fuzethemc MARIETTA, GA

Born and raised in the outskirts of Atlanta, Fuze (formally known as Future The Time Traveler) has had an interesting relationship with Hip Hop. Growing up in a home where hiphop music was and still is frowned upon and dismissed as trash, Fuze was forced to bury any lurking talents and aspirations under a veil of discontent with the musical art form and way of life. That was until he finally found the outlet and inspiration to spark his inner fire at the Atlanta A3C concert in 2008. He performed a short rap entitled "proof" for XXL freshman artist Blu and received well deserved praise from the west coast MC. So much so that the next day Blu himself sent him a beat to rip apart via email. Growing up in the lower-middle class suburbs surrounded by ghettos gave Fuze a striking duality that is prevalent in his music. Waking up in the morning riding, with his single-mother to school listening to national public radio and Sam Cooke only to hear the likes of Lupe Fiasco, Charles Hamilton and T.I at school has shaped his music into something that can only be described as unique. One moment he could be placing hypnotic melodic rhyme scheme across the beat and effortlessly move into a twist mid-verse (a skill not common found amongst southern MC's). In just a few months he has developed skills and abilities it takes many artist years to master. At 17 years of age, Fuze is one of the most promising aspiring MC's today. Check out his Goldmic profile: www.goldmic.com/fuzethemc Download the mixtape he made for the Goldmic community:

Q: Who is Fuze The MC? What's the story behind your name?

I like to think “Fuze the Mc” is my artistic reflection manifested in the form of an audio author. Every day I would have these thoughts and surges of artistic inspiration and before Fuze the Mc came to, it would simply build up and stack, making me a very frustrated unbalanced individual. Fuze the Mc became the avenue for me to funnel and concentrate all of that energy into something, well, beautiful. It keeps me balanced. In recent times Fuze the Mc has become more me than my day to day government issue. The name for this has gone through many changes. I started off as two different characters and/or personas I went by; “Conscious the Word Fuser” and “Future the Time Traveler.” I performed all of my “conscious raps” and slam poetry as “Conscious” and my harder, bang out, “yoko” music as Future. Eventually the two names literally “fused” together and I became Fuze as I started to realize how much balance is needed when being a part of  Hip-hop music. It comes from the concept of in a favorite child hood show of mine called Dragon ball Z. In which, two characters could bring totally different abilities and powers to the table and then “fuse/Fuze” together and become one unique, unstoppable force. That’s how I feel right now, like an unstoppable force that’s highly complex.

Q: Tell us about your personal story with hip hop. When did you discover hip hop? When did you decide you'd become an artist and go pro?

