tg.blk is a rare example of what I would call a popular underground artist. Allow me to explain.

The growth that she’s been able to achieve has largely been organic. Rather than following the conventional methodology used in artist promotion, tg.blk masterfully carves out her own path to success. The same success that ultimately led to her hit single, “Love Being Used”, amassing over 2 million streams and counting.

This is not to say that her numbers make her who she is — far from it, in fact. This is more a testament to preface the advice she gives during this conversation. It’s proof that what she says is more than hot air — it’s advice that actually worked for her.

I sat with tg under a short palm tree’s shade to soften the Nairobi heat while at Waterfront, Karen and talked about her origins, the behaviour of Kenyan musicians, and so much more — gaining absolute gems of advice that you would likely never hear anywhere else.

How did you get into music making?

My friends wanted to make music in high school, and I was like, “Oh, Imma make beats for you guys, and I’ll be your manager,” then never ended up doing that. But I thought, wait, making music is so easy, I feel like I could be just as good. It was fun to do, and I just never really stopped.

What pushed you to the genre of music that you make?

I just fell in love with rap. I liked rap music, but I wasn’t like into it. It’s ironic, but Nothing Was the Same — the Drake Album — I listened to that and went “Oh my God?!” I had listened to a lot of rap albums but I don’t know why that specifically was my turning point, and I decided to fully start listening to rap music. It’s so stupid now that I think about it, but I also watched Straight Outta Compton with my cousins and thought, oh, I wanna rap. I don’t know why, but I distinctly remember watching that movie and being in that space where I was listening to a lot of music and thinking about making music — but it’d be joking music — and then I watched the movie, and I guess how determined they were to make music in the movie made me go, yeah, I’m gonna make music. So I pulled out my laptop and started making music.

So you would credit Drake and Straight Outta Compton for getting you into this?

Yeah… for getting me into rap, specifically. I also used to listen to a lot of lo-fi music, and you know a lot of lo-fi music is kind of like boom-bap in a way? So, it was kind of fitting in already. I started loving the production and then through that, asking myself “Who’s the OG of all this lo-fi hip hop shit?” Then listening to Dilla and 9th Wonder and finding people like Madlib and going, “Wow, I really, really like this genre of music.” And then just keeping up with it and never really stopping.

How did you then transition from the initial inspiration of Dilla and Madlib and lean more into what some would call an Earl Sweatshirt-inspired style?

I’ve been making music anonymously online, and I had this one friend who goes by Alida that I met in the Youtube comment section who would constantly put me on to new music. When Some Rap Songs came out, she was like, “Yo, tg, you need to listen to this album.” I liked Doris, and I actually used to really like Earl Sweatshirt but not to the point where I wanted to rap like him or get on beats that sound like him… maybe at one point, but not as obsessively as the way it is now. Then I listened to Some Rap Songs, and honestly the production on the album was like nothing I’d heard at that point. That really changed the kind of production I really liked and sent me down a rabbit hole of producers and finding other artists who have a similar sound. Even now, I can say that the roots of the kind of production I like now really do come from my interest in Some Rap Songs. So shoutout to my friend Alida, for really, really pushing me to listen to it, constantly, every day, and I finally went, “okay”.

And you met her through the YouTube comments section, that’s new.

Yeah. For a good period of time, maybe 2018–2019, I didn’t really enjoy sharing my music publicly. I spent most of my time sharing music anonymously online, like on Reddit and Discord, and got a lot of feedback. I still knew people, but I was more comfortable online and sharing music anonymously.

What can you tell us about Kidnap Velvet?

That is… interesting that you brought that up. This is from that period where I was like “I’m too shy to share my music!”, so I went on a name generator because I wanted a new account and Kidnap Velvet was a result. I thought, “that’s tuff”. It was a sort of spam page but I’ve kind of neglected it, honestly, which I shouldn’t. The goal was to freely upload there and if people really like my music, then you’ll find my page.

Speaking of Soundcloud, you have a lot of music on your main Soundcloud page, but you have three… now four songs on DSPs. What do you think stops you from putting the songs on DSPs?

I think I get in my head about whether something is good enough to share. I treat my Soundcloud more like a free space, and it feels more “low consequences” — low pressure — and I don’t have to go through as much effort to share the song, it’s completely in-house. I download the beat, which is free for non-profit, record it at home, mix on top of the beat as I’ve ripped it, I don’t need to talk to anybody, I just click it and it’s done. And any time I want to change anything, I can just archive it and unarchive it when I want to. There are so many songs on my Soundcloud that are archived right now. When I feel like taking it down, I take it down, and when I don’t, I don’t. That’s the beauty of Soundcloud. It feels more like a creative space. But preferring it is also a symptom of me being really in my head about what’s good and what isn’t. There are some songs on my Soundcloud that I wish I just uploaded, but it’s too late now.

Still, people in your Soundcloud comments often ask questions like “When is this gonna be on Spotify?”

The producer for one song specifically — I tried messaging him and he ghosted me at one point. So I was like damn — and I really liked that song, but it’s just stuck there. But it’s okay. I also enjoy finding new music on Soundcloud, so I’ll just keep uploading on there. I’m thinking that after I finish what I have planned for this year, I’ll be giving my Soundcloud people a chunk of songs just to enjoy.

And how do you deal with that feeling of not knowing what’s good enough?

Lately, I’ve just been doing it. Literally, just do it. When you spend time thinking about how to not think you’re thinking. So less thinking, more doing. Finishing the thing, getting opinions — if it sounds good? Alright, finished, let’s do it. Because if I give myself too much time to sit, I start ruining things. Especially now. I feel like I have to learn to let my songs go faster. I’ve had songs that I’ve sat on for like two years, and I’m like ugh, this sucks, because I feel so much better than I was then. But then I show it to somebody who’s never heard it, and they’re like, “Why don’t you put this out?” It’s because I’ve sat on it so long that it’s lost that magic that I felt when I first made it. So instead of sitting and contemplating and thinking, I’m just putting it out there. That’s literally my philosophy right now. Don’t even think about it. Just go and do it. What’s the worst that could happen? If I don’t like it, I can take it down.

How did you go from the anonymously-posting-online phase to becoming tg.blk, and growing to the point where you got that Vince Staples cosign?

In summary, it was because I was really active online. Just constantly trying to meet people online… because I wasn’t just telling people, “Yo, listen to my music, listen to my music” … I was also like, “Let me listen to your music”. So constantly looking for new music to listen to, looking for people with small followings, finding mutuals and sharing feedback, and just genuinely not coming to people trying to sell them something immediately. People can get annoying, they just come into my DMs like, “Yo, listen to my song”, and like… you didn’t even ask me how my day was? You don’t even wanna have a teeny tiny conversation about anything? For me it was just putting in the effort consistently online and talking to people. Then eventually I ran into someone on Soundcloud simply off my love of finding music. He was like, “This is dope, if you ever decide to put your music up on Spotify, I can try to help you the best that I can,” and that little thing he did snowballed everything. So, just consistently socialising with people online and not looking at people’s numbers or anything but rather genuinely looking for new shit to listen to. I had a feeling that if I kept talking to people online, eventually I’d meet somebody. I have met a couple people who I’d say that I’m very glad to have met.

So aside from Soundcloud and YouTube comments, where else did you meet people?

Reddit, Discord — I just join music related communities and listen. You’d be shocked how many people are just looking for community. Because either they don’t have people around them to share their music with, or they’re like me and they feel intimidated about being the face of their art initially, and you just want people who interact with you solely for your art. It was a nice shield doing things online, because it didn’t have to be ME specifically.

Why did you feel like that?

It was scary because, one, I have terrible confidence in general. Now I realise that it’s kind of stupid, but I felt that if they don’t like my art then they don’t like me. And because you like this thing so much it becomes a personal reflection of yourself, it hurts to share something so intimate that you’ve worked on and then have people not acknowledge it the way you’d want them to. Also, there was a point when I was making such emo music and I thought, I’m so corny, I can’t share this with my face on it. I felt like I was giving out too much of my business with my music, but that’s the point now. That’s literally the fucking point. I think I was just scared in general. Especially with rap, because I felt like in private, I had the confidence of a rapper, but publicly I didn’t, and I wasn’t even ready to carry it. Because you can’t just be awkward — especially with the kind of rap music I like — you have to talk your shit and carry your shit when people see you. I just wasn’t ready to do any of that at the time.

But then you get maturity, and you grow…

It wasn’t even maturity; I was just tired of hating on myself. It’s quite tiring hating yourself.

Gin & Wine (Ginuwine), how did you land on that name?

