BLP Kosher Will Sign Your Positive Pregnancy Test

For this week’s Tour Diary, we got on the phone with BLP Kosher, the NJB of the Florida rap scene. The 24-year-old rapper’s origin story began in the skate parks of East Boca, his signature look already developed: two payos-esque wicks sticking out from under a beanie. But clearly, the whole Jewish rapper thing isn’t just a shtick for Kosher, whose lyrics reference spinning blocks “like a dreidel”  and “passing the blunt to Anne Frank.” After dropping his latest mixtape, Bars Mitzvah, Kosher hit the road for his North American tour, which included a diet of Hot Funyuns, getting detained at the Canadian border, and signing literally anything for his fans (for the meme, of course). “I don’t even sign my name,” he told us last week. “I just put a dreidel with the Hebrew letter type shit. That’s really my signature.”

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JULIAN RIBEIRO: What’s going on? How are you?

BLP KOSHER: Good. How you doing?

RIBEIRO: I’m good. It’s good to meet you.

KOSHER: Hell yeah. Good to meet you, too, man.

RIBEIRO: Where you at right now?

KOSHER: I’m in my Airbnb over there in Cali, Beverly Hills.

RIBEIRO: Oh, cool. What are you doing over there?

KOSHER: Just recording. The studio is over here and I’m just skating a little bit.

RIBEIRO: Sick. Wait, where do you like to skate in California?

KOSHER: I like the indoor parks. They have some private parks down here with the keys and shit.

RIBEIRO: That’s sick. Congratulations on finishing up a tour. Sounds like it was a ton of fun. How do you feel getting off it, about the whole experience so far?

KOSHER: It was good. This tour was lit, for sure, because I did meet and greets for the first time on this one, so it was closer with the fans and shit.

RIBEIRO: What was it like meeting them?

KOSHER: It was good. Fans are really the reason why I do it, that shit’s real. It feels good to be able to talk to them, get out, listen to who they are and shit.

RIBEIRO: Totally. How many stops were on this tour?

KOSHER: 15.

RIBEIRO: Where’d you guys kick off?

KOSHER: We started in Santa Ana, and then San Diego, and then started going to Phoenix and shit, and all the way down.

RIBEIRO: Totally. Who else was on the tour with you?

KOSHER: I had Certified Trapper and Trapland Pat with me. Honestly, I fucked with this tour. I liked the last tour, too, but this tour felt more like, cult-based. We had shows on Mondays, you feel me? You really got to be a Kosher fan if you’re pulling up to a show on a Monday.

RIBEIRO: What was the crowd energy like? 

KOSHER: I got to test out more songs and I had a lot of new music that I put out since my last tour, too. My favorite crowd was, really, the whole tour, but Phoenix, Virginia, Ohio, and then both stops in Florida like The O and Laudy and shit.

RIBEIRO: Did people show you a lot of love in Florida?

KOSHER: Yeah, for sure. I love Florida so much, for real.

RIBEIRO: That’s sick. I always remember a million years ago, when I was a teenager, going with my friend to see Yung Lean, and he was so drunk that Yung Lean called him out on stage, and was like, “Yo, someone’s got to handle that really crazy kid.” Was there a fan that sticks out that you were like, “Yeah, there’s this one guy that just was absolutely losing it”?

KOSHER: I’m trying to remember. There was so much crazy shit at the shows. People be crowd-surfing. I think the craziest mosh pit was Colorado, which was on the last one. I signed some wild shit that was thrown on stage. I signed a positive pregnancy test.

RIBEIRO: Oh, my god. Wait, you signed a positive pregnancy test?

KOSHER: Yeah, I signed more crazy shit, too. I signed a freaking Magnum box. I signed a Sudoku, like one of those OG games. Yeah, I ain’t going to lie, this tour, for some reason, the cities I went to people had me sign funny crazy-ass shit.

RIBEIRO: I think people fuck with it for the meme of it. 

KOSHER: I ain’t going to lie, my tour manager, Crispy, every meet and greet, he was trying to tell me, “Bro, stop signing shit, because people going to sell shit, and you got to conserve your signature,” but then I was like, “Bro, I’m just having fun.” If somebody has some crazy shit signed by BLP Kosher, it was me that signed it, for sure. It ain’t no capping.

RIBEIRO: You probably made someone’s night.

KOSHER: I love signing the bottom of the shoes on the gum, because I can make it hard. When I sign shit, I don’t even sign my name, I just put a dreidel with the Hebrew letter type shit. That’s really my signature.

RIBEIRO: That’s gas. Wait, what’s on your tour rider?

KOSHER: Hot Funyuns. I ain’t going to lie, I never even knew what a rider was until this tour, and this jit Crispy was like, “Bro, you realize you could get whatever you want for free?” And I’m like, “Well, not whatever I want, because, bitch, I’ll ask for a freaking half-pipe back there like Lil’ Wayne or some shit,” and he’s like, “Well, what snacks do you want?” So we damn near lived off Hot Funyuns the whole tour. We were freaking sleeping in Hot Funyuns on the tour bus. 

