A Conversation with Gangstagrass’ Rench – HuffPost 7.25.14

Mike Ragogna: Rench, your first album was the big, happy Lightening On The Strings, Thunder On The Mic, then came the undeniable Rappalachia. Since then, you’ve been nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Original Main Theme Music. So what is all this Broken Hearts And Stolen Money stuff?

Rench: All three albums draw heavily on the common ground Hip-Hop and Bluegrass have in subject matter–outlaw life, heartache, and being a badass. The latest album just turned out to have lots of songs with robberies, so I figured lets shout that out front in the album title. Maybe because robbing banks is how we financed the last few tours.

MR: “Long Hard Times To Come” was your breakthrough, but It looks like another Gangstagrass song, “Give It Up,” is up at bat. Will this bring on even more heartache and thievery?

R: Actually we have a newer track out now, “All For One” and we just released a video for it that is really starting to pick up steam. This track stands out as one of the rare happy and positive tracks. We show how Gangstagrass can be a symbol for how America could still come together and party. People think we are so divided that there is no common ground, but we are here to prove them wrong. It may be presumptuous to make ourselves the symbol of how America can be united, but if there is anything that stands for how we can bridge the gap between us, it’s a rapper and a banjo player getting down together. So we have declared that this video is good for America.

MR: Okay, perhaps you’re Justified to do such things, but before we go any further, can you go into what gave you the idea to combine two traditionally contrasting genres? What are Gangstagrass’ humble roots?

R: My dad is from the panhandle of Oklahoma, so I grew up with honky-tonk music at home. And when I was in grade school, hip-hop blew up and my friends and I went crazy over it. I always liked things that pushed boundaries and experimented, and because of my honky-tonk roots, when I started producing hip-hop I always had an urge to put something twangy over the beat. I had to just go for it, bring my two main influences into one project.

MR: Has Brooklyn caught on to Gangstagrass and as we speak mimicking what you’re doing for fame and fortune?

R: As far as I know, we are the only ones doing high quality bluegrass hip-hop. I would welcome anyone to join in and make it a movement, and we do have a great fanbase in Brooklyn, which is the perfect place for this–lots of great Bluegrass pickers and sick emcees. Who knows, maybe out there in a basement somewhere right now there is a jam going on to get the next great bluegrass-hip-hop band started. But for now we stand alone.

MR: What and who were your early musical and personal influences and do you feel you’ve honored them with your creative adventures or have you shamed them to tears or both? Don’t leave out anything about your RUN-DMC breakdancing.

R: Yeah, in third grade, it was all about breakdancing for me – every recess we would throw down our cardboard to do our backspins to the Beat Street soundtrack. I had a casette tape I dubbed off of a friend with Run-DMC “Raising Hell” on one side and Beasty Boys “License To Ill” on the other, and I wore that tape out. But when I got home it was Willie Nelson and George Jones on the stereo. There was also Gram Parsons, which I learned more about later, and he was a definite inspiration in terms of crossing genres in a way that was ahead of his time, bringing psychedelic rock and country music together before people were ready for that. I think if he were around today he would probably be incorporating hip-hop into his sound.

MR: Have you been slapped or approached with any other form of aggression by Bluegrass purists who feel you’ve made a mockery of their art form?

R: For the most party the response from Bluegrass fans has been overwhelmingly positive. We just got back from a really successful appearance at the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival, which was an amazing thing to be accepted into. But there is that fun little slice of purists for whom what we are doing is a crime against nature. They are certainly entertaining. Especially the claim we hear now and then that hip-hop is too violent. Apparently they aren’t away of the incredibly violent tradition of “murder ballads” that are part of bluegrass history. One day on tour I put a version of “knoxville girl” on in the van and the rappers jaws dropped.

MR: Where do you see this Gangstagrass-y stuff heading?

R: We will definitely be seeing world domination sometime next week. I look forward to our own brand of sneakers, drinks, and cologne. We are currently working on flying sharks with laser eye beams. We will probably use those for transportation on tour next year. Right now the jetpacks keep falling off the sharks. But expect to see an expansion – there will be more Gangstagrass, a solo Rench release and some other secret side projects to be revealed in 2015.

MR: What’s your advice for new artists?

R: Just do what you love and share it with the world and believe in yourself, and brush your teeth and don’t do drugs.

MR: Would you take your own advice?

R: Absolutely not.