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Speaker 1: Life audio Heynik, Thanks for joining me.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm glad to be here.

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Speaker 3: Dub Award nominated artist in K one of my favorite

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Speaker 3: CHS artists who does a string of new singles including

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Speaker 3: Contagious and Holy Girls. These are follow ups, of course,

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Speaker 3: in nik to your self titled album A nik A

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Speaker 3: couple of years back. Of course you're on Reach Records

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Speaker 3: A NIKK. You were the first, if my memory serves

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Speaker 3: me correctly, you were the first female artist signed to

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Speaker 3: Reach Records.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Look, looking back, what has that experience taught you about

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Speaker 3: God's calling on your life and the platform He's given you.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, honestly, I'm just grateful to be here.

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Speaker 1: Man.

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Speaker 2: I think being the first woman signed to Reach and

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Speaker 2: just even being able to have a career in Christian

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Speaker 2: hip hop, I think it's just showing me what can

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Speaker 2: happen if you give God your yes. Lad all just

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Speaker 2: started from giving my yes. I thought that was going

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Speaker 2: to mean be a missionary overseas, but God said, yeah,

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Speaker 2: it's a missionary, but in a new way when he

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Speaker 2: used me through music, and so honestly, you can show

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Speaker 2: me that he's faithful, that he can do more, you know,

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Speaker 2: exceedingly and abundantly more than we can think or imagine,

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Speaker 2: like the Word says, and I've just been grateful to

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Speaker 2: be here. He's also shown me not to put limitations

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Speaker 2: upon myself and just to step forth with the confidence

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Speaker 2: of the Lord and to be unoffended of the Gospel

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Speaker 2: as I step forward. And it's kind of like, just

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Speaker 2: let them reject you. But if they don't reject you,

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Speaker 2: keep sharing the Gospel. And so that's kind of been

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Speaker 2: my experience in my journey, and I've enjoyed every second

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Speaker 2: of it.

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Speaker 3: Well, let's talk about that. How did you get it in

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Speaker 3: a Christian hip hop, because I think I'm assuming part

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Speaker 3: of it strings from how you became a Christian in

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Speaker 3: the first place, because if my understanding correctly, you didn't

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Speaker 3: grew up a believer.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so I actually it's like an interesting story. Like

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Speaker 2: God he weaves everything kind of like the Bible, how

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Speaker 2: like backstories connects the backstories. So for me, actually, my

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Speaker 2: first conviction to even come to faith was because of music.

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Speaker 2: And so I was allowed to go to church growing up,

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Speaker 2: but my father was a Muslim, and so one of

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Speaker 2: my first convictions, though with the Sunday School stories was

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Speaker 2: music and so the first thing I did was like, no, okay,

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Speaker 2: I feel like this music is wrong. So and the

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Speaker 2: reason that we're listening to it's not really talking about

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Speaker 2: God like they say. So I looked up Christian remixes

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Speaker 2: like to all the popular songs that were out, and

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Speaker 2: so I actually ended up finding actual Christian artists and

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Speaker 2: rappers like La Cree and so I actually started listening

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Speaker 2: to like Lacree and Trip Lee and that was kind

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Speaker 2: of like the beginning of my like hearing deeper conversations

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Speaker 2: about faith and seeing young people like on fire for

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Speaker 2: their faith. And so because of that, it actually influenced

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Speaker 2: me in a positive way to where my church they

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Speaker 2: actually went to a summer camp every year, but I

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Speaker 2: was never allowed to go to that summer camp. But

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Speaker 2: I always heard the kids come back and say, oh

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Speaker 2: my gosh, like I'm in a Jesus He changed my life,

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Speaker 2: and I was like, I want to see what y'allre

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Speaker 2: talking about, Like y'all are talking about this, these songs

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Speaker 2: are talking about this, what's going on? And so I

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Speaker 2: managed to convince my family to let me go to

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Speaker 2: the summer camp. So I had a permission slip that

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Speaker 2: had an intern program for if you were a teenager.

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Speaker 2: My dad was like, okay, fine, internship, that sounds cool,

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Speaker 2: and I was able to go to the camp, and

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Speaker 2: on the third day of the camp, it's a week

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Speaker 2: long camp, I ended up giving my life to Jesus

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Speaker 2: changed my life for whatever. And then on the fifth day,

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Speaker 2: actually the Christian rappers will create all of them came

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Speaker 2: and so that's like my first touch point, right. Meanwhile,

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Speaker 2: I have no idea I'm going to be a whole

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Speaker 2: rapper later on. Second touch point is fast forward to

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Speaker 2: high school. I've been stayed maybe for like two years.

