this song hit different is something else i've got to start at an obvious place like what what is it what is it to you what is the song why are we hearing this first what is going on here you know it's interesting i don't really know why this is like the first it's like i was swimming in my brain about what i wanted to say first what i wanted to like
bring energy-wise first and i just really i just stopped trying to like overthinking i just wanted to give people something just to vibe because i have so much stuff that i'm just done holding on to so it's like i don't even know how any of it's going to take shape or any of that but i'm just done holding on to it and i'm just this is like the
beginning of me just like rolling out all my thoughts and this is like my first time directing all my stuff so i'm just really just really it's just like dying a lot you have to just live and just like do it honestly scissor your instinct is is is right on and i know that there's all this thing about diligence and what do we do and how do we just
how do we make it perfect but i've got to ask the people that you know you decided to work with on this um you know i already know but tell the people who helped you carve the song together with tai this is definitely the neptunes this is definitely um crazy i can't really wrap my head around the experience and i think more so i'm fangirling off of having
you know a track produced by probably the most formative um producers and like artists for me when i was growing up um i cried just explaining to pharrell what he meant to me growing up like here in the in the burbs being one of five black people in my radius and then um i came a day late to like the it was super bowl weekend and i
came a day late to the whole recording experience and i was like everyone did like this is going to be so crazy and then i don't know it just was not and chad was just like perfect and and pharrell was just perfect it was just it was too perfect yeah and then ty just came through and it was so crazy he's so effortless and all he was like mom blind and just said
hit different and it really hit me differently and we made me and pharrell and um chad and everybody we just made like five jams that we just love is six and um i just cannot believe that i felt like i was working towards that moment my whole life and then the next day when i came in after the first day like i don't know why i feel like i'm about to cry right
now but the next day when i came in after like the first session and i was just like i can't believe this is another day here and things are going well and i just feel like i've really been working towards just like this picture combination i'm in the everyone knows video when i was in like 10th grade or like 11th grade because i was just bringing clothes to
set and i accidentally got caught on camera and they were like you just just do something in the camera and i was just like okay but it was just um i just really there's no way to explain what it's like to be like a bbc ice cream stand and wait outside in line with thousands of kids and skip school ah there's a beat and skip school just so you could go see
so you can go see pharrell what's really amazing about the song is the fact that you really take your time to show up and you're so generous and you give tai this space to just tear you up and then when you arrive it's like and i know this is all instinct but it feels like such a moment when you land into this groove how did you write it was it something
cerebral did it just pour out of you like how did the words like happen you see the two ways all right i either write the words first where i write as if i'm sending my last text message to whoever and it's like if i had one more opportunity to tell this person to kiss my ass how would i do it and then there's another way that i write
when it's like where it's like okay um if i was just flowing and i heard this and it wasn't me what would i do hit different is crazy i gotta i've gotta swing into the video and so i wonder kind of where the idea came from and how you enjoyed the experience of undertaking a film shoot and getting all that stuff going it came together in four days uh we
learned the choreography in two days and then we went to the junkyard it was so um it was very serendipitous almost it was kind of weird because we went to the junkyard and and uh scattered everything there was a whole setup that of like hubcaps that i thought like oh these hubcaps like a mountain of hubcaps like thousands of them so i'm like
and they're like gold and these rims they're beautiful i'm like i want to shoot in front of these hubcaps we tell them that we're ready for it the next day right before it's the time to shoot and i'm in rehearsal they come and tell me that they sold all the hubcaps they're gone so i'm like okay so i want to ride the forklift we don't
have a permit to let me ride this forklift on a car unharness but i need you to let me do it because we like we can't fill this face with anything whack yeah i was just so grateful that everybody believed in me even if they didn't see the vision when i was speaking because i'm a novice i don't have a shot list and for y'all like i'm over here being
like and everyone's like so what do we do next and i'm just like well it's such a beautifully directed video says it really is it's amazing and it goes so perfect and the way ty just shows up nonchalant the car yard at the end like i wanted him to be in the song scene the uh the scene where everyone's in blue and they're doing like qigong movements
