By shelz.

Reks’ formula is pretty simple: speak the truth, respect your elders and educate yourself on the entirety of the Hip-Hop culture.  Nonetheless, his practice of that formula is anything but easy.  As a lyricist, Reks combines thoughtful themes with sometimes convoluted schemes that have made him a darling in the underground scene.

Jokes about going platinum aside, Corey Christie appears to be pretty comfortable with where he is and what he has accomplished. So sit back and enjoy as Planet Ill talks Massachusetts’ come up,  The Source screw up and what’s going to be running through his head when its time to wrap it up with Rhythmatic Eternal King Supreme. With a name like that, you would think he’d be pretty interesting.  He is.

Planet Ill: I’ve heard you say that Show Off is more than a label, it’s a movement. I want you to explain what the movement is about.

Reks: Well basically the show off team and its representatives all came into this Hip Hop thing from different areas. Mainly Statik Selektah, Termanology and myself, Reks, coming from Lawrence Massachusetts, a small community, with big dreams and big ideas on how to like fulfill those dreams.  We came into the game knowing we were a tiny machine playing against big machines, but we felt like our music speaks for itself.  The music that we have is creating a cult following and its allowing us to get over seas and travel all across the world.  From our small neighborhood, this is big to us.  A lot of cats may come from small neighborhoods and feel like there is no opportunity to advance past their neighborhood, but we thought bigger.  We viewed it as we have to take it.  We have to look beyond the local bodega.  We have to look beyond the local radio station. We got to think worldwide and that is what we are doing.  And I feel  a lot of the fans out there that are  true followers of the Show Off movement, they are becoming a part of this and they understanding that we can fight the bigger machines and we can etch-a-sketch our names in the game.

Planet Ill: Tell me about how you think folks are treating the Massachusetts contribution to Hip-Hop and what you see as the Massachusetts legacy.

Reks: It’s still building.  It’s still developing.  But I feel like across the board you have to pay homage to cats like Ed OG and Crumb Snatcher and you know, Scientific.  Rest in peace. Brothers who kinda paved the path for cats like the Show Off team and cats like Akrobatic and 7 & Esoteric. They laid the path for us to take it beyond just our neighborhoods. And because of them, we are able to compete in this game and be a part of it.  If they didn’t come first we wouldn’t even be able to follow. So I just feel like the legacy is still being created as we speak.  10 years from now, to answer the question, I feel like we will really have our stamp on Boston music as well as world wide.

Planet Ill: There are some critics in the music industry that say that your music is stuck in a time warp.  Does it bother you that they relate you to a previous or a past sound?

Reks: It doesn’t bother me. I don’t completely agree. I definitely pay homage to the golden era Hip-Hop, what I use as my platform to speak what I speak.  But I don’t feel my lyrics represent that era completely. They pay homage to it. They also embody the need for this culture, which is still in its infancy, to like pay respect to the artists that came before.  If that’s the only thing they can say about me, I’m fine with that.  In any other genre, you see people paying homage to the ones who laid the path for them.  You have respect for the rock artist who paved the way first, the country artist, the blues artist.  Because we are so young in what we do, not one is giving it up.  Especially to someone like Kool Herc, who is hurting right now, should be getting that kind of respect and receiving from the Hip-Hop community.  More to that point, the truth of the matter is this is a community.  It’s a culture.  It’s bigger than a lot of genres in that it embodies so much more than just the actual music.  It’s the fashion.  It’s the B-Boys and the video artists that we need to always remember.  Hip-Hop culture embodies all of those elements.

Planet Ill: Why do you think that Hip-Hop has such a fear of aging?

Reks: I don’t fear it. I just pay attention to it.  I actually feel like fine wine, I feel like I’m getting better as I get older and Hip-Hop has allowed me another chance.  I walked away from it for a long period of time.  From my album Reckless, which was an out of the trunk album to Grey Hairs album which I dropped in2008, there was a 7 year span.  I was just trying to get involved with being a family man and learning how to balance the music with the family life.

Planet Ill: How do you do that?  How do you reconcile being hardcore Hip Hop guy with being daddy?  How does that work for you?

Reks: Well I just feel like the music that I make, it speaks truth to the struggle that we go through on a day to day basis. I feel like I make music that I don’t want me 7 year old or my nine month old listening to at the moment.  Ten years from now when they can better understand and comprehend where daddy was coming from then they can go back and make their own choice to listen to the words that I had to say to see if I was speaking  something that was relevant at the time and relevant to them in their time.  But my whole objective in my music is to show kids there’s different paths other than just the guns and the drugs and like call this chick a bitch.  You know what I’m saying? All the negativity that’s involved and the picture that’s painted by the media; there is more to it. I definitely attack the system and the artists that represent that.  It’s definitely part of my repertoire.