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Speaker 2: At this point, I have a biology project and my

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Speaker 2: teacher says, hey, if you want, you could do the

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Speaker 2: wrapping option instead of doing like a report. I do

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Speaker 2: the wrap option. And then my friends are like, you're

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Speaker 2: actually really good at things, like you could be a rapper.

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Speaker 2: I started getting attention at school. I started doing like

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Speaker 2: freestyle circles during lunch, and I'm getting a lot of attention,

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Speaker 2: and so I'm like, hmm, since I'm getting so much

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Speaker 2: attention and I'm passionate about Jesus, this is a very

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Speaker 2: effective way to tell you about Jesus. So I literally

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Speaker 2: were like, Okay, if y'all listen to me for thirty

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Speaker 2: seconds uninterrupted, but I'm gonna talk about Jesus for thirty

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Speaker 2: seconds in this rap and everybody's like oh oh. And

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Speaker 2: so that was like my way of evangelism and almost

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Speaker 2: like my non awkward way of evangelism, because even on

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Speaker 2: the bus and like it might be awkward to be like, hey,

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Speaker 2: you want to hear about Jesus even though it shouldn't be.

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Speaker 2: But but with kids and stuff like that, I could

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Speaker 2: be like, hey, like I have this song, like do

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Speaker 2: you want to listen to my YouTube video? And they'd

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Speaker 2: be like, okay, I'll listen to that YouTube video. And

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Speaker 2: so I'd bring headphones with me to school every day

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Speaker 2: so that way people could like put it on their

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Speaker 2: head and yeah, they'd be like, oh, they're talking about

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Speaker 2: God in this and then from there I'd like start

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Speaker 2: talking about Jesus with them. And so that was like

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Speaker 2: my beginning origins into Christian hip hop, and then I

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Speaker 2: just felt like the Lord told me like, hey, I

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Speaker 2: want you to do this full time. It was terrifying

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Speaker 2: because I was just known as like a kid being

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Speaker 2: who's smart. You know Nigerians, I'm Nigerian. They just want

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Speaker 2: you to be a doctor or a lawyer. So I

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Speaker 2: literally had to go against everything I've been taught and

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Speaker 2: prepared for in life to pursue what God was telling

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Speaker 2: me to do. You But luckily he gave me greats

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Speaker 2: because I almost tooken it out, but he gave me

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Speaker 2: a dream and he was like, Hey, I need you

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Speaker 2: to do this because if you don't do this, you

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Speaker 2: know it's gonna get done regardless. And so I was like,

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Speaker 2: you know what, Lord, our pitt, I want to be

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Speaker 2: harder what you're doing. And so ever since then, I've

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Speaker 2: just kind of like been fearless, not fearless, but I've

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Speaker 2: been bold. I've been bold, and I just gave God

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Speaker 2: my yes and said I'm just gonna be faithful to

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Speaker 2: this no matter what capacity it is. And that's kind

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Speaker 2: of like how I got connected to Christian hip hop,

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Speaker 2: from intern at researchers to being on staff to then

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Speaker 2: now being a full time artist. And now I get

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Speaker 2: to impact other people just like me who when I

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Speaker 2: was younger.

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Speaker 1: That's an amazing story, Andy K.

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Speaker 3: I was going to ask you many many Christian fans

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Speaker 3: of hip hop, as you know, feel like they have

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Speaker 3: to choose between music that they enjoy in music that

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Speaker 3: reflects their values, and so often in secular music doesn't happen.

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Speaker 3: You know, you've got your listening to music that doesn't

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Speaker 3: reflect your values. But just like the beat, yeah it

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Speaker 3: is Christian hip hop helping change that is that one

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Speaker 3: of your goals to kind of give people music, young girls,

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Speaker 3: young boys, music that they can listen to you and

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Speaker 3: not be ashamed of.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, significantly. And I feel like I always have

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Speaker 2: to remember it my younger self and like wow, like

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Speaker 2: that younger self who said, huh, I'm convicted. Let me

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Speaker 2: see if there's anything I can do to honor God

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Speaker 2: in this department of my life. And so for me,

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Speaker 2: it's like, hey, if I can help you under the

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Speaker 2: Lord in this department of your life, or why not?

