We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful King Monsieur . We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with King Monsieur below.

King Monsieur , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Do you feel you or your work has ever been misunderstood or mischaracterized? If so, tell us the story and how/why it happened and if there are any interesting learnings or insights you took from the experience?

The element of surprise has become one of my greatest strengths now. From first impressions people see the hair, make up and nails and begin to assume that when i perform my music for them for the first time they think my performance style won’t be as good or interesting. Im even shocked at how many people catch onto my songs in new places as if they’ve heard it on the radio or played it before. It took allot of self development to learn to appreciate that and allot of practice at open mics or shows to learn how to engage with the crowd and really be present while on stage. It’s a beautiful journey that’s always changing but the old saying still remains, “you should never judge a book by its cover”.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

So I started writing music in 2015. I was working at a gas station and a daycare and I remembered I always love singing and rapping my favorite songs but I didn’t believe in myself as a singer to be honest. During that time I had been a huge fan of Nicki Minaj and the way she took over the rap industry and became successful being herself but being able to cross over into multiple genres and be successful made me realize that maybe I could do music but as a rapper. I remember writing lyrics to remix’s at work or in my car on breaks. I would record with 2 phones in my car and do remix’s or a quick freestyle just practicing and would upload them to my SoundCloud. I think after maybe 6 months or so i finally got the chance to go to the studio and record for the first time. I was so nervous and I remember saying to my myself “this is it, we’ll know after this session if the song is really hot or we just delusional and need to quit”. I was so happy after that first session and at that time I was still new to the recording process but I remember I uploaded the song “I’m King” the next day.

My expectation for every song I would make was that “this was the one” and that still hasn’t changed. So after the first song I really believed in myself as a rapper and songwriter and continued making remixes and original songs still practicing my craft and making sure once I started making music for sale, that it would be my best work.
While I was in my beginning stages of writing I was also performing at open mics and song competitions. Really anywhere I could find to perform my new music. Starting out in music I was doing male modeling and with modeling you have to have a certain look so at the time my hair was in a standard “bald fade” haircut but once I started doing music I realized the artist is who is in control and I began to take control of my own image again. At first I started with box braids because I was new to hair and needed something low maintenance. Now I’m into lace front wigs and I love the versatility of them. I style and custom color all of my wigs which can be a task at times but it’s all part of my process in getting ready for shows now.

Allot of my performance style and being able to do all my glam myself comes from watching RuPaul’s Drag Race and performing with the Drag Queens and Kings in Columbus OH. I love how everyone’s makeup and performance style is unique and different and even though there are rules to makeup, you don’t have to follow them.

Which brings me to the first song I made available for streaming and purchase “Sriracha”. This song was the perfect first single as it basically represented me coming into myself as an artist and taking control of my art.

Currently as I work on finishing my first mixtape for streaming and my first album I’m working on performing more. I just took my first trip to Austin Tx for Nerd Core Dayz which was during SXSW 2023 and I had such an amazing time. It confirmed for me that I really need to travel more and get some Merch together as well.

Currently I’ve been training because over the Covid period I did gain some weight which hasn’t stopped me from performing but I believe getting in shape will allow me to go harder on the stage and that is the end goal. I’m currently down 50lbs since doing the raw vegan lifestyle since Jan 5th. I’ve learned this journey with music isn’t a sprint but a marathon and I’m prepared to take that journey.

Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?

The Four Agreements The Tipping Point
Blink
The Secret

I will forever be thankful for the time I spent working at Lululemon Distribution center here in OH. They really opened my eyes to goal setting and self development. All of these books besides “The Secret” I discovered working there and they opened my mind to allot of the tools I needed to help myself get to where I am now not only as an artist but as a person. I just recently read “The Secret” and I also unknowingly used the law of attraction but now that I understand it, my life has changed so much so fast. Even this interview itself was something i manifested so I would highly recommend these to anyone and believe all should have audio book options which is how i listened to them.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

My recent trip to Austin TX was one that was both a great experience and even bigger lesson. This was my first trip outside of Ohio for music and I traveled alone. Never having traveled alone and for almost a full week I greatly under estimated how much it was truly gonna cost to stay the whole time. The event I was attending is called “Nerd Core Days” where during the week of SWSW, artist from all over the world come to perform together at multiple venues in Austin TX . We all performed two days out of that Week, but as I was on my way down there the venue I was scheduled for on Friday cancelled so my performance scheduled changed from performing on Wednesday and Friday to just Wednesday with a potential Friday. Because I’m not from there I panicked and cancelled my hotel stay from Wednesday to Saturday and changed it to Wednesday to Friday since I wasn’t sure I would even have enough money to stay for the whole trip. The night of Thursday I got the message that Friday was back on which made me happy to be able to perform again since Wednesday went really well but now I didn’t have money to extend my stay in the hotel till Saturday and my check out was at 11am. I went to the show on Thursday to network since I thought I was gonna be leaving after that night. It was a smart move networking but I ended up waking up later than I was planning the next day to try an get pre-ready in my hotel room before the show which started at 4pm that day. So with less than an hour to pack all my things and try to get ready for the performance and avoid a late check out fee which I couldn’t afford. I manage to get only get packed and finish doing my hair right before check out time. After packing my trunk with everything, before leaving the parking lot of the hotel I quickly pulled out my laptop and created my setlist for the show that day and also ended up doing my make up in the car also. Since I still needed to get changed and shower, I went to a close by Planet Fitness and took a shower but I left my bag with the performance clothes in my car by mistake and because I didn’t want to look suspicious I just changed in my backseat. Finally I was ready and headed downtown to the show. Since it was during SXSW which I never had been too, traffic was so busy as it was getting closer to the show. The funny thing is Austin has two bars with the name “Valhalla” and if course after taking 30 mins to find parking and walking in the building I discovered I went to the wrong location. Luckily for me the correct one was only 1.5 miles away (20 min walk) and I wore shoes that were very comfortable to walk in that day. I made it to the venue and had another amazing performance which made everything that I went through that day worth it. Too embarrassed to let anyone know what was going on behind the scenes, I ended up sleeping in my car that night since there was one more event on Saturday which was just a “Artist Appreciation Picnic” and after meeting and seeing everyone perform I didn’t really wanna leave without try to connect once more. That day was easier since I wasn’t performing I didn’t need to get really dressed up so I showered at planet fitness again after getting a little workout in also this time. The picnic ended up going great and right before that I usually use door dash to make extra money but for month my app wasn’t allowing me to sign in. One my last dime I tried it once more and finally got it to work again. Thankfully I was able to make enough to bring something to the picnic and also enough to make it back home in gas. I definitely be more open about my financial issues when traveling and try to reach out to people/artist who may also be in the show because I found out at the picnic that some artist were staying together and that would’ve helped make the trip allot more enjoyable but I think that was a lesson I needed to learn and glad I was able to learn that earlier than later down the line. This is what I usually call a “Rockstar Moment”. A rockstar moment is when everything before a show isn’t going well but you as the artist still manage to pull everything together and put on a great show without anyone being able to tell your struggling in that moment. Ive learned though that even the greatest Rockstars still need help and asking for that doesn’t take away from you being a Rockstar.

Contact Info:

• Website: Linktree.com/KingMonsieur
• Instagram: KingMonsieurRaps
• Facebook: Facebook.com/KingMonsieur
• Twitter: KingMonsieur
• Youtube: YouTube.com/KingMonsieur

Image Credits
Eric Paul Owens Katie Forbes Cory McCraw