MIDWEST BROTHERHOOD | United Grind

THE MIDWEST | UNITED GRIND

INTERVIEW KB Tindal PHOTOGRAPH @RealDopeCinematic

United Grind is a collective of artists and producers that consider themselves a movement rather than just another Hip Hop group. They are, however, composed of 2 groups. Vice Souletric and HiJinks are collectively known as Play Havoc from Ohio. Along with Sandman, NuFace, Lee Harvey and Juggernaut June collectively known as Game Changers from Detroit, respectively. They came together to form a United alliance. They have collaborated with the likes of Benny The Butcher, rising Buffalo Femcee Che Noir, Skyzoo, and Elzhi just to name a few. Their production team is one of Global proportions and consists of producers from as far as the Czech Republic, Slovakia and London. Their debut compilation Grind or Die (Vol. 1) is set to drop on April 11th and we got into all of that and more, so take the time to get familiar with United Grind. 

Validated: So United Grind is a movement that houses artists, and producers, along with a production and promotional company, and it is also a resource for independent artists. Tell me how such a grand idea came to fruition and what was the process like to get to this point and why you consider yourselves a Movement rather than a group.

HiJinks: Well, initially, I founded the United Grind vehicle to pretty much go along with what Vice was doing at the time. He was solo. So everything that I was doing as far as in the background, I was pretty much just handling things, as far as like the media, the promotions, the social media, things of that nature. At that time, I really wasn't interested in getting back into the music personally. So it was just how I could help. And I figured if we create a vehicle to do it, it would be easier and it would basically just give us another platform to also promote his music. So that's kind of where it started. I always had the intention, even like in our early years, for us to align with other artists and things of that nature, seeing as we, from the Midwest, the market is so small, it always made sense for it to be a community more so than just segmented. And that's how it's always been so when the United Grind thing came into play, the idea of us connecting with other artists to make our outreach bigger, to combine resources, to put everything that we had, just being in this little market, it just made sense rather than closing us off, closing the borders off. Cuz to be honest, at this stage in the game, plenty of us have tried to be the man and do it ourselves and be the lone wolf and shit. So I'm just like, okay, that shit didn't work. Let's do it differently. So it just made sense for it to happen at that point. That’s where we are right now in the gang.

Vice Souletric: And just to piggyback off that as well, like he mentioned, earlier in the early 2010s, I had stepped back. Like I said, we went on a short hiatus at the end of the 2000s as far as music. Got more focus, got the fire burning again, and I basically was putting out the most consistent amount of music outta everybody in the crew. Doing some production for artists, putting out solo stuff, and United Grind was the official umbrella for that so I was sort of like, in the forefront as far as artist wise. But just like HiJinks said, our mission the entire time was to bring in more artists, more producers, more DJs, more creative minds to really make the name United Grind really make sense cuz that sounds like a movement. And to answer your other question, the reason why we wanna be known as a movement as opposed to a group is cuz we're just not a group. I mean, we're separate entities with different styles, different personalities, and we think that doing it that way and coming together occasionally for crew tracks and for projects such as the compilation coming, we think that's more effective as opposed to just trying to present ourself and brand ourself just as one group. Cuz it is so diverse, the sounds are so diverse, you know?

HiJinks: Yeah, I appreciate that question too because I know for a fact it's gonna be hard to get around that perception. And people will see it as a group, especially initially until the wheels get turning and whatnot. But just at every turn that I can get, that I can explain to people exactly what we embody, it's important for me to put that out there as often as I can because people do need to know that we do much more than just make music. United Grind itself is a movement so that's how we want to continue to blast that message.

Validated: Each one of you guys can answer this, man. What is your earliest memory of Hip Hop?

Lee Harvey: My earliest memory of Hip Hop was Run-D.M.C. I'm old school, so Run-D.M.C. I actually had a cat, that's like my brother come into town. He moved here from New York, from Queens, from Jamaica, Queens, and he would sit on the porch and bang, Run-D.M.C., and EPMD. I'm in Detroit so this was a whole different avenue for me. You know, the music he was bringing was just opening my eyes to a whole different vibe that we wasn't hearing out here in the D. So that's my earliest memory of Hip Hop. Sitting on the porch with the big Radio banging Run-D.M.C., and EPMD, the classics.

HiJinks: For me in particular, man, my cousin John, we call him John John, he was from Harlem. He came and stayed with my grandmother I wanna say probably like around 85. Around 85, man, he came from Harlem. He brought all of that culture. He brought B Boy culture the first time I ever seen him like cut up some cardboard and he would go and he would take trips back to New York and come back with different gear and shit, and he'd come back with tracksuits and he brought all this culture. My grandmother had just a little record player. I remember him putting the nickel on the record player. Like all of this, that was foreign to just the Midwest in general, he brought that aspect of the culture. As far as music, it was whatever we could consume where we came from. So those beginning stages of Run-D.M.C. getting on MTV and things of that nature, things that I would pick up on, those are my earliest memories. But as far as the culture, it was what my cousin brought and what I came to learn was ultimately the elements of Hip Hop. At the time, it was just something cool my big cousin was doing.

