Yelawolf knows all too well what it is like to grow up without a father. The Shady Records rapper is determined not to let his career -- or anything, for that matter -- get in the way of him being a good father to his children. Yelawolf, aka Michael Atha, talked to XXL about his views on fatherhood and how much of a challenge it is regardless of being famous or not.
Atha explained that he never knew his father because the man left before he was born. His grandfather became the strong, male role model in his life in addition to one of his mother's boyfriends.
"But for me being a father -- with or without hip-hop -- I couldn't imagine life with the guilt of being a bad father, I don't know how to do that. How do you abandon or not care? I figured it's easy to have kids. My grandmother used to tell me, 'You know what causes that right?' And I'm like, 'Yeah, I know,'" he said.
Atha has been steadily gaining popularity since 2011 when he signed with Eminem's label and released his debut Radioactive. For him, just being a father is enough of a challenge. He called his two sons "geniuses" and "not normal." Both like to skateboard and record movies that they wrote, which Atha finds truly inspiring.
"You begin to watch little bits of you start to grow out of your kids. That's what a man is supposed to be," he added. "I'm separated, which makes things extremely difficult, but I'll always be a good partner for my kids. People fuck up and let their woman determine the relationship with their kids. That's a big problem."
Atha was last featured on Eminem's Shady XV collection, which dropped in November. The compilation featured other Shady Records acts like Slaughterhouse, D12 and 50 Cent.
