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Tag: Dark Times

  • Vince Staples tells Apple Music about ‘Dark Times’, his Netflix show, and shares his perspective on life

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    Vince Staples joins Apple Music’s Zane Lowe on New Music Daily for a candid conversation not only discussing his new album out today, ‘Dark Times’, but to talk about his perspective on life and music. He emphasizes the satisfaction he feels in finishing a project. The two also dive into the importance of being true to oneself and not conforming to societal expectations.

    Staples also reflects on the challenges he faced in creating his television show and the need to convince others to believe in his vision. He emphasizes the importance of staying true to one’s perspective and not letting ego get in the way of executing a creative vision. Staples acknowledges the influence of his upbringing and the cultural touchstones that shaped his artistic journey. Staples recognizes the impact that music has had on his life and views it as a life or death matter.

    Video | Vince Staples: ‘Dark Times’ & Creating ‘The Vince Staples Show’

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    Vince Staples on why we’re getting an album from him right now

    Just to make it, we had a lot of stuff going on as far as things with this show and just movement in other areas of life and just said, “Why not?” We’re making it encapsulate this Tme period, so to say. And I had one more on my contract, so I was like, “Let’s just get it out the way to be completely transparent.” It was a why not kind of moment.

    There’s always a why when it comes to music, if you’redoing it or approaching the way I approach it. It’s just a tmestamp, so to say. You see where you fit. Your thoughts alongside this production or whatever is current to you at the moment, and then you put it out and you make the next one. So, Michael Uzowuru being there again. LeKen Taylor. Saint Mino worked on it. Mike Hector worked on it. Ricarod, he was on Ramona too so… Ron was on it. A couple people I might be forgetting. Julian. But yeah, just making the things that just make sense at the moment.

    Vince Staples on his new album, ‘Dark Times’

    It was just what I felt at the moment. Being able to work with the same people that worked on this project worked on the last one and not like we spoke about getting people into that space. With music, I just feel and think of things the way that I do. Nothing is ever really that deep. It’s just listening to your instincts of the things that you feel and trusting those things.

    Vince Staples on the single, ‘Shame on the Devil’

    Zane Lowe: It’s a great song. It’s deep as fuck I actually think.

    Vince Staples: Yeah. But when we think about depth, a lot of the times from a creative standpoint, it’s like say… Thoughtfulness comes with time or re-approach and things are deep. If it’s okay, I created this because of something that happened years ago and then I put it in the back of my mind and then I revisited that moment. Essentially, it’s like turn the beat on and if I don’t have a song in five minutes, turn the beat on. And whatever the music sounds like is what the music sounds like.

    But I think life in and of itself has its own layers and it has these elephants that we ignore. And when you acknowledge those things that are… Like you said, human or that everybody understands or goes through, then it could be considered deep.

    But I look at it from a standpoint of it’s just what popped up and trying to match the emotion of the music or just thinking about what I feel like would sound good based on my perspective because we only know the things that we know. I don’t really talk about a vast variety of shit. I don’t step outside of my wheelhouse because I just honestly don’t care about the things that I don’t think about.

    Vince Staples on his recent comments re: Drake vs Kendrick

    Zane Lowe: Yeah. But when you got asked the other day about the thing that’s now done, the big wrestling match, and you were like, “Ah. All right. Well, I am going to give you about 60 seconds on the way. The record industry is completely fucking and utterly eating itself alive. And then it’s going to leave very few opportunities for any of us, in particularly any of us in our community and the way that we look and the kind of music that we make can have even less opportunities because they’re just all about profit and scalability, and there’s no ability for us to be able to work with them anymore because they’ve completely and utterly fucking missed the point. And they’ve eaten themselves completely inside out and all that shit has gone away. So, who’s going to represent our music and what the fuck? And we’re busy over here doing that.”

    Vince Staples: So, the morbid truth of the matter is that I was at event called Youth Day in the City of Long Beach where children from the age of 16 to 26 that are in youth programs throughout their schools from high school to college to community college sit and they talk to the man to ask him that question. It was a live stream visual.

