Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: What up, y'all?
Speaker 3: Welcome back to Quest Love Supreme. So last week we
Speaker 3: gave you part one of our conversations with L, who
Speaker 3: Jack tapeed the iHeart Studios Hollywood. Make sure you check
Speaker 3: that out because we asked L about as early as days,
Speaker 3: rapping people, doubting I need love, new producers, and some
Speaker 3: of those rabbit hole questions we always wanted to know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we only made it to talking about nineteen ninety.
Speaker 3: So yeah, here's part two where we talk about everything else.
Speaker 2: Enjoy y'all.
Speaker 1: So, also early with Wildcats with Toys or whatever, you're
Speaker 1: one of the first people in the hip hop lane
Speaker 1: to start pivoting to other mediums acting. Yeah, how easy
Speaker 1: or hard was it to convince you? Because I've literally
Speaker 1: met nobody in our industry that it wasn't a struggle.
Speaker 1: Me too, I had to be talked and almost by
Speaker 1: at gunpoint to direct this film I want to do it.
Speaker 2: How easy was it for you to get into that lane?
Speaker 2: I had no no problems with it, you know, as
Speaker 2: long as as long as it didn't do anything that
Speaker 2: was gonna undermine what I was doing, you know, in music,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, as long as it didn't
Speaker 2: undermine that I was cool. You know. I always believed,
Speaker 2: like my mother used to always tell me, you could
Speaker 2: do anything you put your mind to, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. So it's like for me and I used to,
Speaker 2: you know, watch Bruce Lee and dream about having movies
Speaker 2: and me and my man Pierre would have the he'd
Speaker 2: have the was it the thirty four millimeter or the
Speaker 2: sixteen minute? The cameras the sixteen milimeter cameras and we'd
Speaker 2: be making kung ful movies and all that. So I
Speaker 2: was with it. I was I wanted to smoke. I
Speaker 2: wanted all to smoke. I want to make movies, want
Speaker 2: to do it all.
Speaker 1: How easy was the transition to do though? Did you
Speaker 1: have to get an acting coach?
Speaker 2: I definitely study. I definitely have had many acting coaches.
Speaker 2: I went to the Spies Academy. Uh. You know, I
Speaker 2: work with a lot of acting coaches, Greta Secat, Winnie
Speaker 2: Winnie Hill and my current coach. You know, I trained
Speaker 2: and studied, you know read, you know Stanislavsky, and you
Speaker 2: know and Uda Hagen and you know yo, yeah, oh yeah,
Speaker 2: that technique. Oh yeahechnique. Oh yeah, oh yeah, of course
Speaker 2: hundred percent. Like I listen, you have to you have
Speaker 2: to and you have to respect the craft, right Like
Speaker 2: people assume that I just kind of bounce into things,
Speaker 2: but I you know, I watched I study everything, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying, and I pay attention to the craft.
Speaker 1: Was there a role that you passed up that was
Speaker 1: sort of like, damn, I had first DIBs on blah
Speaker 1: blah blah.
Speaker 2: A role I passed up was the the Alan Payne
Speaker 2: role in New Jack City. I passed that up. Oh really? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I passed on and I wanted to do it. My
Speaker 2: father didn't want me to play a drug dealer, but
Speaker 2: then you did. That's my decision, dad, you know, let
Speaker 2: me do this. That's a call classes, no creative curfews.
Speaker 2: You for real, for real, straight up.
Speaker 4: That probably is my favorite Movie's my favorite Thank you?
Speaker 2: Thank you guess yeah, oh boy.
Speaker 5: We haven't been on this show every time. Every once
Speaker 5: in a while where we talk to people about the
Speaker 5: Latin quarters, and nine of the ten times, everybody's story
Speaker 5: starts with one time I was there and ll cool
Speaker 5: J did this, and I'm not even I'm not even
Speaker 5: making this up.
Speaker 2: Like every story, they're like, we're there, yeah, I was that.
Speaker 2: I feel like you were.
Speaker 5: I feel do you have your favorite Latin Quarter story or.
Speaker 2: We do it every time?
Speaker 5: Very offensive, the.
Speaker 2: Racist. It's just like if you sound like as a Mexican.
Speaker 1: Country Latin, I totally forgot you are a hip hop
Speaker 1: legend that was of age of the Latin corner. The
Speaker 1: only reason why I'm obsessed with the Latin Quarter is
Speaker 1: because to hear everyone tell the story, everyone tells of
Speaker 1: the best time they've ever musically had in their lives,
Speaker 1: like listening to hip hop, but it always comes on
Speaker 1: the b side of like fighting and break it. I'm like,
Speaker 1: why would you go to a place where something could
Speaker 1: possibly happen to you just to hear what top billing
Speaker 1: sounds like on the speaker system? Did you ever frequent
Speaker 1: Latin Quarter or whatever? What is it like in your
Speaker 1: like what's your take on the Latin Quarter?
Speaker 2: I mean it was dangerous, dangerous, Like you know I
Speaker 2: had to do it one time. Man, Like you know,
Speaker 2: he's saying something crazy to me. I'm like, what's up.
Speaker 2: He's like, what's up? What's up? Like, what's up. I
Speaker 2: look down at his hand. He got to raise a
Speaker 2: blade in his hand. I'm like, okay, that's what you know,
Speaker 2: that's what you know what I'm saying. So it's like
Speaker 2: it was that kind of a spot. But then you
Speaker 2: hear like amazing dancing and and like you know, it
Speaker 2: was like a badge of honor to be able to
Speaker 2: walk around in there with jewelry on. You know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. It was so for you.
Speaker 1: Never think of a vulnerability like, yo, man that I
Speaker 1: can't go there because like.
Speaker 2: I start with you, no no, no, no, you gotta remember
Speaker 2: like everybody, I ran with it, yo. No no no
Speaker 2: no no no no no no no no. That wasn't
Speaker 2: a problem. That wasn't my issue. You know. I'm not
Speaker 2: saying this impossible. I'm saying, but that wasn't my issue.
Speaker 2: I was good. I was good. So you weren't a
Speaker 2: roll with yourself person. You were a not in those
Speaker 2: not when I went to certain clubs. Now, when I
Speaker 2: went to the I would do that sometimes, but really honestly,
Speaker 2: I would go downtown with some of them clubs by myself.
Speaker 2: Like I might go to CBGB's or something, and you know,
Speaker 2: fish Bone and falling or I'm down there, like you know,
Speaker 2: standing there and the like they got some punk rock
Speaker 2: dudes on there. I don't know if it's a sex
Speaker 2: pistol or who it might be, and they be in
Speaker 2: there performing at CBGB's. I might go there by myself,
Speaker 2: but when I went to the Latin quarters, I usually
Speaker 2: took a couple of dudes with me, you know, depending
Speaker 2: on who it was, you know what I'm saying. And
Speaker 2: we was moving around, it was we was good. Plus
Speaker 2: like I said, you know, I was I was really
Speaker 2: friendly with all of the guys in the town that
Speaker 2: were really I had very few real problems, you know
Speaker 2: with guys because I knew how to not be tough,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, like how to not and
Speaker 2: not be a punk either, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So I didn't have like a lot of them problems
Speaker 2: like you know, I just didn't you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Can you tell us the story of how you and
Speaker 1: Arli Maum connected And yeah, what is the feeling of
Speaker 1: the perception of being underestimated by that point in your career?
