Killer Mike is on a mission. Now that he’s perfected his expertise as an MC, established himself as a group activist, grow to be an outspoken advocate for marijuana legalization, advanced right into a political dynamo intent on making a distinction, and can juggle his tasks as a devoted household man, the Run The Jewels juggernaut is concentrated on his well being.
“I simply don’t wish to have gotten wealthy and die early,” he says matter-of-factly from his dwelling in Atlanta. “I don’t wish to die with somebody humping on my effective ass spouse whereas I’m [in] the grave.”
As of February 2023, Killer Mike has dropped someplace between 40 to 50 kilos by watching what he eats, consuming a lot of water, and hitting the fitness center along with his coach—however he has some severe targets.
“I’m trying to flip it up and hopefully by the tip of the yr, if I half-ass it, it will likely be 30 to 50 kilos, but when I get actually disciplined it will likely be 50 to 100 kilos, so we’ll see,” he continues. “Both approach, shifting your physique extra, consuming extra water, and consuming higher is sweet for you.”
Third grade was a pivotal yr for the younger Michael Render and he says he out of the blue simply “ballooned” up.
“My grandma used to take me procuring within the husky aisle,” he says with fun.
However his grandmother’s well-known Southern cooking additionally thwarted any makes an attempt at dropping pounds—merely put, it was simply too good.
“My grandmother raised me, so in fact your grandmother needs to overfeed you,” he says. “And my grandmother had like seven sisters, 5 of which have been alive and nonetheless round, so I used to be all people’s chubby little boy to feed. What I needed to study is should you’re going to eat your oxtails, you don’t need to have an excessive amount of rice. Eat your oxtails, eat one thing inexperienced, eat a candy potato, what I’m saying? You don’t need to have all of the cornbread you need. Simply have a small, easy piece. So what I’ve realized is moderation, and I’m studying meals actually is a love language for me.”
Killer Mike appears to be like to his grandfather, who suffered a gentle coronary heart assault when Mike was a child. Following the well being scare, his grandpa stopped consuming beer and different alcohol (save for the occasional sip of moonshine), stop smoking unfiltered Camel cigarettes, and had Mike’s grandmother minimize down on his parts of meals.
“My grandfather would inform my grandmother, ‘Feed me in a saucer’ as a substitute of a plate as a result of my grandmother overfed him,” he explains. “She didn’t say I like you as a lot as she’d make you a giant ol’ plate. So moderation and portion management is one thing my nutritionist will discuss to me about and I’m like, ‘Oh shit, it’s like what my grandfather did.’ He simply ate much less and determined to maneuver round extra. I’m studying these two folks most likely gave me every part I wanted to know that I pay folks $100 an hour for now.”
As Killer Mike acquired older, he found smoking weed didn’t precisely assist management his urge for food, so his relationship with it appears to be like barely completely different today.
“My days used to begin off like this: I’d get up, smoke a joint, eat too huge of a breakfast, hang around, determine going to the studio and shit,” he says. “Now that your spouse simply went into full Claire Huxtable mode, you may’t get caught consuming a hoagie. So now, I stand up, work out with my man Al Claiborne at FITEFX and after I get all of the endorphins of train and that top going, I take it to a different stage and often smoke a joint. I often roll one-gram joints, and I used to roll round with seven to 9 one-gram joints.
“Now, I’m usually rolling round with three [joints]. One joint will get me by the day, and the opposite two are for sharing with my spouse. We used to undergo about an oz each couple of days, now we’re about an oz each three to 4 days. We purchase in quarter- and half-pounds at a time. We solely smoke very heavy indicas. We’re probably not into sativas ‘trigger my thoughts already strikes quite a bit, so I don’t need issues to hurry up my pondering. I must decelerate and zone in, so I’m a fan of very heavy indicas and my factor is that if it ain’t broke don’t repair it, so OG Kush is simply my favourite.”
Certainly one of Killer Mike’s most up-to-date Instagram posts is a close-up of him blowing a billowing cloud of OG Kush slowly out of his mouth whereas rocking spouse Shana Render’s Louis Vuitton sun shades. It’s a reminder of the couple’s shut relationship, one which isn’t discovered too usually in hip-hop.
“The cool factor about my spouse and I is we journey collectively,” he says. “We’re a helluva blended household in that I kinda got here with the youngsters. It was like, ‘Hey, will you marry us?’ So she will get to be a helluva bonus mother and she or he is one, but it surely additionally provides her freedom. We misplaced a toddler early in our relationship and couldn’t have one other, so she’s been capable of simply be with me.
