Happy new year! Is it too late to say that? We’re over 2 weeks in. Oh well, it’s the first time y’all are hearing from me this year. Long time huh? I gotta get better at this. Fortunately I get to drop a meaty interview on this thing. This one was a doozy. The first ever guest on the show, _THESMOOTHCAT. He’s a super talented artist from New Orleans. He has a clothing line, a vast catalog of music, and even slings coloring books when he’s not working one of his 6 different gigs around the city. I caught him on my birthday last month (if you caught the last episode you heard me running out at the end) on my way to brunch and told him I needed him on the show. We locked down a date and got it done. _THESMOOTHCAT had one of my favorite albums of 2025, LIKE MAGIC. I thought it was hella creative and eclectic. The album was full of hard beats, slick raps, soft melodies, and dusty interludes for a very chill vibe. All of the production was handled by Baton Rouge based producer Custodian. There’s some blurred genre vibes that go from R&B to jazz, and right back to hip hop. I was very happy to get the change to cop it on vinyl directly from him. It came on a transparent vinyl record which made me think of one of my favorite tracks, “CLEAR SHIT”. This album needs ears and eyes on it. That’s why I’m here today. To put the homies on! If this is your first time hearing about him, you’re welcome, but also you’re in for a great time. THESMOOTHCAT has worked with a bunch of artists based in the New Orleans and Baton Rouge area, from his band The 9th Life to underground sleeper producer Wino Willy, and a regular collaborator JUU who is a recurring guest star on LIKE MAGIC. _THESMOOTHCAT is sort of a local celebrity in Baton Rouge where he spent his college days from the critical acclaim of his 2018 album Breathe. He has since expanded that album into The Breathe Art Project to push his artwork in drawings and a clothing line. The dude does it all. He produces his own music, shoots his own videos (and for others), and books his own tours. Recently he did a show in Japan, yes Japan. We get into that in the interview as well as other stories about his background and passion for music and art. He shared about his experience walking into a record store in Osaka where they were playing deep cuts from Cash Money Records legend B.G. _Thesmoothcat was feeling the love overseas, but he also got to see how hip hop is appreciated and sometimes appropriated by East Asian cultures. At the end of the day, it was about the love of the music of our forefathers. We also got to chatting about the pressures of competing in the Tiktok age and staying consistent. There’s a lot more in the interview that I edited down for time, but if you want to get the entire unedited chat with some spicy talk about AI, then go ahead and drop me a Lincoln ($5) to support the show and you’ll get to tune in as well as lock in your name for some stickers I’ll be sending out to all paid subscribers (yes even the ones that canceled on me) very very soon. This was such a hard episode to edit as there was so many good conversations and a free flowing conversation. In between I slid some music from his album to break up the talk, but you should definitely check out the album in full. Also if you’re in the New Orleans area, _THESMOOTHCAT has a show coming up on Saturday, January 24th at Full Court New Orleans in the French Quarter. This show will be really special as his band The 9th Life will be reuniting for the first time in almost 2 years. Regular collaborators JUU and Wino Willy will also be performing. It’s for sure going to be a special evening. I will be in attendance to catch some live hip hop and art. Until then, the full interview will drop on here in a couple of days. I’ll be working on getting another episode rocking very soon to play some music I didn’t get to this go round. We got a lot to catch up on! You can follow _THESMOOTHCAT on instagram at @shredsum Thanks again for tuning in to Noire World Radio. I’ve got some big big plans this year including some live shows and more interviews. Big shout out to _THESMOOTHCAT for sitting down with me and hand delivering the vinyl record. You will be hearing from us on a track very soon! Peace, Nigel Noire aka Tito the Griot Noire World Radio @noireworldradio This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit noireworld.substack.com/subscribe
