We were lucky to catch up with Nemo Flow recently and have shared our conversation below.
Nemo, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Do you wish you had waited to pursue your creative career or do you wish you had started sooner?
I started my rap journey in 2017. Doing it seriously at least. I could’ve been a lot farther had I started in 2015 when my high school years started. I often beat myself up for not starting a lot sooner. For example (while I don’t support the traditional education system) I’m sure we’re all aware that high school taught a couple of valuable things. I was aware of the fact that there were extra curricular activities and yet I wasted my time chasing a girl for 3 years of my life. Ranging from computer classes that taught coding, and website design such as html and more. All the way to the fact that I am a rapper and could have did 4 years of choir! Not my smartest moments in life. Instead I worried about spending my time with friends and working a dead end job when I was 17. In all reality I could have been learning music theory, instruments, web design, graphic design. And so much more. The biggest challenge I face today is that there is nobody to teach me what to do. I am my own boss. My own team. My own company, critic, producer, designer, and more. If I could go back right now to my first year of high school I would have never started smoking or drinking, I would have dropped every girl I was interested in. I would have let go of every thing that didn’t benefit me. I would have went to every teacher that taught the things mentioned earlier and squeezed every ounce of knowledge out of these people, wrote it down. Studied it. Mastered it and than went back for more. I wish I would have started sooner but I won’t let that hold me back from what I can achieve now. Instead I’ll let it be a lesson for people who look up to me.
Nemo, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
The reason I got into rap wasn’t because I saw the money in it, wasn’t because I wanted to be the most popular person in the world “although now it is” it was because one night me and my little brother went to the park with our friend who shall remain un named (We are enemies now) he started free styling over a beat and I was in shock and awe. He was amazing at it. How could someone come up with so many words so quickly. That night in 2016 I made a vow to myself that I was gonna go home and figure it out. Me and my brother went out back and that’s when our journey started. I looked up “juice wrld” type beats and I told my brother we are not gonna stop until we figure this out. And from there my rap career began. After that I realized there were 1,000,000 other kids just like me who wanted it just as bad as I did so I had to take it a step farther. The first money I made was from a concert I signed up for. The name of the hosts were Afton. They wanted you to sell 20 tickets and you keep the profit cause the up charge the tickets was insane. Making almost no money I knew it was gonna take a-lot of discipline and studying to figure out how to actually make money out of this industry. Being a kid with a 9-5 job working a Limon tacos and tequila (now renamed). I decided I was gonna take some money and create rave bracelets. Sell them for $5 each at school, than tell people where the nearest raves were. It worked for about a month until everyone at my school was wearing them. Little side note “I have to give credit to my friend Jordan. She gave me the idea by making me my first NEMOFLOW bracelet. She was a real one.”Now fast forward about 7 years I’ve turned NemoFlow into a full on brand that’s slightly controversial lol. I now provide full on mixing, mastering, and studio services. Plus I have a catalog of over 200 beats that people buy from me personally. Most artists hit me up with the same issue. “I have these insane lyrics but I can’t record and I don’t have any beats!” So I figured why not get all of those things learn how to use them and provide them for these artists. It does come with risk though. I have to be careful about who comes into my house. Anybody could cause harm to my household at anytime. I solved the problem of artists having ideas and not being able to bring them to fruition. I also provide music video services and photoshop services to create graphic design. An artist could literally come over to my house and have an entire song, music video, cover art, and contract completed by the end of the day. Before I had this equipment. That process would take months, now I can do it in a day. Maybe longer for the music video but that’s the hardest part. Editing a video in premier pro. I think the one thing that sets me apart as an artist and entrepreneur is actually giving a f*** about the client. My whole life I have went to studios and even if my song was ass the engineer blew smoke up my but telling me this is fire, next big thing. I’ve never heard anything better. For me to listen back a couple years later and realize that was the most a** song I’ve ever recorded. If someone does a bad song I let them know immediately. I don’t hide my skills. I don’t over charge. I also do a flat fee. Just in case the artist needs to take extra time to work on his music. My biggest accomplishment so far is being able to make money off music from a multiple different sources. You got TikTok, and instagram which pay amazingly, I’ve used them a couple times to pay my rent. You got Distrokid which pays around 8k per million streams. (Don’t quote me that’s just last I checked) you got artists coming over to buy your services and beats. You got donations. Giveaways, collabs. And so much more. I’m most excited to be doing concerts in the future. I’ll be paying for everything myself so even if there isn’t a profit in concerts at least I get that exposure! One thing I could say about me is that I have amazing stage presence and I’m awesome behind a camera. That would be something I’m most proud of and I thank my mom for that. She never cared who was watching or what was going on she was the center of attention always.
What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?
The most rewarding thing about being a creative artist in the industry I’m in is that I get recognized in public. You can try all the drugs in the world drink as many bottles as you want but nothing will ever feel as good as getting recognized in public. I had one kid come up to me saying “are you Nemoflow” I said heck ya I am and he caught me alone and he starts tearing up. Like actually crying. He goes Nemo man, you saved my life. Your video on not ever giving up it really changed me. And he gave me a hug. To this day I still cry about it. Another 2 times I was recognized was in front of my mom. I was driving and I went to take a picture of this dudes car and before I could even pull my camera out he goes yo! You’re that kid from TikTok! I’m like fuck ya I am! He’s like I F*** wit you heavy dawg. It was awesome cause my mom couldn’t stop smiling and laughing. The other dad was with my dad and stepmom, I was just flying my drone and these 2 kids came up and were like yo are you Nemoflow! I was like f*** ya I am! There like bro I seen your tiktoks your awesome! It’s those types of moments that make everything I’m doing 100% worth it.
What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
Have you ever wanted to skydive, or go paragliding. Is someone in your family super ill and the only thing can help them is a treatment that costs over 10k. Was there ever a time you were watching a tv and said to yourself “wow I wanna do that one day.” Cause everyday that stuff happens to me. My grandma has almost been diagnosed with cancer about 2 times that I’m fully aware of. My mom was bed ridden for 14 years of my life. All that time I could have fixed both of those issues with money. Me and my dad do jobs together and see this enormous mansions and think to ourselves. Wow we gotta get one of these. My dad will look over at me and say you have to make it before i go dude. I think making it and sharing these experiences with my dad, making it and giving back to my mom. That’s the mission, that’s the drive. If I don’t become the best version of myself for my dad and for my mom. Than I have failed as a son. They have provided me with living spaces. Food, water. And everything I need to survive. It’s up to me become the strongest person my bloodline has ever seen. That’s my drive.
Contact Info:
- Website: Nemoflowrecords.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/nemoflow___?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nemo.flow.35
- Youtube: https://youtu.be/ITeoi2bEw5Y
- Other: https://soundcloud.app.goo.gl/LafazT4Qg5vUMqUF8 https://vm.tiktok.com/TTPdj5xPdv/
Image Credits
Nemoflow