On her debut album, The Breakdown, Rose Rayos a.k.a. Ms. Boogie embodies nothing but main character energy. “It’s that B.K. prissy princess / on my fitness / mind ya’ bidness / I’m so precious / oh so vicious / It’s that breakdown / so you betta’ listen,” she raps on the title track, letting the world know the empress of East New York is ready to claim her throne.
Since Nicki Minaj stormed the airwaves with Pink Friday in 2013, the hip-hop world has seen many wins for women. From Cardi B’s unparalleled number one hit “Bodak Yellow” in 2018, to Megan Thee Stallion winning three Grammys in 2021, to a plethora of new artists dominating the charts, what was once a boys’ club is now quickly becoming a game for the girls. Of course, that has never meant all the girls, which makes Ms. Boogie’s path-charting career all the more influential. Since reintroducing herself to the world in 2018, the artist has garnered praise with her transfeminine anthem “Fem Queen,” her sensuous single to “Dickscipline,” and her collaborations with artists like Kelela and major fashion labels such as Mugler. All this proves that Ms. Boogie’s catalog knows no bounds. The one thing fans have been waiting for is her debut album. Now, the wait is finally over.
While The Breakdown may be Ms. Boogie’s debut, it’s clear she’s no rookie. This fresh body of work combines roof-rattling bops with the type of soul and determination found in gospel. Her voice evokes the sultriness and rasp of Roc-a-Fella Records goddess Amil backed by the boisterous force of icons like Foxy Brown and Eve. To top it all off, her lyricism encapsulates a side of womanhood seldom seen in popular realms of hip-hop, offering urgent insights into the world of girls like her while maintaining the tenacity every iconic femcee is known for. If all that sounds like it’s too good to be true, that’s because The Breakdown proves that Ms. Boogie is simply too good for this world.
Like any hip-hop fan, I am always looking for artists to speak to my struggles while also providing a dreamscape for me to explore. There are a million Black trans girls out there waiting for someone who looks like them, speaks like them, and lives like them to bring their experiences not only to hip-hop culture but the world as a whole. Ms. Boogie is that someone. She’s that girl.
Produced by Minneapolis-based artist M Jamison a.k.a. booboo and orchestral accompaniment from Detroit’s very own Ahya Simone, The Breakdown is the nine-track album you won’t want to put down. Ahead of the record’s release, we spoke to Boogie about life, love, and the fem queen’s pursuit of happiness.
What did The Breakdown mean when you first thought of the title and what does it mean to you now?
The Breakdown, luckily, has kept its same meaning and symbolism since I came up with the idea. That’s one thing that’s been giving me the most confidence throughout this project. The story has told itself; it’s built itself. At the beginning of the journey, “the breakdown” meant simplification, narrowing down, getting to the point. But now, it’s grown into this sense of vulnerability, releasing myself from my own expectations, let alone those of my fans. So that’s how it’s evolved since we’ve spoken [two years ago].
This album is unlike anything I’ve seen aside from Quay Dash’s EP Transphobic.
She was rapping her ass off on that.
You have a song called “Build Me Up” featuring Carrie Stacks. Did you always know you would have a track that would juxtapose the title of the album?
I didn’t always, but I did know that I wanted to create a song that represented the cycle and shows what happens after you’re broken down. That’s what “Build Me Up” is. And I mean broken down physically and mentally. We can look at a photograph of ourselves from about a year ago or two ago, and it’s like, “Damn bitch, what was I eating?” Or, “I look good.” Or, “Damn, what was I going through?” It’s just that psyche that we put ourselves through of being built up to break ourselves back down. It resembles transition as a whole for everyone, not just on the gender identity spectrum; from rich to poor, from sick to healthy, every transition can go back and forth like a swinging pendulum. We’ve seen it happen to people that we idolize. “Build Me Up” is about that hamster wheel.
The hamster wheel. I got a similar vibe from “Dazed & Confused.” On it, you talk about rising up to the top with the next stop being breaking the ceiling, but then you find yourself back on the first floor.
Definitely. “Dazed & Confused” is exactly that. It’s about being at the top of your game, and 24 hours later you can be right back at where you started. Whether it’s intentional or not, it’s important to recognize that that’s possible. I think in my trajectory I’ve seen myself build an army, build a structure based off of who I was before I was Ms. Boogie. I chose to step down from that top floor to work my way back up, which is what I’m doing now with this album.
The cover is really powerful. You have all these passport photos, then you flip it to the back, and there’s the stamp for the Dominican Republic. What was your intention with putting that on the cover?
That was actually my very first passport stamp coming from the D.R. to America. Putting that on the back was meant to spark a conversation about what it actually means to travel. What does it mean to be a certain kind of person in a place where people like you don’t [openly] exist.
