OG BOBBY gives it more than 100 percent

When OG BOBBY was in Thailand, he was surrounded by EDM. It wasn’t until he went to high school in Florida that he got the real Hip Hop experience, with his friends making beats on the lunchroom tables while he busted freestyles. Soon, he was learning how to make songs and raising eyebrows along the way.

After dropping a freestyle on the Teriyaki Boyz’s ‘Tokyo Drift’ beat, NINO, CEO of Hype Train, contacted OG Bobby and things have been heading into the stratosphere ever since. From his first single, ‘AYE AYE OG’ to collabs with VannDa ‘BONG,’ and his latest, ‘YEAH’ with AWICH, OG BOBBY is all about leveling up.

LiFTED caught up with OG BOBBY after his set at Rolling Loud via Zoom to hear about his beginnings, how he finds artists to collab with, and how it feels to play on the biggest Hip Hop stage in the world.

Tell LiFTED a little bit about your background. How did you get into Hip Hop in the first place?

I’m a Florida teenage boy. In my high school environment, there was a lot of Hip Hop around me. In Thailand, there were only EDM moments around me. You know S2O or Skrillex moments. So when I went to the States, there was a lot of Hip Hop in my environment.

How I started was from freestyling. You know on the lunch tables when there’s just a bunch of homies tapping on tables for the beats and whatnot. So I practiced from that. People told me I was good so I should try and make songs. I guess I tried and people f*cked with it. It’s from that point to now and I got better and better.

Tell the people about going from freestyling to actually making songs in a studio.

One is freestyle. Then the other is making music. It puts a lot of pressure on you. I feel like it’s leveling up in a way. This is how people make music. There weren’t any right or wrongs. I was just kind of learning at the same time, too. So with the help of my friends and my environment, they also knew how to make songs. I was just trying stuff out.

You work a lot with Hype Train. How is that going? It seems as though they are blasting out music at a record pace.

It’s going good. Two years ago was my first single, ‘AYE AYE OG.’ It got me a lot of good exposure. All the way till now with ‘Bong’ [OG BOBBY’s collab with VannDa], I feel it’s going good. It’s still the beginning for me international-wise.

You’ve done a lot of collabs over the past little bit with VannDa, ‘BONG’ is one of LiFTED’s favorites, as well as JP The Wavy, Eskimo, Sprite, Ben Bizzy, etc. Is there anyone in the Asian Hip Hop music scene that you want to work with that you haven’t worked with yet?

That’s a good question. Recently, I worked with AWICH in Japan and JP of course. I thought of the Teriyaki Boyz at one point. Because the reason I got into Hype Train was because of the ‘Tokyo Drift’ freestyle that I did. So NINO [CEO of Hype Train] hit me up because of the ‘Tokyo Drift’ freestyle, so if I actually got a track with the Teriyaki Boyz, that’d be something.

Tell us a bit about your collab with AWICH. How did ‘YEAH’ work out overall?

It’s dope. The exposure in Japan is great. I usually get challenges or whatnot, but now they are all doing choreography to the song. I can’t dance, but they know how to pop it in multiple ways that I never imagined. With this song in general, I got a lot of exposure and feedback from Japan. I guess it’s going really good.

How did getting with AWICH come about?

Hype Train had a show with them, so during that time we had six days in Japan. So we were like work hard play hard, too. Let’s find work. Let’s find something to do. We had a lot of people on our minds, and AWICH was one of the ones that contacted us back. I was lucky enough to find a studio and we got something out in three hours with her. Boom. Just like that.

How was the Rolling Loud experience for you overall?

I’m blessed. We had three to four times to rehearse. We were so excited. This was our dream stage. We want to have dialogues. We want to go more than 100 percent. And we did. We had a few complications with set times, but it was understandable. At the end of the day, I know for sure I broke my scale by giving more than 100 percent. I lost my voice the next day. At the end of the day, people were telling me that we were good and we brought people from the main stage. I almost fainted and had low energy after because I went too hard, but overall it was good.

After the show, it hasn’t kicked in. I just literally performed for Rolling Loud. It hasn’t kicked in. Then a couple of days later, it’s me thinking back like damn, did that really just happen? I’m just waiting for those highlight movies on Rolling Loud Thailand. I’m really excited.

One more extra question, you had some braids recently, but now you are clean-cut. Is there any reason for that?

No reason for it, but if I were to see it in one way, I guess it’s leveling up. It doesn’t matter with the hair. If you are only here for my hair, then I know what kind of fan club this is.

Close X

Interview