Speaker 2: So first, the underestimated piece. The underestimated piece is kind
Speaker 2: of like listen. I love a challenge, man, and you know,
Speaker 2: I welcome those moments when people think that I'm not
Speaker 2: gonna be able to do something. It's actually it inspires me.
Speaker 2: I secretly relish the opportunity to prove that I'm more
Speaker 2: than what you think I am, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: And so that part for me is like, you know,
Speaker 2: being down in the fourth quarter is like I just
Speaker 2: want the ball, like I love that. I live for it,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. That's why it's thirty some
Speaker 2: odd years later and I'm still out here. You know,
Speaker 2: we're still doing arenas. You know what I'm saying, because
Speaker 2: I just relished that. You know. In terms of me Molly,
Speaker 2: it was like I used to go up to BLS
Speaker 2: at the time and do interviews, and one day I
Speaker 2: was up there and we was doing something and Mally
Speaker 2: was like, yeah, what's something, And I'm like yo, and he,
Speaker 2: you know, he always had the great stuff, and he
Speaker 2: had kind of the Juice Crew stuff had just cooled
Speaker 2: off just enough, so he was kind of like in
Speaker 2: a little bit of an in between phase. And I
Speaker 2: was coming off a panther and so obviously, you know,
Speaker 2: I had got booed at the use of Hawkins thing
Speaker 2: and all that down down in New York because remember,
Speaker 2: so said, I don't know so what happened. You gotta remember.
Speaker 2: So when I came out with that walking with a panther,
Speaker 2: the real issue with walking with a Panther wasn't yeah,
Speaker 2: there's some songs on there people don't like whatever. The
Speaker 2: real issue was the imagery. Imagery. So at that time,
Speaker 2: it was about you had public enemy, you had ex clan,
Speaker 2: you had care rests that everybody was on the area,
Speaker 2: and I'm running around with diamonds flooded Minx, champagne, you know,
Speaker 2: models on the back and cell phones, briefcases, cash I'm
Speaker 2: going to CALLI getting five sixty benches, getting convertible tops, cutting,
Speaker 2: you know. So they're looking at me like that was foul,
Speaker 2: you know. And see fast forward ten years now and
Speaker 2: everybody was you know, when you asked for it to
Speaker 2: ninety seven, ninety eight, ninety nine, it was different, right,
Speaker 2: But at that time I was the first guy who
Speaker 2: really did that, so it was looked, it was frowned upon, right,
Speaker 2: So that was really the energy. So it felt like
Speaker 2: I wanted to show that number. There was more to
Speaker 2: it than just the trappings. Does that make sense? I
Speaker 2: only show them there was more to it than the trappings,
Speaker 2: like I really because I really loved this. I didn't
Speaker 2: do it for the trappings. The trappings came, but I
Speaker 2: did it for the for the love. And so I
Speaker 2: got with Mally. Mally was like, Yo, what something, man,
Speaker 2: Let me get a remix or something. I'm like, let's
Speaker 2: do it. So that casual yep. Okay, like Yo, let's
Speaker 2: do a remix. Let me get a remix. Someone said,
Speaker 2: let's get it, so I said. He said, we'll send
Speaker 2: me the toys. So I gave Jingling Baby. Okay. And
Speaker 2: when I gave Jingling Baby, you know, I had been
Speaker 2: playing with it already, so I had that baseline on there.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying, because I used to make
Speaker 2: a lot of my beats. Okay, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Like you know I'm a type of guy. I mean,
Speaker 2: I made a lot of my beats. You know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. People don't realize that. So so I had
Speaker 2: already had put that base on it. So I sent
Speaker 2: it to him and he was like, yo. And when
Speaker 2: that came in, when I walked in the studio he
Speaker 2: had the baseline planing. I was like, oh word, He's like, yo,
Speaker 2: how you got this on here? You ain't? So he
Speaker 2: like chopped it in and put some stuff to it.
Speaker 2: Then he put that walking on Sunshine in it, and
Speaker 2: you know, he said, yo, I want you to readrough
Speaker 2: the vocals though you know what I'm saying. I want
Speaker 2: you because you always yelling on your Joe. I want
Speaker 2: you to do it more mellow. I'm like, all right,
Speaker 2: you know leads to booming.
Speaker 1: All right, now, this is all right. This is something.
Speaker 1: So every night, every night I would go to z
Speaker 1: Trip right and I would say to him. I was like, yo,
Speaker 1: are you guys? Is this all pro tools? He's like
Speaker 1: what do you mean? I was like, is Yello doing
Speaker 1: this live or is that pro tools? He's like, no,
Speaker 1: he's live. I was like, all right, you're protecting him.
Speaker 2: So about maybe six years later, I went to the
Speaker 2: pro tools guy right, and I.
Speaker 1: Said, let me see, let me see all the tracks
Speaker 1: real quick, because this is something now as far as
Speaker 1: I know. So the thing is is that in my mind,
Speaker 1: Tarik's greatest gift as an MC is his breath control.
Speaker 1: And when you watch the Hot ninety seven free style,
Speaker 1: like you rarely hear whatever. So like Teriq's you know,
Speaker 1: he is a communications major in college and so he
Speaker 1: does his whole circular breath thing. But I never heard
Speaker 1: a rapper ever use intonation and concert just like their
Speaker 1: record like rock Kim, who's the king of monotone and
Speaker 1: all this stuff, figure of a marital plant, Like he
Speaker 1: goes loud and I was like, wait a minute, ll
Speaker 1: would match note for note like his vocals on each song,
Speaker 1: and it was blowing my mind that he wasn't yelling
Speaker 1: and he was talking monotone and still projecting. So I
Speaker 1: never like that to me, you never get enough credit
Speaker 1: for that, And you know, I don't even know if
Speaker 1: that's a thing to celebrate, Like, wow, you sound just
Speaker 1: like your records, But I've never seen a human being,
Speaker 1: never out of breath matching their vocals, and like that's hard.
Speaker 4: Now a record, a record like Booming System, where you
Speaker 4: kind of are more lowered to do that in an arena, Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: that's like to keep it low like because yeah, but
Speaker 4: you naturally as an MC, I mean, you're excited, you
Speaker 4: naturally want.
Speaker 1: To go being Yeah, but what makes Booming system is
Speaker 1: the coolness of it, right, you know you know.
Speaker 2: You hear boxes say keep your composure. You got to
Speaker 2: keep keep your composure. You gotta you gotta trust it.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying. The audience know what it is?
Speaker 1: How do you know that and apply that, especially when
Speaker 1: you live a life and walk a path in which
Speaker 1: you almost got to justify every step that you're taking
Speaker 1: and not performatively prove yourself every time. But literally, like
Speaker 1: since Panther, every LL record's been an event to me
Speaker 1: because I always been like, all right, I want to
Speaker 1: see Like for me Panther, I was like, I wonder
Speaker 1: what LL sounds like over.
Speaker 2: Sample production, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Next record is like I wonder what LL sound was
Speaker 1: like in nineties production, like you know, topping the beat.
Speaker 2: So it's almost like even from your biggest supporters, it's
Speaker 2: like can he do it again? Can you do it?
