Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Think's the thing that sucks up roll call in the
Speaker 2: virtual sense is but yeahs, you know, like if everybody
Speaker 2: just went around did their thing without the yas.
Speaker 1: Oh, that's the fun part, some part of roll calls
Speaker 1: laughing at each other's roll call.
Speaker 3: We played it, but the guests did. There's live but
Speaker 3: obviously recorded so they can hear it.
Speaker 4: We played back.
Speaker 1: They figure it out.
Speaker 5: Figure it out?
Speaker 1: All right, My good people, Welcome to another episode of
Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme. Life's great rabbit hole, as I've been
Speaker 1: dubbing it. My name is Quest Love, your host, and
Speaker 1: of course we have your supreme effect. We got lia Yah.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I have to say, Layah, you're in Los Angeles right now.
Speaker 1: How how's it going for you out there?
Speaker 4: It's just.
Speaker 3: I'm scared to answer that question.
Speaker 4: I will say this.
Speaker 1: We are allowed by the time this comes on air,
Speaker 1: you know, by the.
Speaker 6: Time that comes on air, we'll be allowed to eat
Speaker 6: outside again. Because I hear that we were the only
Speaker 6: ones on the country that couldn't go outside. Look at
Speaker 6: these nails, couldn't get I went to a black market
Speaker 6: nail salon. They had a black curtain on the window
Speaker 6: yet a knock on the door.
Speaker 1: This is what we're doing, an underground doing. Yeah, be careful,
Speaker 1: all right. When I last spoke to you, it was
Speaker 1: one in thirteen people. Now it's one of eleven. I
Speaker 1: don't want the number to go down the lane. One
Speaker 1: in seven.
Speaker 6: We're getting better, We're getting better.
Speaker 1: Be careful, all right, sugar, Steve. You cool?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know I'm in the same city you are,
Speaker 2: New York.
Speaker 1: We're yeah, but things are problem for you. Got a
Speaker 1: new network, a new show, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean everything's going fine for me personally, but
Speaker 2: you know, city's a mess, country's a mess.
Speaker 1: Whatever if we've always been a mess, man, But you
Speaker 1: know that's that's.
Speaker 3: When you share was last month. Don't do that.
Speaker 5: I'm not scared.
Speaker 1: Hold me, hold me anyway. I built the bar in
Speaker 1: my garage.
Speaker 5: Oh you ordered online.
Speaker 1: That I ordered online? Set up right. It has neon
Speaker 1: lights and ship Yeah. Yeah, I needed something to do,
Speaker 1: so I did it. Just a one of one. You
Speaker 1: have a bar for one? Yeah, my kids sit at it.
Speaker 1: It's a little misdirection. Yeah, you want to keep your
Speaker 1: kids away from the bar.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and they're going to go that way.
Speaker 2: Just want to be able to drink in every single
Speaker 2: room in his house, including the garage.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, so we do COVID. We well, shit, one episode,
Speaker 1: we just might have to take over Drink Champs and
Speaker 1: you know, bring up bring out the alcohol here. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: West Love Supreme. You know, was that a plug? I
Speaker 1: see Layah frowning that I gave another podcast a plug. Anyway,
Speaker 1: how's it down in North Carolina?
Speaker 5: Man, I'm goodle bro, Which it's good. I mean, they
Speaker 5: trying to open up the schools. Wait, they thought about
Speaker 5: doing it because the kids had they testing, like the
Speaker 5: state tests, and I didn't send my son. I was
Speaker 5: just like, fuck that, like hein going, and they were
Speaker 5: just like, well, he can make it up. We'll try
Speaker 5: to make it up later in June whatever. I said, whatever,
Speaker 5: he ain't going. And literally the next day after we
Speaker 5: like when we pulled him, we was like, cause he's
Speaker 5: been home the whole time. Literally the next day they
Speaker 5: had like two cases pop up. And it's been they
Speaker 5: we do it now, but we pretty much get texts
Speaker 5: and emails from the principal every time a new case.
Speaker 5: And for about the past like two weeks, I've getten.
Speaker 5: It's been a new case, like every day yep, and
Speaker 5: so I'm you know, we've been in the house, man.
Speaker 5: I mean I still do my walks around the hood
Speaker 5: and everything. But I'm cooling, bro ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 1: We have a distinct honor of dissecting and exploring the
Speaker 1: third rail. We're bringing of one of the most I
Speaker 1: will say, probably one of the most feared, respected and
Speaker 1: astonishing mcs. Don't I don't want to use bad colloquialisms
Speaker 1: when describing great you know, they always say, like, this
Speaker 1: person is a monster. Oh man, he's a killer. No,
Speaker 1: probably an assassin. Yeah, yeah, no. I feel our guest
Speaker 1: today is probably one of the most beautiful things about
Speaker 1: the culture of hip hop be it as one half
Speaker 1: of one of the most loved duos of the mid
Speaker 1: nineties with Organized Confusion. His own catalog is nothing to
Speaker 1: sneeze at. He's constantly pushing the boundaries of what one
Speaker 1: can do in this art form. He's usually the favorite
Speaker 1: of your favorite mcs. I don't know if that's a
Speaker 1: tired cliche, Like I wonder if mcs get tired of
Speaker 1: hearing themselves being.
Speaker 5: Nah nah man. That's an honor. I mean, that's respected.
Speaker 5: That shows you respected by the people. They really do
Speaker 5: the craft, you know what I'm saying, And that's I mean,
Speaker 5: that's the highs honor.
Speaker 1: Well, he's here with us today, so please give it
Speaker 1: up for the one and only Pharaoh munch To. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's what I hear.
Speaker 4: I didn't want to see it.
Speaker 3: But where are.
Speaker 1: You right now?
Speaker 4: I'm in the basement of the house and Queens, just
Speaker 4: chilling out through a wintering mix of snow and ice
Speaker 4: right now, And like Fante said, man, I take my
Speaker 4: walks and then it's back inside. You know, I'm compromised
Speaker 4: because I'm mathematics. So I just been like.
Speaker 5: Same here, bro, Yeah, yeah, same here as well. I
Speaker 5: can't I can't wuk around.
Speaker 1: So you've been loyal to Queens this entire time for
Speaker 1: your whole career, pretty much.
Speaker 4: I moved. I moved out to l A for a
Speaker 4: couple of months to work on stuff and it was
Speaker 4: cool for a couple of months, then to Brooklyn and
Speaker 4: then back to Queen. So I'm back in Queens.
Speaker 1: Okay. So I know that our audience cannot see your
Speaker 1: zoom right now, but I will. Yeah, I was gonna
Speaker 1: say of all of our guests on the show. You
Speaker 1: probably have the most interesting background right now, well next
Speaker 1: to biz at least you have a very interesting action
Speaker 1: figure collection behind you right now.
Speaker 4: Like I kind of lost my mind during this pandemic.
Speaker 4: Like I said, I've been diligent, so all I could
Speaker 4: do was like all the stuff and go crazy. So
Speaker 4: I went batshit crazy with the action figures and it
Speaker 4: kind of work. Man. They keep me kind of stable, man.
Speaker 4: I love my action figures. There's some rare pieces that
Speaker 4: I caught h Cat on Instagram, who I followed. H
Speaker 4: put me onto a lot of a lot of different
Speaker 4: dope joints and a lot of different companies, and I
Speaker 4: just lost my mind, Like I just got these, uh
Speaker 4: these air Jordan's for my Miles Morales in the Male
Speaker 4: just now, like you know, so I just.
Speaker 1: Wait, wait a minute, Jordan's. You're dressing up your action
Speaker 1: figures in Jordan's exactly. And they're just as they're rare
Speaker 1: to get as well, they're hard to get.
Speaker 4: They're hard to get. They just they just redid a
Speaker 4: couple of companies who do them custom for the for
Speaker 4: the you know, Miles Morales, Spider Man.
Speaker 3: Please tell me, please tell me they're at the same price as.
Speaker 1: No no no, no, no, no no, yes, it's just five
Speaker 1: hundred dollars. Not no, that's interesting. So like your your
Speaker 1: your your passions with the action figures, any anything else
Speaker 1: in the in the pop culture kind of barrel.
Speaker 4: I'm not a collector, a little bit on the sneaker side,
Speaker 4: but I calmed down with that. You got a little
Speaker 4: bit ridiculous. I'm not ahead, but I will catch a
Speaker 4: couple of pieces if it's if it's something interesting. But
Speaker 4: this during this whole thing, man, it's just been movies
Speaker 4: and action figures and action figures.
Speaker 5: What's the last joint? What's the last joint you saw? Movie?
Speaker 5: Vise that talking?
Speaker 4: I mean, I've been watching a lot of stuff over
Speaker 4: and over again on repeat, revisiting, revisiting, and what I
Speaker 4: really really blew me away was the Mandalorian series. Okay,
Speaker 4: that just took me. You know, I waited so long
Speaker 4: for the Star Wars series to get good, and I
Speaker 4: never thought it would, and the movies were starting to
Speaker 4: get so disappointing. But then this series was just like
Speaker 4: it was. It was good and bad in a way.
Speaker 4: I felt like I had the wait waits I get
Speaker 4: got this old for them to get this good with it, you.
Speaker 1: Know, So mandalorian Is is worth investing in.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm gonna ask you when died it get you?
Speaker 3: Like when it was? When it?
Speaker 1: When it?
Speaker 4: The was it?
Speaker 3: Episode one?
Speaker 1: Was it?
Speaker 4: It was off the rip like I was, I was
Speaker 4: shining away from getting that the Disney app. I'm like
Speaker 4: I'm not. Yes, Then everybody kept talking about it, and uh,
Speaker 4: yeah it was worth Mandalorian is worth getting that for
Speaker 4: It's that good.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm gonna make a suggestion, bro, if you have
Speaker 5: a chance, whenever you get a chance, check out the
Speaker 5: sound of Metal. I think you would love it.
Speaker 4: Oh that's the that's the joint where the drummer loses
Speaker 4: is hearing.
Speaker 5: Yeah, man, what that ship? Oh my god, wait, lew
Speaker 5: a story again? You know, like for real? Nah, it's uh,
Speaker 5: it's your boy im and he plays a drummer that
Speaker 5: loses hearing. It's have a metal drummer, And I mean,
Speaker 5: you know, it's every musician's worst nightmare. But that ship
Speaker 5: is a great fucking flick. It's it's a beautiful flick.
Speaker 3: What streaming services that It's on Amazon?
Speaker 4: Amazon, like the whole the whole sounds the whole sounds
Speaker 4: gaping of how they show you how losing is.
Speaker 5: Incredible, not a sound design. That ship is amazing.
Speaker 1: All right, I'm on it. I gotta see it. I
Speaker 1: gotta see it. I just got done Small Acts, so I.
Speaker 5: Haven't watched all of them. I watched the Lovers Rock one,
Speaker 5: but I haven't seen all the other ones.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, yeah, watching in order. If everyone's most Jamaicans
Speaker 1: that I know rock with the second one, Lover's Rock.
Speaker 3: Okay, I'm gonna start with because the other one starts.
Speaker 1: That's a very unique joint. Yeah, but I think you'll
Speaker 1: you'll you'll like it.
Speaker 6: But if we shout now a shout out night in Miami,
Speaker 6: and then I'm done. Okay, Okay, Riverdale one night in Miami.
Speaker 1: Wait, you're just watching Riverdale. Steve pretty good, Steve, Steve
Speaker 1: is good for like it's Steve will be like real
Speaker 1: like non like most pop culture things. But then he'll
Speaker 1: just come back with like, yeah, I watched Real house
Speaker 1: Wives of Atlanta or.
Speaker 2: I don't watch that, but I have a question though,
Speaker 2: and then hopefully we could get too.
Speaker 1: Into the show.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Mandalorian has something to do with Star Wars.
Speaker 1: No, don't don't chat.
Speaker 4: Yo.
Speaker 1: Star Wars been fell off, and they're lucky that we're
Speaker 1: still talking about them forty years.
Speaker 3: About Little Yoda, I mean he's not Yoda's not Yoda.
Speaker 1: But yeah, baby Yoda, Yeah, I mean yeah. Mandalorian is
Speaker 1: like their series on the Disney Channel, and apparently it's
Speaker 1: as good, at least to the people of my age
Speaker 1: that are real Star Wars heads, like they're they're very
Speaker 1: happy with the results.
Speaker 3: Better than the last three Star Wars movies.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'm on, Yeah, for sure, I saw one of
Speaker 1: them that I liked, but I don't know which one
Speaker 1: that was, and.
Speaker 6: Don't worry about it. And you forgot it already. Only
Speaker 6: saw one? You saw Turn the Jedi fifteen times?
Speaker 1: Oh no, I don't mean those three. I'm talking about
Speaker 1: the of the jj Abrams variety, that one. But anyway,
Speaker 1: all right, so with okay, were you born in Queens.
Speaker 4: Yes, sir, going and raised Queens, New York, jamake it
Speaker 4: to make the South Side, Jamaica.
Speaker 1: Okay what uh okay, so only know my New York
Speaker 1: knowledge is just limited to whatever rappers rapping at the moment. So,
Speaker 1: like what was your peer area, like, like who what
Speaker 1: notable MC's that you would know of that that you
Speaker 1: knew of before you became notable or they became notable.
Speaker 4: I mean I was ahead, man, It's like and I'm
Speaker 4: and I'm old as ship. So I came up there
Speaker 4: in a park game era. So it was like, you know,
Speaker 4: urban legend dudes like grand Master Vic and the Boss
Speaker 4: Crew and just local hip hop crews that were doing
Speaker 4: park James that I was you know, inspired by and
Speaker 4: like Nah said, like just way too afraid to ever
Speaker 4: get on the mic in those moments. And then it
Speaker 4: shifted to Mikey D, the incredible Mikey D in the
Speaker 4: l era, and I still was too afraid to get
Speaker 4: on the mic and those jams and wasn't ready. And
Speaker 4: then by the time you know, I started going to
Speaker 4: high school and developing organized confusion, you know, that's when
Speaker 4: it was like, uh, you know, large pro and lost
Speaker 4: boys and all those cats in the in the area.
Speaker 1: Right, So you were there for the first you have
Speaker 1: memories of like the first generation of hip hop and queens.
Speaker 4: Oh definitely, I mean I was, I was shorty, but
Speaker 4: it was it was cats jamming. I mean, that's what
Speaker 4: what attracted me to the whole thing. Like, you know,
Speaker 4: not to sound cliche, but you could hear the music
Speaker 4: rocking from down the block and you know, crowds and
Speaker 4: forties and you know, you just it'll never go back
Speaker 4: to that. And it was an air about that and
Speaker 4: even the danger of the shootouts and you know, it
Speaker 4: was just a different time and a different feeling and
Speaker 4: culturally at that point, I was like I needed to
Speaker 4: be a part of this, but I just wasn't ready.
Speaker 1: Okay, what was your family into, Like what type of
Speaker 1: household did you grow up in? What was your home situation?
Speaker 4: Yeah? Man, both parents Gospel on the mom's side, jazz
Speaker 4: on the pop side. My older brother was heavy into
Speaker 4: the rock, which is, you know, while gravitated to that
Speaker 4: a lot, you know, deep purple Zeppelin, Rush and all
Speaker 4: the whole rest of it. Then my next brother was like,
Speaker 4: you know, James Browner and funk, and my sister was
Speaker 4: Michael Jackson. So I had the whole gamut, and I just,
Speaker 4: you know, just that whole seventies thing I think we
Speaker 4: all did, and just soaked it all in. You know.
Speaker 3: Were your parents native New Yorkers?
Speaker 7: Uh?
Speaker 4: Not? There from Virginia and they moved to New York
Speaker 4: when they had me.
Speaker 1: You're the youngest.
Speaker 4: I'm the youngest. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Do you remember the first album that you purchased or
Speaker 1: was it all just trickled down from your older brothers and.
Speaker 4: Sisters hip hop album or album?
Speaker 5: This album?
Speaker 1: I want to we'll start with that album because I
Speaker 1: have a come to Jesus moment with hip hop. So
Speaker 1: your very first record.
Speaker 4: My first record I purchased was Saturday Night Fiva.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's real.
Speaker 4: When I was.
