Hooligan Chats: A Conversation with Quentin + Brian of Angry Blackmen
Interview + photos by Andrea van den Boogaard
“We're just two characters trying to make it through White America, trying to make it through capitalism, trying to make it through all this type of elitism that's happening, with the divide with music and genre, you know. It's crazy.”
Hooligan meets Angry Blackmen at Humboldt Lagoon to discuss their most recent album with Deathbomb Arc - The Legend of ABM - and upcoming Pitchfork set.
It’s the coolest afternoon Chicago’s had in weeks. Towheaded teenagers scream as they strand themselves in the swan boats. We sit in front of the pricing board for the boats themselves - $30 per hour. We’re ready to talk about consumerism.
I press the record button.
First things first, I was listening to an old interview of yours -
QB: From when?
Dude. Like… 2019?
QB: No! I don’t wanna hear it! [laughing]
[laughing] Well I heard you’re both anime heads! And the people are gonna want to know - favorite anime?
QB: Off the rip, a part of me wants to say Cowboy Bebop, because it's a culture thing. But I'm gonna just be real - and the anime that means the most to me… I'm gonna go Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.
BW: Yeah I'm gonna go ahead and say the same, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. Quentin put me on - and I've watched Hunter x Hunter and I've watched One Piece, but it's not holding up to Brotherhood.
QB: [Referencing Brian’s One Piece shirt] With the One Piece shirt on! Crazy.
BW: [laughing] Don't get me wrong you guys, I still love One Piece! And the shirt is nice. I got the shirt on right now, so when you guys read this, you know.
Second - Favorite anime soundtrack? Does your answer change?
QB: It changes for me. My favorite anime soundtrack is probably going to be FLCL. It's done by this band called The Pillows. They do this Japanese rock alternative type thing. And they put me on when I was at a young age, so I'm gonna go with The Pillows and the FLCL soundtrack.
BW: [Rolling his eyes] Sorry you guys, I'm boring, I don't have a favorite anime track. So please still love me in the end, as I will always love you. Thank you.
Where, in your opinion, does that love for anime or epic stories come up in the music? I mean, it comes up pretty literally in “Stanley Kubrick” - but how big of an influence is it in the other songs?
QB: It gives me a more cinematic approach, a more emotional approach. That's why I think I like anime a little bit more than American cartoons. I like American cartoons too, like they have their pros, but I think anime is really emotional. They're really tapped into the story coming first. I think with American cartoons, it's more about comedy, or big setups, or even animation.
But I think with anime, what I relate to is the character arcs, like the hero's journey is like so big in anime. And I implement that into the music.
BW: Yeah. I go based on the stories that I watch, and how carefully they build the character’s life, their origins… And it's like, you’re all-knowing and fully submerged now, because they do such a great job with the story building.
In your newest album - The Legend of ABM - Who in your mind is the main character of this story? And what are they facing? Who (or what) are their enemies?
QB: I would say the artist in general. The main character is the everyday artist, going against consumerism, capitalism, big organizations. It’s just a story of just 2 people trying to make make it through.
BW: Like, that's what we are. We're just two characters trying to make it through White America, trying to make it through capitalism, trying to make it through all this type of elitism that's happening, with the divide with music and genre, you know. It's crazy.
QB: People trying to pursue something.
Where were you in your respective lives when you began working on these tracks?
BW: Every word I wrote on that album, it was a real event that came from behind that. So like, in “Stanley Kubrick”, I'm just referencing passings that happened, and I'm smoking, and… just trying to get through. And I'm getting calls like a receptionist - everybody was calling my phone when my when one of my uncles passed away - so I was dealing with a lot, and we was working on the album too.
And then, you know, I was having some suicidal tendencies, and just feeling like what we were doing was just - I felt goofy. I felt like, “Why am I doing this?” I feel like I got underwear and a cape on. I'm running around trying to prove to people that I'm a superhero.
And as soon as I had those thoughts, that's when all the doors started opening. So, I don't know, it's like - I kind of had a breakthrough moment. A breakdown that led to a breakthrough.
QB: The Legend of ABM is the story of two individuals coming together. Like Brian had his own experiences, and I had my own experiences - because I wasn't here when I wrote that. We’re a Chicago duo, but I actually left Chicago because I was just dealing with too much shit.
And I just wanted to reinvent everything. And that’s the crazy part about this album, that we wanted it to be like a reinvention, like a remake. It was like this phenomenon starting 10 years ago of rebooting shit, like Creed, Star Wars, Ghostbusters... We wanted that. We wanted to reboot Angry Blackmen to where it's bigger and better.
