Russ: The New Jersey native dishes on 'SANTIAGO' album, industry validation and therapy goals
New Jersey stand up? You better believe it. The rap independent artist everyone loves to keep tabs on - Russ - has plenty to talk about these days especially with new music, a fresh approach to taking on life and all things in-between. So what better platform than Apple Music 1’s Zane Lowe to let loose?
Russ dishes on everything from therapy and new music with Apple Music 1’s Zane Lowe
It’s all types of tap-in energy from Russ. Clocking in at nearly 60 minutes, there’s plenty of knowledgeable gems from start to finish. Kick back and check out some of those key moments along with those pulled quotes all courtesy of the amazing Team Apple Music 1.
Russ Tells Apple Music About New Album ’SANTIAGO’…
It feels like this is my debut album. In a sense, it is. This version of myself has never been heard. You know? I think it's woken me up to what's been going on internally and at least I now am aware of what's been going on, and I have tools and resources and help to try to figure out and how to manage what's going on. It gave me a lighthouse. And at this point, even though it is art and there is a distance from myself a little bit, but I think my goal is to merge what's going on internally with the music seamlessly, so that they just go hand in hand. It's like the creative side of me was always the part of me that would come downstairs and make sense of everything that was going on in my personal life.
Russ on The Lyricism on the Album and Imposter Syndrome…
I'm going to purposely try to push my pen to just the nuttiest limit, but not fluff. When you really read the lyrics for that, it's so potent, and there's a lot of depth there, but… …in this genre, it's so competitive, and yeah. So it's easy to fall into that battle, me versus this person, and… When I was in those rooms, I probably did feel a little imposter syndrome
Russ on the Importance of Authenticity and Humility…
I think for me, I'm trying to share internally what's going on in the most authentic way possible because I think that will help resonate with people and give them the light at the end of the tunnel. I think in the past I tried to make it seem like I had it all figured out. And that was sort of the coping mechanism was what we as men do, which is bury, bury, bury, it's all good. My therapist, mentor, just incredible person told me something really interesting where he is like, "Society dictates the value of a man based off of how much you can carry, how far you can carry it, and how alone you can carry it." And it's so true, and that's what I was doing for the longest time. And I think now I'm at this place in my life where I have the humility to understand that I don't have it figured out. I'm trying to figure it out and I'm trying my best. And I'm going to let y'all know what I'm doing to figure this out, and maybe it'll help.
Russ Tells Apple Music About Including His Therapy Sessions on the Album…
I did therapy in my studio on Zoom right next to the mic. I would do therapy, and then turn to the mic. That's literally the album is therapy, like straight up. Honestly. I told my therapist, "This is all you." And so I would just use the creative side of me, which I've always done, to make sense of everything else. And I would do therapy exercises on the mic, and that's what the album is.
Russ on Embracing Vulnerability in His Music Early On and Chasing Perfection…
I think for me, early on, I had entitlement, to be honest. I think I got to a place now where I realize it's not hip hop's job to reaffirm what I already believe. But the issue early on was I was mad that hip hop was not telling me what I should have already believed about myself. And that caused a lot of, "(beep) y'all, look what I'm doing. Why are y'all digging this guy?" And that's trickled throughout the album as well, this need for external validation and all these... You're chasing yourself the whole time. I was chasing myself. But really, you know what it comes from? It comes from when I was younger wanting approval from my dad. And that manifests into a vicious inner critic because his standard was perfection. So I adopted his metric as my own. So now my metric for success is perfection. So now nothing I do is good enough. And so I ended up replacing my dad with the industry.
Russ on His Close Connection With His Fans…
I think I talk with my fans on such a personal level. I have a Discord server where I'm going in there and talking with them one-on-one, talking to the whole group, chatting in the lounge with them, whatever. And I think I do it to humanize myself and to connect on a deeper level, because I just want to be understood. I have this deep desperation to connect and to feel understood.
Russ on Masking His Insecurities with Alcohol…
I have a healthy relationship with it where I was drinking a lot, and it was just because when I first started making music, that's what it was. The studio was a party. You're smoking weed, you're drinking. And so I would drink when I was in the studio. It just felt normal. It felt regular. But then I was drinking before interviews, and that's how a lot of those interviews went left was I was pretty hammered in some of them. Because it's all that's coming out, but I never had a problem without. I wasn't waking up and like, " I need a drink," you know? I would just drink in certain situations, but that in and of itself was an issue. And it was easier to just do that than actually be authentic and be like, "You know what? I am nervous. I am feeling insecure. I am all these things." And now it's, yeah. I'm not rigid to the point where it's like, "I will not drink." It's I'll have a drink whenever I want to have a drink. It's just now I don't want to have a drink when I wanted to have a drink back then. You know what I mean?
Russ Tells Apple Music About “Fraud” and Defining His Identity By Helping Others…
I think by nature, I kind of talk about it on “Fraud” where for a long time, starting in my childhood, I got my identity from helping and making sure everyone else was good. And then when you inevitably can't save everyone, it's a threat to who you are. And I crumbled when that happened. I always felt so emotionally responsible for everyone. And I felt like it was on me to make sure my mom was good and my brother and my sister.