that's part of my daily exercise that i just wanted to like incorporate because i think qigong and tai chi and um just the movement of chi is so powerful and so interesting i just wanted to combine just all the intentions that i have i don't know and just throw it together and see how it all feels gymnastics on the end part of the video which is like
another a snippet of another song i don't want to blow that up and like guess you too much on that because i know that that's probably mysterious for a reason but it's kind of in my nature to be curious so you got to give me a little something about what that what that thing at the end is i just really want to put out uh more music this body of work
is very um everything sounds different but it all sounds like me so like hit different doesn't sound like anything else on the on the project and then neither does you know good days which is at the end of that it doesn't sound like joanie doesn't sound like love language doesn't sound like it everything sounds different in its own
way and i just wanted to be able the visuals are all completely different but i really realize that you know you are the you're the glue in everything you do i suppose the next question for me really is you know how many songs like how much music have you been making i'm making a ton of music music and then i i in terms of i just want to roll out
as top gave me to go to just put out stuff but hang on a minute right now i feel this is the second time that we've seen this soap opera come up and show its face right which is just like which is just like that i want to put my out i want to put it out right now right and you and you go and you put it out there and it's and listen it's it's wonderful
right but i feel for punch because punch is like ah man like did you see did you see on the timeline when he was like i'm a human being you're hurting my feelings did you laugh but it was so funny i was so funny he's he's a pisces so it's like he's very he's he's very streamlined so when i'm like hey i finally have confidence i think i'm ready
and he's like but he was right the whole time it's really they've never they've always told me when are you gonna put this music out they come and they ask me respectfully they don't press me even though they should be pressing me um and they're just like i like this let me know when you put that out i'm like okay well it can't go out without a
video so i guess and then i started moving around and doing visuals but then i get panicky when i get to the like so this is coming out like to other people they're gonna hear it in the house in their own space and then i start holding this and then i get really like nervous nervous nervous but punch and top have never ever been the type to be like
no like you just can't do this like that if anything they're just like if you are gonna do it because i'm so haphazard i'm like i have confidence today i'ma drop this today because if we hold this another week it's not coming out for another year and then but that's not the way things work and i've never been signed to like a major label before
i've never had to put anything through a system like i've been just dropping soundcloud before i got down to them and i only dropped one album prior to this so it was like and they stole my hard drive from me then so it's like if you really leave it up to me ain't no telling when don't come out because i have anxiety this whole kind of moving in
in a loose space is working and i said this to someone yesterday because i know we're running out of time but i said to someone yesterday when we knew that you were coming back confidentially and i was like you know i just love that there's decisions and things going on that don't have any that don't seem to work in any traditional metrics or framework
and there are very few artists that can do that and and still when you come back when you come out it feels so methodical and thought through even though perhaps it's not it's the strange chemistry and you've got it like when you come back it makes total sense even though perhaps in the behind the scenes hasn't made any sense at all no i i really thank you for saying that i
really um yeah i've never been this scared before i'm just gonna say that in a very honest way because i'm very um i'm just really attached to my music in a way that i um i'm just really attached i'm really attached and i'm really i have more intention in what i'm doing in terms of like i just want to be able to provide for people i don't want to be lazy and
what i do i want to make sure that i'm doing my best and sometimes if i step away from something and come back to it like damn that wasn't your best go go back and make it your best but then like you know it's three years going back and doing that and i was like it's not out again but i just yeah i just thank you for saying that so it's
been such a joy to finally get to speak with you um you know it's it's and it's so rare that someone like you so it's it's like for me it's rare to sort of i don't know meet you with someone like you at this point in your career so it's great to be able to sort of make the connection and apologies for the out and out fanboying at the beginning i was
just like oh my god no i've been stalking you and like fangirling for so long and i just really honestly just wanted to make music that was good enough for like to have i don't know be worth talking to you about and i'm just going to be honest in that and i just really am hard on myself and i just thank you for taking time to talk to me you