Words By David D.
Charles Hamilton is 20 years old but experienced and battle-tested beyond his years. He’s come from being homeless in the streets of Harlem to having his own deal with Interscope that includes him running his own record label. Though the MC had a considerable buzz with his two mixtapes, Crash Landed and Outside Looking, he really garnered the most attention when the home video surfaced of him, Kanye and Game in a cipher. The video led to a lot of people asking:
“Who’s that little guy?”
That question is about to be answered. Charles Hamilton is a lyrical tour de force that stuffs each bar with emotional honesty. He doesn’t limit his candor to wax either. His blog (Iamnotcharleshamilton.com) is infused with honest diary entries that do not pull any punches. Luckily for us, this he approaches his interview with The Smoking Section with the same sincerity. Charles Hamilton responds frankly to a bevy of topics including his thoughts on what the Nas album could have been, mixtape rappers, his girlfriend and what was really going on during that landmark freestyle.
Charles Hamilton: Hello?
TSS: Hey, what’s up man? How you doing?
Charles Hamilton: I’m alright, you?
TSS: I’m doing pretty good. Where are you right now?
Charles Hamilton: I’m down here on 35th [NYC]
TSS: What you got going on?
Charles Hamilton: Ahhh a lot. I’m working on these mixtapes. The thing with these mixtapes – I consider mixtapes as a way for a nigga to just spit on every beat. I don’t do mixtapes in that fashion. I look at them as actually albums, developing concepts from track one to track whatever. So it’s like a story being told. Something along the lines of The Love Below or The Cool. Just stories. And they all kind of lead up to the album. Just preparing me for what I do with albums.
TSS: So what exactly is the message you putting out with these mixtapes because you got like four mixtapes or something coming out, right?
Charles Hamilton: Yea, I think it’s five. I gotta check my blog. I think it’s five.
TSS: The one, Death Of The Mixtape Rapper, is really interesting to me.
Charles Hamilton: Yea, I might get in a little trouble for this mixtape too. Basically I feel like any rapper that is comfortable with being called a “mixtape rapper” should be dead ass just a mixtape rapper. Not like shot dead in cold blood, but dead in the metaphorical sense cuz that shouldn’t exist. I feel like if you categorize yourself as somebody who has no other choice but to put out half-structured songs on other people’s beats then you’re not stretching out your lyrical capabilities. Like 50, he’ll get on another rapper’s beats and do what he does. But the whole “Milli” thing – that’s why I sarcastically got on the “Milli” beat cuz everyone else was doing it. And I was really being sarcastic with it because everyone was going to show how nice they were and I just wanted to show everyone how, like, ridiculous it is for a musician- I don’t even consider myself a rapper I consider myself a musician because I actually play instruments like guitar, bass, drum, other stuff – so being on the “Milli” beat doesn’t test me musically.
Making a mixtape with other people’s beats doesn’t test me musically. It’s not really rapping to me. It’s blogging to me. Writing a 16 to a beat, I’m just writing a blog entry and saying it rhythmically. To be put into the mixtape category or the hipster category, which I hate the most. I’ll rap on the “Milli” beat or just do random shit and that’s all classified as “Death of the Mixtape Rapper” because after that mixtape I wanna see mixtape rappers like Papoose, Jada, and Cassidy come up with fully structured songs. Have your mixtape be on a level of an album so when it’s album time you have a set product.
TSS: Yea, for instance you do play the piano for a second on one of those tracks from Outside Looking In?
Charles Hamilton: Honestly I wanna see more musicians make mixtapes. I wanna see Wynton Marsalis do a mixtape over an Outkast beat. Just play the horns. Honestly I wanna let the world know that I’m a rapper first. You don’t wanna come out doing too many things because otherwise you come out looking like a weirdo. Like “who is this nigga think he can do everything?” So I try to let the world know I exist by doing that thing to let people know I’m a musician to the heart. I want to explore that creatively. I want to go out as far left as I can without losing people. Like when Common did Electric Circus, people didn’t know how to receive that album. That was his best musical album to date. I love Be but I think cats like Q-Tip, Common – even Nas when he brought out Olu Dara – are ill because they bring out musicianship in an art form where the lyrics are the instrument. Broaden your horizons try new things. Like Ne-Yo on the “Milli” beat was refreshing. You ain’t hear Jay-Z on the fucking “Go On Girl” beat, ya feel me? I wanna hear the craziest possible projects.
