Ariel Bencobo, an M.A. student at the University of Idaho, is passionate about music and is not looking for fame.
Bencobo’s dream after graduating from UI is to continue his work in kinesiology and athletic coaching, far from his hobbies of writing, composing and creating new music with his friends. According to him though, the two overlap more than one would think.
“I was an athlete since I was 5 until I hit my junior year of college,” Bencobo said. “Hip-hop overlaps with that a lot because so many athletes listen to it to get pumped up.”
As an athlete, Bencobo was accustomed to performance and what that meant to him. Both in athletics and now in music, he interprets that to be “what it takes to be good at something” and works to get better at whatever that may be. Currently this means finishing his master’s degree and working hard at his hip-hop pass time.
Hip-hop music had always been something Bencobo loved but was not something he had ever dabbled in creating until a little over a year ago. His friends all found that they had a love of music and began working together to create their own.
“My parents always told me to have a hobby, but until now I wasn’t spending a lot of time in music so this is new for me,” Bencobo said. “This is my hobby, it’s my creative release.”
To Bencobo’s music is meant to be an example of what shaped the artist, but dually is about adding something new to what other artists have created. His work has primarily been on lyrics and sound but has a single release on Spotify and Apple Music called “Clarity” featuring vocals from the same friends he began his music journey with.
Bencobo’s artist name is “You” and despite only having one song solo released in 2019, he has plans to release a short album soon with both new and old songs.
“My (creative) process is, I guess, kind of like writing a book, but I don’t want to do that so I just write songs,” Bencobo said. “What I’m working on now are about what has shaped me this year, 2020.”
According to the artist some of the song’s listeners can expect from him in the upcoming album will be about a struggle between being a youth and adult as well as important world problems and social issues. Despite having a causal relationship with producing mus
ic and writing songs for friends who are more active in uploading content than him, Bencobo still strives to improve his skill and talks about what he considers to be important issues.
“I can’t sit on this platform and not talk about important things,” said Bencobo. “I’m a very especially conscious person, very into politics, so I can’t just ignore these things.”
Issues Bencobo plans on discussing in his work will concern everything from the 2020 pandemic to his own experiences with the world’s issues with politics, race, mental health and others.
“I’m not trying to be famous; I’m not trying to do this for a living, that’s what my degree is for,” Bencobo said. “With hip-hop, you have to commit, you have to be all in, and I live in the middle of Idaho, so I should spend my time making my back up that I love.”
After graduation Bencobo plans to apply to get his Ph.D. and hopes to move to a state with a strong sports team he can work with to help it improve using his background in education, sports’ psychology and kinesiology all of which he has studied at the UI. He has no plans to give up his “creative release” and only has more ideas every time he sits down to work.
“I’m all about the bumpin’, that bass and that beat,” Bencobo said. “It feels great to spend a day in academia doing research and writing papers and then go home to hit some drum buttons and see what sounds good.”