Speaker 2: I tell you, Like, like even this this new record
Speaker 2: I just finished, right, I just finished this record with
Speaker 2: Q tip and yeah, yeah, yeah something. No, No, that's
Speaker 2: too that's too fancy. I need I need, I need
Speaker 2: some cheaps. I need something I can get get right
Speaker 2: to it, get right to the world. What I write,
Speaker 2: Just what happened? Why never doing chapstick? And did they each? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 2: everybody shastick for years my whole life. Yea, all that
Speaker 2: aqua fall and all that run around with the shiny
Speaker 2: lips like you know, like like I kissed the chicken
Speaker 2: grease or something like I took the chicken. Yeah, like
Speaker 2: like I've been like I've been kissing a pot of
Speaker 2: chicken grease, knowing that you got up like everything I'm like,
Speaker 2: I mean, be a while. It is my first application.
Speaker 2: That's my first application, you know what I mean? For years,
Speaker 2: like my whole life.
Speaker 4: Sorry, nobody ever hear you about doing that?
Speaker 2: Like getting your that's you your merch game. I swear
Speaker 2: to God that it would sell out too damn long. Yes,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, broke, that's a good damn got.
Speaker 1: My question doesn't matter, you know, it doesn't you know,
Speaker 1: with your intonations and whatnot, like with how how do
Speaker 1: you know like screaming when some of it applies for
Speaker 1: us and when something.
Speaker 2: Is just listen to it. I just listened to it,
Speaker 2: not really really listen. I really make do the song.
Speaker 2: Just do the song? What do you? What's all the
Speaker 2: Just do the.
Speaker 3: It's just that I think, right, you must meditate though,
Speaker 3: because I think what a mirror two is asking is
Speaker 3: like and even what Ponte said about just being nastural
Speaker 3: on a stage and being excited, Yeah, you have to
Speaker 3: have a certain still level of control from based on
Speaker 3: what I'm sick.
Speaker 2: Well, you have pat yourself. You have to well, you
Speaker 2: have to be first of all, you know, in terms
Speaker 2: of cardiovascular you gotta be in shape. You know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying, because a lot of times, a lot of
Speaker 2: the yelling and a lot of that can be attributed
Speaker 2: to people just being out of breath. You're not in shape.
Speaker 5: But I was going to ask what famly of youth
Speaker 5: have you drank from? Because you don't seem to age
Speaker 5: like you know, if you look the same as you
Speaker 5: do from Helen your mouth?
Speaker 2: God, little melon, little melanin on herb. Bro, no me game.
Speaker 2: You know you got a cousin like, Yo, this is
Speaker 2: my cousin. He's sixty one. He's like, yeah, what happening baby?
Speaker 2: It was good? It's good.
Speaker 3: Cook like you don't do Okay, I'm just gonna start
Speaker 3: asking vitamins. Lion's main changa rachi like write him in deep.
Speaker 2: Fronte's face right now?
Speaker 5: Is that.
Speaker 2: I was your mushrooms? You're healthy mushroom. I did not.
Speaker 2: I've never heard of No one knows what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2: I don't know what is. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah,
Speaker 2: the rhythm to the boogey to be.
Speaker 3: That's because spells no magic. I'm telling you healthy mushrooms
Speaker 3: for you anyway?
Speaker 2: What is?
Speaker 3: What is the health situation?
Speaker 2: Here? Are you vegetarian? Pest? Like I meet, I meet,
Speaker 2: I got it, I got I got to have me
Speaker 2: a porterhouse or something. Wait, i't to have it. Wait
Speaker 2: a minute, I'm sorry, I'm an animal. This don't got
Speaker 2: to have it. I love everybody. I want you to
Speaker 2: be a vegetarian. I want you to do that. I
Speaker 2: want you to be a pescatarian. I want you to
Speaker 2: have herbs and spike like I gotta have the best.
Speaker 2: He gets the best coming. Sorry, man, eat.
Speaker 1: This reminds me of the very first time I went
Speaker 1: on my health journey. Courtesy of Mark Jenkins, Right, yes,
Speaker 1: remember so the second time I met ll and I
Speaker 1: know you don't remember this.
Speaker 2: This is like right when.
Speaker 1: The tipping point was out, So it's like two thousand
Speaker 1: and four. So Jenkins was in LA working out training
Speaker 1: me and of course lobby call and you were passing
Speaker 1: the Gower Street in La. So it's like, dog, I
Speaker 1: gotta go to Roscoe's so fair right exactly, I cheat.
Speaker 2: On my trainer. So I went in right now. You
Speaker 2: worked out with Mark Jenkins before, So I walked in.
Speaker 1: I know Jenkins was in LA working with me, him
Speaker 1: and maybe like two others celebrity clientele. And Mark Jenkins
Speaker 1: is the guy who his business one his stock went
Speaker 1: up when he built then for the entitled video. So
Speaker 1: you know I'm in roscos and pictures the Pink Panthers.
Speaker 2: Theme, turn right right and and LL so you can't now.
Speaker 1: The thing is, this is the second I've not met LL.
Speaker 1: So I don't know if he knows what a quest
Speaker 1: love is or who a quest love is whatever. So
Speaker 1: right now I'm panicking because I'm like, oh damn, he
Speaker 1: gonna tell. You're probably gonna tell. So I like gave
Speaker 1: him pan I said, well, just coming from a fan
Speaker 1: standpoints like yo, man, I said, by the way, I said,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm a client of Mark Jenks as well,
Speaker 1: so just you know small, he said, don't worry about it.
Speaker 1: Your secret safe with me, worry about it secret safe.
Speaker 2: The first time I met him, wait, at least that five.
Speaker 1: But the first time I met him it was the
Speaker 1: NAACP Awards. We were I think we were doing something
Speaker 1: for for Bono, like a truth. You know, Bono just
Speaker 1: started the Red Company for Africa or whatever, so they
Speaker 1: gave him an award. So there's there's like.
Speaker 2: Backstage, there's like a two second quick change booth. There's
Speaker 2: two of them. Princess in one of them booths, so
Speaker 2: it's like you can't get in there. Whatever.
Speaker 1: So they're like, I thought there was a booge in
Speaker 1: my nose or maybe a ZiT. I don't know, like
Speaker 1: I saw something there, so I like ran in the room.
Speaker 1: Now LLC is positioned right in front of the mirror.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to like, you know, I just want a
Speaker 1: good I want a good ten seconds, yes, to make
Speaker 1: sure that everything's straight, but really see if I got
Speaker 1: a bully or whatever.
Speaker 2: But llll's not budget. You're just sitting there and I
Speaker 2: don't want to be like yo. And he was like,
Speaker 2: you say, your secret safe door.
Speaker 1: You looked marvelous, you know, you just look at me like,
Speaker 1: don't worry you Marvel's be like the second pop that Jordan.
Speaker 2: Jesus.
Speaker 4: I wanted to ask you about Chris Lighty because we
Speaker 4: I had a chance sat down to you know, meet
Speaker 4: and talk with him before he you know, before he passed,
Speaker 4: and he talked about specifically the Mister Smith album and
Speaker 4: for him how that really kind of set him up
Speaker 4: at def Jam and like really people saw him as
Speaker 4: you know, an executive and it you know, put him
Speaker 4: on another level.
