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Music

PREMIERE: Levii Ru$$ell - "Cold Summer"

Ferocious slice of street salvation from rising Houston spitter Levii Ru$$ell.

Levii Ru$$ell raps like there's someone right behind him. On "Cold Summer," the rising Houston rapper's hoarse flow and paranoid subject matter testify to the gravity of his life so far, marked by injury and violence. He's persevered, though, turning pain into a voracious thirst for rap game salvation. Look out for his mixtape Vi$ionz, dropping in November, and peep my Q&A with the man himself below.

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Noisey: How long have you been rapping?
Levii Ru$$el: I've been rapping since middle school, regular freestyle in the cafeteria stuff. I started taking music seriously a couple years ago after a car accident. I escaped death, which made me want to express my views on life through music.

Tell me about your crew, $upreme $**t. How did you guys come together?
$upreme $**t is a collective of people (me, DT Blanco, J Coney, Sean Evans, Sanchez Paris, and DJ Rambo). We came together through mutual association and became close during times when nobody wanted to help us. Our bond grew because we all strive towards morality and loyalty.

Houston obviously has legendary rap history— to what extent do you draw on that for inspiration? What's the modern local scene like?
3. The inspiration that I draw from Houston musically and culturally are different. Musically, I listen to old school artists like Geto Boyz and Street Military. I look at those groups because they didn't give a damn about anything, the same as $upreme $**t. Culturally, I see Houston for its struggle. In my eyes, Houston is an everyday trap. In Houston, if you have no purpose to strive for the best there's always somebody to shoot you down. Thats why other artists and I are trying to change the culture to expose young artists, just as New York has done in the past two years.

Your flow often seems driven by a certain intensity that borders on paranoia. Where do you think this comes from?
That comes from after my car accident junior year of high school, when a car hit me at 40 mph. I started to see people change for the worse around me. I was a ranked basketball player before the accident, I felt like somebody. I lost most of my athletic abilities due to the wreck. People treated me like shit, like I wasn't the same person, before which lead me down a path of lies, backstabbing, and violence. I'm still paranoid to this day.

Tell me about the real life events that inspired Cold Summer.
5. Cold $ummer is a record about a conversation I had with a big homie of mine when I went visit him in prison. He got word of things I was doing and warned me what I was headed for. The verses are me speaking to him in anger about why I'm doing wrong. Every song on Vi$ionz is about a series of real events that happened between 2009 and 2011. I really want you to see the world through my eyes.

What does a big night out look like for you in Houston?
Going to play basketball, then chilling with my homies making music. We know the real turn-up will come when we get that breakthrough and start doing music festivals such like Coachella, Rock the Bells and SXSW.