Mental Health in Hip Hop: Minneapolis Rapper Farr Well's Hard Pill to Swallow EP Pushes for ChangeOFFICIAL PRESS RELEASENEWS PROVIDED BY Independent Music Promotions Straight from the heart of Minneapolis, artist, rapper, activist and community leader Farr Well is nothing less than a man with a mission on new "Hard Pill to Swallow" EP. Art doesn't get more urgent or necessary than this. Hip-Hop artist and mental health advocate Farr Well (aka Farrington Llewellyn) is creating a mental health awareness initiative around his new album release, Hard Pill To Swallow. Hard Pill to Swallow, shows Llewellyn sharing his personal experiences with drug misuse, gun violence, trauma, and mental illness. From the Artist: I think that by being vulnerable about my experience with bipolar and depression, I can help normalize it; especially in black communities and other places around the world with little to no awareness. My hope is to encourage those who can't speak about it. A lot of people who manage mental illness don't feel comfortable talking about it publicly…This album is bigger than me; it has the potential to stimulate the conversation around mental illness and trauma in communities where it's stigmatized. It's a ‘hard pill to swallow’ but working through our hard life experiences is the path to healing and building resilience. Hard Pill To Swallow sees Farr Well coming to terms with his Bipolar diagnosis and opening the door for conversations on mental illness and generational trauma. Talking about a tough subject is never easy but with the power of music behind it, Hard Pill To Swallow becomes a meditative listen that sparks an inner dialogue and reflection in every listener. “This album is bigger than me,” says Llewellyn, “it has the potential to stimulate the conversation around mental illness and trauma in communities where it's stigmatized. It's a ‘hard pill to swallow’ but working through our hard life experiences is the path to healing and building resilience.” AboutA picture of constant evolution, Farr Well - aka Farrington Llewellyn - is a hip-hop artist with a striking sense of self-awareness and purpose. Based in Minneapolis, Llewellyn has built a platform through his music that speaks to all walks of life and encourages acceptance, understanding, and the betterment of humanity. Perpetually peeling back layers and spurring renewal through self-reflection, Llewellyn shines the spotlight on black identity, activism, gun violence, and most recently, mental illness, through his unique soundscape of eclectic hip-hop. Llewellyn first established his musical artistry in the lunchrooms and playgrounds of his younger school days, participating in freestyle battles with other kids. It wasn’t until he took home the prize for a city-wide freestyle competition four times in a row at the age of 15, that he was established as an up-and-coming phenom in his hometown. Llewellen as Farr Well has opened for Flo-Rida and Blood Raw from Young Jeezy's record label USDA, as well as international artist and hip-hop pioneer, Rakim. Llewellyn has had over 200 performances in over 50 venues in the Twin Cities and has taken his music global with performances at Hojoya Festival in Hakozaki, Fukuoka and the famed Alfie Jazz Roponggi in Tokyo, Japan. Collaborating with several artists on various projects, his music has been featured on several releases and was placed in the Greater Twin Cities United Way Documentary on food justice in North Minneapolis - With Appetite For Change. One of Llewellyn’s most notable projects is the Black Identity Series which set out to find clarity around the issues he struggled with as an African American growing up in a neglected city and experiencing the deaths of friends from school due to senseless gun violence. Llewellyn began interviewing African American people and showcasing different perspectives to show the spectrum of Black Identity on any given topic. He then used these narratives to coincide with his music to ignite deep yet healing conversations on the intersectional struggles some fail to acknowledge. Llewellyn’s 2019 album He’s Got a Gun specifically talks about the toxic influences of gun violence, while his unreleased 2018 album For My White Friends tackles the concept of bringing people together at a time when identity politics and binary thinking is rampant. His work of telling stories through music and film allows Llewellyn to be a community leader in holding safe spaces for healing and hard conversations. This continues with his newest project Hard Pill To Swallow. Coming to terms with his Bipolar diagnosis, Llewellyn is opening the door for conversations on mental illness and generational trauma. Documenting his life from 2015-2020, the six-song EP is an up-close and personal view of his mental health journey that in turn encourages people to work through their own hard life experiences. Creating music that symbolizes all types of people and the issues they face, Llewellyn acts as more than an artist, but as a social scientist dissecting society and unraveling his inner layers to find the root of what he has been conditioned to believe or experience. Constantly finding himself in self-reflection, Llewellyn’s art transcends social stigmas to find a place of renewal in sharing important stories based in reality that educate and change the perceptions of those who listen. Llewellyn’s music is more than just a great hip-hop track - it speaks to lovers of sociology and philosophy as he dives deep into the facets of life in the 21st century.
Source Independent Music Promotions
July 30, 2020 8:17pm ET by Independent Music Promotions |