By Kayla DeKraker
Fourteen years after stepping into the Christian rap scene, Andy Mineo announced his departure from Reach Records as he makes exciting new plans for the future.
“I’m working on a bunch of new music that’s getting ready to come out,” he told Relevant Magazine in an interview. “I’m finding partners for it, and I’ve got a full-time studio engineer now. My wife’s flipping houses. And oh yeah — we’re having a baby. It just feels great.”
After several years learning how record label negotiations work, he has decided to step out on his own.
“I didn’t understand the music business,” Mineo explained of his early years. “When I came in as a kid, I just trusted people and signed contracts I didn’t understand.”
He added, “The music business runs on secrecy and ignorance. If you don’t know what to ask for, no one’s going to tell you. But that ignorance benefits other people, not you…I’ve got a kid on the way. I can’t afford to not know how this works.”
After over a decade of experience, Mineo says that he has a clear vision for the future, something he did not have before.
“Before, I’d go into the studio and just make whatever I was feeling in the moment,” he explained. “Now, I’ve got folders — ‘gym songs,’ ‘reflective songs,’ ‘spiritual songs,’ ‘boom bap rap songs.’ I know what I want to make, who I want to collaborate with and what kind of record I’m chasing. That clarity makes everything more exciting.”
In addition to creating precise new music, Mineo plans to include visuals in his work. Some of his recent visuals in a new music video include puppetry.
“The visuals make the music come to life in a way that engages the imagination,” Mineo explained. “That’s something I’ve lacked in my career. I’ve always had a high bar in my head for what I wanted that to look like, but I didn’t always have the right people around to pull it off. Now, I do.”
Mineo’s vision for the future? To consistently deliver fresh, new content.
Related: Christian Rapper Andy Mineo Wants the Bible to Lead Him Every Day!
“In my perfect world, there’s something new every few months,” he said. “New music, live experiences, visuals. I want people to feel like they’re a part of something.”
He continued, “We’re always asking, how do we make this delightful? How do we make it excellent?”
Mineo announced his departure from Reach Records on Instagram last month.
“It’s been a great run over ten years of making great music, great albums together,” he said in the video. “They believed in my when no one else did, we made incredible albums, we went on incredible tours, made incredible fans, great memories.”
Reach Records, a Christian rap label created by “a few guys from Texas [who] started using music to express their newfound faith,” work with artists such as Lecrae and Jackie Hill Perry.
As Mineo steps out into an independent career, faith and creativity will certainly be front and center.
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