With the release of his new EP, Perfectly,Tragically, Flawed, OnCue has pushed to new heights hitting the #12 spot on iTunes. The 6-track EP was executively produced by veteran producer, Just Blaze alongside Maki & OnCue. Coming freshly off his performances at SXSW and the release of his hot single “Rent Money,” OnCue is really taking no breaks. But all his other projects don’t take the shine away from his EP:

“When I set out to make this project, I just let go of everything. The past, the present and the what might-be’s of the future. I’ve messed up, I’ve fallen down and I’ve gotten back up countless times now. Over the course of time making PTF, I learned I’m just myself, for better or for worse. This is what these six songs are all about – self-acceptance.  I think you can hear the confidence in my voice. I know who I am now.”

The BK artist is known for his effortless genre blending style mixed with his honest lyrics and that is all included on Perfectly, Tragically, Flawed. He applies a hands-on approach by directing his vision as a musician, down to every font and drop shadow.

Check out Perfectly, Tragically, Flawed below.

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The post OnCue’s New EP ‘Perfectly, Tragically, Flawed’ is Topping the iTunes Charts appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

Cuffin’ season is quickly approaching and as most of us are trying to scramble to survive it, OnCue is way ahead of the game. The rapper/singer/songwriter recently released the track, “3AM” and is now back with the visual for the single. “3AM” is the perfect song for those trying to win that special someone over. OnCue holds nothing back as he sings, “It’s 3AM and I don’t want nobody but you/Don’t want your friend/It’s true, I think you need to come through/Come through.” Well, damn. If that doesn’t say “I want you” then we don’t know what would!

“3AM” will be featured on OnCue’s upcoming project, You Knew All Along, which is set to release digitally on November 11th, everywhere! Check out what he had to say about the project:

“I started off making these songs during the mixing process of ‘Perfectly, Tragically Flawed’ and I fell in love with them.  They deserved a home on an official body of work.  I felt “Sip” and “On and Off” would round out the project perfectly to segway into PTF.”

Check out the visual for “3AM” — directed by Hunter Lyon & featuring the very lovely, Karina — below. The visual is smooth, simple and focuses on the most important thing: OnCue’s dope singing. Oh and of course, Karina’s gorgeous features. Tell us what you think of the visual and if you girl start acting up, play them “3AM.” It will surely win her over!

You can preorder You Knew All Along on iTunes now and check out the tracklist for it below. Make sure to keep up with OnCue on Twitter, SoundCloud and Instagram.

“YOU KNEW ALL ALONG”
AVAILABLE DIGITALLY EVERYWHERE
NOVEMBER 11 2016 pic.twitter.com/qWAoxKXf9Q

— OnCue (@OnCue) October 17, 2016

The post RESPECT. Premiere: OnCue is Calling You at “3AM” …. Will You Answer appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

If you have not yet read part one of my interview with OnCue then I would suggest that you do that prior to reading part 2. You can check that out here.

In this interview we discuss everything from Angry Young Man to OnCue’s perfect moment. Enjoy!

RESPECT.: Another song that I feel like would have been very draining for you to write is “Broken Language.” I know you said that song was inspired by the movie ‘High Fidelity’. I actually just watched that recently, randomly! But what was the process of writing that? It’s a really cool song with the voicemail thing. And did you play the song ever for the girl? Did she tell you to take out certain parts?

Cuey: Yeah! I think you’re talking about that interview that I did for BestFromTheWeb, because I think they are the only other people to ask me about “Broken Language,” and I remember saying High Fidelity. But yeah, and I kind of touched on it in that interview, but essentially I was speaking about something that she didn’t want public. Not like for my fans, but like you know, her cousins. We grew up in the same town. It’s not like a small, small town, but it’s not a big town either, so her little cousins listen to my music, her aunt’s were very familiar with my music. We were very serious for a long time, you know? So she didn’t want that stuff public for her family to find out and she was like, “Look, can you take it out? I’m not going to force you to. I get it, it’s a song. But if you can find a way to take it out can you?” And I kind of just realized, it’s a long distance relationship and with the voicemail thing in particular, we spent a lot of time on the phone, so I was like, “What if this whole time it was like a phone call of some sort?” And that’s when the voicemail thing came into play. And that’s how we essentially creatively removed the line. I’m sure you know about it, it’s somewhere early on in the third verse, and I called her back and I was like, “hey! Look. I found a cool way to omit the line.” Cause I told her, I was like, “I’m not re-writing this sh*t!” * laughs * “ I’m not just going to edit it out!”

