Music

Mike Posner talks high-profile collabs and the over-romanticization of hip-hop's golden age

by Anne T. Donahue

Thanks to the success of 2010’s platinum-selling 31 Minutes to Takeoff, Mike Posner has a lot to be grateful for: following his recent collaboration with Lil Wayne, the singer-songwriter has revealed plans to work with Wiz Khalifa, David Guetta and Big Sean—to start.

“I think people don’t realize that I’m a producer first,” Posner begins. “Which is weird to me because I’ve been producing longer than I’ve been singing. [But] I’ve done a few sessions with Wiz Khalifa, a session with David Guetta and I’m doing a project with my best friend, Big Sean. There’s more, [but] I can’t tell you quite yet.”

Posner’s secrecy makes as much sense as his determination not to over-romanticize hip hop’s golden age, using the current musical landscape as proof of 2010s’ equal playing field—despite any negative connotations associated with mainstream music or what it represents.

“It’s really easy to be nostalgic about music from 10 years ago because we only remember the best rappers and the best singers from the ’80s,” he says. “The ones that suck we’ve forgotten about, so it seems like everyone was so awesome. But it wasn’t that amazing. That’s always how I feel when people get super nostalgic about music from 20 or 30 years ago.”

“[And] there’s a lot of really exciting music out there, you know?” he continues. “A lot of people get really caught up in hating everything that’s popular. I used to be like that too when I was in high school. If it was on the radio, I hated it. But there’s some songs that are popular that are really good songs, and I hope that people can appreciate good music [even] though it’s popular.”

Popularity, according to Posner, is determined by a type of democracy he believes explains the meteoric rise of today’s top 40 darlings—musicians who he maintains climbed from the underground to establish themselves as some of the “biggest artists in the world.”

“What’s cool about music today is that it’s more democratic than ever,” he affirms. “A lot of artists that are mainstream now were underground a matter of months ago. I made mixed tapes before my album, so I was an underground artist for a few years before I became a mainstream artist, and I’m not the only one.”

“More than ever before people decide what becomes popular,” he adds. “I just made a CD in my dorm room, put it on the internet for free, and if nobody liked it, I wouldn’t be [talking] to you right now.”

Such confidence should be expected from the 21-year-old former sociology major whose bold declarations help explain his increasing presence in mainstream hip-hop, and help assure his place in the ever-evolving pop culture spectrum.

“The most exciting thing about my life and my career is that I’m still getting so much better,” he assures. “So it’s really exciting to me to make it this far. The music I’ve yet to make will be my best.”