Barrel Maker focuses on the music, not his image

They say my generation is uninspired, we lack motive, but it’s hard to stay focused when the lens is broken, Barrel Maker raps on “State.”

That line, from Barrel Maker’s debut album, Blk Flanl, might as well be his thesis statement. The words in the rapper’s smooth, assured voice fall over light and shimmering beats without anger, but the emotion is no less powerful.

Compared with the rest of Blk Flanl — on which the beats mix with bluesy horns for a heavy, sludgy and solemn tone — the production on “State” sounds almost lighthearted. It’s designed that way because the message was so important, explains Barrel Maker, whose real name is Morgan Cooper.

“I get into social issues on that track,” he says. “I talk about kids with guns, and I wrote that, thinking how we’re becoming so desensitized. It’s hard for me, watching my people killing each other, younger people becoming so desensitized to violence, and people saying my generation — millennials — is uninspired. In a sense, it’s true, but it’s also about perspective.”

Barrel Maker turned 23 in November. As we talk over beers at a River Market bar, the Grandview native attributes his own perspective to his safety-proofed childhood.

“I had a Super Soaker as a kid, you know? I wasn’t thinking about guns and shooting people,” he says. “My head was [focused on] doing what kids do, and I’m thankful for that. My father was there, and I had a stable household. I had a very modest, lower-middle-class upbringing. I was a knucklehead. I wasn’t perfect, but never at any point was I dodging bullets. I wasn’t worried about that.”

Which is why you won’t hear him rap about the rapper-lifestyle image promoted in mainstream hip-hop. Barrel Maker doesn’t shy away from tough social criticism on Blk Flanl, and part of that means calling out some of hip-hop culture’s most prevalent themes.

“There are the Chief Keefs — these artists of our generation who glorify the wrong things and are giving young black men a bad name,” Barrel Maker says. “I’ve never used my age as an excuse for anything. And who would I be, someone who didn’t come from that life, to try to follow those same things and those trends?”

He takes off his glasses and polishes the lenses with the edge of his shirt. He speaks with the same self-awareness, the same confidence, that comes across in his flow. He seems at least a full decade older than his true age, and not just because he confesses a certain distaste for social media. He’s not pushing himself on Twitter or Facebook, he says. He’s not big on photos, either, choosing to keep Barrel Maker’s identity ambiguous.

“I just think I want to take a different approach,” he says. “For so many people, the music comes second. They’re so focused on marketing themselves and media efforts and pitching, pitching, pitching, that there’s a shortcoming in their art. I guess it’s like reverse marketing in that way. I’m just focused on the art, and if the work is undeniable and people can feel that it comes from a genuine place, then you’ll get noticed.”

To be fair, though, getting noticed for his music wasn’t always something Barrel Maker had in mind. After high school, he skipped college in favor of apprenticeships in photography and cinematography, and that’s how he makes a living. He began writing raps in middle school, but that was always a private practice — until he met local producer and beat master Denzel Williams, better known as D/Will.

“I met with D last fall for a video project, and he brought me to the studio, and I just started throwing out lyrics,” Barrel Maker says. “Literally on that day, on the spot, he told me, ‘Yo, we’re going to record in first quarter next year.’ And I was like, ‘Shit, OK.’ And that’s when Blk Flanl was born.”

“He had a lot of raps. I think that’s what struck me most,” D/Will tells me later in a phone conversation. “Every beat I played, he had a different set of raps for. I’ve been doing this for 10 years, and I still make about three or four instrumentals a day just because I love it, for no other reason than just to make the music. And when I met Barrel Maker, it was the same way but with lyrics. He had a ton of raps, and they were all good. He struck me as the type of cat that cared about the music more than he cared about the Twitter followers or the blog comments.”

Not that D/Will doesn’t think Blk Flanl will make a splash. The album is set to release digitally on Thursday, March 5, and the producer couldn’t be more pleased with the outcome. A week before the launch, D/Will is still finalizing the master. He’s on his 11th mix.

“I kind of feel like I’m at a point where I’ve done so many albums with people, and I think I’ve made my fair share of mistakes,” D/Will says. “Now I’m at a seasoned stage where I wanted to make this his best foot forward. I’ve really taken a serious amount of time with the mix and the production. That way, when you listen to this record, you get a feel that him and I are professionals. We’re not just on some, ‘My man got beats and I can write some raps.'”

He continues: “I broke a ceiling with this record — with the mix and the overall craftsmanship of it. I shattered through a ceiling that was limiting me, and I got to express myself. And to have someone so young and so new in my life making music with me, and pushing me into this other world — I’m grateful for that. I think this album is going to be an eyeopener. We wanted to make an impression.”

Both Barrel Maker and D/Will can consider the mission accomplished. The 26 minutes on Blk Flanl fly by, but they have a lasting effect. D/Will is on top of his game: The production spreads around Barrel Maker’s voice like an oil spill, giving the rapper’s cool delivery a greased landing. The majority of the drumbeats and effects were made in real time. Blk Flanl is polished and ready to sink deep into your ear canals.

“I wasn’t sure there was a place for what I did because I rapped different things,” Barrel Maker says. “But it’s just always kind of been there. And I just got to the age where I didn’t care about the perception anymore. I’m just expressing myself the way I want to, and that’s what matters to me.”