Rapper billy woods is a leading figure in contemporary underground hip-hop. He spoke to Jacobin about the inspiration for his music and his left-wing politics.

NYC-based rapper billy woods is a cornerstone figure in contemporary underground hip-hop. Over the past decade, his albums consistently land on year-end best lists — with his last record, Maps, featured in Pitchfork’s “Best Albums of the 2020s So Far.”

Born in the United States to an exiled Zimbabwean Marxist intellectual and a Jamaican literature professor, billy spent part of his childhood in Zimbabwe in the immediate aftermath of the Rhodesian Bush War, otherwise known as the Zimbabwe War of Independence. Having witnessed the first decade after independence — initially filled with hopes but ultimately culminating in Robert Mugabe’s ruthless dictatorship — he is brutally honest both in his personal reflections and political observations. His music uniquely conveys feelings of insecurity, dissatisfaction, and dissociation in an age where all revolutionary politics seems to have failed.

Armen Aramyan sat down with billy woods following Armand Hammer’s performance at the Le Guess Who? festival in Utrecht.

Armen Aramyan

I want to start with your album Maps, produced by Kenny Segal. You’ve mentioned that it’s about your experience of returning to touring after the pandemic. It seems to mark a special period of your life. Can you tell me how the idea of this album emerged?

billy woods

I always try to have a new methodology for the record that I’m working on and try to keep the right experience for each project fresh, different, challenging, and unique to that project. So I started it and I said, okay, this is going to be based around the idea of touring and traveling. Once I knew that was the framework, I decided to do most of my writing on the road, as well as whatever recording was feasible without sacrificing quality.

For example, “NYC Tapwater.” I was on the road when I thought of the idea for the song, and I wrote a couple lines, and then I just stopped and waited till I got back to New York again and the tour was over. And then I wrote the rest of the song within forty-eight hours of getting back — just in that period, because that’s the period that it’s about.

A lot of songs I wrote on the road or at Kenny’s house and recorded them in LA or in Portland, Oregon. I did demos sometimes in other countries and states.

Armen Aramyan

Can you tell me about the period in your life that you were trying to capture on this record?

billy woods

Well, coming out of the pandemic, I was touring more than I ever had. The label, Armand Hammer [billy’s group], and billy woods were on bigger tours than I’d ever been before. Although sometimes that still doesn’t mean that they won’t pay some ridiculously low amount to play in Berlin or something. Also, coming out of a period where I had not been able to tour for some time, I was eager to take advantage and make some money. In that year, I probably logged more hours and miles on the road than in any other period of my life, including after that — at least so far.

Armen Aramyan

On that: you try to preserve your anonymity, there are no pictures of you online, and each of your concerts starts with the request to make the lights on the stage dimmer. Can you tell me how you made the decision to hide your face as an artist?

billy woods

It’s hard for me to remember if there was a definitive moment of decision. It’s like if somebody asked me, how did you come up with your name? It was a confluence of events and thoughts and coincidences. When you’re relatively young and you have an idea, then sometimes before you know it, the idea is going.

In 2000, early 2001, I had some things to be concerned about as I left Washington DC. I wanted to be able to speak freely without being afraid of my words being used against me and also to speak freely about politics. I didn’t want to be associated with my family’s name or myself once I visited DC again. So I thought that this would be a safer thing to do.

It’s also tied into the fact that I’ve never wanted to be [famous]. I mean, I wanted to be successful. I wanted to make music that people cared about, but I’ve never thought about being [famous]. I didn’t want to be recognized. I don’t particularly like having my photograph taken. So it wasn’t a difficult decision in that sense.

Armen Aramyan

Your sixth album with Armand Hammer, We Buy Diabetic Test Strips, features many producers. It has an experimental sound that varies across tracks yet remains cohesive. How did you achieve that consistent mood, and what was the work process like?

billy woods

In that case, I’m lucky to be working with people who are very talented producers and arrangers in their own right — not only the contributors, but ELUCID [the second member of Armand Hammer] is a highly underrated producer himself. Willie Green has also contributed a lot, from engineering work, recording, helping to direct the studio sessions for live musicians to his mixing and mastering and setting the production environment. Those things all factored into allowing us to create something cohesive and interesting while still pushing new boundaries.

