Your Friendly, Neighborhood WIKI

I feel good these days, in general. Everyone’s in a place where, after the quarantine and the pandemic, it’s a fresh start for everyone. I feel bad for the young artists coming up, because that was their first shows and their first tours, but for someone that’s been in the game, it gave me the break I needed to be like, “Where am I at? What am I gonna do?” Before I was in a place like, “I was doing it because this is what I do. Aight, I gotta make another album.”

There’s a certain feeling, like “I wanna do this no matter what,” not just like “This is my job.” That’s how I feel now. Every day I’m excited to be productive and work. I feel like that space was really important for me. I feel hype for the future, whereas before I felt I plateaued. “Is it all downhill from here?” Now I’m like “Fuck that!” Totally different mindset.

WIKI

Exactly, and perceive it. Because to one person, you’re on; you’re going over here. Then you see someone else and you’re like, “Wait, nah, I’m not on like--” whatever. But it’s like bro, just focus on the art. We’re doing it because we’re artists at the end of the day. It’s not to say, “Now I’m on.” You’re never on, that’s what you have to realize.

And I think with social media as well, no matter what you say, if you’re on there, you’re affected by that, period. “You could be like, “Nah, I don’t care.” I could say that and tell myself that, but if I’m seeing those things, they’re still affecting me. Everyone gets it a little bit, like “Damn, they over here? Aye, they doing this, they travelling. What’s going on?”

The world is in such a crazy place, I feel like in the past couple of months I’ve turned off a little bit, and it’s not good because it’s good to be aware of everything. I’ve just been locked in on my art and shit. But at the same time, one thing I see is, in the city, there’s a crazy energy. There’s a good side to it and a bad side to it, but it’s getting real crazy; hectic. I like this freeness; it’s kind of the old New York vibe, but Downtown there’s a lot of people that need to chill the fuck out. I don’t know, what you think?

You know what I’ve been thinking a lot about? I look to the younger generation too. I look at it as, they have a whole perspective I don’t have, so it’s important to learn that. What they’re going through is so different to me. I’m talking about people 18 to 23. That age group, to be locked down with their parents for a year; imagine that senior year or their first year of college, they’re turnt the fuck up. I see it, they’re unhinged. It’s kinda sick, but it’s fucked up too.

I’m curious to see it. In the future they’re gonna say this affected that generation. It could be in a good way, bad way. Just like how certain things that happened in our generation affected us. I’m just curious to see what it’s gonna be. And I see these kids, they don’t give a fuck, but in a good way. They’re out here, stylin’, dressing crazy, feelin’ themselves.

Seeing that, taking notes from them: you can create your own lane, your own team. You can do that by yourself. And the kids are just doing it. They’re making the art, dropping whenever they feel like it, and it works! They’re not thinking about a label, just how am I gonna get this out to the people.

So much of that shit is just middle men, it’s unnecessary at this point. I wanna do shit properly, but it’s about creating the right team. In the past I was like, “I’ma do ‘WIKSET Enterprises’,” or “I’ma do it myself,” and it feels like you’re not really in control of it. To really figure out the steps to create that team that’s for the future, I’m excited for that.

And just being back in the city, for so long. This is the longest I’ve ever been in the city, not ever, but since touring. Before this, I was always touring, but I never had the chance to settle down. It’s made me realize why I make music in the first place. I always want to be in the neighborhood, that’s what excites me, being outside. The regular shit, to be able to be inspired by the regular shit and make some dope art.

And the art, that’s another thing. I used to always stress about art. I have a million friends who make art, but you gotta get them to do it, throw them bread. You gotta be on their time, especially when they;re doing you a favor. You can’t be like, “Yo, come on, where’s the art?” It’s a whole thing, and I ‘ve been doing the art more myself. I always used to do it and rush it, now I’m taking my time. That shit’s mad inspiring too.I’m using a different part of my brain than when I do music. With the raps, I’m thinking specifically about words, but the art can be a lil more abstract, you can kind of go with the flow. The mistakes turn into something that’s actually good. I make collages, so if there’s a mistake, I cover that up, and now it’s like more stuff is involved.

