Squared The Rapper - A Story of Success
While doing this interview, the only question that was running around my head was, “how can you make someone who’s already cool, look cooler?”
An HR expert in the morning and a rising hip-hop star and a rapper at night, sitting down in a tiny homemade studio with a not-so-professional recording microphone, he managed to catch the eyes of so many people, including us. With all honour, I present to you today Mahmoud Mahmoud, best known by his stage name Squared The Rapper.
A graduate from the school of business management, class of January 2019, he has been in the business field ever since he was 19 years old to have a 4-year career in HR, Human Resources. Mahmoud is passionate about his HR career; the chance of getting to know different people from all around the world was always Mahmoud’s favourite thing to do. “I love talking to new people, I love meeting people with different perspectives, different backgrounds. Working in HR -especially recruitment- it allows you to meet hundreds and hundreds of people every day from different countries, different jobs. It’s awesome! I love interacting with new people.”
Apart from being the front face of his agency in all the business deals since he was only 19 years old, Mahmoud says, and I quote, “suddenly, from being a member behind the scenes to having my manager come over and say 'Mahmoud, you are the recruitment lead of our agency.’ I was only 19 at that time, I wasn’t into HR that fully and, out of nowhere, I found myself working with such big names like Samsung, Vodafone and many more. This was one of my proudest moments.” Mahmoud, aside from being an HR expert, is into career development training and visiting universities to give workshops and training sessions to students. This was a turning point for him; from being a simple attendee in one of the biggest career summits in Egypt, to actually giving a workshop there only a year after.
“It was a dream for me. When I attended the 2019th edition, my friends and I had this WhatsApp group as a joke under the name ‘Egypt Career Summit Mentors 2020,’ joking around about who’s going to give a talk. A year later, it actually came to life and I gave a talk there. It was such a big moment for me.”
Now onto Squared The Rapper, the 13-year-old Mahmoud who fell in love with the rap industry watching MTV Arabia 24/7. “It was always showing rap music videos and I fell in love, I used to dress like them, I used to talk like them. My English wasn’t that good so I started writing lyrics and tried speaking like them. A year later, I was performing in my school’s talent show ”Inspired by Eminem’s “Slim Shady” non-filtered, unapologetic, non-censored style in music and falling in love even more with the rap industry. However, Mahmoud’s trigger point into creating the ‘Squared The Rapper’ wasn’t what you expected.
“Funny story, it wasn’t to be like that at all, I called my page ‘Mahmoud Raps’ and the main goal was to share my spoken word poetry and some rap music. Writing poetry was the way out for me the past year and a half, so my idea was, I loved Rap, and I loved poetry, why not mix up between them both and see how it goes? At that time, when first creating this account, poetry was my way of letting out everything inside, at the time, I only did a couple of open mic shows, shared my writings to specific communities, but it came to a time where I really wanted to get out of my comfort zone and let everyone know how I really felt.”
And ever since that, Squared The Rapper has been on a rise! With posting 1 video weekly and getting around 15K views, to growing a complete Instagram account with over 2K followers in just 1 month, from all over the world, to even getting noticed by the creator of the McDonald's rap challenge, the infamous Youtube Rapper HiRez, for Squared recreation of his challenge. Posting as well on Facebook and having his own page, to catching the eyes of several artists' platforms. Squared The Rapper has been everywhere on social media! And when it comes to speaking about social media, we have to admit it’s powerful, with the followers numbers going up, the likes and the shares flying. So high, would someone like Squared ever get blinded by the lights?
“Personally speaking, no. I’d not get blinded by the lights. As mentioned earlier before in MilkyWay’s live video, I am doing this purely and solidly for fun, I’m enjoying what I’m doing, going back to writing lyrics and getting back into the music scene, I love what I’m doing. I’m not focusing on the numbers. However, I’d definitely care when I have 10 thousand followers because that means I'm getting to share my message to more people and my music to many more other listeners. My content is my content, I’m doing what I’m enjoying”
From getting 15K views on his ‘Someone You Loved’ cover, to his latest cover of ‘Bad Guy’ by Billie Eilish, Squared’s creative process of cooking up his songs was as well stunning. Figuring out the right tempo for the right song, playing around the original instrumental of the song, figuring out the flow and trying to recreate the same through rap. He’s also working on his very first EP to be posted on several platforms, including Anghami, with future collaborations. He’s taking his time with it, however, because he wants it to be real. What makes the song ready for Squared to release it is when it’s fully coming from deep inside his heart and soul. And, to prove that, Squared spoke about his experience on his latest collaboration, and of course not the last *wink wink*, with Mahmoud Hazem. Starting from a friend-to-friend WhatsApp chat to both of them actually working on it and presenting to the world, Squared said that he loved it. “It was on my list actually! The lyrics just meant something to me. At that time, I was fresh out of an experience similar to the lyrics and the song just resonated with me. Mahmoud did his part and, with some editing on both sides, it was out for everybody to see. I truly believe that this is what makes it good, art in general. Based on emotions and for it to be as relatable as possible to others.”
