After years of being behind the scenes ― penning songs for Mary J. Blige (“Tonight”) and Keri Hilson (“Knock You Down”) ― Kevin Cossom is more than ready to step from behind the shadow of his hits. The 26-year-old Orlando, Fla. native is currently prepping his debut album, “LOVE (Levels Of Various Emotions)” and rolling out mixtapes in the interim, like last month’s “By Any Means” and his upcoming “Hook Vs. Bridge 1.5.” We caught up with Cossom at the listening session for his new ‘tape to find out how he knew he was ready to come out of the shadows and how he linked up with Diddy and Fabolous for his single, “Baby I Like it.”
GlobalGrind: We know you’ve written a lot of songs for a lot of people. How are you making the transition from songwriter to a recording artist?
Kevin Cossom: It’s definitely been a long transition. Being an artist was always primary for me. It’s always something that I wanted to do. I happened to get a publishing deal before I got an artist deal though. The transition … I’m making it now and it’s feeling good. Finally I feel like people are respecting me as an artist. It’s cool though and I already knew it was gonna be hard work. The biggest thing is the work load. Being a songwriter, all you gotta do is stay in the studio and write the hit. Being the artist, you gotta try to write it then go perform it, then shake all the hands, then promo it and do all of these other things. So the workload definitely is a lot larger than it was before but it’s what I want, so it’s cool.
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You’re releasing a lot of mixtapes and I’m sure the album is coming up?
The album is coming soon.
Do you have a tentative date?
Nah. I mean I could say I’ll release an album tomorrow but it wouldn’t make sense. I just want to make sure that when I release this album I’m at the height of the buzz. That it doesn’t go and slip under the rug like ‘Oh is it out already?!’ You know what I’m saying? The main thing with me releasing these mixtapes is making sure that I get as many people’s attention as I can possibly get before I release the album.
Well you’ve already gotten Snoop’s attention and Fab’s attention. How did those collaborations come about?
Just the connections from me being a songwriter. Each story is a little different. Of course the Snoop story – that came from Danja. They made that happen. They were in the studio with Snoop I recorded the song “Relax.” We knew we needed someone on it. They were in the studio with Snoop and they were like ‘Yo, we got this artist.’ And cool enough he jumped on that. It was real cool actually. It’s crazy when I think about it, me being a new artist still with the caliber of artists I’ve been able to work with. It’s crazy. From Snoop to Fab to Diddy. Those came about just from working with them before me doing my artist thing. My producer Danja did a few joints on Diddy’s new album “Last Train To Paris.” “Hello Good Morning,”“Yeah Yeah You Would” and “Hate You Now.” I did a joint called “My Time” for Fabolous. That’s kinda how I linked up with Fab. Luckily, they jumped on it and wanted to be a part of the project and I appreciate them for it.
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You’ve already worked with some great people, but who’s on your list for future projects?
I’m more of a ‘If I can’t get that artist I’mma do it myself’ kinda person (laughter) but there are a lot of people out there that I look up to in the game and who I respect. It’s kinda hard to choose because there’s a lot of people doing their thing. From Drake to Nicki [Minaj] to Big Sean and even young cats like Wiz who are coming up in the game. J. Cole, I’m a big fan of Pharrell. He’s one of the guys I looked up to when I first started doing it. Pusha [T], that’s the homie. Kanye, Ross. There’s so many people. I’m a fan of Justin Timberlake, he’s dope. That’d be cool. Anyone who’s willing to work with K.C.
How would you describe “Hook Vs. Bridge 1.5”?
All original. It’s an extension of the first one. It’s basically taking some of the favorites from the first one and adding on to that. It’s gonna have an album feel to it. I feel really good about it.
Three words to describe yourself?
Cool. Competitive. Talented.