I first “discovered” when I heard “Knuck If You Buck” by Crime Mob. It was the first time I took any personal stake in Hip Hop. But to back track a little bit, I grew up in a suburbia right outside of a ghetto, with a major city in eye shot .I went to an all white elementary school and there were literally 5 black kids there, but I lived well out of district in a lower middle class apartment complex about 20 minutes away. So in my neighborhood it was Jay-z and Hip Hop, but school it was Smash Mouth and pop-stars. It created this sort of fork in the road for me and for a while I just stood there staring at both paths. That was until middle school. My middle school was a crazy 180 for me because I went from almost all white to almost all black and Mexican school. Now be clear, I’m not a racist person in the least, but I understand racial culture differences, and I was thrown from one extreme to the other. I went from “uppity prep students” and brats to “wannabe gangstas” and thugs; both of which are in my immediate friend circle now. Either way musically, it was a huge change. I went through this phase of needing to fit in and finding friendship with the “in crowd”. Eventually I fit “around” but not “in”. So I was always around and hanging with future drug dealers and bangers just taking it all in, but not ever quite becoming engulfed by it, because at the same time I’d be wearing my new dragon ball z shirt, playing my Pokémon on my game boy trying to get Charizard to level 100 before my best friend. And I remember riding in car with my friend, who couldn’t have been more than 12 or 13 at the time, and he was driving, bumpin “Knuck If You Buck” .The whole car, which had like 4 other people in it, was going crazy. We were walking down South Cobb drive. There was so much energy and I fell in love with it. It wasn’t till I heard “Lose Yourself” by Eminem that I ever got into listening to real lyricism. As I got to high school I started to become aware of myself as a part the world as a whole and let go of a lot of things I previously thought were important. As a result I got in a lot less fights and became a lot wiser. My mother drives me to high school every morning, which is out of district currently; at 6 in the morning so she can get to her job an hour away on time as a kindergarten teacher. Every morning I get in the car and try bump my music with my studio monitor headphones that never leave my neck, and she forces me to turn it off. I’m literally forced to listen to talk radio, npr to be exact, on the way to school and then, as soon as I hop out turn up hip-hop and rock full blast. This duality helped me understand how to let hip-hop to be my life while still understanding hip-hop isn’t all there is to life. I actually didn’t decide to become an “artist” till around this time last year after the A3C concert. I had a little stockpile of lyrics built up in my mind and I got roped into a cipher while we were waiting for the Juice Crew to come out and people were like “you’re dope, got any music?” and they would look at me crazy when I responded “I’ve never been in a studio”. It was there that I met Blu. From then on, I started carving out my abilities and just trying to polish myself as a diamond in the rough. I didn’t get a chance to actually get in a studio till I met Louis, a guy I work closely with under the S.O.V label, through his brother at a gifted program in the summer of 08’. He brought me into his home studio and I did a whole mixtape in one day. Called “counter….” Well I’ll leave it unknown, I don’t want anyone googling it, not too proud of that one. There’s actually some footage of that if I can round it up. But for now, I just turned 18 in March and I’m looking towards new prospects and looking to “push the envelope”

Q: What are your influences as an artist? Hip Hop artists or others.

Quite simply my influences are founded in Life, which is why I named my upcoming mixtape/lp “Life”. However as far as artists go? The list could go on forever, but top 10 most influential artists on my music would be first and foremost Nas , then in no particular order; Talib Kweli, Mos Def, Cassidy, Lupe Fiasco, Lauryn Hill, Common, Kanye West, Blu, Young Jeezy, Sam Cooke. And there are so many more that we feel bad for leaving out. Most influential Album is Lupe Fiasco’s Food and Liquor hands down. It was the first time I felt I could branch out in hip-hop without being condemned.

Q: Many of our members are battlers. Do you attend local battle tournaments? Is it something you're interested in? 

I actually started off as a cipher and battle rapper. In school at lunch I would just go head to head with battle rappers just for the heck of it. I wasn’t an amazing freestyle battler, but it was the only outlet I knew as a mc. I didn’t have protools, condenser mics, etc, I just had lyrics. The only way anyone at school could take you serious is if you could take someone’s head off lyrically. A while back I was on a site called “lets beef” where I participated in online battles rapping into a laptop microphone. I had some pretty awful stuff on there.  As far as local battles the only formalized place I frequent is Apache Café in Atlanta (where I battled once and lost), but battles pop all the time in school. However, I’ve since then stepped away from the battle scene as a competitor. I had a couple situations in battles that followed me off of center stage to place I’d not like to revisit and I’ve since decided that it’s a sport I prefer to spectate. Even so, I still keep a nice arsenal of rhymes for the unexpected beef. Can’t be too cautious now in hip-hop

Q: Looks like you got the props from some renowned cats already. Tell us a story or two about what Blu, Jay Electronica, Charles Hamilton, and others said about you.< b>

