Merkules has been given a shot to open for rap icon Ice Cube in Victoria this spring.
The Surrey-raised rapper will hit the stage April 23 at Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre during Ice Cube’s extended Straight Into Canada tour, detailed on icecube.com/tour.
The concert news was posted on Merkules’ Facebook page Feb. 21, the day after the N.W.A. founder performed at a sold-out Abbotsford Centre, on Tuesday, Feb. 20.
Earlier on Facebook, for his 1.2 million followers, Merkules wrote about “just getting started” in music: “Took me 15 years of playing in front of nobody, sleeping in hostels and getting bed bugs, going on tour to come home broker then when I left, jamming everyone into my parents car we borrowed scraping together change for gas, getting treated like s*** by promoters, constantly being told no, putting everything into your art just for nobody to care and feeling like you wasted your time, having people you love looking at you like your crazy when you tell them it’s really gonna happen one day…. I say all that to say that’s also why I’m so grateful for every single one of you now that we did it, 15 YEARS and we’re still just getting started. The only way is up. I love you guys. For real.”
• VIDEO: Rapper Merkules visits old Surrey home one final time before its demolition.
Years ago, Merkules was better known as Cole Stevenson while growing up in a rancher on 90A Avenue, in the Green Timbers area of Surrey.
The house, now demolished, is where Merkules honed his rapping skills (starting out as Merk Mikz), during a period of isolation there following a brutal attack he suffered at age 16, while walking home from a New Year’s Eve party. The attack was a subject of his “Scars” album of 2015, when he first spoke publicly about what happened to him and his friends that night.
In 2022, Merkules released the single “I’m Here” on Death Row Records. This month he posted a photo of himself with label owner Snoop Dogg, whose 1993 debut album was produced by Dr. Dre for release on the groundbreaking Death Row.
On March 1 Merkules will be in Kelowna to perform at Revelry Food+Music Hub. His concerts are posted on merkulesmusic.com/tour-dates.