The song itself is a funny story. It’s produced by this guy named Eyezeck. Back to my Earl Sweatshirt phase and me preferring to get my beats online cause I’m too lazy to make beats. That’s the real story — I’m too lazy to actually sit down and make the kind of beats that I want, so I’ll just be online looking for Earl Sweatshirt type beats, Alchemist type beats, MIKE type beats, Navy Blue type beats… and Eyezeck posted these beats that were “Free for Soundcloud”. So I just scrolled through his page and made a bunch of songs to his beats. He produced the last song I made, NYDFRYSTL [New Year’s Day Freestyle] and because of that we ended up connecting on a personal level, and I was like, “you don’t know how much of a fan I am! I didn’t just find your beat, I consistently listened to all the beats on your page,” and he goes “Oh, that’s crazy!” So I sent him a bunch of random shit that I’ve done that I had no intention of putting out, and that song [Gin and Wine (Ginuwine)] was part of that bunch. The reason I made that song was…

My ex would always complain, “your music is so depressing, why don’t you ever write me a love song? Blah blah blah…” That’s my art! But fine, you win, I’ll make you a love song, and I’ll make it super corny, and I’ll just go in my room and do it and I’ll be like, “here, take it.” I never actually ended up sending it to her, which is funny now. That first half of the beat I found on [Eyezeck’s] YouTube, and I recorded like the first half of that song but didn’t end up sending it to her. Then we broke up and I thought, well, I’m never gonna post this song, I’m never gonna share it. But then I ended up connecting with Eyezeck and he thought it was a cool song. I told him that I kinda made it as a joke and he went, “Nah, this is cool, why don’t you extend it?” I didn’t like the rest of the beat too much, but he was like, “Don’t worry, I’m gonna put a beat switch in the middle and just see if it inspires anything,” and it did! Then I recorded the second bit of the song, and that’s how it came about. The first bit is from around 2022–2023 and the second bit is from this year.

In the second bit of the song, I say, “She likes gin and wine, girl you’re 90s fine.” And so, I thought, hmm, ‘gin and wine’, kind of sounds like ‘Ginuwine’. Initially the song was saved as “Baby” on my laptop, but there’s so many songs with that title, and I thought, let me just give it a lil’ something-something, so I picked that. Plus, Ginuwine is also a 90s artist, and I thought that was cool so I just slapped it on there.

Do you ever wish you had a sort of “Genius” interview where you could actually just talk about your lyrics and songs?

Oh yeah, no, 100%. Especially when it comes to the rapping stuff, I feel like people aren’t really dissecting the shit that I’m saying! I need my moment to be like, yeah, I’m funny, there’s wordplay, there’s things going on here!! I do those all the time, I feel like every artist does that, though. I’ve had my own Genius ‘interview’ at home… but yeah. It would be cool if I could have a lyric breakdown video, that would be cool. One day.

People definitely need to do more lyric breakdowns.

There was a channel that did it in Kenya a while ago, I don’t remember what his name is. He had this studio and drill page, but they did lyric breakdowns. I think they did one with Swahili Papi. I know they did one with Albeezy as well, but a while ago. And they were doing those “freestyle” kind of videos but just stopped doing it? Which is sad, because I thought it was a cool concept at the time, but I know that ages ago, somebody was doing it, and they just didn’t keep up with it. And I actually watched those, so — I wish they continued.

I think that’s the key to succeeding at everything.

It is, especially in this creative industry. Even though it sounds so corny, you just have to keep going. The minute you give up, it’s genuinely over. Maybe in like 20 years, when they have TikTok Version 6.0 and some random kid does a dance to your song it can go viral, like that song that was so popular by Kate Bush which was from so many years ago — that can happen if you’re lucky. But the minute you give up, it’s over.

Yeah, I think you can’t fail if you keep doing it. The only way you fail is if you give up.

Exactly. [Looking away] Sorry, it looks like that guy in red is being followed by some ducks but… I think they’re on a different level.

Such a random thing to see. Where is that — is that still this mall?

Yeah, it’s a walking path. Sometimes I come by here to walk in the evening.

Oh. I’ve never actually seen that.

I can show you the way, if you’d like.

Yeah!

Yeah? Okay, let’s go. It’s kind of sunny, but I have a hat, so that’s why I’m just giving you the warning.

It’s alright. I’ll cope.