Well the encounters with Blu and Gemstones were definitely the most prominent. With Blu it’s funny because before I heard about A3C I didn’t even know who he was and I was definitely sleeping on the wrong mc. My friend Zoom Soundz, put me on to his music and bought the physical album right before his concert. I saw him live and was like now that’s hip-hop. After his show he was chillin out in the lobby of the CW just kicking it with people and me and zoom went up to him and we talked hip-hop a little bit and eventually I built up the nerve to be like “and yo, I spit too” he kind of gave me a funny look at first, but I was like you want to hear something? And he said sure so I spit for him like two songs one of which is in a video I have on my page. He was impressed after the first one (which in the vid), but was kind of just like ok you’re dope lets hear another. So I spit the bars to this joint I have called “Track Tears,” which is in the Gold Mic Mixtape, and then he was like “you got lyrics, you need beats”. So that night, I emailed him and we exchanged a few emails and he sent me this beat, that I finished the song to a while back and haven’t had the right avenue to release it. The time I spit for Gem Stones on fiasco fam radio was back when I went by Future, the audio is in a vid on my page as well.  It was kind of a talent showcase to just get feedback from Gem Stones, and before me there was some ok mc’s but nobody that really blew him out of the water, so when I came on I was mad nervous. He had shot down like two mc’s before me so I was boarder line stuttering when I was talking but it all worked out and thought I was dope. 

Q: So your first album is out soon. What's it called? How long have you been working on it?

It’s called Life: Soul/Flesh, I’ve been working on it for a long time now. Actually it could be considered to have been a work in progress since I ever started recording. However I just started in November to structure it as an album and form everything together. I’ It’s a compilation of the most meaning full lyrics I have written thus far. I’m actually releasing a mixtape version of it March 18th with the release of the SOV website and then it will be rereleased as an album with all original beats and with extra songs and some songs removed.

Q: Define your album using 2 adjectives only.

Different, Lyrical

Q: What would you say to convince readers to take a listen?

Hip-hop is moving towards a new era back towards lyricism. The time lyricist has at a hiatus for a while now with a few anomalies. Life:Soul/Flesh will usher in the new reoccurrence of pure lyricism. It will have songs that make you move as well as songs that move you.

Q: If an A&R rep gave you 3mn of their time; which song of yours should they listen to? Why that song?

1:50 seconds of Hear(Here) We Go and 1:50 of Wake Up. They show a heavy contrast of what I can bring to the table energy wise, lyrically, and range. It’s hard to box me in to one type of sound when I’m rapping. One person might go “he sounds like Lupe” and the next might go “he sounds like common” and the next “Cassidy”, simply because they all heard a different song. People I work with in music says it makes me hard to market, because listeners don’t hear the same sound and feel in each song, but I say it makes me versatile and appealing to more people. I want to be able to invoke emotions on every level not just one.

Q: What equipment do you use for your demos? Any recommendations to our readers?

I actually do all of the recording, mixing, and mastering for my demos myself so I’m still in the learning process, but I use protools 7.4 with rode nt1-a condenser mic and blue pre-amp. I recommend going into the local music shops and getting some knowledge on how recording works and to invest time in learning how sounds work with each other and learning eq’ing techniques. But like I said, I’m still learning.

Q: You rep for ATL. Any local joints you recommend to any hip hop heads dropping by?

Apache Café in Atlanta, is the realest Hip Hop joint I’ve ever been to on True School Tuesdays, I can’t gas it enough. They have live music, open sign up for performances, and the occasional super star like KRS-One drop through. It’s hosted by Jaws from the Dungeon Family and it’s an event worth revisiting every week.

Q: Any local/underground artist our readers should know about?

J.Nolan and T.Double Turbo The Battletoad. I could go on for pages about how these mc’s should be signed and hyped but I’ll let you listen and hear for yourself. Check J.Nolan on “Soul Brother Part2” and Turbo on “Demolition Double or Gigaton Punch”

Q: Any thoughts/comments on GoldMic?

I love how it’s a genuine opportunity to artists to make a name for themselves through multiple venues. Many other stable hip-hop websites claim it, but can’t really provide, goldmic delivers.

Q: This is your last chance to make an impression. Is there anything else you would like to say?

It’s too common in hip-hop that “being signed” is associated with “being talented” and it’s simply not the case. There are independent artist out there pushing out music on the same level, if not passed that of artists signed to major labels. I encourage true music fans, especially in hip-hop to allow themselves to branch out of the traditional brainwashing on media conglomerates and open your ears to quite simply put “something incredible”.

Fuze Out