RIBEIRO: I knew a girl who had on her rider a six-foot ring light and at every show she’d give people these massive ring lights. I thought that was so fucking funny. Maybe the real hack is to ask for skate shoes. A new pair in every city.

KOSHER: I never knew how that shit works. We got detained twice at both borders, the Texas/Mexico border and going into Montreal. I guess they found a small amount of weed and some shit and they treated us like we were trying to smuggle freaking bodies. They probably saw leftover Backwoods or some kush. The tour bus driver, Jimmy, he was funny. He was the funniest jit ever.

RIBEIRO: They found weed going into Canada or going into Mexico?

KOSHER: We got stopped both times, but in Montreal we actually got detained where they made us try to sign shit. We didn’t sign nothing because it was just weird. There’s no lawyer or nothing. It was like they were joking around, because I think the cops ain’t got nothing better to do. Those jits have no life. I don’t want to talk down on them, but I mean…

RIBEIRO: Yeah, they definitely saw y’all and were just like, “Oh, we’re about to kick these guys around.”

KOSHER: They were bored and the jokes that they were cracking were so rude, rude to my dogs. I think the cops asked Jimmy, “What’s going on?” And they were like, “This jit Jimmy going to spit a whole verse to the police if they ask him questions.”

RIBEIRO: Is there anyone on the newer side that you’re really fucking with?

KOSHER: Who’s new that I fuck with? Coming out of the crib, like Florida, for sure BossMan Dlow. I was playing a lot of his music on the tour bus. Definitely Tyler, and shit, Luh Tyler, and Trapland, and all.

RIBEIRO: Love Luh Tyler.

KOSHER: Yeah, we have a fire song that I was playing to get hype before the show and shit. A lot of pop on the bus. I was listening to a lot of throwback old SoundCloud songs, like Wintertime, because I found my old playlist from when I was a jit.

RIBEIRO: That’s sick. I saw that you guys brought out BabyTron in Orlando and Detroit. How is bringing people out, especially BabyTron, and Matt Ox, people like that?

KOSHER: Yeah, so I brought out Tron in Detroit and Orlando, and then in Philly, we brought out Matt Ox, and then also Arizona, I had brought out Kodak, and then GG6 and Lil Chris. I love being able to give the fans an unexpected treat in their city, especially on a freaking Thursday. The Tron shit was so lit in Orlando. It was all kind of last-second. So it was like the fans be going crazy and I got them to chant that name, and they’re like, “Wait, we chanting this name?” Then they pop out of nowhere. That shit’s so lit.

RIBEIRO: Yeah, it’s the coolest shit ever. And bringing people into their hometowns is so cool. It’s respectful, too. 

KOSHER: Facts. I appreciate Tron so much for always popping out. And Matt Ox, too. And I really appreciated Yak, too, because all my fans know how much I’m influenced by Yak, and how important his music was to me growing up. And GG6 is from Deerfield. It was just a Florida takeover in the building that night.

RIBEIRO: I want to loop back into skating because I feel like skating used to be so much more intertwined with rapping. But that’s kind of morphed over time. How long have you been skating for?

KOSHER: I was in second grade, so seven years old. I got into it from seeing Tony Hawk on TV and playing with Tech Deck in school. When I was in fourth grade, I met my dog Joey, and he  got me to go to the skatepark in East Boca, it’s called Tim Huxhold Skate Park. That really changed my life. It probably saved me. I’ll say skateboarding made me, music saved me.

RIBEIRO: A long time ago, I saw the first photo I’d ever seen of you, you had the Hockey beanie on, and I was like, “Oh, does he fuck with skating, or is it fashion, or…” but you’re really about it. 

KOSHER: I appreciate it, for real. I love that video of Lil Wayne, watching footage, watching a skate park, watching clips at the Grammys or wherever it was. Where was it at?

RIBEIRO: Oh, is it at a Grammy party?

KOSHER: Yeah, I ain’t going to lie, that shit was my every day. That was me in school, bro. Really, from elementary to middle school, that was really me. So seeing bruh do that was like, “Damn.” I love how much he needs skateboarding. He treats it like medicine.

RIBEIRO: Yeah. It probably feels good for him, ‘cause it’s a whole different set of skills to what he normally does.

KOSHER: Yeah, and there ain’t no rules to skateboarding and shit, you feel me? There ain’t no rules.

RIBEIRO: What would you say to smaller artists who are beginning their journey now and starting to meet fans and cultivate a community like you have?

KOSHER: I would say enjoy it and appreciate the fans, for real. Fans are the most important. I feel like I’m still new, trying to learn, get better at performing and shit. Really, I just be having so much fun. I really just love performing and shit. It was only my second tour, so I could give advice, but I could also use some advice, too. I’m fixing to go to Europe. I’m fixing to up the production a little bit.

RIBEIRO: You’ve got to get a giant dreidel.

KOSHER: Yeah, I’m fixing to do that. I’ve been going on jogs. Skating is cardio, but it’s not like I skate every day, so you feel me? 

RIBEIRO: Totally. Well, come to New York. I’ll pop out.

KOSHER: Hell yeah. For sure.