In this exclusive Studio Talks interview, we sit down with Canadian producer SspikeTrap to talk about his journey, creative process, and outlook on today’s music industry. As a member of Neila World, SspikeTrap has built a strong reputation through his work with major artists like Gunna, NBA YoungBoy, Kodak Black, and many more artists. In this conversation, he reflects on his early beginnings in Canada, his approach to making music, the importance of genuine relationships, and how he continues to evolve as a producer in today’s fast moving music industry. This interview was conducted by Andrej Aroch via video call on February 7, 2026.
“Artists don’t really want the same beat as their biggest hit. They want to find the next one.”
- SspikeTrap
For the people who are not familiar with you, can you briefly introduce yourself and your work?
My name is Spike Trap. I’m a 22-year-old producer from Toronto, and I’ve been producing for just about nine years now.
How did you first get interested in music, and how did that eventually lead to you producing?
My introduction to music was probably when I was around eight years old and my sister started taking piano lessons. I saw her taking lessons and thought, okay, she’s playing piano, so I need an instrument for myself. Right away, I ruled out piano and thought, piano’s for girls, she’s playing piano, so what can I play? I ended up thinking about the guitar and started taking guitar lessons for about five years. After a while, I started to hate practicing every day, and since I was doing classical guitar, it started to feel a little lame to me. Eventually, I stopped.
Then I found producing in grade nine, when I was about 14. I came across it because I used to watch a lot of YouTube. One day, I was going through my subscriptions tab and saw a type beat video. I was like, what is this? This isn’t Minecraft. What is this? So I clicked on it, and it was from someone I was subscribed to, who’s now one of my boys at Neila World, Lifted. He had posted a Mexico Dro type beat or something like that. That was the first beat I ever heard and my real introduction to type beats. I didn’t know there was a whole community behind it. I knew what a song was, obviously, but I didn’t realize the beat was its own thing with a whole culture behind it.
After that, I started looking more into beats and watching Genius Deconstructed videos, seeing how they broke down songs and explained how everything was made. On my 15th birthday, I bought FL Studio. I went to Shoppers Drug Mart and bought a $150 prepaid MasterCard because I didn’t have a credit card yet. I bought one of the cheapest editions and just started making beats. Since then, it’s been about nine years.
Who were some of the first artists or producers you linked up with when you started producing?
Like I said, Lifted was the first producer I ever found and really paid attention to. So I started looking at who he knew and who he worked with, and I began networking around that circle. One of the first producers I met was my boy Tommi Oslo. He asked me if I wanted to join this collective called Motorsport, and in that group were guys I still work with today, like Kassgocrazy and Wockboy.
We started networking with other producers in the underground SoundCloud scene, and that’s how I ended up meeting the Neila World guys. The groups were really close, and even though it wasn’t official, it kind of felt like we were the foster team for Neila World, since a lot of us eventually joined that group. We all went on a trip to Atlanta, and we had our own Airbnb while they had theirs. There was also a show, where we all linked up and met in person for the first time.
That’s really how I got started. I focused a lot on networking through Instagram, finding where I fit in, and building genuine relationships. From there, people introduce you to others, and everything starts to grow naturally.
I wanted to ask about how you joined Neila World. You mentioned it was through the first group you joined, right?
Yeah, it was through some of the first guys I had met. Everyone starts somewhere, and it’s kind of random, or just coincidence, who you first stumble across or end up meeting. Those were some of the first people I connected with, and I was always cool with them. I worked with them sometimes, and they were always showing support to me, just like I was showing support for them.
Eventually, they started adding more people to the group, and some of the guys were vouching for me. This was around 2021, maybe 2022. They asked me if I wanted to join, and I said yeah, because it made sense. I already knew all of them, looked up to some of them, and they all rocked with me, so joining felt natural.
Can you share how you first connected and started working with NBA YoungBoy?
The first song I did with YoungBoy was very random. Up until that point, I wasn’t that familiar with his music. I had heard most of his big hits when he was coming up, but I wasn’t really listening to him like that at the time. Around that time, Callari used to send me a lot of melodies, especially these aggressive, hard piano melodies that had that Baton Rouge type of sound. I didn’t really know what they were at first, but I was like, bro, these are fire, so let me try making some myself. So I made a couple of those Baton Rouge style piano melodies and sent them out.
