GiftRapper Jay Kilichand

Grown-Up Gigs Rapper/GiftRapper Jay Kilichand When I read about Jay Kila in New York magazine and his company, GiftRapped which offers customized raps, and a music video to go with it! I bopped right over to the website (what? I bop!) and spent the next half-hour watching all of his  samples. They brought the biggest smile to my face (especially the Bar Mitzvah one hilarity!), and I knew you guys would love him just as much as I did. Enjoy! 1.  What did you wanna be when you grew up? When I was younger I always thought I wanted to be an investment banker and go into finance.   This is basically what every kid from NYC that goes to private school wants to be, because its what everyone in NYC does.   As a kid you get exposed to the extravagant lifestyles associated with banking jobs and its hard not to want that for yourself.   It wasnt until college that I realized my motivation to do finance was purely to make money, so I started looking for things I actually enjoyed doing that I could possibly make a career from.   I had always been into into hip-hop and rap and my junior year I got a MacBook which made it really easy to record songs using Garageband.   From there I just kept doing it as a hobby and it was only the past couple years that I started getting serious about rap as a career. 2. The concept behind GiftRapped just blows my mind. How the heck did you ever come up with it? So me  and my partner Dan were both working at a start-up company in Silicon Valley which was a website that let you order customized songs (without video).   The founders didnt want to put any more effort into the business, refused to sell it, and so the company failed and I moved back home to New York.   Dan contacted me last summer saying he wanted to relaunch the site.   I was hesitant until my aunt asked me to make a song about her husband for his birthday and to put pictures over the music as a video slide-show (this is the Lenny video on our homepage).   She paid me for this and thats when I called Dan and said Lets do it. 3. What did/do you say to the haters (either the voice in your own head, or the voice that comes from other people) who told you GiftRapped could never make any money? Get Gifted!   Hahah. There really arent TOO many haters of GiftRapped, or maybe we just havent encountered them most people actually love the idea when they first hear about it.   In terms of haters, I always feel that people who say I cant do something make me want to do it more just to prove them wrong.   With GiftRapped so far weve had some success, but weve just gotten started making it the company we want it to be.   We still have a long ways to go, so I wont say anything and will let our actions speak for us. 4. Do ya find their needs to be a balance between the time you give GiftRapped and the time you devote to your personal music projects? Yes, definitely.   I try to balance the two as best I can because I figure that promoting myself as an artist in turn helps GiftRapped and vice-versa. I also always make sure to give 100% to both GiftRapped songs and my own music, although Ive found that there is somewhat of a difference in mindset in terms of writing each type of song; if Im in a GiftRap mindset it can be harder to write a regular song and so I may have to wait a day or two to do so. 5.  If you could have your present self give your pre-GiftRapped self one piece of advice, what would it be? Keep going. Dont waste so much time thinking about stuff; just do it. ____________________________________________________________________________________________ Im givin away a copy of The Spark Kit ($150value), and it can go to you!