Speaker 1: I got that ship when I was seven, you know
Speaker 1: you Okay, that's understandable. Concert wise, do you remember your
Speaker 1: first one? Did you go to concerts a lot when
Speaker 1: you were a kid or see performances?
Speaker 4: I didn't. I wasn't a big concert goer when when
Speaker 4: I and I regret it, you know, because I missed
Speaker 4: so many opportunities and I'm so ashamed, Like I never
Speaker 4: I never saw Prince live. Like it's just so I
Speaker 4: know your relationship with that guy, But it's just things
Speaker 4: like that that I that I regret. Also, you know,
Speaker 4: it was we were in Queen's and it was a
Speaker 4: journey to get to where everything was anyway, So I
Speaker 4: was kind of like nerd do too, So I wasn't
Speaker 4: venturing out that much back then like that.
Speaker 1: Okay, So what was your come to Jesus moment at
Speaker 1: least with hip hop as far as that's concerned, Like,
Speaker 1: were you just casually wrapping around the way or was
Speaker 1: this this thing where you were watching him sees on
Speaker 1: the block and decided that's what I want to do. Like,
Speaker 1: what was your introduction to that world?
Speaker 4: Was I was a crazy ill asthmatic, and I knew
Speaker 4: I had to make a choice that wasn't physical in
Speaker 4: terms of what I was going to do with my
Speaker 4: my my livelihood wasn't happening. Fire Man wasn't happening, garbage
Speaker 4: Man wasn't happening. So I was an artist. So I
Speaker 4: went to High School of Art and Design, Big Up
Speaker 4: the Kwame, Big Up, the Prodigy, mob Deep. Yeah, I
Speaker 4: went to that same school, and in that school was
Speaker 4: just a plethora of culture, black books, graffiti, just hip hop.
Speaker 4: Culture was rich at the time, and I just, you know,
Speaker 4: before it became you know, cool even to be and
Speaker 4: MC or get a record deal, I knew I had
Speaker 4: to be invested in the culture. So I'm very thankful
Speaker 4: for those moments because you know, I was pop blocking,
Speaker 4: and you know I was. I was way too heavy
Speaker 4: to get on the ground and do a windmill and
Speaker 4: some shit, so I knew I couldn't be a breakdancer,
Speaker 4: but I was just trying to get into the culture
Speaker 4: however I could in that timeframe. And it was around
Speaker 4: eleventh grade that I was like, fuck the art shit,
Speaker 4: I'm gonna express myself through this, this this, this hip hop.
Speaker 4: Even then I was beatboxing. I didn't you know, I
Speaker 4: had no voice, I was. I was horrible at it.
Speaker 4: Met Prince Paul had my friend tied Stick who had turntables,
Speaker 4: and I was like, yo, let's go and try and
Speaker 4: develop something, made a couple of demo tapes, took him
Speaker 4: home and listened to him. And I'm thankful again to
Speaker 4: be able to listen. You know. I listened back to
Speaker 4: those tapes when I took him home, and I was like,
Speaker 4: you're horrible at this shit, you know I do. It
Speaker 4: was the wacky shit I ever heard. But I was lucky.
Speaker 4: I was lucky to be able to hear that. I
Speaker 4: wasn't good and it didn't sound like the dudes in
Speaker 4: the park, and it didn't sound like the stuff on
Speaker 4: the radio, which made me say you gotta work at
Speaker 4: this sh bro You know, I was able to say
Speaker 4: that to myself before I let anybody hear what we
Speaker 4: were doing.
Speaker 5: But when you and po, who's the oldest between.
Speaker 4: Y'all, I'm probably the oldest by a couple of months.
Speaker 5: Oh okay, well y'all. Y'all, y'all both went to the
Speaker 5: same school. Y'all was in the same class, web gotcha,
Speaker 5: and both of you were art majors.
Speaker 4: Oh man. Back then, they had what was called rotation,
Speaker 4: so we were able to do photography, computer graphics, architecture.
Speaker 4: It was just the school. It was an amazing, you know,
Speaker 4: ray of different cultures from kids from different backgrounds. It
Speaker 4: really shaped obviously a lot of the people who went
Speaker 4: to that school. So that was a blessing in itself.
Speaker 1: I know, or at least I know from the folklore
Speaker 1: of it all, that I believe you were one of
Speaker 1: the last artists to work with Paul c. And I
Speaker 1: assume that this is pre organized or at least pre
Speaker 1: record deal, pre Hollywood basics. Where did he enter the
Speaker 1: story and how? You know, he's one of the most
Speaker 1: loved mythical figures that I've heard of in the hip
Speaker 1: hop like everyone has these like incredible words, but I
Speaker 1: can never get any story about his work, ethic or
Speaker 1: anything about him, like what was his role in Well,
Speaker 1: you were simply too positive before organized confusion, right, I believe?
Speaker 4: Yeah, man, we were simply too positive. We had just
Speaker 4: left like a local label situation and went off on
Speaker 4: our journey to start working on our first demo. I
Speaker 4: thought I was finding my voice at the moment. I
Speaker 4: was starting to get some props with the bars as
Speaker 4: an MC, and we went into the legendary twelve twelve
Speaker 4: to work on some demos. In twelve twelve at the
Speaker 4: time was probably seventeen dural large professor in the corner,
Speaker 4: just on a machine. I didn't know what he was doing.
Speaker 4: And we had went to the studio with some records,
Speaker 4: laid some vocals, and during the time we were laying vocals,
Speaker 4: Paul c was an engineer at twelve twelve as well
Speaker 4: as a producer. He walked into our session to get
Speaker 4: some wires and he was like, pardon me, excuse me,
Speaker 4: I don't mean to thrup his session, got some wires
Speaker 4: and he left. Next day I got a phone call
Speaker 4: from him. I don't know how he got the number,
Speaker 4: and he was like, I heard what y'all was doing.
Speaker 4: I think y'all got talent. I would love to work
Speaker 4: with y'all. And I had asthma attack. I was so excited.
Speaker 1: Did you was was he at least you know, I
Speaker 1: don't know what year this was. Was this at least
Speaker 1: post ultramagnetic?
Speaker 4: Yeah? Right, he had that, He had that status of
Speaker 4: working with Ultra super Love a C and even maybe
Speaker 4: some early rock him stuff at the time, if I
Speaker 4: can't remember. So it was just you know, if you
Speaker 4: can imagine, it was just like the ultimate phone call.
Speaker 4: So we went in and worked with him, and I
Speaker 4: bought in some different things that we were working on,
Speaker 4: and he was a stickler for truncation and programming, you know,
Speaker 4: gave a lot of tulige too large. And I credit
Speaker 4: both of them for a lot of that early SB
Speaker 4: twelve one hundred manipulation. It was very early on and
Speaker 4: they were really doing some real amazing work with that.
Speaker 4: And why I love Paul C Is that I went
Speaker 4: in to do a song and like a lot of
Speaker 4: MC's at that time, I went past the sixteen bar measure.
Speaker 4: He stops the session, closes the session and sends me home,
Speaker 4: like when you learn how to count bars, come back
Speaker 4: and talk to me. And I thought, I was wow,
Speaker 4: you know, I was getting a little name at the
Speaker 4: time and nobody had ever told me some shit like that.
Speaker 4: But he was just like, who's your favorite, you know artist?
Speaker 4: I'm like, Peve was like, go listen to those records,
Speaker 4: learn how to fucking rap, learn how to count. Until
Speaker 4: you do that, don't come back to the studio. So
Speaker 4: that was the first like dude who wasn't a yes
Speaker 4: man and started to help us shape our voices and
Speaker 4: understand how to make records. We made really, really four
Speaker 4: good songs for the demo with him that went on
Speaker 4: to touch Barbado's hands and Russell Simmons' hands and you know,
Speaker 4: but more than that, you know, he just used to
Speaker 4: invite us to his crib. He had a record, insane
Speaker 4: record collection, played drums. It's like, even in this conversation,
Speaker 4: there's no need to mention that he was white, because
Speaker 4: he was just an entity of like some soul spirit
Speaker 4: or some shit, you know, and so funky and whatever.
Speaker 1: And back then was that the novelty like, you know,
Speaker 1: how does this white boy know our shit better than us?
Speaker 4: Or like how you know, you know, it's funny, man,
Speaker 4: It's like, you know, you have to put these things
Speaker 4: in context in that moment, I don't. I don't think
Speaker 4: we gave a fuck, Like we really didn't. Like it
Speaker 4: wasn't even yeah, it wasn't even a question. We were
Speaker 4: just like, we need good shit. And I think too,
Speaker 4: you know.
Speaker 5: And I think too. At that time, hip hop was
Speaker 5: so kind of young. I don't even know if we
Speaker 5: were thinking about it as quote unquote ours, you know
Speaker 5: what I'm saying in terms of black people, like, yo,
Speaker 5: this is our shit. It was. It was so new
Speaker 5: that if you found someone else that was in to it,
Speaker 5: whether they were black, white, whatever, it's just like, oh
Speaker 5: they fuck with hip hop just like me. Like that
Speaker 5: didn't happen untill later on.
Speaker 4: Right, And so we developed a personal relationship outside of
Speaker 4: the music. I remember us going to see Batman and
Speaker 4: you know, him putting the raisin ats in the popcorn
Speaker 4: and like yelling, not up on this shit. I'm like
Speaker 4: raising this in the pile. You know, just cool, cool moments.
Speaker 4: And then the tragedy is we finished the demo. It
Speaker 4: was it was touching people's hands and we were getting
Speaker 4: a buzz and he got murdered, and that's kind of
Speaker 4: like the first of a line of kind of like
Speaker 4: traumatic tragic things that happened. And so me and Prince
Speaker 4: you know, had to go forward and try to get
Speaker 4: a record deal, but we didn't have our guy or
Speaker 4: kind of guide. And that's why that first album is
Speaker 4: like really kind of experimental, because in that moment, we
Speaker 4: lost the master ranger and we just was like taking
Speaker 4: records to the studio and ship and looping stuff and
Speaker 4: just doing ideas and you know, went back the fuck
Speaker 4: did bar count you.
Speaker 5: Know, yeah, noted gases. That was no bark out.
Speaker 1: So basically, had had a situation not turnout, had a turnout,
Speaker 1: he would have probably been the main producer of Organized
Speaker 1: Confusion absolutely.
Speaker 5: Wow wow wow wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well that's the thing now. The way that The
Speaker 1: Source first introduced you guys to the world, like they've
Speaker 1: made such a big deal of Disney having a record
Speaker 1: label that you know, it was kind of like, wait
Speaker 1: a minute, there's a rap group. Like the way they
Speaker 1: did it, I didn't see it as like Hollywood basic
Speaker 1: like just I don't even know why they had to
Speaker 1: put like a subsidiary of Disney Records, So I kind
Speaker 1: of like pushed it to the side, like I lowered
Speaker 1: my expectations a lot, and I jumped on the you know,
Speaker 1: once I heard instrumentals and whatnot, then it was like, Yo,
Speaker 1: that Disney rap group really is dope.
Speaker 5: Like I just kept because I think because real Wrap
Speaker 5: the only thing they had on Hollywood was like it
Speaker 5: was y'all and I remember you Lifers group, like the
Speaker 5: made the album.
Speaker 4: Life was a group. I produced the record for them.
Speaker 4: Me and Prinson produced the record for the We literally
Speaker 4: went into the prison and had to do that ship
Speaker 4: and security prison. That's a whole nother I've never heard.
Speaker 4: So you know, we're on the label and we got
Speaker 4: a little buzz you know from you know, Underground Ship
Speaker 4: Fudge bud YadA YadA, and they're like, yo, you know
Speaker 4: Dave Funk and Klein. Let me just give you a
Speaker 4: little history on him, right. It's responsible for like Brain
Speaker 4: Tribe and Jungle Brothers over to the Europe scene, very
Speaker 4: instrumental and and that whole thing and breaking a lot
Speaker 4: of things over there in Europe. He's that, he was
Speaker 4: that dude, and he was a visionary, and I guess
Speaker 4: he got himself a record label over there and got
Speaker 4: himself a nice team with Tim Reid, you know, and
Speaker 4: so it was it was, it was live. They just
Speaker 4: didn't have this aesthetic, you know. The aesthetic was.
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, the well bench that he will never
Speaker 1: share with me. Do you have? Do you have it?
Speaker 1: Do you.
Speaker 4: So? Going to the prison Roadway State Prison in New Jersey,
Speaker 4: the group was called Lifeless Group because all the members
Speaker 4: was doing life sentences. Dave, Funk and Klin thought this
Speaker 4: would be a great idea because you don't get no
Speaker 4: harder than cats that are doing life in prison. And
Speaker 4: I was like, I don't know if this is a
Speaker 4: good idea. Way cut the check, will go produce the record,
Speaker 4: and I never forget going in there my first time
Speaker 4: in the maximum security prison. They slammed the gates behind
Speaker 4: us and they tasked me and Prince with picking from
Speaker 4: ten inmates the five that would be in the group.
Speaker 4: Can you already see the tragic stake that that is.
Speaker 4: So these guys had to rap and we had to
Speaker 4: pick which ones it was the best. Wow, I was like,
Speaker 4: this is this is this is going to go terribly wrong.
Speaker 4: And I remember, you know, we picked the five a
Speaker 4: week the music. They were working on the songs. When
Speaker 4: we go to come back with like, what's up with
Speaker 4: the other two guys we picked? Shanked Wow, no longer
Speaker 4: in the group. You have to pick another two And
Speaker 4: you don't even know.
Speaker 5: It was that wild and so you did y'all like
Speaker 5: make the beats in the prison and everything, or like
Speaker 5: tracked and everything.
Speaker 4: We we tracked some stuff in the prison, brought like,
Speaker 4: you know, portable recorder to the prison for them to record.
Speaker 4: Oh my god, y'all killing.
Speaker 5: Me all the years we known each other. I had
Speaker 5: no idea Life's group dude.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Man, we did two songs on that project.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I f wow.
Speaker 5: Did like you ever keep in touch with any of
Speaker 5: those guys afterwards?
Speaker 1: They riot or whatever or.
Speaker 4: You did.
Speaker 1: Next you know, you should see the look at his eyes,
Speaker 1: like next question believe.
Speaker 5: Wow?
Speaker 1: Okay, So were there any other options besides Hollywood Basic?
Speaker 1: And why were they chosen uh to be the home
Speaker 1: of organized confusion.
Speaker 4: Barbido was an r at Death Jams at the time.
Speaker 4: He was like, this demo is insane. I love this demo.
Speaker 4: I love these guys. I just did uh him and
Speaker 4: stretched of the day. He's still you know, my peoples
Speaker 4: and my fans just been so many years we've been
Speaker 4: tight and cool. And he had the demo and he
Speaker 4: had Nase's demo. He took them to Russell and he
Speaker 4: was like, these two demos are amazing, and Russell Simmons
Speaker 4: rejected both demos.
Speaker 1: Oh god.
Speaker 4: Positive, simply too positive and not turn them both down.
Speaker 4: And then we were like, what are we gonna do?
Speaker 4: What are we gonna do? Got the offer from the
Speaker 4: Hollywood Basic that was kind of really nice offer for
Speaker 4: underground hip hop back then, and we were like, hey,
Speaker 4: fuck it. Well, well we'll fly to We'll fly to
Speaker 4: disney Land and you know, and record whatever. And then
Speaker 4: last minute I seen Russell in the club and he
Speaker 4: was like, you know what I've been listening to you guys,
Speaker 4: demo call me tomorrow. Let's have a conversation. So we're like,
Speaker 4: oh ship death Jams, oh ship and uh. We called
Speaker 4: Russell Simmons the next day to talk about a deal
Speaker 4: and he said, first off, simply Too Positive is the
Speaker 4: worst fucking name in hip hop that I've ever heard of.
Speaker 4: Gotta change the name. Gotta change the fucking name. We
Speaker 4: were like, nah, it's STP. You know. STP you know
Speaker 4: the oil even like that shi it is the most
Speaker 4: fucked us name I've ever heard him.
Speaker 1: It's nose.
Speaker 4: I'm signing with that name. We got to come up
Speaker 4: with a better name. You gotta come up with a name.
