Similar to that, I feel like you have a cult following, in the ‘if you know, you know’ territory. Why do you think that is?
I think it’s because when I worked with [Playboi] Carti for the first time, it was producer-based work, but he actually wanted me to rap with him. I seen how famous he was and I was like, I could blow up as a big producer so let’s just see how this goes first. Then “Magnolia” happened, and the shit changed my life. I didn’t think it would be so hard for them to just accept my own music but that’s why it’s like a cult thing, because it’s like the ones that really mess with it, they’re like, oh wow this is crazy. I don’t even want to tell anybody. Some people love music so much they don’t want to share the music because they feel like if their favorite artist gets too famous, their music starts to stink and that is what happens, so I get it. But they gotta stop being scared [laughs] because like I said, I made the beat, I wrote the song, so every time we make a song it’s the same formula. I just go in there and be me.
You recently got your first Grammy for your work on Kanye West’s Jesus Is King album, and the similarities between you two are obvious — starting out a producer and having to fight to prove yourself as an artist to people. You said working with people made you feel like you didn’t need to aspire to be anyone else but Pi’erre. Can you elaborate on that?
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The stories they tell about Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, I felt that same way when I finally met Kanye. It was like Kobe finally meeting Jordan because I’ve been studying it from just listening and wondering for so long, so now I can see how you guys really work. It was cool to see. But I felt good to also realize like I can do these same moves like Kobe probably felt about MJ.
To be honest man, he’s gonna be mad at me, but Kanye asked me how to make a beat. I’m like, go figure, sometimes the new things the older folks just don’t know. I’m thinking, you’re supposed to be my OG, you’re my Mr. Miyagi. Once he asked that question, I felt so good because I had studied Ye and his whole approach, Mike Dean all them, all that music since I was 17 years old.
I have a lot of love for Kanye, GOOD music, Mike Dean, John Monopoly, all of Kanye’s camp. Because they operate so collaboratively and there’s a bunch of people doing specific tasks, like somebody doing something for that song over there, another person engineering and it’ll sound incredible. But they like me because I can just sit here and do all that by myself, press play and it’s like, ‘how did you do that?’ When TLOP 4 came out, I linked with Kanye two days later for Sunday Service. I played him the album and we went to Japan right after and he fell in love with that shit. He was just trying to tap in. Kanye really likes good music. It doesn’t matter who makes it, if you make a sound he likes, he’s like “wait do that again!” That’s really a producer. That’s not me though. I like to make whatever is in my head. So I’m just learning there are levels to everything.
There was speculation about Carti’s recent album, Whole Lotta Red, that in one of the two records you produced, “Place,” there was an errant five second pause in the beginning of the song. Can you address that?
You’ll hear it on my album, on TLOP5, the track “Drunk & Nasty,” it’s a dramatic pause just like that. It’s just silence and it makes people go ‘what is going on?’ and you’re there just waiting for it to drop. The real reason is for the shows but since there’s been no shows, everybody’s just listening in the crib like “did this shit just cut out?” But it’s done on purpose. If it was at a show, it builds suspense and then the beat comes in and it hits. Me and Carti got way more [music] though. We locked in the majority of last year, so him just putting those two songs on the album, he’s just playing with the world. He’s holding onto all the music we got.
Now we’ve got to ask, who is the Pi’erre Bourne of the NBA?
Really?! It’s not KD. He’s a superstar and he’s been on three teams now. I’m not that. I’ll say Damian Lillard or something like, y’all gonna get me mine sooner or later. I have a huge chip on my shoulder. I’m Dame. Everyone steals my game and then they become famous for it. I don’t know anybody else that I can compare myself too. Steph [Curry] is Steph. That’s why I’m like, do I want to be Steph or do I want to be Dame? Dame is as nice but he hasn’t gotten the credit yet. I feel like that’s me as a solo artist. With producing, we Steph, we Kyrie [Irving], we whatever consistently great player you wanna pick. The production, I got that, but as an artist, I’m still working towards going further.