TSS: So that’s where you trying to go with the album? As far left as possible?
Charles Hamilton: The album is done. I don’t wanna talk too much about it, though. I’m really really excited about it, but when it’s album time, you’re gonna know because I can’t stop talking about it. There are a lot of technicalities so I don’t want to say it’s one thing and then have to pull back. I don’t wanna get people too hyped up about something I honestly think is groundbreaking. I don’t wanna sound cocky but I don’t want to taint it by talking about it too much.
TSS: Well people already hyping you up in the way you’re avoiding with the album. You feel any pressure from that?
Charles Hamilton: Naw, because see people didn’t necessarily think DMX was the best lyricist but you felt him. And doing these mixtapes, I’m showing you the creativity and everything. Like before I had the deal I had a bunch of songs, like the numbers were in the four digits, no bullshit. And since the deal, the number has skyrocketed cuz now I have unlimited studio time. I just pretty much told them when I got the deal: “I don’t give a fuck about nothing else. Just lock me in the studio with a bucket in the corner and a window to throw it out of.”
At the end of the day, when I tell people “I’m on album creativity mode,” I’m digging into myself and I’m making sure you’re feeling what I went through, what I see, what I don’t see, what I understand and what I don’t understand. With mixtapes, people think they know me from Crash Landing and Outside Looking In. Little do people know that none of that shit is new music. The 9th Wonder joint is the most new song. All of that shit is from 2006-2007. All the criticism I’ve been getting, I’ve already factored it in. Niggas is gonna say I sound like this on this song. People gonna flip out with the Lupe line. People gonna think I’m coming at him. They gonna think I’m trying to be Wayne. As soon as the song is being bounced on Pro Tools I already know what a person is gonna say.
Only thing I was upset about was that those two mixtapes didn’t tell a story. They were just two good mixtapes. So now with the projects I’m working on I wanna let people know that yes, I can structure shit. With my albums, cuz there are more than one albums done, you’re gonna understand me. It’s gonna be a point where even if you don’t like the music, there’s not one song you can listen to where you can’t say I understand where this nigga coming from.
TSS: I gotcha
Charles Hamilton: Because honestly I can’t say I don’t make commercial, pop records. I can, because that’s fun. There’s an art to making pop commercial records. Whereas some niggas are like “I hate commercial records.” No, you have to have talent to make records that can cross over. So if you don’t like when a nigga has talent you can kick rocks my nigga cuz I will gladly work with Benny Benassi from overseas. And I love Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor and I wanted to work with Nicole Scherzinger. That’s not a problem. I can go from genre to genre because you have to be in tune with music to be able to do it. And if a nigga tells you to do it? Like that new Nas record with Keri Hilton ; I fucks with Nas. I’m a big Nas fan. It just didn’t feel like Nas wanted to do that record.
TSS: Yea, I definitely agree.
Charles Hamilton: And that’s not a Nas diss. Please put in that part where I say that’s not a Nas diss (laughs). I’m a huge Nas fan. You can feel Nas had a certain rage in him when he was recording Nigger. He was so proud of it, and now you hear “Hero” and it’s like you know what the album was when it was supposed to come out. I guess that’s why he did the Nigger mixtape. That sort of doused fire is not what I’m trying to hear.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it whether I get a million Grammy’s – which my goal in this industry is to get a Grammy. If they try to make me an artist or try to make me do music I don’t wanna do I will give everything back and I’m back to the street. If that means I lose my girlfriend cuz she doesn’t want a poor nigga. If it means that all these niggas around me don’t care. If it means that all the love I’m being shown is fake then fuck everybody. Cuz I’m doing what keeps me sane. And if people like it then God bless them. But I’m not compromising who I am because it took me way too long to figure out who I am. And I’m 20 years old and comfortable saying I am Charles Hamilton.
TSS: Is that why you stuck with the government to show that that’s who you are? Because I’ve been telling people about this Charles Hamilton dude and they ask me if you sing R&B. Read the rest of this entry »
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