But going back to your original question, I know it was kind of a two parted question. But it honestly wasn’t really draining because all that sh*t is true. If I had to fabricate sh*t I feel like it would have been, you know, draining. It was more kind of weird. The song did start off like, I was going to do three different women or girls in my life, and then I was like, “You know… I don’t have time for that sh*t. I really don’t. You can’t fit years of heartbreak and pain into sixteen bars and then move on.”

RESPECT.: Yeah, and you don’t want to have a 200 bar song * laughs *

Cuey: I mean sh*t… “Broken Language” is long as is.

RESPECT.: That Miguel sample is pretty crazy too on it!

Cuey: Yeah, yeah! That was kind of a team effort between me and Brenton. Well not really, that was really Brenton, but I told him when Kalaidascope Dream came out, a couple months after, I found “P*ssy Is Mine” randomly on the YouTube worm holes, and I was like, “Oh sh*t! This song is fire!!” And I went and got the album. And I remember we were actually shooting a video to Just’s version of “Running” the same morning that I found the Miguel album. And uh, that video is never coming out…

RESPECT.: Yeah I was going to ask you why you never made a video for “Running”!

Cuey: Yeah, it just didn’t come out the way I wanted it to. And Just wanted to put it out, my manager at the time wanted to put it out, but I didn’t want to put it out. So it’s never coming out. Yeah anyway, I put Brenton on the Miguel album and him finding the live version of “P*ssy is Mine” was gold.

There are a lot of versions of that record. Actually, at that interview at BestOfTheWeb I played them one of the early demos of “Broken Language” cause I recorded the whole album there (in the studio the interview was done at). Totally different beat and totally different chorus. It was crazy. I actually totally forgot what it sounded like, because I was working on the album for so long. And I was showing it to them and they were like, “Oh sh*t!” So yeah, there is a lot of versions of that song that were just floating around.

RESPECT.: Well you probably have like a hundred songs that you made for the album right? Do you just have a sh*t load of songs sitting around?

Cuey: Actually no! There’s probably about 45 rough ideas, but I’m not the most, and I guess it sort of comes back to me not rushing things, but I don’t really come up with a lot of ideas, it’s more like I’ll rework the same idea. Like for example, the “Stories to Tell” concept, which veered away from what it originally was, but it’s still kind of there, It’s playing on a feeling of being more or less a crack baby, and that used to be called “Hell Baby.” And there’s like four or five beats for that record. And so, I don’t know, it’s just my process I guess.  I kind of look at that as, it still ended up being “Stories to Tell,” even though there ended up being different versions, you know, with different choruses. CJ made a beat for that idea, Brenton made two. And I ended up running with the one that’s on the album produced by Manikan Party. So yeah, I don’t know. It’s more like I think of song concepts and then I kind of go from there.

RESPECT.: I think it’s better. I think people waste their creativity on spreading it out onto 80 different songs, but I think it’s better when you conceal it to one thing and kind of master that. And I think it really came out perfect on that album. Like, I was listening back. The classic test I do is if I can listen to it two years after the project and still feel what I was feeling when I first heard the project or whatever. And I listened to the album again the other day and I still felt it.

Cuey: Thank you, thank you!

RESPECT.: You mention your mom on a lot of songs, does she ever listen to your songs? Because you mention your d*ck quite a bit on songs * laughs * how does she feel about those lines?

