Matt Proxy runs circles around his SoundCloud rap peers
Before he goes on tour with JPEGmafia, the teen rapper-producer talked to The FADER about his debut album trojan horse ahead of a bonkers NYC show.
19-year-old Matt Proxy met me at the goal post with a dap and a, “nice to meet you,” before rushing out onto the field with a soccer ball, literally running laps around myself, other artists, and his friends as he practiced his penalty kicks.
When you picture New York’s underground rap scene, you probably don’t imagine an indoor soccer field in a skyscraper in Manhattan’s Financial District. But my confusion evaporated around the fourth time Proxy dribbled through me. Most artists try to control as much of their environment as possible, creating a focused zone to do their best work. But Matt Proxy seems to channel whatever energy is around him into his music and performances.
Point in case: when he took the stage a few hours later, Proxy jumpstarted an hour-long frenzy for his fans, playing trojan horse from back to front to back. There was no shortage of crowd surfing, shirt ripping, and smiles from the 19-year-old rapper as he basked in it all.
trojan horse finds proxy unpacking his lifestory, from the frostbitten chill of Minneapolis winters growing up to the tragedies of his personal life: last year, his sister overdosed, and his father was detained by ICE for six months before being deported to Liberia. These are heavy topics for a debut mixtape, but Proxy makes them mesh with his moshpit-ready instrumentals.
In between practicing his free-kicks before he went on, with heated soccer matches in the surrounding fields, Matt Proxy took a break in the penalty box to speak with The FADER on his new album and share some thoughts on horses.
The FADER: Welcome to New York. Is this your first show here?
MATT PROXY: This isn’t my first show in New York, actually. I did a show with Boolymon and Certified Trapper and yuke in 2024. It was crazy because I was the smallest ni**a on that shit. I was just coming up, and now this is like my first headline show.
What do you think of this venue?
It’s cool. It’s like a soccer field. They're going to be playing like it’s like the World Cup.
What was it like growing up in Minneapolis, and how did that influence the type of music you wanted to make?
Growing up in Minneapolis, it gets cold for like four or five months out of the year, so that forces you to lock in, sit down, and make your music.
How did the decision to have your dad narrate on the album come about?
That was the plan before my dad got deported. It just worked out cuz he’s a boxer. So that’s kind of the themes of [trojan horse]. That’s why I’m wearing the Anthony Riddle Boxing [glove] right now, you know what I'm saying? Shout out to Anthony Riddle Boxing, he made this for me today. Um, he’s a boxer, and it was just in the theme of redemption and like the come-up. Trojan Horse is the whole story of my come-up and everything like that; how it’s just weird, and the anxiety [with] the ambition at the same time.
In a lot of your songs, you work with heavy rock and punk influences. Do you think about balancing genres intentionally when you write?
I don’t listen to punk or rock music; I never did. I’m really a hip-hop head. But I just make music with my homies. Like Noah Oken, genius. never goodbye, Danny Dwyer, genius, you know. So I I get in there. Current Joys, Nick, he is a genius. I get in the studio with these people and bro, I was talking to JPEG about this shit, live instruments add so fucking much to an album, and we can combine our minds and make crazy ass shit.
I’ve never really been like a rock ni**a, so having Current Joys on my album is crazy cuz that’s like the ni**a that introduced me to indie rock, no troll. I grew up listening to Osquinn and Hi-C and fucking X [xxxtentacion]. Like that’s what I was on, like fucking Munch and fucking Ayce Comet. This is the scene I was in, you know, like Molly Moon 333, if you were there, you was there. Quinn, Did I say Quinn already? Say it two times. Say it two times!
Heading out with JPEGmafia this summer, what do you think the Peggy crowd will look like?
