Any fan who was expecting a gloomy professional outcome from the newLil WaynealbumFuneralis in for a surprise.
“I’ve always been the artist that’s been left field,” he tells Entertainment Weekly.
“I’ve always been whatever they want to call me, some Martian or whatever.
I’ve always been that artist and that’s just the growth of who that artist is now.”
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY:You’re known for marathon recording sessions.
This is what we’re doing, this is the project we’re working on."
The only time I do that is for a Carter album.
My world stops when we’re going in here, recording like,Tha Carter VI.
Other than that, just whatever comes out that night came out that night.
How many songs you estimate you recorded for this album?
That lets you know how it works.
Mack’s ear is to the world.
Mine is to myself and my music, my world.
So we hopefully end up with the best songs out of that whole hundred thousand of them I recorded.
I really like “Ball Hard” off the record.
It also has a Sinead O’Connor shout-out.
Do you run toward challenges like that?Yeah I do.
It was barring crazy.
So that beat became a challenge as well.
It makes you find different flows.
So I may have killed your beat and not even known who you are; that happens a lot.
With “Dreams,” you talk about the nightmare of being broke.
Music is still my bloodflow.
That [song] right there was just perfect.
When I sang that hook I was like “Okay I got it.”
You know me, I’m a subject guy.
I’ve always been that guy.
That’s what helped me a lot with this, because I was in a group.
It was like being in school.
Sticking to subjects, why is the album calledFuneral?
How’d you come up with the concept?I thought everyone would understand.
I’m noticing that I keep getting asked like “why is thisFuneral?”
So you haveRebirth, and now you haveFuneral.
Just plain and simple, nothing else.
There’s no backstory.
It’s justRebirth,Funeral, and maybe the next one would beReincarnation, I don’t know.
You’ve got your fans shook.Everyone is like “Funeral?
Is this his goodbye to rap?
“A guy asked me [that] question.
He was like, “Does this mean this is your last album?”
I was like, “Hell no, man.”
Just so you know.
Sometimes I came at him though.
And so that’s how a lot of people ended up on the album.
You’ve said before that sometimes you have trouble with hooks.
Do hooks come last, and is that something that features help with?Much help.
[Laughs]Yeah, much help.
I’m not a hook-er man.
I just go at that motherfer.
You gotta remind me that “Man Tune, those are 12 bars.”
You gotta remind me to stop and make it a hook.
So yeah, I still have, not a hard time, but a good time with my hooks.
On whether they come first or last, it just depends on the song and the beat truthfully.
It’s never a process, it’s never a procedure or nothing.
It always depends on the situation.
Or you get sent the beat with a hook already on there, just a reference.
2020 was a huge year for female rappers.
They didn’t do them, so nope.
I don’t have no female artists out there that I like other thanNicki Minaj, bye.
Not anybody else out there doing it other than the old-school female artists.
I don’t have it for no one else right now other than that.
When you came out you were a teenager, which was much more of an anomaly then.
But teen rappers are more common now.
What advice do you have for those younger rappers?Stay with it.
Even if it’s the worst sh you’re doing.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
