Grip talks about his features with Eminem & Royce Da 5’9″ on the new album.
Shady Records’ newest signee, Atlanta’s Grip recently dropped his new album “I Died for This?“. He made a visit to the Bootleg Kev’s podcast for an interview. Among other things, Grip talks about his collaborations with Eminem and Royce Da 5’9” on the new project.
“When your album was done, you presented it to Shady Records, you picked the song you want Eminem on? or does he pick it?,” asks Bootleg.
“Well, I did,” says Grip. “I don’t know how it go usually. I played it before I told him, he was like ‘damn, this hook is dope af.’ We kind of catered that sh*t like to like all right man let’s, if we was going to get Em on the song, what I wanted it to be, what I want this sh*t to sound like. That’s why I kind of feel like it was easy for him to just walk straight into it.”
Then the host asks him when he got verses from Eminem and Royce Da 5’9″, did he redo his verse. “I don’t recut man, I don’t recut. I respect the sh*t,” Grip continues. “Most of the time I saw that saying, if an artist is bigger than you, they’re gonna hear your sh*t on their first. So out of respect and just like I said it’s a code man like all right cool I am gonna send it why my sh*t on there, I’m gonna try to go as hard as possible but some motherf**ker gonna flip some sh*t to go crazy. With Royce, I had already had the song constructed like, the first half and the second half. So he just took the whole middle portion and killed the sh*t. Which was I expecting him to do anyways but then on Em sh*t, I spit at 16. I was just trying to write some most motherf**kin internal, like I was going in. Then I sent it to him and he sent back and I was already knowing that he was coming with at least 36 bars. He went it, he just went the f**k off and I don’t change anything.”
Without a doubt, I Died to See This Happen!? While it shares certain parallels with Snubnose in terms of vision and restless inventiveness, that’s about it. Yes, Big Rube features on both, but whereas Grip’s last statement boldly wore its influences on its sleeve (Goodie Mob and Kendrick, alternately), he’s now primarily intent to peel away from everything not wholly his own. On I Died for This!?, Grip ponders the path to fame in music, the desperation of trying to make it, and the sacrifices you make – and miss – in order to reach that goal. As well as the question of whether everything has been worthwhile. In “A Soldier’s Story?” he muses on how he was about to give up on hip hop as a way of survival when he met Marshall Mathers and signed with one of his heroes.
Watch the interview below.
