Lil Wayne has said that hearing André 3000 say he had nothing to rap about in his 40s was “so depressing”.
Last month, in an interview with GQ, the former OutKast rapper explained why his new album ‘New Blue Sun’ contains no bars.
“Sometimes it feels inauthentic for me to rap because I don’t have anything to talk about in that way,” he said. “I’m 48 years old. And not to say that age is a thing that dictates what you rap about, but in a way it does.”
“And things that happen in my life, like, what are you talking about? ‘I got to go get a colonoscopy’. What are you rapping about? ‘My eyesight is going bad’. You can find cool ways to say it, but….”
Now, during an appearance on Tyga’s show on Apple Music, Lil Wayne, who is 41, has responded, saying that André was someone “that I respect a lot in hip-hop and music period”, but that his sentiments in that interview were “so depressing”.
“I have everything to talk about,” he continued. “I thought that may be a downfall of me staying in it because at our age you may hear what’s going on and feel I’m so out of that. I ain’t about to drop nothing. So that’s why I say I don’t listen. I just go in my little hole, I love what I do, put it out, and hopefully, we swing for the fences, man.”
‘New Blue Sun’, which clocks in at 87 minutes, consists of minimalist and experimental flute music, and it comes 17 years after OutKast’s sixth and final studio effort, 2006’s ‘Idlewild’. Since then, André 3000 has mostly distanced himself from making music.
He previously disclosed that he had sought advice from Tyler, The Creator and Frank Ocean for the new project. Additionally, although he’d been playing flute for several years, the recording process of the album took him to “other realms” in his music.
Shortly after its release, André broke a new record by scoring the longest-ever song to chart on the Billboard Hot 100. The song ‘I Swear, I Really Wanted to Make a ‘Rap’ Album but This is Literally the Way the Wind Blew Me This Time’, which runs to 12 minutes and 20 seconds, charted at Number 90.