You’ve been rapping since high school. How has your relationship with rap changed over the years?
Not much. I still use it for the same things that I’ve always used it for: a communication tool, a weapon, a shield on how I make up my part of society, what part of me contributes to society and vice versa. I’m only able to express that through my music. I don’t deal well with public debates. There’s a very thin line between respecting my existence and not. I feel like I can create that conversation through rap.
On “Clipped,” I was cracking up when you said “I hope she knows how to douche and how to read a book.” You really went in on that one.
In other words, I hope she prioritizes her hygiene, and she’s intellectual.
There’s so much wordplay on this album, and some of it is specific to the culture. It’s very refreshing. How did all that come about?
Writing the album and using language that’s specific and dear to me, my community and my sisters is a gamble, right? Because you’re worried about alienating people who don’t understand or [that you’re] gate-keeping language. I had to take that risk.
But that’s what’s missing in rap and hip-hop: For the average cishet person or cishet-presenting person, they have the luxury to just use a lexicon that’s going to be deemed universal just off of them talking out of their mouth. Even if they’re introducing new language or lingo, people just adapt to it. So it was really important for me to use the colloquialisms that connect our community on this album.
When working with other writers and producers, it was a conversation. Do we want to be specific or do we want to be universal and marketable? I had to really let my hair down with that process. Because I found myself on the borderline of conforming, and I think that that would completely eradicate my whole existence as an artist.
That’s the funny thing about it. Just in the last five years all of these mainstream rappers are using our lingo now, from Drake to Latto. But when trans and queer people use this language, it can be interpreted differently by people outside our community with the wrong intentions.
That’s real. So it’s like, do we communicate with each other through this music? Or do we continue to just give away the lingo for the sake of assimilating to pop culture? While a lot of the language came naturally, it was also very intentional. There are also things that could be deemed cringeworthy. I had to realize why I was feeling that way. I made this song that talks about douching down. The song clearly did its big one-two in culture, in our culture in particular, but you still had a lot of people in our spectrum that were like, “Is she really talking about douching? Ladies don’t talk about this and talk about that.” I’m like, girl, Megan, Latto, Khia’s “My Neck, My Back.” C’mon. Everybody gets to talk about their anatomy and their processes.
New York has always had a lot of the best rappers. I can go to a friend’s birthday party and everyone starts rapping back and forth. There’s such an energy here. What does it mean to you to be from Brooklyn?
There’s this big sense of, almost like, nationalism when being from Brooklyn. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of reminding people that I’m from here in my art or in life throughout my travels. It’s become a part of my DNA. I know that I’m more than my surroundings, but I want to express gratitude to my city. New York has given me the courage to walk in my truth wherever I am, both physically and spiritually. It also feels good to come from a lineage of rappers that felt the same way.
“Hustler” is such an important track.
Thank you.
I think a lot of people can listen to it and feel something. But I think for the girls? You’re speaking on struggles that a lot of us don’t speak on. Sometimes when elders in our community say, "Oh, I’m your auntie, you’re my niece," it’s like this weird ownership.
Wow, you really tapped into that layer?
When I first heard you say, “Barbie, that’s my niece. She took to the streets when she lost her lease.” I thought you were talking about one of your sisters. Then I realized you were telling your own story. I can think of moments when I tried to reach out to somebody who said they would always be there for me, and they’re like, “Oh, girl, I can’t help you.” And I’m just like, “Oh. That’s how it is?”
It’s seasonal. Then they come back around when they feel like claiming you. It applies across the board from family to chosen family. Any human you’re interacting with who’s not holding up their side of the bargain deserves to be called out. Or met with whatever you’re capable of meeting them with.
How did you write “Hustler”?
It happened in pieces. It started off as this story that had to be told. It chronicles my relationships with family, sex work, and domestic violence. I know that all these things are so charged and probably deserve songs of their own. But another thing that I experienced on this album, or just in my journey, period, is agency and giving people as much as I want to give them of my story, right? I clearly could have made a 20-track album, but what would I have been left with for myself?
What do you want people to take away from The Breakdown?
In another hundred years, there is going to be a resurgence of people who want to know what our existence was like, the same way I feel that urge to find someone like me that existed before me in entertainment and specifically in urban music. I am going to die with that need. Because I know for a fact she existed.
I know she was out somewhere carrying, rapping down in the ciphers, somewhere deep in a cut. Whether it be Kentucky, whether it be Chicago, I know she was in there, and I know she contributed to a bigger picture in a scene, in a city, in a sound. So to the people I’m having these conversations with, I don’t know what else to tell you besides the fact that this is valuable history.
Photographer: Ramie Ahmed
Movement Director: Sol Angel
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