In this week's Billboard cover story A$AP Rocky talks grieving A$AP Yams, Police Brutality, and why drugs help him 'Cope with life'.
The closest person Rocky ever had to a collaborator, his longtime friend, mentor and business partner A$AP Yams, aka Steven Rodriguez, died in January of an accidental drug overdose, at age 26.
On the loss of A$AP Yams: "But he showed me that there are people who can be born from another woman and another man but be as loyal to you as a blood brother, if not more. He had my back, man. Me and him had the same vision, and he knew how to help me reach it.”
On the recent police killings in Ferguson, NYC, etc: "All it does is make me cringe. There's not really much I could do, because I ain't about to shoot no cop in the head, blow his f---ing head off, right now. So I just sit back and pray for the best. If I'm not going to Ferguson or any of these places, protesting or contributing, I should shut the f--- up. So that's exactly what I'm going to do. It ain't my place to speak on it."
On the roll LSD plays in his recording process: "It helps me cope with life," he says. "I've been doing this stuff since I got into the industry. People are scared to talk about it." He says he likes psychedelics because his life is psychedelic. "It's trippy. My art, my visuals. Very trippy."
