“Some of the environments I had to grow up in, it puts you in survival mode,” Conway the Machine tells Ebro in the latest episode of The Message. “You got to have an elevator level of resilience to navigate through the b******t that come with life in the hood, in the trenches.” Over the course of a still-burgeoning and already prolific career, the MC has done nothing if not tell his life’s story, a mission he continues on his latest release, God Don’t Make Mistakes. For his The Message playlist, Conway includes selections from Raekwon, Mobb Deep, and his Griselda comrades, all of whom have at different times motivated him to keep chasing his dream. “Shit could have went differently for me a few times,” Conway says. “But I finally made my mind up that this is what I wanted to do. And I did what it took. I was in studios all night until motherfucking eight the next morning; walking in places, passing my demos out, my tapes, being shitted on, having to drive seven hours to New York City to pass my shit out or go to Atlanta on a Greyhound—I did all that. That's the part n***as don't see. And that's pretty much my message with these songs. These are the songs that put that fuel in me, that fire, like, 'If you want that shit, go get it.'”