Iakopo is an international billboard artist, and he is here to declare his place in the music industry once and for all. Once you meet him, the energy is undeniable, and he’s all about bringing nothing but good vibrations. Having grown up all over the world, Iakopo brings a melting pot of influences into his music, from reggae to hip-hop to R&B and everything in between.
In describing himself, Iakopo states, “I’m tropical, I’m about vibes. Self-made, I’m a self-created culture. I’m very multicultural so being born in America, growing up in Samoa, then lived for a solid part of my life in Hawaii, Japan, and Jamaica, I’m a blend of a few cultures.”
Iakopo has come a long way, fondly remembering performing at nightclubs as a teenager and going to school the next morning. His long list of smash records includes “Top of the Hill” with 2 Chainz, “Closer To You” with Sean Paul and r2bees, “Touch Down” featuring Shaggy, “Sparrows,” and more recently “Not a Star.”
Fans can also look forward to Iakopo’s upcoming show in Los Angeles on April 24th and May 3rd.
AllHipHop: Where are you from originally?
Iakopo: I’m very spirited. I live my life off this spirit, energy. I’ve always been like that, but the evolution of that is super dope because I came to a consciousness to where now you see what we create, that’s life. Music and life are the same thing to me. How I deal with songs is the same way I deal with real life: vibrations. I go off vibration, then from there I make the song.
AllHipHop: When did you fall in love with music?
Iakopo: My mom, I came from a musical family so I was always into music ever since I was a little kid. Even as a baby, I was watching my mom play piano. As soon as I could sit there, I was already playing. By the time I was 5 or 6, they put me in lessons. I came from a strict musical background. I always loved music, but right around the time I became a teenager is when I became a rockstar. In my own mind, in my own world. When I became a teenager, I’m like “f### what y’all are talking about, I’m on my own wave.”
At about age 13 is when I started diving into that, I started performing in clubs in Samoa. I moved from California to Samoa when I was 13 years old. Going into high school, I completely changed countries, languages, cultures. I completely changed environments. I was going to high school in Samoa and one of my classmates’ uncles was the leader in charge of this band and he had me go down there to audition. From that moment forward I started performing at nightclubs. That’s unheard of. Even in the States, you don’t go into a nightclub and see an underaged kid performing there. I was performing 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, I was performing in nightclubs as a kid, then going to school in the morning.
AllHipHop: You linked with 2 Chainz on “Top of the Hill.” How was that moment?
Iakopo: I have 2 songs with 2 Chainz, one is with Lil Wayne. Working with 2 Chainz is super dope. It’s crazy, I became more of a fan after working with him. Because I knew a few of his songs, but it was like “okay cool.” After I worked with him, I really became more of a fan. He’s super dope. Original.
AllHipHop: How was it shooting the video with your wife?
Iakopo: The song is a super dope song. This is my wife, her name is Sakura Da Patra. She’s a famous choreographer, event organizer, and dancer from Tokyo, Japan. We always have a great time together, we actually shot the video in Tokyo, Japan. She creatively directed the video, that’s really what made it pop.
AllHipHop: I saw her in the video!
Iakopo: She is! She was 3 months pregnant. She was styling so she’s a stylist, choreographer, and creative director for that video.
AllHipHop: How did the song with Lil Wayne happen?
Iakopo: Very similar to the first one, my old manager. We were already on a wave with 2 Chainz. Most of the songs that I make, honestly I get really f###### high. I go in the studio and start making them, then I just send them out. The first song with 2 Chainz, he sent me the verse before I even made the song, then I made the whole “if I get a bag, it’s up.” The other one was the opposite: I recorded it and sent it out. They said “oh, we really like this. Okay we’ll do a verse.”
I did a song with Sean Paul, he FaceTimed me with my bro Future Fambo last time I was here in LA. He said “hey, we’re recording a song in Kingston, Jamaica if you have some time.”
AllHipHop: What inspired “Sparrows”?
Iakopo: Literally, I just get authentic and real. I get really f###### high and just freestyle, when I really like a best stuff comes that’s how I make alot of my music. Usually I do the melody first, but even last time it was all at once. I then make the melody lines first like “oh I like this cadence,” then it’s just out. Because I evolved. My music and my life, it’s all this seamless, flowing vibration.
AllHipHop: How did you get your name?
