By nature, Doja Cat is all over the place musically, vacillating between R&B, synth pop and hip hop for her own kaleidoscopic brand of infectious bops. But when it comes down to it, though, the deftness of her rhyme schemes and the agility of her flows points toward a true interest in pure hip hop. So do her collaborations with J.I.D and Smino, two artists she worked with on her last two albums.
Speaking with Ebro Darden for an Apple Music 1 interview set to premiere in full tomorrow (June 30), Doja explains that she collaborated with Smino and J.I.D in order to get them more exposure.
“I care about rap. I do,” Doja tells Ebro in the clip. “And I feel like with Hot Pink, I put Smino on there because I know he’s out of this world talented. Putting J.I.D on [Planet Her] was the same thing. I feel like these rappers need a platform. They need to be shown to the world more. And if I can do that, I’m gonna do that.”
Doja connected with Smino for her Hot Pink song “Won’t Bite,” a song that finds both artists floating over a mellow, but bouncy instrumental as they flaunt spurts of flirty lyrics, melody and nimble rhyme schemes. Meanwhile, for Planet Her, Doja linked with J.I.D for “Options,” a song on which they pretty much show off the same constellation of skills Smino and Doja served up on “Won’t Bite.”
It’s hard to imagine that fans of Doja who listened to her most recent albums weren’t impressed with what they heard from Smino and J.I.D, two artists who are as dynamic lyrically as they are musically. For their part, Smino and J.I.D have voiced their appreciation for Doja.
“We Love Doja,” Smino wrote in a tweet. J.I.D repeated the message in a tweet of his own. Check out what Doja Cat has to say for yourself below.