It’s a beautiful March day with the sun out after another brutal Chicago winter, and Chris Patrick finds himself on a rooftop in the Southside doing a photoshoot with an incredible view of the downtown skyline just over the horizon. It's a humbling experience for the New Jersey rapper who still remembers what it was like working at Best Buy and “living the life of a regular dude,” as he puts it. This is quite literally one of those things that weren’t supposed to happen, as it wasn’t on his team’s itinerary when they planned their trip to the city.

Truth is, Chris Patrick was supposed to come to Chicago to record a music video for his song “Gray” with Alex Banin, but fate had other plans. Due to a conflict of schedule, Alex had booked a trip to LA when Chris was supposed to be in the city. Instead of canceling the trip and trying to reschedule, Chris and his team decided to just ride the wave, and the next week for them became a trip with constant spontaneity.

“I tweeted out ‘about to be in Chicago’ and the amount of people who just hit my phone and connected me with the next person was incredible. The love I was just shown, the places I was put into, the spaces I was in was phenomenal. And I’m not gonna lie, this version of the trip is definitely not like, I just didn’t expect it to be like this, but it’s been phenomenal.”

And this is how the scene was built for us to have this conversation. Chris carries a powerful presence with him, and it’s not because of his tall, NBA-point guard-like stature. Rather, it’s simply because of his easy-going and optimistic demeanor that’s reminiscent of a shonen anime protagonist. In short, he’s just really nice. Being an introvert by nature, I shied away from conversing with him during the photoshoot until it was time to do our interview. Once we started though, it’s like I was catching up with an old friend I had known for years. There were often times where our conversation veered away from the actual interview because we found ourselves relating to each other’s shared experiences, from our mutual love of anime to our times working as Best Buy employees —which incidentally is what he describes as the story behind his latest album, From The Heart Vol. 2.

“A part of the reason why I didn’t want to make music at first is because I was nervous that people won’t be able to relate to the regular everyday shit when everything else sounds so extravagant. But the way I see it now is, I wanna grow with the listeners. The same way I’m growing with this music shit, I want people to grow with me. I’m sure the raps are gonna get luxurious eventually, but until we get there, I’m gonna give y’all legitimately what it is. I was working a job at Best Buy, shit was ass, but I knew I was gonna do this music shit.”

This is the most appealing and endearing part of Chris Patrick’s energy. In a world where people often get too caught up worrying about the next person’s perception of them, Chris is simply choosing to be himself and embrace whatever opportunities that the current moment presents. From engaging in friendly conversations online about nerd topics with his fans to singing "Hey There Delilah" out loud with his friends at the end of his shoot; by choosing authenticity, he’s found people who gravitate towards him and can match that energy.

“I want to give music that we can both relate to, you know what I’m saying? There’s a lane for all this shit and I’m realizing that there’s a lane for just the regular everyday person waking up to try and get to their passion and their dream is the lane that exists. People want that.”

FTHV2 is an exceptional and vulnerable album that is reminiscent of the classic mixtapes from rap’s blog era in the early to mid-2010s. Tapes like J. Cole’s Sideline Story or Saba’s ComfortZone. Right away, the listener is presented with the story of a young man with ambitious goals of becoming a rapper without having to compromise his true self. In the project’s second track “Dreams,” Chris spits “I be out at Best Buy selling n---s RAM/And they think that I’m the best guy for helping spend thеy bands/How the fuck I’m finna get by? N----s need a plan.” In the same song, he also opens up about talking to a therapist to help him cope with challenges dealing with mental health.

"I struggled with depression for a really, really long time. I can say for certain that I definitely have gotten to a place now where I’m always good. I know how to not let myself get too crazy. I know how to check and balance myself nowadays," Chris says. "I think all the time about people who don’t take care of their mental health. They may not have the assistance or shit like that to really cope through what they're going through. So for me, I just try my best to, ya know, obviously give music that connects but that the same time that it’s okay to feel what you feel. Get help if you can because as long as you’re strong mentally you can do literally anything.”

