Vic Mensa Interviewed

Vic Mensa speaks with the gravity of someone who has lived several lifetimes before reaching his early thirties. There’s an intensity behind his words, but also a calm that feels newly earned. He describes his latest project not simply as an album, but as a reflection of a man who has shed layers of chaos to step into clarity.

The story of Vic Mensa has never been straightforward. Born Victor Kwesi Mensah in Chicago, he has wrestled with the push and pull of fame, creativity, controversy, and survival. Each chapter in his career carries the mark of reinvention, but the release of his sophomore album, Victor, feels like a culmination—a return to self after years of turbulence.

“I’ve been through everything,” he says with a half-smile, equal parts exhaustion and pride. “I’ve been hated, loved, misunderstood. But through all of that, I had to sit down and really look at myself. That’s where the growth came in.”

For Mensa, the idea of evolution isn’t just artistic; it’s spiritual. He often frames his journey as a battle between destruction and transformation. Drugs, violence, and reckless living once fueled his mythology. Now, reflection and accountability fuel his music. “When life puts you at that crossroads,” he explains, “you either quit or you rise. For me, rising was the only way forward.”

Long before the world knew his name, Mensa was a kid from Chicago who wanted to bend sound into something new. He cut his teeth as frontman of the band Kids These Days before carving out his own lane with the 2013 mixtape INNANETAPE. The project, with its experimental fusion of rap, rock, and soul, became a time capsule of the early 2010s internet rap era.

That moment also cemented his kinship with Chance the Rapper, a childhood friend and frequent collaborator. Their parallel ascents became symbolic of Chicago’s creative explosion, positioning them as leaders of a new school. But while Chance leaned into optimism and spirituality, Mensa’s lane was darker, more conflicted—a truth he embraced.

His 2017 debut album The Autobiography offered a raw portrait of a young man wrestling with mental health, addiction, and fractured relationships. The writing was heavy, dense, and often devastating. Looking back, he admits it might have been too much too soon. “Those stories were some of the best writing of my life,” he says. “But maybe people weren’t ready to hear that side of me yet.”

If that record was about confession, Victor is about reclamation. Recorded after moving back to Chicago following a stint in Los Angeles, the album finds him rooted in the city that raised him. “Being home gave me a sense of purpose again,” he reflects. “LA was a blur—too many drugs, too much violence. Here, I could breathe. I could see who I wanted to be.”

The music mirrors that grounding. Across 18 tracks, Mensa blends global consciousness with street-level storytelling, balancing socially charged observations with flashes of swagger. It’s a project that resists easy labels like “conscious rap” and instead threads multiple dimensions into a single body of work.

Visually, the album draws from myth. The cover art, painted by Terron Cooper Sorrells, reimagines Mensa as Osiris, the Egyptian god of resurrection. Three doves stitch him back together, their wings standing in for the goddess Isis. The symbolism wasn’t lost on him. “I was 28 when I made the record, the same age Osiris was said to be,” he says. “That story of being torn apart and put back together—that’s my life.”

The record also carries the voices of an eclectic cast: Thundercat, Ty Dolla $ign, Rapsody, Jay Electronica, and Common, among others. On $outhside Story, Common paints a vivid portrait of Chicago as a city of contradictions, a place where beauty and brutality coexist. Mensa wanted listeners to feel that complexity. “Chicago is never just one thing,” he insists. “It’s culture, art, worship, violence—it’s everything at once.”

Another standout, Blue Eyes, dives into deeply personal territory. Inspired by an ayahuasca trip and the memory of his late aunt—who struggled with skin bleaching and later died of cancer—the song becomes a meditation on identity, trauma, and beauty standards. “It’s about self-love, about unlearning what the world tells us to hate,” Mensa says quietly.

Then there’s Law of Karma, where he strips away bravado to confront his past mistakes head-on. The song feels like a purging, a lyrical fire meant to burn away ego. “I know I’ve been both a positive force and a destructive one,” he admits. “The contradictions are real. But I can’t let the internet decide my worth. I’ve got to live in the real world and keep moving forward.”

Outside the studio, Mensa’s commitment to impact runs deep. In 2018, he founded SaveMoneySaveLife, a nonprofit that has delivered nearly a million dollars in aid and resources to Chicago communities. From distributing shoes to funding youth programs, his activism remains intertwined with his artistry.

His entrepreneurial streak extends further. With 93 Boyz, Illinois’ first Black-owned cannabis brand, he reclaims a business that once criminalized his community. “I’ve been hustling weed since I was a kid,” he says with a laugh. “Now I get to do it legally and use it as a tool to build culture.”

That local vision expands globally with the Black Star Line Festival, a cultural gathering co-created with Chance the Rapper in Ghana. The festival, which featured Erykah Badu, T-Pain, and other heavyweights, was designed to bridge the African diaspora. The next stop: Jamaica. “There’s so much talent there,” Mensa says, rattling off names like Koffee, Chronixx, and Skillibeng. “It feels like the natural next step.”

In conversation, Mensa often references art beyond music. His uncle, Frank Stella, is a celebrated painter and sculptor whose six-decade career inspires him to think long-term. “My uncle is still being recognized at 88 years old,” he says. “That reminds me not to limit myself to what I’ve achieved so far. There’s no expiration date on success.”

For all his ambition, Mensa still thrives on being underestimated. “It’s cool when people doubt you,” he says, eyes glinting. “They have no idea what you’re about to do next.” That unpredictability—chaotic at times, liberating at others—has defined his career.

As he speaks about the future, there’s a renewed sense of faith in his voice. He doesn’t dwell on past controversies or chart placements. Instead, he frames everything as preparation for what’s still to come. “The best work of my life hasn’t even happened yet,” he declares.

What lies ahead for Vic Mensa is impossible to pin down. Maybe that’s the point. He thrives on reinvention, on blurring the lines between activism and art, pain and beauty, destruction and rebirth. What’s certain is that his story is still unfolding, and if Victor is any indication, it’s only gaining momentum.