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Speaker 2: And even if my words can even help you remember things,

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Speaker 2: because the songs that I listened to also helped me

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Speaker 2: learn principles about like dying the flesh, it's like what

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Speaker 2: does that mean? I look it up? Or just different

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Speaker 2: Bible verses I've been able to do that, or even

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Speaker 2: just getting you a hype to be unashamed, because like

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Speaker 2: in school, it's not necessarily cool to be like the

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Speaker 2: person talking about Jesus all the time. So even if

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Speaker 2: I had a soundtrack that could just hype me up

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Speaker 2: before I like go talk to somebody about Jesus or

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Speaker 2: even just to listen to because I've been to different

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Speaker 2: phases of my life, like right now I'm popular, but

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Speaker 2: it wasn't always like that, and so like in high school,

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Speaker 2: it's like, hey, you might be sitting by yourself, and

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Speaker 2: so if I'm sitting by myself, then hey, I have

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Speaker 2: encouraging music encouraging me in my faith, like while I'm

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Speaker 2: doing what I'm doing. And so I feel like, yeah,

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Speaker 2: if I could encourage people no matter what season of

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Speaker 2: the life they're in, if they're by themselves, if they're

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Speaker 2: the only Christian in their household and they need some encouragement,

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Speaker 2: you know, if you're not the only Christian, if you're

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Speaker 2: in your youth group and y'all wants on the turn

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Speaker 2: up too before service, Like you know, I'm just glad

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Speaker 2: to serve the Lord in different capacities, like you know,

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Speaker 2: no matter.

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Speaker 1: Where you're Let's say about a couple of your songs.

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Speaker 1: Holy Girls is one. I love the vibe and the

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Speaker 1: message there.

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Speaker 4: What is the message from your perspective and Holy girls.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so Holy girls aspired by Power thirty one, and

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Speaker 2: so I really love it because Power thirty one describes

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Speaker 2: as different aspects of like a woman who fears the Lord,

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Speaker 2: a wife, and so Holy Girl just kind of celebrating

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Speaker 2: that like a woman of God. Even in parver thirty

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Speaker 2: one says, like a woman who fears the lord's to

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Speaker 2: be praised, and so we're like giving a shout out

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Speaker 2: to all the women of God who are just faithfully

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Speaker 2: serving the Lord, who are understand of their faith, who

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Speaker 2: are diligent. I actually use like different verses of parverse

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Speaker 2: thirty one, like in the verses of all like how

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Speaker 2: she's seeking the Lord and obvious he does. So I'm

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Speaker 2: like seeking the Lord of it and all this she

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Speaker 2: do so whatever that satyaday, so something, let's you do

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Speaker 2: so like basically saying like he's seeking the Lord and

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Speaker 2: obviously he does. She's trying not to be sitting out here.

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Speaker 2: Just different things like that and so and not even

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Speaker 2: shout out like you know, single woman, married woman, mommies,

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Speaker 2: all of that. And so it's just so the songs

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Speaker 2: to celebrate women of God and just to give them

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Speaker 2: confidence to be like, hey, let's be confident in being

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Speaker 2: one of God. This is a beautiful thing that should

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Speaker 2: be celebrated. This lifestyle should be celebrated. So let's continue

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Speaker 2: to be honestanted the bark faith.

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Speaker 1: How do you remember all these words on stage?

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Speaker 3: What anie k begues?

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Speaker 1: Hip hop has more words than songs.

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Speaker 3: That's one thing that that's it's all because when you

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Speaker 3: look at the lyrics to a hip hop song, you'll

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Speaker 3: look at lyrics to a song, it's like this and

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Speaker 3: this and and so do you ever get on stage

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Speaker 3: and just like draw a blake and forget, forget the

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Speaker 3: words to your song?

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Speaker 2: God that he's helped me out? I think so whenever

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Speaker 2: you're like rapping to record the song, you say so

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Speaker 2: many times that one that helps you learn your verses

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Speaker 2: is like in your core. I think also, like you know,

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Speaker 2: the Lord just gives gifting. So that's one of mine.

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Speaker 2: So it's there. But even in school, like you know

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Speaker 2: how it started with the biology project. So music is

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Speaker 2: a great way to remember things. I remember I had

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Speaker 2: chemistry and I was trying to remember the elements, and

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Speaker 2: like I made a song and I was like, all right,

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Speaker 2: the element right helps?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you changed your name a few years ago from

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Speaker 3: one day to a nick and some people probably are

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Speaker 3: wondering what happened to one.

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Speaker 1: Day hoorcey go. I used to love her music and

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Speaker 1: now she's a nick. Though, Well tell me the story

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Speaker 1: behind that of you of your name change.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so the story behind my name change is actually

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Speaker 2: just an act of obedience to the Lord. So my

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Speaker 2: original name was Yewande and it's a Eurobi name and

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Speaker 2: it means the Mother has come, but sounds cool at

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Speaker 2: birth until you realize, hmmm, that's a reincarnation and basically

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Speaker 2: celebrating things that the Lord tells us to stay away from.