After a year in which a global pandemic, historic job losses, and highly publicized police brutality took a severe toll on the mental health of people everywhere, it’s become more important than ever for individuals to hone in on themselves to heal from their trauma. It’s a lot easier said than done, but with artists like Chris who are willing to share their vulnerability, it helps listeners just feel less alone with their struggles. What Chris ultimately wants is to connect with listeners because he knows that whatever they’ve been through, he’s been through something similar and that it’s all gonna turn out fine. These words of affirmation especially hit home on the album’s penultimate track “Okay,” “And Momma said, don't fret baby, you gon see someday/ even when you lost, you gon' find the way/ she said that you gon’ be okay.”

They say you get back whatever energy you put out into the universe, and for Chris, the energy he puts out is definitely one centered on love and positivity. Now, that energy is beginning to return back to him tenfold as he’s been receiving love not just on national level, but from people that he respects and admires such as T-Pain, JID and Deante Hitchcock. His music has appeared in NBA 2K, and he even had a Netflix crew follow him as part of a documentary series focusing on the hottest up-and-coming rappers in the country.

If there was ever a time to buy into any stock, it would be Chris’ as he’s sure to go to the moon at any moment. He’s not letting any of this go to his head though. Instead, he’s more concerned about growing and experimenting with his sound than quickly gaining recognition. He flexes this experimentation by singing on the standout track “3am,” which he used as an example of how he wants listeners to receive his music.

“I could have told that love story in any way, shape or form, and I just decided to sing it. I just want people to be open to the sounds and the ideas of what I should be doing. I don’t want to keep pushing it the regular way. I want to show people that you can enjoy music, especially music that has substance in many different ways. There's a whole initiative I’m doing, this isn’t just to get blog titles. Don’t get me wrong, I do like talking to you, but we don’t do it for that. We do it for the people who support us and find solace in the shit I’m putting out. I just want people to be able to expand with the music we put out. It’s gonna be an adventure.”

With every milestone he hits on this adventure, the fans are with him and his team every step of the way. He’s just determined to stay consistent and work his ass off, which he says was the most important piece of advice he got from his interactions with JID, with whom he’s developed a personal relationship with after the first couple of times meeting him as a fan.

“The first two times I met him I was more so trying to do all the talking. Whereas the third time came around, I was just doing the listening. I would ask questions here and there. But my whole thing was I wanted to just learn and just understand how he got from being someone that nobody knew what to being that guy. And I literally just followed the steps. We were just talking about music, I was trying to understand more how to process this shit, how he gained his fan base, how he actually ended up moving up the ranks of things like the music really never is the problem. It's just how to move through the industry. And he gave me a lot of insight on that too, which I still you know, utilize to this day.”

So why should you invest in Chris Patrick? To put it simply, you should invest in him because he’s gonna be invested in you. He’s a community-focused artist with a radiating aura who supports everyone who supports him. The late great Kobe Bryant once said that his definition of greatness is “to inspire the people next to you [...] How can you inspire a person, who in turn inspires a person, who then inspires another person?” Sure enough, when you ask Chris himself on why you should invest in him, he’ll give you a similar response.

“Honestly? If you wanna invest in me as the artist, that's cool, but invest in me as the person because outside of this music shit, if it's all said and done, I just want to be able to inspire growth in the next person to come after me. My dawg Deante literally said it himself, ‘The goal is just to take the teachings and lessons that the person before him gave to them. So we can give them to the next person so that perhaps there could be a better version that comes out after.’ That's what we are, we're vessels to literally just help transport the lessons of our ancestors on to the next person. Outside of music, I do a lot more. I try to do, like, drop offs with gifts. I try to do the IG lives, I try to DM as many people as possible, just to let them know like, ‘Hey, I see you, thank you for showing me love.’ And all I want people to know is that regardless of the music, invest in me as a person because ultimately, it's all about chasing that dream. Just saying fuck all this bullshit that we've been taught to do and just chase the dream all the way through.”