Sacario is a rapper and songwriter best known for writing the song “If I Could Go” for Angie Martinez. Billboard named it among the biggest songs of the year in 2002. The song was featured on Totally Hits 2002: More Platinum Hits which is Certified Platinum by the RIAA with sales of over 1,000,000. Sacario’s first record release “Live Big (Car Keys)” and “If I Could Go” were both included on The Transporter movie soundtrack.
In the first ever deal of its kind EA Trax packaged “If I Could Go” with the NBA Live 2003 Video Game Soundtrack which sold 1.3 Million copies worldwide and is inducted into the Guinness World Records as the “first officially-released video game soundtrack to be RIAA certified platinum”. In 2004 MTV announced Sacario’s nomination in the Mixtape Artist of the Year category at The Annual Mixtape Awards.
Now Sacario is back, even bigger and better, with his new release “Open Letter 2.0” and as co-founder of Quiet Ink Entertainment Corp., a boutique American production company specializing in writing, developing and producing media content in both the music and film spectrums. Here, in an exclusive interview, Sacario spits out his truths about his own career and the music industry in general.
1. How long have you been doing what you’re doing and how did you get started in the first place?
SACARIO: I’m a professional rapper for 12 years. I started out performing at talent shows in my High School Norman Thomas in New York City. A few years later I recorded a few songs and created a DEMO. I shopped my demo to record companies but no one wanted to sign me. I eventually met Angie Martinez and played her the music. She loved it. I signed to her production company Animal House. She played one of my demo songs called Live Big (car keys) on Hot 97. The same record labels that turned me down before I got on the radio wanted to sign me when they heard me on the radio. Elektra records offered me the best record deal so I signed with them.
2. Who were your first musical influences that you can remember?
SACARIO: Eazy E “We want Eazy” is the first rap record I ever owned. I made my mother, a churchwoman, buy it for me lol. I loved the west coast gangster shit In the 1990’s. But I was also influenced by Wu-Tang, Biggie, Big L and Big Pun on the east.
3. Today, who do you consider the most influential or most interesting musical artist(s) in your genre and why?
SACARIO: At this point, I don’t think I would call anyone influential. I think Rick Ross is interesting. I think Drake is interesting. I think they are interesting from a perspective of where hip-hop is today. I’m also interesting in what they will say or do next.
4. You’ve got a lot of new fans today, who don’t know much about your past, Could you fill us in, on your time with Elektra, Angie Martinez and the multimillion selling albums?
SACARIO: Well, I was signed to Elektra for a few years. I wrote a song called “If I Could go” for Angie Martinez. The song spent 6 months on the Billboard charts with over 180,000 radio spins. That song opened up a ton of doors for me. I was featured on a movie soundtrack, video game soundtrack, a number 1 kids album. I toured every major city. I performed at Disneyland and alongside Beyonce, Nelly and Diddy. I recorded songs with Missy, Nore and Scott Storch. I never got a chance to release my own album but I was featured on over 7 million albums sold worldwide.
5. You probably know this already, but on first listening, many fans mistake Sacario for Jay-Z. Does that pride or bother you, and in what way?
SACARIO: Of course earlier in my career it bothered me but the comparisons didn’t stop me from getting a major label record deal with a major label budget. It also didn’t prevent me from getting all the platinum and gold plaques I received. End of the day, everyone can be compared to anyone. It’s only your talent that can outshine the comparisons so I just focus on delivering content and catering to fans who know exactly who I am and appreciate what I have to offer.
6. There are rumors about you ghostwriting for a host of big-time stars. Is this true, and could you drop some names of artist you have written for?
SACARIO: I’ll just say I helped out a lot of people.
7. How did your meet-up with Entrepreneur/Finance Guru Oskar Kowalski, and where did the idea for Quiet Ink Entertainment come from?
SACARIO: I met Oskar while he was a promoter at a club in Queens, New York. He booked me for a performance and we hit it off from there. Quiet Ink was always a concept that I had but when Oskar came along with his financial background we were able to revisit the structure of the company and evolve it into something bigger. Today, Quiet Ink Entertainment is not only music but also films and multi-media.
8. Ultimately with Quiet Ink, are you going to be more involved with promoting other artists careers, or will you be conciliating this work with the re-launch of your own career?
SACARIO: It’s all one in the same for me, no egos. I am my company and my company is me so the priority is about whatever is the best look for the brand. As much as we have on the table, we are very organized in that regard. I know everything that goes on with the company but we also have a very capable team of experts that know what they are doing on each project.
9. When you look back on what you’ve achieved thus far, including the difficult period after the folding of Elektra, do you get mad when the media don’t put you onto the front-pages or consider you as ‘relevant’ in the industry?
SACARIO: Of course! But no one is relevant until they are right? Michael Jackson wasn’t relevant until he was. So from that perspective it’s like fuck what anybody thinks, I just do me and keep grinding. Lady Gaga was signed and dropped before she blew up. T.I was signed and dropped before he blew up. Katy Perry signed and dropped before she sold 10 million records. My story is not a new story- it’s just a fucked up music industry pattern. A pattern of talent taking the long road.
