Grimy with a Splash of Flash: Brick Flair is Cali's Newest Rapper

Southern California’s Brick Flair dropped his debut music video last week, and we’ve got it for you here with details on the rapper, his latest album, and all other things Brick Flair related. So keep reading:

Tell us a bit about your story man.

When I was 5, my family moved from Birmingham, AL to Minneapolis, MN. My brother and I would get made fun of constantly for our Southern accents. While I started faking a “normal” accent in order to not get made fun of, my brother actually looked to music to escape the BS. And that’s when I was introduced to hip-hop. I instantly fell in love with it. I f*cking love hip hop. I love the music; I love the lifestyle. The artists bravado gave my brother and I confidence in ourselves when we didn’t have any.

I was raised on this shit. Whenever I heard my parents fighting, I would blare Tupac, Biggie, DMX, or Eminem until they would come yell at me for being too loud. But it made them stop arguing. I wanted to be like those guys, so in middle school my friends and I would spit little one liners back and forth. Then we started freestyling and it just grew from there. I still lacked confidence to release anything to the public, but the fire was there.

Eventually through networking with artists based out of Omaha I gained the confidence to just go for it. If it wasn’t for my homies Cesar Jesus, Teknique Omaha and Jordy (Cake Eater), I would never have had the nuts in my swag bag to put this out. So much love to them and the rest of my homies who pushed me to do this.

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That’s awesome. How did you choose the name Brick Flair?

After much soul searching and many failed attempts at cool names, this moniker just stuck. When I was a kid, really the only good memory I have of my dad was watching WWF and WCW wrestling with him. Ric Flair, one of the greatest wrasssstlers of all time, had that confidence that I wanted to have as a kid. Plus, he was always partying and had pretty women at his side. I mean who doesn’t want that, ya know? A combination of that and the fact that I sold a loooooooot of shitty schwag weed in college to pay the bills as a matter of circumstance and necessity to graduate and pay my bills. On top of that, one other glaring similarity that I share with Ric Flair is that we both have gorgeous heads of hair… well he DID anyway. Homeboy looking a little thinned out now, hahaha. But there you have it… the creation of Brick Flair.

Sweet. We know you just dropped a video last Friday- tell us more about it.

Man, the video thing was one of the coolest experiences. I just moved to Southern California so I don’t really have a lot of resources and contacts out here to reach out to. Luckily I met someone through work who just so happened to love photography and have experience filming, and he shot the video for me. We filmed this bad boy right in downtown Redlands a few blocks from my apartment. There’s some really cool alleyways with awesome artwork painted on the walls. It really gave the video that Brick Flair feel: grimey with a splash of flash. I might have to trademark that.

When it comes to the video itself, I honestly can’t tell you how I thought of it. I decided it would be funny if someone filmed a music video and the artist was just getting drilled with shit.

Overall, we really wanted the video to have a raw feel to match the sound of the track. So we decided to shoot the entire video in one shot, chorus aside. We wanted to let the small slip ups and spontaneity give the video some character. But, since I didn’t really know anyone else besides the guy filming the video and his roommate, we just asked random people on the street to help out by throwing things at me off camera.

Listen to Brick Flair’s album:

Ahaha nice. How did you decide which track you wanted to create a music video for?

Ultimately, it came down to what track would catch people’s eyes and ears. I had a lot of positive feedback [on the album] for “This Is Me Sober”. When I thought about how I wanted to be seen for the first time, it was kind of a no-brainer. You don’t wanna take yourself too seriously because this stuff is supposed to be fun, but at the same time you want some solid subject matter in there that can make people think. For example, why are we all fighting and arguing about politicians who clearly don’t give a f*ck about us? This is a question I hope people can start to really think about when they hear the song and see the video. In short, “This Is Me Sober” has a solid combination of fun and depth.

Do you often rock a fu-man-chu?

Only when the time is right. The stars, moon, and facial hair must be aligned for it to arise from its 5 o’clock shadow. Did it make you feel some type of way? It tends to have that effect on both men and women...

Some type of way indeed my friend. So what are your plans for 2016?

Right now we are just continuing to push the album, Brick Flair Presents...Illicits S. Grant. We are talking about filming another video, we just gotta choose a track. I am also working on a new album with my homie Cesar Jesus out of Raleigh. That dude is nuts. Love his style and flow. He’s all over my album, so if you check it out, you’ll hear what I’m talkin’ about. 2016 is gonna be a real busy year- just gonna continue to work and grow and try to make people smile, cry, and laugh with my music!

Smile. Cry. Laugh. You choose- watch “This Is Me Sober” below:

All photos, videos, and embedded tracks per the artists featured and those credited.