Richmond, Virginia artist SpiffyVee is building a world where rap, dance, storytelling, fashion, and visual expression all meet. She describes her music as a way to tell stories and paint pictures in listeners’ minds, bringing a quirky, colorful personality to records that are often rooted in very real experiences.
Raised across Richmond’s North, South, East, and West sides, Vee does not claim one neighborhood as her identity. Instead, she carries the city as a whole with her. Her foundation in hip-hop started at home. Her parents exposed her to artists and culture, including Lord Jamal, Wu-Tang Clan, Nas, and Tupac. Vee explains the teachings of the Nation of Gods and Earths shaped the confidence she had in herself and her capabilities from a young age. Her father, Eye Speak, was a musician, producer, and artist behind F.O.E. (Family Over Everything Productions), and Vee was involved in his music from an early age.
At 13, Vee began rapping in middle school, inspired heavily by Lil Wayne. But rap was not her first language of expression. She spent years dancing, including throughout high school and with Hampton University’s Majestic Dance Troupe. In college, she also found her voice through poetry slams and spoken word. During COVID in 2020, she picked up the pen again—and this time, she stayed with it.
Her first EP, Off-Script, captures the emotional and artistic evolution that followed. The title reflects both her refusal to be boxed into the “lil vee” or “cutie patootie” image people may expect from her and her belief that life rarely follows the plan. The six-track project moves through heartbreak, healing, family history, Richmond pride, resilience, and self-belief, functioning almost like a diary or a museum of different emotional scenes.
The project opens with “Audition Tape (Dolo),” produced by Ayo LJ, a breakup-inspired record connected to the uncertainty of love. “Break Character (S.B.M.),” produced by Kjay Beats, explores healing and rediscovering yourself after heartbreak. “Cue the Tears,” produced by ARAM, is perhaps the project’s most personal chapter, recounting Vee’s experience learning that police had gone to arrest her father and the years of separation that followed. “Fourth Wall,” produced by EvanneThePlug, turns toward Richmond and self-confidence, while “Strike-Through,” also produced by ARAM, is about breaking through family circumstances and rewriting the narrative with her own pen. Closing the project, “Final Take” is Vee’s declaration of self: MC, lyricist, performer, and unapologetically one of one.
With the entire EP mixed by Mooch, Off-Script is less an introduction than a first glimpse at an artist still evolving. SpiffyVee is not following someone else’s script. She is writing her own.
- Instagram: @spiffyvee
- TikTok: @spiffy11_11
- YouTube: SpiffyVee on YouTube
- Spotify: SpiffyVee on Spotify
- Apple Music: SpiffyVee on Apple Music