Cuey: * laughs * My mom is kind of like, she doesn’t understand rap music that much. Not like she doesn’t understand English but she’s an older mom. She is like 63 so it’s not like, even though I’m older than you cause I remember about you saying about when you found Can’t Wait, but my mom is kind of even old for people my age. So when she hears my music, she doesn’t really understand like the verses, but then the chorus comes. She definitely understood “Alive” off of Can’t Wait because that was slower, and it was piano, and it was very open and so I guess when she heard “Alive” I know she cried. But I guess for the most part, yeah I mean she listens but it’s not like… she’ll be like, “Oh let me listen!” But she doesn’t even really know how to use a computer, so either a friend shows it to her or I show it to her willingly. I remember playing her a rough demo of “Role Play” * laughs * because I figured she wouldn’t really get what it was about and yeah it was sing–songy. And I remember she was like, “Well, what do you mean putting costumes on?” Even though that’s a double entendre, I remember playing that for her in the kitchen, so that was funny.

RESPECT.: Yeah it is! That’s hilarious. I know what you’re saying though, it’s a different generation. Speaking of older songs, my favorite song honestly is “DSFM.” Did you come up with that acronym randomly, or you had the song written? Cause I think that’s dope and also what I like about it is the beat. Cause the beat kind of sounds like Ratatat or something like that. Where’d you get the beat from?

Cuey: It is Ratatat!!!

RESPECT.: Really? Wow!!!

Cuey: Yeah! One thousand percent Ratatat.

RESPECT.: That’s crazy! Cause I was like, “This sounds like something I’ve heard!” Like I remember older Cudi was influenced a lot by Ratatat. How did that song come to be? Because that’s one of my favorites.

Cuey: You’re going to actually laugh. So Brenton has come up a lot in this interview. We just finished “No Way” (which) was the final piece to Angry Young Man right, and we just finished. Or me and Maki were finishing it out, because Brenton gave me a rough skeleton of what ended up being “No Way,” and Maki kind of turned it into this monster. We just finished it, and I was feeling very inspired, and I just did “Closer,” and Brenton was like, “Yo, you should rap over this ‘Cherry’ record by Ratatat!” He’s like, “I just think you would sound so good on it.” After I wrote it, I jokingly was gonna call it “Brenton’s Song” you know, like Brian’s Song the movie? Anyway, good thing I didn’t.

After this we talked pretty in-depth about his new project Perfectly, Tragically Flawed that will be releasing soon.

RESPECT.: What can you tell me about Perfectly, Tragically, Flawed? And what can the fans look forward to? What sort of sound or vibe will it be?

RESPECT.: Your fans are so patient. You could have waited until 80 and dropped an album, and they would have still listened. It didn’t seem like people even questioned it. Like, you were gone, maybe people were hitting you here and there, but when it came out everyone was just like, “oh it’s dope.” So for your next release, I think they’ll just be happy to get new music.

Cuey: Yeah, well we decided to do the EP, just with CJ being out of the picture, at least for the time being, you know, I can really only rely on a few producers that totally get me know. And at the end of the day that’s what really holds it up. I’m super picky. Like, I turned down beats from Just for Angry Young Man. It’s just certain things that are hard to come by, so with that being said we’re just like, “Nah, we’re going to put out an EP. So there’s no hold up, no wait.”

RESPECT.: Personally, I’m a fan too. I would be happy to get new music and I think that it will be dope that it will be sonically cohesive. Whether it’s an EP, album, mixtape, I don’t really care, as long as it’s you and it’s cohesive that’s what matters. And that’s what you’re giving so…

Cuey: Oh it’s super cohesive!

Then he talks more about the first single (which sounds incredible by the way) and gives some details about the new EP that are still under the radar.

RESPECT.: Last thing. My buddy actually wanted me to ask you this, but Bradley Cooper walked out to your song at the MTV Movie Awards! Did you know about that or did you see that?

Cuey: Well yeah, and no. Okay so legally, MTV has to reach out to me to get the rights to use the song anyway. So, I was doing a mini tour at the time. Brenton was DJing the mini tour, and we were with my merch-guy in a hotel room, and the last thing my manager knew was that they might use the song. And I was like, “Okay!” And you know Brenton co-produced the beat so he was like super-hype. And I was watching it live and I still didn’t know! And I said to Brenton and my merch-guy at the time, and I was like, “yo. If they don’t use it for Best Male then they’re not using it, because it’s too aggressive of a song.” It was just funny because I totally blanked. They were loading up the best male sh*t and I resort back to normal Geoff, and I’m just like, “Who do you guys think is going to win?” * laughs * And I feel confident that they may or may not play the record on it, you know. Millions watching. And then all of a sudden they go “BRADLEY COOPER!!!!” And then all of a sudden I was like, “Holy sh*t! That’s ‘No Way’.” It was a cool moment.

