Wale: “I’m America’s Dream And America’s Nightmare At The Same Time”

Photos by Imani McIntyre

Last week, the number one selling artist in America wasn't Jay-Z, Kanye West or J. Cole, but a rapper who currently stands among the most unheralded artists in hip-hop. Wale's third studio album, The Gifted, last week topped the Billboard 200 for the first time in his career, with the MMG rapper finally breaking through after falling just short of the top of the charts with his previous effort, 2011's Ambition (which peaked at No. 2). Yet Wale's career suffers from a strange dichotomy; he's a bonafide talent in the music industry, producing major hits and Grammy nominations while functioning as a key cog in one of the biggest conglomerates in the business, yet he's been downplayed and left out of the discussion more often than not. Women love him, but some men seem to hate him. He argues that he is "America’s dream and America’s nightmare at the same time," producing No. 1 albums while being continually derided by the critics. The DC native sat down with XXL last week to discuss his feelings on being on top of the charts, being boxed in as an artist, the meaning of New Black Soul, and his position as one of the best yet most criticized artists in hip-hop.—Emmanuel C.M. (@ECM_LP)

XXL: How does it feel to have the number one album in the country?
Wale: Top of the world. Feel good. Feel good. The fans have just showed me—they’ve been proving—they been showing me that hip-hop is very much alive.

I remember the energy from the listening party, when I heard it I was like “This is something special.” I know going number one had to be huge.
Man I feel like I proved a lot of people wrong. It was a couple of people who was like, “Oh, he’s not all that,” this that and the third, and I still got some work if I’m tryna prove to them, but for the most part I think I made hip-hop proud, I made DC proud, I made Atlantic Records and Roc Nation and Rozay proud, so those are the people who really matter as far as my business life goes. Jay’s happy? Cool. Ross happy? Cool. Julian, Craig and Mike happy? Cool. Double check, Ross happy? Cool! My fans happy, they coming to the shows...we good.

Why do you think the album got so much love? 
I’m becoming great. Like, you know—but you’re supposed to! That’s why we here, you do anything long enough you’re gonna become very good at it, scary good. I went from good, to very good, the next is scary good. Scary good is when you’re a prodigy. Scary good is when you turn into what Jay-Z is now. That’s scary good. I wanna be legendary and all that, but as far as the skill and ability...I wanna be scary good.

I remember you said you had your hand in everything—every part, every detail, every aspect.
Mastering everything, like, “Love/Hate Thing” had to be mastered like 20 times. That’s how pressed I was this time. Gotta be though! You gotta be. You gotta look at shit like “Simple Man” and shit like, I produced that joint. That was the first song I ever produced. “Wale always has so much to say, always been so passionate, what would his voice sound like, or what would his passion sound like if it can be translated into music?” And that’s what “Simple Man” is. It's open, it's spacey, it's aggressive, it's real. That’s very symbolic of the album. I’m sayi'n so much—I know for a fact people haven’t fully digested The Gifted yet, not even close. There’s so many double meanings and shit that I say about myself in that shit dog. Like, I wrote it to stand the test of time, for real. Like you’re gonna have to listen and listen and listen and listen and listen to go to salvation on “Simple Man” to really go—but you’ll know exactly where I’m at right now. Mentally, in my life, my trust issues, you know, what I want for myself, you know exactly that if you really...really digest the album.

And I just noticed the Nigerian flag in your album art after you Instagrammed the picture highlighting it. 
Nobody knew. I wake up in the morning and hear people saying, “You’re not proud enough.” I hear that all the time, but literally I know y'all just looked at the cover real quick. That shit was a Maybach chain at first. I told em to change it. Is anybody gonna know that? No. But what I gotta deal with, niggas say, ”You ain't proud,” like, you know how many niggas up in Nigeria or been African that y'all niggas didn’t even know? The only reason why y'all even know that I am is ’cause I talk about it enough for y'all to know. So I think that’s symbolic in itself about the album. Niggas didn’t even know, right before your eyes there was a Nigerian flag sitting right there. I didn’t see not one person on Twitter write that.

That’s how the music is. You can’t listen to Magna Carta with a specific ear and not listen to The Gifted with that same ear ’cause the writing styles are very similar. So, people be like, “Oh this is whack,” no, you not listening my man. You’re not listening. You’re not listening on “Golden Salvation,” you cant tell me “Golden Salvation” is not good then go and say “I Gave You Power” or Nas' shit is—you can't. It’s contradicting itself. It's just like if you don’t like red, nigga don’t wear red. If you don’t like purple, don’t wear purple. You don’t like green, don’t wear green, don’t say you don’t like green and then you fuck with green. My goal right now is to show the world—this 200,000 or so people that own my album...it’s our job to show 'em.

