Interview: Bhad Bhabie On Her NZ Tour, ‘Bringing Up Bhabie’, How She Met Kodak Black + More

16 year old rapper Bhad Bhabie was first known to the world as Danielle Bregoli, the 13 year old viral sensation who shocked the world with her snappy catch phrase. 4 years later, Bhad Bhabie has landed herself million dollar deals, been named by Time Magazine as one of twenty-five of the most influential teenagers in 2018 and is the youngest artist to go platinum in a decade with her song “Gucci Flip Flops”. Bhad Bhabie’s hard hitting bars and “I don’t give a f*ck” attitude has gained her a global cult following and she has collaborated with some of rap’s hottest names like Meg Thee Stallion, YG, Tory Lanez and even got Snoop Dogg to remix one of her songs. Bhad Bhabie’s music has been streamed over 1.5 billion times and her music videos have gotten tens of millions of hits. Whether you love her or hate her, Bhad Bhabie knows success and she’s just getting started.

The Florida born rapper will be heading over to our shores in late April for a down under tour and we were fortunate enough to catch up with her for a small chat. An interesting individual who is shockingly still considered a minor despite her booming success has travelled the entire world because of music. Bhad Bhabie chats with us about her show coming up in April, not liking LA, her debut album dropping this year, how she met Kodak Black and her relationship with XXXTentaction.

Hi there, how are you today?

Gooood.

That’s good! So I’ll get right into it. You performed in New Zealand and Australia for the first time 2 years ago, are you looking forward to coming back to perform for us again?

Yesss, I’m very excited to come back. 

So the crowd loved you when you came to New Zealand. You ended up performing ‘Gucci Flip Flop-

Yeah, yeah it was a lot of fun!

(laughs) yeah, you ended up performing ‘Gucci Flip Flops’ twice. Is that one of your favourite songs to perform live?

Mmm no. Hi Bich.

Oh yes, that song is so sick. So what can fans expect from your show in April?

It’s gonna be a lot of fun. We gon turn up. It’s just gon be good.

Awesome. So I know you’re based in LA now, what’s it like in LA compared to Florida?

I don’t like LA. I wanna move back to Florida so bad but I have to be here for business really (laughs)

True. What was life like for you being raised in Florida?

Uh, it was kinda, I don’t know. I mean, it was cool. It wasn’t like- I didn’t have like, the terrible, terrible childhood but it’s just like, Florida.. The part of Florida I grew up in is still the hood. So it’s not like… it’s still like- (laughs) Yeah, I don’t know how to explain it. It’s still the hood. It’s not all like..

What makes you want to move back to Florida?

Um, I just don’t like LA at all.

Fair enough aye. So you dropped your debut mixtape  “15” in 2018 which has 15 tracks on it and was named after your age at the time. I thought that was quite a clever thing to do, can you speak on why you decided to do that?

Um, well, I mean.. For all those reasons you just said, I just- it was my age and a lot of people tell me that like I will never ummm… be anything more than 16 and it’s the fame and stuff like that, so.

So, what's your favourite track off the mixtape and why is it your favourite?

Yung Bhad and I don’t know I just like it. It’s one of my favourite songs.

So from what I read the way you got into music was super random and apparently you didn’t even know you could do music until you recorded “Hi Bich”. Can you talk about how that all came out?

Uh, how I started recording?

Yeah, yeah, so how did you get into music?

Oh, um, I was- I was just like, I wanna do a session. Like, fuck it, let’s see what I can do. I just did it. And everyone liked it so (laughs)

And like, you never expected you could do it, right?

Nuh-uh.

If you didn’t get into music, what do you think you’d be doing right now?

Oh, I have no idea. I really don’t know (laughs).

Can we expect your debut album to drop this year? I think you mentioned it was in the works in 2018.

Yesss, it would definitely be here this year. Definitely.

Oh, yeah, looking forward to it! Can we get any hints as to what the album is gonna be about or what features may be on it?

Uhh, y’all will see when it comes out

(laughs) so Kodak Black features on “Bestie” but that wasn’t the start of your guys relationship, you actually featured on his video “Everything 1k” a couple months before you ended up signing with Atlantic. How did that end up happening?

About the feature?

Yeah.

Oh well we were just cool so I asked him to do the song and he was like “okay!” (laughs)

(laughs) How did you end up getting on his, umm “Everything 1k” video?

I think he had seen a clip of me like listening to the song and then he was like “oh, well let’s put it in a video”

Oh wow. So I love your music videos, they always seem to tell a story. How involved are you in the ideas behind the music videos?