RESPECT.: What’s the moment that you felt most accomplished in your career then?

Cuey: I don’t know if I’ve hit that yet, but there was this moment in time I can say that I felt the most at peace career wise was… It was a while ago. I was on tour, it was right before Can’t Wait came out, and I was also a lot more naïve back then, so it’s kind of like, I don’t know if I can ever be that at peace again. Because it’s kind of like, okay I know how this game works and I’m way further along then I was back then now. But like, just in that moment in time I was like DMing with a playboy bunny, and I was working with Just, and at that moment I was driving up the highway headed to my show in LA, and I was in a van with some of my closest friends, getting paid to travel the country and perform, and every record label was calling at the time, and we were listening to M83’s “Midnight City” and I just remember that. And that was probably my most peaceful moment of my adult (life), like past eighteen, you know I just remember I just sat back and I was like, “Wow this is so dope.” You know what I mean?

RESPECT.: That sounds like a perfect moment. That’s the dream.

Cuey: Yeah, and I was a lot more naïve. Just literally with wisdom and experience, I don’t ever think I’ll be at peace again. But no it was a really nice moment. Well no, until things drastically change, it was a really dope moment. I can give you that.

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RESPECT. Interview: OnCue — Right on Time (Part 1)

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The post RESPECT. Interview: OnCue — Right On Time (Part 2) appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

OnCue is a rapper, singer, and song-writer out of Connecticut who has captured the hearts of fans with his honesty, vulnerability, his ability to be himself in an industry full of people trying to somebody else, and most of all, his music. Cuey, the name he and his fans call him, has been making great music that has proved to last the test of time. I remember listening to his music when I was graduating high school a few years back and I really related to his ability to portray struggle, triumph and the ambition for more perfectly over tracks that compliment his melodic tone and powerful flow. I had the chance to talk with Cuey about his past, present and future music, as well as the journey that lead him to where he is at now. The conversation was a long one (about an hour), but very insightful. So, we decided to split this interview up into three parts. Here is part one. Enjoy.

I started off the interview by ironically asking him questions about his current situation with long-time producer CJ Luzi. The next day Cuey was set to drop his new single “Time,” which addresses discrepencies between the two that occurred during the process of making his last album Angry Young Man. I won’t say too much more about that part of our convo because he addresses it in a very poetic fashion on “Time,” which you can listen to here.

Then I asked him about the journey of chasing his dream and moving out to the big city.

RESPECT.: You moved to New York City at 21. What was your mindset when you finally took the leap to chase your dream? Was the experience of the city what you expected it to be, and how was the adjustment?
Cuey: My mind frame going into it… It was just one of those fork in the road moments. I had just gotten out of a really bad break up. I was with the girl for a long time. It was my first serious girlfriend, and at that point I was about to be 21 and it was getting pseudo-real. I wasn’t 16 anymore. We were about to move in together and I kind of realized that once that went south, “Why the f*ck am I in Connecticut?” At the time, locally, no one was giving me a shot. I’m from a small market. This was 2010 but I was up on the blog and the whole Internet sh*t way early. But small markets like Conneticut were behind. It was one of those fork in the road moments. I was like, “What am I going to do?” I decided that I’ve got to get the f*ck out of here. It was a leap that I knew I needed to make because this has never been a what if. There’s really never been a plan b. A parental figure or someone like that would probably be like, “Well, that is the dumbest sh*t I’ve ever heard” * laughs * but when you really one thousand percent believe in yourself and your abilities… It wasn’t actually up until Angry Young Man (AYM) that I really started to believe in myself.

Before Angry Young Man, I was believing in my potential. That was something that I held on to, even when times got rough making AYM. Some people might think that Can’t Wait was better. Some people might think that AYM is better. But for me personally, I feel like AYM is the first body of work that I was like, “Wow I am amazing at what I do.” Can’t Wait showed the potential and was almost there, and I don’t want to sh*t on that, but it was almost there. So when I got here (to NYC) I believed in myself. I really do. As corny as that sounds, I am nowhere near where I deserve to be. Not even where I should be, but where I deserve to be. Certain things just didn’t fall my way, the cards just didn’t fall my way. It’s funny though, I feel more convinced than ever. After all the time off, a lot of people wrote me off for dead, industry wise.

