Westside Webb Talks “Player Games Pt. 1” & Getting A Plaque With Sonny Digital

Westside Webb is here to prove he can rap just as good as he can produce. While he started making beats, even landing a coveted plaque alongside Atlanta producer Sonny Digital, the rising star has since discovered his talents behind the mic, putting together rhymes, bars, and lyrics inspired by real-life experiences.

Webb describes himself as “a super dope artist, he’s just all about leveling up and motivation. Staying down with your team, being with them and progressing forward.”

Born in Long Beach but spending his time all over the city of Los Angeles, Westside Webb is directly influenced by the greats, from Jay-Z to Nipsey Hussle to anything old school. From them, he takes nothing short of motivation: with every day being a hustle to improve yourself and your situation, and the greater picture to always take care of your loved ones.

Fast forward to today, Westside Webb unveils his newest project Player Games Pt. 1, the first installment to the self-explanatory series. Each track builds off the themes present in his own life while balancing all the things such as work, relationships, and being a father to his two beautiful kids. 

AllHipHop caught up with Westside Webb in downtown Los Angeles to discuss his roots, love for baseball, how he learned to produce, working with Rich The Kid early on, meeting G Perico, getting his name from Que, the new project, relationship with Sonny Digital, studio essentials, fatherhood, merch, and more!

AllHipHop: What was it like growing up in Long Beach? 

Westside Webb: Growing up in Long Beach was fun. You get the best of everything. You got gangbang culture, you got people skateboarding. You got the beach right there, you got sports. It’s a mixture of everything. Growing up in Long Beach, I wouldn’t trade it for nothing. 

AllHipHop: When did you fall in love with music? 

Westside Webb: When I was born. I caught on to music from early on, my god mom is a musician. She’s a jazz musician. She sings, she plays every instrument. As a young dude, I was just running around in her house, beating on sh*t. That’s when I really fell in love, but music talks to me. Ever since I was a little kid, it be talking to me. So it was something for me. I never thought I’d be here though. 

AllHipHop: What did you think you would be doing? 

Westside Webb: For sure I was going to be a professional baseball player. Fasho fasho. 

AllHipHop: Were you nice with it? 

Westside Webb: Yeah, I was super nice. I actually was in Seattle, I just left the game. One of my homies, he plays shortstop for The Mariners. He told me to pull up to the game because he got me some tickets. I love baseball, it’s my favorite sport. 

AllHipHop: What happened? Why’d you stop?

Westside Webb: I stopped because baseball is a real political ass sport, and I wasn’t really into that part. But the music started taking over. Between the music and the streets, you need a lot of time to play sports and I didn’t really have enough time for it. 

AllHipHop: When did you start? 

Westside Webb: I started playing baseball at 8 years old. I stopped when I was 17, right before I went into my senior year. 

AllHipHop: What’d you play?

Westside Webb: I played shortstop.

AllHipHop: Damn, that’s a hard position to play! I had Quincy on Shirley’s Temple, and he was saying he still has dreams of going to the MLB. That never wavered, even though he’s doing music and acting.

Man, you know what’s crazy? You remember how Michael Jordan was such a star at basketball, he said “f### it, I’m a go play baseball”? I be thinking that s**t. I just want to get to the point in music where I can say “yeah, I’ll go play for The Yankees for a year.”

AllHipHop: Quincy wants to play for them too! What is it about the Yankees?

Westside Webb: That’s my favorite team. I mean, I played shortstop growing up, so my favorite player was Derek Jeter. Ever since I was a kid, so I always liked the Yankees.

AllHipHop: How did you start off producing? How’d you learn?

Westside Webb: I started off producing around the Jerkin’ era, like ’09, ’10. All my homies made music, they was rapping and making beats. I wanted to make beats. I always used to be in the programs, making videos and doing all types of s**t. I f**ked around with FL Studio. Like I was telling you, just by having a musical background, it started coming naturally. I really got intrigued with doing beats, like this s**t fun. I’m taking my laptop everywhere, I’m not going nowhere without having no beats. 

AllHipHop: Do you remember the moment where music really became real for you?

Westside Webb: Actually, it’s crazy because the first person to ever have a beat of mines besides the homies was Rich The Kid. But this was way before he was Rich The Kid, this was 2011. I was f###### with Rich The Kid on Twitter. I used to give him beats all the time. He used to take the beats to the studio and be f###### with other n*ggas, so they’d hear me. And they was way in Atlanta. I forgot exactly how it happened, but I had got a song with Lil Scrappy. 

AllHipHop: Shoutout Lil Scrappy!

Westside Webb: Shout out Lil Scrappy, him and Cap 1. That’s when I knew like alright, I could do something for real. 

AllHipHop: How did that happen?