Speaker 2: What was that Mister Smith album for you and working
Speaker 2: with him? What was that experience like? Because that was
Speaker 2: almost like another comeback. Every album is for me most
Speaker 2: of the time takes on that type of energy. You know.
Speaker 2: It's because I take so long between records and because
Speaker 2: I make so few albums that every time it's like, okay,
Speaker 2: well what's it gonna be? But that one was an
Speaker 2: amazing experience working with Chris. I trusted him completely in
Speaker 2: terms of his creative, his ear. What actually happened was
Speaker 2: I made a whole album called Mister Smith. I made
Speaker 2: a whole album. I didn't like it, so then I
Speaker 2: threw it away. You know, I do that a lot. Yeah,
Speaker 2: we're gonna talk about that too. Yeah, So I did
Speaker 2: this album. I did an original a mister Smith album
Speaker 2: with a whole bunch of other songs. It was called
Speaker 2: Mister Smith. But I didn't love the album. So I
Speaker 2: was like, eh, I kept that one song with shot
Speaker 2: skills of mister Smith, but the rest of it I
Speaker 2: didn't like. I kept that yeahs re peace. So me
Speaker 2: and Chris we just started working. He started finding tracks,
Speaker 2: finding beats, and I ended up getting with track masters
Speaker 2: and then getting with Rashad and you know, it just
Speaker 2: came together. It came together, and you know, working with
Speaker 2: them was you know, he was a good dude, man.
Speaker 2: And you know, I remember Chris, you know, when he
Speaker 2: first started, we all got along because you know, Chris
Speaker 2: used to be security at the tunnel, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. So when he was when he was like
Speaker 2: working the door at the tunnel, he always gave me
Speaker 2: love and we always got along very very well. And
Speaker 2: you know, well she was still here. Yeah, man, I
Speaker 2: was one of my favorite records on that.
Speaker 4: When you were talking about I Need a Beat and
Speaker 4: how you pretty much played it live and then right
Speaker 4: over it made me think of.
Speaker 2: No, are oh yeah, let's do that? Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: that was I think, my man, I think Chad might
Speaker 2: have did that. Doctor, I think so. I think I
Speaker 2: think so. I think Chad did that. That's my think.
Speaker 2: Favorite Cha No, No, No, Chad Elliott. Chad Elliott. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they used to work with Jodasi and all of them
Speaker 2: and all that. Okay, you know what I'm saying. I
Speaker 2: was only impression that the track masters of the entire
Speaker 2: record didn't they know, they didn't do everything Rashard did
Speaker 2: doing it. You know, there was a few other few
Speaker 2: other producers, but they finished it. What happened was we
Speaker 2: actually work on the album and I was doing songs,
Speaker 2: and then track messages came in kind of midway and
Speaker 2: finished the album. So we didn't start the album together.
Speaker 2: We finished the album. So they they actually made it
Speaker 2: a cohesive body of work. I have to give Stout
Speaker 2: some credit, and give Tone and Polk credit, and give
Speaker 2: Chris Lighty credit because they came in and helped me
Speaker 2: kind of finish the project and make it a cohesive
Speaker 2: what we felt was at that time a cohesive body
Speaker 2: of work. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: Nah, that's one of like that record mad because I
Speaker 4: mean the singles or the singles were like no airplay,
Speaker 4: Hollis the Hollywood like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was fun. That was fun, yo, you know.
Speaker 2: I mean that's why, you know, I'm really excited to
Speaker 2: like for people to hear this record I do with Tip,
Speaker 2: because this is gonna be I think how many songs
Speaker 2: which Tip so you did? He produced it, He did everything,
Speaker 2: he did all the beats, he did everything sound. Yes,
Speaker 2: he did everything. I think it's fourteen songs, fourteen here
Speaker 2: for this, Yeah, it's fourteen and it's all like like
Speaker 2: a whole new thing. So that's gonna be a lot
Speaker 2: of fun. You know.
Speaker 3: I was just gonna ask about another person, since we're
Speaker 3: talking about having a happy sad moment with Chris Lighty,
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, the last time I was in
Speaker 3: a room with you, I was fortunate to be in
Speaker 3: a room with you, Biz and Greg nice As y'all
Speaker 3: were taping an episode for Serious and so I wanted
Speaker 3: you to talk about give us a fun Biz story,
Speaker 3: but also talk about why you even tap Biz to
Speaker 3: be on your radio station.
Speaker 2: Rock the Bell. So so, Biz, I've known Biz forever,
Speaker 2: you know, before we made records, and then before Biz
Speaker 2: made records, he used to just come to my house
Speaker 2: all the time, coming to the basement. I'd be down
Speaker 2: there right in rhymes. He'd be sitting there. Yo. He
Speaker 2: used to just make me laugh. He was just the
Speaker 2: funniest dude in the world. And me, I love that dude.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying. I love biz man like business,
Speaker 2: my man, you know what I'm saying. And you know,
Speaker 2: we knew each other from Long Island. I would see him, he,
Speaker 2: I would see him, Nona. He we'd come to Queens,
Speaker 2: he would come to the house. So so in terms
Speaker 2: of the tapping them to be on salute the sample
Speaker 2: on Rock the Bells, I started Rock the Bells because
Speaker 2: I felt like the artist that I love, Like when
Speaker 2: I look at the way Bob Dylan is treated and
Speaker 2: held in high regard, and Mick Jaggers held in high regard,
Speaker 2: and you know these various artists, Paul McCartney is held
Speaker 2: in high regard, I felt like, you know, the Bismarcks
Speaker 2: and the Big Daddy Kanes and the rock hymns and
Speaker 2: the public enemies and all of them deserved that kind
Speaker 2: of treatment as well, and I felt like they weren't
Speaker 2: getting it. And I felt like, you know, mc light
Speaker 2: wasn't getting it. Queen Latifa wasn't getting it when I
Speaker 2: look at and then when I would listen to the channel,
Speaker 2: you know, which was Backspin at the time, it was
Speaker 2: like a glorified jukebox, you know what I'm saying. But
Speaker 2: it wasn't really about the coach and it wasn't really
Speaker 2: about us. We shouldn't have to make excuses for having
Speaker 2: long story careers with a lot of success. You should
Speaker 2: be celebrated for that, not persecuted and penalized for it.
Speaker 2: And I felt like I felt like the industry was
Speaker 2: turning hip hop into it was commoditizing hip hop and
Speaker 2: turning everybody into cardboard boxes. In other words, if you
Speaker 2: know it it's an old box or older box, you
Speaker 2: just throw it away and you just kind of they
Speaker 2: weren't treating the culture the way it needed to be treated,
Speaker 2: and I wanted to. So what I said, I said,
Speaker 2: you know what what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna
Speaker 2: do for hip hop culture what I did for me
Speaker 2: in my own career. So all I did was I said,
Speaker 2: so the mindset that I applied to me that helped
Speaker 2: me be here, by the grace of God, for so
Speaker 2: many years and be successful. I said, I'm gonna do
Speaker 2: that for the whole culture. And so I took BIS
Speaker 2: and put them on the channel in Shante and all
Speaker 2: of these artists and got them all, you know, Grand
Speaker 2: Master Kaz and and all of them. And now you know,
Speaker 2: I watched this whole renaissance of hip hop happen. You
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. When we did Rock the Bell's
Speaker 2: Festival and the Cruisers and Rock the Bell's Resorts and
Speaker 2: all of this stuff, getting that on MTV, thank you,
Speaker 2: thank you. Yeah, we streamed it. The thing the thing
Speaker 2: about it is that is that I wanted to do
Speaker 2: what I did for me for the entire culture because
Speaker 2: it can't be about you forever. It has to There
Speaker 2: has to be more in your life in terms of
Speaker 2: your journey. You have to want to see others succeed.
