It’s no coincidence that Asleep in the Bread Aisle dropped on April 20th; it also happens to be the underground smoking holiday for weedblowers worlwide. “People say Marijuana is harmful and it’s a gateway drug but I do way more stupid stuff when I’m drunk”, says Asher Roth about his habit. “Some need to smoke to get more creative but I do it strictly because I enjoy it.” Performance enhancing drugs or not, something seems to be working for this kid.
After leaving college and the comfortable suburb of Morrisville, Pennsylvania, Asher relocated to Atlanta with a couple friends and a makeshift studio comprised of an Mbox and a laptop. It was here that he banged out his DJ Drama and DJ Cannon assisted, Gangsta Grillz tape, The Greenhouse Effect, as the first white rapper to ever be featured on the series. “My parents weren’t opposed to it, they figured I was going to fail and come back to school,” says Asher about his decision to drop out of West Chester University. “But now they are my biggest fans.” And with good reason: Roth ended up in a bidding war, auditioning for Jay-z before finally landing a deal with Steve Rifkind’s SRC record label. The mixtape was sprinkled with punchlines, clever wordplay (check the Gangsta Grillz freestyle staple, “Cannon”), and quirky rhyme schemes. He proved he can spit. But could he make songs?
Today he is chilling in New York, days before his album drops, relaxed and probably just finished blowing something in the air. “I grew and you have a lot of people asking for another Greenhouse Effect and more freestyles but I can’t make another one,” declares the 23 year old. “You have to grow and progress and that’s what I’m trying to do with this album. You’ll definitely find more songs on here.” The growth is evident and it is far from anything on his Gangsta Grillz debut; He has graduated the comedic content into talks of politics (”Sour Patch Kids”) and an unwanted lover’s attention (”Be By Myself” feat. Cee-Lo) but of course he will never stray from his favorite past time like in the instructional, “Blunt Cruisin”, a how-to, step-by-step in blowing the sticky icky.
Drinking, partying and giving into peer pressure, Asher did everything he wasn’t supposed to do and it more than paid off. The result of the debauchery wasn’t a BA in elementary education like expected, but his ode to the party life, “I Love College.” It was while smoking in a cypher that he spit the hook to what would be his first single and what he describes only as “Stupid” and “The worst shit I ever wrote” (Only after strong encouragement from a group of friends he decided to write the rest of the song.) The lackadaisical rhyming and laid back, care free hook grew legs of its own, blew through blogs and birthed countless remixes even earning him a trip to MTV Spring Break. But as he explains, it almost didn’t happen. “If I would’ve gone to college for four years the song would’ve been called ‘I Hate College’. I only did two years so I left with a good impression,” he states, half jokingly.
With countless artists racking fame at light speed through the internet and disappearing just as quickly, it seems like the college dropout has already learned a thing or two in the school of music business “The way the records are selling, touring is becoming more vital to your career. I definitely want to start touring so I can get out there and perform, be with the fans. That and the party life that comes with it”, adds Asher. “You can’t forget that.”