We have also had a different work process with the songs on the record. Instead of finishing a song and moving on, we revisited each track and tried to figure out how to build out more, whether with live instrumentation or beat switches. Songs took longer to reach their final form.

Armen Aramyan

You can tell that there was more work put into each song. It’s not just rap verses over beats; everything is more intertwined. One of my favorites is “Niggardly (Blocked Call).” It starts like a traditional diss track but in the end it’s more like Old Testament–style damnation. It also stands out by being more reflective, with lines like “my heart pumps ketamine.” What were your thoughts behind this song? Were you thinking of specific people when making it?

billy woods

I wouldn’t think of it as a diss, though I understand how someone could look at it that way. [For me, it’s] about hardening one’s heart against people and things, about reaching a place where somebody can’t emotionally affect you or already being in that place. This emotional detachment can also spread into areas of your life where it may not always be intended.

Did I think of specific people and situations? Of course, that was part of what inspired me to make the song. But I also think it’s a reflection of the way that I don’t like to be angry. I don’t like to make decisions purely out of emotion. And for me it’s less about actively trying to engage or fight with my enemies or opponents; it’s more about continuing to operate without them in my orbit and watching what inevitably everybody reaps. Everyone reaps that which they have sown, myself included.

It definitely gets Old Testament. I have always been fascinated with the idea of God and all the things he does to people and civilizations. With Cain, he specifically says nobody should hurt him. But he also makes it so that Cain would never be able to find a place to be settled. And then it’s also Cain’s anger, his inability to control his emotions, that is ultimately his downfall. It’s like when God said, “Sin is crouching at your door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.” And it was Cain’s inability to control his anger, killing his own brother, that was the problem.

Armen Aramyan

Another song with such biblical references is “Spongebob,” which is one of your most popular songs. I have to say that in my circle of friends I’m the annoying person that’s introducing everyone to your music, and this song is usually a good starting point. As I understand, it’s the first song that you worked on with Kenny Segal.

billy woods

That’s not accurate. Kenny Segal produced a bunch of songs on Armand Hammer albums. We also recorded a few songs before “Spongebob.” But it was the first song which made him be like, “Oh, I get it,” and made me think like, “Okay, this one is really good.”

A funny story about that song is that I originally wrote the song with the title “Monotheism.” And then after doing the chorus, I decided to change the name, which is probably the best decision I have ever made financially in my life. I don’t know if “Monotheism” would grab as many eyes.

Armen Aramyan

Can you explain the chorus? The mention of SpongeBob definitely grabs attention, but some interpretations seem to overcomplicate its meaning.

billy woods

I was dealing with Hiding Places [2019 billy woods and Kenny Segal collaborative album that features the song]. I was dealing with a lot of problems in various areas of my life. And I had this feeling of “everything is underwater” in the sense of “a business is underwater.” While things might appear to be going okay, the actual internal reality is that you’re beset with problems. Maybe we’re not going to be able to meet our payroll. You have more problems than you feel capable of dealing with, with whatever resources you have.

The second verse is about the illness and death of a relative very close to my heart. I was writing about it in real time. I was thinking about getting a phone card so I could call people overseas, trying to figure out what to do as this person very close to me is dying in a hospital. [It’s about] knowing that you need to go to a foreign place and feeling like you don’t even have the financial resources to do so. So I’m going to the store to buy the phone card, then I’m just describing the whole milieu. You know, sometimes people are crowded outside the store and you’re like, all right, they don’t move out of the way. So you have to make yourself small to get past people which adds to the atmosphere of a person who is alone and who is cowed and beaten by the circumstances of their life.

