Kidd Kenn and Baby Tate are here to keep you in check.
On their new track, “Want Not a Need,” out everywhere today, the 19-year-old Chicago rapper joins forces with Tate to flaunt their many luxuries — ”different brands, different bags, different shoes” — before confidently cautioning all lovers, “You a want, not a need.”
For Kenn, the single is to “remind the girls these are wants, not needs,” as he tells PAPER. “You never need anything or anybody.”
Tate, the 26-year-old Atlanta breakout, was a perfect feature to hammer home Kenn’s message “because she truly shows the world how much they need her, not just want her,” he says, emphasizing how she raps, sings and dances.
He continues, “She gives more than many other new artists. I love that she’s on this song because she bodies the definition of ‘Want Not a Need.’”
Underscoring the song’s orchestral instrumentation, Kenn’s “Want Not a Need” music video premieres today with a heavy emphasis on opulence. He pulls up in a classic Rolls Royce and tosses around money inside a mansion dining room that’s fixed only for himself.
“You? Not a need,” he raps, waving the camera away. “Him? Not a need. Them? Not a need.”
“Want Not a Need” is lifted off Kenn’s forthcoming EP, GROWN, arriving later this summer with lead single, “Body,” and “At It Again,” off Def Jam Recordings. This marks his first new music since 2021's Saucy Santana collab, "B4 (Remix)."
And while Kenn’s latest suggests otherwise, the rising artist is certainly a need, not a want — at least for us.
Photo courtesy of Kidd Kenn