Last year, I launched a campaign to pressure WEWANTDROGAS into releasing his debut mixtape. This week, we finally sat down to talk about the coming release, and the eight-year odyssey that led to it. What follows is a transcript condensed from a two-hour conversation, proving that when you buy ink by the barrel like I do, you can move mountains.

We met in a private bunker. I offered him some chocolate milk. He declined. I put some peppermint oil in the diffuser and we began:

What's the title of the project?
It's called Lil Black Boy.

When's the release date?
I don't remember the date, but this Friday. That's March 12th? Midnight nigga, be up nigga I'm dropping a video. Tryna see who be up at night.

Hold up, what video you dropping?
"Dead Situations". Then later on I'm dropping "45".

Tough. And how many tracks is it, what's the total runtime?
Seven tracks, each like 2:20 tops, so prolly around (MENTAL MATH) 16 seconds. (LAUGHTER) I mean 16 minutes. (LAUGHTER) That shit feel like 16 seconds though no bullshit.

Can we expect any features on it?
One, yeah, we got Tunji [Ige] on that jawn.

When did that collab happen?
I'd say it's been done for a year and a half now. The [rest of the] tape was done a little before that, maybe like two years, and that's when he sent his part over. Shit is fire, and then we just did some additional production on it, my man Drew, and it just alleviated the whole… I mean elevated (LAUGHTER), it elevated the whole shit.

So you're dropping the tape and the first video at the same time?
Yeah, so I'm dropping the tape Friday at midnight, and then I'm thinking morning time, prolly noon I drop the video. Or drop em both at the same time, I really don't give a fuck. Not, 'I don't give a fuck', but I just want to put shit out. I feel like I've been putting myself in a box for like, the longest. So now I'm ready to get this shit out so I can just, completely focus on some new shit. I ain't get no new ideas off in so fucking long, niggas just been working on the saaame shit for so fucking long.

You mean new ideas, like musically? Or...
Anything, dog, just… I don't know, that shit is just more fun to me. Or not 'more fun', it just come easier to me than making music. I like to like, build a diorama, or create the visual for the music, and the music is moreso just the score. So I like to start with visual and then, build the music around that shit. But, the music been done for so fucking long so I had to do it the other way around, the shit was not fun. … Cuz that shit even help with songwriting. Yo I been, I had writer's block for so fucking long cuz I'm like 'dog we working on the same shit I ain't got nothing new to talk about!'

I'm glad you took it there cuz that's the direction I was hoping to take us in, we bouta get on some heavy psychoanalysis.
(LAUGHTER) Fuck it dog.

So while I was preparing for this conversation, I listened to the interview you did with 2SEATER back in 2018. And when you were talking about this tape back then, you said that you started working on this project all the way back in 2013. (LAUGHTER)
Why so many delays, fuck you think you Jay Electronica?
Ard so late 2013, after we put out Pink Lemonade with The Great Outdoors and then I think we dropped Sandman on some random shit. [Sandman] was mildly successful, not as successful as the first jawn. But after that, everybody kinda scattered and went they own ways, and that's kinda when I started working on this shit. It was called Shades of Red at first.

I remember bro, don't forget who you talking to.
(LAUGHTER) And I don't even know, what I was even talking about. Like, I don't know what the subject matter was. … I don't know, prolly was a lot more free than now, cuz now shit is just bound by fucking finances and, adult life, shit is trash bruh.

–––RECORD SCRATCH–––

You need something bro?
SILIANO: What's that?
DROGAS: Dayum that [chain] hitting!
SILIANO: (GRINS EAR TO EAR) Forreal? It ain't even no
light in here!!! (LAUGHTER)
Bro you cheesing hard as shit! (LAUGHTER)
SILIANO: Naw but what's that though?
It's a essential oil diffuser, it don't smell like
peppermint in here to you?
SILIANO: Yeah it do, that shit opened up my sinuses, I need
one forreal.

–––NEEDLE DROP–––

Naw but yeah where was we at? Yeah at the time it was Shades of Red and I was making some bullshit. You remember "Scottie Pippen"? (LAUGHTER) Just was making some horrible ass songs, but I was like 'ard, I gotta get outta this lyrical spherical shit'. And it's crazy cuz now I miss that shit! Not saying I wanna be fucking Éminem (LAUGHTER).

So you saying that at the time you were still experimenting?
Yeah, yeah, I don't even think I was WEWANTDROGAS yet, I was going through a fucking identity crisis. I remember at one point my name was 'Money Machine Raptor' (LAUGHTER) like what the fuck. I was just like, sooo tryna be Asaad yo. … And now looking back I can say I was on some weird shit (LAUGHTER). Back then, I'da argued the shit outta anybody that said I was on some weird shit, but I can admit it now.