Iakopo: Iakopo: So I was born in America as Jacob, my birth name. I love that name, it’s a beautiful name. I was adopted as a kid so when I moved to Samoa, they said Jacob as Iakopo. They’re saying Jacob, but in Samoan. There’s no ‘j’ or ‘c’.
AllHipHop: How’d you build your social media following?
Iakopo: I’ve just been grinding, honestly. There’s no limit to how much help we could really do to that. I constantly put out content. My formula is put out as much content as a can, and it’s never enough. There’s only 24 hours in the day, and now we got TikTok. Now I gotta be on TikTok. I have 20 TikToks, but I’m definitely not TikToking every day. We put out a single every month we been doing that for about a year or two now
AllHipHop: What kind of content did you put out?
Iakopo: I consistently put out my music. When I see a certain song is really picking up more or I just have more money, ’cause I don’t necessarily want to throw a lot of money on marketing for every single. I put out a song and when I see it starting to take off, more people are sharing it — like if it’s a dance song. I see people are really vibing to it, so I’ll start a dance challenge. I’ll have 100 girls or dancers all do dances to my song. Every day, I’m posting and posting. I’ll go 2 months where I’m posting hundreds of dancing, I’m sure that helps build it.
AllHipHop: How’s the independent grind?
Iakopo: I love it. I love it. It’s something you gotta grow into loving. It’s always nice to have everybody doing everything for you with the major label — to be honest with you, it’s a necessity too. It’s about reverse engineering what they did, but reverse engineering as independent. I love it because I could literally do whatever the f### I want. I could literally walk into a major corporation and say “hey, here I am. Let’s do a deal.” Boom: $100 grand, $500 grand. I mean Kanye West probably has $30 to $40 million types of deals, but at least I’m about to walk into a place and get $1 million or half a million, or $100K. On my own, and I don’t have to pay anyone for that. I don’t have to ask anyone iether, so I really really love it.
Even though as an independent artist, granted there’s moments where I’m like “oh s###, i just totally blew the budget on everything and we still gotta go.” Sometimes that s### happens, but it’s great because literally tomorrow, I could turn the corner and say “aye, I got this deal for you.” And there’s nobody controlling me, that’s so much better. To me, that’s the only conversation now.
AllHipHop: Talk about touring in Japan and in the Jamaican Islands.
Iakopo: Living, and touring in Japan is dope, I love Japan, I love the people. Japan is great, people are amazing.
One of the things I really loved about Japan a lot was the dance culture. Japan got a real dance culture. They really do, they really f###### do and it’s just not the same. I really loved that, and I had so much fun with everybody dancing, it goes great with music.
The thing is too, music and dance go together. What’s music without dance? I really liked that they’re really into the dance stuff over there, I had fun with that. I loved that, it makes me smile. Good food, so many dancers and clubs. One time on tour, we did one of the tours in Kobe Osaka, Tokyo. My wife organized it, she brought 100 dancers to the show. Every song, we had another crew of 5, 10, 15. Every night, every show was with another crew and they choreographed their own thing to my show. It was really dynamic, fun, unique, special, meaningful.
AllHipHop: What can we expect from” Not A Star”?
Iakopo: It just dropped, check it out. It’s dope as f###. The inspiration behind the song, I wanted to connect with people. It’s this interesting dichotomy because I am a star, but at the same time the message is I’m not a star, I’m just like you because we’re all going through this experience in life. We all are going through struggles. Even if you are a star or not, it could go either way. Even if you have $10 million dollars in the bank, a million, or nothing, we all go through the same things. The stress, the worries, the fears, the insecurities, the ups, the downs. The message of the song for everybody: we’re all going through similar s###. We all go through ups and downs. We got highs, we got lows. “I’m just chillin’ with my bro going out of control,” that kind of vibe.
AllHipHop: Anything else we should be on the look out for, anything else you are excited for?
Iakopo: We start tour soon. April 24th I’m performing at Club Avalon in Hollywood. May 3rd I’m performing in LA at Poom Poom Tuesdays with my dancers Sakura Da Patra & JUNNA , it’s a very famous dancehall event in the southern hemisphere of America. That’d be most important, then just focusing on the song. Of course, getting on Spotify. We are touring more. We have more shows upcoming in America, we’re excited to be here. I have a song with Snoop Dogg in the works. We don’t have a release date but the song’s close to done . We’re planning on shooting a video in May, and that’s exciting. The song’s really awesome, it’s a reggaeton vibe. Lastly, Iakopo drops new single “Don’t Think” on April 22nd with California pop group Zupa Nova.