But to go back to your question, I have this very annoying sense of belief in myself, and it’s not in an egotistical sense. I just believe that it is such a fundamental thing that I care more about my craft than 99% of people actually do care about their craft.

Right after this answer, his friends bust in the room and told Cuey that they were going to a local pizza joint. He asked for ten more minutes to finish up the interview before they head for za.

RESPECT.: It’s cool because I think that what you said rings really true to a lot of people. In any field I think that a lot of people look at their potential and what they can become, but when you start realizing what you are, that probably gives you a huge push.
Cuey: Huge, huge. With AYM I overthought everything. So much so that I was self-destructive. At a certain point I was becoming my own worst enemy. I kept thinking to myself, “It’s not good enough.” But I was talking with my boy Brenton about it the other day, and I think that when an artist really starts to hit their stride is when they realize when to think and when not to. Because some of your illest sh*t comes when you’re just like “I’m going to do the first thing that comes to me.” The thinking comes in after, when you just need to be able to think just enough that you’re not being lazy about it. Because at a certain point, I don’t know if I believe in the 10 000 hours thing, but you’re already really good at your craft. How much better can you be? You’re just stressing yourself out over it.

RESPECT.: That’s the point where you can just create. How did you keep faith when you weren’t at that level of comfort though? When things weren’t going your way, what kept you motivated? Did you always know that things were going to work out and where you were going to be?
Cuey: I don’t know. I really don’t. If I really think about it, at the most crucial times (in my life) I’ve seen signs. I don’t know if I believe in God, but I’ve seen signs at very crazy, pivotal fork in the road moments. I saw signs that were just enough to be like, “Dude, keep going.” I don’t know if that’s luck, I don’t know if that’s trying to find signs, you know what I mean?

RESPECT.: Yeah and I don’t think it matters. I think that you can see the signs if you look for them. I feel the same way but whether or not it’s God, or just seeing the signs that you’re looking for, I think that seeing the signs and living that way is way better than considering everything as coincidence.

Then Cuey asked if we could reconvene after he ate some pizza with his boys. Of course I was very supportive because I would never want to come between a man and his pizza.

RESPECT.: So how was the Pizza?
Cuey: It was fire. It was like this brick oven pizza. It was good!

RESPECT.: Word. So, what is your day-to-day life like?
Cuey: It’s meetings, studio. Most of the time it’s pretty mundane. There are industry parties now and then and sh*t like that but for the most part when you’re not on tour or in album mode music is like a normal job. You’re clocking in, you’re clocking out. Life is not too too crazy. I’ve grown accustomed to it.

RESPECT.: What’s the craziest thing that’s happened at an industry party that you’ve been to?
Cuey: I don’t know. But I can say that I almost got beat up by Busta Rhymes’ crew at a party.

RESPECT.: * laughs * Did you try rapping him the “Look At Me Now” verse and he wasn’t happy about it?
Cuey: * laughs * I literally went up and I said, “Yo Bust what’s up?” And he saw me, turned away, and then three of his homies were like, “Yo you better chill.” And then I tell my manager the next day and he said, “Yeah dude, it’s like an industry known thing. Busta Rhymes is hard to approach.” I was like, “I wish I knew this.”

I literally thought they were gonna try to do sh*t. Cause I was trying to leave, and there were people in front of me and people behind me, and I was kind of stuck beside the door. I  just wanted to say whats’ up. I didn’t ask for a picture or nothing like that. I just wanted to say, “Yo!” * laughs * I just threw out my hand for the hand shake…

RESPECT.: That’s hilarious. And it’s funnier because you don’t look like the type of guy who is going to do anything either.
Cuey: Nah! I’m like relatively tall but I’m skinny and scrauny. And Busta Rhymes is like huge!

RESPECT.: He is massive! * laughs *
Cuey: Yeah!

