Yung Bleu Explains How Lil Wayne Impacted His Songwriting

The rap game wouldn’t be what it is today if it wasn’t for Lil Wayne. Even some of R&B’s current favorites took a note from Weezy F. Baby early on, including Bleu. The Mobile, AL artist joined us for the latest episode of On The Come Up where he detailed everything from his early childhood favorites, his relationship with Boosie, and the inspiration Lil Wayne gave him during his early years of making music.


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“Lil Wayne is definitely one of my favorite rappers,” Blue told HNHH. “I feel like he just used to go so hard with the punchlines. Everybody just wanted to say and do them punchlines and see how creative they can get with punchlines. So that was kind of the wave I was on back in the days. Like, I was way more lyrical than I am now.”

Bleu might’ve put an emphasis on clever punchlines at one point in time but he explained that these days, he’s more interested in telling the truth in his music, whether it rhymes or not. Proving his lyricism for Bleu is largely based on striking emotion, rather than witty wordplay.

“Yeah, I write songs now more for the feeling than the bars. I feel like, sometimes, bars will constrict you from getting across the truth, you know what I’m saying? ‘Cause, some shit might not rhyme, but the shit that you tryna say that’s really real. So that’s kind of where I just started rapping more about a real-life situation. I kinda get away from the bars and just kind of replacing that with hitting a mothafucka soul. I feel like that has the same effect.”

Make sure you check out Bleu’s full unabridged On The Come Up interview here