Sweet Life
Aminé has brought sunshine to the game for over a decade. Armed with a new album and his colorful personality, there are no clouds in his forecast.
Words: Georgette Cline
Editor’s Note: This story appears in the Summer 2025 issue of XXL Magazine, on newsstands now and available for sale on the XXL website.
Seasons change, but there’s one that stays the same in Aminé’s world. Jumping around onstage with dreads flying and fans screaming around him, the Portland, Ore. native tears through “Arc de Triomphe,” The Streets’-sampled track from his new album, 13 Months of Sunshine. As the crowd shouts the standout lyrics, “The f**k you be on?” Aminé’s white T-shirt says it all: Spring, Aminé, Fall, Winter. The 31-year-old rapper has become synonymous with summer, making upbeat, feel-good songs soaked in sunny production with all the requisite flexes to evoke a two-step and head nod. He’s the paragon of the Vitamin D genre.
For the last eight years, the artist with Ethiopian and Eritrean roots has shared his kaleidoscopic energy on albums like his 2017 debut, Good For You, and the Kaytranada joint effort Kaytraminé in 2023. Aminé’s made it tangible, too, through CLBN (Club Banana), the clothing brand he created in 2016 and a showcase for his sneaker collaborations with New Balance. But before all that, Aminé was deep in the SoundCloud trenches, combining his passion for rapping over spirited dance tracks in 2014, which helped launch his career.
The multiplatinum-selling executant, whose big 2016 hit “Caroline” could very well see a diamond certification in Aminé’s lifetime, dialed in on his patience with the release of 13 Months of Sunshine through 10K Projects this past May. In an era of feeling rushed, he went back to songs he started working on four years ago and came out golden. The 16-track album finds him collaborating with longtime producer Lido as well as Dahi, FNZ, Loukeman and Toro y Moi, among others. Just like one of its song titles boasts, the result “feels so good.”
Fresh off the treadmill, getting his 10,000 steps in, Aminé speaks to XXL in May on Zoom while sitting in his California home. A week before his project’s arrival, he opens up about having his dad on the album, the joy in discovering new bars and metaphors, inflections with Lil Wayne in mind, throwing his own festival, and the surprise connection he made with his favorite MC, Azealia Banks.
XXL: Your album title, 13 Months of Sunshine, was inspired by the tourism posters in Ethiopia that you’d see as a kid. What do you think this album may change about people’s perspectives of you as an artist?
Aminé: My dad is doing skits all over the album. And it’s him speaking English with his really, really heavy accent. I think it really gives, with the title and the background of my culture and stuff, I think it gives a lot of people a lot more of this telescope into my life that feels like, “This is what conversations with his dad is,” which is cool to hear.
I think from some of my favorite artists, sometimes I really love their music, but I don’t really know much about them, personally. So, I’m hoping that this kind of gives people just a whole new kind of outlook and kind of more in-depth version of whatever kind of fan they are, whether that’s a passive fan or a super fan. I hope this gives a lot more insight to who I am as a person.
“Arc de Triomphe” is your talk-sh*t record. Did somebody piss you off that day? Because you’re talking about burning bridges, stepping on people with the sneakers you’ve designed via your partnership with New Balance?
Nah, what’s funny is, I just think when I focused my entire album on this concept and digging deep in songwriting and stuff, this beat is so fun. There’s no way I’m not going to talk sh*t on it. And I don’t think I talked that much sh*t on this album, which was worrying me actually a couple months ago when I was finalizing all the records for it. I looked at my tracklist and I was like, Man, I’m not really talking that much sh*t.
I think for me, it was more like, that’s just hip-hop. That’s how being an MC works. You talk your sh*t, and you don’t back down. No matter if the people consider you the best rapper alive, you have to rap as if you’re the best rapper alive at all times, or else no one’s ever going to believe you’re good.