And also as an immigrant. . . . I mean, you’re an immigrant yourself. So sometimes there are things happening at home and people can have expectations of you that are not feasible. People might think, “Oh, you live in the United States, you can easily help me. Can you bring me an iPhone?” And I’m like, “I have an Android from three years ago. How am I supposed to get you an iPhone?” The song was actually written on July 3, so there were already a lot of fireworks ahead of the next day. I guess that’s the second verse to me.

Armen Aramyan

So it’s about someone close to you in Zimbabwe?

billy woods

Jamaica, actually.

Armen Aramyan

And about your experience as an immigrant.

billy woods

You know, you’re expected to [come]. Will you be able to make it to the funeral? Are you going to make it back before the person dies?

Armen Aramyan

That’s something that I can understand. Although it’s not an option for me to go back to Russia, because I’ll just go to prison . . .

I was actually going to ask you more about your background. As I understand, you grew up between Zimbabwe and the United States, Washington, DC. You went to Zimbabwe as a kid immediately after 1980 when liberation from white minority rule concluded the Rhodesian Bush War. How many of the events that were happening in Zimbabwe did you experience firsthand?

billy woods

The Rhodesian Bush War or Zimbabwe War of Independence was ten years of some of the bloodiest fighting in any southern African liberation struggle. It even included the use of biological warfare by the Rhodesians and their South African apartheid patrons.

I was born in America, and I was still living in America [during the war]. My mother was not going to move there, and my father was a political exile. He could only go back once the peace agreements came in, and when the elections happened. So when my grandfather on my father’s side was dying before the war was over, my father went to the Zambian border, but he didn’t dare enter Zimbabwe, because he could have been arrested by Rhodesian security forces and disappear.

By the time I got to Zimbabwe, majority rule had won the day. I arrived in the aftermath and I saw the first ten years of Zimbabwe’s existence. My father was part of a government, and it was a very political atmosphere anyway, given that it was a brand-new country with a pretty strong Marxist political philosophy among its leadership. And for my father — who was a Marxist, trying to find an African Marxism — the liberation of his country and him being part of that was, I think, naturally, an achievement of his dreams.

So I was aware of the events, including a government repression of the Ndebele minority, the conflict with the South African apartheid regime, and the bombing of the African National Congress (ANC) offices in Harare. All these things were right there.

Armen Aramyan

So you went back to the States when your father passed away.

billy woods

Not the next day. But about a year and a half later.

My mother did not love Zimbabwe. I think she loved some of the people and some of the things about it. But she found it a hard place to live for a variety of reasons.

Armen Aramyan

After the liberation of Zimbabwe, did your father change his attitude toward what was going on? As I understand it, there were a lot of hopes in the beginning that evaporated during the first decade.

billy woods

No, I’d say the first ten years of Zimbabwe’s independence were. . . . Well, it depends. Looking back, sometimes you look at things differently than at the time. But economically Zimbabwe was very successful for the first decade. The Cold War was still happening. They had a robust export market, a strong farming sector. The currency was pretty strong after independence. Mugabe had pursued policies that had managed to prevent the total flight of white capital from the country, which he had learned was key for a nation becoming fully independent.

[During white-minority rule] they obviously prevented black people from acquiring the knowledge and expertise to run parts of the economy. It was both a brain drain and a flight of literal money that crippled a lot of newly independent African countries that had settler regimes. A good example would be Mozambique, where the Portuguese settlers not only destroyed much of the country’s infrastructure intentionally on the way out but also left with the money and the skilled workers. So all of a sudden you have a country with barely any doctors.

In general, I would say during the first ten years, in many aspects [Zimbabwe] was very successful. But there was not only the deterioration of the situation in Mozambique and its effect upon eastern Zimbabwe but also the constant pressure of the apartheid regime in South Africa.