But don't a lot of artists develop their core following by doing all that experimenting and evolving out in the open? I feel like there's something about the narrative arc of any artist's career–
And I wish I did that, my fault to cut you off, but I was tryna be tooo fucking mysterious. … If it had been easier for me to be vocal, about what I'm doing, and put that shit on view for the world, it wouldn't look like 'damn what the fuck you been doing for so long?' And that's from everybody, even homies, people I work with, family, basically to them it's like 'ard you talented, but you lazy.' … But forreal forreal, every fucking day [I was] doing some shit. And all [my] shit that people like, I was paying to get that done myself, everything, videos, graphics, photoshoots, that shit ain't cheap! ... Bro I ain't had a computer since 2011, I had to outsource all that. And if I had kept track of everything I done spent and didn't use on this shit bruh, I would be very well-off right now (LAUGHTER) … So now I'm just ready to, going back to what you was saying, I'm at a place now where I'm ready to put those fuck-ups out for people to see. I used to be like 'naw let's only post this if it's 100%' but it ain't neeever gon be 100%, and I learned that the hard way.

It sounds to me like you feel, like, liberated from the burden of perfectionism, is that it?
Yeah, that's exactly it. And in the next project, it's called Like a Moth to a Flame, I'm exploring those habits and circumstances that got me into being like that in the first place. A lot of that project is done already, too.

Ard I'm bouta go full Nardwuar now. You used to be an Electron, how did that shape your experience?
(LAUGHTER) I would say, honestly, that high school kinda gave me validation. I was actually the reason why Ben Franklin ain't have a uniform policy after 2011. My mom was like 'I'm not sending you to South Philly High' cuz that's where all my homies from around the way went, so I was the only South Philly nigga at a North Philly high school, and when I first started I had a cast on my arm and my leg from a car accident (LAUGHTER). So long story short, I was wearing whatever the fuck I wanted to, but my grades was good, and I already had extra credits from my old school, so it was nothing they could really say to me. Mr. Johnson, he'll tell you, he had my mom come in to discuss it, and she was like 'he ain't really doing shit wrong except getting fly!' So then they changed the dress code, announced it over the loudspeaker and everything.

That's legendary. (LAUGHTER)
Cuz if you think about it, that uniform shit, it's just like jail! So I guess they thought 'maybe if you can come here and be free and feel comfortable, maybe you'll get more shit done.' And yeah, as far as being an Electron, I didn't wanna play ball, I was tall as shit though, so I made varsity off rip (LAUGHTER). I didn't try out bro! And that's how I met Saeed [Ferguson], ask Saeed!

Bro, what??!
Yeah bro, I was playing varsity for Franklin and I was on the bench every game. After a while, they just was like 'bro you wanna keep stats?' Saeed was keeping stats, for umm…

I'm losing my mind bro, I don't think I've ever heard this story in my fucking life.
(LAUGHTER) That's how we met. We both had on Cool Grey 11's, and one day I was like 'cool shoes' and that's how we met.

That's crazy as shit cuz we all really just went to school on the same block though. Another thing I was gon ask you is who you thought had the best bars back in the Rittenhouse cypher days.
Bro it was definitely… Walt, then you, then Declan, then Lijah, then I prolly was under Lijah forreal forreal.

(LAUGHTER) Bro my Top 1 was Sil, he invented mumble rap back in
2007 forreal.
Damn I really need to get back in touch with a lot of folks from back then. That's a big part of what I'm tryna accomplish with the whole WEWANT shit, I really just want to be able to pay niggas a salary to be creative and do what they do best.

And as far as music goes, who do you find yourself listening to or inspired by nowadays?
It's a few people. I would say, as far as the city goes, I fuck with the youngbul Jah$tar. It's not the most lyrical, it's not the most cohesive, but you can tell like, the nigga is just doing him. It's really nothing like I ever heard or seen before. You ever heard of Cari? This nigga from Chicago, he hard. Uhh. I can't really throw Whack in there, I feel like that's too cliché. (LAUGHTER) Cuz bro Whack is hard, and we all know Whack is hard, and she can't do no wrong in my eyes. Whack is like the BasedGod at this point. You can't touch her, you can't fuck with her, whatever she do is golden, it don't even have to be music! But bro all I really listen to is Mary J. Blige.

On that note, who do you think of as your core influences?
Mary J. Blige for sure. She dropped three bangers off like back to back to back! Definitely Pharrell. Drake. Drake is the GOAT, nigga! He came out, he knew was gon be the butt of niggas' jokes, and he didn't care. Came out wearing bullshit, knew he ain't have the swag, would slip a couple bars in like 'I know I ain't got the swag but I will outwork any of y'all niggas'. Diddy. Diddy in the sense that he just make everything grand. And I would say Busta Rhymes and Missy [Elliot]. Can I throw them two in there together? Matter fact, I take Diddy out, and that's my five.

If you couldn't do music, what medium would you be working in?
Honestly, I would just wanna get WEWANT off the ground, establish a headquarters, and really be a resource to other artists. And, forreal, I need to go back on my biggest influences. My biggest inspiration would have to be the Madbury Club. The way they ran that shit… When we put out my first song, [Pink Lemonade] wasn't even out yet, I remember the bul Phillip had wrote niggas like 'yo this sound like some '93 AZ shit' and that shit, I won't ever forget that cuz those niggas is who I looked at like, 'I wanna do this when I get older.' I was hurt when they ended that shit.

–––

So there y'all have it, anything precious can be won through perseverence (and a splash of cyberbullying). On a personal note, yeah I'm excited for the music, but this was a conversation full of joy and nostalgia and catharsis. It's a relief to see someone I've known for so long free himself from the yoke of 'high potential', and conquer his fear of failure. Maybe you can, too.