Tech N9ne is out of his comfort zone, smiling wide.
The most successful independent rapper of all time is an easy conversation after a warm handshake, a nearly inconceivable departure from his dauntingly intense face-painted onstage persona. Earlier this month, the Strange Music founder unleashed his hotly anticipated rap-metal fusion EP Therapy: Sessions With Ross Robinson to a rush of excitement, aided in no small part to the inclusion of Wes Borland of Limp Bizkit/Black Light Burns, Syd Wilson AKA DJ Starscream of Slipknot and others.
After the high-charting run of his preceding Summer release, Something Else, Tech – real name Aaron Yates – leaped from the comfort zone of his Kansas City studio and into an entirely different world: Venice Beach, California. Setting up camp at renowned producer Ross Robinson’s beachfront studio, he set into a new sound palette in an environment with which he was entirely unfamiliar. The results are explosive, cathartic and, by the telling, a process of exercising demons through creative vulnerability.
We met up with Tech N9ne and Robinson at a gorgeous cafe in Venice, where the duo were clearly on a shared frequency as they discussed Therapy: Sessions With Ross Robinson, working with Wes Borland, reaching far outside the formula that’s brought him such remarkable success, and the vital need for normalcy in the public eye. Also, we finally got some promising comments on the long-awaited K.A.B.O.S.H. project… check it out below!
Pick up Therapy: Sessions With Ross Robinson on iTunes, and keep up with Tech N9ne at the following links:
