Lil Wayne may have played the guitar on his own songs, but now he’s planning to contribute to other artists’ albums.
During a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Weezy spoke about his love for the guitar, which he first learned to play for his and Birdman’s “Leather So Soft” video in 2006.
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“I had wrote a treatment for a video for an album we had called Like Father, Like Son, me and Baby,” he explained. “There was a song we had called ‘Leather So Soft’ – the song has a riff, a pretty prominent guitar. Once you hear it, you remember it. I wrote on the treatment I’ll be playing the guitar next to some old car.
“They were saying, ‘You gon’ look like you playing? You going for the look? You just gonna have it on your back?’ And I was like, ‘Well, no.’ Once I learned how to play it, anybody could tell you, once I learn anything, I’m gonna try to be the best in it and I’m gonna go hard in it and I’m gonna real immerse myself into it.”
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Lil Wayne also reflected on playing “Sweet Home Alabama” with Kid Rock and Willie Nelson at the CMA Awards in 2008, before telling fans to watch out for him playing the guitar for other artists in the future.
“So that’s what happened with the guitar — once those three/four strings got learned, I ended up on stage at the Country Music Awards with Kid Rock,” he said. “I didn’t know what I was doing.
“I play every [day]. You gotta start looking at the back of people’s albums now. No, for real. You’ll see in the production, you’ll see a little D. Carter. And you’ll be like, ‘Who’s D? I ain’t hear Wayne on there.’ Yes, you did.”
Lil Wayne previously spoke about his CMA Awards performance in a 2016 interview with Genius, revealing he learned the strings for “Sweet Home Alabama” moments before going on stage.
“I showed up five minutes [before]. I’m gonna tell you exactly how soon it was when I showed up,” he said while sat next to 2 Chainz. “They weren’t in their dressing rooms, they was behind the curtains. That’s when I showed up, the curtains were about to go up.
“I was like, ‘What are we doing?’ They’re like, ‘We’re playing ‘Sweet Home Alabama.’ They were like, ‘I know you know that, right?’ I was like, ‘I’m Black.’”
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Weezy went on to explain how he’d only ever played “Leather So Soft” on the guitar, but Willie Nelson quickly walked him through “Sweet Home Alabama.”
“What [Kid Rock] don’t know is, I don’t know how to play the guitar!” he said. “I just made a song called ‘Leather So Soft’ and it worked. All I know how to play is ‘Leather So Soft,’ you feel me? Is that gonna work for ‘Sweet Home Alabama’? I’m not sure. So somebody sees I’m like, ‘I still don’t know, bro.’ He’s like, ‘You’ll be fine, don’t worry.’
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“Willie Nelson walks up. He says, ‘Let me show you.’ He plays it with two seconds. He says, ‘Keep your fingers right here on these two strings, you’ll be alright. The whole song, two strings.’ I played it with him. Boom, curtains.”
Lil Wayne also played the guitar on his 2010 rap rock album Rebirth on songs such as “On Fire” and “Da Da Da.”
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