RESPECT.: So funny. So do you have a group of close friends out there? Are you still friends with the people that you grew up with or do you just stick with the people that you’re around everyday now?
Cuey: I’m 26 now, so especially in the suburbs outside of Hartford, where I’m from, you tend to loose touch and fall out from people around you. Just because you grow into yourselves and you kind of realize that maybe you don’t have the same values. But for the most part, I’m very close with the people that I grew up with. Actually, one of my oldest friends in the world, technically by time-wise; me and him have been friends since we were like five, he just came to the city this past weekend to visit. We went to a comedy club and went out and sh*t. So yeah, for the most part I’m still very close with a lot of the people I grew up with.

RESPECT.: That’s dope! Well I had a couple of questions that some of your long-time fans would want to know about (myself included). Who is the kid on the cover of AYM and was he actually smoking during the picture shoot?
Cuey: Okay so the kid is actually Just Blaze’s assistant/ day to day manager, Juan’s high school friend’s son. And I was running around the studio at the time, and I was like “I got this idea for the album cover!” I actually got the idea from, you know that little Cambodian kid who smoked cigarettes.

RESPECT.: Yeah, the kid who just chain-smokes them?
Cuey: Yeah! I got the idea from that. And I was like, “yo what if that was the album cover?” And long story short, the mother came through with two boys around the same age. The younger one posed for the photo, and she was actually down to have him smoke, and I was actually down too. And then my manager at the time, and my creative director at the time, Adam Ross, were like, “nah. No, no no. I don’t want to live with that on our conscience that we may or may not have made this kid addicted to cigarettes.” And I was like, “yeah okay you’re right.”

And I do design myself a majority of the time, but the more photo manipulation stuff Adam used to do. He still does a lot of the time, me and him are still buddies. And Adam was like “nah dude, we can get it done in post.” And I was kind of nervous for post, but Adam made it look very good. He wasn’t really smoking.

RESPECT.: It looks very good! Cigarettes seem to be a big theme for you, even in your videos and stuff. Did they play a big part in your life, or what was the symbolism behind smoking? Do they represent a release or freedom for you?
Cuey: Yeah I mean I started smoking at like 14, 15. I don’t really smoke real cigarettes much anymore because I’ve been on the vape thing for the last year and some change. And that was actually purely because of music. My vocals, and trying to sing live, and performances, it was super difficult. And I was one of those people with a sensitive throat. You know, if I went out drinking and I was chain-smoking the next day, my voice was like deep as sh*t. Like deep as f*ck. But going back to your question, and that’s actually a really good question, the thing is.. It’s like cigarettes are kind of symbolic in a way. Cigarettes to me, and why they were like this underlying theme through AYM is because it’s pain. It’s stress. It clearly symbolizes addiction, which is a concept that I’ve talked about for years. And it was just one of those things. You know, my mom smoked when I was growing up. I think she quit when I was like 19, or 20. And my dad still smokes. And I’ve smoked since I was like 15. And just with the content and what the album was about, the story-line to me it kind of represented pain. It also represented the home I grew up in. It just kind of became a thing. And I was like, you know what, this is what it means. I came up with the title when I was listening to a Billy Joel song, and now everyone thinks that I’m a big Billy Joel fan. And it’s not necessarily that I’m a fan you know, but I heard the song and the lyrics were just resonating with me and how I felt at the time. And how I felt this mission statement should be for this album. And when I saw that Cambodian kid, it all just kind of connected. I actually had the artwork when we had three songs done. In the title track to the album I mention cigarettes on purpose inspired by the album cover that we created.

RESPECT.: So you were kind of building around the album cover sort of?
Cuey: Kind of. Almost. At certain points. I knew it was going to be, and it was, just a big piece to the album. It was just a centerpiece. It added a certain feel; it added a certain touch to the album.

