Last spring, Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman jumped on stage at Boston Calling Music Festival to shout “Free Brady!”, a rather popular sentiment that resonated loudly throughout City Hall Plaza. This May, Boston Calling might get another Patriots cameo when Chance The Rapper headlines the Memorial Day weekend festival at the Harvard Athletic Complex in Allston.
That’s because, as DJ Bean of CSN New England reports, Patriots tight end Martellus Bennett is a huge fan of the Chicago rapper. Such a fan — and friend, it should be noted — that Bennett told reporters at a recent Super Bowl LI press session that he wants to collaborate on a cartoon with Chance.
This seems like a match made in football and hip-hop heaven.
“I’ve loved Chance for a long time,” Bennett said, via CSN NE. “I’ve got a little friendship with Chance. Me and Chance are cool. I’m doing something right now where I’m trying to talk him into the music for a cartoon and doing one of the voices, but he’s super busy. Hopefully we can make it happen.”
Bennett praised Chance for his originality and approach to music. “In hip-hop, you expect the rap to be some way; like it’s a certain way you’d expect some guys to rap,” he says. “Every once in a while, a guy comes in that’s an anomaly and is a little different from everybody else, and he doesn’t act like everybody. He mixes gospel in with his hip-hop. He’s got guys that sing songs about girls twerking rapping about God on his album. That kind of stuff is super cool.”
If you follow Bennett on Instagram (and if you don’t, you should), you know that the footballer has many talents beyond the gridiron. Bennett dabbles in writing children’s books, creating music, and is the head of his The Imagination Agency, a multi-pronged company that taps creative outlets for both kids and adults. “I just wanted to make things and tell stories, so whether it’s films, cartoons, apps, books, I just like to make stuff,” he told SB Nation back in November. “I have all these stories that need to be told.”
Bean writes that Bennett and Edelman attended Chance The Rapper’s Magnificent Coloring World Tour at Blue Hills Bank Pavilion back in September, so another Boston Calling cameo seems likely.
Watch more from Bennett’s presser below.