A few months back, I had the opportunity to play at popular Downtown Ypsilanti venue, Ziggy’s. In addition to being on the bill, I saw this as a great opportunity to network with a few of the other artist, one of those artist happened to be, Juan Michael OG. Off the release of his newest single, “City of God” I had the chance to catch up with the Ann Arbor Based MC.
“I heard the shit on the radio and I hated what I heard. We’re talking like late 1990’s early 2000’s, it was cool, it was still hype, but I felt I could do better, I could make my own, so, that’s when I decided to make music.” Juan Michael responded when asked what got him into music. “I used FL Studios to make my first song and ever since then I’ve been making music, though it wasn’t always necessarily rap. From there, I got ableton and kept growing from it.” He continued.
“1992 was me just having fun; really outlandish, really colorful, really expressive, it was just supposed to be an ignorant, flamboyant project to take the topics that I personally see as a problem, and flip it into a more colorful, happier positive palette. Juan Michael OG spoke on the process going into his highly reviewed 4 song EP, “1992.” One of the tracks on 1992 stuck out to me the most was a track entitled, “New Kanye.” “I love making music, and I will literally forget to eat when making music. I’ll tell myself I need to eat and i’ll forget to go in the kitchen and make food while working on a track. New Kanye sums up that energy and ambition when i’m in the studio, I feel like Kanye. Some of the qualities people see me as is similar to him, so if that’s the case, with this track imma show out. So, that track was me embodying the ego and optimism that Kanye has. Juan Michael responded about the thought process that went into making New Kanye.
photo credit, Juan Michael OG facebook page
“My biggest influences are people who don’t rap. Modest Mouse are one of my biggest influences, and is due to their escentric mentality. The Gorillaz, they have a hip hop-esque vibe, but not necessarily hip hop. Linkin Park was one of my earliest influences as well.” Juan Michael spoke on his musical influences.
“Space Money Records is a thing i’ve been rocking with for awhile. Space Money is all about energy, when you look up at the stars and you see the sun and all these other places, we don’t take into consideration that these other places could have homes. Just like we have a sun, all these other places have suns that we can see visually, but, its all the same energy. The sun gives us life, everything comes from the sun. When I talk about space money, I reference the stars, galaxy and solar systems and with money being the thing that moves us everyday. We we get out of bed everyday, we don’t do shit for love, we do it for money because money helps us get the things we love, but that’s just the society we in.” Juan Michael responded about the origin of his company, Space money Records
You can expect a new project from Juan Michael OG this year as well as a video for City of God coming soon as well as a new single entitled, “2much.”
artwork for “City of God”
Beats, Brews and points of view 