Yelawolf said he was taken aback by the songs included on Shady Records’ upcoming Shady XV compilation.

“I was surprised to see ‘Pop The Trunk’ and ‘Let’s Roll’ on there,” Alabama rapper says during an interview with XXL. “I didn’t know they were doing that, which is cool. The original record I put on there, ‘Down,’ was a record that was really jamming but I wasn’t going to put it on [my forthcoming album,] Love Story. So it just so happened the opportunity came up to place it on Shady XV. ‘Down,’ it’s in the vein of where I’m at these days. I put that song on there. I did the feature hook for the Slaughterhouse and Eminem track [‘Psychopath Killer’] and the feature verse for the Eminem and Skylar Grey song [‘Twisted’].”

Yelawolf is set to be on four tracks on Shady Records’ Shady XV double-disc compilation, which is scheduled to drop November 24.

He said that this Country Cousins project with Big K.R.I.T. is not currently in production.

“I don’t know where Big K.R.I.T. is at with the idea,” Yelawolf says. “We’re homies and it could happen any time. The problem is getting him and I in the studio because we’re both pretty busy. I just read he did a record with Raphael Saadiq, which is nuts. I can’t wait to hear it.”

Yelawolf says his recent video “Til It’s Gone” has the vibe of his upcoming album, Love Story.

“It was important to me to mash up everything that I’ve done in the past,” Yelawolf says. “Just really go back to the roots, but somehow find a bigger sound. It took us five months to get the first record. We recorded 40 different ideas before we had the first record, before we said, ‘Aight, this is Love Story for sure.’ That was the bar for it. It wasn’t ‘Till It’s gone,’ but ‘Till It’s Gone’ and ‘Box Chevy V’ are good examples of the feel of Love Story.”

The Gadsen, Alabama resident says rappers still struggle to make it out of the state.

“Everybody got his or her own story,” Yelawolf says. “I’m real fortunate I’ve gotten to where I’ve gotten. It’s still an ongoing battle. I know artists that are coming out of Alabama right now, especially rappers. It’s still extremely difficult. If anything I might have made it harder because I got my own identity and my own way of thinking and talking about Alabama. So whoever else comes out of there has to be completely different to make it. It makes it harder. So whomever currently doing it is making sure they have a unique sound. It’s crucial.”

Yelawolf featured with Eminem and Slaughterhouse in the “Shady CXVPHER” released this week.

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