By The Hip Hop Writer
Hip Hop Vibe Staff Writer
One of the hardest-working rappers in the game is New York rapper, Neff. He is on the independent scale, but he is making some major moves. Neff commands a lot of attention because of the moves he makes, such as releasing his track with Prodigy, “The Storm,” and he made even bigger noise with his mixtape of the same name.
Last month, Neff released The Storm and had DJ Kay Slay host the mixtape. In addition to the Prodigy feature, Neff also boasted appearances from Game, Tyga, and Cory Gunz, all of which helped raise the profile of the project. There are not many independent artists who are able to pull that off.
Neff is still promoting his mixtape and in the midst of this run, he gave Hip Hop Vibe a moment of his time. Conducting an interview with Neff, he spoke to Hip Hop Vibe about the overall mixtape and working with DJ Kay Slay. In the interview, Neff also talked about the collaborations and the impact he is having on the game.
Read the entire interview below:
When you were creating The Storm, did you intend to have an album-like feel to the project? Yeah. I actually did because the last tape I did was over industry beats, but I wanted to do something different with this tape.
With this mixtape, what was your aim for it and do you feel as if it was on target? I mean, I basically wanted to get my buzz going strong and I did that with a lot of video views and more Twitter followers, it turned out good.
Do you have plans of taking any of the other songs and turning them into singles? Yeah. “Excited” with Cory Gunz, we shot the video about a week ago. I also did a video at the mixtape release party that we plan on dropping soon.
Can you give us a bit of background information on “The Storm” with Prodigy, such as how it came together and the experience of working with a legend? I mean, I freestyled over the beat, me and the people listening to the song, my team thought it would be crazy to get Prodigy on the song. Then, we reached out and he hit us back and we recorded the track in the studio together, definitely a good experience.
Growing up in New York, you know a thing or two about legends, especially DJ Kay Slay, did it feel surreal to be working with him on this project? I went on his show a couple months ago and I freestyled. After appearing on Shade 45, we started talking and we did the mixtape. I definitely love the experience of working with DJ Kay Slay.
How would you rate your experience in working with DJ Kay Slay? It was a great experience, that’s my family right now. I definitely love having his support, we went through this mixtape and it turned out dope.
In addition to DJ Kay Slay and Prodigy, you also had features with Game, Tyga, and Cory Gunz, how did all of those collaborations come together? Having records in the studio unrecorded, we decided who we wanted to have on the record. So, we reached out to the people and the ones we got obviously fucked with the records. We definitely wanted features from artists who are in the game.
Were there any other notable names you wanted to have on The Storm, but did not make the cut? It wasn’t really an artist that did not make it. I got everybody I wanted outside of like Future and Jay-Z, but everybody we reached out to jumped on it with us.
Is the reaction to the tape from the fans and critics at all what you expected? Yeah. Definitely. It got me more views and more of a buzz, so it definitely did what I expected it to do.
For those who have not already downloaded the project, tell them where they can, and where can we find you on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram? You can download The Storm from Datpiff. My Twitter and Instagram is @NeffTV1.