What do you think they would look like, white? No, I’m kidding, I’m kidding. Oh, it’s going to be great, bro. I’m just so excited for this fucking opportunity to show ni**as my hunger and show ni**as I what I believe in, and how bad I want this shit, because these ni**as don’t want it as bad as me.Put that out there. Ni**as see that and ni**as get insecure. Ni**as get insecure cuz I want it bad. How much sense does that make? It doesn’t make no sense to me.
Since this album is titled trojan horse, what's a song or detail on the record you think people are gonna miss?
I love the synth in the second half of "Five." When the synth comes in, it's a super quiet synth, and then it's pitch modulated. On "Atlanta," the samples of my dad’s interviews are all over it. [The record] samples hella childhood songs, like it got "A Milli" by Lil Wayne. Um, I probably shouldn’t say that.
I like how "LOVE&ADDICTION" was made with no VSTs, just analog, bang. Uh, same thing with "BLUE." What else? It’s a Trojan horse, "Stars" is like a Trojan horse. It’s like, if you think about the name, if you're not listening to the whole song, you're shooting yourself in the foot, you know? So that’s the whole idea.
You have a lot of “horses” in your discography. Are horses your favorite animal?
Not really, it just came about. Shout out to horses, though. look, look— "Hold Your Horses," "Horsepower," um "Leading a Horse to Water," "Straight From the Horse's Mouth," bang. Let's go.
What was it like working with fakemink on “5”?
Mink had an earworm bro, and like they actually locked me in, shout out to Moustafa [fakemink and OsamaSon's go-to engineer], they locked me in, and they're like, "Matt, you need hard drives, bro, lock in." So shout out, that’s how it was working with Mink. I love Mink, he shows me so much love. Mink is the fucking goat.
On “MISERY” you scream the lyrics in the background, “you want to hate me, you want to hate me.” Who does it feel like you’re talking to when you say that?
"You Want to Hate Me" is just—I feel like I got hella haters because... I don’t know what it is, bro! “You Want to Hate Me" is like some DMX shit. I just feel like a lot of ni**as got a lot of things to say about me on the internet, and it’s like all right, cool, bro, just keep observing, keep seeing, bro. Like, if you see the vision, you see it. And if you're with me, you're with me, you know?
Obviously, there’s a lot of pain and grief on these songs, but also the album feels like it processes emotions in an almost hopeful way.
I just like to write. When I was writing Trojan Horse, I was thinking “Let me just write good things, bro.” Like, let me write positive things, cuz every time I say shit in music, it comes true. And that’s real, bro. So I was just saying mantras and trying to give positive energy. I have some sad moments, but it’s [more] retrospective.
You tweeted last year that you had a dream about chopping up beats with MC Ride, is a DG collab something you would pursue?
I don’t really listen to Death Grips that much, but I like some Death Grips songs. And that was like an Analog Princess video, she made like a skit about that, it was like a fire ass fucking video. Shout out to Analog Princess. Everyone knows Analog Princess is the goat.
Do you have a favorite song on the record? One that’s particularly close to the heart?
"Stars" is my favorite, "Atlanta" is my favorite… "Blue," "New Solution." What’s your favorite?
"God" at the end like when the guitar goes —
Deen-neen-neen-neen, yeah, that shit’s fly.
If we were to make an edit of this show, which song should we use?
I mean, "Five" everyone can understand, like your mama can understand it, and then like your little brother that’s like 12 can understand it. You know what I’m saying? "Stars" is more for the real ones, though. That’s that’s the whole point. I’m cutting the grass low. That’s the whole point, y'all don’t get it? I’m cutting the grass low. Like, y'all don’t get it? That’s the whole point. Yeah, so probably "Five."
I saw you posted you're already working on a new album. Should we be expecting any new music this summer?
Yeah, of course, bro. I’m going to put it out, and you guys are going to hear it, of course.
Sweet, that’s all I have.
Thank you, appreciate it, bro. Hey, listen to Trojan Horse if you listen to it with headphones, listen to the whole thing, let me know what you think. Listen with an open mind. I feel like XXXTentacion on 17. Bang!