Speaker 2: That's why even when we did the Force Tour, I
Speaker 2: didn't do the normal headlining thing and like snatch all
Speaker 2: of the production and make them kind of rap and
Speaker 2: give them ten feet of stage and no, no, you
Speaker 2: have the same sound, you have the same lighting package,
Speaker 2: you have the same opportunities to rock the stage that
Speaker 2: I do. Because I want us all to succeed, and
Speaker 2: I want to see us treat it that way. I
Speaker 2: want them the same way they treat Bono. I want
Speaker 2: them to treat DMC. I don't want to see a difference.
Speaker 4: No, man, I don't get it was one of the
Speaker 4: biggest things I saw when I went to the tour.
Speaker 4: I always admire how just the professionalism first and foremost.
Speaker 4: And you know, I really think it's something that every
Speaker 4: young artist, like every young MC's I really think there's
Speaker 4: something that they should really see because it very rarely
Speaker 4: hearing your story. You know, you were first in like everything,
Speaker 4: so there was no blueprint to follow. But now we're
Speaker 4: thankful enough that we have a blueprint. And I'm like, yo,
Speaker 4: go Seel go see Rod, go see the roots. This
Speaker 4: is what it looks like to be fifty years old
Speaker 4: and still killing it like they're still a late right right,
Speaker 4: not on some like oh okay, but like no, still vibrant,
Speaker 4: like still jamming.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well that's because hip hop. You know, it was
Speaker 2: being served in a greasy brown paper bag unless you
Speaker 2: had a new hit out, and I wanted it served
Speaker 2: on the silver platter regardless. You know, Rock Kim deserves
Speaker 2: to have the biggest stage and the biggest platform, regardless.
Speaker 2: When we do the Grammy special, we're putting you on
Speaker 2: the biggest stage regardless. I don't need to. There's no
Speaker 2: reason why they should be treated otherwise. We live in.
Speaker 2: It's a strange world, right because like I have, I
Speaker 2: literally have millions and millions of fans all over the world.
Speaker 2: But because not the majority of them aren't fourteen, that
Speaker 2: doesn't make them last valuable. Right, So you're like, my
Speaker 2: fans just had birthdays with me. They didn't disappear, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean? You know, you know, so like
Speaker 2: we got to kind of get out of this kind
Speaker 2: of this this state of mind of like if you're
Speaker 2: not you know, if it's not the brand new thing
Speaker 2: and you've been out three years, it doesn't count. It's
Speaker 2: not how it works. Like I don't know, rolland Stone
Speaker 2: was discography front the back, but when they come in
Speaker 2: town to do a show, I go, I don't know,
Speaker 2: you two's discard back to back. But when they come
Speaker 2: in town, I go to the show. I love the show.
Speaker 2: What I'm saying is, yo, people want to see Elo
Speaker 2: cool J, and they want to see the Beasties, and
Speaker 2: they want to see run the EMC. They want to
Speaker 2: see public enemy, they want to see ice T. You
Speaker 2: just got to put them in a position to be seen,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. And stop trying to pretend
Speaker 2: that it's not they don't want to be seen, because
Speaker 2: that's all. That's just a game. It's not real. Because
Speaker 2: the reality is the fans love it. They want to
Speaker 2: buy the music, they want to come to the show.
Speaker 2: And we saw those arenas and we saw those crowds
Speaker 2: and so they're there. And guess what if we went
Speaker 2: a second time now, it'd be even bigger, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying. It would be even bigger. And we
Speaker 2: did very well, but it would be even bigger because
Speaker 2: it because people now see that Yo. Now they know
Speaker 2: it's real and like a word, ah man.
Speaker 3: And the regional aspect that y'all add too, when you know,
Speaker 3: like you go a certain region and they might bring
Speaker 3: out so and so and so and so I can't
Speaker 3: wait for ought to come back to LA because shoot.
Speaker 2: It's about absolutely.
Speaker 4: I really brought up p D and uh yeah, and
Speaker 4: by I brought up Pea absolutely, David Banner, no.
Speaker 1: Doubt, like ran in the third tier, Beady and David
Speaker 1: tod Up, I love it. Yeah, okay, so I'll be
Speaker 1: remiss if I don't ask this question. And I'm certain
Speaker 1: that you've spoken about it before, and I might have
Speaker 1: missed the story. But just as a lover of them
Speaker 1: sees the four three two one situation, Wait, don't do
Speaker 1: the cynical giggle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, let me ask the question. Ready, let's go take
Speaker 2: it back, let's go.
Speaker 1: Like, I'm under the impression that Cannabis was paying tribute
Speaker 1: to your arm or whatever. Like I never knew the
Speaker 1: story behind that. I didn't even know it was a
Speaker 1: this like, sorry for making rehab on.
Speaker 2: Look, you know, cannabis really ain't do nothing wrong, man,
Speaker 2: I just you know, cannabis just touched the third rail.
Speaker 2: Oh lord, No, he didn't do nothing street, He didn't
Speaker 2: do nothing room street. You know what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. He touched the third rail.
Speaker 2: He and said because we had met downstairs earlier, and
Speaker 2: you know, he said, yo, yo, hell man, like you
Speaker 2: tell him get a tattooed just like yours. And instead
Speaker 2: of me saying all right, man, do you think, I'm like, nah,
Speaker 2: I get your own, I'm like territory and all that
Speaker 2: on the microe and so, and I just said that
Speaker 2: to him. And then when I played it when I
Speaker 2: heard him on the record, because I said, all right,
Speaker 2: he's gonna go thro his vocal, I'm like, yeah, do
Speaker 2: you think when I heard him on the record, He's like,
Speaker 2: is that a mic on your arm? Let me bo?
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, we just had this conversation a so
Speaker 2: that and that was the original. Yeah, yeah right, and
Speaker 2: so he actually it was really more about me being
Speaker 2: a little bit more oversensitive. I think, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. I think it was more about that, you know,
Speaker 2: that being said, Look what I try to do with him?
Speaker 2: I say, look, you know, after it happened, I thought
Speaker 2: about it. I'm like, yo, you know what, I don't know,
Speaker 2: say something on the record or something. Nobody'll know what
Speaker 2: I'm talking about. Just you know, just flip it and
Speaker 2: do something else or you know. And he didn't want to,
Speaker 2: you know, go with that. And then he made the record,
Speaker 2: and you know, but I tried to embrace him later,
Speaker 2: like I did shows with him at Barclays and you know,
Speaker 2: I did a show with him. I brought him out Barclays.
Speaker 2: I brought him out different concerts. I try to give
Speaker 2: him love because I want him and his fans to
Speaker 2: know that, you know, I got love for him, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. It just you know, it was
Speaker 2: just hip hop. It was just an MC hip hop thing.
