When Rocky got out, he flew home to L.A., and then soon after, rather than take a victory lap or do what most Americans imprisoned abroad tend to do upon their release, which is to stay put in the States for a little while, he jetted to Paris to have coffee with Serre so he could propose turning his jailhouse dream of a collaboration into a reality.
“I was not expecting anything,” says Serre of their meeting, but the 29-year-old designer was immediately struck by Rocky’s familiarity with garment construction. “He brought me some scarves that he did himself, and I liked the fact that he really knew how to stitch and how to understand the material. And then basically it was just an exchange—ego was not really there,” Serre says. So they got to work. “It was quite natural and easy, and clearly not all collaborations are like that today.” The collection, which includes clingy nylon tops encrusted with upcycled chains, an oversized puffer made with deadstock leather, and those dark, frilly dresses, each constructed from 11 different vintage graphic tees, came out at the end of last year.
When Rocky was locked up, Tyler, the Creator, declared that from then on Sweden was off-limits: “no more Sweden for me, ever” he tweeted. The likes of Schoolboy Q and Lil Yachty agreed. Rocky, on the other hand, stayed away for all of four months after his release. In December he returned to Stockholm, intending to perform for the inmates at the jail he was previously housed in. After being rebuffed by the authorities, he had to settle for an arena show that people from the city’s immigrant neighborhoods could attend for free.
When I ask if he’d be down to go back to Sweden on his next tour, Rocky scoffs. “I’d be down to go back in general!”
When we meet at a rooftop bar in West Hollywood on a sunny afternoon in April, pandemic restrictions are starting to loosen and Rocky has just returned to L.A. after several weeks away. He’s spent the past year or so mostly out of the public eye, but his style—today he’s in an AWGE x Needles track jacket, Kapital Kountry jeans, Nike Dunks, and a pearl-studded belt he found at a tiny shop on Ludlow Street in New York City—is as prominent as ever. A vintage Esso trucker hat covers his short braids, and when he smiles, as he does often, he flashes a gold cap on a canine that’s emblazoned with a tooth-size Mickey Mouse. A waiter, not recognizing Rocky, asks him if he’s a rock star.
He’s had a place in L.A. since 2012, the year after “Purple Swag” and “Peso” established him as the next big thing from NYC. He carried himself like a rock star back then too: He certainly partied like one, and he looked like one, with a Hendrix-like slinkiness and a taste for the avant-garde fashion worlds of Rick Owens and Raf Simons. His musical output was similarly curated. Though today hip-hop is a post-regional genre, at the time Rocky was a radical and controversial artist for the way, under Yams’s guidance, he mixed sounds and styles from New York and down south. Atlanta and Houston were hot. New York’s hip-hop scene was tepid. Rakim Mayers set things on fire.
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