Westside Webb: Honestly, I think the dude who Rich The Kid was messing with, who he was trying to get features from and do songs with — because he was a little bit more booming at the time, his name was Montana The Mac. He was already f###### with everybody, so then I started f###### with Montana too. Giving him beats. They probably ended up in the studio one day, gave it to Scrappy. He hit me up talking about “you got a song with Scrappy,” I’m like alright cool. At this time, it’s 2012. I’m a senior in high school. I’m like oh yeah! I’m going to school, yeah I got a song with Lil Scrappy. It’s lit! After that, I realized this is what I want to do. 

AllHipHop: I know you’re also So Way Out. How did you meet G Perico? 

Westside Webb: S###, I met that fool on 108th and Broadway. At the studio. When I started going over there, he was still in jail. He was in prison. My homie Freeze On The Beat, shout out Freeze, he used to take me to the studio. You know just dealing with the people in the music industry, when you’re young and small in the music industry: you find a studio to work at, you’re going to take advantage of that s###. So that was somewhere for us to work out of for free. I’m over there everyday, then he came home from prison and we locked in. 

AllHipHop: Are you signed to him? 

Westside Webb: I never was signed to him. I’ve always been independent. I’m still So Way Out though, So Way Out is a family. It’s a label too, but it’s a family. I never been signed to him though. People be thinking that, but I’ve never been signed to nobody. I’ve always been indie.

AllHipHop: How’d you get your name Westside Webb?

Westside Webb: Que from Atlanta. You know the song “OG Bobby Johnson?” Que gave me my name. He got that song “Too Much” with Trey Songz. He from Atlanta though. I had f##### with Que and did some music for him, then I ended up going to Atlanta for 3 months. Staying at his house, other houses. Everywhere we’d go, he’d be like “this my homie Webb, he from the Westside.” He said “n*gga, I’m finna start calling you Westside Webb.” I said “that s### actually catchy. I’m running with that, it’s over with.” For real. Really I went back home and within a week, everybody was calling me that. “Westside! Westside!” When I see people, I’m like yeah, it’s over with. 

AllHipHop: You just released Player Games Pt. 1. 

Westside Webb: Yeah, Player Games Pt. 1 out everywhere. Go check that out. 

AllHipHop: Why Player Games? 

Westside Webb: To me, it’s a bunch of different things. It meant to me: we’re all players, playing this game called life. I don’t really feel like everybody got it figured out, especially where we at. I’m just trying to give people a little game and motivation on what they can do from what I learned. We all playing this game called life, we gon’ figure this s**t out together. 

AllHipHop: So Pt. 1 meaning there’s a Pt. 2 obviously?

Westside Webb: Hell yeah, there might be a Pt. 10. [laughs] You just gotta wait on it, you feel me? But definitely a Pt. 2 coming soon. I got something coming in between that though. 

AllHipHop: What’s coming in between?

Westside Webb: You gonna have to see. I’ll let you know first though, I’m a let you know first when it happens.

AllHipHop: I was watching the “Different Goals” visual, what were you on recording this one?

Westside Webb: “Different Goals,” we was in Vegas. We do that often with the So Way Out crew, we always take trips. We went to Lake Mead, gambling out there, just doing the thing. Riding jet skis, riding boats. I had brought my cameraman with me like “we’re gonna have fun, and we finna shoot a video. Let’s go viral.” So we did that all throughout Vegas, then came back here and shot the rest of the scenes. All my music videos, I just try to make them fun. Some real lifestyle, s### you can relate to. 

AllHipHop: I want to jet ski so bad!

Westside Webb: That s### fun, super fun. It’ll bring the inner kid out of you.

AllHipHop: What was it like getting a plaque with Sonny Digital? Love him.

Westside Webb: You already know, that’s my boy. Sonny, that’s my guy. I be speechless sometimes talking about my bro, because Sonny’s one of the most genuine n*ggas I’ve met in the music industry. I don’t even really call him my bro, that’s really my brother. His kid is my god kid, so that’s really my dawg. We close close, like really close. 

We was out here in LA at Drofe house. We in the room, Sonny started cooking up a beat. And if y’all know Sonny, you’ll know he’ll fall asleep fast. Sonny will work, he’ll get 40 beats done, you’ll look over and he’ll be dead. It be funny because he’ll just be dead. So I looked up in the middle of the beat, bro is just dead. Then he got up out the chair and slid over onto the bean bag, ready to go to sleep. Like knockout. 

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I just jumped on the computer, started finishing up the rest of the beat. He woke up out of his sleep because he heard it, he’s like “yo this s### hard.” I guess he finished that, added some more s### to it. Right before we was about to go SXSW a few years back, he called me like “you hear this s### in the back?” I’m like “who is that?” He like “bro this Tee Grizzley, he just went crazy on our s###.” I’m like “yeah?” He’s like “yeah, he’s about to put it on his project.” Next thing you know, we here. 

AllHipHop: What song was it?

Westside Webb: “Catch It” It was on Tee Grizzley’s first project, that s### was big.

AllHipHop: How did you and Sonny Digital Meet originally? 

