Describe your sound in three words
healing, spongey, detailed
Where is the place where you get more inspired to write the lyrics for your songs? Tell us a few things about your creative process.
Places where I know that I will be left alone. Outside in the streets where I don’t know anyone is a good one, but it ends up being my room and in the bathroom most of the time. Most accessible isolation areas.
You rap in both English and French. Is language a barrier in music?
For me, I grew up bilingually so to speak: always talk to my dad in French, was in French schools until high school, and my mom in English. So how I live with the languages transpires in the music. I also feel this Kanye West quote: “words can get in the way of what you want to say”. I see and feel this being the case for family, friends and myself. Some words exist in some languages and not in others, and so it really becomes a different way of thinking.
Favourite rapper, lyricist and producer?
This is always unfair… but I’m a huge TDE fan so my favorite rapper is Isaiah Rashad, my favorite lyricist is Kendrick Lamar, and it’s a tie between J Dilla and Travis Scott (very different) for my favorite producer(s).
What does the future hold for Hip-Hop?
More and more creative fields and doors opening up! Between French Afro-influenced hip hop, Drill in the UK and trap in the US, lofi instrumental beats, and fusions of all of these and more, Hip Hop is just taken to so many places, and I think it’s amazing.
My first EP was about a four leaf clover island, a metaphor for a land of the rich, the privileged. I am one of them, I grew up on that island. Hip Hop educated me, partly to convey my own life experience in my art form. Hip Hop is not something that was made for people like me. Yet, as a mode of expression, it can be used to convey different types of stories. However, the core of hip hop remains the beauty of giving a voice to the voiceless, to non-white “minorities” and it needs to (and will) stay that way.
Do you have an artist that you would describe as a hidden gem that we should know about?
Mamadou. I opened for him last year. He is an amazing lyricist, poet, and his personality and true beliefs come out through beautiful sounds.
One last thing we should know about you?
I just got back to Paris after four years of college in the United States, and I am going all in with music. Any music people who feel inclined to listen to my music and like it, hit me up for collabs, a talk, anything.
Thank you!
HipHop Paranoia 