Ghemon - Hip-hop without labels

If your current surroundings allow it, take a second, close your eyes if you like, let the environment around you fade away, and go back in your mind to Gianluca Picariello of your first demo, "Bloodstains", from 2000. What would you say to yourself back then?

At the time I was enthusiastic and very determined. Shyness only crept in later, alongside a certain level of exposure, because more eyes are watching you, whereas when you're a kid, part of you actually wants to be seen. So I'd say, "Go, go! Don't lose that spirit!"

Were there obstacles that seemed insurmountable at the time, which you later realized were actually harmless?

No, I'd say none. Precisely because I was just a kid, I didn't see or anticipate a lot of the barriers or difficulties that adult life can bring. That's actually a nice thing too, one I keep as a fond memory. If you have that kind of boldness at that age, it's seen as enthusiasm; if you have it past a certain age, it's read as arrogance. In fact, I still remember it as enthusiasm, and I was certain I'd manage to do something worthwhile.

Are there any professional figures, or otherwise, from that "debut" period of yours that you remember as fundamental, or that stayed particularly close to your heart, even if you may not be in close touch with them these days?

Look, someone I don't see much anymore, but whose talent has stuck with me, is the guy who used to sing with me, Domenico, known as "Domi", from SangAmaro. He had a truly incredible gift for writing. To this day I still read things he's written, which sometimes have nothing to do with rap, since life took him in other directions, and I'm still fascinated by it. He was, in a way, a talent born at the wrong moment in history, when hip-hop in Italy was really just at the start of its rise. I hold onto that fond memory of him, and I think he certainly deserved even more luck as a musician.

You started out as a writer, then gradually moved into music and hip-hop in the second half of the '90s. What sparked the idea of making music rather than graffiti? Was there a particular artist or track that flipped the switch for you toward rap?

I'll tell you the truth: it was definitely when I started listening to Common, and a lot of other stuff from the late '90s, that made me realize I was more of a singer than a writer. Listening to those sounds, I understood that in music I had some hope, because I felt I had talent; as a writer I got by, but I knew I couldn't aspire to much more. Then again, talent can be trained, and it can show up even where it doesn't come naturally, so I'd say it was really those artists who made me understand I had to write and improve myself in that direction.

Having spent your teenage years in the '90s, how did you listen to music back then? Were you into cassette tapes, vinyl, early CDs, downloads? What kind of listener were you?

Loads of cassette tapes — when you could, you'd buy records, trade them, borrow them, dub them so others could listen too. After that, I started buying CDs, and now I've got a collection running from 2001 to 2007-2008 of about a thousand records. My vinyl collection is getting up to those numbers too, because over time I've tried to buy on vinyl the stuff I already had on CD; it's become a proper collection. I'd download when I was after something impossible to find. With P2P a whole world opened up, you could access files from computers all over the globe, and you'd stumble on incredibly rare stuff, like bonus tracks, bootlegs, live recordings. I built up a whole extra layer of knowledge beyond the standard stuff you get from records. I was the type to read the liner notes. I'm someone who'd check whether the artist I liked had given a shout-out to another artist, or whether they'd fallen out, how and when they recorded the track, where they cut it — and I still do that to this day.

So tell me about some rarity of yours that you still have

Let's say that among the many, I'd pick a producer who was almost unknown at the time, 9th Wonder (who later became a small piece of hip-hop history), who recorded a fully remixed version of a Nas track. I bought it from America, and I know the original version is very hard to find. I'm thrilled to own it.

On your first record credited to Ghemon & The Love 4Tet there was the opening track "Prima di Partire", which I think will always stay close to my heart because every line is prophetic. From the line about no decent record coming out since "Dalla Sede", to the one about how "even as success rises, earnings are inversely proportional". But in that track you also said that "among singers with 10 years of hard graft, I'm the up-and-comer", and shortly after that your good manners had to be forgotten. I wonder: did you really have to forget your "good manners" (in the climb to success), or do you feel you've never stepped on anyone's toes along the way?

I think I've always respected everyone, but if I'm being honest, sooner or later you're forced to be very decisive about a lot of choices you have to make. The further you go, the more people you meet along your professional path, and sometimes you can't please everyone, so inevitably you become an asshole to someone. I try to move through things according to my own ethics, in the right way. This is a life lesson, really. Even if you don't love your girlfriend anymore and you put up with her for a year and then leave her, you might say she made me suffer for a year and never met me halfway to try to fix things — but for her, you'll still be the asshole who left her. Sooner or later you're forced to make decisions, and whoever makes decisions ends up being disliked in the end.

On the subject of taking responsibility and facing up to your choices, your latest album “Mezzanotte” is a great analysis of that. There's the figure of the “warrior” in the title track that really struck me. What does the warrior mean to Ghemon?

For Ghemon, the warrior is someone who takes on his responsibilities every single day, and whatever certainties he holds, he's not afraid to lose them in order to improve his own life and the lives of the people around him. A man who's always on the move.

“Mezzanotte” is also the rap event of the moment in Italy, because it's much more sung than your previous albums, revealing, among other things, a real gift for singing. Coming from years of flow and even some spoken word, how did you adapt to singing?