Speaker 2: You know. I didn't really wish him any real ill
Speaker 2: will you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: How was the with the You spoke earlier about working
Speaker 4: with track masters? I want to ask you about the
Speaker 4: Phenomenon album?
Speaker 2: Yeah, what was what was that like?
Speaker 4: And did y'all had yall relationship changed coming off either
Speaker 4: for better for words, coming off of mister Smith going
Speaker 4: in the Phenomenon, you.
Speaker 2: Know, Phenomenon like like the Phenomenon album was one of
Speaker 2: those things where I just wanted to experiment. So I
Speaker 2: went in the studio with Puff and messing around with
Speaker 2: the Phenomenon song, and you know, me and Steve, you know,
Speaker 2: had a conversation about it recently because I think now
Speaker 2: in hindsight, they probably looked at it like I was
Speaker 2: just kind of baling on them a little bit, But
Speaker 2: in reality, I was trying to just be creative and
Speaker 2: do different things and just work with different people in
Speaker 2: experiment because I like working with different producers. I like
Speaker 2: hearing different things. I like to I like that. I
Speaker 2: enjoy it because I do this for fun too. I
Speaker 2: don't do this just for a chart position or money.
Speaker 2: I do it because I love it. So part of
Speaker 2: that love is working with different artists and different producers
Speaker 2: and being creative. So the phenomenon was fun, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying, Like, you know, it was great. You
Speaker 2: know Sally Richison on the records, I'm you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying, like an hour yeah, yeah, yeah, she was ooh,
Speaker 2: mister Smith, Yeah yeah, yeah, she's cool. Wow, man, you
Speaker 2: had I was gonna ask you had a record that drop?
Speaker 2: It was. This has been some years ago. It was
Speaker 2: called Take It. Oh yeah, Joe, Yeah, what happened? What happened?
Speaker 2: It was? It wasn't It was a record that I
Speaker 2: did on a I did it on a little independent label.
Speaker 2: I did the album and I did a few, quite
Speaker 2: a few songs with track masters on there, and I
Speaker 2: just it didn't have distribution. And it was right around
Speaker 2: the time when I started my TV show and see
Speaker 2: I asked Los Angeles at the time, and I just
Speaker 2: didn't have I didn't make the time to promote it
Speaker 2: and really go after it and perform it and get
Speaker 2: it out there. It was, it was it was on authentic.
Speaker 2: It was yeah, it was on authentic and authentic as
Speaker 2: an album was just kind of created in a little
Speaker 2: bit of a vacuum. And you know, I was on
Speaker 2: a TV set, you know, I just was experimented the
Speaker 2: accidental racist. Damn right, let's talk about it. So you
Speaker 2: know what I was trying to say with that song,
Speaker 2: At least I thought I was articulating, because nobody absolutely agreed.
Speaker 2: That's pretty clear, that's pretty obvious. What I was trying
Speaker 2: to say is that you keep your shit to yourself.
Speaker 2: I'll keep minding myself. How about that. Let's start there.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying, like like we just knock going.
Speaker 2: You know, you know, you keep your symbolism over there,
Speaker 2: and I'll keep my symbolism over it. That's what I
Speaker 2: was trying to say. But there is a level of
Speaker 2: false equivalence there. It's hard to really connect the dots
Speaker 2: on that because you can't compare you know, honestly, you
Speaker 2: know what a Confederate flag stands for to what somebody
Speaker 2: may perceive an outfit. To me, you just can't really
Speaker 2: you can't really connect those you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: I can't really connect that. So what I was trying
Speaker 2: to say, what I was looking to say, is that
Speaker 2: if we could get a little bit less judgment, maybe
Speaker 2: it would help us function. You know, if we focused
Speaker 2: more on what works and less on what doesn't work,
Speaker 2: maybe it'll help us function better. That's what I was
Speaker 2: trying to say. But I just didn't you know, I
Speaker 2: just didn't get there. You know, I just missed the
Speaker 2: jump shot. You know what I'm saying, Like it is
Speaker 2: what it is. It's just that that ship bounced off
Speaker 2: the back of the rim, crazy exploded, the backboard fell down,
Speaker 2: the scoreboard fell down, My shorts ripped fell off that record.
Speaker 2: The thing I remember about that record specifically, it came
Speaker 2: out around the time when it was Twitter. It was
Speaker 2: like Twitter was all about going ship with gold on
Speaker 2: top of that ship went gold. It might be platting.
Speaker 2: That's even even worse, you know what I mean, when
Speaker 2: they started making the basketball player. So yeah, I did
Speaker 2: not know that. Yeah, yeah it would go, but I
Speaker 2: forgot about I got a back off that joint. Wow,
Speaker 2: that was I'm just thinking that one back, yo, ill Bomb. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that one, like Bill Bomb Now, that one a lot
Speaker 2: of fun. That was like, you know, running around down
Speaker 2: in the city, run around at queens, me and Bem
Speaker 2: and you know, just run around in the city. And
Speaker 2: you know, Flex asked me if I wanted to do something.
Speaker 2: Scratch made the beat. I just went went in the
Speaker 2: studio and everything I was saying on the record was
Speaker 2: kind of like what we was living. We had the
Speaker 2: strobe lights flashing on the trucks and all that. It
Speaker 2: was all, you know, it was real. It was very real.
Speaker 2: It was very real.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, also, what's my joint on exits thirteen?
Speaker 2: You better watch me? Oh yeah, okay, So here's the thing.
Speaker 1: So I don't know if you know christ Chris Rocks
Speaker 1: nickname is so what Guile Siri dubs Chris Rock. He
Speaker 1: always calls him track nine because Chris is the type
Speaker 1: of music fan that like doesn't go for the hit.
Speaker 1: He goes for the filler. You know, He'll go for
Speaker 1: Stevie Wonder's Yeah, like the filler cut that lets you
Speaker 1: know he's a deep music fan. And when it came out,
Speaker 1: he was just like, this is the one. How come
Speaker 1: I wish like why was it more made of you?
Speaker 1: Better watch me like that to me?
Speaker 2: You know, you know what's funny, man, I'll tell you
Speaker 2: that it was like a winner. I think one of
Speaker 2: the things that that happens, you know, and this happens
Speaker 2: with labels, this happens with artists. You get so so
Speaker 2: spoiled by instantaneous reactions that when you have records that
Speaker 2: kind of hit a different part of your audience that
Speaker 2: is not as reactive, you just don't know, you know,
Speaker 2: don't know how to gauge it, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Like I've had a lot of songs like that, Like
Speaker 2: the dou Wop was a song that people like back
Speaker 2: in the days, really really like. But I didn't know
Speaker 2: back then how to react to that, how to react
Speaker 2: to it, you know what I'm saying. I was gonna
Speaker 2: ask you.
Speaker 1: If we could do that on tour, but I would
Speaker 1: you know what after like we I mean, we kept
Speaker 1: mister goodbar, but then there's like some other you just
Speaker 1: kept cutting them off.
Speaker 2: Was like, ah, I don't never get Yeah, no, we did, Nitro,
Speaker 2: he dropped it. Nitro. I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: like oh boy, yeah, oh boy, oh boy, that's an
Speaker 2: at wheeler right there? Good God? What was it life
Speaker 2: working with the Bomb Squad? Excellent? Eric Yoor, Eric Sadler,
Speaker 2: Keith and Hanks, Shockley, the way they worked on them,
Speaker 2: the way they could. They built the beat in front
Speaker 2: of you or is it wow? Yes, they built them
Speaker 2: in front of me. Yeah. Yeah. It was crazy. Nitro
Speaker 2: was crazy and it gets no rougher.
