hustleGRL: The Next Chapter

Transitions. A few months after turning 19 this past June, Toronto’s Karla “hustleGRL” Moy made a slight transition from working with some of the most highly regarded names in the music industry in exchange for campus life at York University, in an effort to upgrade her already well-known talents. The hallways of the Toronto campus are quite spacey, but could it contain the larger-than-life presence of the hustleGRL brand? “Sometimes people recognize me and they ask for pictures and stuff.” I asked if that was weird to her and she gave me one of those “meh” type responses saying, “Not really. It’s cool.” Not letting any of this stuff get to her head, the graphic designer/web designer/digital marketer/aspiring photographer –who according to her website made “a profit from her work since the tender age of 12” – shows her maturity level in handling all the attention given to her ever since she started getting noticed by publications, record labels and companies alike during her teenage years. “I’ve gotten used to it. At first, it was all very exciting. People wanted to get to know me. It’s fun. To me, it’s a job. People have jobs and this is my job. People are going to be into my lifestyle and my work and I just have to accept it,” said Moy, who didn’t have a strong memory but said at either 15 or 16-years-old, she was first approached by a magazine for her first-ever feature.

With such a built-up client list and portfolio, you may have wondered why she’s still in school studying design considering she could pretty much work for damn-near any big-name artist that comes to mind. “My parents are teachers. My dad really wanted me to go to school before I went off and started doing my own thing. In the future, I want to teach design. I want to get my degree in design. I want to major in design and then eventually go to teacher’s college and get a teaching degree in design. So might as well do it now.”

A day after our interview took place at the YorkU campus, Moy tweeted to her near-16, 000 followers that, “when one door closes, another one opens. 2012 ’bout to be onnnnnnnnnn.” That’s another transition she has made that has been making noise around blogs, social media and websites over the past few weeks since the closing of Drake’s fansite, All Things Fresh. Moy, who started the website when she was 14-years-old, didn’t want to divulge the reasons behind closing the doors of ATF but said, “Not everyone’s happy with it but at the end of the day, I have myself to worry about and it’s just a decision I took myself. The fans are upset obviously but there are other fan sites out there and I’m pretty sure they’ll be able to get their news and their source from there.” It has been a pretty

good ride for her and the ATF crew, which wasn’t exactly a master plan in the making when she came up with the idea of starting it 5 years ago. “It’s crazy. I started when I was 14. I was a little girl and to me, it was just a website. It was something I did for fun. I didn’t think Drake would get that big and I didn’t think the site itself would be that big of a hit. I didn’t have these expectations but it is what it is.” When asked if ATF was ever going to make a comeback? Moy smiled, shrugged both shoulders with both palms stretched out saying, “Who knows. I don’t know. Nothing planned right now.”

Her close relationship with Drake is no secret as they’ve been friends dating back to their first casual interaction at Toronto’s cultural incubator, The Remix Project – a program home to some of Toronto’s youngest and finest creative talents, which Moy participated in when she was 16. “A lot of his friends were part of the Remix Project. We didn’t actually meet there for the first time, but when we met for the first time in person, he was at the Remix Project and leaving.” She said the short conversation was weird as Drake was driving away with Future, who now happens to be Drake’s DJ. Drizzy rolled down the window and shouted out, “Hey baby!” Moy’s body language and facial expression showed her excitement in revisiting that memory and as they say; the rest is history.

But history is the past and Moy is moving into the future. Her future includes a couple upcoming artists by the names of JMSN and Ro Ransom. “Honestly, I just wanted to work with a new artist. I felt like my job with Drake was not done, but I just wanted to work with a different kind of artist.” That “different kind of artist” goes by the name of JMSN (pronounced Jameson, like the alcohol). He used to go by the name of Christian TV but later changed it after leaving Universal Motown. JMSN’s a crooner from Detroit with silky smooth vocals. Moy first heard of him three months ago and fell in love with his track, ‘Alone.’ “He’s amazing. When I first heard him, I was like, ‘Who is this guy?’ I did my research but I couldn’t find anything about him. He didn’t really like the way the musical direction was leading him into so he left the label, changed his name and started to create his own.” Moy describes JMSN as somewhat of a Mr. Everything. “He writes all his music, produces his own music, he records them himself, he mixes his songs and he does everything except for the mastering, obviously. He just finished his album called †Priscilla†. It comes out Jan. 10.” Moy is his digital marketer, a role aimed to get him the exposure necessary to navigate such a saturated industry.

Along with digital marketing, Moy focuses on public relations and beat placement for rapper, Ro Ransom. Ro Ransom (previously going by the name, Nero) is an 18-year-old rapper

from Harlem. “With Ro, we were actually friends before I started to work with him. I always knew he was into music but after the whole name change, [he] got better as an artist and I wanted to offer my talents to him and we just kicked it off from there.”

Aside from those two, she listed Yeezy and Hov as the two guys she would love to collaborate with in the future. “They’re just legends. Even if it’s something minor, I would just love to work with them on a project,” said Moy, who after a long pause, puts together this list of her favourite artists in no particular order which include: Drake, J. Cole, Kanye, Hov, Beyonce, Lil Wayne, JMSN, Ro Ransom, James Blake, Mac Miller, Casey Veggies, A$AP Rocky, Diggy Simmons, Rihanna and The Dream.

With success always come struggles and high expectations. Always striving to do better with each project, sometimes the task for Moy becomes very difficult due to the high bar she set for herself. “It’s hard because people expect so much from me but it’s only so much that I can do. So I just really try to do my best to put out my best work and just act accordingly and pretty much be myself.” She said she would like to improve on certain aspects of herself. “I would just tell myself to think outside the box and just do what hasn’t been done before and to always think positive.”

The expectations and pressures of coming through in the clutch can be a lot for anyone at any age to deal with, but for the 19-year-old we still have to remember that she’s young and has a life to live outside of her studio, aka her messy room in her Brampton home. Some of her hobbies include basketball (she plays center for York’s intramural ball team), the usual list of TV, movies, volleyball, family and friends. Also included on that list is travelling. If you’re a New Yorker, don’t be surprised to see frequent appearances in the Big Apple. Could that be her next transition? “I would love to move to New York. Probably not right away because my parents will never let me move out (laughs) but definitely in the future. I would love to move there and work,” said Moy, who says she knows the subway system in the Lower Eastside of Manhattan through frequent trips to her friend’s spot. Pretty impressive considering most people don’t even know the subway systems in their own city.

But what isn’t impressive are her acrostic poetry skills. When asked what “hustle” means to the self-nicknamed “hustleGRL,” her response was creative…sort of. “Hustle means –I’m going to try and be creative– ‘H’ means hope. I’m going to skip the ‘U’ for now. ‘S’ means strive, ‘T’ means tough –I’m being really corny right now. ‘L’ means longevity.” After giving up on the letter ‘E,’ she follows up with a “Screw that!” At least we can give her an “A for effort,” right?

“To me, hustle is a quality, it’s a trait and hustle is just something natural. You can’t fake it. You can’t pretend you’re passionate. It’s something you’re born with and have in you. I believe I was born with it and that’s why I am who I am today and I’m able to do the things I’m able to do. Hustle is something to live by.”

Almost two years ago, she was in a situation where she was hospitalized. The reasoning isn’t clear, but her overworked schedule played a role. Moy smiles and goes, “That was the past,” and she’s right. The world is about to move onto the next chapter of hustleGRL and like she said, “2012 is ‘bout to be onnnnnnnnnn.”

words by Michael Nguyen
photo credits HustleGRL