Westside Webb: I met Sonny from Que, they used to rap together. They were a combo. When I met Que and they came here to LA, they was working. I pulled up over there. Next thing you know, Sonny asked me like “wassup bro, you wanna cook up?” And we been locked in ever since. 

AllHipHop: Seen you with Fki 1st also? 

Westside Webb: I love 1st, that’s my boy. That man’s beats are crazy. It’s funny to me because a lot of these people, I been listening to them. 1st made all of Travis Porter’s first hits, that’s what we was going to party to when we were 16. People getting they first lap dances to Travis Porter and 1st beats. These the homies now though, 1st is a legend. 

AllHipHop: When did you decide to rap, if you’ve been producing this whole time? 

Westside Webb: I never wanted to rap, like ever. That was not my goal. I guess people like my voice, but I always hated my voice. Polyester The Saint is the reason why I rap. I was at Polyester’s crib one day, he’s doing his songs. He told me to talk over his song, pop some s###. I talk, he’s like “bro your voice sounds good over beats, you need to rap.” I’m like “no, f### that s###. I’m not rapping.”

2 weeks later, we on the phone talking. He was telling me he needed another beat for his project, I told him “yeah I got you right here.” He’s like “alright, I’ll take the beat but you gotta put a verse on it.” I’m like “n*gga, I just told you 2 weeks ago I’m not putting no verse on that.” He like “alright, I don’t want the beat,” and he hung up on me. Straight up, boom click. 

AllHipHop: First of all, how you gon’ hang up on me?!

Westside Webb: Polyester really one of my closest friends too, so I low key felt some type of way. Got me f##### up. I called him back immediately like “what you doing today?” He said “nothing.” I’m like “come to my house right now. We’re finna go get a mic, some Pro Tools. I’m a put a verse on this s### ’cause you not finna not rap on this beat.” Then boom, we got a song called “Cuz It’s Like That.” That was the first song I rapped on. He said “this s**t hard bro, we gon’ have to keep going.”

AllHipHop: Is it hard for people to take producers turned rappers seriously? 

Westside Webb: For sure. You got the best of both worlds. You got most people who looking at you like “oh okay, you just want to rap?” Then you got the other people who feel like you’re stepping on their toes. I went from trying to give beats out to people to now people hitting me for beats. I don’t make beats for people anymore. 

AllHipHop: Oh so you don’t produce anymore? 

Westside Webb: I do, but for who I want to. For me or the homies homies, if people really need something. But I ain’t out here shopping beats anymore. 

AllHipHop: You got something with Seddy Hendrix? 

Westside Webb: Yeah, me and my boy Seddy. I’m not gon’ lie, you just took the cat out the bag. That’s what’s in between Player Games Pt. 2. Y’all gonna get these songs from me and Seddy. Me and Seddy got a couple songs that I want to show the world, that s**t fire too. Fire.

AllHipHop: 3 things you need in the studio at all times? 

Westside Webb: Quietness, peace, weed. All my equipment like my tools, my laptop, my keyboard, s### like that. I’m real simple, I don’t like party vibes in the studio. I like it just me honestly. 

AllHipHop: You got a merch pop-up coming out? 

Westside Webb: Yep. I got merch, I got a pop-up. I got the little samples in today, we got a whole little pop-up coming. We gonna do hard copies of the CDs. It’s going to be out of 100, labeled all 1 through 100. Each one is specifically for that person. It’s going to come with a hard copy of the CD, and it’s gon’ come with the t-shirt too. 

It’s going to be a Meet & Greet, we’re going to package it all up in one deal. You sell it for one package. It’s going to be more of a futuristic type of thing too. It’s on some Nipsey Hussle Proud to Pay type s**t. In the future, it’s going to have something on it where you’re going to be able to tap it and get free tickets to the show. You’ll get free merch or free exclusive songs.

AllHipHop: How important is family life to you? 

Westside Webb: I got 2 kids, they my best friends. My daughter turned 5 on Friday, then my son is 2. He’ll be 3 in October. They the ones who keep me motivated. They the ones who keep me doing this music s###. In the direction that I’m going into, I can’t really be posting guns, drugs, and do all this other s**t that a lot of other artists be doing. 

Just because I got 2 little people looking at me as an example. I don’t want them to be looking at Youtube like “damn, my dad was over there high or got guns.” That’s cool too, but I like to push motivation. I want my kids to be better than me, so when they look on the screen, they think “oh, y’all was popping that s**t. Y’all was fly. Y’all got the foreign cars, y’all got big cribs. We gotta do that s**t too.”

AllHipHop: Anything else that wanted to let us know? 

Westside Webb: Player Games out already. We just shot the “Membership” video in Seattle, probably the tightest video that’s going to come out this year. As far as scenery at least, because I’m all about scenery. We shot on the big Puget Sound, the skyline of Seattle. “Membership” video coming out soon, keep running up those Player Games streams. Listen, it’s a Webby summer.