Mill Bill Breaks Out By Jhantu Randall

With so many regions in hip hop, it’s easy for some towns, or entire states for that matter to get lost in the shuffle. A prime example of this is the artist Mill Bill, based out of Boise, Idaho.I know it may be hard to imagine hip hop having a hold on rural folks in predominantly red states but if you subscribe to the idea of the genre being a voice for the voiceless, you have to listen to the stories of those who really may reside on the outskirts. Towns where in the dark, the life of the rebel is not only celebrated, it becomes mythical.

I admit that I was vaguely familiar with Mill Bill about a year or 2 ago but I never gave him too much attention. Not to say he wasn’t good, I always liked his delivery and his songs definitely appealed to my ear but I guess I naively wanted something more that I couldn’t quite put into words. In actuality, maybe it was I who wasn’t ready to look at his work objectively at that point. Growing up in Pocatello, Idaho Mill Bill had been writing and putting music together for nearly a decade. His song “Crazy” featuring Mark Battles has at this point, become his biggest single he’s released pulling in 17 thousand views on Youtube as well as 65k on Twitter and 100k on Facebook. Say what you want, social media has given many artists the ability to create their own platforms and make countless opportunities for themselves while allowing them to control their own narrative.

As an upcoming rapper, you’d think that Mill Bill would be all about hoarding the earnings from his work and using it to propel himself only, but on the contrary, during the holidays last year, Ill Bill stepped out into the community that shows him so much love and gave back. He put together a clothing drive which was able to successfully hand out over 800 coats to the homeless. It’s this grassroots connection and hardline drive to constantly stay moving that lead to him performing to a crowd of 20,000 people in Spokane, Washington in August of this year.

For me, it’s his song “Boise” that keeps bringing me back to his music. It’s the overall sound and production that gives this song a mood of both defiance and aspiration melded together. 2019 has been quite good for Mill Bill and in 2020 he’s already set to break beyond the local scene of Boise and expand to the pacific northwest and beyond. You can catch Mill Bill in Bellingham, Washington on January 8th followed by a meet and greet on the 10th and a show in Everett, Washington with Lil Wyte. He is currently working on putting a show together in Bend, Oregon on either January 11th or 12th.

With that kind of hustle, Mill Bill looks to be starting off the New Year on the right foot by continuing to push the pace on a marathon he’s been conquering in silence for quite some time.