Russ Tells Apple Music About “I Love You Boy”…
Transparently, just like my house was, I talk about it on “I Love You Boy”, where my mom was, her nervous system wasn't really regulated and neither was my dad's. And so it was a lot of arguments and just high stress, high tension environment. And my mom sometimes would be very fatalistic and my dad was very reactive. And my brother and sister were sort of the still waters run deep sort of people. And so I was just running around knocking on everyone's door and making sure everyone was good after a big fight. It was are they going to survive this? It felt life or death. It truly felt life or death. I was worried about self-harm. And so it's such a heavy burden to deal with as a kid when you feel like those are the stakes, that it's life or death.If I don't knock on my mom's door and make sure she's good and make sure my brother's good or whatever, it's like who knows? I felt like I was talking people off the ledge. So it's a heavy thing to deal with. But like I said, it ends up becoming a part of my identity. And so when my parents separated when I was 24, 25, it's like I struggled with this idea of, hold on, why am I tripping that my parents separated? I'm grown, who gives a (beep)? But that's when I had to do the real growing down in searching for like, okay, what does this actually mean? What am I bothered about by this?
Russ on Accepting His Parents…
So I think I got to this place where for the longest time I was resisting who they were. I was trying to change them and why are you not perfect? See what I'm saying? And I realized that that's not real love. Accepting them for who they are is real love. Not, I'm not going to love you unless you are this. That's not real. So yeah, I don't ever want them to feel like, oh, I'm pointing the finger. I would imagine it's tough for parents to hear how they indirectly and they didn't want to, but there's effects that happened. And yeah, it's weird. Even when I perform certain songs now, I have a song called September 16th that is the anniversary date of my parents' wedding, and I perform it at the shows. And my mom comes to every show. But she leaves, she goes to the back when I perform that song because it's tough for her to hear. And that's okay if they're not ready to hear this truth of mine.
Russ on the Most Challenging Part of Making The Album…
It's tough though, because as you know, everyone's on a different place in their journey and on their race of personal development and truth. And if you're not ready to hear certain things about yourself or face certain things. And I think that was the toughest part about making this album, is how confronting it was to have to come to terms with who I am and what was really going on… And it's confronting. And not everyone is ready to confront themselves.
Russ Tells Apple Music He Almost Scrapped The Album…
…there was no depth. And so going through life, and experiences, and getting into therapy, I remember after the first or second session, I'm like, I have to scrap the album. It's (censored), it's vapid. And then I sat with it. I was like, oh, nah, there's a lot here. I just have to scrap the verses, and now I know what I want to talk about. And so, then I went in and I did all the verses.
Russ Tells Apple Music “I Love You Boy” Was The Hardest Song on the Album To Complete…
I Love You Boy was probably the hardest one. Because it was the most confronting. It was me saying stuff that I just... there's a lot of shame in my life. Shame's played a very big part in my life. I think it plays a big part in a lot of men's life, but it plays a big part especially when you're a perfectionist. One of the results of that is a lot of shame. And so, having to accept that I am flawed, and that I maybe didn't do everything the right way, and I didn't know as much as I thought I did, is tough. And that's my arrogance. The arrogance is the omnipotence to think that what I know now, I should have known then.
Russ on “Oasis” and The Role Money Pays in His Life…
Money was confusing. Because it was a distraction from what I was really going after. But it was confusing, which is kind of what Oasis is talking about. It's a fool's paradise. It's like, I'm getting money and plaques and whatever, so my life must be good. I must be great. I must be awesome. There's nothing wrong. What are you talking about? And so, it was confusing. I couldn't tell if I was feeling (censored) up, if I was allowed to feel (censored) up. Yeah, it was confusing. And it allowed me to mask everything that was going on internally. And that's what Oasis is like, yeah, things are (censored) up, but at least they're platinum. You know what I mean? It's just like symbols of success. It's not actual success, it's just like the symbols of it. The car, the this. I think I was chasing plaques and all that. Because I thought, well, the next plaque, that's when I'll feel good about myself. Oh no, double platinum didn't do it. Maybe three times platinum. At that point, I'll feel good about myself.
Russ on Smoking with Snoop Dogg…
I’ve smoked with Snoop before, and I'm ... not doing that again. It's a death wish.
Russ Tells Apple Music Why He’s Optimistic About The Future…
I'm optimistic for the future, and I feel hopeful about the future for the first time in a while because I feel like I'm actually going somewhere and I'm going somewhere that doesn't have anything to do with achievements, plaques... It's like, "No, I'm going towards this personal self-mastery, self-love, self truth, self-acceptance." I'm going towards that and I'm going to share my process along the way in the best way I know, which is through my art, in hopes that it resonates and helps other people. But my journey now has become more about self-development than it is about getting the plaque and doing this and doing that. I want those things, but it's for a different reason now.
