Q&A With Milwaukee’s Rising Hip Hop Artist Taks One
Hey Taks One! We always appreciate coming across raw underground Hip Hop, especially from Milwaukee, its rare to gets submissions from out there! Please tell us how did you Hip Hop career get started? How long have you been making music? Do you remember where you were at exactly when you wrote your first track!!??
Started free styling a lot in my Moms basement when i was 16. Started taking it more serious a couple years later when a fellow local emcee Just Dan now known as Meestermann produced my first song for me and invited me to hype man one of his shows and gave me a chance to perform the one song I had at the time 98-2000 era.Been doing this well over Twenty years MIA a few here and there.Finished my first track in Riverwest Hipster Hub of Milwaukee Yo !
Your style and rhyme scheme is super raw, smooth and really ORIGINAL? How important is it for your to stay ORIGINAL? I’m sure you hate it when fans say you sound like ???…LOL
Thanks I really do try to have my own style it’s really important to me to be original I don’t get being a carbon copy of another rappers style they used to have a term for that BITING! Not every white rapper is EMINEM LOL !
Tell us about your Hip Hop and/or music influences?
My musical influences come from an eclectic mix of genres from punk/soul/house/rock/metal/and of course Hip Hop !!! I’ve always gravitated towards on the fringe music from any genre early on I was big into bands like Minor threat and Pennywise N.W.A Public Enemy All Hieroglyphics stuff FreeStyle Fellowship Nas Wu Tang but in the late 90’s early 2000’s it was the underground hiphop scene that really inspired me to do my own thing Rappers like Sole Dose The ShapeShifters Sage Francis Juice to name a few.Events like Scribble Jam really shaped me as well.
Please breakdown the creative process of your latest single “Cry Me”. Also, give us the back story on how you linked up with legendary underground Hip Hop artist AWOL ONE!!!
My process is pretty straight forward I produce and record all my own stuff. Beats always come first and I design my rhymes around them. As for AWOL ONE I just want to say what a huge honor it was to work with one of my biggest influences. I’m still fanboying over it. It all started with me looking for a logo to match my branding coincidentally AWOL put up a post about his graphic design on instagram. So I hit him up bout a logo that he killed on for me. Which brought me back into full AWOL rocking mode for a month straight when I came across a Ceschi song featuring him and 2Mex Called “Same old love song” that had the same sample I used in a song called old-fashioned rap song (on my soundcloud) bull shitted with AWOL about it a lil and it inspired me to ask him to do a feature. He was like you got beat ? I had just finished making a beat that day that I was in love with so I sent it over to him ! He gave me the it’s DOPE stamp of approval from there it was on ! As for the single artwork it was a no brainer.
Rappers nowadays think by throwing up a few videos up on social media and pushing quick projects, they can blow up overnight! Give us your view on how over saturated the market is right now with so many MC’s/Producers but not to many quality music.
The internet has definitely caused an over saturation of wackness but I also think it’s a glorious time for underground emcees to get stuff heard. Throwing shit up may gain you a lil popularity. But Hard work connecting with fans through shows and taking your time to put together an all around quality package will always win that and a lot of perseverance. Your gonna fail more than ya win it comes down to love.
Lets talk about the Milwaukee Hip Hop scene. Is the underground Hip Hop scene out there large or small, can you tell us if there are any underground Hip Hop legends that have come out of that city? Also, how important is it to you to truly represent underground Hip Hop for your city?
Milwaukee has a fairly small hip hop scene that has been progressively growing. As far as legends I would have to say locally groups like Def Harmonic The Rusty Pelicans and Kid Millions have always been staples in the scene. It’s always important to remember where you came from I’d love to see Milwaukee on the map !
Here it is! Our most popular question! What is your definition of “underground hip hop”?
To me Under Ground is the greatest part of Hip Hop it isn’t about money fame it’s about shamelessly being yourself. Under Ground doesn’t mean shitty sound and half assing it’s a movement to push the boundaries of quality.
Where can people find you on the web? Drop all the vital links.
FIND ME AT :
http://instagram.com/xtaksonex
https://www.facebook.com/yotaksoneraps/
of course all digital media outlets such as Tidal, Google Play, youtube
Lastly, and shout out?
Shout outs to my beautiful wife Michelle, AWOL ONE,Ryan Rossman at Hi-Five Studios, Meestermann,Dana Coppafeel,My whole family and my dog Rocko !!!! ONE !!! oh and MaMaMa Mary!
