Raw Sewage recently sat down with Blast Holiday for a dope interview! Video for this will be coming shortly so stay tuned!
Raw Sewage: This is an exclusive Raw Sewage interview with one of the most talented new voices in Bay Area rap today: Blast Holiday.
The first time I heard of you was on HD’s Extortion Muzik Vol. 1 but it wasn’t until I heard your verse on “Ice City Nights” off of Lil Rue’s Stars N Straps album that I started to think of you as a fully realized lyricist in your own right instead of just another Bearfaced feature artist. Now of course you have your own movement going and a steadily growing fanbase around the Bay Area, and I thought now would be a good time to get to know the man behind Lost N Da Muzik a little better. To do that we’re going to ask you about your music career, growing up in North Oakland, your family and whatever else we can think of.
Blast Holiday: Yeah, that sounds good.
RS: What does the name Blast Holiday mean?
BH: Well, Blast Holiday comes from my brother Mr. Morpheus (RIP) who passed away, and actually to keep it a hundred I was in jail… I had caught a violation. I was in my cell and shit, and my brother died; I was like I ain’t rapping no more, I had just quit rapping. And I had went to sleep, and on my life, I had a dream… my nigga came to me in a dream, it was like, bruh, you can’t stop bruh, you gotta keep going. I’m living through you, I ain’t got it like you, you too raw… everybody on you. I’m like fuck it, I’m finna do my street thing, you feel me? I swear to God this nigga dead though, in my dream like, Nah bruh you gotta keep pushing, I’ma guide your pencil. Don’t trip, just let me be your pencil. I woke up out my sleep and I had wrote a rap; I had wrote my name in there, I said something in the rap to the point that I had said it was Blast Holiday the Most. And I was like ‘that’s it’ you feel me? When I said that, I just knew it was it, I started saying it like fuck it, it’s me.
RS: That was that?
BH: That was it.
RS: When did you know you wanted to pursue rap as a career?
BH: Shit, I still don’t even really know if I want to pursue rap as a career. It’s something that I’ve been doing in my spare time like right now how we’re all in the booth. I’m still trappin’, you know… I still gotta get up and go get it every day. I don’t really pursue rap, it’s just something I do; I finally got people out here listening to the shit that I’m saying, so really I’m giving back. I’m not pursuing it to be in the spotlight, like I’m a rapper, walking around with the rap persona like I’m a rapper, I’m better than you. It ain’t none of that.
So I don’t really pursue rap as a career, I don’t even look at it that way; I look at it as me being a voice of the underworld, it’s so much shit going out here that people don’t get to hear about. So many talented people. I was one of them, hella talented, just always held back behind some street shit whether it was jail, me being on the run, being too hot, clapping, it’s just constant… But in-between all that I got spits though, I could get on the beat and express myself and they gon’ feel it. That was just something we did, it just became a hobby, not a career though. Rap ain’t really paying, you gotta get that shit every day.
RS: How did you start out in the rap game? Did you start out in a group like HD and Lil Rue with Yung N Restless or did you start out on your own?
BH: Nah, I started out actually in a group [called] Camp Heat. Shout out all my niggas [in] Camp Heat: Charles Charlie, Ju Heffner, Cash Flow, Damage, Stacks. They was all my original niggas. (Phone rings) Speaking of Cash Flow, this him on the phone. (Picks up phone)
That’s how I started. What’s crazy is, everybody who I named right now, they don’t rap no more. I’m the only nigga who still rap out the group. I left fuckin’ with them and then I started fuckin’ with my brother Morph and Lil LA, we had our little rap group called Cold Gunnaz and shit. We was spitting crazy in the hood but Morph passed away, so when he passed away it was over. I’ve just been solo – Blast Holiday – since then, you feel me? Solo movement.
RS: What was the first song you ever recorded?
BH: The first song I ever recorded? It was “Blast A Lot”, that was the first song I ever did. It was a hit too, an automatic hit because everybody was on that. Yup, that was the first song I did.
RS: What project was that off of?
BH: That wasn’t on nothing, that was just a nigga rapping on the microphone just wanting to hear myself over the tapes and shit. We had a little thing that recorded us on tapes – you had to put two tapes in and hit “record” and “play” on another one. That’s how we used to do it, it was off of a keyboard back then… it was crazy.
RS: How old were you when you did that?
BH: Shit, like 12 bruh. We were like 12 and shit, just fuckin’ around. Lil niggas just had some shit, all of us in-between the ages of 12 and 17.
RS: What’s it like being the head of an independent Bay Area rap label and in some ways carrying on a long-standing Bay Area tradition?
