Spotlight: WizTheMc Talks Mental Health And Finding 'Where Silence Feels Good'
AT 18 YEAR’S OLD - WizTheMc had a plan. He would go to Toronto and become a rapper, just like all the greats before him had. And that’s just what he did. Wiz, the musical moniker of Sanele, was born in Cape Town, South Africa, and lived in Germany most of his life. As his interest in music escalated he began to dream about life overseas, instigating his move to Toronto and his recent visit to L.A. Now at 23-years-old Wiz creates “alternative pop hip hop” music, with songs like “For A Minute” racking him up over 40 million Spotify listens upon its release in 2020. Wiz’s music is at times upbeat and feel-good, and at others, it’s introspective, and emotional, a direct reflection of Wiz’s personality. His new EP, Where Silence Feels Good, is no different. The seven songs in the EP are Wiz’s way of expressing his feelings and thoughts on relationships, love, life, and the turmoil and happiness you find along the way. Wiz’s catchy rhythmic beats are heard in songs like “Everything” and “Premature Love” and his more somber acoustic self shines in “Empty Handed” and “Stoned Nights”. Ultimately Wiz’s music leaves you feeling. Perhaps it even leaves you in silence. And maybe, for at least a little bit it feels good - to be reminded that you feel.
Calling from Berlin, WizTheMc’s jovial nature and kind smile were welcoming across the Zoom screen. Beaming at the congratulations on his latest EP, he dove into how he got started with his career and what made him fall in love with rap. It all began with Wiz and his friend listening to music in his room and trying to figure out how their favorite rappers started their careers. They then decided to mess around on their computers. “We basically just downloaded like a beat or two from YouTube, and recorded our first song. It was so fun. The same day we shot a music video, because my background is in cinematography and photography,” Wiz explained. “I was just so obsessed with creating your own character, and just being that.”
Wiz spent the next two years secretly making music until he felt like he was ready to share it with the world. The only problem was he was making English music in a place that primarily spoke German. “So that's why I went to Toronto, and played some open mics,” Wiz shared. He played two or three open mics and when he saw that audience appreciated his music he felt like all of Canada was behind him. “I was like, well, Canadians, seem to give me a shot. So let's do it.”
And that’s how Wiz took the plunge into his music career - and took a serious step to accomplish his dreams. But sometimes dreams coming true can pan out in different ways than expected. This is what Wiz felt when his song “For A Minute” went viral during 2020. “It's just like the best and the worst thing at the same time,” Wiz explained. On one hand, he was excited about the success of his song but on the other, he had a million questions about what would happen next and unbelievable pressure. “It was the best thing that happened because I got to meet all new kinds of people. I learned what it meant to work with business partners and a label and stuff like that,” Wiz began. “But it definitely took an emotional toll that took me a while to kind of realize.” Wiz shared his feelings of depression in 2020 - feelings that partially came from the tumultuous political nature in the U.S and the pandemic, which made the greatest success of his career so far feel less important. But he also has just begun to process that just because a song went viral doesn’t mean your whole life changes. He wasn’t an overnight sensation that made everything come easy. He had to put in the same work with his music, only this time he had to remind himself that not everything can meet the same level of virality.
So Wiz put his head down and started focusing on a healthy mindset – and his EP was born. Wiz wrote “Everything”, “Break”, and “Stoned Nights” at the beginning of 2020 and the last three songs in the EP he wrote in L.A. last summer. Each existing in an emotional sphere that combined Wiz’s sentiments ending his relationship in early 2020 as well as the new emotions he felt emerging into the limelight - the challenging emotions and the enlightening ones.
The enlightening emotions are in part what inspired the EP title - Where Silence Feels Good. Also known as “my very unpredictable creative process,” Wiz said with a laugh. He was hanging out with friends when it hit him. “I sat there, and I was just like, ‘where silence feels good’. It just came to mind. And I wrote it down, like 10 times, which is I think now a good rule of thumb to find out if an idea is good,” Wiz shared. At this point, Wiz knew that he wanted his next project to be titled Where Silence Feels Good but he didn’t know the journey it would take him on and what it would mean to him. Wiz began to understand the two sides of his EP title: “On one side, the spiritual meaning, you know, finding the silence that feels good through meditation or other practices you have,” Wiz explained. “But then also the silence you share within a relationship you know, hanging out with someone. You could both be on your phone or reading books, and you look at each other and it's just like, nothing has to be said, but everything is perfectly fine.” But as time passed leading up to the album release, ‘Where Silence Feels Good’ had taken on another role in Wiz’s life – outside of the album. “In the journey of the past one and a half years while I was making the EP, I have been looking for a place where silence feels good,” Wiz shared. “It's kind of like a journey I've been on, and I'm still on.”
The EP itself was a journey for Wiz too. His first song on the EP, and the first to have been released, was “Everything”. Wiz worked on it with producer, Jeff Hazin, in Toronto. “It's amazing how the song came together. Like we had a burger and a beer and went into the studio. The first chords he played were the chords we hear in the beginning. And the chorus came, like 45 seconds later,” Wiz began. “Then that same night, I was just laying on the couch at my girlfriend's place at that time and I got the bounce. And he usually never sends the bounce the same night. I listened to it, and I just cried for like five minutes.” Wiz explained that it wasn’t a specific emotion that made him cry, just that he was able to express something he always wanted to express through music. “It was just this really odd, beautiful feeling of like, wow, there's a piece of me that just left me that always wanted to leave and always wanted to get out. And I remember that very vividly.”
But right now the song that Wiz resonates most with off his album is the lead single “Premature Love”. And like the title suggests it’s about falling in love too quickly but being aware of it. Wiz wrote it while he was feeling the way the song describes. “I just met this girl in L.A. that I liked and I wrote the song and I never even showed it to her in those couple of weeks where I was seeing her because I felt like if I showed her the song it would be too telling that it was about her.” Wiz said. “Very wimpy kid move,” he added with a laugh. “Premature Love” itself is a very upbeat song, one you can dance around to and a reminder of how good it can feel to fall in love. “Not to compare it to “For A Minute” but it lives in that world of fantasy love.”
Just like the exciting feelings in “Premature Love” Wiz is excited about his music and his next chapter. A feeling he is happy to express and feel after the heavy year that 2020 was and his struggles with depression. He is excited to release the EP and to focus on a healthy mindset. And one more thing he wants to say: “For anyone reading, I appreciate you for doing research and let me know if there is any way WizTheMc can serve his customers better.”
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