Left Leberra and The AREB Crew: A Bloglin Interview
Saturday, January 21st, 2012Left Leberra is an up-and-coming rapper based in New Haven, Connecticut. Along with his sister, the rapper Stash Marina, and the 3-man Northern Lights group (made up of rapper Rod Fuego and producers/rappers New 9 Gs and Don D) Left is a part of a crew called AREB.
I found out about Left and AREB from one of Zach G’s “High Tide” posts last month and found their stuff quite awesome. I got in touch with Left and he, Northern Lights and Stash were kind enough to let me go to their New Haven studio so I could interview all 5 of them. It was a good time.
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How did you guys all get started making music? How did you meet up?
Left: They’ve been making music since they were like teenagers.
Don: We started back when we were 15. 15 or 16.
Rod: We all grew up together. We met Left last year. Daryl’s [a.k.a New 9Gs] coworker Dave hooked us up because we needed a graphic artist. We needed music and art.
Left: Stash is my sister. We’ve been rapping since 2005 or 6.
Left, you mainly work with Norhern Lights but you’ve collaborated with some other people recently, some pretty big producers. We were talking about ASAP earlier and I guess Beautiful Lou is most famous for producing for Rocky now. I mentioned Zach G earlier, too and you worked with him on your most recent mixtape. Has it been hard to connect with producers and collaborate?
Left: Nah, it’s been pretty easy. People send shit to me.
That’s cool. So, producers just discovered your music on your Bandcamp and sent you stuff?
Left: Yeah.
Have you guys [Northern Lights] been producing for anyone outside of AREB?
Rod: Yeah we did some stuff with Nemo Achida (not sure if you’re familiar with him) he’s out of Kentucky. He’s a pretty good artist. He came up here and worked with us. We produced about 35% of his last project. We did some joints for Trademark Da Skydiver.
Oh yeah, from Curren$y’s Jet team.
9Gs: Yeah…what else…That’s the big ones…
Rod: We’ve got some other stuff in the works.
Don: Yeah we’re working with Wesern Tink. And Shadow Runners.
Oh yeah. I keep hearing more and more about Shadow Runners.
Don: Yeah, they’re talented. We like them a lot.
I like how many nerdy references they make in their stuff. Like in that “Slimewave” video they talk about Power Rangers in the beginning.
9Gs: Yeah.
Don: Yeah we connected through nerdy stuff too. I’ve been talking to them about WWF. I was in love with WWF growing up.
Yeah. I feel like WWF or Superheroes or other “nerdy” things are a big, meaningful thing for our generation. I mean, I see that stuff come up a lot in music (in hip hop especially) but there’s something about it we all relate to. We had a lot of cool things to watch as little kids.
9Gs: Yeah it’s common ground. We all connect.
Speaking of that, I wore my Ninja Turtles shirt today because they come up in your songs, Left. You have a song “Oroku Saki” and you have album art that’s Shredder.
Left: Oh yeah. I just moved and when I was moving I noticed I still got my Michealangelo toy from when I was a little kid.
I have to shout out Northampton, MA because it’s where I was born and that’s where they created Ninja Turtles. When I was little I met the creators actually. So, Turtles are always gonna be meaningful for me. Switching gears kinda: Left, A lot of your music is kind of introspective. Like it’s slow-paced and well thought out. And the Northern Lights beats sound that way, too. The production is almost like we’re in space looking down on things.
9Gs: That’s the same way we think about it! That’s us, man! When we make our music We want you to feel like you’re in space. In a galaxy. And Left really complements that.
Don: He does take his time with everything. Not project-wise. He’ll drop a project every two weeks. But, Rhyme-wise. He always keeps the same pace basically. Even if he does speed it up a little Left keeps on that same metronome and always hits the same points. I think he stands out from everyone else by doing that.
Some of the Northern Lights beats are so different they seem almost un-rappable. I remember hearing one of Left’s songs where the drums are really bizarre and really all you do, Left, is repeat the hook on it. But, I think it’s cool you did that, that you figured out that way to be on that beat. Your work with Northern Lights is great because you’re able to rap over some weird, nontraditional stuff.
Don: That’s how we want everybody to look at us. We want to separate ourselves from other producers. We’ve been making beats like that for a long time. We’ve been making stuff we feel like “Nobody’s gonna rap on this. Nobody CAN rap on this.”
Left: They never think I’m gonna like the beats I pick.
Don: It’s always like “you sure you want this?”
He’ll pick like the most ambient, weird thing?
Don: Yeah. And it’ll come out great.
We were talking about producer collaborations earlier. And, on your newest mixtape you’ve worked with rappers outside of your team on there. You’ve got Tiffany from Dark Sister on their and Supa from Sortahuman. How did those collaborations come about?
Left: Through Producers. Party Trash put me in touch with Supa. This producer named Blown from Tenessee got me in touch with Tiffany.
I love that beat for “Left Hand” with Tiffany. It’s like a little kid keyboard trap beat. It’s goofy in a good way. Left, you and Stash released a mixtape of freestyles “Volcano Pyramid” Was there any reason for that in particular?
Left: I always wanted to freestyle. And I always felt like I couldn’t do it. But, the more I’ve been rapping and the more I’ve been fucking with these guys [Northern Lights] I thought I could. We took beats from oldschool stuff. We had an idea for a type of theme: like old thug shit.
Yeah I think you nailed the “Old Thug Shit.” I was listening to the mixtape and my roommate walked by. He was like “What is this? It sounds like old Ice Cube.” I think the freestyle project is good because it brings out some different flows from you and Stash. Do you think it helped you get into a different creative place?
Left: Yeah it helps you say things you might not normally say.
On the Mary Saves album I really love the song “Last Man Alive” where a Martian woman comes from space and you have sex with her. That’s a great story, Left. I think the imagination and the creativity on that song are excellent. There are so many people rapping that I feel like you have to be unique now and I think having songs is really what makes you stand out.
Left: That song was actually Stash’s idea.
Oh cool. So, Stash, how did that idea come about?
Stash: Well, Left’s always talks about how “girls ain’t shit” basically. So I told him he should do something different and was like “maybe this should be about like a bitch from Mars who can take over.” I went somewhere and when I came back he had finished the song I was like “Hell yeah.”
It’s pretty awesome. Left’s able to subdue this monster by having sex with it. It reminds me of those old pulp book covers (and I don’t know if you guys have seen those) like “Last man On Earth!” I can envision the cover actually where Left’s like the hero facing off against this martian woman.
Left: Yeah totally.
Okay. As a final thing: What projects are you all working on now? And that question is for everybody.
Left: Stash’s shit just needs to be mixed that’s “Black Master” and Northern Lights are putting out their shit on the 30th.
And there’s more Left on the way soon, too?
Left: Yeah.
Nice. Well, thank you guys. Is there anything else you want to say?
Left: Thanks for fucking with us.
Rod: Yeah. Love to Mishka.
9Gs: Love to Mishka and love to Zach G.
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After our chat we hung out for a bit and watched Rod’s old VHS tapes of ’90s TV. It was Mostly All That, Weird Al Videos and the 90s X-Men Cartoon.
We all agreed that Cyclops is the worst member of the X-Men.






















