Vic Mensa Decides on New Direction for Debut Album

Last month, Vic Mensa released the There's A Lot Going On EP, and it seems that the personal tone of that EP will also be reflected in his upcoming album. The 23 year old Chicago-based rapper was planning on calling his debut album Traffic, however, in a recent interview with AllHipHop, Vic Mensa mentioned that he discarded that album title and content and decided to take things in a much more personal direction.

“I made an album and then I didn’t feel like it was the right representation. So I started making a new album. That’s where the songs from There’s Alot Going On came out of. I would say it’s about 75% done.” Vic Mensa said of new album which he's making instead of the recently scrapped Traffic. He described his new music by saying that its “very autobiographical. There's a lot of narratives, a lot stories.”

Additionally, the Roc Nation rapper mentioned that the personal feel of the album will also be reflected in its lack of guest appearances. “I don’t really do a lot of collaborations. I really just collaborate with my immediate team. The stories that I’m telling are real personal. It’s very unique to me, so it’s not often that the songs I’m writing for the album really lend themselves for somebody else’s voice.”

Mensa's recent releases have also demonstrated that he's making a concerted effort at raising awareness about social injustice, as “16 Shots” from his There's A Lot Going On EP tackled the issue of police brutality.

“The people that don’t understand and think they’re comfortable where they are, I got to shake their mentality and make them start thinking. A lot of people are just regurgitating the racist beliefs that their grandparents handed down to their parents that handed it down to them.”

By Ryan Donberg for RAPstation.com