Life's a stage. But you still need talent. And getting paid is another thing.
Ever since he first picked up the mic and aptly took on the nickname Broadway before making the change to B.Way, the Miami rapper born Kareem Brown has looked at every day as a chance to break out.
Crossfade hung out with the Pro Club rapper outside of a Five Guys Burger & Fries in North Miami to talk about the inspiration behinds songs, Passion Fruit Love Sessions, and women.
See also: Prez P Talks Ambiance: "I Don't Really Go Clubbing ... We Just Chillin' in the Cut"
Crossfade: What are the inspiration behind songs like "Forbidden Fruit" and "Trophy"?
B.Way: Girls. Girls, man. It's funny, because "Trophy" started as freestyle. Like, I literally heard the beat, that's literally FrankL, "Yo, I got this funky ass song. I want you to see what you could come up with." We're in the room. I'm hearing the beat over and over. I'm freestyling random stuff, and then I was just like, "You know what? Imma sing on this." And he's just like, "Alright. Let's see what you got."
"Trophy", that's me basically using a 40-Year-Old Virgin quote, "putting the pussy on the pedestal," I guess.
"Forbidden Fruit" that's me meeting this chick from my dawg's, one of my homies' birthdays. Went on the beach and had smores. And yeah, the next day, I'm like, "Imma write a song about this girl." And I sent it to her. She digged it.
You didn't hear those type of songs on Dress Rehearsal, but you on almost every other track on LucidNoise.
With Dress Rehearsal, I was just like, "Yo." I was hungry. At that point, I was like, "I just need bars. Imma go over these soulful samples with just straight bars." Then I met FrankL, and I realized, as far as the sound in my head, I was just like, "Strip it down." Simply, what do people want? Everybody wants to feel loved. So I'm like, "Imma make some songs about love real quick."
I feel like those songs led up to the creation of Passion Fruit Love Sessions.
Actually what started it was SBTRKT and Sampha. We were listing to SBTRKT every night for, like, a month. And we were just like, "Nobody is in Miami really making music like this." We don't necessarily have to bite it straight up or even try to put a spin on it, just make something different that's not regular.
Vurn: Wanted the feel, not so much the sound.
Exactly. We just wanted to evoke the feeling of us hearing those sounds because songs like "Never Never" was just stuck in my head forever.
We made "Kidnap" and we was just like, "This shit is too epic for us to even make it a mixtape-type thing. Let's just make it a full-blown project or EP and just stick to the whole Passion Fruit Love Sessions type of thing, and see where it goes.
But we just wanted to do interludes. So, "Athiest" and "Tia's Interlude" was like, "We're going to keep it short and to the point." Something that's repeative, so it's easier for the listeners to sing along to, specifically girls. And that's what happened. Its funny, because at first, people see the freaking title and they're just like, they're ready to bash me, and I'm just like, "Chill. It's a metaphor. Leave me alone."
When it comes to atheism, you have no god. There's nothing there that may fill a void. And at the same time you only have four bars and there's nothing else there.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm so glad people get that song. It's so crazy. I read a YouTube comment, and this guy is just like, "Yo, he's a atheist because he doesn't believe in relationships or the bullshit girls put guys through and just feed us lies. The chick's burying me with lies." And I was like, "Yeah, dude. You fucking get it." That's awesome. You put your heart and soul into a lot of stuff, and as time progresses, it starts to feel like a lie. You don't believe in a lot of shit, like, "Fuck! I wasted my time on that." I decided to make a song out of that. I like the outcome.
Do you feel like that project capitalized on a sound that's hot right now.
Been trying to figure that out lately. Since I put out that project, I've been in the studio. But I haven't necessarily, wholeheartedly worked on anything since that project. Passion Fruit Love Sessions took us two months to do. We'll work on one song a week.
So I wouldn't say we're necessarily trying to capitalize on anything. It was just more so coincidence, because while we're working on it, Justin Timberlake drop and all of that, so it was just like, "Oh shit." Kind of crazy that this is the wave right now, but fuck it.
What is it about these women?
Just the emotions they make me feel. You know, man. At the end of the day, everybody wants something to lay beside, or just something to feel. We all just want to feel something. This world bogs you down. Just life throwing shit at you and you just want to feel something real or just feel appreciated, wanted by something, and you just try to evoke those emotions into songs.
Do you get easily drawn in?
No. That's the issue. That's funny, I had a girl tell me, "I want to meet the guy in your records, because the guy in real life isn't really what it cracks up to be," and I was just like, "Damn, that sucks, but cool."
It's like you have these ideas of what it's supposed to play out to be and then like ... A lot of variables come in to play. It's just weird. Just catch weird vibes. Could be paranoia too. The initial phase of meeting people is cool, and then you're trying to feel them out, and then you just overthink it sometimes, on both ends. Not just my end or not just the girl's end. The mind games are wack.
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