February 4, 2009 22:15

Joaquin Phoenix denies rap career is a hoax

Actor says he is legitimately pursuing music avenue

Joaquin Phoenix has responded to reports that his career as a rapper is a joke, and says that the source who 'outed' the hoax, may be someone there's bad blood with.

Phoenix says that his rap career so far has consisted of free-styling, and that he gets nervous prior to performing, as he gets heckled.

"I did a lot of free-styling around the studio and I've gone to small places, and I guess some people there filmed it and shit, and put it out there," he told NYMag.com. "But it's been really nerve-wracking, because there's literally people there heckling you. It was really difficult, I got really nervous. But the show in Vegas I think was a lot better than people think or what's been said, because of how it appears in the video."

He also said that the source who claimed the move into music is a hoax is "clearly somebody who is an old friend, or somebody that I worked with on music. You know, I've worked with a lot of people on music in the past, and oftentimes those things don't work out. Sometimes you have some bad blood between people, and that's all that I imagine where it comes from."

Phoenix also confirmed that he will begin working with P Diddy "shortly" but did not say if he will be producing the record.

The actor says that he dislikes the word rapper, and does not think of himself in that way:

"I love doing the music, I love programming beats and kind of working on the music, as much if not more than the actual rapping. I mean, I hate fucking saying 'rapping,' it just sounds ridiculous. I wish there was another fucking word for what I do, because I don't think of myself as a rapper."

He says he has ten songs, three of which he believes are "really good", the others, he says, are "pretty crap."

--By our New York staff.
[url="/about"]Find out more about NME.[/url]