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

MaDrique, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you take us back in time to the first dollar you earned as a creative – how did it happen? What’s the story?

This is a great question! I wanna say I did a show in DC around like ’08 or ’09. One of the homeboys booked me to do this show at a cafe. I think I only made $50 or so. I probably spent more money getting there (haha) than I did for the show. The experience was insane; the event was sponsored by Red Bull and the place was packed. This was really my first time traveling outside of my state to do music. Just seeing how my music was being received in a new area, let alone a different state. I get it’s only 5 hours, but it felt good. The funny thing is I’m sure I was promised more, especially since they were making money off the door, but it didn’t matter. I’m sure I blew it all the next day (haha). Me and the homies probably went to Busboys and Poets and cashed out. I thought to myself, “Yo, I made my first check off rap, I gotta keep doing this!”

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?

I started releasing music and going full force when I was about 15. In 2006 I released my first project “THE MONSTA” and ever since then, I’ve been hitting the ground running. So after numerous projects and shows and seeing the response from everyone; I was inspired to create my own record label, Dreams of Children Music Group (DOCMG), in 2009. There I’m able to release music, film, fashion, and everything we love all under one hub. It’s been a huge blessing being able to see all of my dreams come true.

I’ve been an artist for 16 years plus, so to do something that long takes a lot of discipline. Chasing your dreams, it has its ups and downs. It has moments when things are going great and it has times when things are going very bad. I lost track but I was able to refocus and keep going. I say this all the time; some of the things I’m mostly proud of throughout this journey is just staying down and staying dedicated and keeping my mind intact.

You have to stay focused and stay locked in on the end goal and really narrow in on what you’re doing and nothing else. You must understand that what you’re doing is dope and it’s gonna work. You have to focus on the people that support it, and not on the ones who don’t. I think that’s one thing that really sets me apart from anybody else is my work ethic and my resilience, just me never stopping. Always knowing my end goal of what I want and trusting the process.

I’m proud of myself for staying inspired, focused and dedicated; even though all the noise around me. I’m pretty much doing everything that I said I was gonna do, and that’s major. I’m so excited to keep going to see where everything goes.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being creative?

It’s a few things man, but I think the major part is just the ability to create and express yourself through your creations. A lot of us creators are super introverted, you know, we feel misunderstood. Our art is what we use to express ourself authentically; our true feelings, emotions, etc.. So, I think without that, we would all go crazy. I think another one is your art being able to touch other people. There’s so many times when people I know and don’t know come up to me and say,” “You know MaDrique, I’m a fan,” or tell me how a specific song inspired them or got them out of a hard time. It trips me out every time someone tells me what my music has done to them because I’m just giving my life flaws; well what I consider my life flaws and my insecurities. The best one is them buying certain pieces of clothes because I wore them. It feels great to see what I love to do is affecting them in major ways.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

Oh man, so many times I’ve heard. “All you have to do is work hard and you’ll get everything you need out of your career.” It’s taken years to unlearn that, because it’s not true. It takes A LOT; money, connections, relationships, foot work, overall grind, and now today, a social media presence. In reality they need to tell us; yes, work; have a stream of income coming in to keep life things going, that way you can have a strong work ethic in your craft and be able to go out and shake hands and meet different people. Those are things I feel like we miss, the truths, not what’s presented out there now. Work will get you far but it’s not the only thing.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://madrique.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/madriquesanders/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MadriqueSanders
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/MadriqueSanders
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/MadriqueSanders
• Other: https://www.docmusicgroup.com/

Image Credits
Photographer: Aliyaah Annakiya