Speaker 1: You mentioned earlier that you have absolutely no qualms whatsoever
Speaker 1: about scrapping an entire record, So just based on your history,
Speaker 1: how much is in the ll cool J Cannon vault
Speaker 1: from radio down to the Forest album?
Speaker 2: And will we ever see any of it? Will you
Speaker 2: ever released of it? I'll never put any of it out.
Speaker 2: I probably have you at least won't put none, and
Speaker 2: you will like this can't come out possumously or I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna do that. Not gonna do that. But we
Speaker 2: got to see who lives? You know, we don't you
Speaker 2: know no telling how that's gonna play. Give my help, Gerald, No, no,
Speaker 2: I'm saying that, Gerald, We don't know no player. But
Speaker 2: hey listen, I'm not talking tough in that one. I
Speaker 2: don't know. I'm just so can you reveal? Can you
Speaker 2: reveal what you revealed to me. Yeah, probably songs if
Speaker 2: you made with you know who, oh to start there.
Speaker 2: Oh so with Dre, me and Dre probably have about
Speaker 2: forty songs. Yeah, did we doctor Dre? Yeah we had
Speaker 2: we got we had Zoom that was on the bulwark
Speaker 2: right right right, but we had you know, but we
Speaker 2: got a lot of songs in the can, Like I
Speaker 2: had a lot, Like I'll tell you a record that
Speaker 2: was mine that he obviously he took my vocals off
Speaker 2: because he ended up doing it because I was all
Speaker 2: over the place. But that you know, that song I
Speaker 2: was that was one of my points that yeah. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: me and Dre had did that first. Yeah, yeah, that
Speaker 2: that one. Yeah, it was crazy. Quite a few of them,
Speaker 2: it's been a lot of them, had a.
Speaker 3: Lot of damned that be he did real well, Oh
Speaker 3: it killed it.
Speaker 2: It was dope. It was dope. I love you better man. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I wasn't talking about that. Working with the Neptunes, what
Speaker 2: was man, It was amazing working with Pharrell and and
Speaker 2: with Chad and uh that's when they worked together still too,
Speaker 2: and it was like, I mean it was dope. I
Speaker 2: just you know, the one thing you know, what's crazy.
Speaker 2: I was so focused on working out and getting ready
Speaker 2: for the video. This is gonna sound really crazy. I
Speaker 2: forgot to ask Pharrell to be in the video. I
Speaker 2: literally forgot because I forgot, like like like, I forgot
Speaker 2: to ask you. I wanted because I wanted. I wanted
Speaker 2: for Rell to sing on the hook for Real did
Speaker 2: the intro? Why didn't he sing that? He was like, no,
Speaker 2: I don't want to do it. I want to I
Speaker 2: want to put my man on. I'm like okay. And
Speaker 2: so once he put Mark on the hook, then I
Speaker 2: forgot that. He yeah to ask for Real to be
Speaker 2: in the video, and I seen them one day, like
Speaker 2: you asked me to black. I just felt crazy.
Speaker 3: But that's when you got that knife shelf down there
Speaker 3: on your b So it was worth it for all
Speaker 3: of us who was watching the.
Speaker 2: Video up all right now.
Speaker 1: I just want to know the things that we don't
Speaker 1: know that's equivalent to chunking studios. For instance, do you
Speaker 1: know who's singing on around the Way, girl?
Speaker 2: Uh, it's the Flex right, that's like Chris, not Chris.
Speaker 2: But it was the Black Street. It was black before
Speaker 2: they were black streets. So Lighty, Darren, Lighty, and all
Speaker 2: of Yeah, it was them guys. Yeah it was great.
Speaker 2: Is the flex and the driver remember yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I don't know it was No, it was Lighty and
Speaker 2: the other one. And Eric's Eric Eric. His name is Erica. Okay,
Speaker 2: all right? Oh, yes, as we rapidfire? What is the
Speaker 2: meaning I've always want to ask you this, What is
Speaker 2: the meaning of blow titious? Yo? Yo? I mean it's
Speaker 2: just blowtitious? Like you know what I mean? Like yo,
Speaker 2: you know, me and my man Tie fight, yo, Tie,
Speaker 2: and you know, you hilarious with this man like me
Speaker 2: and me and Tod were seeing each other in the
Speaker 2: swept like blow ticious. And then I just put it
Speaker 2: on the record. Now everybody said, yo, he's talking about
Speaker 2: you know, is he talking about trans he? Was he
Speaker 2: talking about? Is he going left?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: It's just blow titious? Stevie Delicious, skeeee Stevie Delicious, Give
Speaker 2: me coops coops love me? Good God, damn hollis the Hollywood? Yes,
Speaker 2: like this again we got alright, So that was so
Speaker 2: that on that you know what I'm saying. And I
Speaker 2: actually had another verse on on on the Flavoring your
Speaker 2: Ear remix, and then I changed it to that one,
Speaker 2: Papa love it that that record, the one, Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I love that. Yeah. That was a cool one too.
Speaker 2: That was fun. Damn. You know some some of them joints.
Speaker 2: This is the part of the show where he does
Speaker 2: yeah but okay.
Speaker 1: So, speaking of flavoring your ear, was there a rumor
Speaker 1: I don't know who told me, maybe Zezriver told me.
Speaker 1: Was that verse at all connected? I heard that that
Speaker 1: was maybe he directed the Biggie or something like that
Speaker 1: with why would I do that?
Speaker 2: But then the who shot then the I shot you.
Speaker 2: I was in the studio with Big when he did
Speaker 2: shot you. I was literally, this is someone trying to
Speaker 2: make something bugging out. Yet, let me tell you something,
Speaker 2: let me say something. That's why I'm asking some of
Speaker 2: my no, no, no, it's all good. My record, Like
Speaker 2: these songs were like sometimes I like it's just like
Speaker 2: head sprung right. Sometimes I just do comedy on them joints.
Speaker 2: Sometimes I just do shit that's stupid. Like sometimes I'm
Speaker 2: consciously doing like Big Ellie a bit silly, big Money,
Speaker 2: big really really with an R. I didn't say Big
Speaker 2: Willie and Big Billy and all these you know. So
Speaker 2: so between that, like saying that or doing his ship low.
Speaker 2: It just sounded good to me.
Speaker 1: I will say that, Yes, you are your your level
Speaker 1: of humor on record, and people ask me on your
Speaker 1: scissor World, I'm like, oh, God, home and use this
Speaker 1: because you know, everyone was like, give you your favorite
Speaker 1: l record and I was like, Yo, I'm sorry, but
Speaker 1: you can't dance.
Speaker 2: It's my favorite song of all time. You look like
Speaker 2: a moro. Yo. That's my favorite shit of all time. Yo.
Speaker 2: They put a patch on it.
Speaker 1: Yes, that's what I'm saying, Like for me, can you
Speaker 1: your your level of humor? Your evil laughter?
