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One that helped us to stay alive and look absolutely gorgeous doing so.
On 2017sblkswn, a pair of tattooed hands are in the process of bantu-knotting the 32-year-old artists growing flow.
No pushing, no drama just keepin their shit prim and proper.
Each album sorta conveyed that this is just what Smi does.
You wanna find him outside the studio?
Seek out the fingers hes trusted to get his scalp right.
What theyre about, largely, is music and the collective joy that comes from performing it.
Can he sing-song-slur a word better than most rappers you know?
Can his voice peak without cracking and chew up syllables like the ripest tobacco leaf?
You bet your ass.
Neither are the conversations about R&Bs apparent death.
To him, its more of a rebirth vibe.
So when you were super-young, your grandmother gave you some bongos to play.
Was that the start of the journey for you?She made my daddy buy me some bongos.
It was like the first time I ever performed in front of people.
Like in elementary school, first-grade-jot down shit.
They had a lil talent show.
My whole family knew I always wanted to play drums.
I could play the drum set a little bit, but I wasnt that good.
And then we did the little thing.
They was in that bitch screaming, Go, Chris, and shit.
Did drumming influence your cadences or flows at all?A hundred percent.
I look at everything about how I play the high hat on drums.
Thats how I flow sometimes.
But like, it could be anything really.
Its just rhythms in general, feel me?
Whats your writing process like?
Are you writing shit down?
Is it improvisational?Shit, I mean, I dont know.
Lately Ive been writing out my raps in myFew Good Thingsjournal that Sabadropped[Laughs].
But nah it just depend on the day.
Sometimes I dont need to write it down.
Sometimes I need to actually see my thoughts in front of me.
Sometimes something might have just happened.
Like thats how I wrote 90 Proof.
I was going through some shit and literally made a song in like 10, 15 minutes about it.
Sometimes its simple, sometimes its complex as fuck.
Sometimes Ill write a song and finish it a year later.
Just depends, bro.
I dont have a set way to do things.
I be just throwing paint most of the time.
Obviously we got the J. Cole verse on there.
Did that originate at theDreamville Camp?
Howd that come about?Im cool with JID.
I knew of Earthgang but never spent too much time with them or anybody else.
Cus all our albums was always around each other.
We around the same age.
Like, that nigga a Scorpio, Im a Libra.
We was always next door.
And when I actually did go, my brother Monte Booker went, my engineer went.
So we kind of just took over a room and Saba was in that shit with us.
The first day we was there, the first thing we did was make Sacrifices.
Like, as soon as we walked in that bitch.
And then we made 1993.
JID made Down Bad in his room right across from mine.
Was that the first time you had ever been at something like that?
Like a rapper retreat.Its the first timeanybodyever been in some shit like that.
Niggas dont be doing shit like that.
Therell be some lock-ins.
I had like muhfuckas coming through and shit, like, Nigga, hey, how you doing?
Nice to meet you.
What are your thoughts on that?
Do you even place yourself within the R&B genre?Hell nah.
Im genre non-conforming gang [Laughs].
I dont know what the fuck I am, bro.
Musician might play salsa music.
He might play rock music.
So I treat rap like a drummer.
I could do any style of music if I want to.
I dont feel like Im limited.
I dont make music for playlists.
I never made music for radio.
So now we doing whatever the fuck we wanna do.
Cus its like, shit, what else we gon do?
We gotta let niggas do they own thing with it.
But R&B aint dead.
They gotta stop saying that bullshit.
Its actually like its a rebirth vibe.
Hmm, say moreYou gotta tear shit down to build shit up.
Its like low-key kind of the new way that shit sounds.
I just think R&B artists know how to rap a little more nowadays.
So they say shit that aint just about one topic.
I wanted to talk to you about I Deserve, which you dropped over the pandemic.
You dont hit that tone too often.I dont be tryna be sad on wax.
I try not to make sad music too often.
But if Im sad, it would come out.
And then you dont gotta hold them feelings.
Imagine not releasing music for four years.
Ethiopia [Habtemariam, Motowns CEO] pulled up on me personally.
Muhfuckas wasnt tryna stop me in no way.
And they was just trying to push me so I was fucking with it.
I had to be like, fuck it.
Im not used to having people in my shit.
I was signed to Interscope before, and they didnt give a fuck what I did.
I turned my shit in, you feel me?
But its still that way.
Its still like, I got that trust.
But it was cool to just try something and give myself the rollout I deserve.
I mean, I do good business.
I aint do no weird ass deal.
I aint stuck in no weird shit.
I still own all my shit, all my masters.
My papa was a touring bass player.
He still be playing his bass from time to time.
My cousin Denzel Curry, he in the rap industry.
Wait, Denzel is your fucking cousin?I just found out.
We had to confirm it.
He was in St. Louis.
But yeah bruh, thats my cousin.
So we went bowling.
It aint like I talk about killing people and shit.
Im just honest man.
I think thats what people like my family get from it.
Cus its just real shit.
And Im like,Damn, Im glad you took every second you wanted.
Its like jazz shit.
Do you remember a time where that really happened?I got this song called Pecans with Terrace Martin.
And then he played to it and he moved with the way I fucked up.
And I had learned right then and there mistakes are the mystique of this shit.
Do you ever look back at your development at all like that?
Like my papa said some shit to me after one of my shows.
I thought I killed it.
And I was just like, damn, bro.
But yeah even on this album or just in general, I been learning how to control my tone.
Ive been going further into being an artist that sings, not a singer but an artist that sings.
Whats the importance of ancestry to you?Know-where-you-been-to-know-where-you-going key in vibes.
You think I aint finna send that nigga hella cleats, you know what Im saying?
Thats just how we get down.
We were raised like that.
And Im saying lets get old like Lee and Lovie.
I felt like I learned how to love from loving my family.
I got a lot of love in myself.
But Im a very present person.
Im tender and shit.
Like this is how I am.
I treat everybody like this.
Im not like a fake ass nigga.
If I fuck with you, Imma fuck with you.
Fame dont seem like the goal for you.Hell nah, I aint never been there.
I dont give a fuck about none of that shit.
So its what it is.
So its like if you dont want something and you get it, its a blessing.
I must be supposed to do something with it.
Tryna use my influence for more than just making people make music different.
I want people to make different decisions.
But that just gotta come with unpacking a nigga, you feel me?
Your hair has gotten a lot of well-deserved publicity.
But do you have a skincare regimen?
[Laughs]Oh, its likes simple like that?Low-stress environment.
I got passed down this shit from my mother.
My hair and my face and shit.
Im like bet, say less.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