RESPECT.: Yeah. It’s pretty iconic I think. And another thing, which I thought was pretty original and creative on the project, was for your single “So Much Love”, you touch on a pretty intense topic but in a way that is very uplifting. The feel of the song kind of reminded me of this 2000’s pop song “Happy Ending” by Mika. Because if you look at the lyrics separately from the music, it is a really sad song. So did you do that on purpose? How did the process and order of making the music come about? Did you get the beat and then you decided to make this type of song to it?
Cuey: It was kind of actually discombobulated. So, at the time me and Brenton Duvall were working together a lot, and he gave me a beat and I ended up keeping it. I think he originally made it for Skizzy Mars, and Skizzy kind of wasn’t really feeling it. I don’t know, but I started writing to it. And as I started writing I thought of that song concept. And the reason why I thought of the song concept is because when I started recording the first half of the album (AYM) I was listening to a lot of old rock. So I was listening to a lot of Fleetwood Mac, and obviously Billy Joel, and also Elton John. And I just had a two-disk greatest hits of Elton John on my Spotify and “Rocket Man” is a classic, classic, classic song. And I was like, you know, I want to write a song like that. In today’s market you don’t really hear a lot of songs that have a lot of meaning in it. You know, you’ve got Adele’s “Hello”, which is a serious topic for her, but it’s about heartbreak. Which is a common theme in pop music you know? And anyway, I was just listening to “Rocket Man”, and there were other songs too, but Rocket Man was the main one where I was like, “I want to write a song like that.” And you know, I kind of somehow just made the correlation between, “what’s the difference between a f*cked up household, and a party house? You know what I mean?” Like there is really no difference. And Just (Blaze) later played me the Hud Mo (Hudson Mohawke, who produced the record “So Much Love”) beat, and at the time I kind of thought, “okay this is super catchy. I love the chord progression. The lyrics, in terms of what I do, I don’t really make bubble gum rap, it was a little cheesy if I were to get on it.” But I was obsessed with the beat. I was like, “this beat is just so fire.” And then I was like, “wait, I could just take that song concept and put it on here.” To be honest, I probably wrote like 6 or 7 different choruses for that song over the course of 8-10 months because I knew that it could be a really, really good record. I was looking at it wrong in the beginning. I kept trying to sing. Like “Way Too Far” sing, on the chorus. And then when I kind of just put it away, and then I came back to it, I loved it. You know, going back to that whole overthinking, and not thinking enough type of thing. I had the beat, and I had the song concept, and I was like, “oh this works.

RESPECT: It worked well. And I think the contrast is what makes it beautiful.
Cuey: Thank you.

Check back this Wednesday for PT. 2 of our interview and make sure to check out Cuey on Soundcloud and Twitter.

Similar Reads:

OnCue Drops Cinematic New Video for ‘Time’ — http://tinyurl.com/zzmav46

New Video: OnCue – ‘Angry Young Man’ — http://tinyurl.com/zm7thmq

The post RESPECT. INTERVIEW: OnCue Right on Time (Part 1) appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

“Time” is brutally honest and vulnerable to the point that every lyric can be felt, whether you know about the situations that he is referring to or not. Cuey touches on topics ranging from depression, his album delay, personal relationships, striving to be great to his constant search to create something timeless.

The slow motion shots contrasted with the way the city streets and trains are passing him by in this video creates an eery feel. It almost feels like you are watching the stream of consciousness within Cue’s head pass him by and become reality. As dark as this video feels at certain points, it also seems like he is coming to terms with some of his darkest thoughts and feeling comfortable with where he is at, both personally and musically. The harmonies at the end of the song when the beat disperses are my favourite moments on “Time” musically. The song really ends on a note where it seems like Cuey has a clearer mind after fighting through his conflicted thoughts and will be able to move forward.

Tomorrow RESPECT. will be premiering part 1 of an interview that I did with OnCue the day before this song was released where he discusses some of the emotions portrayed in “Time” along with much more. The song is available to stream on his SoundCloud page, so be sure to follow him there, as well as on twitter to let him know what you thought of the video.

Soundcloud: @OnCue
Twitter: @OnCue

The post OnCue Drops Cinematic New Video for ‘Time’ appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

The monumental title track to Cuey’s latest album gets some visuals. Go inside the angry young man’s home in this Steven Roberge-directed video. Angry Young Man is out now.

The post New Video: OnCue – “Angry Young Man” appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

OnCue keeps the new music flowing, following the release of Angry Young Man. This one is produced by Mike Kuz and contains Cuey’s blend of high-energy verses and melodic crooning. Stream it below.

The post New Music: OnCue – “This Is Not A Song” appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.