Speaker 4: That's how we listen to Organized Confusion. Took us forty
Speaker 4: eight hours seeing an Organized Confunction record Organized Wait, that's.
Speaker 1: How you named the group Organized.
Speaker 4: Confusion yep from the Confunction album. Yep. We were like
Speaker 4: oxymoron boot boom boom, sounds good. You're there's some that
Speaker 4: you could do. These moves. I could do that move,
Speaker 4: you could wear this, I could wear that. Wow, let's
Speaker 4: do it.
Speaker 1: And you went back to Russell like okay, we changed
Speaker 1: our names and now what's up?
Speaker 4: Okay, we changed our names. Now what's ups? Like eighty grand?
Speaker 4: Basic deal was like one hundred and fifty grand, and
Speaker 4: so we took the money.
Speaker 5: Hey, okay, as you damn will should have I see
Speaker 5: because this is what in ninety what like you remember
Speaker 5: like what you're it was a ninety probably ninety ninety one, right, yeah,
Speaker 5: because that's.
Speaker 1: Oh that period of jam I will.
Speaker 4: You know, I just feel like I heard these rumors
Speaker 4: are getting shelved. And ship never coming out and these
Speaker 4: horror stories and I was like, I don't want to
Speaker 4: go down that road.
Speaker 1: You know, that's crazy. Well, at least then because I know,
Speaker 1: like Reak and I used to dream of being on.
Speaker 4: Deaf Jam like everybody did.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it was such a like going to Motown
Speaker 1: like so for you to make the what you felt
Speaker 1: was the wiser decision of the group, I mean that
Speaker 1: that's that says a lot of what was Deaf Jam
Speaker 1: at the time, for you to walk away from this
Speaker 1: fabled hip hop utopian space and just go to Mickey
Speaker 1: Bouse's new home.
Speaker 4: I've made more terrible decisions on the way on the
Speaker 4: road too, But I don't know, man, I don't know
Speaker 4: if that I don't know if it would have worked out.
Speaker 4: Who's to say, you know?
Speaker 1: Do you you know? I know at least from if
Speaker 1: I get it a little bit, then I know you
Speaker 1: get it a lot.
Speaker 5: Do you kind of.
Speaker 1: Roll your eyes at like super fans who salivate over
Speaker 1: you know? I mean there's so much, especially with well,
Speaker 1: I guess with all three with equal NOx and stress
Speaker 1: and and the self titled record the folklore of it
Speaker 1: or like is it? I know, like sometimes Tarik is frustrated,
Speaker 1: where like every MC after MC comes up and praises
Speaker 1: as work, but then it's like, you don't necessarily see
Speaker 1: the evidence of of you know, your heart work. And
Speaker 1: I mean, does it get tiring hearing that year after
Speaker 1: year of like how much you influenced me and how
Speaker 1: much you influenced me, and yet this couldn't translate in
Speaker 1: the cells and you know, at least to that level
Speaker 1: of what it was back in ninety one.
Speaker 4: Definitely. I think after the first record, we were a
Speaker 4: little bit perplexed because we saw a little bit of
Speaker 4: you know, play and whatever, but we were inexperienced, So
Speaker 4: we chalked it off to that, you know, I'm wanting
Speaker 4: to believe you have to stay in love with the shit.
Speaker 4: But I can see how during that era a lot
Speaker 4: of cats were finding out more and more about the industry.
Speaker 4: Was kind of not sure about this girl anymore, like
Speaker 4: kind of falling out of love with it. And I
Speaker 4: kind of decided that can't do this unless you're gonna
Speaker 4: love it, love it, love it, love it, regardless to
Speaker 4: the outcome. And so I stayed in love and we
Speaker 4: moved on from the self titled record to the Stress Record,
Speaker 4: and I think we you know, started to really find
Speaker 4: our voices around that record, you know, got a little
Speaker 4: more love and pushed a little more forward with the
Speaker 4: Stress record and a couple of joints off there in
Speaker 4: terms of folklore and different songs on that record, and
Speaker 4: then I think, you know, we had it with Mickey
Speaker 4: Mouse after that record, and then we moved on to uh, yeah,
Speaker 4: we moved on to Priority, where it was. It was
Speaker 4: weird because at the time they they had kind of
Speaker 4: signed a bunch of established people and they I didn't
Speaker 4: see where they didn't break any records, and I was
Speaker 4: feeling like we still needed to be broken as a group,
Speaker 4: even though we were two albums deep. And we worked
Speaker 4: on that last one and we really put a lot
Speaker 4: into it, you know, I was trying to do this
Speaker 4: whole story thing and back forward, you know, put a
Speaker 4: lot of effort into it, a little bit of love,
Speaker 4: a lot a bit of love. I think people saw it.
Speaker 4: It's very difficult to do those type of records and
Speaker 4: make them make sense anyway.
Speaker 5: I love the record.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know a lot of people would be like, yo,
Speaker 4: that's my favorite one of the three, but you know, it's.
Speaker 5: My favorite one of the three, which one Equinox because
Speaker 5: that was that came out like ninety seven. So that
Speaker 5: was my freshman year at Central, and I remember getting
Speaker 5: my refund checked and running the goddamn Willie's Rickorsent tapes
Speaker 5: with him. I bought a gang of sh I bought
Speaker 5: the man, y'all.
Speaker 4: I remember when I first Yeah, I remember when I
Speaker 4: first met you. You were like, Yo, I love this
Speaker 4: record and I love the skits and so on and
Speaker 4: so forth.
Speaker 5: Yeah, who did Yeah? Who did the Sir Winston Howard?
Speaker 5: Who was that that?
Speaker 4: Yeah? No, no, no, so my my my guy Brian Fleman,
Speaker 4: who's a writer. Now, he found this guy in the neighborhood,
Speaker 4: like I think he was in the liquor store and
Speaker 4: this dude was like and he was like, hey, man,
Speaker 4: you want to do some skits on this album? For Wow,
Speaker 4: you just had his voice and we just incredible. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, hey, it just it just hit me that I
Speaker 1: believe the first time that I heard of O C
Speaker 1: was on your first Yeah. So how yeah? How did
Speaker 1: how did he get down with the click?
Speaker 4: And Oh? She had moved from Brooklyn across the street
Speaker 4: from from me. In the neighborhood. You know, back then
Speaker 4: we were playing you know, two hand touched in the
Speaker 4: street and still playing basketball and all that ship, and
Speaker 4: you know, I would knock on people's doors and be like, yo,
Speaker 4: we get in the game. You want to play. And
Speaker 4: you know, one day he was like, yo, I rap
Speaker 4: and I was like, oh God, and he rhymed and
Speaker 4: I was like, holy ship, Oh this kid might be
Speaker 4: a problem. And we just you know, started hanging out
Speaker 4: and we would we would trade and spa and he
Speaker 4: would be like, yo, I wrote something. And he would
Speaker 4: come over to the house do verses and wrap over,
Speaker 4: you know, pause tapes and sit and I was like, yo, man,
Speaker 4: you got it, man, you got something special. I just
Speaker 4: think he for me. Oh. He always had a knack
Speaker 4: for pocket, you know, just just command of pocket that
Speaker 4: I could never obtain. It's just something people have that's
Speaker 4: just they lock in, you know.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 4: So yeah, he lived right across the street from me.
Speaker 1: One the the the Stress album, I always wanted to
Speaker 1: know this. This shows you how much of a do
Speaker 1: weeb I am. I believe your Stress review and the
Speaker 1: source was the infamous Tupac hell Raisor issue m H.
Speaker 1: And I also believe that they had you write hip
Speaker 1: hop's very first op ed.
Speaker 5: I believe. Yeah, when you talk about like the rhymes
Speaker 5: you rolled and you clicked on the sp and.
Speaker 1: That's funny. You remember that part. I just remember the
Speaker 1: Chinese chicken wing take out Chinese food reference. That's how
Speaker 1: different we are. This is supernerves. I remember the food reference.
Speaker 1: No that you know that was no history, won't won't
Speaker 1: pan out. How crucial that that issue of the Source
Speaker 1: was to hip hop's future, you know, because basically I
Speaker 1: feel like that that Tupac cover is what built the
Speaker 1: myth in the legend of Tupac, and you know, it's
Speaker 1: one of their highest selling issues. But I also remember
Speaker 1: it simply because the the you know you guys had
Speaker 1: to leave review for that album, and you know, that's
Speaker 1: the first time that I heard of like like a separation,
Speaker 1: Like okay, so there's underground hip hop and then there's accessible,
Speaker 1: easy to understand hip hop.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 1: It was almost as if the reviewer of the album
Speaker 1: was kind of at a crossroads because he and his
Speaker 1: heart felt that this was the perfect album he was
Speaker 1: listening to, but because he knew that it was going
Speaker 1: to go over everyone's heads, he might have to take
Speaker 1: a mic away.
Speaker 5: So it was yeah, it.
Speaker 4: Was almost like we got four mics.
Speaker 5: Yea, yeah, I got four, I remember that right.
Speaker 1: But he basically said I would give this album a five,
Speaker 1: but because this is so above the head of anyone
Speaker 1: else that I, you know, I just have to take
Speaker 1: a mic away because it's too smart.
Speaker 4: I was crushed. That's another That's another moment where I
Speaker 4: was like, you know what, I don't know if I
Speaker 4: want to do this shit anymore because I'm starting to
Speaker 4: see that, uh, this shit is not based on the merits, so.
Speaker 5: On the music either.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and so that those are the things like in
Speaker 4: the relationship, if you will with the music, you start
Speaker 4: to question your commitment and your love to it, and
Speaker 4: you have to keep re assessing and and recommitting yourself
Speaker 4: to it. But that was one of the moments I
Speaker 4: was like, you're going to start this article off with
Speaker 4: I would have gave them.
Speaker 1: And I kept like I I guess I vicariously was
Speaker 1: living through you guys, you know, because at that moment
Speaker 1: we were just starting to make our record. And then
Speaker 1: you know, when I read that, I was like, oh man,
Speaker 1: he's basically saying that this album's too smart for its
Speaker 1: own good. And had they just did a little bit
Speaker 1: of terra firma down to earth, like make it normal,
Speaker 1: I would have easily shown why this is a five
Speaker 1: mic record. And that always horned me. But I never
Speaker 1: ever got to ask you how that felt like you're dope,
Speaker 1: but you're you're too dope, so we have to penal
Speaker 1: penalize you for that.
Speaker 4: It was crushing. I mean, I don't I don't know
Speaker 4: if I I don't know if I expected a five.
Speaker 4: It was a solid record, and I thought we had
Speaker 4: a chance to get a five. And then, you know,
Speaker 4: I would have been fine if you wouldn't have put
Speaker 4: that bit in there like ooh, these guys almost moved
Speaker 4: me to a boof. But I'm not gonna do that
Speaker 4: because you wrapped about part of holes of molecules and
Speaker 4: fucking right may be. So you know, you remember.
Speaker 1: Who the writer was on that review?
Speaker 5: Was it like the original mind squad?
Speaker 4: Dude?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 5: It was.
Speaker 1: Damn, that's that's the one. What's it running? Bro ship
Speaker 1: my my all my sources at at at work.
Speaker 5: All right. I remember around the time Pharaoh you I
Speaker 5: read an interview around the time of equinox and you
Speaker 5: were saying that. I think Poe was saying, like, Yo,
Speaker 5: let's get back in the studio, let's go at it again.
Speaker 5: And you told him like, look, man, I gotta be
Speaker 5: real at my heart really and in this ship you
Speaker 5: know right now? What was that like? Yeah it was.
Speaker 5: I can't remember what it was it. I mean, yeah,
Speaker 5: he was and I read it. I was like, damn,
Speaker 5: like he being real, you know what I'm saying. But yeah,
Speaker 5: what was that like for for you and Poe? Kind
Speaker 5: of that for y'all to both be in different places,
Speaker 5: and how did that affect you both, you know, personally
Speaker 5: and professionally in terms of relationship.
Speaker 4: I mean we're good and we was good. Then I
Speaker 4: felt it only right to go to him, you know,
Speaker 4: talk to him how I was feeling. I was crushed
Speaker 4: at the results of the last record. We put a
Speaker 4: lot into it. It ended it ended with the group
Speaker 4: getting dropped from priority, and that kind of hurt my ego,
Speaker 4: but gave me some time after we had worked so
Speaker 4: hard on that record, and I was like, I definitely,
Speaker 4: you know, talking to myself and fleeping on it. I
Speaker 4: definitely don't feel like going back in the studio right now.
Speaker 4: That's the last thing I want to do. So I
Speaker 4: need some time to kind of recoup and assess my
Speaker 4: relationship with music again. And because I knew it was important.
Speaker 4: You know, you need to love, love, love, you need
Speaker 4: to love this shit, and I knew I loved it,
Speaker 4: but I need to needed to take a step back,
Speaker 4: and you know, I had that discussion with him. I'm like,
Speaker 4: I'm tapped out, Like I'm really tapped out. I need
Speaker 4: to take a hiatus. And during that time, I realized
Speaker 4: that I just had a lot of personal things that
Speaker 4: if I was to recommit myself to this, that I
Speaker 4: needed to get off my chest that I even felt
Speaker 4: would be unfair to drag him into, because you know,
Speaker 4: in a group, you're sharing so much, and you're you're
Speaker 4: making these, uh compromises, and you're making these, you know,
Speaker 4: decisions collectively to put records together. And I just came
Speaker 4: out on the other side like I really felt it
Speaker 4: would be selfish to drag him. I feel like I
Speaker 4: would be dragging him into these ideas that I was having.
Speaker 4: And so went back to him and and was like, yo,
Speaker 4: I think I'm gonna try to vomit some of this
Speaker 4: stuff out and he he was like, yo, man, you
Speaker 4: got my blessings, you know what I mean? So I
Speaker 4: went on that journey.
Speaker 1: I have actually three creative questions about your work in
Speaker 1: organized confusion. Well, to start is, how do you guys
Speaker 1: build ideas and your songs?
Speaker 5: Is it?
Speaker 1: Well? First of all, even with the production, you know,
Speaker 1: do you guys work on beats separate or was it
Speaker 1: a collaborative effort? And that fat like, does the concept
Speaker 1: of the song come at the beginning or does it
Speaker 1: just whoever adds the verse first, then that's the concept
Speaker 1: of the song.
Speaker 4: As soon as we landed the deal, we went out
Speaker 4: and got us we twelve hundreds, and we started just
Speaker 4: banging out beats with the crew of cats and queens
Speaker 4: as well who were the organisms and they were they
Speaker 4: were working on music as well. And I started going
Speaker 4: out to these record conventions, the famous record conventions that
Speaker 4: uh you know, Finesse and Large and uh uh Salam
Speaker 4: and Tip and everybody would be at and I would
Speaker 4: see them in there, and they're my heroes and they
Speaker 4: would be buying these eighty dollars records and I would
Speaker 4: be like, wow, that must be nice, and we would
Speaker 4: you know, look for stuff. And then once I developed
Speaker 4: a relationship with those dudes, they started to be like,
Speaker 4: you got this, you got this. You know this guy,
Speaker 4: you know this guy, you got this. You need to
Speaker 4: get this. And started to you know, begin to get
Speaker 4: my chops up with on the digging side, and we
Speaker 4: started to you know, produce all music, and I gravitated
Speaker 4: to what I knew, which was you know, my brothers again,
Speaker 4: the weather Report and a lot of the Fusion Ship,
Speaker 4: which kind of the landscape of things I wanted to
Speaker 4: wrap over personally, and so just started putting stuff together
Speaker 4: and taking it to the studio and trying to make
Speaker 4: it better and getting with the right for you know,
Speaker 4: engineers and things like that. So Prince would make a beat,
Speaker 4: we would make a beat together. We would be like
Speaker 4: what is this? You know, we would sit there and
Speaker 4: be like, what is this song singing? What are we doing?
Speaker 4: And or I would come with a concept and be like,
Speaker 4: what if we're unborn fetuses and the mothers?
Speaker 5: That was my ship to the in vitro Nigga. I
Speaker 5: ran man, I ran the hell out of the damn.
Speaker 4: Song right right, So and then you know, shout out
Speaker 4: to Buck Wild and then around that same time, we're
Speaker 4: working with OG.
