A conversation with the Sadboy rapper about swapping music to work in a factory, being shot at, and how fake is really real

Text Selim Bulut

When Yung Lean emerged in 2013, he was the 16-year-old rapper from Stockholm starring in bizarro, lo-fi, zero budget music videos like “Ginseng Strip 2002”. Critics pored over it – was it a joke, or was it sincere? Was this a legitimate reinterpretation of hip hop or something more insulting? – while fans took to Lean’s unique aesthetic and bucket-hatted style. He was a child of the internet rapping about the internet. In 2016, things are different. After four years of making music professionally and touring the world exhaustively, Lean returned with a darker and druggier second album, Warlord. Accusations of irony don’t hold as much sway when he’s worked with artists like Gucci Mane and Travis Scott, and a new starring role in Calvin Klein’s AW16 campaign shows that he can make the jump to the fashion world, too. Even his crew, the Sadboys, which features associates Yung Sherman and Gud, are building a name as solo artists. Lean’s rise from oddball outsider to rap contender was recently charted in an in-depth, must-read profile with The FADER. Yung Lean’s newest video is for the hazed-out “Highway Patrol”, featuring Gravity Boys member Bladee, was shot in Miami. We caught up with the now 20-year-old Jonatan Aron Leandoer Håstad while he was in London recently to discuss his world and his life.

You’ve been out on tour to places like America a lot over the last four years, since you started releasing music. Did you ever expect to be making it as a professional musician when you started out? Yung Lean: I didn't expect anything. It was just a way to get out my ideas. Do you ever wonder about anything doing something else? Yung Lean: Yeah. I went crazy and cancelled all my shows this summer and worked at a factory for a while. What were you doing? Yung Lean: Shampoo. It was in Sweden, in Stockholm. How did you find that? Yung Lean: Relaxing. What else did you learn from that time? Yung Lean: That there’s no real working class left in Sweden. It’s all transformed into other jobs. How was it working for someone else and having that hierarchical structure? Yung Lean: I’ve always had jobs with hierarchies – wherever I worked, like McDonald’s, or cleaning toilets. It’s always been hard. What about in music? Yung Lean: Oh yeah, definitely. Fuck the music industry. It’s filled with hierarchies. Everyone just thinks that this person is better than this person, and then they all end up being the same. I’m in my own little world. I don’t get invited into galas, I don’t meet other people that I don’t find interesting. I hang with my friends all the time and we do exactly what we like. “I’m in my own little world. I don’t get invited into galas, I don’t meet other people that I don’t find interesting. I hang with my friends all the time and we do exactly what we like” — Yung Lean Do your parents approve of your lifestyle? Yung Lean: Yeah. They’re happy as long as I’m happy. How do they feel about the unhealthy aspects of touring – the partying, the long nights? Yung Lean: I don’t know. They’ve probably done LSD too. No, they’re good as long as I’m good. I bring them gifts. Warlord has a darker vibe to it. How much of that had come out of your experiences over the last few years? Yung Lean: I never really noticed it. I just keep going. It’s just because obviously, at the same time as making music, you’re growing up a lot – 16 to 19 are crucial years. I was wondering if you’ve actually enjoyed being able to make music during this time? Yung Lean: I’ve been the happiest doing music – the process of making music. Everything else is so-and-so from time-to-time. Everyone just has to make a living. The title of the record is Warlord, and then you have tracks like “Afghanistan”. Why did you want to use that kind of imagery on the record? Yung Lean: There’s no meaning. I had the name ‘Warlord’ written on my phone since, like, 2012. And I was like ‘Fuck it, I’m making an album called Warlord.’ And what about “Afghanistan”? Yung Lean: It's what I sing in the song. Right, it’s just the combination of the two... Yung Lean: It’s fun for people to put two and two together.

