A true Hop Hop expressing his faith within, sharing experience on life and shown in flexy bold fashion all wrapped inside one ultimate \crushing production by some of the rising talents from West Africa. 4RUNNA, The Port Harcourt based upcoming rap star with a story to tell. His intro to 2022 single Johnny's interlude, produced by Nigeria's ToneeC the song is a leading taster into the Nigerian artist's upcoming EP coming to streaming platforms later this year. Built on confidence and courage the high-performance rap act is ready to bring the badass and sizzling shazam and also to the iconic Quentin Tarantino classic Kill Bill which he includes the unforgotten outro to the movie and further extends his steed in the global music scene to your eardrums with a cataclysmic experience for all. He told us more about this project, growing up in humble settings, his role models, favourite albums and what else is to come.
Stream the track on Audiomack
1. 4RUNNA, welcome thanks for rocking through with this fully throttled booming track. It’s finally out how do you feel about that?
4RUNNA: Thank you very much, I appreciate the love. Firstly, there’s the excitement that comes with knowing all the work you put in behind closed doors gets to be seen/ heard for what it has become so there’s a level of fulfilment that comes with that. Secondly, I’m just happy to be able to do what I absolutely love.
2. Now this record brings out so much from you from being a newcomer rap artist from the Nigerian state of Port Harcourt to faith in oneself, expression and its flamboyant and bossy vibe. For those who don’t know, tell us how it was growing up musically?
4RUNNA: Well, growing up I was exposed to a lot of evergreen records from a vast array of artistes, for context, my mom leaned towards the harmonies of the Celine Dion’s, Toni Braxton and Destiny’s Child so I would from time to time find myself listening to their music and as for my Dad, he was more in tune with the music of the Jackson 5, Elton John, Elvis Presley to name a few. I would say this was my background in music for quite a while, I think up until I came across Lil Wayne circa 06 and his earlier projects and Hip-hop fully held my hand in that regard. From then upwards, I just kind of never let go.
3. It’s a good view to see more rap artists like yourself coming through, now this record you’ve said is just a sprinkle of your upcoming new EP what can the people expect from it?
4RUNNA: Like I said, it’s a sneak peep into what my fans would be getting from my debut project. Undoubtedly the project sees me at my most confident thus far and I think a little bit of that was mirrored in Johnny’s Interlude. Normally I’m a very reserved person but over the course of the years I’ve come to be my most confident self as 4 and it’s on that note I put together the project to inspire whoever lends an ear that they could be just as confident in whatever they do and be sure that they did what they set out to.
4. Johnny’s interlude is a big step for you, and it also features an interesting outro section from the instantly classic Quentin Tarantino movie Kill Bill. Could you talk us through why you included it within the record?
4RUNNA: I had earlier made a list of movies I had watched many years ago that I regard as classics to return to them In a way that I could watch them to fully understand them seeing as I was a lot younger when I watched them initially. A very close friend of mine suggested Kill Bill and it was really a no brainer. So I rewatched it a few days after recording the song and it just struck me that the entirety of the song was actually in line with the movie, The whole red imagery which I felt was the most suitable for the record still rang true with the movie and the excerpt which I sampled on the record only further passed across the message of being ready to face whatever comes my way full on. So I just did what was begging to be done.
5. With this song dropping in what else would you hope that new listeners can grab from hearing you, could you talk us through some of the artists, producers or even albums that helped shape your sound?
4RUNNA: One thing I would want my listeners to take away from my record is that you really just have to do you above everything. Because that’s the only time you can really say you pulled it off, by being yourself and unapologetically so. A couple of artists that have helped in shaping my sound so far definitely would be, J.Cole, Lil Wayne, A-Reece, Nasty C, Kanye West, Kendrick Lamar to name a few. For Albums, Born Sinner, Good Kid Maad City, Take Care, Todays Tragedy, Tomorrow's Memory, 4:44, Strings & Blings, etc.
6. Thank you for stopping by and taking us through more about you. We wish you the highest on the new EP coming out soon, when will that be released and are there any special guests on there?
4RUNNA: Thank you very much. I’m honoured to be a part of this and I know the only way is upwards from here. Right now, the tape is scheduled for sometime in the first half of this year. Don’t have a specific release date yet but soon enough I should have enough intel to go by and of course, there’s a couple of special guests on it. I’ll prefer not to let the cat out of the bag but there’s a very special hip hop record on there with one of the foremost faces in the Nigerian hip-hop scene right now and I can’t wait for you all to hear what we created. Till then of course. Salud and Go stream!!!
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