As one of Chicago’s veteran emcees, Twista was recently asked to share his thoughts on the violence plaguing his city during an interview with Vlad TV. According to the rapper, he feels that the introduction of social media paired with heightened egos has contributed to violence in his city.
In addition to social media, Twista says lack of money and the children in his city left with nothing to do have also played a role in the rise of violence in the Windy City.
“It’s hard, man. We got the highest taxes. Ain’t nobody got no money,” Twista said. “These kids ain’t got nothing to do. And they going at each other. And then, one thing I see that’s different—like they was killing each other back then, but we didn’t have social media back then. Like I think social media contributes to it too. Not that it’s a bad thing. Anything you get you’re gonna have goods and bads with it. So, I think one of the bads that comes out of it is these shorties try so hard to impress each other. They got egos, man. They just going at each other real hard right now.”
While the city of Chicago may have held “the badge” last year due to the number of violent acts committed in the city, Twista says the violence notorious in Chicago is present in a number of other cities as well.
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“I mean, it be crazy who gets the badge each year,” he said. “Chicago got the badge right now, but you can best bet that it’s some neighborhood out here, out there, or somewhere else—it’s pretty much about the same kind of shit going on. You know what I’m saying? So, it’s just we got the badge for it right now. But it’s definitely going down at the crib. But you better believe it’s going down in every urban neighborhood right now. You know? So, it’s something that we need to do. Some people think we can do it on a simple level by just giving the kids something to do and building centers, but I think it’s a systematic thing going on. And we gotta look deeper into it.”
Later in the interview Twista was asked about fellow Chicago rappers Chief Keef and Young Chop, two artists he suggested are products of the environment they grew up in. Speaking specifically on Keef, Twista revealed that he wasn’t familiar with the rapper prior to his rise to the spotlight, but did say that during his encounters with the young emcee he was usually making music.
“Really, I just think that they had hot music at the time,” Twista said. “At the time they did they thing they was hot, but they [got] like—them like so many other artists in Chicago are just the face of what’s going on in the city. You know? Just like man, you know, it’s violence. This all they grown up seeing. So, that’s all they [can] rap about or being doing their music about. So, that’s how they came up. But it’s funny cause when you see all of that stuff from the outside it looks one way and then when you sitting there chilling around people you be like ‘Damn, they just kids having fun, doing they thing.’ Like if you asked me what’s something that I know about Chief Keef…The thing I see is he just be chilling in the crib making music…He just come out that mothafucka and trouble follow him.”
Once rumored to have signed with the Kanye West-led G.O.O.D. Music, Twista has not released a studio album in over three years. Despite the lack of a studio album from Twista, the Chicago emcee did recently release his Back To The Basics mixtape. Released on December 10, the mixtape was released via GMG Entertainment and includes seven tracks from Twista.
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