Back then, I was emailing out packs all the time. I had a list of about 50 people I worked with, and I’d make a Dropbox folder and send the pack to everyone. One of those loops ended up getting picked up by Hzrd. He and Hurtboy added drums to it and sent it to the engineer. I didn’t even know any of this was happening at the time. I didn’t know someone had used my loop, and I hadn’t heard anything about the song. I didn’t even know Hurtboy at the time or talk to him before that. He just randomly hit me up and said, “My boy, we got one.” I replied like, “Let’s go,” but in my head I was thinking, how did you even get my melody?
Then he sent me a two-second screen recording of the beat, and I recognized it right away. I was like, yeah, I remember this one. He told me to stay on the lookout because YoungBoy previews a lot of music and might play it on live or on his story. I swear, about two hours later, YoungBoy went on live, played three songs, and the first one was the “Smoke Strong” beat. That’s how the first one came about.
The most recent one I worked on was also pretty random. After the first placement, I connected with a lot of the other producers who worked on the Sincerely, Kentrell album and other producers making YoungBoy type beats. We were grinding hard, almost like a sweatshop, just making loops and sending them out. I was getting songs, but none of them were being released, so I started feeling discouraged and focused on other things. The good thing is that those melodic YoungBoy style loops are pretty versatile, so I could still send them to other artists and not box myself in.
Later on, I knew my boy Carter Bryson was on YoungBoy’s last album, so I went to check it out. While listening, I suddenly heard one of my melodies and couldn’t believe it. It was crazy to be listening to the album and randomly hear something I made. It was a really cool surprise.
Can you describe how you usually work and how you like to start an idea from scratch?
Usually, I make a lot of melodies, and I also make a lot of beats from scratch. When I start a beat, it’s usually pretty random. Sometimes I’ll go into it with the intention of making something for a specific artist, but most of the time I’ll just start messing around on a plugin or some hardware until something sounds cool to me. Once I find something I like, I’ll build off that idea.
If I do have an artist in mind, I might start adding things that I think would make it fit their style more. But for the most part, I think my best work comes from making whatever I feel sounds good and figuring out where it fits afterward. When people try too hard to make type beats, it can turn into copy and paste versions of what artists have already done. Artists don’t really want the same beat as their biggest hit. They want to find the next one. So you have to bring something to the table that you think will resonate with them and still feel fresh.
Do you ever do studio sessions directly with artists and make beats with them in person?
I do. I used to record a lot of rappers in Toronto, and they’d come to my studio. I’d play them beats or make them right there with them. Being in the room together is definitely different. Most artists are really cool to work with. You hear crazy stories sometimes, but the majority of them are good people who respect what you’re doing and genuinely want to hear what you’re making.
Collaborating in person is nice because you always end up with something different. When you’re just sending out beats, you don’t always know exactly what an artist wants. You might understand their sound, but you don’t always know what mood they’re in that day or what kind of vibe they’re on. When you’re in the room with them, you get a much clearer picture of what they’re trying to do.
I wanted to ask about how you joined Neila World. You mentioned it was through the first group you joined, right?
Yeah, it was through some of the first guys I had met. Everyone starts somewhere, and it’s kind of random, or just coincidence, who you first stumble across or end up meeting. Those were some of the first people I connected with, and I was always cool with them. I worked with them sometimes, and they were always showing support to me, just like I was showing support for them.
Eventually, they started adding more people to the group, and some of the guys were vouching for me. This was around 2021, maybe 2022. They asked me if I wanted to join, and I said yeah, because it made sense. I already knew all of them, looked up to some of them, and they all rocked with me, so joining felt natural.
Can you share how you first connected and started working with NBA YoungBoy?
The first song I did with YoungBoy was very random. Up until that point, I wasn’t that familiar with his music. I had heard most of his big hits when he was coming up, but I wasn’t really listening to him like that at the time. Around that time, Callari used to send me a lot of melodies, especially these aggressive, hard piano melodies that had that Baton Rouge type of sound. I didn’t really know what they were at first, but I was like, bro, these are fire, so let me try making some myself. So I made a couple of those Baton Rouge style piano melodies and sent them out.
Back then, I was emailing out packs all the time. I had a list of about 50 people I worked with, and I’d make a Dropbox folder and send the pack to everyone. One of those loops ended up getting picked up by Hzrd. He and Hurtboy added drums to it and sent it to the engineer. I didn’t even know any of this was happening at the time. I didn’t know someone had used my loop, and I hadn’t heard anything about the song. I didn’t even know Hurtboy at the time or talk to him before that. He just randomly hit me up and said, “My boy, we got one.” I replied like, “Let’s go,” but in my head I was thinking, how did you even get my melody?