Speaker 5: Two man y'all o G was that Decisions record? I
Speaker 5: love that record?
Speaker 4: Thank you. Anton Puchowski was bringing live instrumentation to a
Speaker 4: lot of the early shit and just pushing us along,
Speaker 4: And it was a collective effort to answer your to
Speaker 4: answer your question.
Speaker 1: So I always wanted to know because you guys were
Speaker 1: so advanced, like way past where ultramat Netic was taking it,
Speaker 1: Because you guys were so advanced and sort of wrapping
Speaker 1: outside the boundaries of you know, outside the boundaries, coloring
Speaker 1: outside the lines. Was it frustrating to have such not
Speaker 1: not limitations as far as what hip hop music could
Speaker 1: have been. But I would always have I would have
Speaker 1: I could imagine. I always thought of you guys as
Speaker 1: sort of like advanced ere hip hop, like future. Well
Speaker 1: that's the time I've seen you guys are a future
Speaker 1: hip hop that kind of got stuck with the palette
Speaker 1: of limited music output. Like if if you guys could
Speaker 1: easily figure out ways to program that's twelve hundred so
Speaker 1: that you could rhyme seven eight meter here and then
Speaker 1: slow down there, and things that you could easily do
Speaker 1: now on pro tools, and you know, and reasonable like
Speaker 1: this shy yeah and all these so was it or
Speaker 1: even things like you know where ghost Face just rhymes
Speaker 1: over an album like I always wanted to know, Like shit,
Speaker 1: if you guys could rhyme over Frank Zappa or my
Speaker 1: Visa orchestra, just like you guys would have been those people.
Speaker 1: So like, was there ever musical moments that you tried
Speaker 1: an idea that was just like way too ahead of
Speaker 1: its time, at least technology wise.
Speaker 4: I was frustrated then, which is which made me happy
Speaker 4: because I knew what I wanted to do was expansive,
Speaker 4: you know. And I would listen to bands and they
Speaker 4: would play a groove at a tempo and then break
Speaker 4: it down and do a beautiful transition into a slower,
Speaker 4: more beautiful tempo. And I was like, how am I
Speaker 4: you know, how are we going to achieve this with
Speaker 4: what we're trying to do? And that's kind of what
Speaker 4: brought about that Hypnotical Gases song, which starts at one
Speaker 4: temple and goes goes into another temple. We didn't know
Speaker 4: how to program and at the time, so we started
Speaker 4: off with that one loop that that that slow loop
Speaker 4: and goes goes into the Fusion Ship. I remember Anton
Speaker 4: Chowski having to cut the two inch tape in order to,
Speaker 4: you know, get this ship to work, and you think
Speaker 4: back to things like that, and he's literally like, I
Speaker 4: gotta get this ship right, you know, He's literally slicing
Speaker 4: the tape. I know, y'all know, you know. And I
Speaker 4: wanted to go and I wanted to go into the
Speaker 4: fast beat as if the band was was was doing that,
Speaker 4: you know. That's that what was in my head. But
Speaker 4: I had no other way to achieve it, you know
Speaker 4: what I'm saying, Like, I didn't know how to you know,
Speaker 4: which kind of brings this full circle, you know, moving forward.
Speaker 4: I didn't know how to achieve that in terms of
Speaker 4: the programming in the sample time. I don't believe we
Speaker 4: had nine fifties at the time, you know. So I'm like,
Speaker 4: how are we going to get this idea out of
Speaker 4: my head? And we did it, and it's it's one
Speaker 4: of the records that Organized Confusion is most known for.
Speaker 1: Okay with without without uh without without want to be
Speaker 1: starting something. How frustrating was it for you as an
Speaker 1: n C as an M.
Speaker 5: I mean, I've been I've been doing this show for
Speaker 5: a little while man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, how how frustrating was it for you to
Speaker 1: hear just you know, without being condescending like mortal mortal
Speaker 1: hip hop fans just salivate over I gave you Power when.
Speaker 5: When you did Straight Bullet like years already did Straight
Speaker 5: Bullet like how and didn't have to tell people that
Speaker 5: you were good. That's something I hate about I gave
Speaker 5: You Power. It's like I'm a motherfucking gun. The song
Speaker 5: I was Gonna Dodge, Yeah, hip hop hip hop abody.
Speaker 4: Anybody ever told that that? People hate that intro to
Speaker 4: that song.
Speaker 1: Between between I Gave You Power and the way that
Speaker 1: Dre says NAS's name fucking Tray, motherfucking.
Speaker 5: Tray and all that lead into like the word yeah,
Speaker 5: but that's all right.
Speaker 1: I took half of mic off just for those two intros. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but basically like yeah, you know.
Speaker 4: It brings it, It brings it back so many just
Speaker 4: what we're dealing with today. From our lens, the fucking
Speaker 4: the lore and the love we got for Stray Bullet
Speaker 4: was just insane. You know. We would perform that record
Speaker 4: and it would be like the crowd would be like insane.
Speaker 4: So from our lens, we were getting the love and
Speaker 4: the props from that record and the writing and the reviews.
Speaker 4: We were like yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. When I Gave
Speaker 4: You Power came out, I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 4: that's fucking it's fucking premiere, Like what can you say?
Speaker 4: And then and then nas is like one of my
Speaker 4: favorite mcs, like like like literally that that's just so
Speaker 4: uh the rush of people that came to us like hey,
Speaker 4: got your ship. Man. Like, But but as a as
Speaker 4: a I don't think.
Speaker 1: I don't think to know.
Speaker 4: Right, and that that was That was another thing. The
Speaker 4: crew the crews were. The crews were interconnected in different
Speaker 4: way because OC was with search Light and it was
Speaker 4: you know, but just for real, as a as an artist,
Speaker 4: I didn't I didn't feel away like oh man, you know,
Speaker 4: I just I didn't get those feelings from it. It's like,
Speaker 4: you know, as Tarik says, it's like some still sharp
Speaker 4: and steel ship and what you're gonna do next. I
Speaker 4: say that to say later in life, I find myself
Speaker 4: in the backseat of a range Rover with Naves having
Speaker 4: a conversation and now says, you know what, man, A
Speaker 4: lot of people you know what I mean say, you know,
Speaker 4: they came to me, they say, yo, man, you know
Speaker 4: Pharaoh man did that ship before you man, and you
Speaker 4: know we had a lot of similar ship d so
Speaker 4: you know as the foundation, you know, we need to
Speaker 4: you know, we need to. So we had a discussion
Speaker 4: about it. But yeah, I never really felt like, oh
Speaker 4: my god, that's my concept, Like I never really felt
Speaker 4: that way.
Speaker 1: You know, I still maintain that Nos, I don't think
Speaker 1: NAS listens to that much at least and most of
Speaker 1: them season I know that on that level, I don't
Speaker 1: agree with you.
Speaker 4: Because I don't listen to I don't. It's like a
Speaker 4: handful of people that I listened to when I'm reporting,
Speaker 4: And then do we even listen to people's anymore as artists,
Speaker 4: you know what I mean?
Speaker 3: Yeah, season, So how you're going to be such an
Speaker 3: expert on I.
Speaker 1: Listened in the off season, but when usually when you're
Speaker 1: creating your thing, you're you're in your own you don't
Speaker 1: want to listen to other people, so that you don't.
Speaker 3: But if it happened afterwards, yeah.
Speaker 5: I listened to stuff like you have to listen, like
Speaker 5: so you know what not to do. Nothing else is
Speaker 5: more of just kind of a just like all right,
Speaker 5: if I know, like if I'm working on an album now,
Speaker 5: I'll listen to Pharaoh album be like okay, I know
Speaker 5: not to do this because he covered that already, you
Speaker 5: know what I mean, that's how it's far to go.
Speaker 1: Has Riek ever told you, I know for a fact
Speaker 1: that a big part of Tarik's development, especially on Things
Speaker 1: fall apart, like you know, I mean, there's a period
Speaker 1: for those that listen to the show, And I guess
Speaker 1: I can ask you this as well, Phararell. If you're
Speaker 1: creating this music in the mid to late nineties and
Speaker 1: the early arts, you know, there's usually in your head
Speaker 1: like a jury that you imagine, you know, listening to
Speaker 1: this and that you have to have it to that standard.
Speaker 1: So I know for a fact that Jesus Christ, like
Speaker 1: Tarik would run the it out of Equinox like every
Speaker 1: night at like religiously, like that was his that was
Speaker 1: his rocky music to get him hype for the show,
Speaker 1: like literally like it was like I gotta get to
Speaker 1: this level. I want this level and this this level
Speaker 1: of respect. Did he ever tell you, like how much
Speaker 1: that that that album into him?
Speaker 4: When we when we talk, we just we just do
Speaker 4: verses of each other's and different ship and not be
Speaker 4: like the fifth to make it all come together like
Speaker 4: the Zippo on a butter level, right, just you know,
Speaker 4: just amazing ship. Uh, nothing specific, but that, Like you
Speaker 4: have to know that. I imagine that when I when
Speaker 4: I turn in an album that Fonte and Thought and
Speaker 4: Broyce and and different other cats, you know, at a
Speaker 4: big fucking oak table and they're like.
Speaker 5: Now's like.
Speaker 1: Like the last time, like a whiteboard. Yeah, that's real.
Speaker 5: What is that?
Speaker 1: What is that?
Speaker 4: So?
Speaker 1: What is that in twenty twenty twenty one? Is because
Speaker 1: the thing is that we don't have that, Like right now,
Speaker 1: I'm current. This will be the first album I created
Speaker 1: in which I'm you know, in my mind. I always
Speaker 1: kept like, okay, the source is still a thing in
Speaker 1: my mind, and I have to have that level of perfection,
Speaker 1: Like I'm still striving for that four point five rating
Speaker 1: that I want even though it doesn't exist now. So
Speaker 1: what is what is that for you in your head
Speaker 1: when you're creating things or is this now you're just
Speaker 1: in the place where you just create for yourself.
Speaker 4: That's what I did on this this new project. A
Speaker 4: deconstructed all the shit that I don't like and you know,
Speaker 4: a lot of stuff I would listen to and be like,
Speaker 4: this doesn't have any replay value for me. Why doesn't
Speaker 4: that have any replay value for you? And what can
Speaker 4: you do when you do your shit that's going to
Speaker 4: give something some replay value? You know? The the lyrics,
Speaker 4: the lyricism work is really really good right now, just
Speaker 4: being a good or grade m C. It's just not
Speaker 4: good enough anymore for me. It's like, you know, people
Speaker 4: can fucking rap now. People have been rapping for thirty
Speaker 4: years now, more like what you know, what more is it?
Speaker 4: You know, just to hear somebody, Uh that's nice? It's like, yeah,
Speaker 4: he nice, And then I would kind of drift away
Speaker 4: from it. What can what can you do to make
Speaker 4: people retain some information? Or you're like, no, I think
Speaker 4: I'm gonna listen to that that that song for a
Speaker 4: second time, and it has to do obviously way more
Speaker 4: with the ranging and melody and chorus and bars as well.
Speaker 4: So in that time, I'm just like, let me step
Speaker 4: away and focus, still keeping in the mind that I
Speaker 4: want you guys to hear this ship, you know, because
Speaker 4: I'm in touch with thought. Towards the end, of the
Speaker 4: the record and he's just sending me tons and tons
Speaker 4: of shit and I'm like, how does he do this?
Speaker 4: Like your record records on records? And then he's sharing,
Speaker 4: like I'm so scared to share my ship, but he's
Speaker 4: just like, yo, I did this ship. Check this shit out.
Speaker 4: And it's like, oh my god, and so and so
Speaker 4: that's the bar. You know, you you know what your
Speaker 4: bar is, and it's high for me. But at the
Speaker 4: same time, Pharaoh can rap so fucking.
Speaker 5: What, like right, we.
Speaker 4: Know this already. And I don't mean that to sound
Speaker 4: I reckon. I mean that to say it's like it's
Speaker 4: the same thing with the.
Speaker 5: It's like the straight A student, Like if you get
Speaker 5: straight a's all the time, it's like people don't notice
Speaker 5: until you make a bee and it's just.
Speaker 4: You know what I mean, like the sort freestyle. Everybody
Speaker 4: in the note is watching that ship like y'all ain't no.
Speaker 4: You know, y'all ain't no. But it was so monumental
Speaker 4: for me because he's he's breaking the matrix in that moment,
Speaker 4: look at him. Only somebody who loves this tool to
Speaker 4: this level would even be able to put together a
Speaker 4: string together that level of artistry and lyricism, and so
Speaker 4: that that's what's beautiful about the now and getting mature
Speaker 4: in this and knowing that you know, I'm on my
Speaker 4: Morgan freemanship man, just trying to be the Morgan Freeman
Speaker 4: and of hip hop.
Speaker 1: I never heard it put that beauty. That's great.
Speaker 5: And even the thing with that thought freestyle, the thing
Speaker 5: that always tell people is like you have to you know,
Speaker 5: to your point kind of almost you know, fel about
Speaker 5: like rapping up being enough. You know. The thing is
Speaker 5: people watched that freestyle. It wasn't that they listened to it.
Speaker 5: They watched it, you know what I'm saying. And that
Speaker 5: was what kind of gave it the novelty aspect of it.
Speaker 5: Because I mean, again us we've been in the know,
Speaker 5: we've been knowing. But if we if he were to
Speaker 5: take those same bars and just spit them over beat
Speaker 5: and put it out and be like, yo, I just
Speaker 5: let some bars go, it wouldn't have been the same reaction.
Speaker 5: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: People see, I understand what it did for him, Look
Speaker 4: what it did for all of us. You know what
Speaker 4: I mean, Like anytime somebody come to the table and
Speaker 4: they they display that it just reinforces how marginalized I
Speaker 4: think lyricism still is. As much as it gets praised,
Speaker 4: I still don't think people like even like jay Z.
Speaker 4: I'm like, y'all still don't understand how good he is,
Speaker 4: as much popular as he is. It's just levels of
Speaker 4: lyricism that isn't discussing forums that can be brought out,
Speaker 4: in my opinion as somebody who's a fan of Fonte
Speaker 4: and Jay like this, this is just amazing shit that
Speaker 4: happens to me an amazing penmanship. And you know, I
Speaker 4: think a lot of it goes still to this day,
Speaker 4: goes over people's heads. How amazing some of this shit
Speaker 4: is that makes any sense? All Right?
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna not ask you the question that I
Speaker 1: hate when journalists ask me this question, So I'll remix it.
Speaker 1: Who are your favorite MC's then? And I guess I'm
Speaker 1: really asking, is there anyone post twenty ten, really post
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen that you like? Now prepared for that answer
Speaker 1: to be no if it's non, no, no no, So
Speaker 1: that's I'll just have you just who who are your
Speaker 1: go to?
Speaker 4: Like?
Speaker 1: Who do you like? Really?
Speaker 4: Like? I'm I'm trying, you know, I pull from all
Speaker 4: of these dudes, But I think Kendrick is an obvious,
Speaker 4: an obvious choice because you know, on the on the
Speaker 4: album That Touched My Heart, he had an understanding of
Speaker 4: very early on that I'm nice, but I need to
Speaker 4: be surrounded by arrangement and music and all these things.
Speaker 4: And he made that marriage and it was a moment
Speaker 4: again that that pushed the envelope of what could be done.
Speaker 4: Kendrick is one, but just all time, like any you know,
Speaker 4: I mean, my all time is the same cast of dudes.
Speaker 4: It's a rock him and Kane and g rap Rap
Speaker 4: being my favorite, slick Rick, who I think influenced a
Speaker 4: whole array of people, but they don't get that slick
Speaker 4: rickers influence them because of tone. But slick Rick is
Speaker 4: the voice, he is a master. And Chuck d and
Speaker 4: Chris and l is there.
Speaker 1: Someone that you feel is over and overrated, overlooked, Like
Speaker 1: I'm realizing now that Tarik's main influence is an MC.
