An Interview with MaceyOMaze
Dami: What inspired you to start music?
MaceyOMaze: I was always interested in music growing up. It started off with dance for me though; I used to try to copy Michael Jackson and Chris Brown, but what inspired me to start rapping was NWA when the “Straight Outta Compton” movie came out.
Dami: When making music, where do you grab inspiration from?
MaceyOMaze: I get my inspiration from the atmosphere of my current environment. Whether that be when I’m on the bus riding through Roxbury or Mattapan or Dorchester. Whether I’m in my room and I get a sudden spark of inspiration, or even just walking around my neighborhood in general.
Dami: How would you describe your sound?
MaceyOMaze: My sound comes from a combination of 90s and early 2000s hip-hop with heavy focus on lyricism and soul. Boom bap is my main choice of production, but I am able to branch out and experiment with new subgenres as well.
Dami: With boom bap not being as mainstream as it once was, what is your plan?
MaceyOMaze: I feel as though boom bap not being mainstream is more of an advantage to me than a challenge. Reason being is that if boom bap was all over the place, it would get oversaturated quickly. And even though boom bap hasn’t been quite mainstream these days, it’s had a bit of a resurgence in the past 5 years with underground hip-hop artists.
Dami: What’s your creative process like?
MaceyOMaze: My creative process is very slow. I like to take time with my music. I’m a quality over quantity kind of artist.
Dami: Doesn’t that affect releases though?
MaceyOMaze: Sometimes it does, but there are pros and cons to everything. In my opinion, I would rather it be released late than to release something that lacks quality just to meet a certain date. I feel like that’s not fair to the listeners.
Dami: You just dropped a mixtape. Tell us more about it.
MaceyOMaze: My latest mixtape is called “Wreckin’ Shop!”. With this project, I really wanted to dive deeper into that 90s hip-hop influence. From the production to the cover art; even to the way I projected my voice in the cadences I used while rapping. I was really intentional about every little detail to make this project as authentic as possible to that golden sound.
Dami: What was the creative process like?
MaceyOMaze: It was quite a struggle actually. I wanted to figure out how to get a raw and gritty sound production-wise, but still maintaining a high level of quality throughout the songs. It was pretty difficult to find that balance.
Dami: How did you find it at the end?
MaceyOMaze: With the help of my boy Rxot2hard. He mixed most of the project, and gave me some production tips along the way.
Dami: What are 3 words you’ll use to describe the tape?
MaceyOMaze: Real, underground, classic.
Dami: What’s next after this tape?
MaceyOMaze: I have a couple concepts in the works as we speak. I don’t want to say too much about what’s coming next in terms of my own projects, but what I’ll say is the next project I drop is purely me and my story.
Dami: How’s it been like being a part of Ethereal Visions?
MaceyOMaze: Ethereal Visions is the best thing that’d happened to me. They’ve helped me reach lengths I never dreamed of seeing growing up. Thanks to them, I’ve come so far not only as an artist but as a person. They’re really like family and we move as such.
Dami: What led to y’all becoming a collective.
MaceyOMaze: Ethereal Visions is actually a label. What led to me meeting them was the underground mixtape we dropped on SoundCloud back in 2021. I sent a lot of beats for that project and I also recorded a verse on there as well. After that project dropped, I stayed in touch with them on a daily basis just cooking up beats and writing songs with them on Discord. It was a real natural transition. Before I knew it, I was a part of Ethereal Visions.
Dami: Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
MaceyOMaze: In 5 years, I see myself being a staple in Boston hip-hop scene if not sooner than that.
Check out MaceyOMaze’s newest mixtape here