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Speaker 2: And then on top of that, my other names we

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Speaker 2: just Muslim names that you know, my family gave me

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Speaker 2: from birth. And so yeah, I just felt like the

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Speaker 2: Lord was saying, like, hey, for this new chapter, I'm

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Speaker 2: bringing YouTube. I want you to let it go. And

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Speaker 2: so I had no problem with that. You know, it's

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Speaker 2: also kind of terrifying of like, hmm, I'm built a

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Speaker 2: whole brand on this, But I think the Lord has

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Speaker 2: even been showing me something in a new way too,

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Speaker 2: Like in Isaiah talks about forget the former things we

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Speaker 2: hold on doing a new thing. So the Lord has

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Speaker 2: even been showing me the things I preached about, like, hey,

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Speaker 2: just let go the God can do a new thing.

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Speaker 2: He's like, do you believe that for yourself? And so

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Speaker 2: the Lord has even been taking me to a new

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Speaker 2: level of having faith of like can you let go

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Speaker 2: of a platform that you built and believe that I'll

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Speaker 2: still be there with you even if you change your

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Speaker 2: name and people have to rediscover what's going on. And

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Speaker 2: so yeah, just as it was an act of obedience

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Speaker 2: to let go of things that weren't honoring the Lord,

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Speaker 2: and even having my name now honor the Lord, it

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Speaker 2: was also an act of obedience of like, hey, even

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Speaker 2: though you build a platform with a name too, I

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Speaker 2: have still worked through you, still moved through you, even

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Speaker 2: through the change.

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Speaker 3: A couple more questions for you as we land the

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Speaker 3: plane here, Anik, you were one of the winners of

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Speaker 3: the Forest Frank contests a few weeks ago.

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Speaker 1: Jesus is Alive. That was so fun, Listen. I was

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Speaker 1: one of those.

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Speaker 3: I was one of the commenters saying, you can't just

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Speaker 3: have one winner. You've got to You've got to have

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Speaker 3: a bunch of waders. There's too much good music here

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Speaker 3: and thankfully Forced Frank released an album with I forget

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Speaker 3: how many twenty.

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Speaker 1: Or so songs. You were the one, you were the

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Speaker 1: one of the winners.

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Speaker 3: Tell me why you wanted to enter that and what

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Speaker 3: were your emotions when you learned you were one of

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Speaker 3: the people here were chosen.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so I wanted to collab with Forest for a minute,

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Speaker 2: and so a lot of times with the artists just

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Speaker 2: finding the right song honestly. So literally I was like

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Speaker 2: getting off a plane and someone had tagged me and

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Speaker 2: they'd be like, oh my gosh, like check this out.

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Speaker 2: And then Forrest is like, yeah, I need someone to

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Speaker 2: go hard on this, and I was like, this is

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Speaker 2: the moment. So I didn't waste any time. So God

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Speaker 2: has also been showing me about that of like, hey,

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Speaker 2: when he gets through an opportunity to do it, have

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Speaker 2: faith and so yeah, I literally recorded it on a

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Speaker 2: camera microphone, like it wasn't even my whole studio setup.

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Speaker 2: But I didn't make any excuses. I just was like,

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Speaker 2: you know, I'm just gonna do it. Yeah, And so

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Speaker 2: even that, I feel like that was an act of

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Speaker 2: obedience to the Lord of like oh, like it's not

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Speaker 2: the perfect setting like, I'm at my relatives house because

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Speaker 2: I was flying out there. So I'm at my relative's house.

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Speaker 2: I don't have my mic setup, I don't have like

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Speaker 2: my fuble glam, but you know, I'm just gonna show

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Speaker 2: up as I am, and the Lord can still use that.

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Speaker 2: So even I feel like that's a beautiful testimony to

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Speaker 2: encourage others, Like it doesn't matter if you don't have

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Speaker 2: the perfect formula. God can work with what you have

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Speaker 2: and your seed, and you know he can. If you're

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Speaker 2: faithful with little, he can do it much with it.

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Speaker 2: And so I was super excited because then I ended

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Speaker 2: up getting an email later like hey, we really love

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Speaker 2: your version. We want to turn into a real version.