![I think it’s because when I worked with Carti for the first time, it was producer-based work, but he actually wanted me to rap with him. I seen how famous he was and I was like, I could blow up as a big producer so let’s just see how this goes first. Then “Magnolia” happened, and the shit changed my life. I didn’t think it would be so hard for them to just accept my own music but that’s why it’s like a cult thing, because it’s like the ones that really mess with it, they’re like, oh wow this is crazy. I don’t even want to tell anybody. Some people love music so much they don’t want to share the music because they feel like if their favorite artist gets too famous, their music starts to stink and that is what happens, so I get it. But they gotta stop being scared [laughs] because like I said, I made the beat, I wrote the song, so every time we make a song it’s the same formula. I just go in there and be me.](https://media-s3-us-east-1.ceros.com/hype-beast/images/2021/05/25/968d1f39d74242e69b516e1680672f1d/26.png)
What parallels do you see in both these worlds that resonate with you?
I feel like when I was playing sports, we had to train before we even played the game. We had to do intense training and conditioning for weeks until we got our bodies physically and mentally right. It’s a lot of preparation and when it comes to making music, it’s a lot of preparation going into the beat or writing that song or preparing for a show. The process of making it, getting the vocals right and saying things in a certain way is cultivating the perfect way for you to perform that song later. You get all your errors out in this process, so it’s basically like when you’re conditioning your body to play in a game. If you don’t do that before the game, you can’t say you’re ready. I want to be prepared for opportunities so I try to keep working, even during downtime. I feel like in the NBA, you’ve got to keep bettering yourself every single day.
![Really?! It’s not KD. He’s a superstar and he’s been on three teams now. I’m not that. I’ll say Damian Lillard or something like, y’all gonna get me mine sooner or later. I have a huge chip on my shoulder. I’m Dame. Everyone steals my game and then they become famous for it. I don’t know anybody else that I can compare myself too. Steph [Curry] is Steph. That’s why I’m like, do I want to be Steph or do I want to be Dame? Dame is as nice but he hasn’t gotten the credit yet. I feel like that’s me as a solo artist. With producing, we Steph, we Kyrie [Irving], we whatever consistently great player you wanna pick. The production, I got that, but as an artist, I’m still working towards going further.](https://media-s3-us-east-1.ceros.com/hype-beast/images/2021/05/25/cdb193a3e5824794bc577cc8868d4c8b/18.png)
The culture around the NBA and hip-hop are synonymous, now more than ever. There’s the mantra, “rappers wanna be ball players, ball players wanna be rappers.” Where does that come from?
I actually tried to do some research, like “who was flashy first?” It’s not necessarily even NBA players but it was an athlete. Deion Sanders, who was in the NFL and MLB, he did a music video and the video looks like all early ’90s hip-hop. Bad Boy records, Biggie, Ma$e videos — it’s the same vibe, but it came before. Also, you have to think with those big contracts that ball players get, they can really buy luxury pieces in abundance and that’s what every rapper wants, but they don’t get multi-million dollar contracts out the gate like that. So that’s the only difference. In New York, in the ’80s and early ’90s, drug dealers looked the freshest and they were the ones booking the artists so they influenced a lot of that look. The drug dealers were first, but the ballers were the first to do it legit, the legal way. They didn’t have to be lowkey about it.
HYPEBEAST: What’s your earliest memory of watching or playing basketball?
Pi’erre Bourne: Growing up in my neighborhood in Jamaica, Queens, there’s a lot of parks, a lot of basketball courts, so basketball was the thing to do for all the youth in the community. Everyone had their own hobbies, but because the court is so center and there’s so many basketball courts, I feel like all the kids felt like they had to learn how to play to fit in. Everybody played ball back then in the neighborhood, everybody was outside. You might not have been good, but everybody was just there — it’s part of the culture. It started early for me. Just about as early as the music.
As the league celebrates this anniversary, its deep history, big moments and greatest superstars are magnified through a lens other than sport. For decades, the NBA has set the bar for cultural mashups, blurring the lines between basketball and hip-hop, fashion and entertainment. To mark this, HYPEBEAST caught up with Bourne to discuss the 2021 NBA Playoffs, the parallels between the game and music, how growing up playing basketball helped to inspire his career that includes a Grammy award, starting his imprint label, SossHouse and his fifth solo project as a rapper, The Life of Pi’erre 5.