At your most human level, when the album hit number one, were you just like, “Fuck y'all!”
I gotta say that every day just to keep myself from going crazy ’cause I ain't never been—I ain't never had nobody tell me none of this troll shit in real life! Not even around me, not even across from the club. It just don’t happen. I just wanna be in my own bubble sometimes.

Do you think people just don’t get you?
I’d probably get a little more complacent if I knew. Like I said earlier, I’m America’s dream and America’s nightmare at the same time. I show you you can make it. Like, I was in the detention center, then I came from a hometown that didn’t have no rappers, then I got dropped, then I did it all over again! If that ain’t America’s dream, I don’t know what is, but at the same time I did get dropped. I did make it. You know how many mothafuckas wanna make it? You know how many mothafuckas wanna say they got a car that cost $750,000 or they got jewelry for days? Even though that’s not what matters to me, I’m not a money person, but you know how bad it feels for niggas that work in shoe stores. You know how many niggas that rap that work in shoe stores? How the fuck did I make it outta that bunch of niggas? Why me? You know how many African niggas wanna use the fact that they African to get a record deal? Like, “I can market to all the Africans,” like, why the fuck…why me?

I’m very relatable though. I don’t look like a cartoon. I don’t look like—I look like a regular nigga, like, that scare niggas. Regular niggas that talk about regular shit—I ain't never been in the streets. I’m just a regular nigga making stories and writing stories and writing raps. Niggas don’t like that. Niggas wanna sometimes hear a rap album and feel like they watched a Vin Diesel movie, or a fuckin Scarface movie. A lot of niggas resent that. A lot of niggas be like, “Ah, that’s soft shit,” “Oh, Wale always talking bout girl shit.” You know “Love/Hate Thing” ain't a girl’s song? Oh, you didn’t know that ’cause you saw the title, but that’s what people do. They try to force me in a box. I ain't come in this game with Jay, I ain't come in this game with Ross. I came in as a regular mothafuckin' dude from DC with a chipped tooth and a sneaker collection.

Do you think that intimidates people, especially guys?
That’s what it is! It's rarely you’ll hear girls say it, and if she say it she heard it from her nigga. Girls gonna call down the line, like, “Pft! Y'all trippin, that nigga with with the Balenciagas, girl he was fly as shit, girl he was talking that shit!” And it don’t even be about girls songs! They don’t need a fantasy. They want some real shit. They want somebody that’s gonna make em feel like, “Damn, he know about the world, not just pussy and girls and shit.” Vanity. “They hatin on me so I need more bottles / them niggas gotta see that a nigga ball harder / I got it to a T ’cause my tee costs dollars / but still chain so big cant pop my collar,” I’m talking bout us! How vain we are, how long it took me to get dressed to go to the fuckin' Red Lobster. And I’m talking bout those things on the album, but like I said, they ain't digest it yet. It’s such a rush to be like, "I love Wale’s shit," or "I hate Wale’s shit." Kanye’s, new J. Cole, I know you waitin' for Jay’s shit to come. Wait 'til it settles down a little bit. Its gon' be real fun then.

Do you think people put you in a box of “conscience rap” or “love rap?” 
They do, but I don’t have nowhere to go, son. They trappin' over there, they doin' pop music over there, they doin' weed music right there, they doin' fashion rap over here—I don’t even have no place to go. I just camp out in the middle, like, “Man, fuck y'all I’ma have my number one.” All y'all forced music, I just write...from my heart. I don’t have a box, we right in the middle of everything. When I grew up niggas was bumpin' Wayne, Juve, Tribe Called Quest, Pac, Jay-Z, Biggie, Eminem, like...it was really there.

Kanye’s out now but he’s not selling like he used to, Jay’s out but he’s over 40. Do you think you’re gonna eventually be the next international star?
I don’t know ’cause I don’t play the game enough...unfortunately. And I want it for my fans, and for my town—’cause all we got is the Redskins, so I want it for my town—but I don’t know. I just don’t play the game enough man, and that breaks my heart, ’cause it's like I feel sorry. There’s a little boy somewhere saying, “Wale’s gonna be the greatest rapper one day,” and to tell that nigga like, “Nah, I might not be,” ’cause I don’t play the game like these niggas do. I don’t—I’m not fake nice to niggas. I’m not politically correct. I respond to negativity sometimes, ’cause it’s what I wanna say. I don’t have a muzzle. I’d love to. I’d love the things I could do from that position. I love how I could affect the urban culture the right way. ’Cause when you sittin' in that seat as one of the hottest niggas you don’t really gotta go from school to school talking the word, you just make an announcement and you can single-handedly change the culture.

