fortable when I moved here, is that even though when I moved here I heard, ‘Oh, it’s a Greek neighborhood,’ it was different and never felt like I kind of stood out or didn’t fit in even though I moved here and everything was brand new to me,” he said. “It felt like somewhere I could fit and be comfortable, so I think that’s a big part of why I ended up staying here and made it my home and have been here for so long.” The “Control Your Own” album features different vocalists on each track, and everything that you hear other than the rapper is created by Jensen, mostly through sampling. The song “Queens” is unique in that Jensen was not working with a vocalist. “I just wanted to challenge myself to make an instrumental track where I wasn’t working with any rappers or any vocalists on it,” he said. Jensen has already released two music videos from the “Control Your Own” album: “With No Pressure” and “God Bless.” Those can be found on his website, rasbeats.com, where the “Queens” music video will be released as well. He said that his previous experience as a DJ inspired him to create his own music. “My music definitely came from being a DJ initially, playing records and learning a lot of different music,” he said. “DJing definitely played a huge part of when I began to create my own style and create my own music. That was a huge part of my inspiration in the beginning.” When he sets out to create a song, Jensen puts together the instrumental tracks, and the rappers write the lyrics to those tracks. After the rappers do their part, Jensen puts the finishing touches on the song. “My stuff is largely based off of rearranged samples, meaning that it’s sounds from different records that have been manipulated and put together in a new way,” he explained. “The majority of stuff you wouldn’t recognize where it came from, so it’s very different from some things with sampling where you take a record and you repeat it and it sounds like the original record.” In the past, Jensen had released a couple of singles and an EP with six songs. All that led up to the making of “Control Your Own” — his first album, which features 14 tracks. Even though there are different vocalists on each track, Jensen said, “It’s not really a compilation because it was created to give the album a consistency so when you listen to it, it sounds like one record, not 14 different directions. It’s hip-hop with a little bit more edge, you can say; it’s a little grittier than what you hear on the radio.” There’s a lot of focus on what the rappers say, whether it’s their message or their clever wordplay, Jensen said. “Also the beats, the production style is a little harder than what you hear on the radio right now,” he said. “It seems to my ears that hip-hop has turned very pleasant right now, most of the stuff that you hear on the radio. The line between hip-hop and R&B is very blurred. A lot of hip-hop and a lot of rap that you hear is very catchy. It’s very sort of accessible to everybody. “And music is different things to different people, but this one is something that it might challenge you a little bit more when you listen to it, hopefully,” he continued. “The lyrics are all written for the sake of great craftsmanship and great lyricism, and the music just has more of an edge to it. It’s funkier than a lot of stuff you hear right now on the radio. ‘Underground’ is one of the terms you might use for it.” Jensen said he kicked around the idea for this album for about five years before he started creating it, and while it required a huge investment of time and money, it was something he needed to express. “Musically, I wanted to create something that would be my version of a lot of great albums that I’ve gotten a lot out of listening to over the years, and I wanted to add on to that. I wanted to just honor the tradition of this style of music and at the same time add some new twists and turns to it so it’s fresh.” Photos courtesy of Andreas Vingaard “I’m just pretty sure that my music would sound different — whether that’s in the attitude of it, whether that’s in the drums or the melody or what have you. My music is definitely affected by living in Queens in a positive way and in a creative way.” Rasmus Jensen Local hip-hop producer 42 I BOROMAG.COM I DECEMBER 2016 ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT
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