Um, my managers bring me their ideas and then I tell them what I’d do and which ones that I like.

What’s your most favourite music video you’ve created and what is it about?

Umm, my favourite one was “Trust Me” and it was about catching a predator (laughs)

Yeahh, I remember that, it was a very creative video. So I know you and XXXTentacion were close friends and you guys are both from Florida. Can you speak on your relationship with him and what it’s like thinking about him now?

Hmm, we was just so- We just had a very like, unique friendship, like no one would’ve ever thought we’d be friends but he just kinda, like, looked at me and was like, someone who he needed to be there for because he knew I needed someone to- someone to be real with me. Tell me right from wrong. Cause you know, in the industry everybody always wants to please people. Like, everybody has a lot of yes men around. He didn’t really wanna be a yes man. He wanted to… let me know right from wrong.

Well that sounds like a great relationship you guys had. What’s it like thinking about him now?

Uhh, I try not to honestly. Like, he comes up enough that I do have to deal with it but um, it’s really sad. 

Yeah, it really is. So umm, you’re not just a successful rapper, you’re also a successful entrepreneur. What else do you want to achieve?

Umm, well I have- I’ve been working on stuff that- I’ve been working on some stuff that’s gonna be coming out soon so, yeah. Y’all will see.

(laughs) okay, looking forward to it. How did you get to be such a business person though? You’ve landed so many hefty deals even though technically you’re still considered as a minor and I think that’s incredible. How did you get so business savvy like were you always just hustling or...? 

Yes! I had to learn everything like as soon as I came into all this shit I was like well, I’m not gonna leave like, without… making it so I had to learn everything quick.

Well you’re really good at it so you know, good on you.

(laughs) thank you.

You really are proving age is just a number with the huge amount of success you’ve had and even being the youngest artist in a decade to go platinum for Gucci Flip Flops. Before you got signed, did you ever think you were gonna make the huge mark that you’ve left today?

No, I never thought it would be this crazy (laughs).

I think you’re so good at what you do especially with the business side of things. Like you got a DMX cameo, you got Meg the Stallion to jump on the Bestie remix, Snoop Dogg to jump on Gucci Flip Flops, Bella Thorn. Like you just know how to make a lot of noise. How did these kind of opportunities come about like did you chase after them or were they like offered to you?...

What do you mean like? 

Like with all the cameos in your music videos and you’ve had amazing features, people to remix your songs like, is that something that you chased  after or like, were they offered to you?

Oh, um, a lot of it was A&R work.

Mm, oh okay that’s cool. So you teased an unreleased song on your IG live with Lil Gotit and it’s definitely different from the music you normally put out and I have to say I like when you do trap music. Can we expect that or any other songs to be released before the tour?

Umm, I’m not sure yet. I don’t know. My label is like… like, weird to me like they don’t really seem like they have much interest in letting me do like, drop shit. So I don’t know! (laughs)

Really? That sucks. So David Spade is like the last person I ever expected you to be friends with. He featured on your music video Gucci Flip Flops and I know you went on his Comedy Central show. How did you guys end up linking?

Oh we met at umm, we had seen each other at Catch one night  and then we just had a little, like, I guess a little friendship ever since then (laughs)

Wow. Your Snapchat series ‘Bringing Up Bhabie’ was a success. What can we expect from season 2?

Season 2 will be very interesting, I don’t even know- we did so much on there, I don’t even know what to expect from it. All I know is that it’s gonna be very interesting. 

Awesome. Can we expect that to drop maybe this year?

Yes!

You’ve worked with some great names. Who else would you like to collab with?

Uhh, at the moment I don’t really have anybody. 

Well, you’ve already had some fire collabs so that’s alright. Anyway, that’s all the questions I have for you today. Look forward to catching you here in April!

Interview: Breanna Tugaga-Rogers

About The Writer:

Breanna is a 21 year old uni student who was born in Australia and raised in South Auckland. Half New Zealand European and half Samoan, Breanna is undergoing a Bachelor of Arts, double-majoring in Communications and Sociology. Currently residing in Auckland, Breanna loves hip hop, rap, RnB music and enjoys watching TV shows, movies, travelling, going to concerts and keeping in touch with the latest of pop culture. Breanna especially enjoys writing and using it as an outlet to talk her sh*t. Breanna loves to always integrate her worldview, her background and her experiences into her writing and values your feedback.