Vice Souletric: Yeah. My earliest, as far as just hip-hop in general, I remember going to Breakin' and Breakin' 2, like in the movies. I remember going to them when they came out. No, I don't remember all the details of the movie, but I remember for a fact that we were there and I loved it. Ozone? Was that one of the dude's names?

Validated: Yeah, Ozone. Shabba-Doo.

Vice Souletric: Right, right. So that's like my first earliest memory that I could reach back and get that's connected to Hip Hop. As far as music, I remember my brother had brought home Raising Hell, and I was just tripping because we grew up real church-like. My parents were strict, and churchgoing. So when he brought it, it was just my first time just experiencing, basically not giving a fuck. And I remember that being a big deal as far as music. As far as production, I'll never forget the first time we hooked up like a couple speakers and I heard and noticed a baseline for the first time. And I know that may sound weird, but back in the day, if you just listen on little rooty poot speakers, you wouldn't really notice a baseline. But I'll never forget the first Hip Hop song where I heard a baseline and understood that there was a part of the beat that was just a bass and I loved it. And I'm a producer too, so to this day, like I cannot stand beats that don't have a baseline and that's when I fell in love with production. I think it was like a Fu-Schnickens song or something like that. It was in the early nineties. Well, yeah, those are my earliest memories, man.

Validated: How do you guys manage the personalities within the movement? And the reason that I ask this is because, if you guys have been watching the Wu-Tang: An American Saga, if it tells us anything, it shows us that personalities will clash along the road to greatness. So is there some kind of formula that you guys have developed? Are there primary roles that you each take on to keep things running smoothly? How do you guys work that out?

Vice Souletric: You're giving us some on point questions, boy. These are some on point questions.

HiJinks: Oh yeah. No, but it made sense man. With the relationship between me and Vice, you have to understand we're like brothers. I know a lot of times how he's going to answer certain things before he answers it, and I'm sure vice versa. We each take on different tasks and when it comes to certain operations of the business. Vice who has appropriately put out a couple of projects and at this point, we just consider him the president of the company. So a lot of the strategy and operations and things of that nature go to him as far as executing the vision and the mission and things of that nature. And a lot of the finances go to me so you could consider me the CEO, MCEO rather, you know what I'm saying? So we kind of just take those tasks and we divide them appropriately. The Game Changers recently became a part of it. They really entrust us in what we know and what we've been doing. A lot of times, they play the role of soldiers and we take the time to highlight everybody individually so everybody has their time to shine and their time to step to the forefront. But as far as the operations, it's primarily me and Vice at this moment. And then B who also we brought in as the third partner for United Grind, he oversees the Game Changers for the most part. But he also plays his role as far as a soldier in the whole United Grind movement. It just fit like a glove, which is why it made sense for us to expand at the time that we did.

Vice Souletric: Let me delve into this cause I know there's another element of this that he spoke about that you really didn't touch on, and that's how you deal with the personalities because we have that issue. We recently have had that issue dealing with the different personalities. The thing about us that's a little bit different, we're obviously still on on the upswing. We're rising. So when you look at somebody like Wu-Tang, their ascent was pretty quick and swift and they were getting money and really in the limelight at that point. Now that's not to say that with this group that we have, that once we get there and the money starts rolling in, some things may change that we may have to look at. But what I'm happy about is right now, we have been able to somewhat sift the culture and sift who is affiliated with the group, to the point where everybody is pretty much on the same accord on what their role is, what they're expected to do. I'm glad we were able to get it done now and I think that's something that when you're on the way up the ladder, a lot of cats, they don't really set enough standards as far as what's expected. Like, you gotta treat yourself like you're superstars now. Like you have to set a high standard now. You have to set a high bar now as far as what you're gonna put up with. As far as us with United Grind, we pretty much ask very minimal for the people that are affiliated with us to be a part of the crew. And pretty much, we've got to the point now where the guys that are with us now, Game Changers, DJ Dura, P, everybody that's affiliated with us, B Ready, who's a producer from Atlanta, and we're growing slowly. Everybody pretty much knows what's expected even with having different personalities.

HiJinks: Those who are dead, we had to get rid of them.

Validated: What are the origin stories behind your individual stage names?

Lee Harvey: So I used to be with another crew. My guy, Rex my boy, we were called The Pentagon. And the way I rap, I was more conscious. I would add consciousness to it and so I would try to touch people. I was calling myself Lovi Doecious. My man was like, yo, we The Pentagon, you gotta have another name with that. So I was like, yo, alright. So I started thinking like damn, if I'm hitting people mentally, I'm trying to assassinate their character, I'm calling myself Lee Harvey. So that's what I did. So Lovi Doecious Lee Harvey, that's my name.

