If you’re a local to Miami Gardens, “Murda Gardens” is the last place you’d expect a rapper to embrace vampires and horror movie aesthetics. PlayThatBoiZay, however, has made it an integral part of his artistry.
Part of this artistry is calling his fans and supporters VIPS (“vampires impersonating people”), which many might find odd since Miami’s sun might theoretically turn any vampires to dust, but that doesn’t phase Zay.
Zay is currently supporting Denzel Curry on this year’s Grey Day Tour. Curry has also been a big part of Zay’s career.
“A lot of people always told me, ‘Oh, you should write. You got a voice, word?’ Then it was like crazy when Denzel said it, ’cause it’s just like he wanted. I’m looking at him like, ‘You one of the few people that made it out the city,'” Zay was quoted as saying to the Miami New Times.
The encouragement from one of Carol City’s finest led Zay to begin experimenting with his music as a career. He began releasing music in 2018, but it wasn’t until 2019 that his project Nocturnal and an appearance on Denzel’s Zuu closer “P.A.T.” that same year put him on the radar as a South Floridian rapper to watch.
During the pandemic, in December 2020, Zay released the Girls Love Vampires E.P. and began early production for his debut album, V.I.P.
“The whole inspiration for the project can be traced back to an awful heartbreak. I got my heart broken, and that’s where my mind was at,” Zay says. “Then, when I had linked with Kwes Darko in 2020, that’s when we started making a tracklist. That was all I could talk about, so it was all natural. We made the album originally in 2020, and then I just been working on it, adding tracks. And you know, like making it to what it is today.”
Zay’s rapid-fire and high-octane flow has made him stand out in a crowded hip-hop space–and thanks to friends like Denzel, Zay has grown an audience. He’s even gained a fan of rapper A$AP Rocky, featured on one of the album’s tracks, “Hoodlumz.”
Zay, Denzel, and Rocky exchange verses on a Southern hip-hop-inspired beat for two minutes and nine seconds. The song has been an underground favorite, with fans requesting longer verses from the trio.
Zay has shared, “The craziest part about it was me and Denzel when we first made the song.
“I think we had both laid down maybe eight more bars on our verse, but then Rocky just randomly walked into the room while we was making a song. He had heard the song, he was like, ‘Yo, this is fire. This song going wild.’ But he was like, ‘Bro, I just have one suggestion: shorten your verses.’ We shorten our verses because of Rocky; if Rocky would have never said nothing, it would have been a longer song.”
Despite its length, “Hoodlumz” has only continued to build hype for Zay’s debut, especially in an era where many believe hip-hop is either dead or full of industry plants.
“I won’t say it’s dead because it’s definitely not; it’s just evolving,” Zay says. “I remember when Instagram first came out, and people were still on Facebook and Myspace. It’s entirely like that.”
Zay also notes that audiences used to have to wait longer between releases. Now, more of it is being released every day.
“I feel like the current state of music is just a drastic evolution. People are saying fast-food music, you know, because the way how it’s presented and the way it’s accepted in the culture nowadays, but I just feel like that’s just evolution,” Zay explains. “We have shorter attention spans nowadays, so that’s kind of like the music kind of caters to that.”
PlayThatBoiZay released “V.I.P.” on August 23rd via Loma Vista Recordings.