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Speaker 2: And I'm like, yeah, let's go. So super excited. See,

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Speaker 2: I'm so glad because I love the verse. I feel

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Speaker 2: like it's a good representation of what I do. But

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Speaker 2: also I feel like even the song is great too,

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Speaker 2: and so I feel like it was even just a

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Speaker 2: great moment to collab and I'm glad that other people

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Speaker 2: could be celebrated as well in the process. And yeah,

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Speaker 2: it was just it was so fun and I'm glad

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Speaker 2: that even the story of how it came to Bart

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Speaker 2: can encourage other people too.

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Speaker 3: It's a It was a beautiful celebration of the diversity

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Speaker 3: within Christian music. I think because there's so many different

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Speaker 3: voices in different just different people, different styles on the

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Speaker 3: on that album.

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Speaker 1: I loved it. A couple more questions for you, How

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Speaker 1: important is.

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Speaker 3: It is it for you for young girls to see

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Speaker 3: female artists in h that they can they can look

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Speaker 3: to and listen to around their family and and what

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Speaker 3: you know, what do you hope they learned from your journey?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? I think it's really important because I'm seeing now

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Speaker 2: a lot of people love the Lord, but they just

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Speaker 2: they how could I say? I think a lot of

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Speaker 2: people just don't have faith that God can work through

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Speaker 2: them by following the straight and narrow, and they think, oh,

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Speaker 2: that's cool for them. But you know, if I want

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Speaker 2: to be successful, I had to, you know, compromise this way.

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Speaker 2: I have to address this way. And so I think

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Speaker 2: being a representive of Christ and as being an artist,

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Speaker 2: female artists and Christian hip hop shows other girls like, hey,

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Speaker 2: you can be an artists and the Lord can still

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Speaker 2: use you. You can wear your hair the way it grows

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Speaker 2: in your head, and the Lord can still use you.

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Speaker 2: You can be just who God calls you to be today,

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Speaker 2: Like I don't have makeup art in this interview, and

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Speaker 2: the Lord can still use you. And so I think

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Speaker 2: it's a really cool way for like the Lord to

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Speaker 2: just show examples of people who are trying to honor

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Speaker 2: him and show like, hey, i'ma still be there with

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Speaker 2: you in that moment, and you don't have to follow

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Speaker 2: the world's standards in order to be successful. And it

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Speaker 2: also give them something to listen to that's relatable from

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Speaker 2: a woman who may have gone through certain things that

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Speaker 2: they go through. Who can put it into words on

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Speaker 2: the song for them to listen to for encouragement.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and who can make music as good ad or better.

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Speaker 1: I guess good ads are better than the main stream stuff.

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Speaker 1: I would just put that in there as well. You

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Speaker 1: don't have to say that.

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Speaker 3: But a final question for you, nick A, I'm some

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Speaker 3: understanding you're doing something in education.

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Speaker 1: Now tell us tell us about that.

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Speaker 3: What's going on?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, So recently I've been actually trying to give back

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Speaker 2: to other artists. So I started dropping like ebooks. So

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Speaker 2: I dropped an e book titled a Song Released one

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Speaker 2: on one and it just educates other artists. So I'm like, hey,

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Speaker 2: if you want to release a song, here's how to

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Speaker 2: do it the legal and also whenever you do it,

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Speaker 2: here's some things of like register for these platforms, or

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Speaker 2: here's how you can get your royalties from your songs.

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Speaker 2: Here's what to look for if you want a management team,

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Speaker 2: if you want to get your song, here's the files

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Speaker 2: you should ask back from your producer. So that way,

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Speaker 2: if you get invited to a show, you'd have your

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Speaker 2: files and you can perform. So basically everything I knew

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Speaker 2: whenever I was young, but I had no one in

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Speaker 2: my town who did music professionally. I'm just giving it

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Speaker 2: to people in a very accessible way, basically almost like

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Speaker 2: a checklist to where if you go through all of that,

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Speaker 2: you can officially release music and you'll be set up.

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Speaker 2: And so yeah, I just want to be able to

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Speaker 2: get back to other artists who want to do it,

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Speaker 2: but they just have no idea.

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Speaker 1: Where to start and how them folks can find us.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so you can find it on my site at

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Speaker 2: any k dot. Next.

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Speaker 5: If you enjoy today's interview, please make sure to subscribe

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Speaker 5: and share the episode with a friend. A big thanks

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Speaker 5: to the team at Life Audio for their partnership with

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Speaker 5: us on the podcast. If you go to lifeaudio dot com,

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Speaker 5: you will find dozens of other faith centered podcasts in

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Speaker 5: their network.

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Speaker 1: See you next time,