10. If you were forced to choose only one, which emotion, more than any other drives you day after day to stay in this tough business. Is it joy, anger, desire, passion, hysteria, pride, or revenge etc., and why?
SACARIO: Passion without a doubt. You can only push past pain and create excellence with passion. Passion is love and the greatest bodies of work are formed because of the passion of the creator in relation to the instrument. Revenge is the yang to the ying of Passion. Revenge is extremely necessary because it makes winning personal.
11. Which ingredient do you think is the most fundamental, in making Sacario’s music unique or special, compared to contemporaries?
SACARIO: In my music, there’s no inhibition. There are no reservations. In my music, I give you everything. Rappers rarely give everything- too much bravado.
12. What aspect of being an independent (indie label) artist and the music making process excites you the most, and which aspect discourages you most?
SACARIO: I can say and do whatever the fuck I want. That’s fucking exciting. Censorship doesn’t exist in the indie world. It’s exciting when you actually have something to say and can say it without a corporate filter. At this stage of the game, there is nothing discouraging about being indie because indie is the new major.
13. How involved are you in any of the songwriting, recording, producing, and marketing processes involved in your music.
SACARIO: I am fully involved in every step. I have been doing music a long time; since reel-to-reel, Dat machines and patch bay. I’m young but I started out as a teen behind the scenes just watching how everything works. I’ve always been just as excited to sit with the engineer during the mix or sit in marketing and promotion meetings as I was recording the actual record.
14. The best piece of advice in this business you actually followed so far, and one you didn’t follow, but now know for sure that you should have?
SACARIO: Best piece of advice I ever received was don’t ever slow down. Producer Clark Kent told me, don’t ever slow down. In entertainment, momentum is key and when you have it do not slow down. I don’t think there was any good advice that I didn’t use.
15. At this point in your career, which is the one factor you desire most, and feel will undeniably benefit your future (for example increased music distribution, more media exposure, better collaborations, bigger live gigs etc…)?
SACARIO: Try this scenario: You are one person with a lot to offer. You are standing outside of a club amongst a sea of people. Inside the club is the place to be but you are the last person in the back of the crowd the farthest away from the club entrance. No one knows you exist. Exposure makes those people in the crowd, turn around and pay attention to you, which in turn brings you closer to the club entrance, which in turns brings you into the club and into success.
16. Do you consider Internet and all the new technology, as fundamental to your music, or music in general, or do you think it has only produced a mass of mediocre ‘copy and paste’ artists, who flood the web, making it difficult for real talent to emerge?
SACARIO: I was signed before social media so for me to be able to interact directly with fans and producers, writers etc all over the world is fucking dope. The flip side is people who should have no voice have a fucking voice. People who have nothing to say are talking-yelling even and more importantly being heard. People who have nothing to offer are offering shit no one wants, not even for free. When a faucet is running you cannot pick and choose the drops and this is what is happening with the Internet.
17. What do you think is the biggest barrier you have to face and overcome as an indie (or indie label) artist, in your quest to achieve your newly set goals?
SACARIO: Again, indie or major has the same challenge; finding a hit record. The music is the only thing that separates the men from the boys. No one gives a fuck who you’re signed to now-a-days. The thrift shop record that is all over the radio just sold 5 million copies. Ask anyone who is familiar with the record who those guys are signed to. No one cares. Make good music, make better videos and you win.
18. Is going Platinum or winning a Grammy still considered important to you? If you were forced to settle for only one choice, which of the two would you go for and why?
SACARIO: We play for awards. Any ball player will tell you a championship is more valuable than money. Of course we want money, money is always the goal but awards are rare and cannot be brought. Awards are earned. Losers have money, they don’t have awards. I have a wall full of awards and every morning when I look at those awards I think to myself, I need more! A Grammy is our Oscar but Gold and Platinum is reflective of how many people know your name. I’ll take gold and platinum anyday.
19. Jamar Austin, Mr Guantalo Ahi and Sacario. If you could go back in time, is there anything you would change in your life or in the choices you made?
SACARIO: I wouldn’t change one single thing. It’s all God’s will.
20. In closing, tell fans about current projects and what to expect from Sacario in the near future?
SACARIO: New music, New films and quite possibly changing the world. I’m on a mission that’s greater than just wealth and myself. I’m here to leave my mark and leave something that will exist longer than my time on this planet and after I do that I’m gone.
[soundcloud params=”auto_play=false&show_comments=false”]https://soundcloud.com/sacario/open-letter-2-0[/soundcloud]
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One Comment
Natalie cruz
Sacario is a liar and a dead beat father. I have had to collect welfare to support his son Tyler Jordan. Angie did not discover him he recieved demo production from mobetta a long time JZ producer. Sacario stole the production from mobetta from my old manager