INTERVIEW WITH

FELONS

Title

Thanks so much for agreeing to do this interview, I really appreciate it.  Why don’t we start with you just introducing yourself & giving everyone a little insight into what you do and what XXL Heat is?

Thank you bro!  My birth name is Zachariah, my alias include Felons and Z Money.  I’m a person who gets high on creating, and XXL Heat is the way in which I create.

For me, I’m extra with everything I do.  I always see the fire in everything I love and I’m passionate about, so I’m just XXL HEAT in everything I do in my life. 

When did you first get into hardcore? What drew you to it? What bands do you feel like really resonated with you & brought you into the culture?

I was introduced to Hatebreed Satisfaction and Madball Hold it Down at a young age by my brother, and honestly I was really hooked on the lyrics - they spoke to me on how I was feeling at that moment in my young life. I was already heavy into metal and rap, but hardcore was the real voice for me. I was around 11 when he showed me those bands, and then I just took off from there.

In more recent years you’ve been super active in hip hop & producing beats - how did you get into that?

Beat making was always something I admired from afar - shoutout my bro Sammy Thomas aka Selftaught for first ever showing me about cooking up beats.  I was living out in Montauk and my boy Sammy worked with me at the club.  He was a dope beat maker and audio engineer, and we cooked some of my earliest stuff together.

Years later after doing a bunch of different musical projects I got back into making beats because I wanted to create alone, no longer with band mates.  I felt I had nothing left to say, I just wanted to give a canvas for listeners and MC’s to get inspired with. That’s where the production journey started.

At what point do you feel like the beat is done and not overcooked?

I tend to overproduce sometimes, and those beats go into a “beat tape” folder. I’ve learned when cooking up for an MC, less is actually more.  I just feel when I’m done with it.  That’s kinda how I am with everything. 

When I listen to the beats you make, they range from aggressive and hard to angelic and soft. No matter what the beat is you can sense depth - sometimes with a touch of sorrow. What mood are you usually in when you’re feeling inspired to write and when do ideas pop in your mind for writing music? 

Every project I’ve ever done always sounds somewhat sorrowful, I guess that’s because music is therapy for me.  I never actually saw a therapist other then some court ordered anger management, but I felt I never needed it because I had music and art to pour my pain into.

I remember when I was doing my folk band, I was really doing that project for my parents.  I wanted to give back to them the music they showed me like Neil Young, Warren Zevon, & Tom Petty.  Every song I would write would make me cry, and I realized it was the most therapeutic shit ever.  It made me feel the most connected to music, just me and an acoustic telling stories of my life and trauma.  That shit helped me so much. 

I know you’ve been through a lot in life. Do you feel like what you’ve been through in life comes out in your songs? 

I know I partially answered that in the last question but YES. I wrote a song called Tombstone, a story about me running the streets with some serious people and getting jammed up.

A couple days after my father overdosed, I wrote a song for him called Jeter. I cried hysterically when writing it.  I remember playing it for my girl and we cried together, and afterward I just felt so good.  I forgave my pops for everything in that song.  I wrote a song for my mom too; I never released it 'cause it’s extremely personal, but it helped me so much with her passing too.

Both my parents battled heavy drug addiction and a life of crime, and both passed from drugs. Music saved my life from where I was heading. I owe everything to underground music and art, and I’ll give it everything I got to help keep it going for the next kid who feels that pain.
Title

“Music saved my life from where I was heading.  I owe everything to underground music and art, and I’ll give it everything I got to help keep it going for the next kid who feels that pain.”

Title

It seems like there’s a lot of influence from both hip hop and hardcore in your projects. Would you agree? What would you say has the biggest influence on your songwriting?

I’m influenced by so much, but my hood is my biggest influence:  CENTREVILLE GARDENS.  25th-26th St Projects in Bayonne, NJ.  I do it for all 6 buildings, that’s what inspired me always.  Every single mom, every broken home, every hurt kid, that’s the biggest influence on me.