I was in a car crash before this album started, so even that propelled me - like, “All right. We gotta do it, cause I don't want to, you know - die.” Make shit count, you know?
AV: I’ve been listening to your music all week, and there’s that honesty in the EP, too, but the shit that you’re saying in The Legend of ABM… It’s like you really peeled off a whole layer.
QB: Yeah. [To Brian] You’ve said that before, that this album is like us taking off the cape.
The EPs were more like we just angry, or we just rapping, and we got a little shit. This is more, like… Behind the curtains. Reboot, part two.
BW: I compared the legend the ABM to the movie Logan. [laughing]
QB: [laughing] Yeah! Cause Logan's, like, a deconstruction of like all the X-Men movies! That’s a great movie.
BW: I watched that movie like 3 times.
QB: [laughing] So good. He literally has to face his past self.
BW: [laughing] Gets beat up.
Do you actually want to talk about the beats for a sec? What was it like to create them with Formants/Derek Allen, and what references did you use for that soundscape?
QB: Yeah. Cook, bro. I think the beats for The Legend of ABM were epic. I only co-produced 1 track, and that was Magnum Opus.
BW: Magnum Opus was one that we know for sure he stuck with, because he's on video playing the piano. And then I'm such a music kid, I was just, like, throwing ideas at Derek.
QB: He brought his own thing to that. All that shit, he really put his foot into. I want to give him his flowers.
Like with Derek, he had a distinct thing he wanted to do with the production, and we brought our own take on that - whether it was lyrics or adding shit.
He was influenced by Public Enemy like The Bomb Squad… And Nine Inch Nails was a big one. I remember I sent him this track called The Day The World Went Away, and he was already familiar with it. He made his own version of that with Dead Men Tell No Lies. So if you listen to that track and listen to Dead Men, it's kind of crazy.
Dälek from the early 2000s, too. Shout out to Derek.
BW: Shout out to you Derek for staying up those late nights, producing it in your boxes. You know what I'm saying? Got to give you your flowers, man.
QB: Even like the mixing, we made like 11. I think he was getting tired of my black ass. [laughing]
BW: [laughing] There's like a running joke - Because we was on the radio and he had to send some files to the radio station, and it said “Stankley Kubrick” instead of Stanley. That's how tired he was. I laughed, I rolled so hard that whole day.
QB: Yeah, shout to him.
I wanted to ask, what audio are you sampling in the title track of Legend of ABM?
QB: So like, I'm gonna be real, I got that idea from Death Grips, shout out to them. [laughing] I like that they do that, I ain't gonna lie.
But I'm big on obscure shit. Like, I don't want to come off weird, but I like Aileen Wuornos, the serial killer - Like she's in the album. That's her voice, “The cops! The system!” part - that's her. I don't know, it just sounds cool. Shit like that adds some realism. Because everybody wants to be pristine and clean in music - especially in hip hop. And something like [the sample] just adds this grittiness into it.
And in that song, “Sabotage”, I personally feel like out of all the serial killers, she got sabotaged the most. Like, I don't think Aileen Wuornos is as bad as a Ted Bundy type, because she was a sex worker and she was trying to defend herself, and she started killing out of that. I just thought Aileen Wuornos was dope to put in there.
Our friend Yuki, who's on the cover, is also the audio sample on The Legend of ABM. If you translate it from Japanese, she's basically telling our story in a similar way - Like, “Angry Blackmen is returning, Quentin and Brian, and they're back to take the industry by storm,” and that was cool.
BW: We had Oppenheimer on the old EP, too.
QB: Before the movie came out, yeah! J. Robert Oppenheimer was on the old EP, on Atomic, that famous Bhagavad Gita quote. “I become death, the destroyer of worlds,” that shit. On Reality, we did The Wire, too, right? On The Wire, he was like, “the most dangerous person is a nigga with a library card.”
BW: See, you got references towards other artists. I was just a fan of that because I made an obscure instrumental album under a different producer name, under the name Black Brian - But you have to figure out how to spell it yourself. It’s spelled funny. [laughing] And it has that same type of taste. I was just already a fan of it just from the feel, from the vibe.
You pull so much from history. Now that you’re touring with these songs around the world, do you feel like your interpretation, or experience, of the songs is changing based on what you’re seeing around you right now?
BW: I don't feel like it's changed. I feel like in my head, when I touch the stage, I live the same story that I was building the night that I wrote what I wrote. Because one - it helps me remember all my lyrics, and two - it helps me bring more feeling, because I'm not mentally there on stage. I'm mentally living the world that I built on a piece of paper.
