CitR: Did you have to make many sacrifices whilst you were at university in order to pursue a hip hop career?

Shad: Yeah but it was always fun, I did what I had to do, I played a lot with some friends, and would have late nights than would have school really early in the morning. There were definitely some exams where I was sweating it, maybe scraping by on a mark here and there, it never felt like a sacrifice, I wanted to do both. In a lot of ways I think it helped with school, I wasn’t really in love with what I was doing in school, so having other stuff that I liked doing allowed me to put my nose to the grind with school stuff as well.

CitR: How haveve you been spending your spare time in the UK?

Shad: Sleeping… literally. We caught up a bit on time difference, but I’ve still been having an hours sleep here and there. We walked around a bit in London, in Soho neighborhood, and I have a cousin that lives there who we hung out with a bit. Got to see friends more than sights I guess, Bristol we got there too late to see anything, and Birmingham we were too freaked out to see anything. (laughs). Hopefully we’ll get to see some stuff in the morning.

CitR: Yeah we saw a photo of you napping on TLO’s facebook…

Shad: I can fall asleep in pretty much any moving vehicle. I’m just conditioned to, trains, cars, planes…

CitR: I saw you’re living on the West Coast now, what brought you to Vancouver?

Shad: I was going to school part time, been there three years now, it’s very different from Toronto. When I’m off tour it’s great to be in a place with fresh air and mountains.

CitR: Have you found a difference in the music scene on the West Coast?

Shad: In Vancouver I think a lot more of my friends are musicians, I have friends in Toronto that I grew up with, but in Vancouver a lot of people that I know just happen to be musicians. The music scene in Vancouver is a lot smaller, I really respect the bands that, ‘cus they work hard, it’s not like touring the UK, you can travel the whole place in a day, some bands travel for two days without playing a gig.

CitR: How often do you get put on the spot to freestyle?

Shad: Not that much actually, maybe if I’m hanging around some younger cats that love to freestyle, they’re just on the grind all the time.

CitR: Is that how it all started for you?

Shad: Yeah I was 14, 15, we’d be at a house party, and someone would be like “Shad spit something”. You know, it was fun in that kind of environment. When you’re just starting out your friends are excited if you can do it at all. You learn more, you listen more, and listen differently. I remember being in high school and the first time you hear Eminem or Common, and you’re like “Wow, that guy is next level”. Then you try to understand what it is that they are doing.

CitR: Have you ever had a fan try to freestyle battle you?

Shad: We were talking about that yesterday actually! There was actually one guy in Victoria, at Lucky, who was yelling from the crowd “I’ll battle you, I’ll battle you” and I was just like “I’m performing right now, it’s a concert it’s not going to happen”.

CitR: So how do you go about writing?

Shad: Well I guess the writing process comes out of freestyling, then you craft it into something and make it a bit better, usually it’s when your mind is loose, in the shower or bed, a few lines will start to stick together, then I’ll write them down.

CitR: Are you the kind of guy who writes everything down?

Shad: I try to, if I think I have a really good idea, then I try to. I feel like “if I can’t remember it then it’s not that good”.

CitR: The track Reservoir Poetry, is that where that comes from?

Shad: Yeah that was all so train of thought-ish. I can write without a beat nowadays, so I don’t always need a tempo to write to. More intelligent, double entendre stuff works better at a slower tempo, allowing the word to breathe, but faster stuff can also work better.

Read the rest of the interview HERE