Photo by Saul Sosa
Matt Proxy is balancing co-signs from fakemink and Grimes with heartbreak and the ICE deportation of his father. We caught up with Proxy after the release of his new LP ‘Trojan Horse’ to get a peek into his world.
July 2, 2026
BY Will Schube
Matt Proxy’s Trojan Horse emerged out of what he describes as the most pivotal six months of his life. He lost his girl and his father was arrested by ICE and deported to Liberia. All the while, he’s been experiencing rapid growth in his music career. Life is turbulent but the thing he’s been working towards since he was 12 years old is finally coming to fruition. When we catch up with the Minneapolis-born rapper, he has just finished his first ever set at Summer Smash. He’s been manifesting these milestones for years. Highs and lows ebb and flow like the tide.
“I 100% did expect this, 100% did plan this, but it's insane to see this actualized,” he explains. “I did Summer Smash and I met Cole Bennett. I popped acid for the first time.” As Proxy continues to navigate the personal turmoil that’s occupied his focus in recent months, recording music has been more pivotal than ever. “What helps me is just to keep going and put it in the music and express myself. It’s what I like to do. I'm having the best moments in my career,” he adds.
He stepped into a professional studio for the first time in February of 2026, and is currently racking up over 200k monthly listeners on Spotify—up from 50k just six months ago. fakemink is in his DMs, saying Proxy is “the only artist who challenges him.” He rolls through on Trojan Horse’s “5.” Grimes is a fan, too and she’s offered him some advice for navigating the music industry. She also makes an appearance on Trojan Horse. Proxy has also leaned on the wisdom of fellow alt-rap renegade JPEGMafia, who will be bringing the young MC on tour this fall. It won’t be long before Proxy is taking the next generation of boundary-pushing rappers under his wing. That’s what this is all about, in his mind. “I just want to make kids feel like how XXX[tentacion] made me feel when I was 13.”
Below, get to know Matt Proxy in his own words.
Matt Proxy: The title came into my head because my first EP was called beating a dead horse. I needed a part two. I did horse play, and I needed an extension. I did Trojan Horse, but it manifested in this idea of the unexpected—the listener expecting one thing from me and I give them something completely different; the shock factor of everything. Also, this rap shit is war. I come in the game on some shit and n****s expect one thing from me, but when I drop this shit, it's like a Trojan horse. I'm using the underground as a platform to do something even greater.
Matt Proxy: My biggest superpower is putting the audience last, not caring about what the audience thinks. You have to fully accept me and fully accept my taste. I’m force feeding my swag to someone and they just have to accept that. Every popular song that I have sounds extremely different from my last popular song. So many great artists get into this thing where they feel like they have to make a certain type of song. I try my best to eliminate that idea. If I make a popular song, I don’t feel like I have to make it five times.
You look at Lil Uzi Vert and it’s so obvious he’s in his head about the old Uzi. Look at Playboi Carti and it’s like, ‘fuck that old sound.’ You have to always evolve. Every time I go in the studio, I either want to make a really good song or some shit I haven't made before that's fun and challenges me. That's kind of my bag.
Matt Proxy: Minneapolis is the biggest psyop to grow up in. Minneapolis is designed to make Matt Proxy. Growing up in Minneapolis, I've seen a lot of political turmoil. That manifests in Philando Castile and George Floyd and then the ICE shit and the alleged Somalian takeover fraud. Minnesota has a lot of politics ingrained in it. My sister's actually a politician. My family's always been a pretty political family. My grandpa is a senator in Liberia. That has heavily affected me growing up in Minnesota.
The other thing about Minnesota is that it's so cold for four and a half months that it bleeds into the music. You have to get locked in. It's not like LA where it's like sunshine and rainbows all the fucking time and you could be outside. You could have a balance of being artistic and making cool shit and then going out and living life. Minnesota gives you that period of, ‘Yo, this is the time to lock in.’
Matt Proxy: ‘mink found me on IG Reels maybe eight months ago. He told me I'm the only artist that he truly listens to and he knew I was going to go up. He told me that I'm the only artist who challenges him and who can make an actual album. He said there’s a potent way in what I say and what I feel and what I do. I appreciated that because a year ago, a year and a half ago, ‘mink was at 50,000 monthly listeners. Now he's at nine million.
Six months ago, I was at 50,000. I feel like he's me in the future and he just gives me so much game. He's one year older than me. He brought me out to a couple of his shows. He’s a super chill guy. I love mink. He is just the goal. I sent him every song but “5.” He was like, ‘Bro, send me more.’ I sent him “5.” I knew it was a hit. I didn’t need him on it, but he just sauced it up. I was just like, ‘You know what? I want to put this on the album.’