HiJinks: For me, it's funny because I literally had just posted this little audio bite on my gram in the wake of the passing of Tame One (rest in peace) from The Artifacts. And I basically gave a story of how I got my name, which was basically due to the fact that at the time of us starting to do this music, I was playing around with the idea of DJing. And a DJ who would throw little courtyard parties at the school that we attended, he would kind of let me mess with the turntables every now and then. And his idea was like if you wanna learn how to do it, pick a record and just continue to cut a phrase. And the record that I picked was an Artifacts record. And in that record, Tame One had said a line, something like, "Don't think in an eye blink, I won't start my HiJinks." And so when we was coming up with rap names and shit, we was really trying to solidify rap names, me and Vice, we always had early names and shit like that. But when it came time to form the group and getting serious, it's like, okay, do we really want these to be our names? Let's pick the names that's going to be it. And so Hijinks was the one that I picked and we kind of came up with the name Play Havoc and our individual rap names all around the same time. I can't remember what the Vice’s was...How did we come up with that shit?

Vice Souletric: Play Havoc?

HiJinks: No, no, no, your rap name. Vice's name was Ill Advice and I think Ill Advice was going to be the group name at one point. And then you was like, nah, that's just gonna be my name. I think that's what it was so Vice started out as Ill Advice.

Vice Souletric: You gonna tell my story and shit. Okay, go ahead, tell it.

HiJinks: It blended, nigga, it blended. You ain't remember that. You ain't remember that, nigga.

Vice Souletric: So by the way, I'm like sitting here getting ready, okay, this is what I'm gonna say, but nah. Yeah. So my name was Ill Advice at first. Nah, he's right. We came up with Play Havoc and Ill Advice around the same time cuz Ill Advice was the name that we would consider for the group. And since we came up with Play Havoc, which we came up with that name because we were actually trying to find words that were synonymous with no compromise. And I think we went as far as looking online and typing in synonyms for "no compromise" and a phrase that came up was Play Havoc. We was like, man, that's crazy. And I'm glad we picked that name because everybody remembers that name. And it's just like different, you know? So basically during the early Play Havoc days, my name was Ill Advice. So like I said, we took a little hiatus. I came back only basically doing production. So when I came back only doing production, I sort of twisted my name. HiJinks had always called me Vice, short for Ill Advice. So I took the Vice and then I came up with this made-up word called Souletric that everybody in the world spells incorrectly, but it's cool. I actually like it that way because whenever you do search my name, I'm the only thing that comes up on Google. And that's one thing I tell rappers. Man, if you come up with a name, you gotta come up with something that's easily Googleable, if that's a word. So that's why now it's like Souletric because it's a mix between soul and electric as far as the sound of the beats that I do or whatever. So that's what that's about. So Ill Advice or Vice or Souletric, either one I'll go by.

Validated: No doubt. No doubt, no doubt. The Debut project from you guys, from United Grind, is titled Grind or Die (Vol.1). It drops on April 11th. First of all, let me get this out of the way. There's some accolades. The production is top tier, the final mixes are super, super clean, bro. I hear a lot of independent artists when I'm riding in my car. I can hear a bunch of shit in the background and it doesn't sound right, but your production is on point, the mixes are super clear, the wordplay is definitely on point.

HiJinks: Appreciate it.

Validated: You dropped a few singles. You dropped “M.A.M.N (Me and My Niggas)” with Benny The Butcher, the “United Grind Cypher” over the classic “Grinding” by The Clipse, and "Give it Back.” Lena Jackson on “Ambush Ballad” is one of my joints. I think that joint is Fire. “The Order” Ft. G Huff and Che Noir is also a banger, and another one that I like is “Grimey Love” . I think that's also dope. And that's just to name a few off the project. Now, to my understanding, this has been in the making for about two years and so tell me what was the hardest part and the most joyful part about the process of making this project, and what's the chemistry like in the studio between you guys?

Lee Harvey: So the crazy part is a lot of the production that we do is down here. Now they'll come down for certain tracks, but for the most part, like the Game Changers do our stuff in house and then Vice and HiJinks will come down and do their stuff with us. But the chemistry is amazing. It's like one big happy family, man. So what we didn't say about the Game Changers and the United Grind is when we met, when I was able to finally meet these guys, it was like I already knew 'em. So the chemistry was already there. Me and HiJinks, we did a couple tracks together a couple years ago and the moment we met, we knew a bunch of artists, similar people that I associated with that he already knew that he had been on tour with. So it was like, wow, the connection was instantly there. And then meeting Vice, it was like this is my brother. Like for real. And that was from the start, you know what I'm saying? So the chemistry is amazing when we're in the studio together. Like we have so much fun, we don't wanna stop.

