Jack Harlow’s Come Home The Kids Miss You arrived on Friday, so naturally, the 24-year-old has been out on the press circuit, promoting the 15-track record. Most recently, he sat down with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe to discuss rumours about him being an “industry plant,” his biggest inspirations, and how he remains humble as he shoots to superstardom, among other things.
“My career had very humble beginnings,” the “WHAT’S POPPIN” hitmaker told the host of the aforementioned gossip. “That’s why anytime I see my name associated with anything like ‘industry plant,’ it makes me so proud to really be able to say that I’m like, out of everyone in the game right now, one of the furthest from it.”
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Harlow recalled the years he spent performing at open mics and attending events like South by Southwest and A3C, even performing at showcases “with no one there.”
“My first tour, I went to Madison, Wisconsin, did a bar with eight people in it,” he said. “I felt those feelings of not being the guy at all. Yeah, bravado on record, but then I’m going around and finding out I’m not the guy. I felt all, I did this, but it’s like you said, once you’re there in this bubble, and if people didn’t see any of that, they’re like, ‘Where’d he come from? Wow, he just got it dropped in his lap.'”
While he didn’t become a success overnight, now that he’s made it, the White Men Can’t Jump star has a lot of legends in his corner, including Drake and Kanye West, who he revealed have been major inspirations for his own work.
“We’ve had our talks. But more than anything, I just take notes from him on his actions. He’s leaving a blueprint behind, you know what I’m saying?” Harlow said of the Toronto native.
“I just pull from the playbook of all the legends where it resonates with me. Ye is a huge one for me, just resonates with me massively. I see what he did. But I think it all just comes from just being the route of just not being a street artist. Because it’s just something so traditionally street about this genre. And if you’re not street… I’m not the first artist to come through that isn’t that. And so inevitably I’m going to take notes.”
Elsewhere in his interview with Zane Lowe, Jack Harlow spoke on the importance of humility and financial freedom – check it out above, and stream Come Home The Kids Miss You here.
[Via]