My buildings have changed so much; nobody outside no more.  No more crime, everything getting gentrified, but it’s those memories.  The pissy hallways, the cops whipping up on us and we all scatter through the buildings.  DYFS showing up and your neighbor tells them they were watching you so they didn’t take you away - that’s my influence. 

I wouldn’t trade my life for anything, my shit ruled. I was smoking and selling weed at 12, kids now can’t even tie their shoes at that age lol.
Title

“One style is just too boring to me.  Mix that shit up.  Right now I’m back dressing how I did when I was 13...but next year, I might be in bowling shirt with a fedora smoking a joint at the Italian deli. “

Title

You have a classic NY style.  What helped shape that style and what are some staples for your outfits?  What do you want your style to say about you?

Yo I’m from the 201, Hudson County - also known as the 6th Borough - so every show I went to was in NYC.  It’s a train away; you could see the towers right from Prospect Bridge by my house. I love active streetwear cause we're always on the move - North Faces in the winter cause we stash all the drugs in the pockets when we were hustling lol.

I’m also big on jerseys cause sports were a huge part of my childhood.  Band tees a must cause I gotta rep my boys and the underground.

And footwear, c'mon, too many fire kicks to name but my all time faves are White Cement 4’s, fresh pair of white Air Forces, and Air Max 95’s.

And last but never least YANKEE FITTED SIZE 8!  C section head!!!! Haha but yo I also dress on some Bronx Tale shit too - I have crazy pieces like long rain coats, vintage Ralph denim jackets, and insane hat collection of fedoras, pork pies, flat caps, fitteds, snaps, buckets.  Yo I love so much shit, I even got some crazy like Matrix fits - that’s when I make my Euro drug music albums haha!!!!!

But for me fashion is art, and different pieces fit different vibes.  One style is just too boring to me.  Mix that shit up.  Right now I’m back dressing how I did when I was 13 - RANDY MOSS JERSEY, SWOOSH PANTS, YANKEE FITTED, JORDAN 4’s. But next year, I might be in bowling shirt with a fedora smoking a joint at the Italian deli. 
Title

“ I need a Danny Diablo statue in my house.“

Title

Different types of music come with different types of  clothing & style.  How do you think your style has been developed through hip hop and hardcore?  If there was a Venn diagram with hardcore on one side & hip hop on the other, where do you feel like they intersect?

I’m from public housing, but my parents showed me Black Sabbath and weed, so I was always on some hip hop/metal head vibe. I was wearing Candiria shirts with Black Cat 4’s.  It’s all street at the end of the day.

I remember seeing Madball when I was younger and thinking, “Yo Freddy looks like my boy Dio’s pops who was fresh out the feds”. All the hardcore bands looked like my neighbors. And BRO EZEC LIVED IN MY HOOD FOR A WHILE.  I used to see him by 7-Eleven.  Shoutout Danny Diablo bro, the realest dude ever.  He is the first dude to put me on in the hardcore scene.  I need a Danny Diablo statue in my house.

But to your question, Hardcore and hip hop are too much the same to me to really see them as separate. They both fuel each other stylistically. But maybe that’s just how me and my friends see it.

If money/obligations weren’t a thing, what would you consider the perfect day? What would you do, what would you eat, where would you be, etc.?

I love this question so I’m gonna answer with brutal honesty: I would be on the beach in Aruba rubbing coconut oil on an insanely hot Spanish girl with a thong tan, extra fat ass, so basically my girl, “but let a kid dream of something new” lol, listening to the waves crash, then we make love on the beach. Then I hit a bike ride while blasting some Pink Floyd or Boldy James on one of them JBL pill joints, then I go have a chicken parm dinner on the beach watching the sunset, then I teleport back to my hood where I fight someone over a parking spot, just to make my way into my house to stare at my insane card and figure collection while making beats, then lay in bed and watch re-runs of the Simpsons with my girl. With my dog, my best friend Oakley, laying next to my on the floor.

My life rules. I love everything about life and what it has to offer. Thank you for letting me share my point of view with you. Peace and love. 

