NBA star Kawhi Leonard working on second album

Kawhi Leonard is a man of few words. His two-time NBA champion usually speaks for his quiet dominance on the court, but now, along with his music and culture, he continues to let his actions speak for themselves.

Last summer, Leonard, 31, surprised his fans when he and his creative partner Eesean Bolden quietly released. Kawhi Leonard Presents: Culture Jam Vol. During the first round of the NBA playoffs. And now he and Bolden, his senior vice president of A&R at Warner Brothers Records, are working on their next album.

“Kawhi is hands-on,” Bolden, 37, tells PEOPLE. Leonard doesn’t lend a voice to the project, but he’s a “passionate head of hip-hop” and hand-picked the featured artists alongside Bolden.

“We’re really locked in and focused on Volume 2. We have some great artists who want to be a part of that we’re working on. Kawhi is hands-on. He’s me.” I’m picking records with you. Cordae and Swae Lee are just a few of the artists who will be participating in the Part 2 project.”

Bolden says he and Leonard “talk about artists he likes because he’s the head of hip-hop himself.” Educate him on how he is made to work and how we will work together to do this.”

Volume 1 was a 7-song mixtape that fused basketball and hip-hop, a ‘passion project’ from our creative partners. “This he is two worlds colliding and we are discovering a lot,” he says, Bolden.

Bolden says he and Leonard “kind of wanted to see” how fans would react to his musical quest. We wanted to see how people would react because we wanted to offer a .A lot of people didn’t know we needed the Kawai Leonard Culture Jam business.”

Culture Jam’s latest release, “OK”, an energetic music video featuring Brahmsit and Flenna, features Ghetto Kids, a Ugandan youth dance group founded in 2014 by Dauda Kavuma.

“It’s such a great foundation,” said Boden, who reached out to Dowda himself after seeing the group featured in the French Montana music video in 2017. “We’re the ghetto kids.” wanted to be part of this project and wanted to make a donation and we want to give back but the spotlight on how crazy talented these young kids are I also want to hit it,” Bolden says.

According to Culture Jam’s official Instagram account, “Culture Jam is making a financial contribution to the Inspire Ghetto Kids Foundation to help build a community center that will support children living in villages in the Kalaani zone of Kampala, Uganda with school supplies. to strengthen their research.”

Youth empowerment is important to Leonard, who grew up near Moreno Valley, about 90 minutes from Los Angeles. “Community is a big part of what we try to do,” Bolden tells his PEOPLE. “We want to give back to the neighborhoods where we grew up, the urban youth. We want to be able to offer an experience. ‘Come out of our realm and say, ‘If you work hard, you can be successful at a high level as an athlete or as an artist. ”

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Bolden says it’s an “honor” to work with Leonard, a three-time NBA All-Star and Finals MVP winner. I see, “Let’s do it right. Let’s win.” He gives me the ropes to do what I need to do.

Bolden hopes that basketball and music will intertwine and continue to influence new generations of fans. I want to create moments like that and bring that relationship closer because when the two of you are in the room, they respect each other because they come from the same place. So I wanted to provide a platform where they could come closer together and do things together.