“I find it irresistible. That is nothing dangerous, however that’s my dawg. That’s my dawg. That’s simply my pal. That’s simply my accomplice in life. We love figuring it out collectively. We smoke collectively. She simply got here off a 21-day quick the place she didn’t smoke and I used to be like, ‘Man, I actually miss smoking with you.’ She simply got here off her quick. I used to be like, ‘Goddamn, what have been you praying for?’ She was like, ‘You!’”
As “dedicated marijuana people who smoke,” Killer Mike says he and his spouse have a wedding “tailor made” for them. She will tolerate the occasional journey to the strip membership and a packed touring schedule that so usually comes with the life-style of rappers—not all ladies might or would, for that matter.
“I’m simply completely happy that she’s selecting to stroll this journey with me,” he provides. “I like her quite a bit.”
As a lot as Killer Mike loves weed—he’s the star of Vice’s Tumbleweeds with Killer Mike in spite of everything—he does have some issues relating to youthful youngsters smoking solely for leisure functions.
“You already know that outdated adage that it robs you of ambition?” he asks. “I don’t assume that’s true when you’re a purpose-filled particular person. So Michael Phelps was fucking bold. He needed to swim these goddamn laps, so marijuana is one thing that most likely helped calm and focus him. However if you’re within the ninth grade and it’s both go to swim observe or smoke with the homies, it’s not the smoking that retains you from being efficient. You identical to hanging with the homies greater than observe, so I informed all my youngsters after you’re 18, we will burn it down. That’s no downside. However I don’t need you to really feel good with out having to do one thing, which is why I finished smoking earlier than the fitness center. Now I smoke after the fitness center as a result of I would like the fitness center to present me the primary really feel good of the day.”
However, Killer Mike continues to be hoping to see the day when marijuana will now not be unlawful on the federal stage. At this level although, he’s asking the query: “What the fuck is happening, President Biden?” Marijuana continues to be a Schedule I drug underneath the Managed Substances Act, that means it supposedly has a excessive potential for abuse.
“You [Biden] might re-schedule this from a heavy narcotic proper now,” he says. “Why aren’t you doing it? Kamala Harris, former prosecutor, why aren’t you within the outdated man’s ear each fucking day when prosecutorial workplaces are being clogged with bullshit marijuana instances and convictions? Let’s give the Black group, who gave you 94% of their votes, and the progressive stoner group, who additionally gave you a bunch of their votes, a break and decriminalize. Whereas we’re at it, let’s create a pathway for many who are in jail for nonviolent marijuana convictions on a federal and state stage, be it leaders, to indicate the states what to do by doing it federally. Let’s launch some folks since you mentioned you probably did it, however I haven’t met one one who mentioned they acquired launched but. Truthfully, I feel People ought to simply begin with a quiet protest. And that quiet protest might go, ‘As a police officer, I’m not locking somebody up for marijuana.’”
However till then, Killer Mike is past content material blowing his Kush and placing the ending touches on Run The Jewels’s subsequent album, the aptly titled RTJ5. The venture will function the follow-up to 2020’s wildly profitable RTJ4.
“The album is actually two days away,” he says excitedly. “I’ve to go in tonight and alter two strains on a tune. I’m simply ready for some drums from [producer] No ID and we’re executed.”
Killer Mike by no means imagined when he first enlisted his rhyming accomplice El-P—who he unapologetically says he “loves”—to supply his 2012 solo album, R.A.P. Music, what would transpire after they joined forces as Run The Jewels.
“I didn’t see it for precisely what it was as a result of I’ve by no means been right here earlier than, however I knew we have been one thing badass and we have been going to be huge,” he says. “Large is relative. Coming off the underground, huge is simply, ‘Hey man, I went gold,’ and I can play small golf equipment. Did I see us doing 100,000 folks in England with [Labour Party leader] Jeremy Corbyn? Did I see us opening for the Foo Fighters on the Tremendous Bowl in Atlanta? Did I see us doing Pitchfork Music Pageant with 40,000 youngsters? No, I didn’t. I’m so, so grateful.
“A gaggle is a treasured factor. Run-DMC won’t ever be the identical. De La Soul won’t ever be the identical. A Tribe Known as Quest won’t ever be the identical. I worth each single day of the final 10 years. I worth the errors we’ve made. I worth the grievances. I worth the arguments. All of it, as a result of this journey don’t all the time final, however to date, it has been a tremendous one.”
This story was initially Up to date within the Might 2023 challenge of Excessive Instances Journal.