“There are so many different meanings behind Expensive Pain, but it’s basically everything I went through to get to where I am right now,” he confides. It is a wonderfully descriptive, fabulously poetic title for a man who has rid himself of his literal shackles but is still feeling the effects of his metaphorical ones. But it came at a cost - the price of which is the focus of his fifth studio album, Expensive Pain, his first effort since 2018’s Grammy-nominated Championships. His last incarceration in November 2017 - from a reckless driving charge in New York City for popping a wheelie - spurred the international #FreeMeekMill movement, spearheaded by Jay-Z and Philadelphia 76ers partner Michael Rubin (whose New York home serves as our shoot location), which ultimately resulted in Meek’s release on bail in April 2018 and eventually led to his original conviction being overturned.Īnd now he is free. It’s always been a contentious case: the arresting officer was the lone testifying witness, and though he has since been discredited, it was enough to earn Meek a sentence of 11 to 23 months in jail with a probation period that seemed to last an eternity.
Up until July 2019, Meek, born Robert Rihmeek Williams, had been stuck in a seemingly endless and frustratingly familiar loop within the criminal justice system, shuffled in and out of prison, to and from court hearings, incarcerated or on house arrest, for more than a decade - all on technical probational violations stemming from a 2008 gun conviction. It’s no surprise that freedom is his priority.
You’re thinking about getting to your destination, your safety. “There’s no phone, nobody can bother you. He himself has that same kind of plumage, peacock-brilliant in a bright yellow Supreme jacket and a T-shirt of his own design. “When you ride, you’re free,” he explains from his New York City home during our October interview over Zoom, a huge, wildly colorful painting of his late friend Nipsey Hussle looming larger than life over his head.
Or maybe I should say the 34-year-old rapper from South Philly gets found, in the sense that he finds inner peace by hopping on one of his 25 dirt bikes and hitting the streets hard, the wind in his hair and the buzz of his bike a welcoming sound. When Meek Mill wants the world to fade away, he gets lost. SHOT ON LOCATION AT MICHAEL RUBIN’S PENTHOUSE, NYC STYLING TUKIE BABUMBA AND ADRIENNE FAUROTE MEEK MILL GETS REAL ABOUT THE COST OF FREEDOM, THE STRUGGLE TO KEEP IT REAL AND SHOWING VULNERABILITY ON HIS FIRST ALBUM IN THREE YEARS.