Anderson .Paak can’t just be one person. The rapper, singer and all-around Renaissance man finds the most joy in dipping into different personas. “I'm really a person that doesn't like to get too comfortable doing one thing,” he tells PAPER.
The California musician has just released his new album, Why Lawd?, as NxWorries, a music duo he created with producer Knxwledge. Aside from the brand new LP, he’s set to celebrate the 10th anniversary of his debut album, Venice, and embarking on a US tour in support of his critically acclaimed album, Malibu. Not just that, but he’s making his directorial debut with upcoming film K-POPs, which was inspired by creating YouTube skits with his son during the pandemic. It’s safe to say that he’s pretty busy these days.
NxWorries isn’t the only project that .Paak has become known for. He also is DJ Pee .Wee, his DJ alter ego who has played some of the biggest festivals in the world and will hit stages around the world in the coming months. He constantly tours with his band Free Nationals and, most notably, created Grammy Award-winning duo Silk Sonic with Bruno Mars.
There’s nothing .Paak can’t do, it seems. So to get the scoop on it all, PAPER sat down with him after Paris Fashion Week last month where he made his front row debut at the Louis Vuitton show.
How was Paris Fashion Week?
I mean, fashion week can be a pretty nerve-wracking, weird experience, because even if I'm not performing, I still feel nervous. Everyone's looking, and you want to look your best. Then I think about how I don't need to be nervous. Like, the people putting on the shows should probably be the most nervous. So I just get to hang out, watch all these incredible designs, beautiful models. It's really a feast for the eyes, and it was cool to be able to be invited to the Louis V show with my boy Pharrell for the first time and in Paris. I didn't get to see what they were going to dress me in, but I was confident that it would be cool, and it exceeded expectations. So I had a really good time.
Tell me about Why Lawd? How do you think this album situates you in your career, especially with the 10th anniversary of Venice coming up?
It's a full circle moment, and I'm really blessed to be able to come back to it and have this outlet to be able to to make music with one of my best friends, Knxwledge, who I think is one of the greatest producers of our time. I think it was a needed type of therapy for me to be able to circle back and work on this album. I always had plans on finishing it, and I'm just really appreciative of Knxwledge and my team for just allowing me to venture off and try different things, like going out on tour with Bruno and working on our album as Silk Sonic, and doing tours with the Free Nationals and working on their project. I just did a lot of side quests and a lot of different things, and no one was making a big fuss out of it on my end. I was able to come back and finish what we started with this album. It feels really good to have that balance in my career and to see the response. It's been so much love, and I'm just really grateful and appreciative.
The side quests seem like the most fun, in a way.
Yeah, for sure, man. It's a great outlet, you know? I'm really a person that doesn't like to get too comfortable doing one thing. I like to challenge myself, and I have a lot of fun with my musical personalities and my alter egos. And it's cool to be able to put them in certain places, whether it's Nxworries, or DJ Pee .Wee, Anderson .Paak, Silk Sonic, Free Nationals. All these things make up one artist, you know? All these different facets.
And you’re making your directorial debut with your film K-POPs!, right?
Yeah, K-POPs! is my labor of love. I've been working on this project for about three years now, and it started in quarantine when I was just hanging out with my family, and my oldest son was telling me he wanted to be a YouTuber. I was like, "Cool, we're going to be YouTubers." But we started just hanging out, doing sketches and skits with him, and that's when I started thinking of that idea. I was like, Wow, this kid is really talented. He's a natural. I wanted to write a script where we're both in it, something funny that we can kind of showcase all these things that we've been doing together, and it took a while to get it on its feet. But thank God for Stampede Studios, the production company that we did it independently with, and Live Nation. I got with a cowriter, Khaila Amazan, and one of my best friends, Dumbfounded, helped me produce it. We sat there and went draft after draft, and eventually we got it done, man. I got to shoot, direct and star in it. We shot in Los Angeles, Korea and al-Ula, Saudi Arabia, and I'm really proud of it. It's just been so much work. Acting, directing and just film in general is something I’m really loving and want to do a lot more of in the future. I'm enjoying learning the process as well.
It's a family comedy. It was a great way for me to be able to get some quality time with my son and learn a lot about him and have just a whole lot of fun making memories and telling a story that I think is going to be very unique to my experience and is going to be something that people haven't really seen before on the screen. People ask me, "Is this based on a true story or anything?" And I like to say that it's based on a true family, and it's definitely not what happened verbatim in my life. It's just like a fun comic book version of things that inspired me somewhat based on it, but nothing that was really based on what actually happened — just like a fun version of it.
More kids nowadays want to be YouTubers than, say, astronauts like they did back in the day.
YouTube is the new cable, and so the people on YouTube are the new cable/movie stars of our time. When I was coming up, I wanted to be like those people I saw on TV, too. So it's good to have some good representations, some different things out there for people to see. But yeah, it's pretty much based on BJ, who's my character, and he's a washed up musician that plays in a live karaoke band, but he finds out that his kid that he doesn't know he has could be the next K-pop star. It's a lot of fun.
You're touring Malibu in the fall. What made this the right time to take this album on the road?
I decided that I was going to do the Hollywood Bowl show and do Malibu in its entirety, and I just got such an overwhelming response. And once we put that out, people got so excited and were hitting us up from all over the world. I was like, You know what? Let's just give the fans what they want and take the show on the road. Why not now? I just think it's going to be a cool experience for us to be able to play some of these songs that we've never played before as well, and I really love amphitheaters. I think it was just the perfect combination.
What’s inspiring you generally right now?
Right now, it’s just life and travels in general. That always inspires me. I'm constantly working and on the road, so every conversation, every audio clip, every book, every movie, just looking out the window is me just chasing inspiration everywhere I can. And besides that, I've been working in the studio with some very talented artists that inspire me. I've been listening to some music. I've been really enjoying this artist named Mk.Gee and working with artists that I’ve been developing on my label. That's pretty much it.
Thanks so much for talking to me.
Thank you too, bro.
Photos courtesy of Louis Vuitton
