You're listening to Song Exploder, where musicians take apart their songs,
and piece by piece, tell the story of how they were made.
I'm Rishikesh Hirway.
This episode contains explicit language.
Janae Aiko is a Grammy-nominated singer and songwriter.
She's released three albums so far, and in addition to her own records,
she's been a featured guest vocalist on songs by Kendrick Lamar,
Drake, Childish Gambino, and many others.
In 2017, she released her third album, Trip,
which debuted at number five on the Billboard charts, and includes the song Sativa.
Sativa features guest vocals from Sway Lee, who's one half of the band Rayshrimered.
In this episode, Janae tells the story of how Sativa was first made,
and how it got stuck, and then how it got unstuck.
I spoke to her along with producer Brian Warfield of the production duo Fisticuffs,
who made the beat.
My name is Janae Aiko.
And my name is Brian Warfield.
I'm a producer.
I'm one half of Fist of Cuffs.
Fist of Cuffs are Mac and Brian.