Speaker 1: He never mentions, well, not that he does interviews. I
Speaker 1: didn't realize how much of an influence that Greg Nice
Speaker 1: is on Tarik. And usually Greg Nice isn't the first
Speaker 1: name that comes to people's but I mean Greg Nice
Speaker 1: is he He's kind of like a really great tuna
Speaker 1: fish sandwich. Like it's not it's not the it's not
Speaker 1: the food. No, it's not the food that you like,
Speaker 1: Like it's not on your last meal list, but it's
Speaker 1: consistent and if may right, it hits the spot. But
Speaker 1: you just overlook it, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: And that's exactly that's exactly what I'm talking about. Like
Speaker 4: Greg Nice is in the Hall of Fame of and
Speaker 4: you wouldn't realize that he could influence a black thought,
Speaker 4: but hell yeah he could. He influenced all of us.
Speaker 4: He pushed over this area and he you know, I
Speaker 4: can't explain it, but this shit is marginalized that can
Speaker 4: only be discussed in a lyric room. How Greg Knights
Speaker 4: can influence black thought, it's very much so. And he's
Speaker 4: one of my favorite MC's as well.
Speaker 1: Okay, I got one last organized confusing record. I swear
Speaker 1: to God, we'll finally get to your solo career within
Speaker 1: the first four hours of this. This is this question
Speaker 1: I've been dying to know. I have a copy of
Speaker 1: Stress that has different music on. Let's organize, not the
Speaker 1: protruce Russian sample but there's another version of Less Organized
Speaker 1: with Tip that I had. I guess I had the
Speaker 1: press copy of this Ship. Why was that music change?
Speaker 1: That Ship drove me crazy when I first heard it,
Speaker 1: and then when I brought the album it was new
Speaker 1: music and I was like, wait a minute, this isn't
Speaker 1: a version on it, and it's like snuffle up. I guess,
Speaker 1: like was it real? Was it not real? And anybody
Speaker 1: that's been on this show involved with that record? Whatever
Speaker 1: Tip name? I asked, was it me? Or did I
Speaker 1: remember another version of Let's Organize that never made it?
Speaker 4: It's the original version. It's ill, the ill version, and
Speaker 4: we will we have that version I do I could
Speaker 4: get and see. That's another That's another thing that won't
Speaker 4: ever happen again. Is we were in studios, you know
Speaker 4: the Drive the studio that was in the Jive building,
Speaker 4: Battery studios, and we were recording and Tip, you know,
Speaker 4: artists would be in difference and Tip just heard that beat,
Speaker 4: came into our room and was like, fuck, y'all, I'm
Speaker 4: getting on this song. Where's my part? We were shit
Speaker 4: and he went in and he just you know, vibed
Speaker 4: it out. You know this It got me moving like this.
Speaker 4: It got me moving. I need to be on this song.
Speaker 4: I remember ever could being in sessions in there and
Speaker 4: again it was just people flowing throughout the hallways and
Speaker 4: that should have never happened again in music. I think
Speaker 4: mistakenly I want to say mistakenly, but organically happening because
Speaker 4: of different people in different studios. But yeah, we're working
Speaker 4: on that and it was like y'all got to get
Speaker 4: on this song. So that's how that happened.
Speaker 1: Wow, Yeah, I gotta hear that, man, Like I've been
Speaker 1: dreaming of that moment. Why was it changed at the
Speaker 1: last minute or was that sample issue or.
Speaker 8: H I don't know, man, I think I think it
Speaker 8: was a label things, you know, we need to remix
Speaker 8: this song or whatever, and you know we fell for it.
Speaker 1: I mean this is actually this was the jazzier, more effective.
Speaker 1: I mean I've DJ'ed it and people danced to it,
Speaker 1: so it was it was probably the better decision. But
Speaker 1: the way y'all hooked that beat up on that first
Speaker 1: Joe Prince Pol did.
Speaker 4: That beat, man, if I was driving, I would.
Speaker 1: Have drove two hundred miles per hour into a wall
Speaker 1: and been happy like that. That Joe was just so incredible. Man.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, thank you.
Speaker 5: In your time off from in between Equinox to uh
Speaker 5: you know, na, what were you doing during that time?
Speaker 4: Contemplating my life? Now, I thought, if you're gonna if
Speaker 4: you're gonna recommit, you know, on some rocky shit, and
Speaker 4: you're gonna do it by yourself, then you need to
Speaker 4: really put yourself through the the ringer and the test
Speaker 4: of that it wasn't a pretentious thing. Started working on music.
Speaker 4: I did some demos. I went overseas with Barbido and
Speaker 4: Que Unique and destroying those cats or retored retord Europe.
Speaker 4: I was by myself. I had a dabt machine and
Speaker 4: I was like, and you know, this is me having
Speaker 4: a conversation with my owner self. If you really about it,
Speaker 4: about it, you're gonna press that debt and you're gonna
Speaker 4: go on stage by yourself, and you're going to see
Speaker 4: if you're about it, and you're going to see if
Speaker 4: you got what it takes to be a solo artist.
Speaker 4: Because I really, if it wasn't for Prince, I wouldn't
Speaker 4: have got into it. Like you know, he was the
Speaker 4: conduit obviously to give me. You know, I'm not really
Speaker 4: outgoing like that, and so I needed to be like,
Speaker 4: are you really you know about this shit? You need
Speaker 4: to get up there by yourself and not having any money,
Speaker 4: and you know, tours in Europe, I ain't have a DJ.
Speaker 4: I literally had a portable DAT machine. Wow, and would
Speaker 4: be like press play on the portable dat to my
Speaker 4: intro and walk out on stage.
Speaker 5: Hey, it was no break, it was.
Speaker 1: Can I ask from one too? Damn? That annoys me?
Speaker 1: How burdensome were annoying to you? At least in the
Speaker 1: last twenty years? Are those four notes from Simon says.
Speaker 3: I didn't say it. I was scared.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's strange, man. It's like I know a
Speaker 4: lot of artists talk about the disdain for those records.
Speaker 1: Yeah, te Spirit or me myself, and I like the
Speaker 1: group that hates their hit, right.
Speaker 4: But I've really embraced the ship. I've braced the love
Speaker 4: of it. I've braced the the way it bought a
Speaker 4: lot of people from different genres to that records. I
Speaker 4: embraced the festival ship with the record. I embraced the
Speaker 4: novelty of the record. It almost became a novelty before
Speaker 4: this shit came out, you know, Raucus was late to
Speaker 4: claim it, and Flex was playing it and Puffy was
Speaker 4: walking out to that song at the garden for intro
Speaker 4: before I was able to be like, wait a minute,
Speaker 4: this is me, you know, and we had that we
Speaker 4: had to push forward the reclaim the record, you know,
Speaker 4: to grab it. So to answer that question, like, I've
Speaker 4: decided to love that fucking song and it's brought me
Speaker 4: pain too, and and and you know with the sample ship,
Speaker 4: but uh I love the record?
Speaker 1: Wait you did? Wait? Can I ask a question? Fantee?
Speaker 1: Am I the only human being on earth that sort
Speaker 1: of associates that record and that sample that is also
Speaker 1: on Ladies Sings the Blues, And as a person that
Speaker 1: has watched Lady Sings the Blues like twenty times when
Speaker 1: she's getting when she's getting arranged and fingerprinted in the
Speaker 1: beginning during the opening.
Speaker 5: Creditsky okay, the music in the.
Speaker 1: Background is it's the same thing. So it's been used
Speaker 1: over and over again.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 1: The thing was that I know when the lawsuit came on,
Speaker 1: it's one of the Godzilla people and YadA, YadA, YadA
Speaker 1: and whatnot. But I don't know, like I knew that.
Speaker 5: Some public do not public domain.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I knew that Lady Sings the Blues, and I
Speaker 1: believe like there was almost some Gilbert of Sullivan Bismarck
Speaker 1: Marquish it coming going on where they were trying to
Speaker 1: go extra hard on you from ruining the the legacy
Speaker 1: of this this fictional dragon. And I'm waiting a minute, No,
Speaker 1: Lady sings the Blues. So it's it's like, what was
Speaker 1: that whole ordeal? And I got mad James Murdock questions
Speaker 1: for you as well with succession.
Speaker 5: But anyway, man, man for real, for real.
Speaker 1: Let me, yeah, just start with that, like with how
Speaker 1: did that whole thing, the whole lawsuit thing come to be?
Speaker 4: You know, I was a fucking monster movie buff and fan,
Speaker 4: and my best friend, who was a DJ for Organized
Speaker 4: Confusion as well, Tossick calls me and he's like, yo,
Speaker 4: I just came back from Tower. I got this CD
Speaker 4: with the original shit that we used to love back
Speaker 4: in the days, and we used to run on from
Speaker 4: school to watch the four thirty after school movie shit.
Speaker 4: I used to have the four thirty after school Karate shit,
Speaker 4: and he used to have the four thirty after school
Speaker 4: Monster joints with Gamera and Kong and all of that.
Speaker 4: I got the soundtrack to the sounds and all that
Speaker 4: stuff that was on there, and I was like, I'm
Speaker 4: coming right down right now, and I go down there
Speaker 4: and I listened to it at his house and I
Speaker 4: just heard like some some notes and phrasings, and the
Speaker 4: whole CD is amazing. It's a couple of things that
Speaker 4: I could have chopped off of there, but you know
Speaker 4: that things that that out to me. And it was like,
Speaker 4: oh man, there's this intro. Every DJ loves an intro
Speaker 4: to his song. This is just classic hip hop. And
Speaker 4: I can set it up where I have this intro
Speaker 4: to this song and then this drop on the one,
Speaker 4: and then I'll just rock these four beats, do it in,
Speaker 4: do the four beasts and put some drums on it.
Speaker 4: Just rocking in the room and listening and I'm like,
Speaker 4: did you do that? Sp yes, sir. And then that's
Speaker 4: you know, and then I just had the four notes
Speaker 4: and then I didn't have enough time to set up
Speaker 4: the intro that that's where Lee Stone comes in. I'm like,
Speaker 4: I gotta bring you the ship and then we go
Speaker 4: and we work on the jigger, jigger and all the
Speaker 4: rest of the ship. So you know, I'm just yeah,
Speaker 4: listen to the record, and I'm just like, you know
Speaker 4: what this is. You can only fuck this song up.
Speaker 4: You need to tell people what to do. You need
Speaker 4: to be direct, and you need to write. You know.
Speaker 4: I wanted to write a rhyme like like how I
Speaker 4: felt with kind of like ll that people remember the
Speaker 4: rhyme and you do the rhyme and everybody saying the rhyme.
Speaker 4: You know, up until this point it's intricate and it's
Speaker 4: a lot of gymnastics, and people would be staring at
Speaker 4: me at shows like, oh nice. I wanted to write
Speaker 4: something that you know, the whole crowd is like, I'm him,
Speaker 4: you know, I'm him when I'm saying I said, I
Speaker 4: could do that shit in the Marryland if I was
Speaker 4: doing that song. So those are the two things I
Speaker 4: started with. Push come to Shove, get the record done,
Speaker 4: and the bare bones are the record, and I take
Speaker 4: it to Raucus and I'm like, I think I got
Speaker 4: one before I made that record. Again, if we put
Speaker 4: it in context of what's happening in music at that time,
Speaker 4: at radio and labels, I'm looking at the scope of
Speaker 4: the shit and I'm like I think I could. I
Speaker 4: think I could hang out with these guys in my way.
Speaker 4: New York City had a place to break records, which
Speaker 4: was the top. Know that shit doesn't exist anymore, and
Speaker 4: so I'm factoring all of this in when I'm thinking
Speaker 4: about the song. You need to get this record broke.
Speaker 4: You need to move people. It needs to be hard,
Speaker 4: and it needs to say you know a couple of
Speaker 4: things on it. You know that that could change things.
Speaker 4: It needs to be aggressive anyway. I take the record
Speaker 4: in Headquarters. Piece of Headquarters was that raucous at the time.
Speaker 4: They just went crazy. They was like this shit is crazy.
Speaker 4: I remember Headquarters.
Speaker 5: So the record was done before you even went for
Speaker 5: Rocus even heard it like, this was done before you
Speaker 5: were signed to Raucous.
Speaker 4: No no, no, I was signed, and I was you know,
Speaker 4: I was like, I was telling them I could, I
Speaker 4: could make records that can go with what is happening
Speaker 4: on the radio right now an hour in my way,
Speaker 4: you know, I felt like if this is the illest
Speaker 4: things that's happening right now, it was like halla, halla,
Speaker 4: I'm like, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 5: I hated that damn.
Speaker 1: So you know what I like it.
Speaker 5: I like that era, like holla, holla, can I get out?
Speaker 5: And all them records was kind of kind.
Speaker 1: Of back then, I didn't like it, but now.
Speaker 4: Like hardcore now.
Speaker 3: It because you heard it so much. You didn't like
Speaker 3: it because the radio player back to back to back
Speaker 3: to back to.
Speaker 4: Back that you know exactly.
Speaker 5: I didn't like it the first time I heard it.
Speaker 3: Oh damn, yeah, you so that makes sense.
Speaker 1: I like it for the first time.
Speaker 5: That was it.
Speaker 4: And that's another a misnomer, Like all the cats that
Speaker 4: Racus was, what's fucking with those dudes. It's not like
Speaker 4: we were like hating you know, I like you, right, uh,
Speaker 4: But they drew this line and you know, cats that
Speaker 4: I knew on that side was like, yo, you bumping
Speaker 4: your ship and the whip And I was with these
Speaker 4: dudes and they playing you and kual Lee and and
Speaker 4: most in the car and they doing the ship and
Speaker 4: they rocking with y'all ship too. Like I don't think
Speaker 4: it was a bigger disparity in line between the two
Speaker 4: genres at the time as it was made out to be.
Speaker 4: Of course, I was fucking Big and Jay and Javu
Speaker 4: and all that shit, like who who wasn't. I mean,
Speaker 4: I'm from South Jamaica, queens. That being said raucus, I knew,
Speaker 4: you know I was. I was where I wanted to
Speaker 4: be and where I needed to be and was working
Speaker 4: on this song. I brought the record and I don't
Speaker 4: mean to be long winded. No love the record. I
Speaker 4: love the They loved the record. Jared was like, I
Speaker 4: don't know about this titty thing. You might want to
Speaker 4: change the titty thing because you know the female fans.
Speaker 4: If you could just go back in and rew the
Speaker 4: titty thing, it was weird.
Speaker 3: Every time it came on, we was like, wait a minute,
Speaker 3: what am I doing?
Speaker 1: Yes, I was like, what y'all doing?
Speaker 5: I love it.
Speaker 4: I literally went back into the studio because I wasn't
Speaker 4: a jackass artist. I'm like, let me let me you
Speaker 4: know see if I could rework it. And I was like,
Speaker 4: fuck that ship, man, leave it how it is. It
Speaker 4: is what it is. It's an unconventional chorus because it's
Speaker 4: extra long and all the ship and then it gets
Speaker 4: into some other ship with the itty bitty ship. I'm like,
Speaker 4: leadership man, it's feel it feels good and we left it.
Speaker 4: They rocked with it, and I came to them with
Speaker 4: the business side, and there was notorious there, like business
Speaker 4: wasn't just executed on a high level. And I brought
Speaker 4: the samples in and whatever, and it was like, uh,
Speaker 4: you know, this is saying we don't really have to
Speaker 4: you know, cons about the boot the book, and they
Speaker 4: dropped the ball on the business side. It's not like
Speaker 4: I hit what the fuck I was doing. I was like,
Speaker 4: here's the CD, here's the paperwork, here's a ship, Like,
Speaker 4: let's cut a shit that it could pop if you
Speaker 4: feel in it like that, we need to do it.
Speaker 4: And it was kind of like.
Speaker 1: So you're saying that. They just thought, like we're raucous,
Speaker 1: you know, under the radar, it's only going to be
Speaker 1: in twenty thousand units. This will sell at fat beats
Speaker 1: and write, you know.
Speaker 3: And then came radio.
Speaker 1: Okay, well, I was gonna ask like, did you have
Speaker 1: relationships with Brian and Jarrett and about to say Rupert
Speaker 1: James Murdoch at the time, because it's only I mean,
Speaker 1: do you watch Succession, Uh, the HBO kind of.
Speaker 4: Drama about the Murdoch family need to mourn it?
Speaker 1: Yeah, like they they the character that's playing the James guy,
Speaker 1: like you know he's going through his you know, his
Speaker 1: post hip hop phase. But now that I've watched that.
