Mach-Hommy

Mach-Hommy (born June 21) is an enigmatic Haitian-American emcee from Newark, New Jersey.

Although Mach began rapping at the age of thirteen, freestyling over Raekwon’s “Verbal Intercourse,” his earliest known work can be found on the 2004 mixtape titled Goon Grizzle. Through his early career, Mach founded the music recording progress to be an “unhealthy” environment and thought of going into the filmmaking industry instead, but thanks to the encouragement of longtime friend Westside Gunn, he returned to rapping in the early 2010s.

Almost a decade later in 2013, he released a handful of EPs and a debut studio album titled F.Y.I., the project includes production from frequent collaborator August Fanon and originally surfaced on Soundcloud. F.Y.I is available on his website in an updated Digitally Remastered format.

In recent years, Mach infamously began to self-release his music, first on Instagram and later on Bandcamp, for hundreds of dollars per physical copy. His 2016 release H.B.O. (Haitian Body Odor), his first under the Griselda Records imprint, was made available with the limited release of 187 physical CD’s, each sold for $300 through Instagram, but has since made public to streaming platforms years later. He has frequently collaborated with producers Earl Sweatshirt, Knxwledge, The Alchemist, Camoflauge Monk, SadhuGold and August Fanon and rappers such as Tha God Fahim, JuJu Gotti, and many more.

Mach-Hommy would soon earn the attention to the mainstream media thanks to the release of his May 2021 album, Pray for Haiti, his second release under the Griselda imprint. The album saw a commercial success, with artists such as Drake catching the attention of the artist. From there, Hommy has since gained a cult following as a result to his work ethic and elusiveness and would continue to release a slew of projects, either released through all platforms and or released through his website for hundreds or thousands of dollars.

In October 2019, Mach and fellow collaborator Your Old Droog had their lyrics removed from Genius after sending them a DMCA notice. When reached out from Pitchfork, Mach-Hommy gave them a cryptic response stating: “The game is to be sold to you; not told to you.” Two years later, through an October 2022 interview Rolling Stone, Mach-Hommy responds to a question about why his lyrics (in general) aren’t on Genius:

I’m a literary artist. Before we start to describe what kind, whether I’m a giant or a dwarf or whatever the fuck, I’m a literary artist and I’m a writer, number one. Before it ever becomes a sound, number one. And so that in and of itself is a work of art, and that’s published writing. Those words, they’re mine. For instance, a writer writes a book. Ernest Hemingway writes a book. Everyone loves it. It’s ill. Then they adapt it as a movie. Then the movie’s out, and some niggas just take the book and are like, “Yo, free book. Free book.” And not only “free book,” but a free book, and then monetizing it.