In a recent interview with Dazed, A$AP Ferg talked about how A$AP Rocky gave him his first big break in the music game, Obama's aura, and a few of the people who have influenced his life. After sharing his admiration for his mom and saying that he would put his father's face on the $100 bill, Ferg claimed that he relates to Jean-Michel Basquiat.
At this point, it seems like every rapper name-drops Basquiat as his or her favorite artist. It's true that there have been quite a few Basquiat references throughout hip-hop history, but Ferg was able to backup his claim with facts. "He used to paint with Andy Warhol, and was one of the first black mainstream artists," the rapper told Dazed. "He kind of came from the bottom, from the downtown scene in NY all the way up to mainstream LA."
Ferg added that he is friends with Fab Five Freddy, a visual artist and pioneer of hip-hop culture who was also very close with Basquiat. As a designer and artist himself, the rapper also respects the level of swag that Basquiat had: "He used to go out with Madonna, fuck with all these major singers, and paint in Giorgio Armani suits. He’d have paint all over his suits, but he didn’t give a fuck. His art was dope, but I think it was his personality that made him."
Read the full interview over at Dazed, and go deeper into the mind of Ferg with an episode of "The Neighborhood" that we shot with the young Traplord in Harlem.
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[via Dazed]