Photo by Fredrik Andersson Andersson

Are you interested in these events? Yung Lean: I am – but I’m not a political rapper. Why not? Yung Lean: I don’t like political rappers. Is it something you intentionally shy away from? Do you ever think it belongs in your music? Yung Lean: No. I’ve had a good life. There’s nothing to really bitch about, you know? The worst thing that’s happened to me is probably getting shot at. And I don’t know if that’s even the worst thing. But you know, political rap comes from oppressed people. What happened when you got shot at? Not many people in Europe can say that that’s happened to them. Yung Lean: I don’t know. We were just outside meeting fans, and then we heard some shots. (This was) in Pittsburgh. Do you feel like some people are still misinterpreting your music, or your character? Yung Lean: Everyone’s a critic. You don’t have to get my character or my music – I don’t care. When people are like, ‘This is who I am, this is what I do’, then there’s not much fun. “The worst thing that’s happened to me is probably getting shot at. And I don’t know if that’s even the worst thing” — Yung Lean What’s it like playing shows in Stockholm nowadays? Yung Lean: It's good. There’s more people. It’s like a happy, big family. Do Stockholm shows have bigger audiences? Do the crowds have a lot of hometown pride? Yung Lean: I think a lot of people who are like 17 and in the UK – or 18 or 19 or 20 or whatever – they’re like, ‘Yeah, let’s go to Yung Lean’s show!’ They won’t have any relationship. In Sweden it’s like, ‘Oh no, I fucked Yung Lean, all my friends fucked Yung Lean, all my friends fucked Sherman. We took drugs together.’ Less people will go because of that – or maybe more, I don’t know. On the deluxe version of Warlord there’s a new track, “Sippin”, with Glo Gang’s ManeMane4CGG. How did you connect with each other? Yung Lean: He followed me on Twitter. He was like ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, follow me back bro, FaceTime me’. And then I went out to Chicago, out west where he comes from. What did you do when you were out there? Yung Lean: Drank lean, saw a bunch of guns (laughs). (I was out there) just for the video shoot, just hanging with his group. I respect ManeMane a lot, he’s a very great good rapper, a good person too. He took good care of us. He came out with a black van and tinted windows, started screaming in the street, ‘This shit is major! You know about Lean, this is some next level shit!’ What was your impression of Chicago? Yung Lean: It was like the video. It’s not my world, but it was good to be part of ManeMane’s world, you know?

That followed collaborations with Travis Scott and Gucci Mane – what’s your relationship with the American rap world like? Yung Lean: They like me. It’s fun. Obviously you come from very different backgrounds. Do you ever see yourself as an outsider in that world? Yung Lean: Probably, but like Gucci Mane fucks with Marilyn Manson. They fuck with weird white people. Real rappers, real gangsters, they don’t care about that. It’s only, like, white 24-year-old people that are like, ‘Oh his background isn’t on the street, he went to school, what’s he doing?’ Because they’re scared about breaking boundaries. Real rappers don’t really care about that. I’m not speaking for all the real rappers, but the ones I know. And there’s no such thing as real or fake, either. Is that something you’ve realised over the years? Yung Lean: Yeah, for sure. Fake is very real. “It’s only, like, white 24-year-old people that are like, ‘Oh his background isn’t on the street, he went to school, what’s he doing?’ Because they’re scared about breaking boundaries. Real rappers don’t really care about that” — Yung Lean It’s cool that you can work with someone like Gucci Mane, then work with someone underground like Uli K. Yung Lean: Yeah, I’d like to see Uli K and Gucci together. That would be some sick stuff. How did you meet? You’ve know each other for a few years right? Yung Lean: Yeah, I’ve known him for a few years. Me and Benjy (Keating, aka Palmistry) talked for a long time, he wanted us to connect. And then I just hung out with Kami (Kamixlo) and Benjy in, like, 2012 I think. Was that when you were over here? Yung Lean: Yeah, it was my first time in London, as an artist. I met Kami and then he’s like, ‘This is my brother’. We started calling him ‘Young Chop’, because he looks like Young Chop and smoked a lot of weed. And then I realised he’s the sweetest guy and he makes great music. We’ve been friends. He came to my place in Stockholm and we recorded some stuff.

Photo by Fredrik Andersson Andersson