Speaker 3: Wait, I'm sorry, connected dots. Wait what are you saying
Speaker 3: right now, a'm mirror. Are you saying that the Murdochs
Speaker 3: are connected to Raucus? Is that what you're saying?
Speaker 1: James Murdock, Oh, yeah, the youngest son of Rupert Murdoch
Speaker 1: is the the kind of deceived money for Raucous Records.
Speaker 3: Shut the fuck up, James.
Speaker 1: Actually, you know, James, I forgot James brought Raucous to
Speaker 1: Wendy Goldstein. So at one point like, yeah, that's how
Speaker 1: most got on the label.
Speaker 3: Ship, like the most conscious rappers.
Speaker 4: W Yeah.
Speaker 1: The irony of it all is that, yes, the youngest
Speaker 1: Murdoch song son, James Murdoch was was one of the
Speaker 1: heads of Raucous Records.
Speaker 5: And I first heard that and from an LP song.
Speaker 5: It was one of his records. It was an LP
Speaker 5: A company for I can't remember, but he had made
Speaker 5: a mention of and I was like, holy.
Speaker 1: Shit, like you wasn't on the fun Crusher plus.
Speaker 5: It might have been on Fun Crusher plus yeah yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so yeah, So if you start watching the show succession,
Speaker 1: which is, you know, kind of mirror. It's it's like
Speaker 1: McDowell's and McDonald's, like we the Vernock family, but that's
Speaker 1: who it is. Like one of their sons was like,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean not wigorous, but you know he's
Speaker 1: oldest steeped in the no, the youngest steeping the hip
Speaker 1: hop whatever. So I always wondered, like what the relationship
Speaker 1: was between the artist and those three at the time,
Speaker 1: because in my head I thought they were like that
Speaker 1: it was strictly a backpack. I didn't realize like.
Speaker 4: How it was money it was. It was heavy money
Speaker 4: flowing through.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I know, not enough money to clear samples apparently.
Speaker 4: Exactly exactly, so have they handled her?
Speaker 1: Have they handled it?
Speaker 4: Now?
Speaker 1: It's like it has it been cleared or dealt with
Speaker 1: or the song just that does not exist anymore unless you.
Speaker 4: Already had it. It doesn't and it hasn't been cleared.
Speaker 4: And I own that album and I own that recommended
Speaker 4: back in my possession and thank God for that. And
Speaker 4: during this pandemic things, where.
Speaker 5: The is that?
Speaker 1: Are there any plans to get the first two organized
Speaker 1: records on streaming or you're going through a day lossul
Speaker 1: thing as well.
Speaker 4: With we're in the midst of putting those up soon.
Speaker 4: But I just was telling Prince, let's do the ship
Speaker 4: in a real ill, you know, ill way, and not
Speaker 4: just make it a vaila. Let's try and shoot something.
Speaker 4: Let's shoot something for a straight bullet, make an announcement,
Speaker 4: and it would be nice to be, you know, just
Speaker 4: to be like, Hi, I'm Prince, Pope, Hi, I'm pharaohmont
Speaker 4: and we are organized for the first time. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 4: I think that ship would be cool. So to all
Speaker 4: the heads out there, it's coming. We just want to
Speaker 4: do it and honor the catalog. It's all we have.
Speaker 4: You know. It may not be what us some other
Speaker 4: catalogs are, but it's ours and I want to honor it.
Speaker 5: And that money gonna come in every month.
Speaker 1: I was about to say, with the Desire record, what
Speaker 1: was the decision process too, Well, I'm saying growth. It's
Speaker 1: almost as if every one between two thousand and four
Speaker 1: and two thousand and five was expanding their their creative
Speaker 1: palette in terms of their presentation, So there's a lot
Speaker 1: more live instrumentation. Was that just based on not trying
Speaker 1: to mess with samples anymore? In the whole nightmare of
Speaker 1: that situation, like what what brought that?
Speaker 5: On?
Speaker 1: One of my favorites on that record was your terror
Speaker 1: Dom cover.
Speaker 4: Well, thank you man, probably you know, looking back emotionally
Speaker 4: and psychologically, but more so than that, I had went
Speaker 4: through so much trauma with the sample and the label
Speaker 4: shit and uh raucous folded and went to MCA, and
Speaker 4: then they went over there, and then they was at Geffen,
Speaker 4: and then it was this, and I was caught up
Speaker 4: in all that shit. And in the midst of that,
Speaker 4: uh there was there was some almost uh me going
Speaker 4: with Shady and then Sylvie and then over here, and
Speaker 4: then I was just all over the place. And then
Speaker 4: I finally was like, you know what, I'm gonna just
Speaker 4: try to be a free agent and get out of
Speaker 4: this kind of web. And I was finally able to
Speaker 4: walk from it all. And when I walked from it,
Speaker 4: I felt free again. And I was like, I don't
Speaker 4: even know if I want to do this shit again
Speaker 4: right now in the way that I'm used to doing it.
Speaker 4: And I had a bevy of songs that I have recorded,
Speaker 4: and I had love. I was on tour with most
Speaker 4: and Qua. We was on a Sony PlayStation tour with
Speaker 4: tour buses. I had landed a publishing gill and I
Speaker 4: was chilling and I was like, I'm not signed. I
Speaker 4: don't want to look for a record deal. I'm good
Speaker 4: and Corey Qualley's manager at the time, Blacksmith, Blacksmith was like, yo,
Speaker 4: what you're working on? And I put something on the
Speaker 4: tour bus and I played a couple of songs and
Speaker 4: he lost it and he just tore me apart and
Speaker 4: he was like, these songs are great, They're not yours.
Speaker 4: They're given to you from a higher place. It's wrong
Speaker 4: for you to hold on this stuff.
Speaker 7: What are you doing?
Speaker 4: You know it's not yours to hold onto, Like, what
Speaker 4: are you doing on? I don't know. You know, I'm good.
Speaker 4: I'm on tour with with Most and Quad, and you know,
Speaker 4: I'm just turned off by the record label shit. And
Speaker 4: he really beat me up and was like, and you
Speaker 4: need to give them away? And there was again putting,
Speaker 4: putting music in context. The industry is changing, like you
Speaker 4: said at the time, and I couldn't understand. As the
Speaker 4: nineties do the concept of give the what no record cover?
Speaker 1: Like what?
Speaker 4: Uh like? No artwork? What do you mean? Give this shit? Away,
Speaker 4: and he was really like, this, it's not really yours, man,
Speaker 4: you have fans, you need to let it go. I
Speaker 4: was just like, I can't get the concept. I go
Speaker 4: on to record more on Me music, and I do
Speaker 4: realize that what I'm feeling is I want to uplift,
Speaker 4: So I incorporate Mila Machinko and Showtime Showtime, because I'm
Speaker 4: hearing that these harmonies can can be uplifting in the
Speaker 4: song and these tones. And I knew that I wanted
Speaker 4: to perform and have people feel a certain way because
Speaker 4: I feel like I was let free from my situation.
Speaker 4: So I was incorporated, you know. To answer your question,
Speaker 4: sorry for being long winded. I was trying to incorporate
Speaker 4: this instrumentation that can make you feel good and get
Speaker 4: a goosebump, hopefully from the live performance. And that's why
Speaker 4: the Desire record sounds like that.
Speaker 5: How did you hook up? Man?
Speaker 4: How?
Speaker 5: What was How did that connection happen?
Speaker 4: There was there was I was moving back and forth
Speaker 4: between Shady and this and that, and we hooked up
Speaker 4: and he's responsible for a lot of that. And you know,
Speaker 4: I was in Detroit, man, it was one of the
Speaker 4: best times. You know, just being out there with with
Speaker 4: Black Milk and Guilty and the Non and and that
Speaker 4: whole crew, and uh, he sold Soulful and he bought
Speaker 4: a lot of that. You know. That's why I gravitated
Speaker 4: that way because he sings and you know, I broken heart.
Speaker 5: I'm still waiting for that. I need that to come
Speaker 5: out on something like I.
Speaker 4: Love that man, Thank you man. And uh, that's that's
Speaker 4: why I went in that direction because I'm I was like,
Speaker 4: I need to move people in a in a different way.
Speaker 4: And that being said, the record that most of the
Speaker 4: demo got dropped. When I was in Detroit working with
Speaker 4: the Nan, I was also writing for Puff.
Speaker 9: I wanted to ask you, So I'm feeling I'm feeling
Speaker 9: really good and I don't have a record deal and
Speaker 9: I'm just fortunate that d narm is helping me out
Speaker 9: and I'm working on music again, feeling really fortunate.
Speaker 4: And I'm I'm I'm writing and I'm doing shit, and
Speaker 4: I don't know where this music is going to go.
Speaker 4: And there was an actual created and actual bidding war
Speaker 4: just to push this forward. It was src Puff was
Speaker 4: loving what he was hearing because he would ask me
Speaker 4: to play shit when I was in the studio with
Speaker 4: him No Desire and uh the ship with Alchemists and
Speaker 4: the different songs that was on that album. People were
Speaker 4: feeling and my lawyer was like, I can't believe that
Speaker 4: in this context, in this timeframe, that you actually have
Speaker 4: three deals on the table Sony SRC and Puff was like,
Speaker 4: whatever they offer you double that ship, true story, and
Speaker 4: I was like, I don't believe you.
Speaker 5: I don't believe.
Speaker 4: I don't leaders will work there. You know, we would
Speaker 4: have the hearts and he would be like why, and
Speaker 4: I'm like, I tarrell Mont's bad Boy in the building.
Speaker 4: I was like, nobody's trying to wait.
Speaker 1: That's real, though, I gotta ask only because you know,
Speaker 1: there's there's a part like Past the mid Arts two
Speaker 1: thousand and five, two thousand and six, where you just
Speaker 1: stopped reading credits. So I don't know, but I always
Speaker 1: felt in my heart that one of them rhymes on
Speaker 1: Diddy's I'm So Glad You said that press play album.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I didn't want you want to insult you. I was like, wait, it.
Speaker 5: Was a future right, it was, yeah, wait to see.
Speaker 1: Because I always thought that you wrote uh everything I
Speaker 1: love the one that Kanye did because the way he's
Speaker 1: riding on about someone's going.
Speaker 10: I was like this, he's penny like coome bar this,
Speaker 10: And I always wanted to know, did you go write
Speaker 10: that joint?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 5: He I sat it was the press Play album, right.
Speaker 4: Yeah, press Play sat with him, had a meet with him.
Speaker 4: He was like, I'm working on an album. I got
Speaker 4: to meet with him because I had did this publishing
Speaker 4: deal and the writers there and y'all know how that go.
Speaker 4: And my only thing was when when I sat with him,
Speaker 4: I'm like, I'm good. I just want to be credited,
Speaker 4: which is why I don't have any problem saying what
Speaker 4: I'm saying because I'm credited as a writer on the song,
Speaker 4: so it's not like speaquiet right, Okay. And then you know,
Speaker 4: I just again, I just I just learned so much
Speaker 4: from him. You know, I thought he credited me so
Speaker 4: much on my work ethic, but he's really an animal
Speaker 4: at that ship too, And I watched him and and
Speaker 4: learned about applying, re applying myself and a different way
Speaker 4: when it comes to my own shit. Because I'm like,
Speaker 4: no way, I'm gonna work this hard on his ship
Speaker 4: and not work that hard on my ship, and just
Speaker 4: learn so much from him in that sense of how
Speaker 4: he pushes really good at figuring out how to push
Speaker 4: your writer or to push your artists. I love that
Speaker 4: dude for that.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I want to know what that process is
Speaker 1: like when you're is it like does he just take
Speaker 1: what you give him? Do you have to be there
Speaker 1: to coach him? Like say it like this, like how
Speaker 1: how much work does he put into the preparation? Because
Speaker 1: I mean, he pulled it off to the point where
Speaker 1: I was like, Wow, he's he really got good at rapping.
Speaker 1: And then I was like, wait a minute, this guy
Speaker 1: somebody for him. And then when I.
Speaker 5: Heard I write rhymes, I write checks.
Speaker 1: Right, And then when I heard the rhyme scheme, I
Speaker 1: was like, Yo, this feels like farah some pharaoh would say.
Speaker 1: And I was like, there's no way that he reached
Speaker 1: that deep into the to the wrapper bag. Yeah, to
Speaker 1: go to go that level, but now realize and he
Speaker 1: goes in cycles where he's like, Okay, I got to
Speaker 1: take it back to the beginning. Like even right now
Speaker 1: as we speak, he I hope I'm not letting this
Speaker 1: cat out the bag like he's trying to make He's
Speaker 1: he's now making like Camp Diddy where it's like he
Speaker 1: has two underground cats, Like he's trying to go back
Speaker 1: there again. You know what I'm saying, He doesn't.
Speaker 4: You got to realize who he discovered. Yeah, at the
Speaker 4: end of the day, you got to realize who has
Speaker 4: written you know, you know we could, we could, you know.
Speaker 4: Even having conversations with him off the rip, he was like,
Speaker 4: I know what niggas say about me. I'm like, what
Speaker 4: do they say? He said they'd be in the barber
Speaker 4: shops and they be like, I funk with his junes
Speaker 4: and I don't funk with his music.
Speaker 1: With his music, I can say that I was. I
Speaker 1: was once a short John model.
Speaker 3: Question because I.
Speaker 6: Do want to know the answer to the question of
Speaker 6: the process that you asked me about, Like what is
Speaker 6: that process like? And were you in the studio and
Speaker 6: there for like all the infections and what again?
Speaker 4: In those heart the hearts? He was like, Yo, if
Speaker 4: you have an issue, tell me to my face, be
Speaker 4: honest with me. And that's why I took the job.
Speaker 4: There's been a lot of ships that a lot of
Speaker 4: things that I was offered in my career, which is
Speaker 4: where I'm in the position. I'm not in the higher
Speaker 4: position that I could be that. I was like, ah,
Speaker 4: it's just not in my heart to do it. But
Speaker 4: when he told me that, I was like, all right, nigga,
Speaker 4: if you're going to be that raw and you're going
Speaker 4: to be that honest, then then let's do it. And
Speaker 4: he played me the beats and it was like has
Speaker 4: it the lawn? I'm like, oh shit, I was like,
Speaker 4: this is what the A list beats sound like.
Speaker 7: I was like, oh my god, this music is good.
Speaker 4: Let's do it. So he flies me down the Miami
Speaker 4: and I'm writing and I'm writing and I'm writing and
Speaker 4: we're nailing the ship and the engineers are in there
Speaker 4: and they're like, this is crazy. This is crazy. This
Speaker 4: is crazy. He's going to love this. And he he
Speaker 4: would come in in the eleventh hour and be like,
Speaker 4: A maybe the last four bars, you know, going into
Speaker 4: the thing could be could be a rewrite. And we
Speaker 4: you know, we work hard on stuff. So I got
Speaker 4: it done. You know, there was some some great stories
Speaker 4: down there in my own me.
Speaker 1: What was it like recording down there?
Speaker 4: Not going there. I was working on my album with
Speaker 4: the Nawn at the same time, and I really was
Speaker 4: like I want to finish this so I could go
Speaker 4: back to d Troit and finish my shit. And he
Speaker 4: was like, Yo, your shit is amazing as well. You
Speaker 4: might want to think this out. Boom boom boom. I
Speaker 4: finished my writing. I flew to Detroit and we're working
Speaker 4: on my stuff. And I'm in the studio with the
Speaker 4: non maybe Milk may be guilty with chilling and with writing,
Speaker 4: and I'm having some whiskey and I get a call
Speaker 4: from Sean C and he says, my brother, I think
Speaker 4: Puffy's gonna use one of your joints as the first single,
Speaker 4: first release kind of. And I'm like, you gotta be
Speaker 4: fucking shitting me, and he's like, you got to hear it.
Speaker 4: And I was like, send it to me. And they
Speaker 4: send me the song and the nan has this elaborate studio.
Speaker 5: He puts it.
Speaker 4: In, puts it on, puts it on the big speakers
Speaker 4: in press play, and all you could hear is laughter.
