Joining UNAPOLOGETIC.

Why an indie/folk artist joined a hip-hop label

UNAPOLOGETIC.

I’m going to separate this article into two different sections. The first half will be dedicated to recalling the literal events that led to me joining the UNAPOLOGETIC. Team. The second half will describe my feelings as these events were transpiring. I felt it important to organize this as such.

How it happened

I came to Memphis from central Pennsylvania not knowing a single person in the city. In fact I didn’t know a single person in the entire state of Tennessee. I think the closest person I knew was my grandfather who lives in Kentucky. I had only been to Memphis once and that was for a brief orientation at University of Memphis in mid July…so I really didn’t even know the city at all outside of the block of campus. This is crucial to understand. I knew nothing, other than that I was pursuing a life in music.

I was encouraged to “get involved” by my family, who figured I’d have a hard time making friends and meeting people if I didn’t make a conscious effort to put myself out there. I only remember joining one thing, and that was signing up for intramural flag football. There happened to be a sign-up desk in my dorm and for that reason alone, I signed up. I can’t explain why I did this, knowing the kind of person I am…it makes little to no sense at all. But it happened, and the next week I was out on the field.

I don’t remember meeting anyone the first day who I immediately became friends with. There were probably 15 or so people who signed up and I was a pretty awkward kid (also a pretty awkward adult) so I didn’t become fast friends with anybody there, but after a few practices I met a handful of people who learned my mine and I learned theirs and they became my first actual friends in Memphis. One of those people I met was Keynan Harden, aka Kid Maestro.

Kid came from Chicago, and similar to me, did not really know anybody in the city of Memphis. His family had moved to the city at least, but we were on somewhat similar trajectories. We quickly realized that we had the same major and were pursuing the same degree, and had similar interests, so we mutually agreed to be friends and began attending various music based events on campus.

Fast forward over the course of the next year and a half, we begin jamming together, crafting performances together, joined a few other clubs and met more people, sat in on various classes, actually performed a few times…Kid was also the one who convinced me to audition for an ensemble that would land me free tuition for the next 3 years of my schooling. A very fruitful friendship indeed. We room together for a year, and start taking baby steps towards world domination.

I went back home to Pennsylvania the summer leading into my junior year of college to work a job, visit family, and enter into a very toxic relationship that I will speak no more of, and upon my return to Memphis, Kid lets me know that over the summer, he met somebody named IMAKEMADBEATS…and that they were starting something that he felt like I should be a part of.

I didn’t know what it was, but I knew Kid, and I knew if he said I should be involved then I should try being involved. I met Mad sometime in the fall of 2015, and ended up interning with the newly named UNAPOLOGETIC., and the rest is history.

That’s how it happened. Pretty simple but also very fate driven. I could go into more detail on the earlier days of the company and how I slowly began to assume more and more responsibilities. How I began playing guitar for Cameron Bethany and how during this time I was also beginning to write and record my own songs. How by the time I went back home in the summer of my junior year and came back for my last year at UofM, I cut my hair, changed my fashion and began going under my full name of Aaron James. All of those things were driven by my first year being a part of UNAPOLOGETIC., and that self-confidence and belief in my own vision only furthered and furthered the more time I spent with that team.

How it felt

Okay…

The details of the story externally are honestly pretty simple. A fairly direct series of events leading to me meeting a friend who then led me to the team. Easy. However, the details internally were a bit more complicated.

Let’s start with step one, moving to Memphis from central Pennsylvania.

I grew up in Elizabethtown, PA. I love my home town, but let’s be super clear, this is Amish country. Horses and buggies and what not, there were about four black students at my high school if I remember correctly, and as I’ve traveled back more in recent years, I’ve learned this is also very much a Trump town and a Trump county. Again, love my home town and the people in it, but these are just facts.

So with these details in mind…you could see how moving to Memphis would potentially cause interesting feelings for a young Aaron James.

Quite honestly I think I was too ignorant to the changes I was about to face to even be overly concerned at all. Truthfully I just REALLY wanted to go all in with music. That’s all I knew. I didn’t care where I had to go or what I had to do, I just knew I wasn’t going to be a full-time artist staying in central Pennsylvania. It was as simple as that. I don’t think it was until I got to Memphis that I started to realize how much of a fish out of water I really was. I was a cub out of the woods. A bird out of the sky. A Jebidiah out of the farm. Do you understand what I’m saying? I was in uncharted-as-hell territory.

Let’s move on to step two, joining an intramural flag football team….guys…

I shit thee not, I walked out onto the field and these are just facts, I was the only white gentleman on the field of 15-20 participants. I was outnumbered. I saw my life flashing before my eyes. But it was in this moment….that I realized, I am a loving, and accepting person who had no problem with NO ARE YOU KIDDING ME OF COURSE I WAS UNCOMFORTABLE AS SHIT.

