The DMV Daily Interviews: Zaamwe

The Maryland Recording Artist Discusses His Musical Background, Love Of 70s Music, God’s Influence On His Art, and His Creative Process As A Musician

Coming from a family of artists Largo, Maryland raised singer-songwriter, producer Zaamwe grew up listening to a wide variety of music from classic Soul and R&B acts stating “Bee Gees, KC and the Sunshine Band. I was always around that and my parents are from Nigeria so they used to play traditional music from Edo and Delta state. My uncle Victor Ehikhamenor lived with us for some time and used to play Fela  Kuti, Bob Marley, and Sunny Ade when he painted. I was always around that type of stuff … I was exposed to many great musicians at a young age”

Zaamwe is a strong believer in the Lord and is divinely inspired saying “God’s glory in my life and I use my talent to bless other people”. With his eclectic sound, Zaamwe mixes his Gospel roots with Indie Rock and R&B. Over the past few years, the Maryland artist has released two albums The Cool-Cool EP and Godflowz Vol.1 on which he has put his musical repertoire on full display singing, writing and composing tracks. Zaamwe’s creative process is painful but beautiful producing lovely heartfelt music.

“The whole feeling of creating something from scratch, creating art, it’s just like a spiritual thing. God is the creator and he made us in his image. Everybody feels something supernatural when they’re creating something. It’s like giving birth. That’s how I feel when I make my music, like giving birth to a child.”

This interview has been slightly edited for content and clarity.

Has music always been a part of your life? What got you into recording music, wanting to make music, wanting to perform, what got you really interested in being a musician?

Zaamwé: When I was young, I was always around music, like my parents played the 70s and 80s music from people like Michael Jackson, the Bee Gees, KC and the Sunshine Band. I was always around that and my parents are from Nigeria so they used to play traditional music from Edo and Delta state. My uncle Victor Ehikhamenor lived with us for some time and used to play Fela  Kuti, Bob Marley, and Sunny Ade when he painted.

I was always around that type of stuff … I was exposed to many great musicians at a young age, and I’d say that’s what shaped my foundation for my music, my taste in music, and then as I started growing up I got interested in drums. I started playing drums when I was 15 years old and I played for my church choir. From then, I was just teaching myself different instruments. I was interested in music and how everything came together, so after I played drums for a little bit then I got interested in bass. I taught myself bass and taught myself a little bit of piano on the side as well. And then, I got an understanding of pretty much all the instruments, or at least the basic instruments that I would need to make a song of my own. Then I got interested in doing producing. I got my own MacBook around the time I went to college, freshman year, so when I was 17, 18. I started messing with GarageBand on there. Eventually, upgraded to Logic Pro. And that’s pretty much how it went down.

Your music is really lively, it’s lush, it’s beautiful, and it’s really rhythmic. How did you find your sound?

Zaamwé: My African culture inspires me. My faith inspires me. I’m a Christian, I believe in Jesus Christ. I believe in inspiration from the Holy Spirit, so I feel like that’s where I get my sound from. He [Holy Spirit] teaches me what to pick from the different genres that I like. For example, I’m a big fan of indie rock. Bands like Phoenix they combine different genres to make something fresh and unique.

I’d say my sound is inspired by genres that I like to listen to, like Jazz, Electronic, Rap, R&B, urban stuff. What else? The 70s and 80s music. The way they wrote back then was so genuine and it’s simple, it’s relatable. So, I’ll say that’s what influences me when it comes to writing lyrics.  I like to look at people like Hall and Oates, I don’t know if you know them. Tears for Fears. People like that.

https://soundcloud.com/zaamwe/right-here

Do you have a favorite songwriter?

Zaamwé: A favorite songwriter? Who would be my favorite songwriter? I don’t know. I don’t think I have a favorite songwriter. I like a lot of different people’s songwriting.

Okay, so you mentioned being a fan of the 70s and 80s. Do you feel like the quality of music has dipped off in the past ten years?

Zaamwé: Has it dipped off? Well … I’ll say as far as content, yeah, but as far as production, we have more technology. More gadgets. We have access to everything the people before us had access to and more. It’s way better now and it’s just gonna keep getting better as long as technology keeps growing. Plus, we have all these greats to look up to, so pretty much we’re just improving on what already has been discovered. So, as far as that’s concerned, I’ll say it’s actually better. But as far as the art, the craft, it’s getting kinda worse now because people are focusing on the money … They’re not really focusing on impacting their listeners positively. Like on a spiritual, mental, emotional level. They’re more focused on, “let me make money, let me blow up” and everything. You know what I’m saying? You don’t really need be a tough songwriter anymore. You just have to get on a nice beat and you’re straight.

What’s the exact reason you make music? Is it to express yourself, is it to give glory to God, is to connect with others who go through common experiences? What’s the primary reason you make music?

Zaamwé: There’s a lot of reasons, the primary thing would, of course, be to give glory to God. Yeah, that is the primary reason. I mean I was blessed with the gift of making music by God’s grace. It would be a disservice for me not to showcase God’s glory in my life and I use my talent to bless other people.  I’ll say that’s the main reason, just to glorify God through my craft. You know, just share my faith in Christ. Just talk about my past experiences, so that I can pass that on to the next person. I want people to learn from my past success and failures …

Other than that, I mean, I love making music — music is fun. The whole feeling of creating something from scratch, creating art, it’s just like a spiritual thing. God is the creator and he made us in his image. Everybody feels something supernatural when they’re creating something. It’s like giving birth. That’s how I feel when I make my music, like giving birth to a child.

The process of making music is like birth pains. Like if I’m struggling with writer’s block or I finish this beat, or nothing is going according to plan as far as recording with others and scheduling is off. All that is stressful. But once you finally get everything done and finally produce the music and you drop the track or you drop the whole project and you witness how it’s impacted people’s lives it’s like physically how a mother feels giving birth to a child and watches that child grow up. To see that child interacting with the community around it, impacting people, that’s how I feel when I make music…

Who are some people you want to make music with? They could be from this area, outside this area, just in general, who are some people you would love to collaborate with.

Zaamwé: I wanna make a song with Mannywellz one day

That’d be nice. That’d be tight.

Zaamwé: Yeah, when the time is right. Who else? … you know Foots x Coles. Yeah, I wanna make a track with them. I like that group; like they have the groove. Like really funky. I can definitely mess with that, cuz in the 70s and 80s that’s what it was all about. Funk. Feel-good grooves.  As far as like big names… I’d wanna work with Fred Hammond. He’s a legendary bass player and singer. I like his style… I wanna work with Toro y Moi. He’s a producer, singer. I like his style too… I think that’s pretty much it.

How do you categorize your music? Do you categorize it as gospel, or do you put it under a different category? You incorporate a lot of different sounds and mix it with the Word of God.

Zaamwé: I mean, yeah you can call it Gospel. I feel like when people say “gospel” the genre, they are referring to old church songs. I don’t really like to use genres but on iTunes, you have TO pick a genre for your tracks so I used Gospel for my EP “Godflowz”.  It was jazzy and R&B and a fusion of other stuff though. For “The Cool-Cool EP”, I labeled it as R&B and soul. I mean, I don’t know how to describe my genre. It’s true, authentic music that glorifies God. So yeah, if you want to call it gospel you can call it that, you want to call it indie, R&B, and Soul, Jazz, Urban… yeah, it’s a mixture of all that. The main point is, it’s authentic music, it’s genuine, and it gives glory to God.

Follow Zaamwe on

Twitter: (@zaamwe )

SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/zaamwe

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zaamwe/

&

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1gIqDLrB1IrhxxC7EYTRuJ