The beat is so fun and dancey, and I think bars get missed here and there, but that’s perfect for me because I filled it with tons of bars. So, maybe in two months, you’ll recognize one bar you never understood, which is what I love about hip-hop and how I’ve experienced hip-hop growing up.
Tons of Jay-Z records I listened to as a kid, and then when I got older and I learned what a Presidential was, I was like, Oh, that’s a crazy bar. And it’s like those moments, the youth might not understand this, or the adults might not understand. It’s cool to just see people kind of understand metaphors and bars later on.
Azealia Banks is very vocal. She praised you in multiple tweets this past May and described the music you’re making right now as boyfriend rap. When you first read it, what did you think about that?
As long as Azealia Banks ain’t cussing me out, I’m happy. To be on a serious note, she’s genuinely one of my favorite MCs, boy or a girl, you know what I mean? I think she raps circles around everyone.
When I rap over dance music—2015, that’s when I started to do it on SoundCloud and sh*t, 2014—she is the epitome of that. She’s been doing it since forever, and she is one of the first to do it, on just this grand level. That was so impressive to me and showed me that there were other beats you could select in hip-hop. It didn’t have to be a certain way.
Like she said, you can’t lose being the boyfriend rapper.
And me and her have been talking since then. I’m so psyched. I’ve always wanted to speak to her and collaborate with her and all that. So, I’m on 100 right now.
Last year, you put out the “360.5” freestyle. You killed it in your own way, but it was also giving Lil Wayne from over a decade ago in the best way possible.
That’s a compliment. That’s crazy. Yeah, I love that era of Wayne doing Da Drought 3, or whatever, and remixing every hot beat on Earth. That was the whole point for me when I did that.
I was just like, I love this beat. A. G. Cook is a really, really good producer. And yeah, it was summertime, I had nothing to do. I was still working on my album. I was like, let me just rap. I just felt like rapping.
I actually had Covid [in Italy] when I was shooting that. I was dead. I turned it on to look happy for that thing. I had to shoot it, but I went back in bed, and I was so sick after that.
So, you get some kind of inspiration from Lil Wayne. How has he been able to play a part in your career, when you’re thinking about rapping, bars, excellence, wordplay and songwriting?
I’m trying to find the perfect words for it, but Wayne, growing up for me, I was on LimeWire, illegally downloading music all the time, you know what I mean? I had “A Milli” before “A Milli” came out years ago. He’s the G.O.A.T., everyone knows he’s one of the best ever. But for me, it was more so, he has this personality on records that can’t be ignored.
I think a lot of people are really good at lyrics and metaphors and bars, but something about the way Wayne says something has an inflection to it. He makes sure you remember the way he says something. And that part is really important to me in rap, where I think we focus a lot on lyrics, but delivery and the way you say a word is so important because it can change the perception of a song, completely.
I’ve done a verse, listened to it and thought, Oh, this is pretty good. And then, I recut the entire verse with way more attitude, way more inflection, way more dramatics to it. Just because, yeah, I’ve seen that in Wayne, and you learn that that’s the way to deliver a song.
You’ve mentioned you leave things up to God. How important is faith to you in your personal life and your business career?
Faith is really important to me. I grew up Orthodox Christian, and I might not be the ni**a that goes to church every week, but I definitely pray all the time. And that’s something me and my therapist talk about all the time, about my relationship with God, and how much that means to me, because for me, it’s not even just a religious thing, but for me, it’s more so that I just know how I’ve seen things work out for other people in their lives, and crazy sh*t happened to people and great sh*t happened to people, and the worst sh*t happened to some people.
I really believe in karma, and I don’t really believe that things just happen because you’re so great, you know what I mean? I do believe I have been blessed because of a greater purpose, and it’s not just me, because I just rap good. A lot of ni**as rap good. So, yeah, it’s harder for me to not have faith in something like that because it’s really hard for me to believe just me. And, also, I cringe at the fact that anyone would think that it’s just them.
What are you enjoying about rap so far in 2025?
