Pitchfork: What were you like as a kid?

Tierra Whack: I was pretty shy. I always knew I had something, but I didn’t really know what it was. When I figured out that I liked to write and rhyme words, it gave me a way to express myself.

It started off with my mom giving me Dr. Seuss books. I love Dr. Seuss so much. The way he put words together was just so crazy and cool to me. Even the illustrations, the colors and everything, and how the animals were animals you’ve never seen before—everything was made up. And then, in reading class, we had our unit on poetry. We had to write our own spoken word poems, and then get up in front of the class and recite them. That’s when I first had the opportunity to write down whatever I wanted. Everyone else just read off their paper, but I memorized mine. My teacher was like, “Wow, that was crazy,” and all the kids in school were like, “Yo, that was so cool!” I went home and asked my mom to buy me a composition book. It was one, then it was two, then it was three, and I just kept writing poetry. Eventually, I decided to put it over beats.

How did the idea for the Whack World project come about?

I was just in the studio—recording, recording, recording. I was at a point where I had so many songs that were all so different. In the industry, you’re told that you have to stick to one sound, but that’s boring to me. So I’m like, “Yo, I have to give people a taste of everything.” I’m thinking about myself performing live, and I don’t wanna do the same type of song 10 or 20 times. I wanna mix it up.

Were you developing the album’s visuals at the same time that you were developing the songs?

Well, I have to have some type of visual in my head to finish a song. I can’t finish a song if I can’t see anything.

What were you seeing? Were there any specific visual references you were thinking about?

For “Fruit Salad”—I love [Australian children’s music group] the Wiggles so much: “Fruit salad, yummy yummy.” I had that in my mind. I actually pulled it up and just watched episodes of the Wiggles while I was recording.

Why did you decide to cut off all the songs at one minute?

I just didn’t want to overwhelm the world. I’ve seen people drop their first projects where it’s like 17 songs, and I don’t want to hear that shit. And, to be honest, when I’m listening to new albums, I’m only listening to the first 30 seconds before I know if I like it or not.