YSL Rapper Strick and James Blake on Their Young Thug Collab ‘Kisses Make Sure’

Young Stoner Life Records rapper Strick is premiering a new music video for his song “Kisses Make Sure” with Rolling Stone. It features Young Thug, who encouraged Strick to step in the spotlight when he was just a songwriter, and James Blake. It is Thug and Blake’s first collaboration ever, according to he and Strick. 

“It’s an honor,” Blake says of landing his first track with Young Thug, who the singer and producer has been a vocal fan of for years. “Hopefully people like the result. It doesn’t matter who you’re working with, if the final piece of music isn’t it, then it doesn’t matter. I really wanted to not kill the vibe basically.” Mission accomplished, we’d say.

Blake’s signature hums start the song off delicately, atop tender guitar and careful drums by producers BRYVN (Juice WRLD, Young Thug, Trippie Redd) and Neenyo (Drake, PARTYNEXTDOOR, Future). In his hook, Strick takes account of the little things that provide security in a relationship and how wide a gap is left when they don’t happen. “This morning, I woke up, didn’t smell no coffee,” he raps. “You wasn’t making breakfast downstairs / Fell asleep, I had a nightmare I was lonely / I think losing your love got me scared.”

Thug also seems haunted by a strained love in his verse. “I don’t like the way you don’t keep it real / Went and told my momma, she told me ‘Wipe off all my tears,’” he raps calmly. “Even though she gone, there’s something that keep on giving me chills.” Blake’s closing verse is stirring and gauzy as he sings lovelorn admissions like “Everything I wear is to impress you.”

None of the three performers appear in the music video – instead, real couples in LA were cast to capture quiet, intimate moments between them. “We decided to shoot the video with only actors, one, because we felt like this song is the story of a lot of people in the world,” Strick says. Blake says he wasn’t involved in conceptualizing the video, but immediately loved the idea. “The song, when I first heard it, I was like, ‘Oh, this is instantly cinematic. I could see this applying to so many different relationships and romantic situations,’” he says. 

He especially thought the approach was a good one as Young Thug is currently incarcerated in Georgia as Fulton County’s controversial trial against the rapper, born Jeffery Williams, for allegedly leading a gang named with the same acronym as his label, to which Strick is signed. “It would just be weird to have just me and Strick in it and there’d be this incredible presence that was missing,” Blake says. Strick says, “Jeff loves the video concept. He thinks it’s pretty sick, and I can’t wait until he actually gets the chance to see it.” 

Strick began recording the song on his own at his home studio in Malibu before taking his hook to Thug, who recorded his verse with him in California. He then sent it to Blake, who he had shot other tracks to since they met “quite a long time ago,” says Blake. However, “Kisses Make Sure” resonated with him for its sweetness and storytelling. “[Thug] switched his flow up for it as well,” says Blake. “It was a nice verse from him and a nice angle, a nice part of his personality I think that comes out on that song.” Blake says he recorded his vocals about seven or eight months ago in Atlanta, while hanging at a studio with rapper Swavay, a friend of his. “He also engineered his own vocals on the track which is phenomenal,” says Strick. “[He’s] such a talented person.”

Though Thug can’t celebrate the release with Strick or Blake, Strick assures Rolling Stone that his label boss is ecstatic. “This is definitely probably one of his favorite songs and he was very excited about it coming out,” says Strick. “We had a bunch of conversations back and forth just about the idea I had for the video, the release date, et cetera. He’s super excited to have a record out with James as well.”

Blake says Thug’s current incarceration is “devastating.” “As a fan of his for so long it makes me really sad that that’s the situation we are in,” he adds. “But praying for his return home, as I know all of us are.”

The song marks Strick’s first release of the year. He previously teased the track in a June interview with Rolling Stone. He released his debut album, Strick Land, in 2021, following a string of mixtapes and an EP. Blake released an electronic album, Playing Robots Into Heaven, last September. He recently shared the Grammy for Best Rap Song with Killer Mike, Andrè 3000 and Future for his songwriting on Killer Mike’s “Scientists & Engineers.” He co-proudced the song alongside André 3000, No I.D., DJ Paul, and TWhy. Blake says collaborating with hip-hop artists has shifted his approach to production. “I just think it’s been probably the most creatively explosive genre to be following really for quite a long time,” he adds. “I think there’s a bravery to production and stuff in hip-hop going back decades that has inspired producers all over the world.”