Then he sent me a two-second screen recording of the beat, and I recognized it right away. I was like, yeah, I remember this one. He told me to stay on the lookout because YoungBoy previews a lot of music and might play it on live or on his story. I swear, about two hours later, YoungBoy went on live, played three songs, and the first one was the “Smoke Strong” beat. That’s how the first one came about.
The most recent one I worked on was also pretty random. After the first placement, I connected with a lot of the other producers who worked on the Sincerely, Kentrell album and other producers making YoungBoy type beats. We were grinding hard, almost like a sweatshop, just making loops and sending them out. I was getting songs, but none of them were being released, so I started feeling discouraged and focused on other things. The good thing is that those melodic YoungBoy style loops are pretty versatile, so I could still send them to other artists and not box myself in.
Later on, I knew my boy Carter Bryson was on YoungBoy’s last album, so I went to check it out. While listening, I suddenly heard one of my melodies and couldn’t believe it. It was crazy to be listening to the album and randomly hear something I made. It was a really cool surprise.
Can you describe how you usually work and how you like to start an idea from scratch?
Usually, I make a lot of melodies, and I also make a lot of beats from scratch. When I start a beat, it’s usually pretty random. Sometimes I’ll go into it with the intention of making something for a specific artist, but most of the time I’ll just start messing around on a plugin or some hardware until something sounds cool to me. Once I find something I like, I’ll build off that idea.
If I do have an artist in mind, I might start adding things that I think would make it fit their style more. But for the most part, I think my best work comes from making whatever I feel sounds good and figuring out where it fits afterward. When people try too hard to make type beats, it can turn into copy and paste versions of what artists have already done. Artists don’t really want the same beat as their biggest hit. They want to find the next one. So you have to bring something to the table that you think will resonate with them and still feel fresh.
Do you ever do studio sessions directly with artists and make beats with them in person?
I do. I used to record a lot of rappers in Toronto, and they’d come to my studio. I’d play them beats or make them right there with them. Being in the room together is definitely different. Most artists are really cool to work with. You hear crazy stories sometimes, but the majority of them are good people who respect what you’re doing and genuinely want to hear what you’re making.
Collaborating in person is nice because you always end up with something different. When you’re just sending out beats, you don’t always know exactly what an artist wants. You might understand their sound, but you don’t always know what mood they’re in that day or what kind of vibe they’re on. When you’re in the room with them, you get a much clearer picture of what they’re trying to do.
I wanted to ask about how you joined Neila World. You mentioned it was through the first group you joined, right?
Yeah, it was through some of the first guys I had met. Everyone starts somewhere, and it’s kind of random, or just coincidence, who you first stumble across or end up meeting. Those were some of the first people I connected with, and I was always cool with them. I worked with them sometimes, and they were always showing support to me, just like I was showing support for them.
Eventually, they started adding more people to the group, and some of the guys were vouching for me. This was around 2021, maybe 2022. They asked me if I wanted to join, and I said yeah, because it made sense. I already knew all of them, looked up to some of them, and they all rocked with me, so joining felt natural.
Can you share how you first connected and started working with NBA YoungBoy?
The first song I did with YoungBoy was very random. Up until that point, I wasn’t that familiar with his music. I had heard most of his big hits when he was coming up, but I wasn’t really listening to him like that at the time. Around that time, Callari used to send me a lot of melodies, especially these aggressive, hard piano melodies that had that Baton Rouge type of sound. I didn’t really know what they were at first, but I was like, bro, these are fire, so let me try making some myself. So I made a couple of those Baton Rouge style piano melodies and sent them out.
Back then, I was emailing out packs all the time. I had a list of about 50 people I worked with, and I’d make a Dropbox folder and send the pack to everyone. One of those loops ended up getting picked up by Hzrd. He and Hurtboy added drums to it and sent it to the engineer. I didn’t even know any of this was happening at the time. I didn’t know someone had used my loop, and I hadn’t heard anything about the song. I didn’t even know Hurtboy at the time or talk to him before that. He just randomly hit me up and said, “My boy, we got one.” I replied like, “Let’s go,” but in my head I was thinking, how did you even get my melody?
Then he sent me a two-second screen recording of the beat, and I recognized it right away. I was like, yeah, I remember this one. He told me to stay on the lookout because YoungBoy previews a lot of music and might play it on live or on his story. I swear, about two hours later, YoungBoy went on live, played three songs, and the first one was the “Smoke Strong” beat. That’s how the first one came about.