HiJinks: Bringing the fun back was a big part of me even wanting to come back into the scene as a artist. And around the time when I met Lee Harvey, it was basically due to just a chance meeting with Brian “B Row” Stovall who's basically the head of the Game Changers. And I met this cat in a cigar lounge. He was wearing a Griselda shirt. And I was like, yo, I see you got the Griselda shirt on. At this time, we had already put the joint out with Benny. And he's like, "Yo, I'm originally from Detroit. I live out here in Ohio now. I got my cousin, I got my brother out there, I got these cats, you know what I'm saying? They spit." And when you talk to cats about who could spit and who's dope, that's what's up. I don't even think he sent me a link. He gave me a card and I went and searched Game Changers and some other cats came up. So I'm looking at this shit. He's like, "Yeah, I shoot videos." I'm looking at these videos. I'm like, nah. So he ended up texting me the actual link and I was like, oh, these are the Game Changers. So it was some other cats called the Game Changers. Once he actually got me the shit for their actual music, I'm like, oh, this is dope. So it was maybe a week or maybe about two weeks after that meeting where we were in Akron. That's where I met Lee Harvey. They were doing some recording in Akron, Ohio. And we had a session there and I think we had dropped maybe like three joints in that session. And that was kind of the snowball. After that, I ended up bringing them back to Vice's. I was like, yo, Vice, I got these cats, you need to check 'em out. So we ended up bringing them, inviting them back up to Ohio, Vice met him and the relationship's just been building. So the time between then and now, mind you, this was right after the pandemic. So coming straight outta the pandemic, like we're still trying to regain our footing as far as what we were doing before the pandemic had hit. We were doing a lot of shows, we had put together our own tour, we had done a lot at that time. It was all about reestablishing, okay, what's the direction now with the pandemic, we gotta deal with that, how we gonna make this shit work now? So figuring it out and recording 

Vice Souletric: Also, I wanna shout out as far as technical aspects of the things that you mentioned, and we appreciate you mentioning those things cuz it really tells that you listened and we put a lot into trying to get our stuff sounding good. But with that being said, we gotta shout out Tone Rizzo outta Detroit. This cat engineered the whole album. Now, we didn't record everything there, which is the most incredible thing because it sounds like we did. We brought songs that we had recorded from outside the studio, he sat there in front of us and mastered that whole album in like two hours.

HiJinks: Yeah. Shout out Sound Smith Studios.

Vice Souletric: I've never sat in on an engineer mastering an album. He mastered it all. It was 12 tracks at that point. Or did we have “Ambush?” No, we had “Ambush” too. He mastered all 13 tracks right in front of us, dude. And we just wanna salute him cuz the engineer does not get enough props out here in Hip Hop. But they are the most important. They are the last person that touches your music so we appreciate you with the shoutout on the quality. He's fam too. He's Game Changers all day, any day.

Validated: Yeah. I mean, cuz I'm listening to it in my car and I'm like, well, is the next track gonna sound lower or different? And the whole thing sounded cohesive and that was impressive to me because you don't really get that a lot in a lot of independent music. So yeah, definitely kudos to the dude that definitely did that engineering. He definitely put the work in on that. Absolutely.

Vice Souletric: He gonna love hearing that.

HiJinks: We bumped our heads, man. We bumped our heads a lot trying to figure out what's important, what we should be pouring into, what things we need to make sure that we get professional help on and so it has been a big learning experience just over the years. And we realized that we can't compromise on mixing and mastering. There's just no way. You know, we tried it. Years ago, we tried to mix and master our own and a lot of what we do is in-house. We handle a lot of things but when it comes down to that, at this point in the game we realized that quality has to be topnotch.

Validated: Absolutely. How did the collaboration with Benny and Che Noir come about?

Vice Souletric: You know what? And I'm gonna get on my soapbox. I take pride in trying to find out who's next as far as artists. So what happened was we actually got with Benny. Was this before Tana Talk 3? There was a point…

HiJinks: No, this is an old ass joint, nigga.

Vice Souletric: Benny was on his way up and I reached out to him and I was like, yo man, let's get it. And at that point, I told G-Huff who was on the song and HiJinks, I was like, yo, Grizelda, this movement is popping, but guess what? This dude is gonna be the one. And this was when Conway and West were still like the two big dogs. I said, this dude is gonna be the one right here, Benny. So I reached out to him and we did our business or whatever, got him on the track, we were actually supposed to shoot a video for the song too, which never came about because of scheduling differences or whatever. But yeah, we're still cool with Benny to this day, man, and we still get a lot of burn from that song, and we're re-releasing it on the album with a brand-new mix and put it with everything else because there's still a lot of burn left for that joint. Che Noir is another one where I was like, yo guys, we need to rock with this chick. I don't even think HiJinks had heard of her at the time when I first brought him to her. I was like, yo, we need to rock with Che. And I had a little bit of rapport with Che because I worked in the booking agent space as well and did some work with her there. And so she already knew me and she was down to do work. And luckily we were able to do the song and we went out to Buffalo to shoot the video. So that video that you see for the order was shot in Buffalo, New York. So shout out to Che, shout out to Benny. We always try to make sure that we work with artists that are dope and it makes sense for the sound too as far as the essence of the music.

