Mic Capes is a rising star from Portland. While many might not consider the Oregon city a hip-hop hub, the young lyricist says the scene is growing organically, just like most things from the Pacific Northwest.
“The local scene I feel like is stronger than it’s ever been,” Mic Capes says during an interview on Unique Access. “It’s a lot of quality coming out of there. Not just rappers, but videographers and photographers. The scene is nurturing some great talent. The local scene is strong because we throw a lot of local shows where we don’t really bring in a main act. We pack it out with local rappers and that’s what’s making it real strong out there.”
The Concrete Dreams rapper shares his own personal journey through the scene and says at first, he was trying to keep up with what was cool. Then, he found his own sound and ran his course.
“I started out writing about all the shit a lot of other people do,” he explains. “I was good at it, but at a certain point, it was just empty for me. So it was just like, I need to just be myself. At a certain point, I realized, man it’s only one of you. You don’t stand out if you’re trying to be like everybody else. So I just wrote, started telling my story. The more I got comfortable with my identity and who I was, and stronger in that, the better my music got, speaking from the heart and speaking on real shit that was going on around me.”
He didn’t completely throw away what he thought people wanted to hear. He calls his unique musical blend “candy and carrots.” His song “Jansport” was the first time he recalls perfecting this formula.
“You make people think that they getting some candy, but there’s also substance in there,” he says. “So I got the beat from this cat named Brxtn Chase and I thought, ‘Ah this is the one that I can do this on.’ So I went with popular I guess flow patterns and shit like that, like simplified it, but also still talked about shit that’s going on and where I come from. I kinda hid it in there like finessed it.”
Mic Capes says he found his own passion for lyricism when studying 2Pac, The Notorious B.I.G. and Nas. He has a special connection to Nas’ debut album, Illmatic and names “NY State of Mind” “one of my favorite songs ever.”
“When I relistened to Illmatic, that was like probably the turning point for me,” he shares. “I learned that he was 18 years old when he wrote that shit. I’m just listening to it, I was like damn. I can see everything he’s saying and the way he’s pairing his words together was crazy.”
The rising emcee says he blends the West Coast and East Coast influences to create his own sound.
“The West got the flavor and the feel, but the East got the real intricate rhyme patterns and shit like that,” he says.
One of the West Coast rappers he’s inspired by is Kendrick Lamar. He reveals that when he has writer’s block, he listens to the Compton artist to break him out of a funk and create a sense of competition.
“Kendrick Lamar to me is the bar,” he says. “Not just because he spits. It’s just the fact the shit he does on records is different. I haven’t heard many people since Andre 3000 do the shit that he does on tracks, so like I’m always looking at what’s the bar and going after that or trying to go above that. Or just trying to make my next verse better than my last, really.”
But Mic Capes has bigger goals than to just outdo Kendrick Lamar. He wants his audience to have a personal connection with his music and hopes he can give them new insight with each listen.
“My whole goal is touching people with the music,” he says. “Opening up new perspectives for people that may not come from where I’m talking about. Just understanding, getting people to ask deeper questions about situations and things. Just learning, really. Learning, motivating and inspiring. And pushing the bar lyrically, that’s my thing.”