I like that; it’s a different creative process, but it’s nice to take a break from the writing and be able to go get into that zone. It’s still for flyers or an album, so it feels productive.

I’m really happy about the time I had with XL, I’m blessed. XL is a great stepping stone. If you have the right people there and you’re in the right lane, it’s not only a great stepping stone, it’s a great label to be on.

The only thing is that XL comes off as an indie label, but the deals they offer aren’t indie deals, percentage wise. That’s something to be aware of because people don’t think about that shit. When you’re young, you don’t really think about that. Even our lawyer at the time , he was like, “This is great! XL,” but we didn’t understand. There’s a certain standard that certain labels hold.

It’s important to be aware of that shit, cause you can get a deal that’s 50/50. That’s a good deal. But separate from that, like I said, the experience was great, and I met so many people from there in terms of being out in the UK. That’s the reason I was out in the UK, and that created my presence out there, so I owe XL so much, and I appreciate them. That being said, don’t read the book, “Music Industry for Dummies,” and take every word in there for fact, like, “Never sign a deal!” Be smart about it.

If you’re on XL and you have a couple album deals and it’s not 50/50 and they own most of it, that’s not a bad look. I don’t plan on making two albums, I plan on making a shit ton. Get those two albums off, use that, see where you’re at, see where you can leverage it. I’m into that too; doing a short term thing, and maybe it’s not the ideal thing, but get your price up. You can use a label to be like, “This is gonna get me relevance, people are gonna see I’m on this roster, let me use this to my advantage.” That’s something with XL: even if the deal in terms of the percentage isn’t the best, they’re not gonna sign you to some 10 album deal. They’re gonna work with who they want to work with. If you don’t want to work with them, they’re not keeping you on or shelving your record.

I made the whole ‘OOFIE’ in XL, they let me take the whole record, no charge, no nothing. They’re good people over there. When I talk about the percentages, it’s just that they’re a company that’s been around. They came up in the era where that’s how labels were, period. In that way, it’s a more old-fashioned deal, in terms of the percentage that they usually offer. That’s XL, that’s usually what they do. That comes with this prestigious label. It’s indie, but it’s mainstream indie. They got Adele, so you’re still a small fish in a big sea, that’s another thing.

I think the most important thing is people that believe in you, genuinely, and you really need to seek that out. My team I’m working with right now with WIKSET Enterprise, I did a label deal. The only reason I did it is because they believe in me. It was like they were working for me, not like a label. It was basically like hiring out people to work for you, but it’s people that believe in you, that are passionate about it. They’re putting into the rollout, the same shit that I’m putting into the art, like “What’s the illest way we’re gonna do this,” passionately. That’s what you need.

Figure out what’s best for you. You could sign a deal, and you know your shows are the thing; if you’re FKA Twigs and your shows are crazy next level -- that’s such a big part of it, the shows. If you’re signed to XL, you’re probably making more bread off the shows than the album sales anyway. Be smart about what you need too. For me, I’m trying to put out records and make people listen to them. I’m tryna play shows too, but you know what I’m saying?

We’ll figure it out once we get to the Super Bowl.

Also, I’m just trying to keep it a buck. I know XL, they’re gonna be hot. They been around, they were established. But it wasn’t a 360 deal, it’s not old-fashioned in that sense. If it’s not a 360 deal, that’s great. That means you can make all the bread off your shows, you can make all the bread off your merch. They don’t own you, WIKI, or Ratking, they just have a large percentage of those records for a certain amount of time.

But then there’s those classic projects where you’re like, “Damn, we don’t really own that project.” I’m also looking towards the future, so it’s like fuck it. Everything I did, whatever. To me this album [coming out] is like my first album. Obviously it’s not my first album, that doesn’t make any sense. How I’m looking at my career path is as if all that shit was school, that was training for what I want to do now. And it’s a new world we live in, so perfect timing.

At first it was kind of tough because I was working with a manager I didn’t really get along with. We just weren’t on the same page. It wasn’t ego shit, but they were like, “I’m the manager, yada yada,” and it’s not about that. Even with that name, I don’t want anyone “managing” me ever again.