    Now, the fact of the matter is that the two questions before that asked by the same young man were, “How do we get more people…” He was in a program that’s basically for people that have been incarcerated to get into Long Beach Community College. He asked me a question about how do we stop gang violence and get people to transition their life because it’s hard. And then he asked the mayor about some resources.

    It was a livestreamed event, so someone had to be filming the livestreamed event on their computer. And then pages that are dedicated to the city and to people cut out every question that these children asked about trying to stay alive in this environment that’s had over a hundred shootings in the first four months. So, if I say plainly, no one cares about anybody else, then I look crazy. But I’m speaking to children. So, my thing is am I supposed to look at a child who just asks those questions and say, “Yeah, I want one of these to kill each other lyrically.” What the fuck are we talking about?

    But you got to be nice because I understand that people care about these things. I personally don’t give a fuck.

    But my thing is if you hold the mirror up and say, “Hey, why didn’t you post the other three pages? And you guys are media outlets dedicated to the city because that’s why you’re watching a live stream with the mayor that I didn’t post or no one even knew I was going to be there. So, if you’ve been watching this whole event and you saw no other clip from that event, what does that tell you about the world that we live in?” And I don’t really want to get into that because then we got to start being honest and no one wants to be honest. This is the music business. No one wants to be honest.

    Vince Staples on his Netflix show

    Zane Lowe: And congratulations on the show. Another season?

    Vince Staples: We’ll see. We’re figuring some things out right now, so we’ll see.

    Zane Lowe: And I know that that was a real process for you and Corey and the team. And I love the pivot based on the interview I read recently where you said, “The meetings weren’t really catching. There was no fish on the hook here. No one fucking- “So, rather than just keep pounding through that door, you went right down another corridor, took another right, another corridor took a left, doubled back around, went up through the fucking air conditioning unit, landed back, and somehow then it was like, “Oh, yeah, come on in.” Do you know what I mean?

    Vince Staples: Yeah. But also a lot of that is artist’s ego because someone goes to, say, community college, and then they go to their local university, then they go to NYU and they study film, and then they just engulf themselves in this world and they’re an artist and they can’t get something off the ground without a short or without previous work.

    But since I make songs and people know who I am, I didn’t just expect someone to just give me something. Especially when there’s nothing beforehand.

    Even when we did the show and they’re like, “Oh…” I was writing the scripts and I had a lot of input on a lot of things. It wasn’t viewed like that. It wasn’t contracted like that. It was a vanity plays so to say, because a lot of artists, “Oh, this is this show,” or “This is that show.” They don’t really, but you have to work and you have to work hard at it.

    So, it didn’t really even bother me I have to go around because a lot of great directors who say they do amazing creative music videos, you’re still a first-time director. So, then you have to go do a short and then you have to do something indie and go to a festival circuit and hopefully somebody picks it up.

    Zane Lowe: It’s going to make it better as well in the end.

    Vince Staples: And I really appreciated that part of the process because you learn how to do things as you go. And I’m a process person, so I really like that it worked out that way. But it’s important, like you said, to show people that there is work that is attached to this level of success and this isn’t even the top level of success, and it’s a lot of hard work. So, I think it’s important to share that with people and not make it look as glamorous as we like to a lot of the times.

    Zane Lowe: And so how did you feel at the end of the experience?

    Vince Staples: It wasn’t easy, but I don’t like… Easy things are annoying but… Making the things were easy because I feel like you either do it or you don’t. And I can stay within my perspective and find things that align with my perspective. The hard parts are like, how do you step into this room and hear people say, “Oh, this doesn’t translate with an audience,” basically meaning that Black people don’t make or like this kind of shit.

    And then, how do you showcase… Which could be true from their perspective because certain things do or don’t get greenlit. We have these conversations about people of color getting positions and women getting positions and having the opportunity to tell their stories. It’s a real thing. So, from their standpoint, no one wants to be the person who green lights the thing that gets them fired. I 100% agree.

    So, the hard part is to convince people and try to galvanise the people that are working on the project and get them to believe in the thing that you’re doing. And I think at the end of it, having a conversation, I was like, “Oh, yeah, we see it now.”