INTERVIEW WITH

FELONS

Title

Thanks so much for agreeing to do this interview, I really appreciate it.  Why don’t we start with you just introducing yourself & giving everyone a little insight into what you do and what XXL Heat is?

Thank you bro!  My birth name is Zachariah, my alias include Felons and Z Money. I’m a person who gets high on creating and XXL Heat is the way in which I create.

I’m extra with everything I do, and I always see the fire in everything I love and I’m passionate about, so I’m just XXL HEAT in everything I do in my life. 

When did you first get into hardcore? What drew you to it? What bands do you feel like really resonated with you & brought you into the culture?

I was introduced to Hatebreed Satisfaction and Madball Hold it Down at a young age by my brother, and honestly I was really hooked on the lyrics - they spoke to me on how I was feeling at that moment in my young life. I was already heavy into metal and rap, but hardcore was the real voice for me. I was around 11 when he showed me those bands, and then I just took off from there.

In more recent years you’ve been super active in hip hop & producing beats - how did you get into that?

Beat making was always something I admired from afar - shoutout my bro Sammy Thomas aka Selftaught for first ever showing me about cooking up beats.  I was living out in Montauk and my boy Sammy worked with me at the club.  He was a dope beat maker and audio engineer, and we cooked some of my earliest stuff together.

Years later after doing a bunch of different musical projects I got back into making beats because I wanted to create alone, no longer with band mates.  I felt I had nothing left to say, I just wanted to give a canvas for listeners and MC’s to get inspired with. That’s where the production journey started.

At what point do you feel like the beat is done and not overcooked?

I tend to overproduce sometimes, and those beats go into a “beat tape” folder. I’ve learned when cooking up for an MC, less is actually more.  I just feel when I’m done with it.  That’s kinda how I am with everything. 

When I listen to the beats you make, they range from aggressive and hard to angelic and soft. No matter what the beat is you can sense depth - sometimes with a touch of sorrow. What mood are you usually in when you’re feeling inspired to write and when do ideas pop in your mind for writing music? 

Every project I’ve ever done always sounds somewhat sorrowful, I guess that’s because music is therapy for me.  I never actually saw a therapist other then some court ordered anger management, but I felt I never needed it because I had music and art to pour my pain into.

I remember when I was doing my folk band, I was really doing that project for my parents.  I wanted to give back to them the music they showed me like Neil Young, Warren Zevon, & Tom Petty.  Every song I would write would make me cry, and I realized it was the most therapeutic shit ever.  It made me feel the most connected to music, just me and an acoustic telling stories of my life and trauma.  That shit helped me so much. 

I know you’ve been through a lot in life. Do you feel like what you’ve been through in life comes out in your songs? 

I know I partially answered that in the last question but YES. I wrote a song called Tombstone, a story about me running the streets with some serious people and getting jammed up.

A couple days after my father overdosed, I wrote a song for him called Jeter. I cried hysterically when writing it.  I remember playing it for my girl and we cried together, and afterward I just felt so good.  I forgave my pops for everything in that song.  I wrote a song for my mom too; I never released it 'cause it’s extremely personal, but it helped me so much with her passing too.

Both my parents battled heavy drug addiction and a life of crime, and both passed from drugs. Music saved my life from where I was heading. I owe everything to underground music and art, and I’ll give it everything I got to help keep it going for the next kid who feels that pain.

Title

“Music saved my life from where I was heading.  I owe everything to underground music and art, and I’ll give it everything I got to help keep it going for the next kid who feels that pain.”

Title

It seems like there’s a lot of influence from both hip hop and hardcore in your projects. Would you agree? What would you say has the biggest influence on your songwriting?

I’m influenced by so much, but my hood is my biggest influence:  CENTREVILLE GARDENS.  25th-26th St Projects in Bayonne, NJ.  I do it for all 6 buildings, that’s what inspired me always.  Every single mom, every broken home, every hurt kid, that’s the biggest influence on me.

