Tre Capital wants to start off 2017 by hitting the ground running and he’s doing just that with the release of his We Must Do Better album.
The Los Angeles rapper has 11 tracks on the project with production from J. LBS, VNSN, Haze Banga, Beat Butcha, Michael Seven and Eestbound. Frequent collaborator WondaGurl crafts the beat for “Life Outro.”
When making We Must Do Better, Tre explains in a phone conversation with HipHopDX that he started with the title to form the concept of his album, which challenges his ability to share his personal experiences with fans. As he’s already a few projects into his career, he has faced his fair share of frustrations and knew it was time for something different.
“Let me really make sure that I’m putting in the effort and the time to talk about the relationship with my family and how I felt discouraged trying to be a bigger role model for them,” he says. “My brother or my sister or friends around me or just music. Combining all of those topics and putting it into perspective of saying man, fans are so geeked to hear this album because it’s refreshing.”
Tre explains what it’s meant to him to have a co-sign from WondaGurl as he navigates the industry as an independent artist. She has produced for Drake, Travis Scott and Jay Z, but noticed something in Tre that she wanted to support.
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“I think to have someone like her who’s so young, she’s working with the Kevin Durants of the rap world,” he says. “So what makes me different compared to any other artist that she could work with, I’m forever grateful. I said in an interview, I’m her Luke Skywalker and she’s my Yoda. She’s taught me so much about music and plus, me getting to learn about her ear, it pushes you in a different direction sonically, business-wise, how you present your music, your marketing. She wasn’t even saying, ‘Tre, do it like this, do it like this.’ You’re just around her and you know. It’s kind of like what her standard of music is is what pushes you to say ‘Fuck, I want my shit to be just like that.’ You’re getting an inside scoop about what exactly she likes and that’s a reflection of what could elevate your art.”
After his last album, I Can’t Die Yet, which dropped in March and had no features, Tre wanted to go track by track to improve his craft. One of the signs of progression is his incorporation of guest appearances on We Must Do Better. He enlisted Inglewood’s own SiR for the track “Figure It Out” and Tre emphasizes how everything came together organically as SiR walked into the studio at J. LBS’ house.
“He’d heard about me and I’d heard about him, so I was like, ‘Oh man, this is awesome, we got SiR here,'” Tre explains. “So I played him a couple songs off the album, he was really feeling it. Then we pulled up the session for ‘Figure It Out’ it was really crappy it wasn’t even halfway where it was. He was like, ‘I really like this song, so let’s do something to it.’ So from there I got him on the record and we both really loved it, but it still needed some work. So I lived with the record, then when we did the mix and master for it, I was like, ‘Oh my God, this is one of my favorite records on the album.’ And I know SiR is very — he’s not someone that’s very easy to get ahold of on features and stuff so I felt like it was just organic.”
As further proof of his growth, Tre has received calls from Just Blaze, has gotten to hang out with Ab-Soul and met Noah “40” Shebib on a recent trip to Toronto. Although he is Xzibit’s son, Tre has never depended on his famous father to give him a boost, but instead has let his own work ethic speak for itself.
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“I feel like to go from being, man I’m really not where I need to be with my music and I feel very held back, but then to have someone like Ab-Soul or Just Blaze or 40, to come in contact with those people and still to be an independent artist, I feel speaks — the music speaks louder than anything,” he says. “And I feel like for this album, I didn’t even drop it with a premiere because it’s about the music at the end of the day. It’s not about social media. I feel like the work ethic for me is starting to show where people are like, ‘Man, Tre how are you so known? How are you getting this much feedback?’ I’m like, man, you just have to go back and look at the track record because it’s all there for you to see it.”
Stream Tre Capital’s We Must Do Better album and check out the cover art and tracklist below. Purchase the project at iTunes.
- Welcome to the Glory [Prod. Michael Seven]
- Clean / Filthy [Prod. Eestbound, Michael Seven, Don Derrion, 3PTS]
- Look, Us (f. Ismael) [Prod. VNSN]
- Invest [Prod. 2AM]
- Figure It Out (f. SiR) [Prod. J. LBS]
- Disbelief [Prod. Haze Banga]
- Quick Pay (f. Martin $ky) [Prod. Martin $ky]
- way we see it [Prod. J. LBS]
- Last Time (f. TĀLĀ) [Prod. TĀLĀ, Beat Butcha]
- Life Outro [Prod. WondaGurl]
- Last Time Remix (f. TĀLĀ) [Prod. TĀLĀ, Beat Butcha] *BONUS*
