Talking to Canberra hip-hop artist and Wiradjuri man YNG Martyr is a reminder in the benefits of shooting for the stars. Over the past few years, his music has been streamed over 140 million times, thanks to a combination of witty wordplay, melodic flows and booming production (and a healthy dose of meme marketing - more on that later). His self-belief is present throughout our conversation about his new single, Love Boy, and you'd back him to achieve anything he adds to his list of goals. 

Love Boy is a sweet love song, and YNG Martyr admits that seeing love positively is a new thing for him (it also happens to be the way he told his girlfriend he loves her for the first time). It shows a more vulnerable side of YNG Martyr, and may take fans by surprise. It's the poppiest moment in his discography to date. While it's not a sound he'd explore at this point in his trajectory, he's stoked with the results. "I never thought that I would make poppier music (or what felt like more radio-friendly music), but what was actually more real music to me at the time, which I have with Love Boy.

"I always had that thing in my head about all these love songs on the radio, they're so fabricated, and maybe that was an extension of me not ever feeling that properly or me not ever wanting to admit I felt that properly," he reveals. It's a typically insightful response from an artist who's not afraid to admit he's ambitious. It's a refreshing attitude in a country that often displays 'tall poppy syndrome' whenever someone becomes "too successful". 

YNG Martyr's musical journey begins like any younger brother: imitating the taste of the older sibling. Artists like Eminem, Slipknot and Lamb Of God played important parts in his formative years, but he points to two other names as the ones that made him want to become a rapper. He reminisces, "I remember the moment that really turned me into a rap fan was hearing Whoa by Earl Sweatshirt. That was a big one for me.

"From there, I found Rain by Mac Miller. Earl and Mac were the two artists that got me into rap music. I felt like it was such an important thing for me, and I loved it so much. I wanted to get amongst it. I wanted to be like them so bad." He's a big fan of the "sport of rapping", and while he's more open than ever to leaning into poppier tendencies when making music, he's always going to be a bar-spitter at heart. 

Our conversation turns to goal-setting, and YNG Martyr shows us a list on his wall from when he was planning the rollout of Nike Ticks, the song that allowed him to become a full-time musician. It's a story that's become the stuff of legend amongst his fans. To promote the song, he took out a $15,000 loan, put the money into marketing Nike Ticks through promoting the song as the backing track for various memes that would go viral on different social media pages. The rest, as they say, is history.

However, YNG Martyr finds that while goals are great, it's important to live in the present moment. He points to the book The Enlightened Gardener by Sydney Banks, a book that's reminded him of the importance of living in the moment. "One thing I always struggle with is looking into the future," he laments. "I'm like, 'oh, is my career going to be dead in a year? Or is this going to happen?' And then I look in the past. I'm like, 'oh, fuck, I regret doing that so much'. It's all whimsical, it's not there anymore. It's not. It never will be."

His reputation as someone that appreciates the importance of marketing precedes him, and asked about his views on marketing one's music, YNG Martyr is adamant that more artists need to look into the business side of being a musician. Given his track record to date, he's someone that knows what they're talking about. "People just think marketing is this scam or you're tricking people into listening to your music," he explains. "Everything we've heard has been through marketing, so you better understand that system.

"If I could tell my earlier self something, it would be to look more into the business and marketing aspect of music and really learn how to use these platforms," pointing to TikTok as one that he wishes he'd been on earlier. He sums his views up by saying, "There's a quote, I'm not sure who from, but it says that if you had the best song in the world on a USB, and you threw it into the woods, no one's gonna hear it. It's not gonna blow up. Nothing's gonna happen with it. You have to get it in front of people." In researching this article, we weren't able to find who initially said that quote, so you can consider it another piece of wisdom from YNG Martyr.

As a digital native, YNG Martyr's put in the groundwork online, but he's often prioritised countries like the US when building a name for himself. He's frank about his place in the Australian music industry. "Early on in my career, I always knew that my music was more US orientated because that's what I grew up listening to. A lot of people here grew up on Kerser and 360, and I had that somewhat in my life. But I love the American bar-spitter style of music. Earl Sweatshirt, Mac Miller, Vince Staples. I fucking love it.

"I always knew my music was going to gravitate more to those people. But last year, and this year, particularly, everything has really started to pick up locally." With triple j support for Love Boy, and multiple Australian festival appearances planned for the next few months, 2022 looks like it'll be the year that more Australians will realise what a lot of people elsewhere already know - YNG is a star in the making. 

We touch on YNG Martyr's cultural background - he has Indigenous heritage on his mum's side and his grandfather's side. It's a side of himself that he hasn't explored through his music, and he recounts a story of his early days growing up in Townsville to explain why. "I remember at school there was one big moment that was really odd for me. After parade, they asked the Indigenous kids to stay back. And I remember staying back and I was like, 'okay, yeah'. And then one of the dudes there said something (and this is no fault of his either). It makes sense. But they're like, 'why is whitey here?'

"And that for me early on was like, I felt like I didn't fit in within that community at all. Being a young kid, being your age and hearing that, you're like, 'actually, yeah, what the fuck?' Like, 'am I being stupid with this?' So I kinda hid that side of myself. I didn't want to make it part of my identity, or part of who I was." Instead, he's someone that writes music that allows people to bring their own experiences to the table, explaining, "I really want to make music about what I'm going through, or what's happening around me more so than specifically me or my background. I want to be a vessel for people's experiences."

YNG Martyr lets us in on the story behind his angel number, 222. It's fair to say that, like many, this week's 22/2/22 date was a big day for him. He's got the number 222 tattooed on his wrist, and it's a number that he looks for when he's looking for guidance. When asked why the number holds such significance in his life, he shows us a photo of his younger self, taken by a friend. He explains, "He took a photo of me. The lights in the background made out twos and there were multiple twos all around me from the lamp lights.

"I remember we came home. We'd just got this place I live in now and we were talking to our roommate Rhys. And we were like, 'dude, this is fucking weird, I'm seeing this number everywhere. Look at this photo, I swear to God, we didn't edit it.' And as that happened, he had his hand in his pocket, pulled it out and a $2 coin fell out and rolled on the ground. I shit you not.

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"It might be confirmation bias in my head. It might be purely a brain thing, or it could be something higher. But every time I see that number, I get a feeling that I'm on the right track. It pushes me and confirms certain things that I've been unsure about."

It's 2(0)22, and YNG Martyr's excited for what's set to unfold over the next 12 months. "I am most excited to show people that I'm not just a rapper. I'm an artist. I'm not just a kid who loves memes. I'm an artist. I'm going to show people what it's about."