BH: It’s raw. It’s tight when you can be the forefront, when you know that you got other people that you’re working with that’s in your label. I don’t look at myself as the top or no CEO or big-shot type of nigga or nothing like that, we all brothers in the camp. It ain’t no other shit, you feel me? I look at it like, as me being the forefront – the one who started Lost N Da Muzik – and everybody knowing that’s one of my things that I say, that’s my logo… It’s like LeBron on the Heat. He know he got D-Wade and Chalmers and Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis and Chris Bosh… he know he got dope niggas on his team. But he also know 75 percent of them people that’s paying to watch that game in the arena are going to see him. So, he gotta outdo himself, he gotta make sure the people are like yeah, that’s why he’s the best. That’s why we fuck with him. He gotta go out there and make his fans believers, you feel me? So that’s how I feel. So when I get in there or when I be in my zone, when I get lost… At the same time I look from the outside in like, what would I say if I heard some shit like this, you feel me? Like, what would I be thinking if somebody just started spitting like this if I heard it? It’s big, I just… Man. It’s a challenge, but I’m up to it, I don’t got no choice. I’m here now, so… (he nods) That’s real.
RS: How did Lost N Da Muzik start?
BH: Lost N Da Muzik started as a song. I had done a song called “Lost N Da Muzik”. And then as I was just out here, I was thinking like, that song really symbolized me, so that should be something I represent. I’m not Bearfaced – I fuck with Bearfaced heavy – I fuck with Faeva Afta Bread (Mistah FAB’s label) heavy, ASAP, I fuck with Livewire, I fuck with hella niggas you feel me? I’m not that type of rapper that be like no, I don’t fuck with them. If a nigga wanna work, we could work. I show love and go hard on everything. But [going back] Lost N Da Muzik started as a song and the whole song was just describing me. I was just like man, that would be dope. I was just like fuck that, Lost N Da Muzik, that’s my shit.
RS: You’re talking about that song off of Dragon Slayer?
BH: Nope, it was a song before that on some undisclosed shit man, y’all probably never gon’ hear that shit (laughs). It’s on some crazy shit…
RS: Don’t tell me you’re talking about those mysterious-ass No Hider No Liar tapes, you’re talking about that?
BH: (laughs) Yup, them No Hider No Liars man, I don’t know where they at, they spread out. Yup, it’s on something off of those – Damn, yeah it’s on that shit bruh. I’ve done so many songs now that I can’t even remember shit like that.
RS: What are some of your short term and long term goals for the label as it’s head, and what accomplishments that you’ve already done are you most proud of?
BH: My long-term goal is I want Lost N Da Muzik to be a household name. When people hear Lost N Da Muzik, I want it to automatically be like when you hear Roc-A-Fella. Old school “The Roc”, you know like when you hear their shit, or when you hear State Prop… when you hear it, you automatically know it’s something dope coming out. Like D-Block, Jadakiss, you feel me? When you hear, who droppin? I just want my label to just be like that so when they hear Lost N Da Muzik, they be like they gotta get that. That’s Lost, it’s somebody on there that gonna be turnt up. That’s long-term.
Short-term is that I want everybody to be heard and expressed, to let the talent we got really be shown. Some of the niggas I’m fuckin’ with bruh… they killing a lot of the niggas out here. I’m listening and I’m like, they just gotta be heard. That’s really what I’m doing now, just working with hella people in my label to just get them out, and get them in a position where they can be their own boss and branch off and do whatever they want to do. I want to give them that stepping stone.
What I’m proud of right now is, I’ve been getting a lot of love from the East Coast man, East Coast showing me hella love. I worked with Harry Fraud, Coke Boys – that’s French Montana and them, they produced some dope-ass tracks. We was in Brooklyn, shout out Harry Fraud… we was in Brooklyn getting it in at like four or five in the morning with him on some dope-ass beats. A1, Maybach Music, we was fucking with him hella heavy out there, beats from them. We got some shit with Styles P, I knocked out some shit with Young Buck… We been getting hella love from the other side, different coasts.
That’s why, it’s been big. Ain’t nobody out here spitting like nobody on my label or like me, you feel me. Niggas raw, don’t get me wrong , but we’re just bringing it in a different way.
RS: How did you develop a working relationship with JaysWetwork since he seems to do a lot of your videos?
BH: I met JaysWetwork through doing a video with HD – “Chess Moves”. Keep your love, I’d rather have your loyalty. That shit. When I met Jayswetwork, that was the first video I shot with him and that was through HD. I don’t know if I hit him or he hit me, but somehow we got linked back in together. He was like, man let’s push. He was someone who believed in me, like get your shit out here. People need to hear this shit. So I started fuckin’ with him, but I met him through H… I met him through HD.
RS: Who would you say your audience is? Do you think this audience exists in the greater country outside of the Bay Area and if so do you know of other artists who have successfully tapped into this audience?
BH: Um… you said my fanbase right?
RS: Yeah, basically.
BH: My fanbase… I don’t know who the fuck they is, they fuck with me though. I don’t know if it’s just all my partners clicking my shit and getting my views up, I don’t know who it is. Whoever it is, they like it man. I know I got some folks out in Canada fucking with me, shout out everybody in Canada, Skinny Thomas my nigga in Canada. I got some folks in the UK, Sweden and shit… I got hella fans outside of the country. Mistah FAB just traveled somewhere outside the country, he was like, they were asking for me like why didn’t you bring Blast? Why didn’t you bring Blast? Bring him out… You feel me? So I got people everywhere. I don’t think I got the type of music that you can just say oh he’s West Coast or oh he’s East Coast, oh he’s Southern. No, it’s just music that anybody, any age, any gender can listen to and be like this dude nice.
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