Ever since civilization began, there has been royalty. Men have gone to war and lost their lives for thousands of years in order to call themselves “the king”. In modern times, the term is generally used as a nickname for the greatest in a respective field. However, from King James VI of England to King James, #6 of the Lakers everyone who calls themselves king of anything has had pressure to live up to the moniker.
OTS J Huncho came into the rap game proclaiming himself “King of the Hills” and has not shied away from the pressure and attention it’s brought him in his career so far. The Hills refers to the Tulsa neighborhood he grew up in, Gilcrease Hills. Being from out of town, the only thing I knew about The Hills previously came from references I had heard other Tulsa rappers make, and they didn’t speak highly of the area.
Huncho attributed that to people thinking the area was “soft” and “suburban”, things that don’t align with the persona most rappers try to portray. He even mentioned that there are a few rappers from the area “but they won’t let you know that” because “if [you’re] that, you can’t make music. You can’t rap cause you gotta be the toughest cat in the world, you’ve gotta have a million bodies.”
That never stopped J Huncho from representing where he was from with pride, however. On the song “Shhh” from his project Guerilla Warfare 2, he rapped “they had them jokes and sh*t ‘bout the Hills, but ain’t said sh*t since the Huncho done popped out.” He wants to prove to people that someone from his neighborhood can make it in the rap game and he is doing just that, finding a lot of success in a relatively short amount of time. He said at this point “when they think of The Hills, they think of me” and that he has “changed a lot of people’s opinion” about the area.
Being The King of the Hills is not where J Huncho wants to stop. He is looking to elevate to “the king of Oklahoma and then… elevate to the world.” He is well on his way to reaching those goals and said “Tulsa, yeah I got that too and as far as Oklahoma” he should be in everyone’s top 5.
His work has made that point hard to argue, recently dropping the third installment of his Guerilla Warfare series, Guerilla Warfare 3 (Dawn of the Apes), which has standouts like “Bryce Thompson”, “Wayman Charlie & Huncho” and “Mirror Mirror.” He is looking to use the success of the project to get “the world to hear” him, possibly branching out of Oklahoma to garner new fans, but always with the plan “come right back as soon as it pops off.”
No matter where he goes, his starpower will help him climb to the top of any situation and I can’t wait to see “The King of the Hills” become a worldwide success.
