Kid Ink recently sat down with VIBE and went over a few things. After signing onto a major label like RCA, Kid Ink is feeling the pressure build up. “It’s definitely a pressure to try to exceed what people expect from you — and then also exceed what I expect from myself,” the inked up kid says. You have to have higher expectations, since he’s no longer an independent artist. However, the pressure to work harder has not taken away from his tattoo sessions. He’s gotten so many that he doesn’t even know how many he has. “I lost count on my tattoos after about 22. It really got to a point that I was getting tattoos that I was forgetting about.” The two most important tats he does know, which are the two portraits on his chest of his mother and grandfather (the two people that raised him he says). Kid I just hope that when you’re 60, your still in shape. LOL.
Ink fills us in on the collaborations he’s done with Meek Mill. “Bada**” wasn’t the first track that they did together. Well before the two were signed to any label they were making hits. Despite the fact that the two haven’t spoken about how their hustling as independent artists has turned in to pressure forced work on major labels is a good thing. WHY? “Because no one’s every really had that time to sit down. Everyone’s been working so hard,” Kid Ink mentions. I’m happy for the both of them. I would though, like to hear at least one more collaboration from the two. Drop down bottom for more.
Do you have a collaboration wishlist? You’ve worked with quite a few people already, but are there others that you would like to work with?
It’s definitely the greats and the big names, but even for me, if they don’t have records on the radio. There’s the artists and producers that I grew up on like Pharrell, Timbaland and Kanye West, those are artists that made me want to produce, do music and write hooks. Since they inspire me to do what I do, it would be amazing to work with them and make that bigger record and just do things bigger. And more female artists with bigger hooks than rappers, like I’m looking forward to the Alicia Keys, Rihanna’s, Rita Ora’s, Jordin Sparks’s and Jasmin Sullivan’s.
What are you looking forward to for the rest of the year?
One of my biggest goals besides finishing my projects is writing and getting some hooks out there and some placements and getting back into the behind-the-scenes production side. I wanna play that role a little more and be able to say “Yo, I wrote and produced that, and y’all didn’t even know.” I think that would be pretty cool.
