Spending around ten minutes on the phone with the man once known as Hollywood Holt, HXLT isn’t some punk gimmick or forced switcharoo. It’s something that was in the Chicago native all along. For a man who was once steeped deeply in Hip Hop culture from b-boying to party throwing, his G.O.O.D. Music debut titled under his new alias HXLT is more than a coincidence. This is music from someone who jammed Tupac and Onyx around friends in the street while listening to Daft Punk at home. Like most contemporary artists of the internet age, being genre agnostic is almost seen as a creative badge of honor. Right now, HXLT enjoys a rock aesthetic that still enjoys very light Hip Hop undertones. Having a feature with legendary punk artist Kathleen Hanna couldn’t serve as a better example.
Taking time out to speak with HipHopDX, HXLT explains his approach to music, making the cover to his debut and eventually getting back to rapping.
“If you don’t like [the album], you don’t like me”
“It feels really good to have my album finally out. It’s taken me forever to get to this point. It’s almost surreal as I felt like I’m still waiting and now it’s out. All the responses have been really good so I’m stoked about it.”
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“It’s about cohesive and realness. Everything about my album is real. I don’t have writers to pen my lyrics and I don’t have producers on the album outside of my cousin. Everything you hear from the beats, sounds and video to image is me. If you don’t like it, you don’t like me. It’s just real. If you see or hear something from me, you know it’s from me and not somebody else posed as me.”
Disagrees With Punk & Rap Labels
“You know what’s funny? I don’t think my album is rap or punk. People keep saying that my album is rap and punk and I actually disagree. I think it’s melodic music. I’m just a punk person who uses to rap. I don’t even rap on the album at all. I think that’s just spillover from my old career as a rapper. I don’t rap. I’m not a rapper, at least on this project. If I do decide to get back into rapping doing Hollywood Holt stuff. Right now, I’m not.”
“I’m a very punk person. You come to my shows, it’s punk and the way I look is punk. The actual music that I make isn’t necessarily punk. There are aspects of punk there, it’s more melodic and chill honestly. I think most people are tired of being stuck in genres anyway. People have these incredible ideas and feel like they can’t. If a rapper has an R&B song idea, he shouldn’t feel incapable of making that. I feel like most people are just letting their ideas out without care of being put in a specific box. Drake does all of that and imagine if was only a limited to being an R&B singer, he wouldn’t have made “0 to 100” or all of those bangers. I don’t if Future raps or sings. It’s just dope, though. That’s what it should be, this guy makes dope sounds and it sounds dope.”
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HXLT Helped Create His Own Cover Art
“Well, I wanted to make an image where people could stare at it forever and be timeless. I wanted twenty years from now, people looking at the album cover and be like that’s incredible. I randomly saw an image from some ad where this guy was flying out the window. It reminded me as a kid, I wanted to break through a window and fight crime. I said for the album cover, I’d jump out of a three-story window and catch that image. We found a guy who worked for Chicago Fire and rented his landing pad. I cooked sugar class and learned how to make it on YouTube.
My boy just held the glass in front of the window and I jumped out of that muthafucka like eight times. We had to get the right shot.”
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Adding Kathleen Hanna’s Punk Logic
“To speak about Kathleen Hanna’s music only is like talking about Gucci and focusing just on the logo. She’s so much more than that. Her influence as a creative spawned a generation. The fact that she speaks in stands for women’s rights or influenced half of the bands coming up in the 90s. There are so many things that she’s done on top of her incredible music. She’s very vast. You listen to Bikini Kill, Le Tegre or Julie Ruin, they are like three different artists. All three are dope. I’m just a fan of her in general.”
“We didn’t really work together because I asked her to hop on the record and two days later, you sent her parts. She made the song like mad quick. We didn’t sit in the studio or anything, but I wish for that soon hopefully.”
Having G.O.O.D Music’s 1st Release Under King Push Administration
My album was already done, turned in and everything by the time Pusha became president. I actually just started talking to Pusha and got his info. He’s very active and involved now. At the time, I was supposed to be talking with Kanye, but I didn’t talk to anyone. It sounds kind of bad, but it was kind of good because I didn’t have any creative blocking or stopping. No one told me to do this or that. I got to make the music exactly how I wanted. I just got to make my sound, the way I wanted to make it.
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To Rap Or Not To Rap, We Have No Answer
“I literally just put my album out a week ago. With me, I don’t have specific set things. As of now, I don’t feel like rapping. I feel more fulfilled and content making my real music. I also like rapping, so it’s not like I’ll ever rap again. What I’m doing now is really me. Later on, maybe. If I get inspired to rap, who knows?
