For better or worse, summer 2021 feels like communities, neighborhoods, families throwing off the restraints of the pandemic. The time under quarantine sparked Mic Geronimo's creativity in ways he didn't anticipate.
"I think it just was a catalyst to put certain things in motion. It definitely gave me the opportunity to sit back and do a retrospective. And to reflect on myself, shed a lot of things and invite other things in. The energy that we all were sharing during the course of it, it did something to open up parts of my mind when it came to writing."
"In a weird way, it helped me to hone in on things you do as a creative. It gave me a greater sense of appreciation for being able to create music. That in and of itself made me want to make the best music that I've ever made. It definitely, in a strange way, brought something good out of all the chaos."
It's been more than 25 years since Mic Geronimo dropped The Natural. In those heady days with Irv Gotti, he was part of a wave of young Queens emcees taking Hip-Hop by storm. When he looks back now, he sees what made that time special.
"I think with The Natural, it was just that: it was organic," Mic says. "It was me at 18 years old. I equate it to being a very young fighter pilot and you're in your first plane. You're seeing what. you can do and you're seeing how fast you can go. You kind of have this fearlessness because you're so young. But you allow it all to just go. I think over the course of my career, as to where I am now, I think I'm a lot more definitive in terms of what I'm aiming to get across."