IDS interviews rapper, hip-hop producer Mac Lethal

David McCleary Sheldon, the Kansas City emcee also known as Mac Lethal, isn’t concerned with money.

Since leaving the Minneapolis-based Rhymesayers label in 2006, only two years after being signed and releasing his well-received first and only full-length album, “11:11,” Mac Lethal has taken over his own career.

With close friend, Jeremy Willis, he co-founded Black Clover Records, his own D.I.Y. label where he can be both an artist and an executive.

He also has his own radio hour at Kansas City Alternative 96.5.

“At a bigger label, you obviously have more money, more resources,” Lethal said. “Being on a small label you have to do it all yourself. And you know, I honestly don’t mind doing the work.”

After more than a decade of rapping and prolifically pumping out mixtapes, EPs and other collections of songs, Mac Lethal has cemented his reputation as a Midwestern hip-hop powerhouse whose known for his energy, his foul mouth and his live performances.

Mac Lethal is performing on Friday at Rhinos.

The IDS interviewed Lethal as he trekked around an unfamiliar part of Chicago, looking for, among other things, Jay-Z’s new book, “Decoded” and yogurt with Cap’n Crunch on top.

IDS You signed to Rhymesayers Entertainment in 2004. Why did you leave just two years later? Was the split amicable?

LETHAL It was amicable. Basically, I think Rhymesayers is a brilliant label. I think that they’ve done a lot of amazing and innovative things in hip-hop. I think I realized that I wasn’t good at being a soldier and taking orders. I needed to be in charge.

I realized that I could absolutely, under no circumstance, sit there and not be in 100 percent control of things. I cannot, not be the boss. I felt like my career was in other people’s hands, and maybe it was in the right hands, but ultimately I decided to take a chance at being 100 percent in charge of this and still
possibly failing.

IDS What were the benefits and drawbacks of working at RSE, a bigger label?

LETHAL I get to do whatever I want, whenever I want. I don’t have to ask permission or wait behind 12 other artists. I also don’t have bigger artists looking down on me, telling me I didn’t know how things were because I hadn’t done this or that.

IDS Some might say you’re a prolific rapper. You’ve got three full-length albums, 12 mixtapes, four EPs, 10 Black Clover Special Reserves (mixtapes) and guest vocals on 22 other tracks. What period of your career or specific album are you the most proud of and why?

LETHAL If we get super-uper-duper-uper-duper specific, I’ve only released one record, the original “11:11.” That’s the one I’m proud of, because I know how much went into that, how much work. All the songs I’d write and say, ‘No, no, no, no, I’ll put that on the next Love Potion’ (mixtape).

IDS You said in an interview with Yahoo.com that commercial hip-hop on the radio is the main reason so many artists and movers and shakers think that hip-hop, as a genre, is in jeopardy. How do you use your radio show to combat that?

LETHAL I said that? That doesn’t seem like something I’d say ... I’m not one of those people. Calling hip-hop a genre is stupid because there’s stuff on the radio that’s completely different than the stuff I do. It’s like comparing Aesop and T.I.
Why is there only one genre? They need to split it up. I mean, I like commercial hip-hop a lot.

Sometimes I do interviews and people will say, ‘Well, Mac is so anti-mainstream.’ And I’m not. I’m actually anti-having an opinion for no reason.
 
IDS If you had to pick one word or phrase to describe one of your live shows, what would it be?

LETHAL Fun. It’s rap. It’s hip-hop. Performance hip-hop. People love it, and we have a very, very good time doing it. I take live performances really
seriously.

After Bloomington, we only have one show left, so if I had to pick a phrase to describe this performance, it’d be: After Bloomington, we have one show, and then I get to go home.

Mac Lethal
WHEN 8 p.m. Friday
WHERE Rhino’s All Ages Music Club
ADMISSION $8 in advance, $10 at the door
MORE INFO Kansas City rapper and hip-hop producer Mac Lethal will make an appearance in Bloomington.