I work with my close friend; we’re a team, it’s more like we work together. It’s not as if he’s the one saying, “I’m the guy.” He helps me with organization and shit, and at the same time he does my music with me, he’s my engineer. It’s so close knit, not some guy over here, it’s the person making my music with me every day. He’s my guy. Once you get that going, and you have people with belief behind you, then it’s fun.

I’ve been getting my team together, new bookings, all these things, so now I’m excited because things are starting to come through. There was a period during the pandemic where I didn’t play shows for hella long, I was on unemployment and shit. That was nice cause I had a little bread to just work on music and I wasn’t overstressed about paying rent, but now that shit is done. The timing worked for me, cause now I’m ready to play shows. I wanted to wait for the right time; I didn’t want to just play a show because now shows are back. Like I said, this is my first new album, Iwanna play that. The first show is October 8th, that’s the album release show.

It was kinda like a thing where Navy was sending me beats. I think the first one I did was the Earl one, actually. I was out in LA. I was in a real down place at that time; me and my girl just broke up. It was like a whole fucking thing. I felt like I was gonna quit; I was like, “I don’t even wanna do this.”

I went out to LA to work with this dude Dom, he’s in the group Mount Kimbie, and we started working on music which is cool but then Sage hit me up. He hit me up every day like, “Yo, pull up, pull up.” And I was like, “Alright.” I finally pulled up and he had me pull up to Al’s studio, Alchemist’s spot. [Sage] had the whole plan; he was like, “Aight, I’ma get this off.” I was chilling there a couple of days, and one of the nights we went to dinner, and we had a fire ass dinner, we was feeling good. Everyone was like, this is the night, we gotta record some shit.

Sage put up the beat; me and Earl just wrote, and then everyone else left, so me and Earl just recorded each other doing the verses. That was the first song, everyone was hyping it, we were playing it on repeat. It was a good first one, but that could’ve ended up on Earl’s tape, I didn’t really know, that was just up in the air. But that ignited the fire; Sage just started sending me shit. He hit me up like, “I think I did two more. Is this gonna be for your next record or you wanna do a project?” I was like, “Bro, we should just do a project.” And then you know how it is, we said we’d do six joints, then nine joints. I was like, “I want it to be tight. No more than 11 joints. Like ‘Illmatic’, tight.”

Bro, there’s 16 joints on there. I’m sorry, I was like, “Fuck it, 16.” I couldn’t give up any of them, and actually, the way we made record flow -- it’s a long record, but it’s perfect. Sometimes you need the long one. Like a short film, great, but if all that shit is necessary, it’s necessary. Books too. Sometimes it’s like, “Bro, this book is too long for the sake of being wordy.” Sometimes, a short book takes me forever to read. And then there will be a fat book and I get right through it. It’s not about how fat it is, it’s about how it was written. The book is a page turner, that’s why it can be that long. That’s how I feel about the record, it’s a page turner. You wanna keep going like, “What’s next?”

So it came together like that. Then I quit drinking for three months, so I was in this place where I was doing really good. I drink a little bit now, here and there, but I needed that to learn. Before, I was so bad. Every day; the moment I ate, boom. To be able to say, “I don’t like how that feels, let me chill today,” and to be in control of that. I needed those two-three months, I couldn’t just take a week off, to actually live in that, and be like, “I learned to be confident in myself, not based on drinking. Based on just me.” And once you learn that, you actually get more confidence cause you’re like, “I don’t need this thing to be confident. I’m just confident in my sober state, while I’m actually on point.

I would go out when shit started opening up a bit and I still quit drinking. You say you quit drinking and people be like, “How do you do that? How do you function?” Like how are you saying that? That’s crazy. How are you living with only doing that? The question itself is crazy. Because even me, when I drink, I would understand the perspective. If someone doesn’t want to be fucked up, I get that. Once you get into that mindstate..