HiJinks: One thing I'll add to that is I think around that time, Vice had booked Benny's first big solo show so that also helped in us having that rapport with him and his management and whatnot, and it all helped that he was in the budget at that time. Right now, he outta here.

Vice Souletric: That's why you gotta be forward thinking, man. You gotta be forward thinking cause the thing about it is once you drop that song and then go back to talking about mixing and mastering, you get a song mixed correctly, so it doesn't ever date, you get it mixed right. I mean, nobody can ever take that from you. So if Benny goes on to be the next Jay-Z, we got a song with the next Jay-Z and there's nothing anybody can do about it. So that's why you need to be forward thinking and always be open to working with cats on the way up and not just wait for cats to blow up before you wanna start doing anything with 'em. You gotta sort of always have that A and R hat on. That's what we're doing with the Game Changers too, man. We're with the Game Changers because we get along with 'em, but we also get with the Game Changers because the Game Changers are dope. We just did a show in Detroit last week where they completely tore down in their hometown. They are dope. They have an ear for beats, they can all spit, they all got presence on the mic, all of that. That's the reason why we're rocking with the Game Changers, you know what I'm saying? So you just gotta always have mutual respect. And as far as how the album came together and how the movement came together, it's just like any other relationship, man. Sometimes it happens by chance. You can't force it. You have to find the right people to work with for a long-term relationship and that's, I think, what's happening now and the reason why we're finally able to move forward like we wanna move.

Validated: I know when an artist makes a project, all of the songs are like your babies, man. They're like your kids and you love putting a cohesive project together. But if you had to pick one song off the new project, what would be your favorite track and why?

HiJinks: For me, it would have to be “Similar” just for the fact that Play Havoc as a group, we virtually had been inactive for well over 10 years. So it was really the first joint that we put out as Play Havoc in over a decade. And I would say that it solidified where we were individually as artists because Vice had been doing a lot of solo things and I had just started or really just finished recording my solo album around the time where we put that song together. And essentially, it's not the Play Havoc sound but the essence. It's still Play Havoc because he's still him and I'm still me and our relationship is strong even without us working together as a group. So us doing that and doing the video for it, to me it was just a good time. We pretty much just celebrated the 15th anniversary of the album that we put out. So that song within itself is just like a memorial to that era and who we are as a group. So that's the reason that it's probably my favorite joint on the album.

Lee Harvey: I think "Give it Back" is gonna be my favorite. Either that or "Cut Throat," but definitely "Give it Back." And "Give it Back," the reason that's one of my favorites is because for one, we was all in the studio together. We were actually gonna work on something different, which was crazy, and Vice said, yo, I got this beat, check it out. And he threw it on and it was just like the chemistry was just so good. The vibe was so good that day and everybody was like, he was like just gimme a few bars from everybody and we gonna kill it. And it just came out and it flowed effortlessly.

HiJinks: Yeah, I think we had that done in less than an hour.

Lee Harvey: It was beautiful so I think "Give it Back" definitely because you've seen everybody get a piece of their shine on in the spirit of camaraderie.

Vice Souletric: Yeah. That song was like something you don't get anymore. Completely the whole concept, it was written, everything was done in the studio, all of us together there at one time. It was like a throwback. Like that doesn't even happen anymore. I love "Give it Back," I do love "Give it Back," I love "Similar," I love all the joints. I do like "Similar" for the reason why HiJinks said. I do love "Give it Back," but my favorite song is "Got Something." And the reason why I like "Got Something," it ain't even necessarily cuz I produced it. I did produce that joint, but the dope thing, the story behind "Got Something" was when we first got with the Game Changers. So at least when I first sort of got in a circle with the Game Changers and they met me or whatever, I just threw them some beats. Right? And that was like the first beat that they came back to me with and had vocals on and was ready to go. And when I heard it, I instantly knew that, okay, I'm rocking with the Game Changers. Like I'm fucking with them. Okay, yeah, we got something. And that was the name of the song, "We Got Something." So I was like, yeah, we got something. My man June, shout out to June. And then they was like, yo, like man, why don't you get on this, why don't you rap on it? And I was like, alright, bet. So I did the third verse and it just has a certain vibe to it that I think sort of represents, if you know, the backstory. It sort of represents the union of United Grind and Game Changers. Like, yeah, we really got something here. We got chemistry, we got something that can really move. So "Got Something" is my favorite. Yeah.

Validated: Okay, dope. Now here's a doozy for you. Who is the artist or producer that you know personally or that you don't know personally that pushes you to step your pen game up or your production game up the most when you're in the studio?

HiJinks: Between us?

Validated: It could be between y'all or it could be somebody outside. Yeah.