The most recent one I worked on was also pretty random. After the first placement, I connected with a lot of the other producers who worked on the Sincerely, Kentrell album and other producers making YoungBoy type beats. We were grinding hard, almost like a sweatshop, just making loops and sending them out. I was getting songs, but none of them were being released, so I started feeling discouraged and focused on other things. The good thing is that those melodic YoungBoy style loops are pretty versatile, so I could still send them to other artists and not box myself in.
Later on, I knew my boy Carter Bryson was on YoungBoy’s last album, so I went to check it out. While listening, I suddenly heard one of my melodies and couldn’t believe it. It was crazy to be listening to the album and randomly hear something I made. It was a really cool surprise.
Can you describe how you usually work and how you like to start an idea from scratch?
Usually, I make a lot of melodies, and I also make a lot of beats from scratch. When I start a beat, it’s usually pretty random. Sometimes I’ll go into it with the intention of making something for a specific artist, but most of the time I’ll just start messing around on a plugin or some hardware until something sounds cool to me. Once I find something I like, I’ll build off that idea.
If I do have an artist in mind, I might start adding things that I think would make it fit their style more. But for the most part, I think my best work comes from making whatever I feel sounds good and figuring out where it fits afterward. When people try too hard to make type beats, it can turn into copy and paste versions of what artists have already done. Artists don’t really want the same beat as their biggest hit. They want to find the next one. So you have to bring something to the table that you think will resonate with them and still feel fresh.
Do you ever do studio sessions directly with artists and make beats with them in person?
I do. I used to record a lot of rappers in Toronto, and they’d come to my studio. I’d play them beats or make them right there with them. Being in the room together is definitely different. Most artists are really cool to work with. You hear crazy stories sometimes, but the majority of them are good people who respect what you’re doing and genuinely want to hear what you’re making.
Collaborating in person is nice because you always end up with something different. When you’re just sending out beats, you don’t always know exactly what an artist wants. You might understand their sound, but you don’t always know what mood they’re in that day or what kind of vibe they’re on. When you’re in the room with them, you get a much clearer picture of what they’re trying to do.
Do you have any favorite VSTs you use often, or any hardware gear you like using?
For VSTs, I really like Pigments. The newer version of Omnisphere is pretty cool too. I also use some of the Roland plugins, especially the SRX bundles. They have a very specific sound, but when you need that sound, they’re great to go back to.
On the hardware side, I have a synth at my place called the Super Gemini, and it sounds really fire. I also use some pedals, especially when I’m recording guitar. Using pedals low key changes the game, because you can get sounds you wouldn’t normally expect. It’s unpredictable and gives you a lot of random textures. I like experimenting, stumbling across something that sounds cool, and building from it.
Do you have any favorite VSTs you use often, or any hardware gear you like using?
For VSTs, I really like Pigments. The newer version of Omnisphere is pretty cool too. I also use some of the Roland plugins, especially the SRX bundles. They have a very specific sound, but when you need that sound, they’re great to go back to.
On the hardware side, I have a synth at my place called the Super Gemini, and it sounds really fire. I also use some pedals, especially when I’m recording guitar. Using pedals low key changes the game, because you can get sounds you wouldn’t normally expect. It’s unpredictable and gives you a lot of random textures. I like experimenting, stumbling across something that sounds cool, and building from it.
Do you have any favorite VSTs you use often, or any hardware gear you like using?
For VSTs, I really like Pigments. The newer version of Omnisphere is pretty cool too. I also use some of the Roland plugins, especially the SRX bundles. They have a very specific sound, but when you need that sound, they’re great to go back to.
On the hardware side, I have a synth at my place called the Super Gemini, and it sounds really fire. I also use some pedals, especially when I’m recording guitar. Using pedals low key changes the game, because you can get sounds you wouldn’t normally expect. It’s unpredictable and gives you a lot of random textures. I like experimenting, stumbling across something that sounds cool, and building from it.
What are your thoughts on using AI in music?
I think AI is cool, but it really depends on how you use it. If you’re just generating an AI song, taking the vocal, and throwing a melody on it, I feel like that’s kind of lame. There isn’t much of a real thought process behind it. But if you generate something and then flip it so it doesn’t even sound like AI anymore, that’s different.
It’s kind of the same as using Splice. If you don’t know how to sing, how are you going to get a vocal unless you’re sampling something else? With AI, you could generate a vocal and then flip it in a way where it becomes almost unrecognizable or you add your own swag to it. When you do that, AI isn’t the end of creativity, and it doesn’t take away from what music really is. You’re just using it as a tool and being creative with how you manipulate it.
Can you share the story of how “conscience” for Gunna was made from your point of view?
