Interview: Evidence talks about his new album, Unlearning Vol. 1, out this week - Grown Up Rap
at the piece below
That’s really good to hear, man. With the title, is that something that’s limited to the music, or does it extend to life in general?
Everything, right now. I mean I made the song “Unlearning,” which was the result of a challenge from Alchemist. He was like I dare you to make a song, then mix it the next day, then call the video guy the next day, shoot the video and then put it out the next day [laughs] so I was like, fukk no one has challenged me to do shyt for a long time. So I accepted. Graymatter, my friend, was in town so we cooked that up, made a song, put it out, BOOM. And it seemed to touch people in a weird way, like I hadn’t got that reaction in a minute from stuff I had done. So I was like, okay I’m going to run with this because it feels right, and there’s so much to the art… like I have puzzle pieces that are the wrong pieces that fit the right place, so that’s kind of a metaphor for where I’m at right now.
Very dope interview
He basically says that this is going to be his most personal album and that the production is going to be super striped-down - raw and authentic. I smell a classic
And then shyt came back and I got fukked up, you know what I mean? I lost her, then raising the kid solo, trying to be a mom and dad, it’s a tall order, bro [laughs] as I’m sure you can imagine. And especially for someone with my lifestyle. Like if everything was right, I would have been out touring, making the money, keeping everything flowing; I would have been pressing on in the exact same fashion. But with this, it’s like a curveball got thrown at me, so how do I deal with this? So, I chose to make music through all this time and then it got to a point where I was like so do I share this, or do I wait until a point where I feel more up and just make a record that’s a little more… you know, not trying to weigh everyone down with all this shyt. And then I thought about it and I was like, well why would I do that? [laughs] And the only reason I would not do that is if it comes off as a ‘feel bad for me’ record. But then I played it for people and they were like no I don’t hear that. So, then I was like, alright I’ll do it. There are moments in there where it’s not about that, you know like rapping with Conway and shyt, but let’s just say the pen was moving for me a lot easier this time when I was writing about shyt that was true to my life. Unfortunately, that’s not really what I wanted to be writing about, but it’s what made my pen move, so I was like fukk, I’m caught in a weird place. It’s kinda hard to front that you’re happy, when you’re not, and write about how dope you are, you know? So that was the issue with this one, but I made so many songs and the ones I made for volume one, I think they really capture where I have been in my life. Definitely not the brightest point, but you know…
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