Words by Quentin Yarolem. Photo by Bryan Allen Lamb.

Chance’s are that if you’re not familiar with TheMIND the person, you’re familiar with his work. He’s a part of the production team THEMpeople, a stable that has been a staple in this new generation of Chicago music for a few years now. When he’s not working with his team, TheMIND has been working on his own solo project, Summer Camp, which is set to release in early June. After dropping two singles off the project and doing a handful of high profile features for artists like Joey Purp, Chance The Rapper and Mick Jenkins; hype for TheMIND is at an all time high. Read up on the burgeoning artist below, and make sure to Summer Camp on the calendar.

FSD: You’ve been in the Chicago hip-hop scene for a minute now, but on the other side of things. You’re part of the production team THEMPeople, what made you want to transition to the performing side of things?

TheMind: Well, THEMpeople actually started as a group back in ‘07, and we went by another name that I refuse to mention. We started at that point and kind of grew more into the production side lead by Michael Anthony, who’s still pretty much like the curator of the whole brand. He basically told us that we should cater to Chicago artists. We were all transplants in the city, none of us were actually from here, so the first thing we should do is cater to our artists from the city, and by that build a foundation that we can all build up off of ourselves. Not to eat off of a culture or not to eat off of a brand, but while feeding the culture, we ourselves are eating too. We were always different artists at the same time, we just decided to take the production route to play the background for a while until we earned our stripes.

FSD: So, Summer Camp is your first introduction to the world and it’s supposed to come out in May, is that still true?

TheMIND: We moved it back a little bit, maybe like early June. It’s my first solo project introduced to the world. We had a lot of features from Alex Wiley, to Leather Corduroys, whoever on the squad tape we released before with like Mick and a bunch of other people, I think that was the tape I made my first introduction on, or my first solo songs from “TheMIND” on.

FSD: What are you trying to say with Summer Camp? Is there a particular message you want the audience to receive?

TheMIND: Yeah! I would think so. Summer Camp is an adventure to find yourself. I think in the past couple years I have definitely been on this journey, facing insecurities and depression and a bunch of other things that the rest of the world has been plagued with as well. I think really finding myself and really finding a way to love myself taught me a newfound freedom that I had never really had before. It allows me to say things I could have never said before, so Summer Camp acts as this catalyst for that. Summer Camp is being put in this metaphorical state by it being me and this woman speaking to each other through this tape. The woman represents pretty much the manifestation of me beating out all of my demons.

FSD: The first single, “Mercury Rising,” one of the lines that sticks out most is “Whoever said the sky is the limit wasn’t living where I was living.” Can you elaborate on that line a little more?

TheMIND: Growing up where I grew up, Philadelphia, I grew up in the foster care system, and so the one thing that I saw around most of my peers and most of my friends was this thing where they felt like they had a feeling. Most people would call it small town mentality, but I think people in big cities have the same thing where, they reach the ceiling and it’s over. You kind of feel like you can’t leave the city, but there’s always a bunch of people who say, “No there’s a bunch of opportunities and if you change things you can get to where you’re going.” Not realizing that there are a bunch of blockades that can change these things right in front of us.

There are a multitude of things that, I don’t really want to go down that path, but you feel like are these blockades that you feel like are stopping you from doing the things you could do in your life. Whether it be your mother or father saying, “No you shouldn’t do that, you should take the safe route and go to school,” or racial equality, or you not having the money, it can be a bunch of different things, but for me it was being a foster kid and not really feeling like I had a solid foundation to build on, and not really knowing who I was for real. So when people said, “The sky is the limit,” I was like, “Yeah, okay. I still can’t get outside of these four walls.”

Finally, I realized that was a mentality, a demon in my own head, and until I broke that down I couldn’t get to where I wanted to go. It’s kind of why I say it so many times, because after a while I’m saying it and I’m like, “Nah fuck that. Fuck that mentality.”

FSD: So now would you say the sky is the limit? Do you see past that now?

TheMIND: For sure! I think there is no limit at all. There is legit no limit at all. If you can think it or dream it, then it can become real. That’s the whole premise of TheMIND. Anything you can create in your head, DO IT. As long as you work hard at it, there’s going to be roadblocks, there’s going to be blockades and stuff like that, but we live in the new age of the internet. Anything is possible. I say that to my friends all the time, like, anything is possible. If a record label won’t sign you, drop that shit independent. If you want to start your own television show, but no studio will fund you fucking go to YouTube. If you want to be a blogger, but no one wants to stand behind your writing then go to Twitter or WordPress or Tumblr, just find your niche and chase it.