A Latest Interview With An Indie Hip Hop Artist Prozhan

Prozhan is an indie hip hop recording artist currently living in Kristiansand, Norway. Born in the Bahamas, he moved to Brooklyn, New York for college where he released his first album before relocating to Scandanavia.

Q: How easily do songs tend to come to you?

Ans: Once I have the right track I can write a song in a matter of minutes. I typically set it aside and come back to it in a day or two and clean it up a bit. Sometimes it feels like the words are in there and I´m simply pulling them to the surface. To this day, I don´t have a clue how I write songs or what process I use to do it; it´s something beautiful that I just cannot explain.

Q: What’s your motto or the advice you live by?

Ans: The motto that I live by is «Someday is not a day of the week». I am a planner and I give myself an actual start date and an end date for projects. Once you can organize and follow through, I find that you can get a lot more done.

Ironically, my latest single is titled «Someday». In it I´m reminiscing meeting old friends that I haven´t seen in years and thinking about many of the antics we used to get up to back then. But I don´t make any real plans to meet with anyone, rather I just say we´ll get together «Someday».

Q: What is your favorite song to belt out at the bar/in the car?

Ans: «Don´t Look Back in Anger» by Oasis is an all-time favorite of mine. If I go to a karaoke bar, that´s a song that I will definitely go with. Granted I sound nothing like them, it just makes me feel really good and that to me is the whole purpose of music.

Q: For our readers who have never heard your music, explain your sound in 5 words?

Ans: Playlist of various musical genres. That is to say that I love hip hop, rock, reggae, dance etc.. and to some degree you will hear variations of those elements in my music from one song to the next. I use the word playlist because when I would make a playlist, I would choose music that I loved and wanted to listen to. Genre played no role in that and that´s how I approach making music.

Q: You write all of your own music; where do you draw inspiration from when you write songs and what’s your favorite part about the proccess?

Ans: Yes, I do write all of my own music and I draw inspiration from my everyday life. Granted not every experience will be my own, some I will have read about or seen but for the most part they are my stories that I set to music.

IMG_6299

Q:What is your favorite song to perform live?

Ans: «The Zoo» is my favorite song to perform live. It´s a dance track telling a story about all of the fun and exciting things that happened to us when we would go to this club called The Zoo. We were party animals and every night we would be there. The crowd goes wild when that song comes on and I usually have to do an encore because nobody wants the party to end.

Q:Do you have any events coming up or recording going on right now?

Ans: I am recording new music now and I will be releasing a new single next month via Spotify, Apple Music and other digital distribution outlets. Just search «Prozhan», follow me and get updates when I release new tracks.

Q:  Which instruments do you play?

Ans: I play the piano and the guitar. As a hip hop artist most people don´t expect you to be able to play an instrument and for a long time that was true of me. But the more I fell in love with rock music, Oasis, Aerosmith, and those guitar riffs I want to actually play them instead of my always available air guitar. So I  got an electric and an Best Acoustic guitars , went to youtube and began watching tutorials on how to play. The same can be said for learning the piano as well.

Q:  Who are your favorite musicians? Groups? CD’s?

Ans: My go-to list of music is Oasis, Aerosmith, DMX, Tupac, Alanis Morissette and Kenny Rogers. I can listen to each one of their music and be transported to a differnt place in time and have totally different emotions. One is to rock out to, while another is just to lay back an hear a story.

Q:  Do you get nervous before a performance or a competition?

Ans: No, I don´t. The thing is, I love karaoke and I have no problem getting up on stage and performing in front of an audience. So when I have a performance I simply see it as performing karaoke, only difference is I using my own songs that I just happen to know all of the words to.

 

Q:  What advice would you give to beginners who are nervous?

Ans: I would strongly recommend going to karaoke. Get a couple friends, rent a private room and just sing to your heart´s content. Then progress to the open room and perform for the crowds there and after a few times it will become second nature.

 

Q:  How often and for how long do you practice?

Ans: I practice the piano and guitar for a minimum of 30 minutes a day. Each. Currently, I don´t perform with an instrument, just backing tracks; this is hip hop. But I want to play the guitar and keyboard on songs during shows at some point so I´m working up to it. If there were something I would be nervous about that would be it.

Thanks for taking time out of your day:)

Thank you for the opportunity to share my passion with your audience and they can follow me on sosial media, I´m very easy to find. Everything, IG, twitter, fb, youtube is all prozhan or @prozhan.

So thanks again and I look forward to connecting with some of you.