- A lot of my fans, when I released this, they were like,
"Another mindless, ignorant trap song, just a turn up song."
But you know, just 'cause it has some distorted 808s
and stuff, doesn't mean it's all devoid of all meaning.
That's not fair to the 808s.
Quarantine is such a creativity killer.
I've barely even gone outside in five weeks.
I think people under appreciate how much just real life
is so helpful for making music.
I'm like, "I need to lock myself in a room for three years
"and I'm gonna make the best album ever."
I've gotten more into a routine
but it was definitely a new
sort of weirdly difficult process.
I do kind of cheat in this Genius interview a little bit,
I have to apologize to everybody because there's this big,
in the beginning of the song, this huge atmospheric,
all these harmonies, intro.
And then, outta nowhere, just like,
"I'm like, where'd you go".
So in the song, it sounds like I'm coming in outta nowhere,
which I thought was cool, but it's also,
that's how I feel what has happened in this weird
sort of odd and small amount of success I've had.
I feel like I came outta nowhere.
And when I say, "I didn't mean to scare you bro",
I also feel like maybe that has scared people away.
Like, "Where'd they go", which is actually,
now that I'm saying it, it's very sad.
Yeah, it is kinda a little sad, sad boy vibe actually.
No matter where I get to, numbers wise in my career
or whatever, I'm still the same person.
When I say, "I'm never thinking 'bout the past again",
that's me saying like I'm still true to myself
and who I have been, but I'm trying to almost move on.
In elementary school, I would make songs
like me playing the piano, I'd be singing my heart out.
But kids, they're mean in middle school.
Those are like the meanest people in the world,
are in middle school right now.
Nobody wants to be vulnerable and be baring their soul
when you're like 12 and nobody really gives a fuck
about the art of anything.
People are just like, "Ugh you're a loser."
I definitely always felt, and not even just music wise,
I've always been sort of like a weird person.
And I don't blame people for laughing at my tracks.
I look at my tracks and I laugh at them myself.
I felt like that was for good reason.
But it still just goes to the point
of I've always sort of felt a little bit
in my own sort of weird, isolated zone.
I was sort of just trying to draw parallels
all throughout my life.
In the beginning,
"No matter where I go, I'm not fitting in",
I talk about my childhood and high school.
And then even going to this thing where everybody thinks,
once you make it and you're doing what you love,
then you're perfect, right?
But even in that lane, I still don't really fit in.
I'm the goofy white kid who flails his arms around and shit.
What the song's trying to say
is that's not necessarily a bad thing.
There's so many parts in my career or whatever
when I've tried to be like, "Oh, I'm cool, I'm the cool guy.
"I can wear Yeezys, right?
"Doesn't that make me so cool?"
But it's like, there's some level of just acceptance
where you're like, "Hey, I am this sort of weird guy."
An unconventional figure, definitely in rap music,
I'm not a conventional sort of rapper
and I've tried a lot to try to change that,
but I think this is sort of just like,
"Hey, that's who I am
"and I'm gonna make as much dope art as I possibly can
"and yeah, I may flail my arms around and whatever
"but that's the way it's gonna be."
That's just the hardest bar in the song.
Bring me my biggest hater.
Add Twista to the Zoom call right now,
you know what I'm saying?
Everybody, nobody can disagree, that's just,
that's kinda a banger bar.
I'm sure every artist deals with people saying,
"Oh, you're trash" or dealing with things
and of course it'll get to you
and I'm sure it gets to a lot of people.
But this is sort of me saying, "That's not gonna stop me",
you know what I'm saying?
That's just the tweet.
I'm still very much an independent artist.
The first verse is sort of explaining,
"Yeah I feel I'm sort of disconnected in all these ways".
And then the second verse is like,
maybe that is actually beneficial
and it's using this example of being an independent artist,
but also representing who I am as a person.
When you're independent, you reap more benefit
and it's more validating when you do have success
and so, that's sort of a flip of the perspective.
Like maybe I do sort of feel like I'm in my own
sort of zone, but maybe that's not such a bad thing.
Yeah, Simon Cowell's just always been there
throughout my childhood, on American Idol.
He's always saying no and no and no and no,
and yeah, I just thought that was a little
clever throwback bar right there.
I did my last album when I was 17 and 18,
not really with many resources to make the music,
other than the basic Logic software and stuff,
but I've always been very big on lyrical, thematic concepts.
I feel like in this new project,
I've pretty much produced every single song,
most of them without any other co-producer
or anything like that,
and I feel like I've finally found my own sound,
which on my last project, there was good concepts,
there were some good songs, but I feel like a lot of it
may have just sounded like a kid
rapping on some tight beats and stuff.
But this, I feel like, is much more of a statement
to who I am as an artist.
So if you're watching this and you don't like me
or you think whatever, just give it a shot
and that's all I'm gonna say.