Exactly. And then you’re out sober like, “Dude this is what it really is?” Everyone’s like, “Bleeeeeh!” I don’t want to have conversations like, “Yeah, we’re talking about all this real shit,” and it’s like no, it’s not going anywhere. We’re not actually talking, we’re gonna forget about all this shit tomorrow.

Bro, even that, with my old manager, we used to go to the bar to have meetings and nothing was getting done. Now we’re getting shit done when we have a meeting. People be like, “People get together, drink, and ideas come together.” Yeah, kinda, but you need to have that sober time to actually execute the ideas. I would sit there like, “We’re gonna do this movie, it’s gonna go crazy!” A movie is hard to make. It's not just some shit you say you’re gonna make.

A movie? Maybe we can make an album tonight. “Oh we’ll get fucked up, make an album. Just record the shit.” And then we’re still gonna have to figure out who’s gonna mix it, what’s the tracklist, what’s the art. But a movie? Like, that’s so many moving pieces bro, people don’t realize. Like, “Bro, you’re gonna make a movie? I’ll see you in two years.” People don’t understand what goes into that.

Uhh, I gotta think…

I look at it as, you’re an artist. When you say superstardom, it’s not even about that. If you do what you do, then the light will come. It’s not even about being famous, or being a superstar -- you’ll be good, you’ll be happy. Maybe not happy, cause maybe you’re never satisfied, but you’ll be aight.

I feel like once you start chasing that shit, you’ll lose sight. But there’s that balance. Let’s still be smart about how we’re gonna get that exposure to the people that are gonna love and understand the art. You could just put it up there, or you can have a strategy about how you’re gonna drop. I like to say I have a strategy. I know that’s the vibe these days, like, “Oh, I just dropped.” That’s dope, but I be trying to strategize, but on the outside make it look like that. On the low we’re doing these things.

That’s key, I think. And it doesn’t have to be like, “We released it on this outlet.” No one really wants that anymore; people don’t want to hear it from some random outlet for the first time. They wanna hear it from the artist. “Rolling Stone announces,” I feel like the fans don’t even want that. They want it from the artist, or a Half Moon, something like that, something they can tap in with. They can go to the shows and the events.

I think that’s cool too, the underground. Being in the underground, I fuck with that. There’s so many different things I could’ve done. Sometimes I’m like, “Damn, I should’ve taken this opportunity.” But I laid the groundwork. People that know, know. I feel confident in that, and that makes me confident to keep going.

I might not have the most fans, but the ones I do, they fucking care. Quality over quantity because quality will last a lot longer. Those 10 dudes will buy a record forever . I don’t wanna put any artist under the bus, but let’s say Lil’ Pump, that’s just an example, but an artist like that where they were the most hype -- the fans are only into what is the hypest thing right then and there. Do they love Pump, or do they love whatever the hit single is right then? Especially if the whole thing is, “I’m young, now,” but you’re not gonna be young forever. How are you gonna maintain that?

He’s gonna be good forever because he’ll have the hits and he’ll do his shows. But that moment when you’re playing a show and everyone was there, will that be forever? But even if it’s a small show, that’ll be there; that essence of a real fucking experience. I don’t even want to play a fucking stadium filled with people, that’s too much.

That’s the other thing: the idea of “falling off.” Fuck that. I feel like there’s that whole idea, like, “I gotta always be hot.” I don’t care if I’m broke or I have money or whatever. I’m just doing this. I don’t wanna care about numbers or how much money I’m making. I’m just tryna make it work. Half of this shit is to keep investing in art. Everything is going back into it.

That’s what I’m saying. I’m trying my best, I’m trying to get my shit together. If I get my shit together, then I can really help out. I can help out with looks, I can give yall a pedestal and a stepping stone, but to really try and do some shit…

A lot of these people that are on, brands, different things I see, where is the give back? Some of them from out of town, where’s the give back? I want to figure out the right way to facilitate that connection with the community and the art, I think that’s mad important.

That record was cool. That was something we did during quarantine, right in the middle of it. It was something where it was kind of like, we been meaning to make something together; we wanted to do it really together so we could make it live, his live sets are crazy. We’re still happy we got to put something together.