The South African regime [initially] hoped to have a curtain of white rule protecting them: the Portuguese in Angola, the independent settler regime in Rhodesia, and then they themselves took control of Namibia. But all of a sudden, there’s the coup in Portugal, and the Portuguese leave Angola and Mozambique. A Marxist government seems to be taking power there, which of course leads South Africa to engage in what eventually becomes a pretty brutal and costly war. Then there’s also a CIA-funded engagement in Angola, as well as a sustained campaign of destabilization of Samora Machel in Mozambique. And in Mozambique, they’re particularly successful through supporting a group called RENAMO [Mozambican National Resistance] that starts fighting the Marxist government and also engages in cross-border attacks into the eastern part of Zimbabwe. So Zimbabwe had to deal with that, as well as attempts to help the Mozambican government.

So when Zimbabwe becomes independent, and South Africa realizes that the Rhodesian regime they’re supporting was just not going to survive, they decide, kind of like Israel, to try and create some sort of a détente with their black African neighbors and be like, okay, you can do you, but you can’t help the ANC. The ANC can’t operate from your country and attack us. It’s similar to when the Israelis made a concerted attempt to drive the Palestine Liberation Organization out of Lebanon and other places. They also were able to affect Zimbabwe’s economy. Zimbabwe is landlocked, so access to ports is pretty important. The situation in Mozambique affected their ability to go to ports to the east. To the west lies more South African–controlled territory in Namibia. And then, of course, South Africa itself to the south. So they were squeezing Zimbabwe in many different ways to try and force the ANC out of the country, including by direct attacks. They blew up the ANC headquarters in Harare.

But then on top of that there was a conflict after Mugabe won the vote. In the elections he primarily appealed to an ethnic majority [Shona]. When Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) and Joshua Nkomo [representing the Ndebele minority] lost the elections, the government started to feel threatened by reports that they might be planning to stage some sort of counterrevolutionary activities. There was also [awareness] that not all of the ZAPU guerrillas who fought against Rhodesians had turned in their weapons. A large cache of weapons was discovered on a farm belonging to Joshua Nkomo, and he fled the country. It’s hard to say how much of it was a real threat, how much was paranoia or justified paranoia given the counterrevolutionary activities in post–Cold War African countries. But for whatever reason, Mugabe unleashed a disproportionate wave of repression and military operations in that region that took on a decidedly ethnic character. And of course, at the time, living in the country it was projected in one view. And now looking back in history it looks different.

So the country had its challenges, but initially those first ten years looked good economically; the civil conflict ended, they signed a peace agreement. It seemed like a victory at the time. . . . But in retrospect, you see how that’s when Zimbabwe enshrined itself basically as a one-party state.

Armen Aramyan

I feel like you describe it in your verse on Noname’s song “gospel?” There’s this celebration of independence with something lurking in the background.

billy woods

That’s in reference to when I’m there early, early, early, when people are still celebrating the victory. But I am definitely trying to foreshadow what is to come. As well as highlight the beauty and hopefulness of that moment at the time, which was real and should be appreciated.

Armen Aramyan

I feel like in many of your songs you have this dual attitude towards revolutionary politics. You could almost call it pessimistic, because you show how it feels when all these revolutionary projects fail at the end. Is this attitude influenced more by your personal experience with revolution in Zimbabwe or in general by your interest in history of revolutionary movements?

billy woods

By all of the above, but personal experience certainly [played a big part].

I mean, I consider myself a leftist. But I get into a lot of arguments, because I think a lot of the time there’s this romanticization. . . . I think people’s hearts and their desires are in the right places. These are people who are seeking justice and equity and to live in a better place. But sometimes I feel like they are repeating the same things that I grew up with. Nobody talks about what happened and what will be done differently.

If you look at the world at the end of the 1970s, when I was a child, leftist forces and ideas had captured much of the developing world. Of course, they were in combat with right-wing forces and ideas. Nobody’s pretending that communism was just allowed to flourish. When we talk about things like the Black Panthers and people say, “But COINTELPRO” . . . Well, of course, if you’re attempting to overthrow the government, the government is going to work against you. This is just A plus B. If you’re looking for a world in which those in power just allow you to remove them from power, it doesn’t exist. So if I’m evaluating a revolutionary movement, part of how I’m evaluating it is the ability to overcome those obstacles, or at least whether you planned or had a logical, sound idea of how to do so.

