Louisville artist, producer, and quiet force 7eventray pulls up to the OddPod for episode 20 with Marc and Pod Rashid — and the timing couldn't be more perfect. His new project Louder in Silence just dropped April 14th, and this episode doubles as the unofficial listening party.
7eventray grew up in Louisville as the middle child of five, with five more siblings on his dad's side. He attended four different high schools — Eastern, Atherton, Liberty, and Aarons — before life intervened. When his mother got sick around 2014-2015, he stepped away from school to be there for her. She passed in 2016, and it took him years to process that loss and find his footing. Getting his GED recently wasn't just a milestone — it was something he did in honor of her, because she never got to finish hers.
As a kid, 7eventray was so quiet his middle school classmates thought he was mute. That silence, though, wasn't emptiness — it was observation. It fed everything. His music taste reflects that depth: J. Cole's Friday Night Lights first got him writing, but his influences stretch from A Tribe Called Quest and Gil Scott-Heron to Linkin Park, All American Rejects, Tina Marie, Curtis Mayfield, and even French cosmic jazz band Cortex. He's been making beats seriously for years — at one point cranking out seven beats a day — and produced the majority of Louder in Silence himself, with mixing handled by collaborator Tay Beats.
The album name is personal. 7eventray talks openly about how growing up quiet made people underestimate him — assume he was a pushover, or simply invisible. But silence was never weakness. It was strategy. The opener "Button Mashing" sets the tone perfectly, built around the idea of whether we're actually playing life the right way or just pressing buttons and hoping something works.
He's also a core member of Hxndsxght — a collective of producers and artists, including June DeWayne, quietly building one of the most interesting sounds in Louisville right now. The conversation also touches on his name change from LaTray to 7eventray after a drill rapper with the same name started flooding his streaming pages. Seven has always been his number — and now it's his name.
Louder in Silence is out now on all streaming platforms. Follow him at @7eventray and go check out the project.

Gary, Indiana native and Louisville transplant June DeWayne pulls up to the OddPod with Marc and Pod Rashid for a long overdue conversation — third time was definitely the charm. Known for his silky melodic delivery, saucy flows, and a catalog that hits different no matter the mood, June DeWayne is one of Louisville's most interesting artists flying under the radar. Not for long.

Born and raised in Gary — home of Freddie Gibbs and the Jacksons — June grew up close to Chicago, shaped by military parents who ran a disciplined household in a rough environment. That push-pull between stability and the streets is woven into everything he does. He moved to Louisville at 14, finished high school here, planted roots, and never left. He considers it a blessing.

Musically, June was a sponge from day one. He started writing at 13, inspired by J. Cole's 2014 Forest Hills Drive, studying rap all the way back to De La Soul and Sugar Hill Gang before finding his way to his own melodic lane. His early rap names — Rula T (courtesy of a battle rap app) and Kid 90s — didn't stick, but June DeWayne did. The name came simply from combining his birth month with his middle name, and now even his own mother calls him June.

The conversation digs into how June really found his sound: daily studio sessions at 400 Recording, a chance meeting with producer Tay Beats, and an obsessive study of what makes a lyric actually hit — not just what's said, but why it makes you feel something. His latest project JD Cooper takes its name from D.B. Cooper, the infamous 70s hijacker who parachuted off a plane with a bag of cash and vanished. June saw poetry in that — the plane imagery, the disappearing act, the perfectly executed move. That's his whole thing.

He also shares a heartfelt moment around the Lost in Translation project, named in honor of his friend Jonah Webb who passed away, and talks about a legendary Spike Lee-shot music video that turned into one of the wildest nights of his life — someone jumped off a roof into a pool.

Looking ahead, June has two projects dropping this year: the EP C'est La Vie coming in May (12-13 minutes, intentional, raw, honest) and a full-length project called I Don't Want to Be Perfect dropping in September — an OddPod exclusive reveal. Follow him everywhere at @junedewayne.

June DeWayne, OddPod, Louisville hip hop, Gary Indiana rapper, JD Cooper, melodic rap, Louisville music scene, underground hip hop, rap interview, hip hop podcast, Tay Beats, C'est La Vie EP, independent artist, J Cole influence, Louisville rapper, emerging artist, 400 Recording, hip hop culture, new music 2025, Louisville Kentucky

Louisville-born rapper, producer, and self-described "circumnavigator of thought and circumstance" Prodigy the Kid (PTK) sits down with Marc and Pod Rashid for a two-and-a-half-hour Easter Sunday conversation that covers just about everything — from childhood bedrooms to the music industry, faith to freestyle rap history.

Born in 2002 and raised in Louisville, Prodigy started writing music at 8 years old — lining out composition grids on notebook paper. By 11 he was freestyling over Childish Gambino beats into a Rock Band USB mic plugged into a PC, then graduating to a first-gen iPad, an iPod touch, a closet recording setup, and eventually a Mac mini purchased with money saved through middle school. GarageBand carried him all the way to 2019 before a mid-session computer crash forced him onto Logic Pro for the first time — and he's been on it ever since.

A Ballard High grad (class of 2020, homeschooled his senior year due to COVID), Prodigy grew up in what he describes as two separate worlds — bouncing between his mom's household and his dad's — which he credits with sharpening his instincts and sense of right and wrong. He talks openly about navigating depression at 13, how Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly became a lifeline, and how that album still reveals new layers over a decade later. His musical convictions run deep: Kendrick is his GOAT with three pivotal albums, and he has a standing dream project called Ville Matic — a Louisville compilation record inspired by Illmatic — that he hopes to bring to life as his platform grows.

The conversation gets into the business side of music in a serious way. Prodigy — currently studying music business — breaks down Spotify's evolving terms of service and the AI rights implications for independent artists, why Drake's $500 million lifetime deal was a missed opportunity, the mechanics of record advances, and Bandcamp as a more artist-friendly alternative to streaming. He also touches on staying a clean rapper, navigating faith and art, and how his 2023 album Ten Year Rookie was the peak of his ego — followed by a deliberate reset.

Rounding out the episode: a deep dive into wrestling (Cody Rhodes' redemption arc hits different), the Young Thug RICO case, Gucci Mane's legacy, and a side project podcast with his church friends built entirely around pitching terrible ideas.

Follow Prodigy the Kid at @prodigythakid