QB: Somebody in Europe was like, “You know why I like your music, is because it's so simple.”
And I took offense to that quote at first… But what he was saying is that when we rap, it's just to the point. And like, he understands it.
Cause you know, America has its own little intricacies that you have to be American to know about. So when we were rapping over in Europe, people can get it because it's clear, and they can understand it cause it's up front. And I thought that was really cool. He's like, “A lot of European people are gonna gravitate towards that, cause it's easy to present, but not easy to digest.”
I used to hate that. Because a lot of people - like in reviews - people were saying that we were super simple.
BW: Yeah, but that's just the background of people that were judging that type of music.
QB: Yeah. So I think it worked to our advantage. And it’s cool, because we want people to understand it. So for me, it just hasn't really been like… a misinterpretation. You know, everybody's gotten it. And I think it's really because the time period we're in. We talked about that too - if George Floyd didn't happen, this would be a different conversation.
BW: You said if George Floyd didn't happen, the album wouldn't hit as hard as it does today.
QB: Yeah, because I feel like that really brought that shit back into like the public. I think it's the biggest demonstration/gathering in American history. So yeah, I got to credit that. I mean obviously we had big events in the past, but that's the one where I feel like, you know, people get it. Cause we would go to Europe and we would see ACAB shit there.
AV: Yeah. There’s a quote I’m thinking of from Leigh Bowery about finding the poison in your art. But I think about it when we’re talking about work where the idea is like poison. It sticks because it’s accessible, and it spreads really quickly and it stays there, it’s not a fleeting situation. Once it happens, it’s there forever.
QB: Yeah, I like that. I like that a lot.
On the topic of obscure shit - I was listening to your Vocalo interview with Bekoe from earlier this year, and you said something that inspired me. When you were first getting to know each other, a friend defined you as both liking weird music, and that that’s partially what drew you to each other. What, in your opinion, is your favorite thing about weird shit, especially in our modern culture of popular consumerism?
QB: It makes you feel special.
Cause if you like Drake, I don't know…. He's getting shit on right now, but I'm gonna take every turn I can! Cause it used to be uncool to shit on Drake! Now you can shit on him and nobody says nothing! Back then It's like, “Oh, why you shit on Drake?” It's like - Bros! I told you! [laughing]
No, but when you like shit other than that, it's like…. You just feel special. Like it's yours. And only a select few of people like it. And that’s okay.
I feel like you don't have to make everything for everyone. It just has to have audience. That's why I kind of hope that we stay in this - I mean obviously everybody wants to eat make money, but I hope we stay in a realm where it's just appreciated, you know. It's just like not everybody knows about it, but if you know, you know.
BW: The one thing I like about weird music is the different perspectives that it brings. Like, you get drill rap, you get the Chief Keef's, the Lil Durk’s, and they all rap different - But they all get towards the same moral of the story: They're the shit, we got drugs, we got guns, we'll kill you, don't try us. And it’s like… Okay, well, let me hear about an argument with your mom last week. Let me hear about a weird thing you and your friend encountered. Or if you and your girlfriend are polyamorous, let's talk about that.
One thing a person told me, they was like, “I see you don't like main industry music. You like backpack music.” Like, another artist I like, Veeze, he's from Detroit. He was like backpack rap basically. Not as known... It's known, but it's not as known.
So I kind of like that take. I took that and ran with it. I do enjoy music that other people don't listen to, because then I would hate to be driving in the street and I'm listening to my favorite, and then the next car over, they listening to the same thing. I don't know, it's not stylish no more.
Speaking of main industry shit - In Dead Men Tell No Lies, there’s this line, “Devil really stalking, I can see the pitchfork / Fuck a publication and them crackers up at Pitchfork.” Do you want to talk about playing Pitchfork this weekend? [laughing]
QB: Oh yeah, I got some shit. [laughing]
So I was just mad because like, we were doing this - When did we start? 2017. Holy shit. Yeah, I was in college at the time, and we were doing this for so long, and I felt like people just weren't paying attention. And then with this album, our backs were against the wall. It was like we just didn’t care about all that shit.
But I was just fed up with these people, these gatekeepers that wasn't giving us a shot. That's why I was like, man, fuck a publication and these crackers up a pitchfork. Now. Did the 27 year old Quentin know he was gonna be on Pitchfork and play Pitchfork? [laughing] He did not know that. But at the time, you know, that was the sentiment. So sometimes you know, when people’s backs are against the wall and they want to make honest music, that's the shit that gets people who are in a dishonest world. They don't seem to care [at Pitchfork], though. [laughing] They're just like, “Man, these guys - put them up.”
