Biography

HXLT is one of the few serious renaissance men in music. An OG in the hip-hop/punk scene, he's a true creative - a rapper, musician, designer, director, fighter, and a great entertainer. His sound is a mix of melodic minimal chords, strings, and guitars paired with hard and gritty beats. Heavily influenced by punk rock and gangster rap, his music is various different tastes neatly blended to express his diverse background and innovative spirit. Born in Chicago to a multi-ethnic musical family, HXLT was raised listening to Led Zeppelin, Smokey Robinson, 2Pac, The Clash, & countless other genres. Early on he developed a love for art, culture, and fashion, paving the way for his future in music and design. While working on his first HXLT project he met Kanye West in NYC. The rest is history, HXLT signed to West’s record label G.O.O.D. Music in April 2014. In 2016 his debut HXLT record released featuring Kathleen Hanna. It was critically acclaimed by Pitchfork, NPR, Billboard, etc. The past three years HXLT taught himself guitar, piano, and production, finally able to fully express himself musically. He showcases this on upcoming project Bloom From Doom (releasing this summer). Every track originated from a guitar melody to match the emotion he was feeling in the moment. Made during the hardest point of his life, the album unveils extremely raw emotional honesty about real despair, failure, depression, & pain transitioning into songs of actual hope & forced positivity.