Vice Souletric: I'm gonna give you a couple of different answers. Actually, all of these cats, and obviously HiJinks with us, we been rapping since we were young, like I always try to stay on par with him. He's a beast and he always has standout verses so to be completely honest, I gotta always stay on par with him. Now if you talking about somebody and the crew as a whole, we're all competitive. I've come to find out just how competitive the Game Changers are and I'm finding out through the grapevine. So we're all on that level. But as far as if you wanna say like somebody outside of the crew, like a notable artist or whatever, two cats, man, really stand out. Elzhi: When I hear Elzhi, nobody to me is as amazing as putting words together with the syllables and different things. Like when I listen to Elzhi, that to me is like, man, this dude is really on another level from everybody. And everybody that we speak to about him or that I've ever spoke to about him, he's respected in the highest regard of lyricism. So Elzhi, I will say, he makes me wanna step my pen game up. RJ Payne too, I really love RJ Payne cuz he's another cat. Like with his simplicity, he's very simple, but he knows exactly what to say and when to say it. As far as Beats, it's always Nottz. Like it's always Nottz. I'll just leave it there. Nottz is just the hallmark. He's your favorite producer's favorite producer. You hear a Nottz beat, he makes you wanna go back to the lab and figure something out. So those are my people that make me wanna step up.

HiJinks: All right, man I definitely gotta tip my hat to Elzhi as well. You know, I just recently established a rapport with him and shit. Cool brother and all that. I believe he's a Taurus as well, just like me. And just having conversations with him, he's a craftsman which is what I would consider myself to be so it's not surprising how he sits and takes his time with bars and shit like that. That was really the first time I had insight to how other cats go about it, and it was surprising but not so surprising that he was similar in his process. I've always said that Casual from The Hieroglyphics is one of the dopest cats ever. And the reason that I say that is that this cat has just the ability to put words together, and not necessarily in the way that say Eminem would bend words to his will. I think what makes Casual different in that realm of just lyricism and just word play wizardry is that he just finds words that motherfuckers just don't put together. He just puts words together. He doesn't necessarily bend them like Eminem does, but he finds ways to take words that are just like, I know ain't nobody ever said that. So that's one. Casual has always been one of my top tiers as far as lyricists and shit. I never really liked his beat selection, but I could literally sit here and listen to that nigga rap over bullshit beats all day. That's how dope Casual is. That nigga could rap over Playschool, Tinker Toy beats, and I'll just be like, yo. And he actually did that shit. He had a mixtape out called “Meanwhile” or some shit like that, and the Beats was just terrible. But I'll just listen to that nigga just spit over them terrible beats all day. So yeah, I would have to give it up to those two just off the top of my head right now.

Lee Harvey: So I'm gonna finish it up. Definitely hometown favorite El. El has been phenomenal since back in the day with the Boomerang slang. I mean, El has set the standard out here. I know a lot of people say Em or Royce, but El has always been outside that one artist that you say, damn what did he say? You got to rewind that and be like damn. He is very witty. You could pick it up, but you had to play it back again. Like, damn, did he just drop that shit like that? But also, I like artists that push me cuz I like to write stories with my lyrics so it would be hands down Nas. He's like the God to me. There's a cat in DC I used to listen to, Asheru.

Validated: I remember Asheru.

Lee Harvey: I'm always trying to consciously slip it in there, so Asheru was one of those artists that loved to slip that little piece of knowledge in there. I got that from him. And hands down, the Juggernaut, my boy, the best to ever be, he's a monster, him and HiJinks are the Hulk and the Juggernaut. They're masters, I'm telling you. Ain't nothing fucking with it. So we've got something coming out there, these two leading the forefront and we behind coming through. Like when the Avengers came back to fight Thanos, you got them in front and us in the back like, yeah, let's set this shit up. So we're ready for everything that these cats got out there, man.

Validated: As Hip-Hop artists, and just as black men in general, what do you feel your responsibility is to Hip Hop culture?

HiJinks: I could say emphatically at this point, Hip Hop is in a state of emergency. And with everything hanging in the balance as far as mainstream Hip Hop and the direction that it's going, there's really only going to be so many cats that really hold onto the essence of it and really understand it. Like, yeah, of course, we wanna get paid. Everybody wanna get paid for doing this shit, but if the love isn't there, I don't see too many people hanging onto the art form in the sense of just giving back to the culture. So with us, it hasn't been a cash grab or anything like that. Our love for the culture right now is really what has us continuing and pushing forward and striving. And we want things to be profitable. Seeing we're from the Midwest, we realize that we're underdogs in the game and I've always said that if we were in a major market, we would be undeniable. It's just my personal belief. If we was in New York or we was in LA, whatever the case is, I think we would be undeniable in just a sense of everything that we bring and just the unity and the idea that you still can be a veteran emcee, you can still be at the top of your game, you still can contribute, you still can push messages, you can still be positive, you can also still make money in the game. At this point, I think it'll be a beacon for cats that are kind of reaching that age bracket. However long we decide to keep doing this, there'll be cats that are graduating into that veteran space in Hip Hop that I would still want to somehow be an inspiration to, saying like, hey they kept doing it, they made something happen, they made some noise and they didn't stop doing it because people said that you can only do it till this a certain age, or you can only contribute to this point. So I think right now, we have multiple different responsibilities. We have a responsibility to where we're from, we have a responsibility to Black men and the culture, we have a responsibility as businessmen trying to make something happen for our area. So all of those I feel like rest on our shoulders right now.