A lot of niggas don’t like me, a lot of mothafuckin' press people don’t include me. This my second time over 150. Last time you ain't even hear a peep outta them niggas. I was only behind Justin Bieber's Christmas album. I thought he was Jewish? He might not be. Probably isn’t. Obviously not. But the point I’m tryna make is, not everybody a Wale person, and I realize that. I got just as many downloads as all these niggas, and they never include me. Look at Complex, they put me the 13th best rapper under 30. 13th? Really? Come on, man. I’m not one of those people who think, “Oh, the world’s against me,” [but] at some point you just gotta look and be like, “Yo, this is ridiculous.” What, y'all want him to react? Pitchfork gave my album a five. I ain't gonna put no other rappers name in this shit ’cause it ain't about me and them, but I look at they rating for those and, come on, man. The people are the power for real, but like, there are powers and there are entities that ain't pro-Wale. I would have to jump out this window and fly to that MetLife building in order for them to say I did something special.

And when you say, “Play the game,” what do you mean by that?
Whatever game it is that I’m not playin' right now. Clearly, somebody at Pitchfork I offended at some point. Clearly, mothafuckas, I’m not doing enough of something. Clearly somebody at Complex don’t like me. They did an article, “The Best Verses of, like, 2009 or 2010” recently and they ain't include nothing, like nothing, that I did. I’m talking bout they was diggin up niggas demos from like, MC Scratch and Sniff that nobody heard, putting that mothafucka on. Like, you  mean to tell me Self Made 1 just came out and you didn’t—there’s nothing? That’s what you tryna tell me? Oh, but I’m not hot enough? Is it that or is it lyrics? You mean to tell me I ain't sellin' out all these shows in New York, I ain't on the biggest tour in hip-hop right now, during the MMG tour? So that doesn’t register with you? So clearly I ain't doing something. It's either that or I’m not a good rapper.

Look how hard niggas went when Cudi insulted me. Look how like—you gotta think about it. I’m a grown man who just lost his job essentially at that point. How you think I feel? What you think I’m telling my girl at the time like, “It's gon' be all right,” no they not! Because Complex said they don’t fuck with ya music and y'all making that a thing while I’m already on my back. And these is the same niggas that expect me not to be feeling some type of [thing] when I’m somewhere. “Oh, why is Wale always mad?” When have I ever been included in anything? Why am I supposed to wake up and be like “I fuck with the world, I love all y'all?” You know how many niggas on my back? Everything I do I could say, “God bless everybody,” “Good morning,” and niggas like, “Fuck you Wale,” “You suck Wale.” Sometimes I just feel like it’s me and my fans. We all we gon' have in this situation.

What’s New Black Soul?
It’s that music that’s from the heart. Let's take away the beat and the hook of “Love/ Hate Thing.” When have you ever heard a rapper talking bout he beef with over 100 niggas where he from and don’t none of em know him? Or when a nigga talk about his home in such a manner—“My affinity grows as the city gets cold / As you reaching ya goals, you gon' meet you some foes.” You niggas don’t even realize I’m talking to every nigga on the come up! We not even talkin' bout the way the song sounds. If you just check the words...I’m talking about everything that’s real. And that’s soul. I’m talking from the soul, and when you add that with soul music—it's barely a hip-hop beat. It's almost like a funk, groove, 70s soul.

And that’s just a mind state or a way of life?
Everything. It’s everything. Like, I’m in inspired by the Huey P.’s, and the Malcolm X’s, and all of those people who was super proud to be black, super proud to be of any ethnicity. I’m proud to be a black hip-hop artist in America. Successful. Jay told me, “Right now you’re the number one nigga at what you do in the most powerful country.” To hear that from your idol, I’m proud. I did it my way though. I didn’t do it with no Lady Gaga record. And she dope, she talented, but it's like...it wasn’t even the time for all that. I didn’t know that ’cause I’m just listening to everything they tell me.

Now I’m doing it my fuckin' way and I got the number one album in the country. I cracked 150 [K] two times. I’m proud. Looking at Martin talk, that’s why I got tatted right here. Muhammad Ali, I got him tatted on this side. I got that. All that. I’m really of this shit. Of this culture, of this moving the culture forward, of this righteousness. I’m righteous ratchet! I’m human enough to go to the strip club and say I fucked up 10 bands, but I’m human enough as to get into the psychology as to why I’m in there, or why she dancing there. I think that’s a perfect analogy for me as an artist right now. I’m the guy that goes and fucks up 10 bands at the strip club and then breaks down the psychology as to why it happened, and why it's going to happen again. I think that kinda sums me up.