Planet Ill: It doesn’t sound like you would necessarily run out of things to say to your audience, but just say you did. You ran out of things to say.  You didn’t feel like it was worth progressing any further.  Would you be content with you have been able to accomplish at this point?

Reks: Absolutely.  I mean I feel like, be it a smaller audience, I feel like I have been able to affect an audience with what I had to say.  If I can make two or three people decide to like read a book rather than pick up a gun. If I can have a kid sit back and reflect on their life and relate to what I went through, then I’m fine with that.  I’m happy with the impact I’ve had on the game.

Planet Ill: You have been a little vocal in your opinion about Southern Hip-Hop, that it’s not exactly your favorite sound. Why do you think that the southern sound or southern scene has been so consistent for so long?

Reks: Let me clarify, because it’s not that I’m not a fan of the southern sound at all. When I state that Southern rap has ruined Hip-Hop, I don’t state that to say I don’t like Southern rap. I state that the mind state, where the game went, when it went to the Southern rap, that’s when it got dummied down.  That’s when they eliminated a lot of the pure nature of the way the culture started, the way the music started. But that’s not to discount the numerous amounts of artists from the south who have a lasting imprint of the game. I mean I’m one of the biggest fans of Outkast, Goodie Mob, Scarface, Trick Daddy. And some would be surprised I’m a fan of Lil Wayne.  It’s not like I have issues with Lil Wayne.  I have issues with us bring force fed what to listen to and being treated like that our only option.  If I could listen to a Lil Wayne record and then follow that up with a Saigon record then I would be much happier because there is more on the pallet for us to digest.  So that’s what it is.

Planet Ill: Outside of Lil Wayne, what else is floating around on your iPod that people would be a little shocked to know that you listen to?

Reks: Shocked? I don’t know about shocked.  Let me see, more of my eclectic taste.  There is a rapper from the south named J. Nicks and a brother named Mnemonic who just put out a tape that I’m listening to right now.  I really like the sound. Floating in my iPod right now is J. Cole’s Friday Night Lights. I’m late on the tapes that I listening to because I’m always in the lab and I’m always crafting. Not to mention, I’m a father, you know what I’m saying.  So I spend a lot of my time of my day with my kids. When I do get a chance to listen, these are some of the cat’s I’m listening to.  Skyzoo, Saigon whose album is a classic.  I think the source got it wrong.  I really believe it’s a classic album.  That’s the type of stuff I’m listening to right now.

Planet Ill: Tell me about your album.  What is REKS doing that the previous two didn’t do? Or anything else in the industry right now isn’t doing?

Reks: The album is REKS, Rhythmatic Eternal King Supreme. That’s what the acronym stands for.  I feel like we just put together a record that embodies, again, the foundation with the legendary type of producers that we are rocking with.  There is a lack of artists who are willing to go back to some of these producers who are still genuinely great and utilize their beat work for their projects.  They are moving on to what’s popular.  Not to discount any of these other producers because there are so may amazing producers out there. I feel like it goes back to cats not respecting where they came from or paying homage to where they came from.  I utilize these producers because I grew up idolizing these producers. If I ever rock on a Hi-Tek beat or a Primo beat I’m going to go crazy. You know what I mean?  So having the opportunity to utilize them to tell my stories is great. I used them on the album that way.

Planet Ill: I know you and Statik Selektah have been working together for over a decade really. Do you think there are more pros as opposed to cons involved with growing with somebody in the industry in that way instead of hopping from producer to producer or situation to situation?

Reks: It’s always better to grow with somebody because you better understand them as a person and you’re better able to connect to what works with them and what doesn’t.  I have created relationships later on in years where sometimes it just don’t click.  The producer may be great.  You may be a great rapper. But the ability to click just doesn’t work at the time.  Growing with Statik and knowing what Statik was looking for in his life and knowing what he was trying to create and knowing the sound he loves helps me to better understand what our working relationship is going to be and what kind of music we can create.  Plus we’re drunken messes and we just record when we’re wasted.  Like Hennessey bottles, gallons like just pouring all night til like 5 in the morning and making a drunk classic.

Planet Ill: Does that do something for your creativity?

Reks: It probably distorts it. I’m sure.  We feel like we’re doing it.  You know. But we’re drunken messes cause we’re drunken messes. We’re trying to enjoy what we do.  Everyone has their vices. Everybody has their things that they use as crutches. My habits are I drink and I smoke probably way too much.  And I’m not talking about weed. I’m talking about cigarettes. I really need to kick the habit.

Planet Ill: Well if you are smoking menthols you might not have a choice.

Reks: Yeah, I guess so.

Planet Ill: They say they are trying to make those illegal.

Reks: That would be great.

Planet Ill: Well that’s all I have for you.  Is there anything you wanted to add that I didn’t ask?

Reks: I’d just like to thank you for taking the time to speak with me. Make you go out there and cop REKS 15 times and then go have your friends do it.  By word of mouth we may go platinum.

Shelz Interviews Reks

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