Vice Souletric: I somewhat agree about Hip Hop being in a state of emergency, but we're really in a funny space now because Hip Hop's turning 50 this year, and as Hip Hop gets older, I think it's evolving to opening up a whole new space and almost a new subgenre where people can appreciate the original art form, completely separate of what's going on on the radio, completely separate of whatever's mainstream. I think that people talk about the way that music is consumed now, and some people complain about it. I've always thought that it's for the greater good of music because really right now, I can go on a phone and I can find and listen to the music that I like for 24 hours nonstop if I want to, and I can discover new artists if I want to. You couldn't even do that in 1995. You couldn't do that. I mean, basically, we could only go listen to whoever was on MTV or BET that you knew about or are getting played on the radio, and luckily for all of us, all those cats were good. Those cats were dope. But now, if you come across Vice, you can go back to Vice's four albums, listen to 'em all day. You can just stream them and then you can go to Vice's show and watch and support him at the show. What it is, is I think that the era that we're from, you have people that are still sort of stuck on only gravitating towards what's "popular" and what's given to them in a certain format. I wish more people our age were more open-minded to discover more new music that we like. Now you do have a group of people that do that, but it's a small section. So I think to answer your question, our responsibility is to help grow that section, to let people know that, look, it's okay to represent and bump an unknown artist. I mean, if his music's dope, bump it, support it. It ain't about it being played on top 40 radio or whatever. So I think that when you present yourself in the correct way with your artwork to your music, the way that it sounds, everything we've been talking about, your presentation, it makes it easier to open up that space. So I think at the end of the day, that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to make it easier for cats coming behind instead of doing exactly what we're doing, grassroots, dope, doing it the right way, presenting it the right way and giving them a chance to be heard, making it easier for those that come behind us.

Validated: Listening to the lyrics, man, I know that there's other streams of income for you guys. I believe I heard somebody spit about a Juice Bar and some Merch and things of that nature. So tell me more about the other business ventures that you guys are into and how important that is to kind of like sustain the dream of being artists and pursuing the dream.

Vice Souletric: That's a good question though.

HiJinks: Yeah. I'm actually a freelance designer, creative, web and media guy myself. So full-time, I have a variety of clients in the corporate space that I do that type of work for, which ultimately translates over to what we're doing here at United Grind. So handling a lot of that. A lot of the media and production side of things is really just kind of where I rest at personally, and I think Vice will tell you what he's into as well.

Vice Souletric: Yeah, me and HiJinks both, like I said, man, we brothers man, we came up since middle school, elementary school, man. We both have always been just artists. So I'm also in that creative space as well, like graphic design. My clientele was actually more geared toward like the urban space and the music space. So I've actually been able to use that to garner a lot of relationships in the music space with different artists so that's cool. And also, I had sort of touched on earlier, for the last few years, I have also been a talent agent for Breakpoint Booking which is a boutique talent agency based outta Hollywood, California. Worked with a lot of dope artists. Actually, I got down with Breakpoint because Isaac Gordon who was my manager at the time, put me on my first little national tour run. I went on a little four city run with CL Smooth and it was dope. I was so hyped to be able to do that cause I was in markets that I had never been before on the West Coast. But after that took place, we got to know each other more. He's like, yo, man, I think that you would be good. You should try to do booking. So I've taken that and obviously, being able to put that hat on, I've been able to gain new relationships with just a whole bunch of different artists and managers. But no matter what you do, you gotta do it the right way and handle yourself professionally and not be thirsty and all that type of stuff. But yeah, those are the things. So everything that we do, we bring it back around obviously to United Grind. So after I was doing the booking for like a year or so, I came back to HiJinks and said, look man, I got it. I know what the formula is. This is what we need to do to do our own thing and produce our own shows and things of that nature. 

Lee Harvey: Definitely. So trying to do it independently, but at the same time, give back to the community, you know what I'm saying? Get the community some help. So trying to give back. And that's one thing I really wanna focus on too within our community. My man knows, we'd be around the same age probably, growing up, fast food was something you got every now and then. It wasn't an everyday thing, but nowadays these kids, that's all they know. And our community is so dependent on the bad things that we eat and we need to get back to the good things. I love what Styles P is doing. He's brought the juice bar to the hood and is trying to teach a culture for people to be healthy, to have a future, instead of all this heart disease, diabetes, and everything else that's killing us. And unfortunately, within the black community, we got it bad because we get the cheapest stuff because that's all we can have. But if we teach that we can grow the food, we can have the juice, this juice right here will sustain you. It would help your body, heal your body, instead.