I got the opportunity to work on that through my boy Sinatra. He’s in the fashion world and had known Gunna for a long time. Around 2022, he really started locking back in with him, making a lot of clothes for him and going to the studio with him regularly. Before that, I already knew Sinatra through a brand called Stellar Studio that he had started with a guy named Caliber. They were reaching out to a lot of producers and promoting the brand through that, so almost everyone had one of their hoodies. He sent me one, and we started talking from there and became friends.
He lived in LA, and whenever I went out there, I’d link up with him and just chill with him. He’s a super cool guy. Once he started working closely with Gunna, he began asking me for beats and loops. I asked him one day, “What are the chances you could bring me to the studio sometime?” and he said, “Honestly, probably pretty high.” We had that conversation on a Tuesday, and by Friday I had booked a flight and was in LA, staying at his place.
Nothing was guaranteed though. There wasn’t a session booked yet at that point. With artists, it’s really random when they go to the studio. Most of them go pretty often, but you never know what they have going on that day or that week. So I just took the chance and went out there. The next day, he told me, “Yo, let’s go. We got a session tonight.” I remember we were standing outside waiting for the Uber, and a car drove by with the windows down blasting “BLINDFOLD” by Gunna. I looked at Sinatra and said, “Man, they don’t even know where we’re going right now. That’s crazy.”
We pulled up to the studio, and on the first day, Gunna wasn’t really recording. Me and the other producers, Kenny Stuntin and EVRGRN, who I worked on the song with, were just cooking up beats. We made about ten beats in six hours. The session was from around nine at night until five in the morning, and we were just going hard the whole time.
The next day, I pulled back up and they were already there, running through beats. They played the one we had made the day before, the “conscience” beat, and he said, “Yeah, pull this one up and record on that.” When he recorded it, I thought it was fire, but I didn’t think it was going to come out. It wasn’t a complete song yet at that point. He had freestyled the hook and the verse, and it was only about a minute long. They ended up looping parts to build out the hook.
A couple of months later, EVRGRN called me, and said, “Yo, check his story.” Gunna had gone back to Atlanta and previewed the song in his car on his Instagram story. I was like, “No way, so you’re saying there’s a chance?” Sinatra had been telling me the whole time that this was one of the ones and that Gunna really messed with it. Eventually, they finished the song, recorded it properly, and released it. It really passed the test of time.
Do you have a favorite production of yours that’s special to you for any reason?
I feel like I’m really proud of a lot of the songs I’ve put out, and I’m grateful to have worked on them, but none of them fully represent the kind of beats I really like to make. I’m not sitting here making YoungBoy type beats every day. I’ve had those opportunities, and they’ve been amazing, and I really mess with those songs, but most of the time I’m working on other types of stuff.
If I had to pick one, I’d say I really like “conscience.” There’s also a song with my boy Kassgocrazy, who’s a producer in Neila World and also releases his own music. We have a song called “DM,” and that beat is fire, and the song is fire. It’s like a gang classic, and all the boys really rock with it.
Do you have any advice for the new generation of producers who are just coming up today, especially on how to break through and connect with the right people?
I think the time when I started was really different from starting out today. Instagram feels kind of burned out right now. Everyone is constantly spamming DMs, and it’s ruined it for the real ones. When you’re networking and meeting other producers, you should go into it with the intention of meeting a new person, not just looking for an opportunity. There are tens of thousands of producers out there, and you’re not meant to work with all of them.
You have to find the people you genuinely relate to and actually like, and build real friendships with them. That should happen naturally. It’s tough to do that through Instagram, so sometimes you just have to meet people in real life, or connect through random situations. Things happen in unexpected ways. You just have to be cool and yourself. I know everyone says that, but that’s really how people remember you and want to be associated with you.
Just because you meet someone today doesn’t mean you have to work with them right away. Leave a good impression and build real connections. You never know when that person might reach out later or want to work with you on something. Not everything has to lead to immediate results right away. You put yourself in good positions, stay consistent, and over time, things start to happen when you least expect it.
What are your plans for this year, both personally and career wise?
I’m planning to do some traveling this year. If you have the opportunity, it’s good to get out, meet new people, and work with other creatives. Meeting people face to face is really important when it comes to networking and building real relationships.
Career wise, like I mentioned before, I feel like my catalog doesn’t fully represent the sound I’m trying to push. I’m just going to keep working and making music that I genuinely enjoy creating. I think you get the best results when you’re doing something you actually want to do. I’m going to stay consistent, keep building my catalog, and hopefully keep running up these songs while making music I’m proud of.
Follow SspikeTrap on Instagram: @sspiketrap
