music that you do?
Classified: Umm, other artists I think? I work a lot with other artists and I’m always in the studio working on my music and stuff and that always inspires me to work on my own stuff when I work with other artists, but at the same time you know life and just going through things. Like I think I write some of my best lines and come up with some of my best topics when I’m out getting groceries or just walking to get the mail or something, just really when you’re not even trying trying to think about things something will pop into your head. Like when I came up with the whole adventure theme on this album which was almost a skit intertwined throughout the whole album – a day in the life of Classified – that whole idea came up while I was just getting groceries. It just popped in my head and I wrote in down and you know when I got home I started writing and stuff. That’s why I try to write what I am going through, otherwise I’d be running out of things to write about and as we grow and get older we appreciate different things and our values change, so it gives me something else to write about!
GO: Of course! Now, I’ve read that you started rapping at the age of 15. What got you into rap music at that time?
Classified: Ummm, I started listening to hip hop at like 12 or 13 and I don’t know what really got me into it, I just started getting into it. My dad played in bands so we always had microphones and speakers set up in the basement where his band would jam and yeah when I started getting into it I just wrote my first song and set up my tape cassette and lopped up my beat and recorded on that. I think just the excitement from that to having my own song recorded, which wasn’t a great song by any means, but just to be able to have it and show friends and to see that excitement, I think that kind of built into – ok let me do it more, let me buy my own sampler and my start making my own beats and stuff and it was something that started out small and kinda started going ahead. I started touring and doing shows and here we are like ten years later and things are still going forward and we’re having a fun time doing it!
GO: So who were your influences at the time?
Classified: Early 90s hip hop, like Dr Dre, Snoop Dogg, Redman, Souls of Mischief, Cypress Hill, all of the mid 90s and early 90s stuff is that stuff that really got me into it and really molded my appreciation for the sound of hip hop.
GO: Having been doing this for a long time, what would you say is the key to longevity in this music scene?
Classified: Honesty I think, definitely. I think you could definitely come up with a few records and write what you want, but after a couple of years people start to see through that, specially for hip hop. So, I think that’s one of the biggest things. And for any musical genre I think touring and doing shows and meeting fans is what builds those long term fans. You got to do shows and play live. That’s where you really got to entertain people. Live shows is the one thing you can’t buy on the internet. You can buy an artists song or their clothes and all that stuff on the internet, but you cant sell the artist who does the live shows, it’s the one thing you always have so you got to make sure you tour a lot.
GO: What do you enjoy most about performing?
Classified: The energy. I like being in the studio, but there are so many questions. You start making a beat and its like should I change this… there are so many maybe- maybe nots, but when you do a live show, you get up, you do a song if you are in the mood and..
GO: you cant take it back!
Classified: Yeah that’s it! You can’t take it back! You do a song and that’s it. It’s done! Yeah the excitement and to see people appreciate what you work on is great.
GO: And what have you thought about Australia in your time here?
Classified: It’s crazy! Beautiful! This is you guys’ winter! We are all kinda sitting here wondering what the hell – is this really as cold as it gets in winter? Nah, it’s a beautiful place! And I always tell people that a lot of Canadians and a lot of Australians I find are very similar. I find a lot of Canadians come here to see the place and a lot of Australians go to Canada. We just want to get out and see a Koala like everybody does! And see a Kangaroo, and see the culture!
GO: Have you had a chance to see any of the wildlife yet?
Classified: Nothing! We drove down from Newcastle yesterday and we think we saw a dead kangaroo on the side of the road that got hit by a car, so that was interesting. The only kangaroo we saw was on the side of the road!
GO: Oh no, well I hope you get to see some live ones before you have to leave!!
Classified: Oh definitely! We are not going to leave until we see some!
GO: haha that’s good. Ok so for people here in Australia who don’t really know your music as yet, what would you say about Classified?
Classified: Small town guy who has been making music for ten- fifteen years and just likes doing it. And you can hear the love in the music. It’s not like someone paid me a bunch of money and said go make a rap record. You can hear the honesty and hear the music. That’s what a lot of people tell me back home. I’m talking about things that a lot of hip hop artists don’t talk about but at the same time I still got the values that hip hop came from so people seem to feel it.
Catch Classified live across the nation with the Hilltop Hoods!!