    But until the show came out, the people were… A lot of the people that were producing with us and working with us, and that gave us our opportunities, were like, “Yeah, I just don’t get it. It doesn’t make sense yet.” I was like, “Oh.” Well, there are so many things that live in this vein. They just don’t look like this. And you have to understand and give it that grace because-

    Vince Staples reflects on where he thinks he’s grown the most as an artist and creative

    [I’ve grown] In every facet really, from songwriting to just the ability to execute certain things. It is just as deconstructed as it was in the beginning. It’s not a bunch of people who I work with or who I even know to be honest. So, being able to do more and keep that installation in a sense. Being able to give directives. Patience is important in music, especially when you’re dealing with other people. No matter what, people aren’t going to know your thoughts and everyone views things a different way, so just being able to convey the stuff you want to convey and not coming across the wrong way or not misdirecting someone, that’s really important. Singularity. I’ve never wanted to do anything specific as far as reach a certain audience or have a certain amount of success or a certain benchmark awards, nothing like that. So a lot of people do work for those things, and that’s perfectly fine, but you want to make sure that you’re not telling someone… Say you walk into a studio with four kids, I want a Grammy more than anything in the world, and you walk in and you say, “Oh, we’re not making this to get Grammys.” Well, then you just deflated your room. So, learning how to coordinate those kinds of things and see what everybody wants separately and making a collective decision to make sure everybody’s happy with it. That kind of stuff is…

    Vince Staples on being “political”

    I was in the studio the other day with one of my friends and he was like, “Yeah, man. Can you change this part? It is too political. I don’t want to get political. Girls stuff.” I was like, “Well, you got the wrong motherfucker, man. I’m going to say what I have to say at the moment. That’s just how I make stuff.” I’ve never sat down and been like, “This is about this.” And that doesn’t discredit anyone that does do that. It’s that’s not necessarily my process. But I think within my process, it being so pure to the way that I think and the things that I feel like are important to me or that I feel or say or whatever, I think that allows it to relate to other people because we’re all more similar than we like to give off.

    Vince Staples on the ways of the world right now

    We have the internet and all that stuff I get, but a lot of people have very minimized viewpoints and very minimized perspectives. So, you only know what you’re shown or what the world wants you to see or what just happens and go across the feed or something like that. So I think the world is always going to be the world. As humans, we have these issues that we try to overcome that’s next impossible because of just human nature. And it is also human nature to keep trying or improving. And it’s also into human nature to shame people and shade.

    The world is the world, man. That’s why when it comes to music or anything, it’s just capture the snapshot and keep it moving. I’m not really trying to fix shit or change shit. It’s like I have a very morbid opinion on those kinds of things. So, I think we are what we are, and I think it’s important that people try to be better or try to get better, even if it’s not really happening like that.

    Vince Staples on success

    Vince Staples: It’s a talent to be able to have that level of [big] success and maintain it, but you got to know who you are and where you fit in those things. And I think with me, I’ve always been aware of where I fit within the ecosystem of this whole thing, and that allows me to create freely I think with me, I’ve always been aware of where I fit within the ecosystem of this whole thing, and that allows me to create freely.

    Zane Lowe: What do you think that is? Can you put it into words where you think you fit? What’s the…

    Vince Staples: I’m not obviously A tier artist. I don’t make music that’s… No one’s coming to me from a fan standpoint looking for a single or looking for, I don’t know, party record or things of that nature. So, I don’t feel those pressures, but I do know the people who listen to my music probably looking for thoughtfulness or creativity, the people that… Yeah. So that lets you know what you need to execute on and the other things you can take risks on if you’re willing to. Or you can take risks on the part that people. Me personally, I just do whatever I want.

  • Vince Staples announces final album ‘Dark Times’ with Def Jam

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    After debuting his phenomenal series on Netflix dubbed ‘The Vince Staples Show’ in 2019, Vince Staples, the talented rapper-songwriter and television star hailing from Compton, California, has announced the arrival of his forthcoming album. The twelve-track album ‘Dark Times’ will be his final LP released through his recording contract with Def Jam Records. He shared the following statement alongside a visual accompanying his full release:

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    The album ‘Dark Times’ comes out this Friday, May 24, 2024. We’re looking forward to listening to it.