Speaker 4: Everybody in the studio is laughing at the top of
Speaker 4: the ark and lungs because it sounds like Pharaoh manch
Speaker 4: coming out of Puffy's mouth. Yes, yeah, And I'm like,
Speaker 4: you know, I actually did it, you know, with I
Speaker 4: did it with a New York swagger on the demos
Speaker 4: and it's kind of laid back and it, you know,
Speaker 4: kind of has like a lot of flavor that I
Speaker 4: don't even you know, project back then. That's not where
Speaker 4: I was with it. And it was so ill. So
Speaker 4: he said, if you have an issue, you can call me.
Speaker 4: So I was like, I gotta get him on the phone.
Speaker 4: I want to fly back. I want to re record
Speaker 4: these vocals. I want to fly back to New York
Speaker 4: and I want to go in with him and re
Speaker 4: record these vocals. And I was like, I gotta get
Speaker 4: him on the phone. And they just steady laughing. It's
Speaker 4: just laughing in the background, and I'm calling and I'm like, hello,
Speaker 4: it is Pharaoh. Can I speak to Puff? And it's
Speaker 4: like Pharaoh, who what? What? Like Fara, can I speak?
Speaker 4: Hold on? Who what? Pharaoh? Okay, hold on. Finally get
Speaker 4: through to him and I'm like, just listen to the record.
Speaker 4: I think we could re record these vocals more laid
Speaker 4: and relaxed. And he was like, fuck you man, I
Speaker 4: love this ship. I'm not changing it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so much talk.
Speaker 5: Wow, wow, man, what what do you think made you
Speaker 5: go with? You know, go with s RC rather than
Speaker 5: going with bad Boy or going with like Sony. You
Speaker 5: know you said some what what how did you choose them?
Speaker 4: I mean, I know what that record was sounded like
Speaker 4: it was a non and I'm like, I don't you
Speaker 4: know you I would be like explaining to me how this,
Speaker 4: how this would work, and you know, it's like I
Speaker 4: could walk you on the MTV, I could do this today,
Speaker 4: and this was like, I just don't think if it's
Speaker 4: the aesthetic unless something else is kind of created. And
Speaker 4: I love that dude, and I would have loved to
Speaker 4: have worked with him under his tutelage and got all
Speaker 4: that extra kind of love, but I just didn't think
Speaker 4: it fit. There.
Speaker 3: Was that your last experience in the writing? Because did
Speaker 3: you write some more for other folks?
Speaker 4: I quit after that. It's such it's so taxing. You
Speaker 4: give all of your heart to his soul and it
Speaker 4: just this is kind of draining in a way.
Speaker 1: If I say, who did you say no to? If
Speaker 1: I'm allowed to ask, did he can't be the only
Speaker 1: person that asks you to hook up his pen?
Speaker 4: I can't.
Speaker 7: I can't.
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, wait, wait, wait, just yes or no?
Speaker 1: Are these like rappers? That we would respect that we
Speaker 1: be shocked at or is it like a less celebrities
Speaker 1: that want to rap based on that. I already know
Speaker 1: the answer, never mind, and I'm born I think I
Speaker 1: knew the answers.
Speaker 5: But anyway, uh wow wow. So like once you talk
Speaker 5: talk to me about like after you left, you know,
Speaker 5: after Desire and then the years I think, like the
Speaker 5: four years uh three four years when you came with
Speaker 5: the War LP. How is it like to get your
Speaker 5: mind frame of being ready to be an independent artist
Speaker 5: and like really like doing it yourself in a way
Speaker 5: that you had never had prior to any point in
Speaker 5: your career.
Speaker 4: After the Desire album, Steve and we went back and
Speaker 4: Steve loved a record, yeah, telling me him and his
Speaker 4: wife at the time, and was it was something that
Speaker 4: they played and they they had sex to and it
Speaker 4: was really on some real ship. Like he was like,
Speaker 4: really record and he was very disappointed I think.
Speaker 1: When he had the War record, No, no Desire to
Speaker 1: the War record, that's an ex videos channel okay, my bad,
Speaker 1: my bad.
Speaker 4: Me and immortal Technique and and so he uh, he
Speaker 4: was like I loved this record and and I was
Speaker 4: in the system in which I believe that that in
Speaker 4: that two week frame, little Wayne dropped the Lollipop record
Speaker 4: and that shit shut it shut everything down. I think
Speaker 4: it like killed Erica had America, I think at the time,
Speaker 4: and from what I could see from my optics, it
Speaker 4: just soaked up all of the moneys from everywhere and
Speaker 4: they put all their money on on that shit, and
Speaker 4: we kind of got yeah. But that being said, I
Speaker 4: tore it off that record. I did Rock the Bells
Speaker 4: off that record, and it was very well received, and
Speaker 4: I saw a different level of fan coming in. I
Speaker 4: remember being on Rock the Bells Overseas with nas and
Speaker 4: Daylight and the Elevator, and I was talking to Nads
Speaker 4: and I said, yo, you know, I put this out,
Speaker 4: and you know, head seemed a little disappointed that I had,
Speaker 4: you know, the singing and this, and nas imposters like,
Speaker 4: don't worry. These things are like children. They grow, they mature.
Speaker 4: Talk to me three years from now and see what
Speaker 4: it's like. So when I ask people desires is it
Speaker 4: was up there and and my my solo ship that
Speaker 4: that people vibe was still brought in new fans, and
Speaker 4: I was starting to learn that that's okay. As I'm
Speaker 4: moving forward, so I go back to Steve and then
Speaker 4: that moment when we're going into the new record, I
Speaker 4: was like, Yo, I got these samples and ship and
Speaker 4: I want to do some rock shit and I want
Speaker 4: to do some of this ship and that shit was
Speaker 4: like nah. And then I was like I want to
Speaker 4: leave them and I want to be on the label,
Speaker 4: and they let me go because we're all mature and
Speaker 4: whatever and whatever. And Guy Route, my manager at the time,
Speaker 4: was like, you know, I think this major label shit
Speaker 4: went over people's heads. You know, you're telling me. People
Speaker 4: see you in the mall and they're like, you still rapping,
Speaker 4: and I'm like, I'm want to major right. You know.
Speaker 4: It was something they connected and the labels is changing
Speaker 4: and it's going digital and they're missing it. We decided
Speaker 4: to go into pen It learned under the Tulge tutelage
Speaker 4: of duck Down and get the game from somebody who's
Speaker 4: been doing it for twenty five years, you know, and
Speaker 4: not just jumping to the game. And we talked to
Speaker 4: them and we went there and we did the The
Speaker 4: War record, which again for me, you know, from my lens,
Speaker 4: did better than the Desire Record because we had a
Speaker 4: record on there. I had a record on there called
Speaker 4: Still Standing with Jill Scotty that performed extremely well overseas
Speaker 4: and kept me out on the road, which is obviously
Speaker 4: the only way I was making money at the time,
Speaker 4: the only way I could earn so I was enjoying
Speaker 4: staying on the road.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and we did Black Kancide. We shot the Black
Speaker 5: Kancide video with that was man. That was you. The
Speaker 5: one you introduced me to Terrence Dance, who is the
Speaker 5: director of uh Random Acts of Flyness on HBO, and
Speaker 5: he's also and he's one of one of his homies
Speaker 5: is also. I don't think he was on set that day,
Speaker 5: but his man Shaka King, I don't know, you know
Speaker 5: Shaka Yeah, yeah, you know who's thebody who did the
Speaker 5: upcoming Fred Hampton joint. But but nah, man, I really
Speaker 5: the videos that y'all did for that record. I just
Speaker 5: I remember just telling guy, you know, because we shot
Speaker 5: our video the Black Hand Side joint with styles P.
Speaker 5: But before that, Yard shot Clap and I was like, Yo,
Speaker 5: these ships is like movies, dude, And you know, it
Speaker 5: always just made me think of you and just wonder
Speaker 5: if you ever had any aspirations of going into screenwriting
Speaker 5: because perfect fit of the ship man.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I wrote all of those. I wrote the concept
Speaker 4: for black Hand Side with the through the different lens
Speaker 4: of the shades. I wrote the concept for Clap and
Speaker 4: Still Standing. And obviously I was lucky enough to hook
Speaker 4: up with tern Nance, who's uh fucking that is going
Speaker 4: to do incredible, insane, major major things. But I was
Speaker 4: lucky to fall into that that laying with him and
Speaker 4: his cinematographer Sean and get those visuals done, which really
Speaker 4: really helped the record a lot.
Speaker 1: Pharaoh. All right, so we we got here finally in
Speaker 1: three hours, explain to me the concept behind the thirteen project.
Speaker 5: Damn, you're gonna steal my one question?
Speaker 1: All right, good Steve asked your question.
Speaker 2: I mean, I love Daru Jones and Marcus Machado, and
Speaker 2: yet if you could just tell us about the trio,
Speaker 2: but specifically why you chose a drummer or drums and
Speaker 2: guitar as as the other two parts.
Speaker 5: As you.
Speaker 4: Know, of course, you know the rock thing has been
Speaker 4: sprinkled throughout. You know, I had some some ill samples
Speaker 4: that that didn't make the record of stuff that I
Speaker 4: was rocking over, and I realized if if I wanted
Speaker 4: people to take me a little bit more serious than
Speaker 4: me even saying that word that I needed to incorporate musicians.
Speaker 4: I liken it to somebody from the rock side saying
Speaker 4: he's gonna do an authentic hip hop record, and how
Speaker 4: everybody on this side would be like, yeah, the fuck
Speaker 4: out of here, and so, you know, I wanted I
Speaker 4: wanted to at least get a look on that side.
Speaker 4: I'm a fan of the genre and I respect the genre,
Speaker 4: and I know people have tried to have done these
Speaker 4: type of matchups before, so uh, I wanted someone who
Speaker 4: had who could who could do the late Diller ship
Speaker 4: as well as had rock chops because a lot of
Speaker 4: the stuff was straight ahead, and I knew it should
Speaker 4: be more straight ahead than more laid back in the pocket,
Speaker 4: you know, thinking about what I wanted, and I wanted to,
Speaker 4: you know, get somebody who who can understand that. And
Speaker 4: you know, I know how busy darru is, but I
Speaker 4: was like, fuck it, yo, I'm doing this project and
Speaker 4: I need a bit of commitment, and I know cats
Speaker 4: are always gigging, but he was like, I'm down, and
Speaker 4: that was like, you know, one of the main things
Speaker 4: because I needed to do. Obviously a couple of straight
Speaker 4: live records to make it make sense, but more importantly,
Speaker 4: I wanted it to keep the temperament and not lose
Speaker 4: hip hop because that's the core of the shit still.
Speaker 4: It's the reason why I liked the genre. You know,
Speaker 4: to begin with, you're talking rush. It's savage as Zeppelin,
Speaker 4: you know, that's all shit I would rhyme over. You know.
Speaker 4: I heard Tom Sawyer and I'm like, I don't know
Speaker 4: any MC who wouldn't want to rhyme over that. So
Speaker 4: to me, I'm like, that's that's hip hop to me.
Speaker 4: And it's always been the genre's kind of blending to
Speaker 4: each other for me. So I knew that was very
Speaker 4: important to bring in the knots so that the shit
Speaker 4: is official in terms of that pocket, but then able
Speaker 4: to expand outside of what you would get and an
Speaker 4: intro and outro of a record, so we could stretch
Speaker 4: a little bit. So that's what that's all about. On
Speaker 4: the musical side.
Speaker 5: What is the what is your almost this fault called
Speaker 5: it obsession with the number thirteen because you're publishing this
Speaker 5: stress condecta for over you, which is the fear of
Speaker 5: the number thirteen. Great. Is that right? So that, yeah,
Speaker 5: what's that? That's that recurring kind of theme in your career.
Speaker 4: So with the asthma shit, when I got it when
Speaker 4: I was little, I contracted it at thirteen months of age,
Speaker 4: and that's what I would hear all the time. People
Speaker 4: would be like, how long has it been since he
Speaker 4: had asthma? And my mom would be like, since he
Speaker 4: was thirteen months old? And I, you know, it just
Speaker 4: kind of stuck in my head like that. And then
Speaker 4: as you know, I went on, I was born on Halloween,
Speaker 4: which is thirty one, and the number just kept reoccurring.
Speaker 4: And then I'm a big sports fan, and then a
Speaker 4: lot of the players that I like water number. So
Speaker 4: when me and Prince picked numbers, you know, his favorite
Speaker 4: number was eight. We played on the high school basketball
Speaker 4: team in the art school, so it wasn't really that
Speaker 4: good and thirteen was my number, and so it stuck
Speaker 4: with me. And that's just the basis behind that, you know.
Speaker 4: And it's cool to to do the awkward ship and
Speaker 4: just I think it's hip hop to be like, yeah,
Speaker 4: it's supposed to be bad luck, but fuck it. And
Speaker 4: it's also rock to be like supposed to be bad luck.
Speaker 4: So that's what the thirteen is about.
Speaker 1: Okay, So not to totally weird y'all out. Okay, So
Speaker 1: you know, as of this recording, I don't know when
Speaker 1: this will hit the air, but as of this recording,
Speaker 1: I just celebrated a birthday and someone was gracious enough
Speaker 1: to gift me a medium, a three hour session with
Speaker 1: a medium, and oh wow, nice. Yeah it was deep.
Speaker 5: Man.
Speaker 3: No no no, they're not nice, not nice.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, I'm saying that's amazing.
Speaker 1: The thing is is that, yeah, you know, I've also
Speaker 1: been looking at my my my lineage and my bloodline,
Speaker 1: which the Bedeen people of Africa are also connected to Haitians,
Speaker 1: and so I'm slowly just discovering that there is a
Speaker 1: lot of propaganda with the number thirteen and also the
Speaker 1: number six, which, of course, you know, we've been taught
Speaker 1: kind of postcolonial Christian America that you know, six six,
Speaker 1: six is the market, the beast and signed the devil,
Speaker 1: and there's no thirteenth floor anywhere, none of those things.
Speaker 1: And I'm slowly realizing in my studies, especially in Haitian culture,
Speaker 1: that thirteen is actually a holy number, and it's almost
Speaker 1: as if, you know, the propaganda that that's been used
Speaker 1: to sort of to tear you away from embracing it,
Speaker 1: say it's evil, but it's actually that's actually a very spiritual.
Speaker 1: It's it's for African culture. It's it's a spiritual number.
Speaker 3: So kind of everything y'all do is bad. God damn.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I'm realizing this year that actually we need
Speaker 1: to embrace the number thirteen, which I when I saw
Speaker 1: the name of the group, I was like, damn, he
Speaker 1: took my number.
Speaker 5: Man, I didn't know that thirteen is my number.
Speaker 1: Damn it. Did you?
Speaker 2: Did you know Marcus or did Daru bring him aboard
Speaker 2: or to you?
Speaker 4: I knew Marcus uh from you know Vernie Reed and
Speaker 4: those cats and family stand and he grew up around
Speaker 4: those people, and you know, when it came to you know,
Speaker 4: I need you know, I need someone who could take
Speaker 4: it there and you know, do some double time or
Speaker 4: you know, do some funk. You know. His he he
Speaker 4: was the dude. And uh, I've seen him play and
Speaker 4: it was like you know, blue Note, and I was
Speaker 4: like he got that. I just needed to see if
Speaker 4: he had the edge, and uh, you know, obviously he's
Speaker 4: a Jimmy fan and and I even needed it a
Speaker 4: little more edgier than that. And he's just that dude,
Speaker 4: like he's he's a prodigy, like I asked for. We're
Speaker 4: still in the beginning stages, so we don't know, but
Speaker 4: I asked for two dudes who could if we break
Speaker 4: this ceiling and people be like, I don't know any
Speaker 4: of these guys. I don't know the fucking rapper, I
Speaker 4: don't know who any of them are, you know, or
Speaker 4: run the juice style. I wanted people to be like,
Speaker 4: I'm here for the fucking guitarists. I'm here for the drummer,
Speaker 4: like the vocalist is cool. And I asked for you know,
Speaker 4: cats that can shine like that, because I think, you know,
Speaker 4: the goal is to take away the pretentiousness of what
Speaker 4: you get. You know, like I said, I'm trying to
Speaker 4: deconstruct and I just got tired of seeing dudes in
Speaker 4: the front with whatever, and I'm like, I need to
Speaker 4: see a team. So I told them, you know, I
Speaker 4: didn't want my name on this shit at all, but
Speaker 4: obviously because of algorithms.