Let me see. I got my downloaded albums, but off rip, I mean, for sure, [Rob49’s] “WTHelly.” That is a phrase I love saying just because.
But for me, I really like the new 2hollis album [Star]. It’s pretty sick to me. I think 2hollis’ album is sick just because of his production that he’s doing on there as well. I love Ken Carson’s new project, More Chaos. I think that’s really good. There’s a freestyle I heard from this rapper named Nino Paid that’s really fire. Nino got this slang to the way he say certain words that just sound good. I really like the new Playboi Carti album [Music]. I love Carti sh*t.
I really, really like the Sault album [10], even though that’s not hip-hop, but it feels like it has hip-hop in its soul.
I really like the Blaccmass remixes. He’s this producer, where he’s been doing these remixes that are fire. There’ll be a song I barely like, and then he’ll remix it with a classic beat, and I’m like, Oh wait, this is kind of crazy.
It’s Freshman season. Looking back on your 2017 class, what was a memorable moment that you have from the shoot or just from that time?
Dude, I remember there’s this whole lore of people saying that me and Carti are twins. We look alike. It’s this whole thing that’s been going on for years and years and years. And I know him. He’s super chill about it. We have never personally talked about that, which is funny.
But when we were on that shoot, Carti had, he was standing next to me, and he had Cheetos before you guys took the photo of us. I was young and really thinking about marketing. I wore that T-shirt [with the different ways people would mispronounce my name] on the cover, and I sold that T-shirt the day after the cover happened. I think that was the first time someone ever sold merch they wore on the cover after the cover came out.
But he had the Cheetos in his hand, and I was trying to convince him to keep the Cheetos on the cover. He was just like, I don’t know.” But it looked so cool with the outfit that I just wish he kept it on there. It would’ve been hard.
I look at our XXL cover sometimes, and I’m just like, Man, I was so happy I did that. I would’ve been so dumb if I didn’t do that. It is just legendary. I think those XXL covers are such an award. It’s not just like a magazine cover. I think it’s a stamp in hip-hop.
I have [the cover] framed in my crib somewhere, and it’s sad to look at it and see how many deaths have happened in hip-hop [with XXXTentacion and PnB Rock] and just in general. It’s just melancholy. It’s nice to look at the cover, but I guess it’s just the reality of things.
Last summer, you had your inaugural Best Day Ever Fest in your city of Portland. Are you going to bring it back this year?
Definitely, yeah. We’re finalizing and planning this year’s one right now. Just keeping the lineup to be true artists I’m a fan of. I think that’s been the goal for me is to make the lineup always feel like these are the artists that I definitely listen to and you’ve seen me either post their music or you’ve seen me just be a fan of it and just kind of trying to offer something that Portland doesn’t usually get.
I’m also trying to do something with New Balance this year at the festival. So, just something one of one and really special with New Balance as a popup at the fest.
Album’s out for the summer. You have the Tour de Dance world tour coming. What are you excited about next?
I definitely have a tour coming later this year. The thing I’m more excited about is just the
album and just people consuming it and living to it for the next year or months or forever, whatever it is. I’ve just held this music and had it for three-plus years, so, I think it’s really, really nerve-wracking to see it say, “Album released,” and fully out into the world.
So, yeah, I’m just excited to see how people react to it, see how it changes people’s perspectives or lives, or just whatever it might do.
Aminé’s Tour De Dance Dates
Listen to Aminé’s 13 Months of Sunshine Album
Aminé photo
The summer 2025 issue of XXL magazine featuring Aminé’s interview is available to purchase here. The issue also includes interviews with all 12 members of the 2025 Freshman Class and producer Cardo Got Wings, as well as conversations with Larry June, Key Glock, Monaleo, Tech N9ne, Nardo Wick and more, plus a look back at what the 2024 XXL Freshman Class has been doing and a deep dive into who’s the biggest and best XXL Freshman ever.
