Buffalo Soldier-Poet Keisha Plum Is Ready For 'TROUBLE'
Griselda's poet laureate discusses her new project and the keys to her working relationship with Westside Gunn.
First things first: here are three new tracks to snack on...
AJ Suede, "Arrow To The Knee"
Preservation & Gabe 'Nandez, "Ball & Chain"
Declaime & Spectacular Diagnostics, "Cali Kinda Day"
Effectively the poet laureate of Griselda, Keisha Plum makes a strong, lasting impression on record.
The Buffalo native, now based in Atlanta, has the unique distinction of being the first (and arguably, foremost) guest in Westside Gunn's career-defining Hermes series, quite memorably appearing on the initial volume's opener "MKQueens Dead" back in 2012. Subsequently, she proved a welcome fixture on his mixtapes and albums, perhaps even more so than Conway The Machine or Benny The Butcher–even showing up on the 2019 Shady Records-backed group effort WWCD. Other notable spots on projects by Flee Lord, Mach-Hommy, and Shaykh Hanif further demonstrated her appeal to the hip-hop underground.
"I think I have well over 50 songs that I've been featured on, which by all accounts I am very, very blessed in that respect," she says. "But you just start to think of what I could have been doing on my own as well."
With the release this past weekend of TROUBLE, a seven-track solo effort meant to foreshadow a planned full-length album, Plum puts to rest any foolhardy doubts of her ability to carry a full project. Though her wider catalog includes known quantities like Nicholas Craven on the beats, here she sources from relative unknowns SHOWTIME and Mr.Knock, who respectively cover the front and back halves.
"I love looking for new production to work with," she says, before adding, "I have some heavy hitters on the album that a lot of people already know."
CABBAGES: What prompted you to give this collection of songs their own release?
Keisha Plum: I was having some self-reflection going on, honestly, going through a lot over the last few years, dealing with multiple different things, with grief, with depression, with finding my identity still as Keisha Plum. There were so many things holding me back, primarily fear. I've been doing a lot of writing. I've started my blog posts back up on my website and I just joined Substack, just trying to find different elements of ways to write. Writing has always been therapeutic for me, but I said, I have to get something out.
It started with "TROUBLE," because that was my therapy, writing about my mom first, and then it trickled into these other dynamics. I was going to do three songs and it turned to seven very quickly, about what I really wanted to speak on and what I wanted to give as far as my truth and my truth telling. I have to share a part of who I am. People have heard me. Not to say that there weren't some truths in some of the things that I've been speaking on in some of my other poetry. There's always a part of storytelling and truth mixed in between. But this, I really needed to start bearing a little bit more of who I was as an artist.
That autobiographical component definitely stands out on this project; there's some very personal stuff on the song "TROUBLE," specifically. Is it difficult or otherwise challenging for you to really open up to your listeners in this way, especially on a project headlined by you?
It is. The constant fear element can be very crippling. More or less, I'm bearing my soul here. I'm about to be very vulnerable in a lot of different ways. I really have to tell y'all what's going on, what's been bothering me, what has been causing me trouble, just even my circle getting smaller, my relationships changing with people, and then battling this huge coming of life of sorts with my mom's health.
Which I say, I never imagined life to be this way. You start to reflect, you think back 10, 15, 20 years, okay. And now you're just thinking about the next 10 to 15, 20 years. It starts to put things in perspective of what you have to do for yourself now. I had just been going back and forth like, oh, I got a body of work complete, and then I don't release it. I keep pushing my own album back. I said, let me get together some songs. Let me get focused. Let me stand in it and get something out for the people and for myself. I had to get this out for myself.
As with your features on Westside Gunn projects, your choice of imagery here and the storytelling is so evocative. On songs like "ALL BLVVDY" and AK SPRAY," you have this approach that's very direct, but also really descriptive. How intentional or natural does that approach come to you as a writer?
