Tee Grizzley continues to prove why he is one of the smartest and most business-savvy rappers in the game.

The “First Day Out” artist made headlines last week for his comments about discontinuing his music career in favor of gaming and acting. According to Grizzley, he hasn’t needed to do club appearances in a long time due to the fact that he doesn’t need to leave the house to make money.

He also neglected to include “rapper” in his career title, saying he would rather define himself as a professional gamer and part-time movie director. Many took these comments to mean he was finished with rap forever, which he was able to clarify during a TMZ interview yesterday (Oct. 24).

When asked if he was solely going to focus on music and video games, the “From The D To The A” rapper confirmed that he will still continue to pursue music. “That’s false. I’m still going to do music. I dropped an album not too long ago. I was just trolling, my album was a series of stories. So I probably said something like, ‘I’m only doing movies for now.’”

The reporter then asked Grizzley if he would ever leave the music business, to which he responded with a resounding no. For preferable acting roles, the Detroit-bred rapper jokingly said, “I just want to be the cashier at TJ Maxx. Employee of the month.”

In recent months, Grizzley has turned his attention to vlogging and gaming on his YouTube channel, tapping into the audience of 2.08 million subscribers he gained from his rap songs. The entrepreneurial artist is not the first rapper to recognize the power of directly connecting with fans through mediums unrelated to music. Artists like Polo G and NLE Choppa frequently post vlogs on their YouTube channels to capitalize on their pre-existing fan bases.

Rappers are also recognizing the growing necessity to utilize Twitch and YouTube creators to help promote their music. Last week, Lil Baby joined popular streamer Kai Cenat’s channel as part of the promotion for his new album, It’s Only Me, which soared to No. 1 with 216,000 sales.

Tee Grizzley explained that he makes six figures a month playing video games on Twitch, namely Grand Theft Auto. He mentioned that he turned to gaming during the pandemic, which has yielded huge financial results.

Grizzley certainly isn’t taking his foot off the gas with his music. He recently dropped the video for “Shakespeare’s Classic,” the leading single off his new album Chapters of the Trenches which was released earlier this month. The album is his second full-length offering of 2022.