Scrolling down his Instagram, I couldn’t really pick a favourite cover, even Squared couldn’t pick a favourite either! “You cannot pick a favourite child, right? But, to say it all, I enjoyed doing ‘Bad Guy’ the most. It was a bit new! I’m not going to deny I was a bit scared and felt off about it, presenting a couple things that people might see as inappropriate in the video; I am still not familiar with my audience. But, it was more of my vibe, more of my tempo, more of my flow. That’s why I loved it. It was Squared’s flow. I even received very good feedback about it, I’m not really one to sit down and wait for the feedback, but it was the one I received the most positivity from. Even when it isn't positive, I always love to know the feedback of my audience so I can get better.”
Performances are usually the key to success of artists. Practising for it beforehand by months, to actually stepping on the stage and rocking it with all the lights and the eyes pointed towards you. I have seen Squared perform on so many occasions, from a friendly hangout in Room Art Space to Artkhana’s latest Open Mic Night. It always left me amazed by how much confidence is oozing off this guy! And I think we got his secret and even some special tips!!
“I’m just having fun. I’m enjoying myself. As you said, I only did small gigs, or karaoke nights. And not to sound snobbish but I always have this mentality that ‘Hey, I’m going up there and I’m lighting this sh*t up.’ I don’t want people to think I’m hesitant, or that I’m not confident. No, I’m confident enough. And that’s my tip to everyone, just enjoy yourself, you are doing something that you love, you go on stage and perform and, even if people didn’t like it, you still went up and loved what you were doing. Have confidence in yourself, no one will know if you made a mistake if you are performing something you wrote, always have that mentality ‘I’m going up there and I’m the best out there.’”
Contrary to the belief that the rap industry is all about big names on the scene dissing each other through songs, the industry itself is much more than that. Rap is much more than just the negative side of promoting drug use or sexual stuff or cars, rap is much more than just a couple of artists beefing in front of the whole world. Rap is “expressive, fun, artistic.” Rapping is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates "rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular;" it’s art. It’s challenging to make it to the industry without having to lean into their field. Our question to Squared was, how can you be the positive to all of this?
“Rap is usually looked at as a very violent way of expressing yourself and that's because people choose to listen to rap songs that do so, rap songs that talk about women, cars, money. What I’m doing with my songs is something that we usually call conscious rapping, it’s when you are rapping about a cause, having a message behind the song. Just like NF, Joyner and some Eminem songs, they are delivering a message. And, to answer your question, of course not; rap isn’t only dissing. 90% of rap songs aren’t dissing or beefing. The other 10% are just normal people who chose to express themselves using this expressive art, instead of going onto the news talking about their problems with a certain person, they just chose to make a song about it and hit them with that. Of course, it’s not based on diss tracks, but I’m not going to deny that I am also having a diss track dropping soon!”
As we spoke about all the glory details of the EP, Squared hinted at having collaborations with several other singers and artists as he has said, “I’m in the mood for collaborating.” If he was to ever collaborate with someone in the underground Egyptian rap community, he would love to work with artists such as Batistuta or Abuyusif, if the songs they’re collaborating on had a meaning to him. And, internationally speaking, he would love to work with HiRez or Crypt The Rapper. “I’m not quite familiar yet with the Egyptian rap community. However, if I took the time to actually search, I'm sure I'll find lots of fire songs and amazing talents.” With so many messages to deliver with his art, just like the very first song he posted on his account, Barely Alive, which was about mental health awareness, Squared promises to convey so many messages with his music and in this EP.
“Going back to the main aim of having this account being done, it was all mental health awareness. Most of the poetry, hell, all of my poetry is about mental health awareness. And I guess I have 3 originals until now that are about mental health. So, yes, you’ll be seeing more of that in my music. I guess my purpose is to advocate more for mental health awareness in our community. I, also, have a song that I have shared a couple of times in several live videos and open mics called My Therapist. I’ll be recording this song and posting it soon!”
Since starting as a young 13-year-old boy with big dreams, to being where he is now, this is Squared The Rapper. This is Mahmoud Mahmoud. A rising Hip Hop Star that I was so honoured to sit down with for an hour talking and playing around, did you guys know that Snickers rhymes ith flickers, triggers and spitters?! #knowledgeyouneed #pleaseyasquaredmakeasongaboutsnickers, here’s Squared’s final advice for you.
“Stay true to yourself, don’t go with the flow because, as they say, only dead fish go with the flow, stay true to your vision and the reason you’re creating all of this, and your audience will come to you. Be patient! If you really want your talent to be out their fully. Try as much as you can to innovate and don’t imitate. And, to the rappers out there, don’t be the typical mumble rapper who’s all about silly lyrics and autotune, write lyrics that actually have a meaning, legit rap.”
And at the end, I cannot really end my interview with anything else other than thank you Squared for being such an inspiration :)