I have that same problem now sometimes talking to people about Palestine and Israel. People say, “Oh well, this is a sad and upsetting moment, but this is the most Palestine has ever been in the world consciousness.” And I’m like, no it’s not! We’ve done this several times! We’ve done this! Palestinians have the right to resist; the oppressed have the right to use violence to throw off their oppressors. At the same time, I think it’s important sometimes to look and say what has happened when this has happened. And steadily over the course of my life as a person who grew up in a profoundly anti-Zionist culture, country, and domestic environment, [I observed] how Israel has gotten more territory, how it got more powerful, and how Palestinian lives have become more and more miserable.

When I was a child, Palestinians moved freely through Israel. Now, after two intifadas and several wars, Palestinians are worse off than they ever have been and are currently being ethnically cleansed. It’s okay to question what these movements have done for their people. I’m not going to sit here and say that Hamas is great just because they fight. Lots of people can fight, and if you fight and lose or every time, everything you do helps your opponent. . . . The Israelis actually used Hamas’s growth to split the Palestinian movement and neuter it in many ways. It’s okay to acknowledge that and look at things.

For example, when I was a kid, I found the Shining Path really exciting and fascinating. And then later in life, I was thinking: thank god they didn’t win. That doesn’t make their opponents good. But the Shining Path was a cult of personality led by a psychopath.

In the 1970s, ostensibly leftist movements were in power in many parts of the Middle East and also were the dominant groups fighting for revolution and liberation in Palestine. And here we are now. The failure of those governments, the rise of political Islam, and the failures of the secular state in the Middle East have profoundly changed the whole dynamic. Now if you’re talking about the Middle East and resistance movements, you’re almost always talking about movements that are religious in nature. And you see the rise of political Islam and the sidelining of socialism.

Some of that is also the failure of ostensibly socialist states that just became kleptocracies and dictatorships. There’s nothing wrong with wanting and desiring revolution. But [there should be] some level of recognition that in any revolution you’re letting a tiger out of the cage. What’s going to happen after that is hard to say.

Armen Aramyan

So you told me about all these disputes with other leftists in the United States. It makes me want to ask you if there is any political movement or ideas that you’re inspired by currently or optimistic about.

billy woods

It’s interesting how many significant elections [happened in 2024]: Narendra Modi in India, an important one in Brussels, the US election, and the ANC losing its mandate in South Africa. Mexico elected Claudia Sheinbaum. I don’t have much optimism about Palestine, just because in general that’s not how it has worked, but I hope [for the best].

I am encouraged by the fact that many young people seem to be seizing what is really a global discontent with the status quo and moving to the left, but I also see a huge uprising of right-wing parties. And it’s also interesting, especially within the United States, that young men are moving rightwards and women to the left. And I’m curious about what that means. I guess you asked me for positive things . . .

Armen Aramyan

Yeah [laughs].

billy woods

Some of my leftist friends would say I don’t pay enough attention to the things that are happening at the grassroots in terms of coalition building, community building. . . . [It’s also important] that there are so many avenues for independent media. And of course, the rise and more opportunities and power for women, and greater recognition of nonbinary people’s place and rights in society.

It’s tough because with many of these things I think, “Oh, they’re just doing this instead.” One on hand, there’s a lot of dissatisfaction with the status quo and energy among young African people. But I also feel like the modern African state is let off the hook by happily watching all of their young people flee to other countries so they can continue looting and stealing. And they’re like, “Good luck. Hope you make it across the ocean to Italy. And if you don’t, either way, you’re still not my problem.” In the past, some of those leaders would have been in trouble because you have all of these young people, some of them educated, who can’t find work and who are dissatisfied. And that’s how you end up with street protests and revolutions. And now those people just go to be an Uber driver somewhere or they drown in the Mediterranean or die in the Colombian jungles.

