Interview With Christian Rich

Christian Rich consist of Tai “Christian” Hassan and Ken “Rich” Hassan. Christian does all the vocals and is the main figure in the group. Rich is the producer, arranger, organizer and co-writer. If this was the show Entourage, Christian would be Vince, Rich would be E (Eric), as Rich takes on more of a background and developmental role.

We started as producers in college attaining platinum plaques for some songs we produced. As the industry changed we refined our music hustle and began writing more records. With a few obstacles out the way we began keeping songs that we wrote for other artist and from there Christian Rich the artist were born. We moved our music via online and hand to hand to consumers and set-up our own shows. From there the industry started to pay attention leading us to the present day and the Neptune camp.

We have always done music. We started creating and experimenting with music when we were 10 years old. Coming from Nigeria in 1990’s created a culture shock that we adapted to quickly. When we attended college we started to meet people who heard our creations and wanted to pay for them. I believe it was about our Sophomore year that we realized we could make some real money. I remember our father was confused on how two 18 year old kids were buying $2000 keyboards while in college. We made enough money in college selling beats to buy 2 Benz coupes honestly. But as Senior year came close we started to make our plans on the rest of our lives as music was the main priority.

Our homie Shomi hooked up a meeting with Shae from N.E.R.D. Shae jumped on as management and introduced us to Pharrell, who then introduced us to Diddy, and Jeezy and a slew of others. But the initial meeting with Star Trak came about from N.E.R.D watching our Famous Girl video in London online. They thought we were signed, which was not the case. After they discovered we were free agents they decided to work with us in all aspects of our business.

We take our ideas from an array of sounds. We listen to Brazilian Jazz a lot, but also appreciate Electronica music specifically Daft Punk. When we created this album we wanted to not waste time and make hit records that would be played 10 years from now. We know people would have paid for the album and we plan on releasing “The Decadence 2.0″ with revamped versions and more content. But we needed the world to hear us first and be the verdict. They spoke and now we are ready to give you our world. The Decadence or our music is beyond just the sounds. Its the visual stimulation, the performances, the artwork, the collabs, the language, the taste, the fashion…. Its about us. Its about you all understanding how we see the world with the hopes of adding our positive values to your world as well.

We actually do all our production. We let our friends do remixes of course but we enjoy creating sounds more than anything. We learned the process of production early on. It was something that was just a past time love, a passion. We cared so much about chord changes, mixes and sounds that we dedicated all our summer work monies to equipment with not intentions of making profit. Did we think we would be here? Absolutely, but the passion is foremost.

Briefly, Famous Girl is about a world of fame that gets the best of our main character. She enters a world of success, only to lose it all at the end because of greed. Hello Virgin is about the “Hand” representing virginity in life. A baby’s hands are pure until it starts touching things and then it becomes used and damaged due to bacteria. We wanted to use this symbolism to represent virginity in everyday life. Whether its virginity with school, work, relationships or creativity it all as a starting point.

I mean we are still working and learning as well. But I would say just be yourself. Being you comes natural just learn how to market it and keep things simple. Learn from your mistakes as well as others. Most importantly, hustle! The ball is in your court!

Well we DJ in New York, Chicago, LA etc so look out for that. We are releasing “Breakfast At Tiffany’s” as a single on iTunes next week and “The Decadence 2.0″ will be on iTunes and in stores by August this year. Go to ChristianRichGoods.com for updates as well as twitter.com/christianrich.

Thanks…

Click [HERE] to download “The Decadence” Mixtape x Christian Rich