Defined as much by his style and taste, as his music, A$AP Rocky does not let music conventions define him as an artist. He is a Harlem rapper that believes hip hop is what he makes it, as evidenced by his transcendent sound. Long.Live.A$AP is littered with dope traditional hip hop features, but Pretty Flacko also recruited famed EDM DJ Skrillex, and Florence Welch from Florence and the Machine. Talking to MTV, Rocky discussed why he chose to go a non-traditional route with some of his features.
Known for his party lifestyle, the A$AP Mob front man says he has known Skrillex for a long time, “I used to hang out with him and go to downtown raves and stuff like that,” and says that recording a record together just happened organically, “With me and Skrillex, we was just chillin and we were like 'Yo, let's go to the studio,'” Adding, “so we went to the studio and it was just organic, we was just chilling."
Some hip hop traditionalists might look down at Rocky’s tactics in recruiting an Electronic Music producer, but the NY native says they recorded a great party record, “I had fun that night, had fun making the record and I think everybody else gonna have fun listening to it."
Working with singer Florence Welch happened because she decided to reach out to A$AP, and while he was not too familiar with her work, he eventually became a fan and they decided to work together. “"[Florence Welch] is actually a huge fan and she reached out [to me],” the Harlem spitta adds, “I'm not gonna sit here and lie — I wasn't too in tune with the music, so when I found out she was fascinated with my style, that's when the infatuation with her came. I just started doing research and I became a fan."
Young Rocky feels it is important to be open to other genres of music as much as he hopes fans of different genres keep an open mind about hip hop, “It's an honor that people from different genres really appreciate my music...It's not just categorized or labeled as ignorant hip-hop or just rap. I feel like when you just say 'rap' it limits it."
After some delay, Long.Live.A$AP is slated for a January 15th release.