It's something I've trained over time. Unfortunately – so to speak – I come from a “tough school”, that of 90s hip-hop, where you have to be skilled, well-versed, virtuosic, determined, you have to have it all. So I've always trained my singing, but writing for singing is a different matter altogether. I had to sit down and figure out how to approach writing lyrics. Fortunately, I managed to pull it off on this record. If you look at some of the metrics in “Un Temporale” or “Quassù”, there are quite a few lyrical hybridizations between rap and singing, which, incidentally, happens a lot today in r&b and sometimes in trap too, where rap cadences get folded into the sung parts or the chorus. Riding that approach, I managed to reclaim something that was already mine anyway, and make it more personal.

Regarding the other genres of Black music you managed to touch on in your new record, I noticed a considerable soul influence, which lately has become one of the most talked-about genres in hip-hop overseas too. I also read that making the record involved constant back-and-forth with Tommaso Colliva, with whom you kept each other updated on the latest releases. Among those, do you feel any particular record or artist had a special influence on your recent way of making music?

Contaminated, no, I wouldn't say so. Influenced certain choices, yes. My first contact with Tommaso happened before “ORCHIdee”, because he knew what my favorite things to listen to were, so we thought about mixing rap with what I listened to a lot – soul, funk, r&b. This time, though, I managed to land on an even more varied mix, which is what I wanted. But, to give you an example, let's take three albums that, between last year and this one, really stood out – let's say likeable and original too: “Blonde” by Frank Ocean, “DAMN.” by Kendrick Lamar, “Awaken, My Love!” by Childish Gambino, and also the one by Anderson .Paak. They're all decidedly hybrid albums. Take “Nikes” by Frank Ocean, a track where he raps, then sings, then raps again; same thing with Lamar, and even more so with Anderson .Paak, where you can't tell when he's rapping and when he's singing; Donald Glover plays the rapper but basically doesn't rap at all. These wonders showed me the way toward the approach of “Mezzanotte”, which isn't about wanting to sound like them, but about the need to go beyond genre boundaries and not care how the thing gets pigeonholed afterward. Soul: it's true that it's a genre in the spotlight right now, but in Italy it's had little traction, except for a handful of names; mentioning it in press releases or on the radio as the genre feels almost like a curse word, because it's a foreign term that hasn't really caught on the way you'd think. Hopefully it'll spread little by little, even if it's partly my fault (laughs) – I wouldn't mind that at all.

Actually, a question that comes to mind naturally is: aren't you afraid that, by moving away from traditional rap, the record industry, but also the mainstream audience, might superficially label you as pop?

I couldn't care less! Think about it, with my old band we saw D'Angelo's tour twice, and on the second date, which we saw in Milan, there was a moment where the two guitarists turned their backs to the audience and traded solos back and forth, with D’Angelo himself joining in with a third guitar, and that moment lasted about five minutes and it was pure rock! I never had any doubt that that was a rock moment, made by Black musicians playing soul and funk. It was, at most, in some way, black rock. Someone might have doubts, but what I do is simply the result of what I feed on, and have always fed on, musically speaking. Doubts, in my opinion, come to those who lack points of reference, but the clothing these tracks wear is something else entirely. I have to say, with pleasure, that especially in the more traditional media, the way my music's genres have been categorized has always been done correctly.

Coming to the themes dealt with in “Mezzanotte”, there's the demon of depression. When did you realize you were dealing with something far more than just a rough patch, but something more complicated and serious?

It happened at the exact moment – or shortly after – that I wrote “Un Temporale”; that's why I later chose that track as the single, even though we could have picked something more upbeat and punchy, coming out of summer, but I pushed hard for that one because I wanted the mood of this record to come through clearly, and I didn't want to send a different message. It was a feeling I'd already known for a while, but I'd never called it by that name until a doctor pointed it out to me explicitly, and that's when I understood what it was. My writing was affected by it in some way, but maybe never in a self-pitying way – if anything, with anger, strength, a desire to make it through these shitty moments.

Do you think depression really is the disease of the century? Is it a myth, or is it genuinely happening?

It's not a myth, it's an accurate definition. It's hard to understand its origin, it's hard to treat, you can hold it at bay with palliatives, but self-management remains the best approach. You have to manage to get through it with your own strength, take control of your own head and your own mechanisms, because from the outside people can only encourage you, but what really counts is you. So yes, it's the disease of the century, because so many people still don't recognize it as an illness, there's a lot of misinformation, and it's much more widespread than it appears, since it takes on subtle, non-obvious forms and manifestations.

As a fellow Campania native, I have to ask: how do you experience your relationship with your home region?

I do feel a sense of belonging, and I have a good relationship with it. But I also have to admit that, in order to do what I loved, I had to pick up the microphone from a young age and travel. The internet didn't exist back then, none of that today's online parochialism that sometimes pushes kids who stay in their “hometown” to represent the city – to the point that, before I was actually recognized for what I did back home, I had to tour all over Italy and even a bit of Europe. Now, though, I'm completely at ease with my home region, and every time I go back I feel better. Away from home I don't hide my origins, even though by now, wherever I go, people make me feel at home. Sometimes I think about the stores in Milan and Naples that get more turnout when I make an appearance, and I think back to myself as a kid, the first time I went to Naples coming from Avellino, feeling almost second-rate because you're from the provinces. Now, though, having such a wonderful relationship with audiences wherever I go – Benevento, Salerno, Caserta, just like up North – makes me happy, because none of that parochialism ever comes up.