With his recent signing to Epic Records earlier this year, Namebrand is set to release his first official project since the milestone next week. Speaking with HipHopDX ahead of Monday’s release, Namebrand explains how support from Sha Money XL led to performing live in L.A. Reid’s office and an offer from the label less than an hour later.
“It’s a very rare situation at Epic because I got signed off talent,” he says in a clip that premiered in today’s DX Daily. “I didn’t have no fucking big Twitter following and a million views on YouTube. I went in there and performed. They flew me out to New York. I went into the office and performed for L.A. Reid live, like two three songs. ‘Suicide City,’ like giving him bars. And then, next thing I know, a half an hour later I had a deal on the table. That shit don’t happen nowadays. Now they want the whole thing. I know that he was in there before, reiterating to them like, ‘Fuck all that. He’s the next dude. I believe.’ That’s what made me want to make the decision, and I know he gon’ work the machine to do it. You know what I’m saying? It clears up a lot of the legwork doing it independent, ‘cause it’s a lot of legwork you gonna have to do independent. That takes away from your craft a lot of the time. As artists we don’t wanna deal with the business a lot of the times, we wanna just fucking get in there and pen and bar out. I think that’s what it was for me, the fact of the big homie believing in me and really putting me up on the forefront like, ‘You the next dude up.’ That’s what made me wanna make the decision.”
Namebrand’s The Great II mixtape is scheduled for release on Monday, November 24. His latest single “I Don’t Wanna Know” features BJ The Chicago Kid and is available to stream on HipHopDX here.
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