When it comes to releasing music, what do you think is better? Should an artist be as expressive as possible with their online presence, release tons of songs, and be really active? Or do you think they should follow the trend and try to be (I hate this word) mysterious, almost?

I’ve been trying to, even though I’ve been on my “just do it” kind of vibe, this is the thing that I haven’t been able to just do yet. Being mysterious is a waste of time, because for every like 2 million artists, only two of them are going to be allowed to be mysterious and successful. Genuinely. I’ve seen more artists blow up off being really engaging and really out there with their support of the people who follow them, versus people who are on that mysterious shit. The mysterious shit — nobody cares! You know what I mean? Literally, think about the number of mysterious artists who get to function. Like, do you really think that’s about to happen to you? It kills careers. Even for people who we think have “made it”, being mysterious kills careers. It can make people completely forget about you. You’re better off constantly being — not even constantly being in people’s faces but being a human being. And actually sharing your life with people. And being present. People enjoy that. Personally, there’s artists whose music I didn’t particularly like on first listen, but because of how consistently they shared, not even music but just their day-to-day lives, it kind of makes you feel more connected, in a way. You kind of feel more inclined to pay attention. Versus an artist I like who posts on their story once every two months, and it’s like, bro, I don’t give a fuck. The music is good, I’ll listen to your song, but what appeal do I have to come and see you? That’s another thing I really don’t like. Being a mysterious musician also bleeds into your performances, where you come on stage and you have to be mysterious on there too. Then it’s like, why did I even come and see you?

Performances are meant to be… performed, you know?

Yeah so I just don’t think it pays to be mysterious. There’s a balance of keeping some things hidden, but that’s building anticipation. It doesn’t have to be “being mysterious”. There’s a better mix to it. I just think this mysterious shit kills your career. Especially for Kenyan artists more than anybody. For all of us who are trying to come up, being mysterious does absolutely nothing for you. All of us are Z-List rappers and musicians. We’re all on the Z-List level. We’re at the bottom and you’re trying to be mysterious? There’s no way. So, I’ve been trying to hype myself up lately, because I’m a bit awkward on camera, but then I’m like, I’m chasing a bag right now. So, if it requires me to be talking on camera, doing shit and sharing shit, then so be it. Because the more you see me, the more you’ll think about me, and the more likely you’ll go and check out my music. And then you’ll know what I look like so if you see me in person, then maybe you’ll come and say hi and then I have a better chance of winning you over in person. Versus just seeing me online and being like, “Yo, your music is so dope!” and I go, “Ahh, appreciate it G” — bye. End of conversation. But if you come and see me in person, I can chit-chat with you. And then I feel like — especially for me, when I meet people whose art I like and they’re even nicer in person — I feel even more inclined to support you. So again, being mysterious kills your career.

I’ve seen it for me personally and how much time I wasted being “mysterious” and wanting to curate everything, and I was like, curate that shit later, when enough people care.

[Laughs] Yeah!

When enough people care, you can start curating, but for now, your only task is to get people to care. That’s why — even though I should do more of it — I’ve been thinking of how I can go live as I make music and leave my phone in the corner and just do it. Or post a snippet, but that’s what I already do. Sometimes I share what I’m working on, on my IG story. But the shit I hate is that niggas will go to the studio and just take a photo of them in the studio and that’s it. Like, that’s cool, but give me something. Take a video, show a little something. People really appreciate it.

I think the video thing really works. Because I saw a video you posted, I think last week or a few weeks ago, and then I was listening to Gin and Wine, and I was like, “Oh, this is that snippet I saw the other day!” It was much more familiar, because I felt like, “Oh my God, I know a bit of this!” And it makes the experience so much better.

Yeah! Also, I think more artists need to learn to reply to their comments. That’s my “oldhead” rule, because genuinely! You post a photo talking about new music and you’re just liking the replies? I kind of slack sometimes, but I usually try to reply to every single comment. Because one, it boosts your engagement. Two, it makes your page look nice. And three, I’ve noticed, when you personally reply, the same people come back.

Oh yeah!

The same people do come back when you actually give people your time of day. Because you didn’t have to comment. It takes a bit of extra effort to actually interact with the people who listen to you. Show them some love. Involve them in your process somehow.

Because you want the same from them.

Yeah, you want the same from them, so you might as well.

But now we’ve walked the Waterfront lap.

Huh. That was actually…

Wasn’t bad, right? It’s much nicer when it’s cooler.