Validated: I think that's super important, man, because just in the realm of the Hip Hop space alone, if you look at the amount of people that are dying before they turn 60, it's outta order. And I think a lot of that is due to how we treat ourselves and what we put in our bodies so that's definitely always a good route to go. Last question for you gentlemen. What does Hip Hop mean to you?

HiJinks: Hip Hop is a part of the culture, it’s a part of our legacy as black people in America. I think we don't really treat it with the reverence that we should. I think certain things should just be a lot more sacred that they are in this space seeing the opportunity that Hip Hop has allotted a lot of the people in the spotlight who we would consider just to be moguls or legends, things of that nature. The reverence that I have for Hip Hop, I don't think it's necessarily common amongst black people at this point. And I think honestly, a lot of us have just become jaded seeing that it's been around for as long as it has at this point. But I think that there is something sacred about it. I don't take it lightly in the sense that I understand what it has done for us and what it has the potential to do for the future. So with that being said, Hip Hop does mean a lot to me. I spent a lot of my early years in the game just becoming read up on Hip Hop. As a matter of fact, I think I got a book back there. It's like a Hip Hop glossary or some shit. That's how serious I took it. Now, I haven't cracked that book open in some years but once I started becoming entrenched in the culture, learning about it just became important. Especially like I said, we from the Midwest, we didn't necessarily have all the experiences and we didn't really know all the nuances as far as the start of Hip Hop and things of that nature outside of what rolled down the popular information as far as Kool Herc and some of the larger components of the culture that translated over to other areas. But learning about the small nuances was important to me and just realizing that there's something sacred in just what the opportunity that Hip Hop has provided us.

Vice Souletric: Man, I don't know, that's a deep question, but I'm sitting here, I'm listening to what HiJinks said and the simplest way I can put it, man, hip-hop to me is just like a complete reflection of the black experience. It's like a personification of the black experience and the reason I say that is Hip Hop at its core, basically is comprised of fragments of things that we just took from this and we made a beat. We took samples from here, here, here, we took drums from here, we took this style, we took this style, but we made something new and it took ugly stuff and turned it into something great, same way our forefathers took things and did the best they could with it. And not only that, it's a reflection because Hip Hop is like the most powerful musical genre on Earth. It's used to sell everything.

Validated: Absolutely.

Vice Souletric: It's like American culture. It's like apple pie now. Nobody really wants to say it, they still wanna act like it's some low-level ghetto type of thing, but no, if you just look at it, every single major corporation in the world uses hip-hop in some way, shape or form to sell their products for millions and billions of dollars. And it's the same way that Black people were used to make America money before. So it's just crazy, man. Hip Hop is super deep and just like HiJinks said about the reverence. It's not given enough reverence. It's still just being used just to make money. It's crazy, man. I jumped on an Instagram post and I made a comment on a post that somebody had made, and it was that meme with Trevor Noah when he got with Busta Rhymes, saw Busta Rhymes after the awards show when he was just rapping, and I just made a simple comment on there. I said, no other genre can do this but Hip Hop. Hip Hop is the only genre that can create this type of feeling. And people are still hitting like on that comment. That has over a thousand likes on that comment because people just understand they feel me. Hip Hop has a specific feel and a specific vibe that no other genre of music has. To be honest with you, I think the closest thing to Hip Hop is Gospel. Like, for real, little-known fact, Gospel music is my favorite music next to Hip Hop just because of how real the emotion touches you from the music to what people are talking about. Like when I'm listening to Nas, when I'm listening to Jay, like it's another level. It's an experience.

Lee Harvey: I mean, they put it best. The only thing I could say in one word is Dumbo, because Hip Hop, like he said, is an element of everything, and yet, they took this, put it together and made it something beautiful, made it a movement, made it the voice of the youth, the voice of the culture, the voice of the world now. You can go to Germany, you can go to Japan, you can go anywhere in the world and hear Nas. You can't even speak the language, but you can know what they are playing. Man, they're playing “One Mic” over there, dang, I ain't heard that in years. That feeling right there alone stands out. Wow, I can go anywhere in the world, bring my music, and that right there will bond these people to me.

Validated: Where can they find you all on Social Media?

HiJinks: You can find me @mos.hi.jinks pretty much on all platforms. And as always, @UnitedGrind, you can get at us on all social media platforms there.

Vice Souletric: Yep, yep, yep. I just started a new music page, but no matter what, just look up @vicesouletric and just follow me on one of my pages. You'll get to the right spot eventually.

Lee Harvey: You can find me on Instagram, @LoviDoecious_Lee_Harvey.