What do you think’s going to happen in Russia?

Armen Aramyan

I’m definitely not an optimist.

billy woods

Why?

Armen Aramyan

Just like you said, a lot of politically active people left the country. I’m one of those. Many Russian political groups don’t have experience in building movements. On the other hand, the Russian state is very effective in suppressing dissent, so I don’t expect any political movement to rise in Russia anytime soon. The democratic movement which opposed the war with Ukraine was crushed, with thousands of people prosecuted and imprisoned. And right now, there is no way to build more power because of the repressive apparatus that the Russian state has built.

Like you said, with all revolutionary movements, you either win or you lose. If you’re strong enough, you win; if not, you lose. It’s about this balance of power, and we lost.

billy woods

That’s another thing that I sometimes tell people. I don’t have a problem with going to war or something, but I don’t want to go to war to lose. Because then when you lose, everything is worse, as well as all the people are dead.

Armen Aramyan

But you don’t know if you’re going to win.

billy woods

You don’t know if you’re going to win. But sometimes you could look at situations and say what the likely outcome is.

The Russian situation is sad. As a child, I saw the Soviet Union as heroic. Then I realized, “Oh, this is actually terrible.” And now, seeing it reform and turn into something like the Soviet Union again, but without any principles . . .

Armen Aramyan

That’s exactly what happened.

billy woods

It’s so much worse. At least before you had an animating principle, although oftentimes it failed, [and now] there is nothing. . . . The same way I look at Zimbabwe, and it’s sad that all of that came to this.

I had an experience a few weeks ago in the States. I was walking down Fulton Ave, and I [came across] this small African Liberation Day concert. I spoke with one of the organizers, who was wearing a Zimbabwe T-shirt, and asked if he had been to Zimbabwe. He said that he had been there a lot and worked with some organizations there. It was a black American person, and he seemed like a good person with his soul in the right place. But when we discussed the current situation, he spoke about fighting the sanctions [against the government of Zimbabwe] and how the leading ZANU PF party is the only party doing right by the people, with the opposition being controlled by the West. And I’m like, “I am from there! The people you’re talking about ate dinner in my house! I know these situations!”

And it’s crazy that people can be so into their ideology that they just refuse to look at reality. It can’t all just be “America’s fault.” People in Zimbabwe are just regular people like you and me, and they’re not better than anyone or worse. Their leaders do bad things and are corrupt, just like anywhere else. In what country in the world does one party remain in power for thirty, forty years and not become corrupt? And it’s interesting to me how easily people are still able to call on the boogeyman of the West and say, “Oh, yeah. Now forget all of the things that are going wrong. America did everything.” America does lots of things wrong. America has its own problems, and America spreads its problems around the world.

I have people that still tell me that the West caused the situation in Ukraine. And I’m like, but [Vladimir Putin] has done this in Crimea. He did this in Georgia; he did this in Chechnya. So America just did all of these? America is the reason that Russia took Abkhazia and Ossetia? They took Crimea; they took Donbas.

Russia has used the pretext of Russian minorities in its neighboring countries to take pieces of the country and to weaken them internally in order to prevent people from thinking that they can leave the Russian orbit. That’s not NATO: I think this is going to happen at any time when one of those countries tries to move outside of the Russian orbit and they don’t want them to, period.

Like with Chechnya. Sometimes it can be as simple as a sort of very visceral, masculine show of power. There was nothing that Russia needed in Chechnya, but the instability in Chechnya and the loss of the First Chechen War gave Putin an opportunity to show, “I can take control, I can defeat our enemies. I can put an end to separatism as an idea, and then we’re not going to have to worry about Dagestan and every little person deciding they want to leave. I’m going to stop it right here.” Certain things could be understood strategically, like you want Crimea because of strategic reasons as well as power reasons. But sometimes people are just doing things because they feel some sort of ownership over a place, or people, or culture.

