Some artists can pinpoint the special moment in their careers when they felt the tide was turning in their favor, but when Mexican-American rapper Claudia Alexandra Madriz Meza, aka Snow Tha Product, is asked the question, it’s not that she doesn’t remember. It’s just more of a rollercoaster.
“There’s been a lot of ups and downs, times that I was sure and times when I wanted to quit, especially dealing with my own mental health,” she said in a recent phone interview. “I can’t tell you that there’s a moment that I was like, ‘Hell yeah, I’m gonna make it,’ or something because I doubt it all the time.”
Still, Snow has learned when to step back and reminds herself that she exists outside of her rap persona and that a balance is needed to achieve happiness.
“My main priority isn’t looking the coolest; it’s enjoying an entire, complete life and having everything that comes with that, and that makes me happy,” she said. “That, in turn, makes me grateful, and that makes me vibrate higher. It all goes hand in hand.”
Snow talks openly about therapy and her struggles with depression and anxiety, which she often references on live streams with her fans and on her podcast, “EVERYNIGHTNIGHTS.” The authenticity she emulates in her persona, music and direct rapport with fans has built her loyal following and provided insight into her values.
Snow sits at an intersection of identities: she’s a bilingual queer female rapper who won’t compromise on anything that isn’t her. That includes not marketing her sexuality, but she doesn’t knock other women for doing so. She dresses in baggy clothes that add a street layer to her look and echo her inspirations from Lauryn Hill, Missy Elliot, and Da Brat. It’s vital for Snow to represent an alternative example that exists and thrives outside the cookie-cutter box of the male gaze in a predominantly male industry.
“Everything I do, even if it sounds fun and ratchet, there’s some sort of representation in there, whether that be queer, or a woman of color, or being Mexican,” she said. “Everything I do is intentional and is always representing something. In the past, we lived through [the moments] where people had to be quiet, and now we’re in a prouder moment, and it’s in a way, a better place than we’ve ever been, but I also feel like we got a long way to go.”
The “Bilingue” rapper is also comfortably outspoken on social justice issues and participated in the summer protests of 2020 in response to the murder of George Floyd committed by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who kneeled on Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds. Whether she’s spitting bars in Spanish, English or a mix of both, she’s not shy about telling it like she sees it, despite sometimes getting backlash for her positions or identity.
“There’s always going to be several things about me that make people uncomfortable,” she said. “They want me to cower down and be scared, and if I am, I’m damned, and if I’m proud, I’m damned anyway. That’s the reason why I’ve become loud. Sometimes, the best representation is to succeed while being your true self.”
In 2016, Snow appeared alongside K’naan, Riz Ahmed, and Residente on the track “Immigrants (We Get the Job Done)” off of “The Hamilton Mixtape,” which features assorted songs from the 2015 Broadway musical “Hamilton” performed by artists including Naz, Alicia Keys, John Legend and others. The music video for the track features immigrants performing jobs such as sewing American flags, picking fruit and washing dishes, which earned the rapper her first MTV Video Music Award.
A few months later, she released “Despierta” (Wake Up), a Spanish track directly addressing the Latino community’s infighting driven by racism and expressing her frustration with the Republican presidential nominee at the time, Donald Trump. Snow reminds Latinos about their voting power but also cautions them to remain vigilant as to who they support and namechecks the Obama admin, which had record-high deportation rates.
“I’m neurodivergent, so that’s just how it is, and I almost feel like I have an injustice sensitivity,” she said. “When something unfair happens in front of me, I really can’t just shut up. I wish I could because I probably would be way further in my career and probably way more famous.”
Despite Snow’s modesty, she’s earned her credibility as a fierce lyricist and rapid-flow rapper who dropped out of college at 19 to pursue her craft. After a few years in the indie-rap scene, she bagged collaborations with rap heavyweights Tech N9ne, Ty Dolla $ign and Snoop Dogg. She also worked with Latin music stars Natanael Cano, Santa Fe Klan and Ovi, but perhaps her most prominent collaborative work was with Argentine DJ, producer and songwriter Bizzarap. The hitmaker has worked with a long roster of Latin artists, including Peso Pluma, Shakira and Young Miko.
On April 28, 2021, Snow and Bizzarap released “BZRP Music Sessions #39,” which marked the first time Bizzarap featured a bilingual artist on his tracks. Snow said it meant a lot when he reached out, and he reciprocated that sentiment when the two reunited for a show in Mexico City at the end of May. In their conversation, they reflected on their collab where Bizzarap expressed that their bilingual track was also a big turning point for his career.
“I’m glad I brought some sort of value,” she said. “It was intentional for him to want me to do that first bilingual song, and we hit a home run. It was just as much of him giving me that platform as me doing what I’ve always done, but sometimes the messenger matters, and I’m so grateful for all that Bizzarap did.”
Snow didn’t immediately benefit from the Latin boom in the later part of the 2010s, which elevated reggaeton and Latin trap stars to the global stage. Early in her career, she hesitated to rap in Spanish and English out of concern of being pigeonholed to Chicano rap, but she quickly put that aside. She continued to pursue her role as a bilingual rapper, and when the Latin boom finally did explode, she was more than ready for it.
“I was hoping this would happen because otherwise, a lot of us were just never gonna make it,” she said. “They weren’t ready for identities like myself and we needed a reggaeton reemergence for there to finally be a new wave of corridos and cumbias popping off and making Latinos more embracing of each other. I love it now, especially watching the representation on social media. I love that every culture becomes this big blend of cultures. It’s very inclusive.”
In the comfort of Spanish and English, Snow has evolved to make her music even more versatile today. She releases new music several times a week, experimenting with the sounds of cumbia, corridos, dembow, hip-hop, trap, and R&B. Her most recent releases include “Uh Huh,” a somber Latin R&B breakup song and “Nah,” a series of sharp bars that remind listeners of her MC skills.
Snow’s upcoming tour Good Nights and Bad Mornings is a nostalgic nod to the beginning of her early mixtapes, “Good Nights & Bad Mornings” and “Good Nights & Bad Mornings 2: The Hangover,” which she launched after signing to her first major label, Atlantic Records, in 2012.
“The tour is a celebration of my journey and will also have new music,” she said. “At the end of the day, I show up in a town and make people have a good time. That’s my job and my only goal: to show up to your city and make sure that you have a blast.”
Snow Tha Product
Where: Riverside Municipal Auditorium, 3485 Mission Inn Ave., Riverside.
When: 7 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 10.
Tickets: $48 at Livenation.com.
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