The City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia. Home of the Sixers, Eagles, Flyers, and so much music that it would take us the next decade just to finish the list. Yet there is a new face of Philly, a fresh outlook , a rebirth to hip-hop from this region. With a name that should make Philly proud, illroots.com brings you a true fighter….Enter Rocky Fontaine…..
illRoots.com: I definitely appreciate you family for sitting down with us. So who is Rocky Fontaine
Rocky: Rocky Fontaine is the next upcoming star to come out of Philadelphia region, uptown Philly. Who is currently in Atlanta right now promoting the few mixtape projects I’m on my Kashi Kicks and the Philadelphia Comeback Movement.
illRoots.com: So what do you represent coming out of Philly that hasn’t been represented so far?
Rocky: I mean I’m not necessarily representing something new its just Philly has been putting out quality music for a while, its just the artists that they’ve been choosing to release hasn’t been as marketable as I am, and haven’t been able to sell there selves as much as I’m planning on selling myself. Basically I’m bringing that Philly style but I’m a universal artists and I’m going to catch fire once I’m put in the right hands and the right opportunities. So like I said Philly has been putting out good shit for a long time but the artists haven’t really been that marketable so the world hasn’t really you know what I mean caught on to what they was trying to move. So right now I’m getting ready to come with the fresh uptown Philly style and I know its getting ready to catch fire.
Rocky in the Studio recording "Real Nigga Like Me".
illRoots.com: Who contributes more to your success other than yourself?
Rocky: I guess artists that I have seen take a swing at it and fail, I just watch them and make sure that I don’t make the same mistakes they’ve made and like I said DJ Scream that’s my man. DJ’s have a lot to do with it you know what I’m saying because I have a whole lot of DJ’s of power that are in my corner right now and around the first quarter we’re going to go ahead and push a couple singles to DJ’s like Scream and Don Cannon, DJ Smallz, Cosmic Strictly Skillz Kev, but we got a lot of major DJ’s and radio personalities that are about to push my product extra hard. But nobody contributes more to what I do than myself. I’m at this 24/7/365
illRoots.com: They always try to label people or put them in a box or genre as far as hip hop or whatever, I disagree with that, but what artists that aren’t necessarily hip-hop would you want to work with in the near future?
Rocky: I like a lot of artists, I like the guys from Maroon 5, I like guy that jumped on the new Lupe single...
illRoots.com: Matthew Santos.
Rocky: Yeah I could see myself working with those type of people, I’m real cool with Slim from 112 and we got a couple big records that we’re getting ready to drop, one called “V.I.P” and one called “Change Your Life”, they are some real real big crossover hits but they are still relatable, but the streets are definitely gonna bang with them. Like I said I’m one of them artists that can jump on anybody’s track and make it a hit. So whoever is really trying to put in some work tell them to holla at me.
illRoots.com: Is there one book that you could recommend to the youth?
Rocky: Umm. I guess the book “Everything You Need to Know About Hip-Hop”, if your in the game you definitely need to go over everything that you need to know about the music industry. You definitely need to go and grab that book and pay attention to it because a lot of people are getting jerked left and right in the game because they don’t really know what they doing as far as business moves in there career.
illRoots.com: Yeah, you need to read a couple of DeePak Chopra’s books they are fire.
Rocky: Yeah, there is so much more to it than what meets the eye. I been through a nice couple runs when I was 18, 19 and 20 and 21 I had a major run, it just wasn’t good. I just took a crazy loss and I just told myself I would never take another loss like that again in anything that I do.
illRoots.com: Do you mind elaborating on that?
Rocky: Basically I was in the streets or whatever like that and I had probably spent like 200 grand I like 12 months with different things, family issues, a couple of my homies caught cases and I had to pay they lawyer fees and bail them out and a couple of them ran I ain’t get my bread back and I mean at the time it was a bad time for me and I just had to cover my losses and move on. So I moved to Atlanta and put more into the music game but I’ll never be rich and broke again this time around I’m going to be straight forever.
illRoots.com: So you said you moved to Atlanta from Philly?
Rocky: Yea I got a crib down Atlanta like a year ago. Bought my first home down here and Stan (his manager) was supposed to come down and a bunch of my homies were supposed to come down but like I said the game is a little dirty these days so a couple of my homies that were supposed to come down got 8 to 10 years so I ended up moving down here by myself but it was a blessing for me because really my back was against the wall. But currently I’m with my family in Baltimore so.
illRoots.com: Thanks for everything Big Homie, as well I want to thank Stan and Kashi Kicks. Stay tuned as we bring you “Live with Rocky” Part 2 of this interview Live in Baltimore, MD.
For more Rocky Fontaine Check Out: www.myspace.com/rockyfontaine
For more Kashi Kicks Check Out www.kashikicks.com
