Kajun Waters: Taking Life One Beat at a Time

It’s about to be another long night in the studio for Kajun Waters.

As a music producer for some of hip-hop’s finest, however, that’s just part of the job.

Waters has made his music dreams into reality.

A true hip-hop head at heart, the Los Angeles-native studied the genre profusely, and moved to New York City to  earn a degree in music sociology at New York University.

“I probably got a lot of my [music] taste from my mom,” Waters said. “My mom was always playing music, so my first memory was just being in the backseat of the car with her playing hella’ different records. D’Angelo, A Tribe Called Quest, those were like my first memories of music. So I think that ever since then, I just had a taste for it.”

With an accredited degree under his belt, along with a master skillset in music production, music composition, and audio engineering, it came as no surprise when music label Empire offered him a full-time position as a producer/engineer.

Nights at the studio can end at 7pm or 7am, depending on how many artists come in that evening.

“The studio life is definitely filled with long nights,” Waters laughed. “It’s something I had to get used to at first. I don’t think I ever pulled an all-nighter until I really started working here. You get here at 9am sometimes and end up leaving at seven in the morning.”

“It’s crazy,” he continued, “It took me a while to get used to that schedule, but now it’s just part of regular life. Rappers, for whatever reason, like recording through to midnight. It’s none of that early 9 to 5 stuff over here, we’re not probably starting to record until around midnight.”

Aside from spending various hours in the studio laying down tracks for the likes of Jim Jones, Migos, and Dusty Locane, Waters is constantly on the go.

When he’s not putting in work at the mixing board, the music producer  can often be found onstage alongside the artists he works with, or on the sets of their music videos.

Dusty Locane, one of hip-hop’s newest and most prominent rappers, is just one of the many artists Waters has worked with who appreciate the producers talent and work ethic.

“I met him not too long ago, but he’s a real, real, real [expletive]if you ask me,” the rapper said. “Hard worker, feel me, he stays on it. When I need to pull up, make some [expletive] with him, we get it done.”

“In terms of chemistry,” Locane went on, “me and him together is just different, feel me? Like, it’s a competitive thing that we both got in us. So we push each other, feel me, automatically.”

Most people can’t handle living life in the fast lane.

But for Kajun Waters, he takes life one beat at a time.

“This career, I’m super grateful for everything that’s been brought to me,” he said. “I didn’t think in a million years, even as a kid, that I would be able to pay my bills off [of] rap music. Like that’s the most wildest dream for a little kid, you know? ”

“So every day I wake up thankful,” he went on, “and it keeps me working hard too. You never want to get comfortable, because I would be heartbroken if any of this got away from me. So everyday I wake up and just try to put my best foot forward. This is what I dreamed of when I was little, and I got it now.”