My buildings have changed so much; nobody outside no more.  No more crime, everything getting gentrified, but it’s those memories.  The pissy hallways, the cops whipping up on us and we all scatter through the buildings.  DYFS showing up and your neighbor tells them they were watching you so they didn’t take you away - that’s my influence. 

I wouldn’t trade my life for anything, my shit ruled. I was smoking and selling weed at 12.  Kids now can’t even tie their shoes at that age lol.

Title

“One style is just too boring to me.  Mix that shit up.  Right now I’m back dressing how I did when I was 13...but next year, I might be in bowling shirt with a fedora smoking a joint at the Italian deli. “

Title

You have a classic NY style.  What helped shape that style and what are some staples for your outfits?  What do you want your style to say about you?

Yo I’m from the 201, Hudson County - also known as the 6th Borough - so every show I went to was in NYC.  It’s a train away; you could see the towers right from Prospect Bridge by my house. I love active streetwear cause we're always on the move - North Faces in the winter cause we stash all the drugs in the pockets when we were hustling lol.

I’m also big on jerseys cause sports were a huge part of my childhood.  Band tees a must cause I gotta rep my boys and the underground.

And footwear, c'mon, too many fire kicks to name but my all time faves are White Cement 4’s, fresh pair of white Air Forces, and Air Max 95’s.

And last but never least YANKEE FITTED SIZE 8!  C section head!!!!  Haha but yo I also dress on some Bronx Tale shit too - I have crazy pieces like long rain coats, vintage Ralph denim jackets, and insane hat collection of fedoras, pork pies, flat caps, fitteds, snaps, buckets.  Yo I love so much shit, I even got some crazy like Matrix fits - that’s when I make my Euro drug music albums haha!!!!!

But for me fashion is art, and different pieces fit different vibes.  One style is just too boring to me. Mix that shit up.  Right now I’m back dressing how I did when I was 13 - RANDY MOSS JERSEY, SWOOSH PANTS, YANKEE FITTED, JORDAN 4’s. But next year, I might be in bowling shirt with a fedora smoking a joint at the Italian deli. 

Title

“ I need a Danny Diablo statue in my house.“

Title

Different types of music come with different types of  clothing & style.  How do you think your style has been developed through hip hop and hardcore?  If there was a Venn diagram with hardcore on one side & hip hop on the other, where do you feel like they intersect?

I’m from public housing, but my parents showed me Black Sabbath and weed, so I was always on some hip hop/metal head vibe. I was wearing Candiria shirts with Black Cat 4’s.  It’s all street at the end of the day.

I remember seeing Madball when I was younger and thinking, “Yo Freddy looks like my boy Dio’s pops who was fresh out the feds”. All the hardcore bands looked like my neighbors. And BRO EZEC LIVED IN MY HOOD FOR A WHILE.  I used to see him by 7-Eleven.  Shoutout Danny Diablo bro, the realest dude ever.  He is the first dude to put me on in the hardcore scene.  I need a Danny Diablo statue in my house.

But to your question, Hardcore and hip hop are too much the same to me to really see them as separate. They both fuel each other stylistically. But maybe that’s just how me and my friends see it.

If money/obligations weren’t a thing, what would you consider the perfect day? What would you do, what would you eat, where would you be, etc.?

I love this question so I’m gonna answer with brutal honesty: I would be on the beach in Aruba rubbing coconut oil on an insanely hot Spanish girl with a thong tan, extra fat ass, so basically my girl, “but let a kid dream of something new” lol, listening to the waves crash, then we make love on the beach. Then I hit a bike ride while blasting some Pink Floyd or Boldy James on one of them JBL pill joints, then I go have a chicken parm dinner on the beach watching the sunset, then I teleport back to my hood where I fight someone over a parking spot, just to make my way into my house to stare at my insane card and figure collection while making beats, then lay in bed and watch re-runs of the Simpsons with my girl. With my dog, my best friend Oakley, laying next to my on the floor.

My life rules. I love everything about life and what it has to offer. Thank you for letting me share my point of view with you. Peace and love.