Speaker 5: The algorithm, yeah, you know.
Speaker 4: That, like we got to put Pharaoh in here somewhere
Speaker 4: to take advantage of your millions of people who have
Speaker 4: locked into you on Spotify and all that shit. So
Speaker 4: that's what that's about. But if it was up to me,
Speaker 4: I'd have just been like thirteen. But you know, I'm
Speaker 4: not as stupid to run away from what I've been
Speaker 4: working on for thirty years. So that's why my name
Speaker 4: is even on the shit.
Speaker 3: You know, can you break down?
Speaker 6: Because I think Amir asked you, but when you never
Speaker 6: got a chance to answer about the concept of the group,
Speaker 6: and even I mean the videos, there is a concept,
Speaker 6: there's a focus.
Speaker 4: It's see yeah, you know, it's just anybody who who
Speaker 4: has a brain and any empathy, you could just feel
Speaker 4: that the system in the country is way heavy on
Speaker 4: our spirit and when you think about how do you
Speaker 4: get back to zero, you know it's going to be
Speaker 4: some hardhass discussions that need to happen because of the
Speaker 4: atrocities that this country has founded on. And so you know,
Speaker 4: in my mind as an MC, I'm like, you know,
Speaker 4: the only real way to do that ship, the only
Speaker 4: real way to atone collectively is an exorcism, even if
Speaker 4: it's with ourselves, and I as an MC, I know
Speaker 4: people would hit that word and be like woo, And
Speaker 4: I was like, good, fuck it. You should be scared
Speaker 4: because this shit is scary that's going on. But it's
Speaker 4: kind of like the it's kind of like a cleansing too,
Speaker 4: you know. And it's been cathartic for me as well
Speaker 4: doing it. And also, you know, we've been kumbayan and
Speaker 4: praying and all that shit for a long long time
Speaker 4: now and holding hands, and I just wanted to like
Speaker 4: it myself and be like, let's just come at this
Speaker 4: to like real dark and meet the ship head on
Speaker 4: how it's coming at us, because you know, to keep
Speaker 4: information from people and to you know, not allow people
Speaker 4: to have loans to get homes and all the secret
Speaker 4: shit that's been going on for all these years. It's
Speaker 4: pretty evil, you know, point blank. And I was like,
Speaker 4: how about we we we come down to that vibration.
Speaker 4: I know, it's like light shines on the dark, but
Speaker 4: I'm like, how about we go there and throw this
Speaker 4: system a little voodoo and get a little dark with
Speaker 4: the ship motherfucker's back in the face.
Speaker 1: Yes, Hey, I have one last question before we wrap up,
Speaker 1: Fronte you okay, yeah, because I feel like I'll get
Speaker 1: roasted for not asking this question because we asked about
Speaker 1: like your history, and we asked about your records and
Speaker 1: your business decisions. But the one thing I never asked
Speaker 1: was your actual creative process, Like can you just give
Speaker 1: us you know, and I know MC's and artists have
Speaker 1: general you know, it just comes when the spirit hits me.
Speaker 1: But do you idea of a specific ritual, like do
Speaker 1: you get up in the morning, do you like what
Speaker 1: is your what is your ritual when you are creating
Speaker 1: a song?
Speaker 5: Does it come instantly?
Speaker 4: I'm a sponge. I love good conversation. I love talking
Speaker 4: to people who are way more educated than I am
Speaker 4: and listening to them and talking to them and and
Speaker 4: sponging and film and I sponge off of films like this. This,
Speaker 4: this whole project is probably off of Fury Road, Logan
Speaker 4: and Joker in a sense that you look at the
Speaker 4: commitment that I looked at the commitment that Joaquin Phoenix
Speaker 4: made to that film and literally went back in the
Speaker 4: studio and it was like, I got to redo verses.
Speaker 4: I need you to be more committed to the verse.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you were one of the first simc's I'll say too,
Speaker 5: man like you were one of the first casts that
Speaker 5: I've really someone I respected at the time in hip
Speaker 5: hop when everybody was trying to be Ja and fifty.
Speaker 5: I get it in one take, Guru. You know what
Speaker 5: I'm saying, Like, Oh, I got it in one take.
Speaker 5: I got in one take. You were one of the
Speaker 5: first cats I remember hearing saying like, no, I treat
Speaker 5: my vocals like a performance or you know, treating almost
Speaker 5: like an actor where it's like, you know, if I
Speaker 5: got to do it two three times, or even if
Speaker 5: it's like comping and just okay, I want to do
Speaker 5: this line right here, you know what I'm saying. And
Speaker 5: that was so mind blowing to me, and it just
Speaker 5: opened me up because that was in rap world. That
Speaker 5: was thought of something that was just so like, oh,
Speaker 5: you don't do that. We just come in and rap
Speaker 5: and that's it. It was never thought of as being
Speaker 5: a performance and treating it, you know, like a voice
Speaker 5: actor would.
Speaker 4: In the beginning, because you know, we couldn't afford studio
Speaker 4: to time, it was like you gotta knock that shit
Speaker 4: out with two MC's on one microphone. You know, it's
Speaker 4: just you know, as we keep going back to context,
Speaker 4: but now it's like, do you believe yourself, you know
Speaker 4: what I mean, Like, listen back to the ship.
Speaker 7: If you ain't.
Speaker 4: Convincing you, you definitely ain't gonna convince Spante, Black Thought,
Speaker 4: Royce Quest or anybody else. So just listen and see
Speaker 4: if it is cutting through in that sense and if
Speaker 4: I if I could get the Yeah, I think I
Speaker 4: got it and I can let it go. And it's
Speaker 4: not wrong with that. Like even after Nicki Minaj came
Speaker 4: out and I noticed how the way they were producing vocals,
Speaker 4: which we you know, that's a part of making the record.
Speaker 4: You know, they took that ship to a whole other level.
Speaker 4: And even on some of the songs or some of
Speaker 4: these songs, I'm like, I need to, you know, produce
Speaker 4: the vocals. I am I getting young? Am I giving away? Nah?
Speaker 5: Dude, man, this.
Speaker 6: Is what it is, showing the different aspects of the
Speaker 6: art too, because like Fante said, a lot of people
Speaker 6: do just think you dope if you can get it
Speaker 6: out of one tape. People didn't even think that, Wait
Speaker 6: a minute, let's treat this life art.
Speaker 3: So no, thank you for that.
Speaker 4: Nah.
Speaker 5: It's real.
Speaker 4: Nah.
Speaker 5: And he's one of the most I've never worked with
Speaker 5: much in the studio, but the times we have were
Speaker 5: you know, we would just send each other stuff whatever.
Speaker 5: I mean, he is just one of the most meticulous.
Speaker 5: Like I remember you sent me back your verse for
Speaker 5: the Wee Go Off record we did for my Alum,
Speaker 5: and you sent me that shit and I was like, Yo,
Speaker 5: this nigga doing sound effects. He got it. But it
Speaker 5: was that shit was just what the fuck you know,
Speaker 5: I needed and that was why I called you like
Speaker 5: to do just that. And you know that was the
Speaker 5: time I remember, like when we was back in I think, man,
Speaker 5: this was even before Minstrel Show came out, because you
Speaker 5: were one of the cats that we were thinking about
Speaker 5: putting on on Hiding Place. Me and Pool was talking,
Speaker 5: you know, about putting you on that record, and you
Speaker 5: came to Raleigh, I think it came to Durham and
Speaker 5: we went and got some seafood or something. I can't remember,
Speaker 5: but we were just talking and you was telling me
Speaker 5: about the time Desire was about to come out, and
Speaker 5: he was like, Yo, man, new ship coming. I'm about
Speaker 5: to be like Tom Jones on this bitch.
Speaker 1: You know what I mean.
Speaker 5: You talking about you know the Body the Body Baby record.
Speaker 5: I mean, but uh.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you hear artists and they don't fit. It's all
Speaker 4: good like you're supposed to be, like, let's see if
Speaker 4: this guy fixed this puggle and sh it has to
Speaker 4: work like you know, that's how it's supposed to be,
Speaker 4: Like you.
Speaker 5: Know, yeah, for everything we've done, like all the records,
Speaker 5: like you ever reached out to me for I'm just
Speaker 5: like anytime I have a chance to rhyme with you,
Speaker 5: I'm just like, dude, just say the word. I'm there whatever.
Speaker 5: I don't care if produced it, I don't care what
Speaker 5: it is. Like I'm going ahead to head. And I
Speaker 5: just always appreciated the way that you just always you know,
Speaker 5: I could I always tell like the I think when
Speaker 5: we did the Black Kan side video, that was probably
Speaker 5: the first time that I really saw and I mean
Speaker 5: this like in a in you know, in a very
Speaker 5: beautiful way, just how sensitive of an artist you were,
Speaker 5: and not like, oh man, I'm sensitive, not like that,
Speaker 5: but just how intuitive I guess you were, and how
Speaker 5: you know it was. And it wasn't even on no
Speaker 5: music shit, it was just we was talking. I never
Speaker 5: get this, bro. We was talking and I think we
Speaker 5: had finished shooting for the day. We don't had like
Speaker 5: one scene left or something. But this was around the
Speaker 5: time when man, don't I think they hit like Kadafi.
Speaker 5: This was when all that ship was popping on with
Speaker 5: Kadafi and his son had got killed or some ship.
Speaker 5: It was something. I'm all the history people listening to
Speaker 5: this interview, please don't crucify me. But I just remember
Speaker 5: someone on set came in and like delivered that news
Speaker 5: and you were just sitting in this chair and you
Speaker 5: just looked up and you was like, Yo, they killed
Speaker 5: Goddaffi's son. And I just would never get to look
Speaker 5: in your face like he was just like, yo, boy,
Speaker 5: these crackers ain't ship. God damn.
Speaker 1: He was that look.
Speaker 5: He was like yo. But I just remember seeing that
Speaker 5: and I was like, man, like you really, you know
Speaker 5: when you said like a sponge, You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 5: Like you really I saw the quality in you. You
Speaker 5: know what I mean.
Speaker 4: I'm an EmPATH and it is what it is. I
Speaker 4: don't know if that's a cool thing to even say,
Speaker 4: but it is what it is. And I love this ship.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 4: I love I love you, I love I love the
Speaker 4: little Brother. I love you too, brother, I love I
Speaker 4: love the roots. And it's cool to say that ship like,
Speaker 4: I'm a fan fan, you know.
Speaker 5: Bro, when you came. Man, when we did DC, like
Speaker 5: we was like one of the last kind of shows
Speaker 5: we did before you know, everything shut down. You know,
Speaker 5: we had booked d C the same night, and I
Speaker 5: hit you this, I hit you. I was like, Bro,
Speaker 5: I had no idea this was gonna happen. I didn't
Speaker 5: even find out to Athawards, and so I hit you. You
Speaker 5: were doing the Kennedy Center. We were at Howard Theater
Speaker 5: and I was like, Yo, I'm gonna come through. I'm
Speaker 5: talking to guy and there I'm like, yo, I'm coming through,
Speaker 5: and I'm a you know, feral show.
Speaker 3: That live for a second. You was doing the Kennedy Center. Okay,
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, damn right, you know what I mean.
Speaker 4: He was.
Speaker 1: We was in that thing.
Speaker 5: So no, man, I came over and like rock with
Speaker 5: you and and you know, and then you know, afterwards,
Speaker 5: I told us, like, yo, were going to LB show
Speaker 5: and so y'all came over and we didn't get a
Speaker 5: chance to talk afterward. But bro, I never got a
Speaker 5: chance to tell you. Man, that ship meant so much
Speaker 5: for me and Pood to be on stage and we
Speaker 5: looking in the back and you don't normally in the back,
Speaker 5: it might be just whoever, right, but we're looking like
Speaker 5: behind where DJ is and it's you. I think Fame
Speaker 5: was back there from Mop guys back there, like it's
Speaker 5: all these dudes that we grew up listening to watching us.
Speaker 5: And I remember Guy was asking me before, he said, man,
Speaker 5: you know, if you want much to come on, you know,
Speaker 5: just just you know, we got you. I said, nah,
Speaker 5: bro like munch Fame. I said, Man, let them niggas
Speaker 5: be fans tonight, bro, like, just.
Speaker 1: Dang got you know what I mean.
Speaker 5: Just let them chill, you know what I mean? And
Speaker 5: that meant so much.
Speaker 4: I wish I could have been in the audience that
Speaker 4: it was so packed in that motherfucker. I couldn't even
Speaker 4: go out there, like I know.
Speaker 5: Now I would have been a problem, you know, but.
Speaker 4: Like I said, man, you know not, you know, fuck it, man,
Speaker 4: like flowers, flowers, flowers, you know for what everybody, it's
Speaker 4: dope to just be a fan fan. It's fun to
Speaker 4: be a fan fan, you know, so give love.
Speaker 3: It's dope to hear brothers give love.
Speaker 4: Real love.
Speaker 5: We evolved. Niggas go to therapy.
Speaker 3: Brother like I like this.
Speaker 1: Ye y'all talked me last week.
Speaker 2: So yeah, hey, if you love me too, I got
Speaker 2: a Sugar Steve action figure for you for your top
Speaker 2: shelf over there.
Speaker 1: Are you probably do I don't think, yeah, he probably does.
Speaker 5: Joke okay, but but nah, bro, I mean I've told
Speaker 5: you time to time good. But now, bro, you were
Speaker 5: like one of the greatest like to ever do this
Speaker 5: ship and you're always in See that makes me, you know,
Speaker 5: sends me back to the drawing board, and I hear it.
Speaker 5: I'm just like, holy shit, like I got to step
Speaker 5: it up again, and uh to be able to maintain
Speaker 5: that intensity for the last thirty fucking years, I mean,
Speaker 5: and and with no signs of decline or slipping off
Speaker 5: or you know, I got you know, I posted early.
Speaker 5: I bought the thirteen record. I had a chance listen
Speaker 5: to it yet because I've been like just running around
Speaker 5: all day. But uh, but nah, man, just from what
Speaker 5: I heard, you know, I mean, I was like, yeah,
Speaker 5: manch is doing this ship is Yeah, the visuals, everything
Speaker 5: is on point, man. And I just want to give
Speaker 5: you a flowers to say thank you for always showing
Speaker 5: me that love. I love you respect, Thank you utmost Brothers. Yeah, yeah, yeah, man.
Speaker 4: Prior to the pandemic, I was I was difficult with compliments.
Speaker 4: After this ship, I'm soaking all.
Speaker 1: The Yeah, we'll get your flowers. Man, thank you for
Speaker 1: doing this episode. It's definitely uh, you know, one one
Speaker 1: for the record books, one one for our our or what.
Speaker 5: Do you call it?
Speaker 1: Check off the bucket list, the bucket list, right, I
Speaker 1: was about to say a notch in the bed post.
Speaker 1: Oh no, exactly.
Speaker 3: Looking good over there, mister.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But thank you for doing the show, man. I really
Speaker 1: appreciate it, of course.
Speaker 4: Man. And I'm on it. Man. Thank you guys for
Speaker 4: having me. I need this. I got a new record out.
Speaker 4: We we we. This's the first week we we came
Speaker 4: in at sixteen. We did the tiny desk. We got
Speaker 4: a lot of stuff flowing. So I appreciate this, man,
Speaker 4: you know, appreciate it.
Speaker 5: No, man, Shout out to God for hooking it up.
Speaker 5: Shout out my brother God, man like whatever.
Speaker 1: Absolutely all right on behalf of on pay Bill and
Speaker 1: the Sugar Steve and Layah in particular. My name is Questlove.
Speaker 1: Thank you to the Great paramounts for joining us, and
Speaker 1: we will see you next week on quest Love Supreme.
Speaker 1: All right, Red, Hey, this is Sugar Steve.
Speaker 5: Make sure you keep up with us on Instagram at.
Speaker 2: Q LS and let us know what you think we
Speaker 2: should be next to sit down with us.
Speaker 1: Don't forget to subscribe to our podcast.
Speaker 5: Ust Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.