When they asked me where I would like to interview Johnny Polygon my first reaction was Roscoe’s Chicken and Waffles but only because the night before I got into a intense conversation with my girlfriend over the deliciousness that is waffles, syrup and chicken—which is not OK for my no-salt diet, but as Johnny stated, he was on cheat day and so was I. I have to admit I was worried about falling into a stereotypical scenario but seriously, who doesn’t like chicken? I think every race has chicken as part of their diet; have you ever tasted Cuban chicken or Korean fried chicken, it’s simply AMAZING!
Johnny Polygon is like our favorite yard-bird in the sense that he has the ability to appeal to everyone and like I said before, who doesn’t like chicken? With his new EP “Group Hug” and his entertaining videos on his MySpace page, Johnny is about to bring his panty-dropping skills to your speakers and headphones.
Where are you from?
Oklahoma—Tulsa, Oklahoma—it’s not the capital but its next most important place.
Is it the black Beverly Hill of Oklahoma?
(laughing) My block was.
How many tornadoes have you lived through?
Five but they never really hit the city, its always hitting the really, really country people.
You would think they would move because they know it’s coming every year.
It’s the same thing with fires here. You know every year there are going to be fires.
Touché. So what is there to do in Tulsa? What did you do as a kid?
I did music and a lot of ’shrooms.
You’re a brave man. That’s an inside-with-a-pillow drug, anything other than that is adventure.
I mean there wasn’t much to do other than get in trouble or try to do something. So I was like, let’s try this rap thing out and see where this takes me.
Tulsa is not a place typically mentioned when discussing hip-hop. How was it trying to get noticed and make a name for yourself there?
Actually, it gave me a lot identity from jump street. It was one of those things where the confidence came through because there was not a lot of people that were really good at rapping so as soon as I started rapping I was the best rapper around, so it was just really natural.
Can you count the amount of rappers in Tulsa on your hands?
No, yo, there are a lot of rappers out there but the ones you really see are the ones that are trying to be something else—trying to emulate people—pretending to be rappers. (This waffle is amazing!)
It’s very much like that in the sense that I came up battling. I was known around Oklahoma for a long time, “That’s Johnny Polygon Battle Rapper, he’ll make fun of you and it will rhyme and it will be hilarious and amazing.” But it was a lot like 8 Mile except when I moved to LA, I only had $297; it started as $300 but my dad drove me out here, ’cause I was going do this rap thing, so my parents, who are still married—that’s some gangsta shit—were like, well, this is no place for you to do it and you’ll end up a loser that can rap good. So my dad drove me out here to LA but on the way I stopped and got a Slurpee and some Doritos, then I had $297. I’ll never forget, the very, very first thing I saw in LA that was like, “oh, shit,” I was staying at this hostel on Hollywood Blvd and it was my first time on Hollywood Blvd and I see Spiderman getting patted down by the cops, in full gear with the mask and everything, assuming the position, and I was like, “Whoa, what the fuck?”
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