The difference I’d say is, the NAH record is more of a WIKIxNAH record, whereas this record is more my album, but it’s produced by Navy Blue. He was like, “This is about you. I want to set the tone for the WIKI record. I wanna make the WIKI album.” Along the way, he’s been really supportive of that. The NAH one was more back and forth with that balance of, “This is how I want it to sound. This is how I want it to sound.” It was more of a collaborative project in that sense. I mean, Sage did every beat on the other one, but Telephonebooth had more back and forth.

If I wanted to extend the beat, I extended the beat. The NAH one was like, “Nah, rap on the 30 seconds I gave you.” Me as a writer, usually if I get a beat and I write more, cool. But the way NAH made it, he just made the beats live, so he’s like, “That’s it, there’s no loop.” That’s why the songs were so short; I kinda liked it because to me it was more like it wasn’t my next album.

Like you said before, I’m an artist. This doesn’t need to be my grand opus. I always used to be like, “My next album needs to show every side of me,” and then that shit just gets all over the place. I was like, “Alright, this is a piece I’m making with NAH, we’re gonna do it like this. Take it for what it is.” And people who fucked with it, fucked with it. Some people were probably like, “Damn, WIK”s going real weird over here,” but I fuck with that.

The Navy one I feel is my next album. I have a bunch of albums I’m working on now. I’m tryna do a mixtape -- I don’t know if it’s a mixtape, it’s a project, but you know how some projects are more fun. I just want to make music without thinking about it.

I love creating that; it's like creating a collection as an artist. Like different series and shit. You when you’re like, “Damn, this artist was in this era. They went nuts over here and started doing line drawings.” I feel like that happens.

Even Kanye’s shit is kinda like that. Take Kanye for who he is, but he’s an artist. Now we talk about him, he gets a little grandiose. Have you ever seen the movie Walk Hard?

It’s kind of making fun of biopics. There’s a whole part, where it’s the part in his career when he’s a little bit older and he’s like, “I need to make my epic album. We need to get South American flute players.” And they’re like, “Dude, it sounds crazy.” Like that’s too much, take a step back.

But Kanye’s had all those eras. Even me, when I was a kid, I didn’t like ‘808’s & Heartbreaks,’ I didn’t like that at first. It was the era I was in; I loved rap at that time. I was like, “What is this?” I wasn’t open minded. Now looking back, that’s crazy.

Not to do a whole Kanye spiel, but he’s always been an artist about it. Even as a superstar. And I know his whole thing is to be the superstar. That’s even cool because his whole thing was, “I’m gonna be the producer kid. I’m not just gonna make a rap album and be a fucking rapper.”

He’s that crazy artist that you love; once they get a little older, they get a little nutty. I feel like any one of your favorite artists, you can go back and there’s a period like that. They’re trying to do it with the art, trying to over-conceptualize it. [Kanye]’s making the Trump thing part of his art, and the whole, “This is how they see me, and i wanna fuck with their head.” Like dude, you’re overthinking it with this insane crazy shit, relax.

It’s so weird, it’s like why are you doing this?

For sure. One, with the art, I’m tryna tap more into it. With WIKSET Enterprise, I’m trying to figure out how to actually help other artists out. I’m not really getting the bag, so how am I supposed to get other people the bag? But I think I can get to the point where I can get people some bread, at least put em in a situation, at least give them that stepping stone; where I can highlight you and show you to my fanbase. Showcase you without taking anything from you, and still helping you out.

Also, I wanna do books, I wanna publish books. I’m trying to do a poetry book with art. A couple of my friends have photo books that they've been trying to put out for years. I’m just trying to do it, expand a little bit outside the music.

I’m trying to tap in on the acting thing a little bit. I don’t wanna go crazy, but when I was a kid I liked to act, and I’m more confident than I used to be, so I’m like fuck it.

I did an audition for them, for something, they called me in. I’m trying to be on some type-cast shit, as the New York character, whatever, cause then it’s easy. I’m not tryna be some fucking Oscar worthy dude. But that’s a way to get into it, cause maybe from there you could learn how to act and be in a different role.