We caught up with the brilliant and insightful William Hill II a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, William thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Who is your hero and why? What lessons have you learned from them and how have they influenced your journey?
I’m a huge fan of Jay-Z, have been since the beginning. Following his story has been very beneficial to my own success, starting from the bottom having to do whatever you can by any means necessary. Finding a vehicle in music to get to a better life. I can speak to this because that’s exactly what I did, used music to make my life exponentially better.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I had small beginnings, working in fast food restaurants to pay for studio time. I also had to do a few illegal things to get money, like robbing people and businesses and selling the stolen materials to pay for studio time and equipment. I finished high school, I even tried out college but it wasn’t for me. I wanted a career in music and I wouldn’t let anything stop me. Working hard enough to get to the point where I can charge people for my own music was one of the best feelings I’ve ever had. When I started out everything was analog, nothing was digital like today. I can record a complete album and less than three days digitally, versus having to buy more tapes to free up space recording analog. My pride for what I do comes from knowing that I never gave up, I’ve booked shows where I only had five people in the crowd. I’ve made albums that were extremely hard to sell. I didn’t let any of these things deter me, I kept fighting and kept at it. I learned over the years that you cannot become complacent with any type of music or sound, if you want to sell music to people you have to make the music they want to hear.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
Well desperately trying to make it as a rapper in my mid 20s, I came across a Music conference called get seen get signed. This company was supposed to showcase your music in front of the largest record companies available, the largest DJs in the industry at the time. Of course you had to pay to play, and for a person who had no backing it wasn’t cheap. You were required to pay fee if you made it through the first round of Artists, I had to come up with $500 and fast to allow these people to hear my music in Chicago. I had just set off on my own, I have bills to pay and I did not have an extra $500. I’m not proud of this but I stole the money from my job and paid for my spot, lucky me they never found out and they gave me the time to go without me losing my job. So now I’m in Chicago performing in front of Twista and other hip-hop names, at the famous Navy pier. I’m in this place for hours, rapping for hours, things are going very well. I go to each record labels booth, I do my thing and they enjoy it. I get business cards from everyone, and everyone telling me I’m going to be hearing from them. My confidence is through the roof, I am extremely excited about the fact that I may potentially be signed to a record label. I leave Chicago and head back to Kansas City, thinking of my next moves. I call the record labels the very next day, and hope that I can get something started. What I come to find out is, all the numbers are fake. I’ll be going to Google the names of the people on the cards, and the names are correct but the faces do not match the people that I spoke to. I was completely ripped off, I’ve stolen from my job, and I’m out of $500 now. This made me want to quit, it was one of the largest blows I’ve ever endured. I began doing a side hustle of mechanical, secretly paid my job back and stepped away from Music for a year. After overcoming my anger I began riding again, I met a new crowd of people that were closer to the music industry than I ever was. I kept at it and the rest is history.
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
After being an analog wrapper for so long it was pretty daunting to get into the digital era, I had personally met people who had music all across the Internet. I’ve never been very tech savvy so I never knew how to start, networking through my music I met the right people that help me put my very first song on the Internet. “YouTube choppers “, this song has a ton of views. Once I learned how to navigate the Industry via Internet, I put the analog business in my rearview. I used to print CDs and sell them at my shows, that gave me a lot of confidence to talk to people face-to-face. Now with social media, I don’t have to talk to anyone face-to-face unless I choose to. Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter, have been a great vehicle for me to sell Music. I’ve been approached by Facebook to monetize my own artist page, the traffic that I get now helps me gain more streams. Learning how to outwit the algorithms is a big part of the game as well, everyone wants money and if you’re not willing to pay you must be smart enough to advertise yourself.
Contact Info:
- Website: Subliminalmusicgroup.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/therealhurracane
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/therealhurricane
- Twitter: @therealhurracane
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/user/hillwilliam10
Image Credits
Images by Subliminal Music Group