INTERVIEW: G-EAZY and The Endless Summer Release

23 Aug

Dirty Laces got the chance to catch up with Oakland born G-Eazy to talk about his latest digital release, The Endless Summer , the creation of his super retro music video for “Runaround Sue” featuring Greg Banks and his favorite part about the city of New Orleans. Check out the interview after the jump..

Rapid Fire with G-Eazy

Name: Gerald Gillum

Hometown: Oakland, CA

Nicknames: G-Eazy, G

Age: 22

Favorite animal: Giraffe

Favorite cartoon: Hey Arnold

Favorite TV show: Fresh Prince

Favorite movie: Hook

Personal style in 5 words or less: Classic, iconic, clean, relaxed and cool.

Favorite clothing brands: NV Euro, Sloppy 2nds, Supreme, Mishka, American Apparel, j. Crew, Nudie jeans.

Celebrity crush: Rosario Dawson

Breakfast, lunch or dinner: Lunch

Nba or nfl: NBA

Finish the sentence: I can’t go a day without…. Sex.. Haha or music.

If you could have dinner with any 5 people, who would they be?

Kanye, Jay-Z, Beyonce, Rosario Dawson (would be my date haha) and Dr. Dre.

Words to live by: patience is a virtue

Dirty Laces: You’ve recently graduated from Loyola University, Congrats!! How was balancing class work and time to work on your music?

G-Eazy: Thanks yo! It was definitely a tough balancing act, but to be quite frank, school was pretty easy to bs once I got the hang of it- so I got good at doing enough to keep my scholarship and take what I needed from it, so that I could focus the rest of my energy on my music.

DL: How do you think living in New Orleans has influenced your music?

G-Eazy: Just by being in the South, New Orleans has definitely had it’s own influence on me – it was totally different from the Bay Area, where I grew up. They’re both super unique in their own ways. But the South has been driving hip-hop for the last 8 or 9 years, so I’ve soaked some of that up.

DL: What were your musical influences growing up?

G-Eazy: My aunt & uncle were in a local surf rock band when I was little, and I totally looked up to them. But at school, and around my friends, I was submerged in hip-hop culture. So 2pac and Biggie were early influences of course. But being in the bay, cats like e-40, keak da sneak, etc were big inspirations.

DL: Best part about living in New Orleans?

G-Eazy: How much that city likes to party. It’s unbelievable. And how much they enjoy live music. You can play a show any night of the week and they’re there. Other cities don’t seem to have that same appreciation for live music.

DL: What is your Favorite Restaurant in the city?

G-Eazy: Camellia grill! Those freezes are the shit, and the waiters there are hella cool. Good atmosphere in there. But if my budget is a little bigger on a particular evening, I’ll hit up Bourbon House, get some oysters and drink some wine.

DL: What did you learn during your experience when you opened for Drake?

G-Eazy: That I had a ways to go. It was both humbling and inspiring. Being so close to something so big, was dope. But it taught me how to work a crowd that wasn’t necessarily there to see me, which was a valuable learning experience. But most importantly, I learned that’s definitely what I want to do for the rest of my life. Touring on that scale, is the shit.

DL: What track on The Endless Summer do you most relate to right now? Do you have a favorite track? Which track was the most challenging?

G-Eazy: The title track might be the most honest depiction of who I am and where I’m at right now, in terms of school and my career. As far as a favorite, it’s either that or “all I could do” with Devon Baldwin & my homie Skizzy Mars. That one was fun to make, it came together really easily, but was actually quite a challenge to get OUT of protools lol. I made the beat and recorded the vocals all in the same session, but I had a million plug ins on all the tracks so the computer kept crashing everytime I would try to bounce it. I was like man, I know this song is good, now if I can only get it out of the computer lol. It literally took over 60 tries.

DL: I loved the concept and video for “Runaround Sue”. What was your favorite part about creating the video? And, can you give us a little insight to the creative process?

G-Eazy: Thanks!! Glad you liked it. Well first off, Tyler Yee’s a great talent- he’s been polishing his craft for the last 4 years or so and has really dedicated everything to what he does. He’s a good friend of mine, so it made the creative process really easy. We were both on the same page from day 1, we both agreed we were gonna have to pay a ton of attention to detail since it was a period piece set in 1961. So we knew everything had to be super on point. We watched a ton of old movies from that era, studying everything from wardrobe, to color correction, to overall cinematography. We re-wrote the story a few times, and just made sure everything was doable. So by the time we finally got on set to shoot everything, it came together because we had it ALL planned out ahead of time.

DL: What can we expect in the near future?

G-Eazy: Definitely more videos. Were planning the next couple right now. I’m always recording so more music too.