Even if you look at US support of Israel, [it doesn’t make sense]. At this point, with the Cold War over, the United States has favorable relationships with lots of countries in the Middle East, which would be even better if it didn’t support Israel. Sometimes people describe US support of Israel as a colonial project. Those factors play some part. But a significant part at this point is, I think, cultural. If somebody’s painted as your ally, and people feel this religious and cultural connection to this side, then strategic reasons don’t matter. Strategically, the United States has more to gain from disengaging with Israel. But everything is not numbers. Some things are people’s emotions, projections, how they feel about a thing.

Like when the United States left Afghanistan. Actually Trump started it. And there was nothing left to be gained. It’s a lost project. But the way in which it ended has been endlessly brought up like a humiliation: “Oh, the way we left Afghanistan made us look weak.” I’m not speaking my personal opinion, but for these people, based on their logic, what do they care about? You stop pouring a bunch of money and human lives down a drain in a project that was not working. You’re never going to go to Afghanistan. You don’t like Muslim people. You don’t want anything to do with Afghanistan. Apparently, you don’t like foreign wars because you’re against these other wars that are going on. So who cares how you left Afghanistan? You’re gone now and you don’t have to worry about it anymore.

Armen Aramyan

I would like to speak with you about how the current political moment is reflected in music. Elsewhere you’ve mentioned that your interest in hip-hop started with politicized music such as Public Enemy. Right now, hip-hop is the most commercially successful music in the world. It’s also the biggest genre in Russia and the whole region, and American hip-hop is, of course, popular all around the world. Do you feel like there is still anything politically radical left in hip-hop or is it wholly subdued by this commercial form?

billy woods

Anytime you’re talking about an art form there’s all sorts of. . . . It’s like if somebody said, is there anything still radical or politicized in film? Of course. Is it in the Marvel movie you’re about to watch? Probably not. But there are lots of films being made. And of course, naturally, many of them are radical in thought and ideas.

I really think what Mos Def said on “Black on Both Sides” is true. Hip-hop is us: wherever we’re at, that’s where hip-hop is. So if you ask, is there anything radical left in American society? Of course there is. Is that the mainstream? No, but the mainstream can never be radical. It’s very rare that the mainstream is radical. And of course, when the mainstream becomes radical, then radicalism necessarily becomes something else. After the October Revolution, being a communist was no longer radical. Maybe being a Trotskyist was.

And sometimes it’s not necessarily overtly political, but it could still be radical. I like to think that my own music is radical in its own way. I like to think that it’s thought provoking and challenging on levels that are both political and personal. But to me, politics is personal.

Armen Aramyan

I feel like in the ‘90s or early 2000s, a politicized hip-hop was closer to the mainstream.

billy woods

You could say in some ways, yeah. But then what about Kendrick Lamar, who is one of the biggest artists in the world and certainly in American hip-hop? I would say that whatever his politics and social views, his music is politicized in the wider sense of the word — again, if we’re thinking of the personal as political and not purely like, are you left-wing or right-wing. I think it’d be a mistake to say that his music is not politicized or at least overtly concerned with the state of our lives, our culture, our society, for better or worse.

Armen Aramyan

In conclusion, could you recommend some politically conscious hip-hop artists that you feel more listeners should be introduced to?

billy woods

I think I would say ELUCID. I’m a huge fan. I think he’s great, and I think that his music is very both political and personal. Also, Noname. Not all her politics are my politics, and [I don’t agree] with some [of her] perspectives. But I think that Noname is somebody who is very genuine and outgoing with her own politics and her views. And then on a side of something that’s personal but where you find the political in the personal, in terms of being quality interesting underground music, I think MIKE is really dope. Also Quelle Chris. Cavalier is definitely an artist who is in that lane. Curley Castro. ShrapKnel. Of course, Moor Mother. She would be close to the top of my list. I think all of those are good examples and fall into that category.

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