Look I really wanted to write this article but it was hard to figure out how to write this without it coming across as performative. Meaning, I really didn’t want to make it seem like it was a seamless transition for me to meet these primarily hip-hop producers in Memphis when I came from Amish country Pennsylvania just off of the idea that I’m a good person who is accepting of people. Like, yes those things are true, but it of course was not that simple, and to try and pretend like it was, as if it’s just that I’m a good person and everyone else should just be a good person and it’s that simple…painting that picture does more damage than good in my opinion. So I’m just wanting to use this recollection as a means to be honest, and raw with what my thoughts were at that time.

And my honest thoughts at that time were, of course I noticed how uncomfortable I was with that dynamic. I had never been in a room or any space where I was in the minority of race, or the minority of anything. Not because those are the spaces I chose to be in because of prejudices or worldviews…it’s just not what I had access to. I didn’t really have the capability of being in spaces where I could learn about people who come from different places than me, or experience the world in a drastically different way from me, because I was only really around people who looked for all intents and purposes, the same as me. And there’s nothing wrong with that. That doesn’t make me a bad person, but it does make me a bit of a narrow-minded person, again not by choice, but just by default.

But I can also honestly say, without trying to sound performative or disingenuous, I was raised to be accepting of people no matter where they come from or what they look like. I was raised to understand that there are a lot of different people in the world who come from different places and that I should never be afraid of someone just because they are different from me. And I can genuinely say that it was those thoughts and ideals that made me feel as comfortable as I could stepping onto that field and meeting everyone that day.

That doesn’t mean I didn’t embarrass myself. I had communication flaws, I had to navigate trying to fit in while also trying to make sure I didn’t look like I was trying to fit in. So embarrassing to think back on. After a little while though, I quickly realized that the most important thing was that I really just needed to be myself. If I was taught to be accepting of others, I just needed to be me and allow others to accept me for who I am as well. And Kid Maestro accepted me for who I was.

I became brothers with Kid because of how much we realized we had in common, and also how much we were accepting of each other’s differences. We were both passionate, and driven by a dream, and Kid was also the hardest working person I had ever met. And I knew that good things were going to happen if we continued to operate in a similar ecosystem. And I could also accept that there were things about how he experiences the world that I just didn’t understand, and that I needed to learn, and he made me not feel embarrassed to show those ignorances I had at that time. (and still have now even after 10 years of being in Memphis) And I would like to think that he saw similar things in me which allowed us to navigate life in Memphis together for this long.

But even after meeting Kid, that whole first year especially was very very difficult in terms of trying to adjust to this new community. I was so quiet. Honestly still to this day I would classify myself as a quiet and introverted person…I’m just talkative and open with the people I know and those who have gotten to know me. But it was very difficult. The only thing that made it not difficult, and the only thing that continued to push me through in the times where I felt like I was way too out of my comfort zone, was the dream of life as an artist.

It was that simple. Whenever I felt uncomfortable or scared, I just kept asking myself, well what’s the alternative? I could move back home, but I’m putting myself at a severe disadvantage at achieving my dreams if I move back to central Pennsylvania. And life as an artist surely is going to put me in all kinds of uncomfortable situations, so if I can’t even make it past talking to people I don’t know much about, then how will I ever be a successful artist? I would ask myself these obvious questions and suddenly, everything became much easier.

Fast forward to step three, being introduced to IMAKEMADBEATS and the UNAPOLOGETIC. team.

I can’t stress this enough, I was not the kid in my rural high school who was always listening to hip-hop music, or dreamed of being a part of a movement like UNAPOLOGETIC. I had a few friends that occasionally listened to Wu-Tang and that’s about it. (haha) But this was by no stretch the kind of team or scenario I dreamed I’d find myself in. All I knew was this…

These were incredibly passionate, and incredibly hard-working people who, I knew if I stayed in orbit of, would help me also be a harder working, more passionate human being. That’s it.

It had nothing to do with anything else. I’m fully aware of the genre differences. I’m fully aware of the cultural and personality differences and I’m aware of how it looks from the outside. But inside, of all of the differences that I had/have with the rest of the team, I also felt like I had more in common with Mad, and Kid, and everyone else in the early stages of that team than I did with almost anyone else I had met at that point in my life. And if you’re the product of the 6 people you spend the most time with, then those were the people I wanted to be around because those were the types of people that were going to help me build the skills to make it more possible for me to succeed in my dream.

I still learn something new everyday when it comes to the differences in how I experience the world compared to my friends here. And I’m still regularly humbled by experiencing those differences first-hand. But beyond anything musically I’ve learned, or artistically I’ve accomplished, I’m most thankful for how much more well-rounded of a human being I am being aligned with this team. That’s something that never would have happened anywhere else. There is no city like Memphis, and there is no team like UNAPOLOGETIC. For everything I’m still learning and everything I don’t know…that’s something I know for sure.

Just a few months back, UNAPOLOGETIC. celebrated its 10 year anniversary as a company, as a team, and as a movement. I continue to be thankful to be on this journey with everyone, and there is so much more I have to share, and the team has to share, that I can’t wait for the world to experience. I feel just as connected to my Memphis family as I do my Pennsylvania family, despite the differences…and I’m excited for more growth to come!

Thank you as always for being here, and I’ll talk to you again soon.

-Aaron