Machine Gun Kelly opens up with Interview Magazine with Dave Franco, talks Eminem & more.
Machine Gun Kelly recently sat down with Interview Magazine for a new interview with Dave Franco where he talks about his latest and first number 1 album “Tickets To My Downfall” and more. In the interview, Machine Gun Kelly also revealed that his last year’s project ‘Hotel Diablo‘ wasn’t well-received by everyone due to his infamous feud with Eminem.
Unless your name is Machine Gun Kelly, 2020 has been the year of the devil. While the rest of the world was in disarray, the 30-year-old musician and actor released his first number-one record and fell in love with Megan Fox. Kelly, born Colson Baker and known to his fans as MGK, made a hard transition from rap to pop-punk with his fifth album, Tickets to My Downfall, released this year. When the album, replete with anthemic earworms that evoke the early aughts (the record was co-produced by Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker), topped the Billboard 200 chart in its first week, critics had a lot less to say. While this new collection of songs is sugar-coated with big hooks and designed for getting day-drunk by the pool, Kelly, who is also the director of the upcoming musical Downfalls High, returns to some tough themes: addiction, heartbreak, and self-destructive behavior. But that was before MGK met Fox on the set of their forthcoming thriller, Midnight in the Switchgrass. Following the subsequent tabloid tempest, the two have recently settled into a relationship that Kelly admits has given him some serenity. But not too much, as he advises his friend and former co-star, Dave Franco.
“Were there moments when you almost gave up because you were killing yourself for your music and it still felt like you were misunderstood?” asks Dave.
“Yes. [The 2019 album] Hotel Diablo is that for me because that was the first time I really expressed my true self with no outside influence, meaning the label,” says MGK. “As a hip-hop album, it’s flawless front to back, and also a hint at the evolution of how I went into a pop-punk album. But it was coming off the tail-end of that infamous beef [with Eminem]. So no one wanted to give it the time of day. It’s like if you make a shi**y movie and then you come out with a great movie right after, but people want to focus on the fact that they hated whatever you just did. What I did in the beef was exactly what it should be, but that project wasn’t welcomed. The next album came from already feeling like I’d counted out, so I didn’t even care what the public was going to think. That’s why the project was ironically my best-received one because it was the most effortless, with the least outside influence.”
After selling 39,000 equivalent album units in its first week, Hotel Diablo debuted at No. 5 on the Billboard 200 list. The album was released in July of this year. It’s been less than a year since Machine Gun Kelly and Eminem first feuded became public.
Despite the fact that their conflict stretches back to 2012, the pair’s run of diss recordings revealed that their problem was considerably more serious than anyone suspected. Following the release of his tune “Not Alike” featuring Royce 5’9 off Em’s album Kamikaze in August 2018, Kelly retaliated with “Rap Devil” a few weeks later.
In other places, MGK went into great lengths on a variety of different subjects, including the problems he has with the way certain detractors have reacted to the popularity of Ticket To My Downfall debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. Additionally, it was requested of he name the albums that he has personally enjoyed listening to the most this year. The majority of MGK’s 2020 rotation has included his own songs as well as tracks by Lil Peep, blink-182, and Take Off Your Pants and Jacket.
Downfalls High is set to be released in January. Meanwhile, Machine Gun Kelly fans can look forward to the next new song featuring Travis Barker and Yungblud. At midnight, “Acting Like That” will be released.
Check out the full interview in Interview Magazine.
