Jack Harlow recently sat down with The New York Times' "Popcast" podcast, hosted by Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli, to talk about his new album Monica. Many fans expressed surprise at the LP's R&B/Neo-soul direction, and he spoke on diving deeper into Black music while avoiding the mistakes of his white contemporaries.
The hosts said the Kentucky artist didn't "retreat into a whiter genre." This led Harlow to remark that he "got Blacker" on this new album, and spoke on the thought process of it. More specifically, the "Just Us" rapper reflected (without name-dropping anybody) on how some of his white peers in the music industry moved to more white-centric genres after dabbling in hip-hop.
"[That decision to make R&B music] certainly made what I already wanted to do even more appealing. Absolutely," he remarked. Jack Harlow's thoughts appear at around the 12:34-minute mark of the YouTube video below.
"I think I love Black music," he continued. "I love the sound of Black music. Of course, I'm hyper-aware of the politics of today, that safer landing spot that a lot of my white contemporaries have found. Of course, it appealed to me to do something that I felt like, at a time when there's plenty of people expecting me to take some of the routes that y'all are taking, to take the route that not only might not be expected, but is also the one I genuinely want to take. So all the stars aligned in that way for me, to be honest.
Read More: Who Is James Broadnax? The Texas Death Row Inmate Travis Scott & Young Thug Are Fighting To Save
Jack Harlow's Drake Inspiration
"I'm not going to pretend like what you're talking about, I was like, 'Huh, I guess you're right,'" Jack Harlow concluded. "I knew that there were multiple things appealing about this route. But I also came to the decision, I'm proud to say, off of what feels good to my ear. I love R&B music. I love the sound of soft, intimate, melodic music. So I want to be understood. I want to write melodies that invite people to sing along."
Elsewhere during this interview, he also reflected on how he comes from "the school of Drake." "I’m much more averse to mimicry or anything that feels derivative than I was in the past," Harlow stated. "As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become more concerned with finding my voice and who I really am as an artist."