BW: It was like, a really punk move of them to do that. A real, like, heavy rock move. “All right, you say fuck us, we're gonna put you on our stage.” You know what I'm saying? I love that. And that made me grow more respect for Pitchfork. Like, “We can take a bash. And, don't take it away.” It's a part of art. It's a part of hip hop. They know.
With that bring said, what do you hope to bring to Pitchfork?
BW: Well, I've been storing my knees away for 6 months in the refrigerator. It's time to bring them out. I've been unthawing them all week. [laughing] They're ready for Friday. I'm bringing straight energy, straight muscle, and straight curiosity. You're not going to know my next move on stage, so be careful.
QB: Damn.
[Watching people in the park] I miss Chicago.
Anyways, I just want to bring a great performance. I want this to be memorable, a memorable event in our history. And just a memorable event in general, where people even 20 years from now will go down the list and be like, “Oh, who was Angry Blackmen?”
You just had a show at Chop Shop - and your first show together was right next door at Subterranean in 2017. Flash forward to now, and you’re signed and touring internationally with a critically acclaimed album, playing a whole festival - What’s it like to return to Chicago after all this?
BW: Man, Chicago…. y'all gotta do better on the performance side.
Like, y'all be so dry and just so just trying to be so focused on being cool. Those people in Europe, they let go and they just have fun. They don't even have their phones out. They're just worried about the moment in time, and that's what that's what made my heart clamp on to them more than people in Chicago - and I'm from here. So y'all of Chicago, please do better! I'm not saying that in a bad way. I'm saying that, let’s do better for the music scene, so more artists want to come here and put on more shows and have a better outcome.
QB: Yeah, it's America in general, I think. In America, the shows here are more toned down, I think. And in Europe, they just let loose and they really appreciate like the music out there. They didn't even know who we were, but they were like… ready.
So yeah, that's what I would say. Come back to Chicago and It's always a good time, but I wish they embraced their artists a lot more. That's the short version.
AV: You’re not the first person to tell us that. Hooligan talked with Ariel Zetina, who DJs around the world, and she said that, for example, people in other countries dance a lot more. A lot of Americans don't dance at the club even.
BW: Yeah. And it’s like, why didn't you just stay in your room?! I really wish everybody would just be more open, even. Just like when we're out with this guy [referring to Quentin], he's just like saying hi to people, and I'm not used to that. [laughing] If I’m used to you, my mean mug to you is me saying hi to you. [laughing]
So when you’re back in Chicago, where’s the first place you’re going?
BW: I'm gonna stick to my commercial answer, Giordano’s.
QB: You're not gonna do Harold's!
BW: I would but [Q] stole that for me! I would do Harold's - Okay, I'm gonna switch it up - I'm gonna say Harold’s. Giordano’s was last week. Harold's is this week.
QB: For Chicago Tribune, I said Harold's. They're probably like, what? All these people were saying all this sophisticated shit. And I read our shit…. Harold's. Yo. [laughing]
AV: Quentin, do you have the same answer?
BW: Say something high-end and luxurious.
QB: I'm gonna say the first place I would go is... Millennium Park. Because I come from the airport and I just sit there sometimes. Yeah, that's a good one.
BW: You’ll find people in Millennium Park looking for your ass now. [mocking him] “I get off the airport and I go to Millennium Park. Hey everybody!”
QB: [laughing] Look, that's actually one of the reasons why we’re not on the album covers! We actually went to a store - We went to Shuga Records, and they had our album there. And we were asking the guy, like “You guys have this?” He's like, “Yeah, they're playing pitchfork!” all excited and stuff. I was like, “Yeah that's us!” [laughing]
What else do you want to shout out before Friday?
QB: Yeah, I want to shout out Yuki Fujinami in Japan, she's a DJ. She's on the cover of The Legend of ABM.
She has that sample in The Legend of ABM song, too. I think her presence on that album just really brings this energy. I think from the lyrics, to the production, to the subject matter, to her on the cover. She was a big part of that, so I want to shout her out.
BW: I want to shout out Yuki, I want to shout out Derek, I want to shout out Joey, you all know who you are - the team. I want to shout out Sam, everybody coming together and just making this happen. The team. Everybody said there's going to be a team that you need to make it happen, and we got that now. And I'm so proud of everybody. And I want to shout out Q, I want to shout out Andrea and Hooligan, I want to shout out everybody for this. Thank you, I appreciate you. And we coming with more music.