Rico Nasty’s name continues to receive a growing buzz in the music world. This summer, the Maryland native released Nasty, a 14-song LP. In a recent interview with Vinyl Me, Please, Rico discussed the difference between Nasty and her previously released projects, Tales of Tacobella and the Sugar Trap series.
“If I would have not just been so afraid to not be cute, that’s really what it was,” she said. “I knew I was gonna have a lot of people lookin’ at me and I didn’t want to be that ugly girl. So I conformed and I tried to be cute on purpose. And I tried to give them like this girly aesthetic, and no matter how hard I tried to do that, it felt like school all over again.”
Rico has pulled away from her formerly animated sound to embrace her grungy, not-so-sweet side.
Embracing two different sides of herself is something she struggled with her entire life. Rico, born Maria Kelly, has a Puerto Rican mother and a Black father.
“I just don’t fit, so it was always, like, hard trying to find a balance of like, you know, ‘Who am I?'” she said. “Like, ‘Am I more Black than Puerto Rican, or?’ Like, what the f*ck?”
The 21-year-old rapper has learned to embrace all parts of herself and be her own motivation. She said coming from the DMV, you can’t wait for anyone to tell you you’re the best, especially if you’re a woman.
“I know for a fact I can’t sit around waiting for them to call me the best because as long as I have a p*ssy between my legs, they won’t call me the best,” Rico said. “They just won’t, they won’t do it, and it’s like, it sucks.”
Rico said she won’t let anyone’s doubts hold her back, even her own.
Read the full interview here.
