A$AP Rocky

Editorial

Creative concept and on-set art direction for the Mr Porter The Journal. Read an extract of the article, below:

It’s only a short distance from the tough streets of Harlem to the front row of a New York fashion week runway show, but it’s a journey that very few rappers have made. A$AP Rocky, however, managed it even before the recent release of his No.1 debut album, Long.Live.A$AP. And his appearance at last month’s Paris fashion week, dressed in clothes by British designer Shaun Samson, reinforced the impression that he has come a long way from a childhood that inspired the line on his album’s title track, “I thought I’d probably die in prison”.

On meeting A$AP it quickly becomes obvious that if any young rapper is going to transcend hip-hop’s cultural ghetto it’s him, despite the fact that the 24-year-old admitted to dealing drugs in the past. Lots of MCs enjoy enough success to make the leap, but few have the vision to grasp the opportunity.

Yet the way A$AP explains it, it sounds deceptively simple: “I realised that the streets were my reality, and I wanted to make another home, so I started doing positive things. Some people have it in them to get out, and some people are content to stay in the hood.”

That “everything” includes two family tragedies. The first was the death of his older brother, Ricky, “Killed about 10 years ago”, according to A$AP. “He was a gang-banger, a Blood [member], and he got killed. I wanted to be like him but when he died on the streets I realised that the streets are not the place I wanted to make home,” he remembers.

His older brother didn’t just inspire A$AP to escape the block; he gave him the tools to do so by introducing him to rap music. “My brother was a hip-hop fan, and when I was eight he made me rap for the first time – he was beating on the table to make a beat, I started rapping and he encouraged me to keep doing it.”