It’s actually a crazy story. He sent me the verse. I go to my homie Vadakin, who was going to mix the verse for me. He was engineering the song “5” because he helped produce it with me and Danny. He’s dating Grimes. He's just a producer n***a in LA. I pull up to mix my track and Grimes is there. Claire’s just there for a couple hours. I didn't even realize that was her. We just talk, I play her my album, and she really digs it. She digged the song “NEVER KILL YOURSELF.” She was just like, ‘Yeah, I want to hop on this. I want to produce on this.’ I was going to drop it in April, but Grimes specifically told me, ‘Yo, this is very important for you. Don't drop. Take your time.’ We spoke about a lot of things.
Matt Proxy: I 100% did expect this, 100% did plan this, but it's insane to see this actualized. I did Summer Smash and I met Cole Bennett. I popped acid for the first time. Bro, I met Cole Bennett and Young Thug and Current Joys was there. Everyone was there. I just met everybody. I remember being a kid being 13, 14, talking to my friend and would just lie. I'd be like, ‘Yo, I'm up and coming. Lyrical Lemonade is about to drop a video with me.’ Now I'm actually posted with Cole Bennett. That shit is crazy to me. It's just wild to me.
Matt Proxy: Originally I was just going to have my dad narrate the album because I wanted him to narrate the album. Then he got detained by ICE. He was detained by ICE for six months. On the horse play EP from November 2025, you could hear he’s in ICE detention. I’m just talking to him about books and shit. He’s a boxer, he’s a fighter. He has dozens of interviews on the internet. I chopped up the interviews. He sent me voice messages, some jail calls, and I put that on there. My relationship with my dad is pretty unique and pretty interesting. I'm there for him. I try to look out for him. He tries to look out for me.
He got deported to Liberia earlier this year. It’s just some bullshit. He went to jail for four and a half years when I was one year old—18 years ago—for trafficking cocaine. Then he got arrested for trespassing at an airport. He was doing rideshares. He was one of them n****s who would hold up the Uber sign and try to sell that. They arrested him, and since it was an airport and he had a cocaine charge from 18 years ago, they deported him to Africa because he's technically classified as a drug dealing felon. I was literally one year old. I'm about to be 20. It was 2007 and he already did four years. You know what I'm trying to say?
I was going through it. I lost my girl and I lost him in the same span. I was fucked up. But, I just started grinding. I have support around me. I’m a fucking workaholic. Some of the most pivotal things in my life happened within the last six months. What helps me is just to keep going and put it in the music and express myself. It’s what I like to do. I'm having the best moments in my career. I can't really slip up.
Matt Proxy: The original name of the album was Everything I Couldn't Tell You. It refers to everything I couldn't tell my father, everything I couldn't tell my girlfriend, everything I couldn't tell my mom, everything I couldn't tell God, everything I couldn't tell my biggest hater, everything I couldn't tell my biggest supporter, everything I couldn't tell my sister. The original concept was a CD that you would give your girlfriend: ‘here’s everything I couldn't tell you.’ That’s what manifested on Trojan Horse, just writing shit I couldn’t say out loud and felt uncomfortable with saying out loud.
Matt Proxy: I don't really make sad music necessarily. I make emotional music. I don’t know if my music makes me feel more or less lonely. It definitely makes me feel heard and more understood. I just want to make kids feel like how XXX[tentacion] made me feel when I was 13.
My uncle Jesse put me onto so much music growing up. He put me onto Young Bans and SOPHIE in 2020, even Aphex Twin. He showed me the “Come to Daddy” music video years ago when I was a little ass kid. He actually showed me JPEGMafia too. He's a huge music fanatic. He's like 50. I remember playing him XXX and he's like, ‘Yo, this shit is garbage. This shit is idolizing pain and trauma.’ I played him Lil Peep. He's like, ‘Yeah, this is horrible. This is just drug idolization.’ I remember having that conversation with him and it made me realize that XXX meant so much to me as a kid growing up, and I really felt it. You just had to be there in that situation. I just wanted to make kids feel like how I felt about that where I was like, ‘Yo, this is the greatest piece ever.’ He feels like this and I feel like this and it's cool music, too. It's not just basic music I've heard before. X introduced me to different bags that I didn't even realize Black kids could like. That's my main intention with this shit.
Matt Proxy: I hope my fans understand that I'm hungry and I'm still a rookie and I have so much more to offer. I hope they understand that I really care about this music shit and my intentions are pure: to make good music.
This is what I dedicated my life to. I had this thought like, ‘Yo, I'm just going to die doing this shit. This is what I love.’ If I don't want to do it, I won't do it, but I really do want to do it and I do this shit every day. I feel like the spirit of Kanye West talked to me, bro. I remember sitting down and watching Ye interviews and realizing that self-belief is so fucking powerful.
Also, I'm just a grinder, bro. I do the shit for my family, bro. Me and my sister. We shared a room until I was 13. I just do this shit for my mama and my little brother and I got shit to prove, bro. N****s used to make fun of me, bro. I've been rapping my whole life. I got shit to prove and it’s just manifesting more and more every day.