Mike Schpitz has a lot to be thankful for this year when he sits down at the table to dig into a plateful of turkey and stuffing.

The Windy City rapper with deep Topeka roots had a busy year career-wise. Schpitz (perhaps better known to Top City residents by his given name – Mike Jones) talked to Splash! back in June about his musical pursuits, and he certainly hasn’t slowed down since.

“I just came from working on some beats for a new album with my buddy Phys Ed[ison],” Schpitz said via cell phone during his commute home. “Hmmmm… what have I been doing since the last time we talked?”

Where to begin? Schpitz released his EP Stanley Ipkiss: Year of the Nice Guy on iTunes and Amazon, and even cracked Amazon’s top 25 online releases in Germany. He shot and released a video for his song “Run It Back” with Papi Jamon. Since then, Schpitz and Phys Ed have been working on an upcoming album called Paid Time Off.

Dropping in the next few months will be a mixtape release titled Prize Package – Vol. 1: Shout Out to Topeka. It’s a collection of older, previously unreleased material, and Schpitz will be shooting the album’s cover art next week when he returns to his old stomping ground for Turkey Day festivities.

Last but not least, he’ll also be teaming up with two area DJs and two other artists to put on a pre-Thanksgiving show at downtown pub The Celtic Fox Wednesday evening. With all of his old buddies home to visit family, Schpitz said there’s no better time to catch up and of course – enjoy some underground hip hop.

Splash! got the scoop on Schpitz’s upcoming show, reconnecting with his hometown and advice for Thanksgiving Eve revelers (don’t spend the big day hungover).

The last time we talked, you said Thanksgiving shows were a tradition for you.

It’s actually the third year in a row we have done the night before Thanksgiving or I think seven years in a row we’ve done either a Christmas or Thanksgiving show in Topeka, which is just like a crazy reunion when everyone’s back. It always turns out really, really big. Parents don’t stay up too late, so usually we have the show when parents go to bed and the kids that are back in town – anywhere from 18 to 40 years old – always show up for the show. Last year, we actually did two of them over Thanksgiving. We did one at McB’s the night before Thanksgiving, and then I think the night after we did one at the Celtic Fox. We thought that if people couldn’t make one they could make the other. It was pretty wild.

You must get quite a turnout, huh?

A lot of people from middle school, from high school, I mean – there’s so many people, and people who don’t even know that I do music. They show up like, ‘What? Mike performs?’ So yeah – it’s all just a really big high school reunion, just a big party.

When you’re anticipating a busy day of eating pumpkin pie and watching football, how do you even begin to work up the motivation to perform a show?

Aw, man. You know, I think it’s the energy of knowing all of my friends and family are back in town for the holidays. I don’t get to come to Kansas much – just because I’m constantly working or whatever. So when I come back, and especially when a lot of people who have moved away from Kansas are back, there’s just an energy and this really positive atmosphere that everyone’s back, everyone’s just having a good time. I think that helps a lot when I see that. I’ve been working so hard this year, so I want to show everyone what’s been going on and what I’ve been working on.

What is it like to be back home performing for a hometown crowd? That must be a lot different than shows up in Chicago?

I think Topeka is cool because a lot of the people up here are more familiar with what’s going on as far as my music and what I’m doing. Shows in Topeka are so fun because there are more people and the energy is just a lot different, only because people know who I am – not just musically, but personally. Here, it’s like I come up onstage and I have to prove myself. There are obviously people who’ve seen me perform or heard the music so they know what to expect, but there are a lot of people who don’t. So I always have to prove myself. So like I said, the shows in Topeka are a little more carefree and just more relaxed.

It’ll be fun. And I think it will be cool because Topeka doesn’t have a lot of hip hop shows with local artists like this. I think it will be a really, really cool event for Topeka, and probably one of the biggest local, underground shows that Topeka’s had all year. Not much goes on as far as underground hip hop shows.

So, you’ll be back in Topeka for the first time in ages, and yet you’ll be doing a photo shoot and a show in one day. So much for relaxing, huh?

And I’m running a four-mile race on Saturday. You know what? I always try to make zero plans when I come back for holidays because I end up making too many plans, so I’m just rushing around. I’ll be back for about a week, so hopefully I’ll have enough time to get everything accomplished. Wednesday’s pretty much the big day – we’ll do the photo shoot and then the show at the Celtic Fox.

Do you advise those who come to the show to take it easy – seeing as Thanksgiving will be only hours away?

Hopefully everyone will not have to work, and not party too hard where they are sick and hungover during Thanksgiving. I’ve had that experience, so I want to try and take it easy as far as drinking too much.

Friends are definitely not encouraging good behavior. When you get so many different years of people from high school back in one place at the same time, I mean, there’s a lot of debauchery going on.