Ahead of his highly anticipated debut album arriving later this year, Baby Keem sat down for an interview with Nadeska Alexis to talk about his relationship with pgLang and Kendrick Lamar.
K.Dot and his frequent collaborator Dave Free, who has also directed videos for Keem, established their “at service company” pgLang last year. In the initial video announcing the venture, Keem appeared alongside Kendrick, who is his cousin. Explaining a little more about what it is exactly pgLang does with Keem, specifically, he explained to Nadeska that it operates as both creative agency and management team.
“They handle a lot of aspects creatively and, you know, management-wise and things like that for me," he said of pgLang. "We work as a team to contribute to each other’s goals and things like that.”
He briefly alluded to his relation to Kung-Fu Kenny, too, which he has shied away from in the past. “Regarding Kendrick, it was, I don't know...it was funny. Like, people already knew, so it was like, you know, it was just one of those things where it's just like, it is what it is, you know?"
When it comes to their relationship, Keem said it “goes beyond music.” He added of Kendrick, “Whenever I need anything regarding, like, life, and if I need some wisdom, then that's who I go to, you know? That's one of the first people I look towards, him and Dave Free.”
Last week, Keem appeared on an episode of the Rap Pack and also spoke about how he and Kendrick initially reconnected. “It was an unfortunate situation that happened in my family, and then I guess we kind of just connected through that," he said, later suggesting he didn't want to hit up the Damn artist about making music together early on.
"He didn't really know until later later," he explained. "We just got cool on, like, that aspect first. On a regular aspect. He didn’t know I made music for a while. He was like, ‘What do you wanna do?’ I was just like, ‘I just wanna go to college bro.’ … I wasn’t even 100 percent sure I was even good at music." In fact, he said he thought it might have even been "disrespectful" to reach out when he wasn't taking his music as seriously.
When asked if he was “strategically” not acknowledging his relation to Kendrick early on, he said, “For sure.” As for why, he said he wanted to make it on his own terms first.
Watch both interviews with Keem above.
