Nick: How’s it going man?

 

Heavensouls: I’m chillin tbh not much, jus been makin’ alot of music!

 

Wavromance: Your discography reads almost like a map; northside, southside, the sides of a city becoming a framework for your work. What does "trapped" mean to you as a recurring concept, and how does that geography —real or imagined— shape the music?

 

Heavensouls: So at first it sounded hard, to me but then I found a connection with all of those albums. “Northside Trapped” I made when I was stuck in New York, “Southside Trapped” I felt stuck being forced to make the same type of music and “Westside Trapped” I felt culturally trapped. Everything fit together to me.

 

Wavromance: This is a fairly basic question, but what Nigerian artists and composers did you listen to while recording the album?

 

Heavensouls: Listened to a lot of Fela of course, Odunsi, Ebo Taylor, Exuma, Rokia Traoré, Igwe Aka shit like that. Plus like a lot of non-nigerian artists like Nina Simone, Tina Turner, Al Green, Zappa, etc.

 

Nick: You also mentioned previously to me that the same Louisiana jazz band that helped you with “New York Fall, 1977” played a part in “Westside Trapped.” I think what surprised me is that compared to that jazz album was that this was a lot more joyful and celebratory, but is that deceptive?

 

Heavensouls: Hell yeah man, westside trapped is a celebration of Nigerian music just as much as it is a protest album.

 

Nick: Compared to that project, how different was the recording process like for “Westside Trapped?”

 

Heavensouls: From what I remember, “Westside Trapped,” when it came to making that shit, there was a lot of recording and post production. I met up with them around 2023 in Louisiana and during that time it was literally just us taking recordings of different saxophone bits, drum bits collaging it in with different thrones and shit, and I would just fuck with it and post production to be honest. With “Westside Trapped,” it was completely different though specifically because of the fact that whenever I made “New York Fall,” I only had saxophone as the drum as a bassist and that was it. I did keys, but whenever a “Westside” track came in, I needed a guitarist. So, I got a few more niggas in to make it.

 

Nick C: Who’s the guitarist you managed to get ahold of for “Westside Trapped.” I was enamored by what he did on “Playing Around Wit A Flip” and “Shed a Tear for Me.”

 

Heavensousl: Friends& hooked me up with this dude named Big Head. He’s helped out with “Shed a Tear for Me” and “O Gi bere.” Also my caperflower mate shelby did some shit on shed a tear too she also played guitar!

 

Nick C: Anyone else who had the pleasure of contributing their musicianship for “Westside Trapped” that you’d like to give a shoutout to?

 

Heavensouls: Shoutout to my cousin Maxwell for doing some sax bits on it! He’s a real one.

 

Wavromance: How would you describe the relationship or symbiosis between samples and live instrument arrangements on this album?

 

Heavensouls: Whenever I usually sample music, everything comes with like a flow state of “this shit just sounds good” but with “Westside Trapped,” I try to be more intentional with the samples that I use. Like there's a reason why I did a Bobby V sample. There's a reason why I sampled a hit from a JPEGMAFIA song. There's a reason why I included a Nigerian radio host on the last song because there's a bit more intention to my samples than usual. 

 

Nick C: While I expected the afro-funk contents, a track that threw me through a loop was “straight rawhhhhhhhhh.” Who did the vocals for that and how do you think it fits into the album?

 

Heavensouls: It was an old friend that I had. She did some shit for “Darkskin Niggas.” I wanted to make a Jazz Funk song just like some R&B smooth shit. It's something that I always wanted to do, but I finally did it this time and I think I did it well hopefully I don't know. 

 

Wavromance: "O di gbere" is perhaps the most beautiful piece I've heard of yours. What does the concept of "o di gbere" mean? Where do the Yoruba vocals you use in the song come from?

 

Heavensouls: “O di gbere” means “farewell” in Yoruba and I wanted the song to sound just like a melancholic goodbye to the album to be honest.