[Interview] The Niceguys: What The Hell Is A Niceguy?

The Houston underground hip-hop scene is…well…non-existent. Not too many acts from the Houston area hit your radar when you are talking about indie rap. But The Niceguys are here to change that perception. The fearsome foursome hit the scene hard when they dropped The Show out of the blue last year. No cosigns, no big name guest spots, no major label. Somehow, someway, the internet ran with it and the crew went from obscurity to the darlings of the blog world in one fell swoop. Hell, we even cited them as one of the 10 hip hop acts you shouldn’t sleep on.  But now it’s time to capitalize on the buzz they created. TheWellVersed caught up with the humorous collective to discuss The James Kelly EP, how you get by without a cosign and just who the hell are The Niceguys.

TheWellVersed: So…who the hell are you guys?

Free: I’m Free, half of the production team of The Niceguys. I also choreograph dances onstage and I provide the waters after the show…

Yves Saint: Shut your ass up! I’m Yves from Queens, NY.

DJ Candlestick: I’m Candlestick but the ladies just call me “Stix.” I’m the DJ of the group who producers every blue moon.

Christolph: I’m Christolph, the other half of the production team. I’m in charge of making sure the towels are warm when the team gets to the sidelines. I’m also in charge of making sure that everyone’s ankles are properly taped.

YS: You’re a curator of tape?

C: Yeah and I have to tape yours next.

*laughter*

TWV: Where did the name The Niceguys come from?

F: Around 2007, Yves started doing this adlib “niiice” all the time because of this joke on “South Park.” He kept doing it on every song ; we thought it was hilarious and it started to stick. Then one day we were in a meeting with someone who wanted to sign us at the time. He asked if we got a deal what we would call ourselves. I said…”The Niceguys.” Ever since that day we kinda ran with that name. No exciting story and no drawing names out of a hat. Just a natural happening.

TWV: You guys put out The Show and it spread like wildfire over the net organically. How did that feel to do this without any cosigns?

C: I’m glad you said that! Our biggest thing was to do everything in house as the grassroots way. A lot of people rely on cosigns, which is cool and we don’t take anything away from those that do but it just feels more natural when you do everything in house and organically. I will tell you this, it’s a little bit of a longer of a process when you do it this way, but it will always work out in the end.

YS: Grassroots! Keep it grassroots….

TWV: What’s next to capitalize on the progression?

F: We’re currently working on the James Kelly EP. James Kelly is the owner, engineer and a good friend of ours. He’s done a lot for us to make all of these things possible for us. So right now we’re wrapping up the James Kelly EP and the theme behind this whole piece we’re doing is titled “When In Rome.” When you feel like doing something, at that moment, that’s probably the most suitable and genuine things you can do at that point. We are just doing whatever we have felt at that moment. The EPs coming out and honestly we are just exercising every muscle we have.

YS: The album was a little more serious at the time. This is a more carefree project.

F: Still fun but doing what it is that we want musically.

C: A lot of people don’t have that luxury. We’re going to take advantage of that and execise our strengths. We get to do what we want to do, so why not?

TWV: Have you guys bumped into anybody that may have surprised you by saying that they are fans of what you do?

DJC: That’s actually happened a lot man. We’re at the point to where we are so focused on our personal goal so we don’t even have time to measure our buzz. So when we do step out to places like SXSW and CMJ in New York and people approach us that we don’t know, it’s always a big surprise. We never know how big our buzz really us. It feels really good.

F: The biggest names to show love to us so far were Devin the Dude and Bun B. When that happened we were like “woooooooow.”

TWV: With it being a new day and age in music, you guys have taken full advantage of the internet and more specifically the blogs.

C: What the blogs have done has been tremendous for us. They have done as much as they can for us especially without a cosign. Whatever help we can get we appreciate. I was talking to Free about achieving more of a tangible buzz. Although we love the blogs and the fact that their input and help is so important, what we need to do is really get out so people can see us, smell us, feel us and touch us. We want it to be like some 1995 shit. People used to see you! If you were a thug, then I wanted to see you be a thug. Not hiding behind the smoke in mirrors. You had to be whatever you said you were. We need that tangible buzz. We don’t want people to just like us, we need people to love us.

TWV: With the new EP, can you divulge a little bit more about it? Are you working with any other artists?

F: We’re pretty much keeping it all in house again. Our engineer James Kelly is playing a lot of instruments. We’re making the sound bigger. We may have one or two collaborations. Ummm…you’ll see.

C: And before you push the stop button on this interview. I can see your thumb! *laughter* I didn’t hear anybody drop the name of it. The name of the project is…

F: You didn’t hear me say that already?

C: Ummm…nevermind. Anyways, we’re just going to reiterate the name of the EP. The James Kelly EP and I like her that just walked by. Oh, yeah…we’re looking at 7-9 tracks maximum. It’s just going to be straight to the point with new music. You know what? Quote this bruh “We’re monkeying the game up right now.”

TWV: Like I have a choice…

L: Oh and one last plug for you. Andreas Hale was the last real nigga alive at BET!

C: I heard about that! Last real nigga alive!

TWV: Oh geezus…stop the tape.

All: *Laughter*