MIC/LINE is HYPEBEAST Radio‘s music-centric show that looks to deliver in-depth conversations with your favorite artists, digging into their origin stories and asking the questions you want answered. For this week’s episode, we sit down with Trippie Redd.

At only 20-years-old, the Love Scars singer has made a name for himself amongst the rise of SoundCloud rappers. The Ohio native, born Michael Lamar White, is notable for his fiery-red dreadlocks, face tattoos, and amalgamation of music ranging from hip-hop to rock to r&b. With numerous EPs’s, billboard topping projects and certified gold studio albums, Trippie is looked to as one of this generation’s standalone talents in today’s eclectic music industry.

His latest drops, “Under Enemy Arms“ and “Mac 10,” alongside an impressive body of work, showcase the artist’s distinctive style and creative story-telling which he explains is “up to your interpretation.” Trippie’s music production can be seen as spontaneous, yet intentional. While he freestyles his lyrics, he spends most of his time on creating the perfect melody before doing anything else. His particularly distinctive voice and range of singing is alluded to his influence of bands like KISS and Nirvana. His affinity of rock music aspires him to to do “something different, knowing Black people made rock.”

“I just like rock music. That shit fire. A person like me, because I’m so melodic, I can go anywhere with my voice. So that’s why it’s just so amazing to do rock, because you could just go anywhere. You could sing anything. I could sing anything.”

While he’s intent on dropping a rock album later this year, his most anticipated work, !, is set to drop this month. It channels his alter-ego TR666 and plunges into heavy topics dealing with suicide and depression. With a massive following already accumulating, Trippie says his success comes as no surprise as he’s always been keen on “speaking things into existence.” Behind his antics, many may not realize how hands on the artist is when it comes to his career. Trippe Redd discussed how he contributes to all the creative aspects of his music, including video direction, artwork and business ventures. Later on the he discusses his interest in fashion, his love for anime and much more.