One doesn’t have to look far to see that Bourne has taken every advantage of each opportunity he created for himself, tapping in with early Soundcloud era rappers including Playboi Carti, Young Nudy, Lil Uzi Vert and Trippie Redd, creating the sound for what would become a new era of rap with his blissfully quirky beats. This rap faction he would help cultivate bares similarities with that of the new generations of players in the NBA too, like Ja Morant, LaMelo Ball and Anthony Edwards — young men who are unapologetically themselves, even in the face of mountainous pressure to be a professional athlete or rapper. From the regular visits to Icebox and pulling up in the latest Rolls Royce Wraiths, to the brash trash-talking and matter of fact approach, the youth in each of these respective worlds control the tempo and have breathed new life into the game. This of course comes along with paying homage to the pioneers who came before them, contributing greatly to the longevity of the NBA’s influence and cultural presence.
Of the many lessons rapper and producer Pi’erre Bourne learned growing up in Jamaica, Queens, some of the most profound were taught on the basketball court. One in particular was formative in shaping his unrelenting work ethic, garnering him a career that lists Kanye West, Travis Scott, Young Thug and Drake as some of his collaborators, in addition to his respected solo career. Bourne recognized early on that for every buzzer-beater shot or game-winning defensive stop, there’s years of preparation that go into a single chance to make something happen. “You only get so many opportunities, and even crazier, you never know when they are,” he says. “Look at the NBA. You’ve got to stay prepared.” Case in point: He just happened to be walking past his brother watching T.V. one random day after school when he would hear the producer tag — originally a line on the Jamie Foxx Show line — that would ultimately come to soundscape a generation of rap. “Yo Pi’erre, you wanna come out here?” eventually became a viral phenomenon thanks to the song “Magnolia.”
Celebrating the 2021 NBA Playoffs, he waxes poetic on the evolution of the game, its intersection with hip-hop and how basketball influenced his own work ethic.
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Artist Pi'erre Bourne Is Calling All
the Shots Now
You know how some players are really good but their coach doesn’t let them be good. I felt like TLOP4 was me being my own coach and I never knew that I was my own coach. I make all my beats, I record myself, I write the songs, so there’s no direction given to me and I always felt like I needed that or I wanted that, but I didn’t realize all the hats that I wore. I call my own plays, so let me call ‘em. TLOP4 was very much me being like ‘Okay I called these plays but I see how this is being ran’ so I’m not gonna give you all of me right now. Why would I give you the greatest thing ever and then it becomes a secret or its swept under the rug? When everybody’s paying attention, then they’ll get everything, the real deal. But for now I’m laying the foundation.
TLOP5 is done. The thing that took the longest was securing features. I got Carti and Uzi as features. And my artist Sharc. I finished Balmain, I’m not sure if that’s the final title but it’s supposed to be like Pi’erre Balmain and it’s a collab album with TM88.
The Life of Pi’erre 4 felt like you really came into your own and hit another stratosphere. What about that project worked for you and what can we expect from the new album now that “4U” and “Groceries” are out.
He’s making all the beats and that’ll come after TLOP5. I believe me and Cardo should be dropping after Balmain too. Me and Young Nudy are dropping another project in about a month too. I been working in overdrive ever since the pandemic, all I want to do is drop music but now I have a plan, my own schedule and I’m in control.
With SossHouse, you been putting out projects with each of your artists too, like Chavo and Jelly. What have you learned about incubating emerging talent?
I’ve got seven artists in SossHouse now. It was six and then I just added this kid Kura, he’s from Detroit. He just turned 18 but I’ve been following him since he was 14, but I told him he’s gotta finish school first because I would reach out to a lot of people and then they would drop out and I didn’t like that. I never dropped out of high school. You can finish that shit! Not saying that if you have to drop out, you can’t be successful, but if I’m contacting you, it’s not to drop out of school. So I told him, you gotta finish, because everybody else I started working with, they dropped out and I still feel bad about that.