Alexander Coope is learning to do things his way when it comes to music. The rapper continues to drop music that resonates with his listeners while also achieving the goals that he set for himself. As an independent artist, Coope is doing it all — but that isn’t stopping him from being the dynamic creator that he is.
Coope spoke with rolling out about his latest song “My Way,” his music inspirations and plans for more music in the near future.
What is the message you want to give to your listeners in your music?
I just want to make stuff that has a purpose to it. Before I started recording at home, I was recording with some people, and every song they wanted me to make was, like, a– shaking music. It didn’t feel fulfilling. [My recording at home again is] kind of like breaking myself back down and figuring out what type of artist I want to be and what type of music I want to make. And I feel like that’s kind of why it’s been taking so long because you got to kind of gotta, like, reinvent who you are and what you want to do. I’m just trying to make music that actually resonates with me first and then hopefully resonates with other people [as well as having] some type of substance to it.
Tell us about “My Way.”
I was working with some people, and I remember I sat down with them. They were showing me tracks because they were trying to get me to rap on a beat. This might’ve been 2019, but they were pulling out beats from, like, 2015 and 2014. You have certain artists, and they have version one or version two. Let’s say you had Soulja Boy and you have the “Crank That” that he used, and then you got “Crank That” version five, but you tried to get me to make something to that beat.
When you’re first starting, you feel like you have to put up with certain bulls— because you feel like that’s the only opportunity you get. After a while, it’s just, like, “Okay, this is not the type of music I want to make.” You’re not happy doing this s—. I ended up walking away. So, I was making a beat and then the hook. [What you hear in] “My Way” just means I’m separating myself and doing it in a way that I want to do it. That’s basically where the song came from, but it took probably two years to drop it.
What is some advice that you would give to independent artists?
Consistency, self-belief and just continuing to learn. If you’re an artist who has a bunch of people around you, you can go into the studio and everybody kind of bigs you up, everybody kind of telling you that song is dope or this part is dope. When you are independent and you don’t have an engineer or producer, you’re sitting in the room by yourself. You got to tell yourself that that’s hard or that’s dope. You don’t really have a tastemaker; you don’t have a person that’s constructing how you should do certain stuff or how engineers would cut off certain parts. You have to figure it out. The whole thing is just really having that self-belief and being consistent.
