“I feel like me playing football is a gift, being able to compose music is a gift too, so I’m not going to just let it go to waste."
This is why South Carolina wide receiver Christian Owens works to balance schoolwork, athletics and his other passion, rapping, despite the sacrifices that he has to make.
“A lot of times I sacrifice sleep because I may have to wake up at 5:30 in the morning and I’m up at 2 or 3 (a.m.) writing,” Owens said.
This struggle ultimately served as the inspiration for Owen’s mixtape C.O.L.D (Cost of Living your Dreams) that he plans to release Feb. 28 on spinrilla.com and on the Spinrilla app.
“Once I had finally made the decision that I was going to take [rapping] more seriously, I started to realize how much harder it was,” Owens said.
Owens has a bigger time management problem than most college students: finding time to pursue music while still maintaining good academic standing and excelling in the weight room, the film room and on the field.
“So it was just kind of tough because, like I said before, my days are full so I was like ‘Man, I’m really paying the cost right now to really just do everything I want to do,’” Owens said.
When he reaches these obstacles, Owens’ passion for the writing process motivates him to keep working on his music.
“Everything is coming from emotion, really, because if this happens to me or that happens to me then I might just start writing in my phone. I may be in class, I may be walking to class, I may just be chilling in my room,” Owens said.
So how does he do it?
“I kind of set it up as if I’m writing an English paper honestly,” Owens said.
First, Owens finds a topic he wants to write about, which serves as his thesis and his three main ideas. He uses these ideas to compose the hook and the chorus. The verses of his rap are crafted like the body of an essay. Then he returns to his hook and chorus to provide the conclusion to his essay and the end of his rap.
Owens considers himself not only a writer and rapper but also a student of music.
“I’ve grown a new passion for music too,” Owens said. “Not only do I write music of my own but I study it to a T. I listen to other artists and break down the music and analyze it and just try to really get the message that they’re trying to get across, and not even just on the standpoint of just listening from words but even just the industry itself."
Although he said does not want to sound like any other rapper, Owens said his music would fit best under T.I. or Future’s record labels because of their energetic and party-ready style.
“I have meaning in what I’m saying as well; I could break down every song why I wrote this song that I’ve made so far, but mainly I just want to see people joyful, moving and dancing to my music,” Owens said.
Owens, whose rap name is C.O., first became interested in rapping during middle school through his brother.
“If you have an older sibling, whether it's a brother or a sister, you know you’re going to be kind of interested in what they’re doing. So at first it was karate, then he jumped to football, then he kind of got into music, because my brother had been into a bad car wreck when he was like 3 years old, so he can’t really participate in anything that was physical,” Owens said. “So he got into music and I mean me being a little brother, I got into it because, you know, you want to impress your older siblings."
A few years later, the Georgia native recorded his first mixtape in his high school’s recording studio at the urging of his friends.
“I actually winded up taking [the mixtape] down because my mom was like ‘I don’t know, it may conflict with your image and with your know with the football and the coaches and stuff,’” Owens said.
When Owens joined the Gamecocks as a four-star recruit, he decided to stop rapping in order to concentrate on football. Although football played a role in his decision to step away from rapping, it was a teammate that pulled him back. Owens began talking to linebacker Ernest Hawkins, whose rap name is Ernest Peso, and the two discovered that they shared a love not only for football but for music as well. However, Owens and Hawkins did not write a song together until the summer of 2015.
“At first it was like a hobby or something fun to do but then as I started making more music people started to like it, so I was like I’m really going to do this for real and just see what happens,” Owens said. “So now I just balance the three: school, music, football."
As Owens has become more serious about his music, more of his teammates and classmates have become aware of his talent.
“I love people’s reaction when they hear my music,’” Owens said. “They see me as an athlete, but when they hear my music they’re just dumbfounded, like speechless. They’re like ‘Really? You’re capable of doing that?'" he said.
C.O. and Ernest Peso will perform on March 25 at Myxx Nightlife in Columbia.