Speaker 2: All? That's my favorite shit of all time. I really
Speaker 2: love the force the new song Oh thank You? So
Speaker 2: you still get the same rush from writing a song
Speaker 2: that you did when you made I Need to Beat
Speaker 2: one hundred percent. I love it. I mean, you know, like,
Speaker 2: I love the fact that the way people address the
Speaker 2: idea of me having an album is going to be
Speaker 2: very different after I put this record out, because right
Speaker 2: now it's kind of like a warm and fuzzy cute.
Speaker 2: All that's cute, and let's talk about what you've done,
Speaker 2: because that's just the nature of our game, right Because
Speaker 2: when you do something a long time the bar goes
Speaker 2: up and the expectations go down. Right, So my bar
Speaker 2: is up here and the expectations for what I'm going
Speaker 2: to deliver is down here, and so we you know,
Speaker 2: you have to be self aware with that, right. So
Speaker 2: I love it, you know, I love you know, making songs,
Speaker 2: and I love the challenge of showing people what's possible
Speaker 2: in hip hop. We haven't had an artist that's been
Speaker 2: out multiple decades to put records out that really have impact.
Speaker 2: We've had quotables, we've had critical acclaim, you know, we've
Speaker 2: had everything kind of in between there, but we haven't
Speaker 2: heard anybody really smash them. Yeah, nah, man, it's change.
Speaker 2: I was when we were at the four Stour.
Speaker 4: I was just sitting there and I'm watching it and like,
Speaker 4: you know, this is you know, rock Cam, this is everybody, Daylight,
Speaker 4: everybody some of my favorite rap routs all time. But
Speaker 4: I was just really watching your performance and it really
Speaker 4: reminded me of something like a mirror you would say,
Speaker 4: like how what you're saying like kind of like the
Speaker 4: curse of the straight A students, so to speak, Like
Speaker 4: no one you have so much longevity.
Speaker 2: And so much consistently so good. We take it for granted, Taking.
Speaker 4: For granted, And I'm just watching thefore and I'm like,
Speaker 4: I'm watching it, but I'm like, yo, I know these
Speaker 4: songs like and I don't think people really give you
Speaker 4: that credit as an MC. They give you the credit
Speaker 4: as you know, breaking being a pioneer and all that,
Speaker 4: but I'm just like, yo, funck all that.
Speaker 2: If we just talking RAPSG like ll is probably the
Speaker 2: most quotable rapper ever, Like I knew all the songs.
Speaker 2: I think that's I think that's I think that's probably
Speaker 2: you know, Look, that's all subjective, right, Like, I don't
Speaker 2: really concern myself with that part of it. What I
Speaker 2: will tell you is this, obviously I'm good enough to
Speaker 2: still be here. So that's a start. I mean, because
Speaker 2: you were telling your story and I'm like, it's not
Speaker 2: an eighty damn bro. And when the album comes a
Speaker 2: lot of them gonna listen, They're gonna listen. Can you
Speaker 2: tell us like you told us it was you and Tip.
Speaker 2: That's really kind of all you told us.
Speaker 1: Was you?
Speaker 2: Right? Yeah? You know, I'll just just driving on what
Speaker 2: season is it coming? What season is to be cold outside? Soon? Come?
Speaker 2: How do you I'm regaining your masters back from that. Ye,
Speaker 2: how did you do that? It just it just worked out.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know people you own your masters? Yeah,
Speaker 2: he should? Should you open that place? Crazy? By the way,
Speaker 2: there's a song. So when I'm was teaching the n
Speaker 2: y U there's a song.
Speaker 1: I don't know how well now that poss explain to
Speaker 1: me a whole like how two inch tapes are whatever
Speaker 1: a rare commodity. There's an actual LL song on one
Speaker 1: of the Nation a millions reels that I never heard before.
Speaker 1: It was just like one verse, probably because that's probably
Speaker 1: Rick Rick probably just like a raven shit And yeah,
Speaker 1: probably that makes.
Speaker 2: A lot of sense because you know, it's funny, like
Speaker 2: a lot of the original Public Enemy songs. At the time,
Speaker 2: Rick came to me and he was like, yo, he
Speaker 2: wanted me to record Uzie ways a ton wow. And
Speaker 2: I was like and I was like yeah, he was like,
Speaker 2: do you want to record it? I'm like, well, what
Speaker 2: do you mean. He's like, well, you just do the song.
Speaker 2: I said no, I write my own rhymes though. Rick,
Speaker 2: He's like, oh, okay, okay, okay, So then he did.
Speaker 2: He ended up doing Public Enemy. You know what I'm saying, so,
Speaker 2: you know, so he brought me UZI ways a ton.
Speaker 2: He brought me like he wanted me to record a
Speaker 2: lot of those PE songs. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 2: Oh my god, you had a reck I'm on the
Speaker 2: Street Fight the soundtrack the Light, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah?
Speaker 2: What was I was just wilding, man like, just having fun.
Speaker 2: Like a lot of the songs are like become like
Speaker 2: jam sessions, just vibing and then say, yo, I keep that.
Speaker 2: I like it. You know what I'm saying. I don't
Speaker 2: like for me to be honest with you, you know.
Speaker 2: And this goes back to the MC comment that you
Speaker 2: kind of that you were talking about. Like the difference
Speaker 2: between me and a lot of the other guys is
Speaker 2: that for a lot of them, they're always focused on
Speaker 2: being as descriptive and as creative and as clever as
Speaker 2: they possibly can lyrically on every song. I don't do that.
Speaker 2: I go for the feeling of the song, whatever the
Speaker 2: song requires to feel good. That's what I do. It
Speaker 2: is I'm not so so what does But what that
Speaker 2: does is you get in situations where you only need
Speaker 2: twelve points to win, sometimes you need forty five. Sometimes
Speaker 2: you need seven. Sometimes you need nineteen as opposed to
Speaker 2: a guy who's always out there trying to go to
Speaker 2: thirty forty every night. That's the so creatively, that's why
Speaker 2: I probably am not in a lot of those conversations
Speaker 2: because that's not my focus. I look at guards like
Speaker 2: Michael Jackson. I look at Rick James, I look at
Speaker 2: you know, James Brown. I look at you know, these artists,
Speaker 2: Marvin Gay. I look at these different artists and the
Speaker 2: thing that they all have in common is the feeling.
Speaker 2: It wasn't about just the lyrics, right, the technical lyric
Speaker 2: was not what made you feel good? You know what
Speaker 2: I mean?
Speaker 4: Nah, I mean because we sang the whole flavor in
Speaker 4: ear verse and blow t is ain't even real word,
Speaker 4: but it just it's so good, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: But I bet you you know if if in a
Speaker 2: certain scenario, if you said you're like blow you know
Speaker 2: what I mean, like you just it's just a vibe,
Speaker 2: So that was you don't say I'm saying no. That's why,
Speaker 2: like my catalog is the way it is, because part
Speaker 2: of being able to run fast is being confident enough
Speaker 2: to run slow. Damn you know, you know, you know,
Speaker 2: being it, you know what I mean, that's part of it.
Speaker 2: I ain't all the time, you know, because you know
Speaker 2: you see Hussein boat jogging, You're like, oh, he ain't
Speaker 2: really fast. It's like he's jogging. Okay, you know you
Speaker 2: understand I'm saying. So that's kind of part of But
Speaker 2: I think that I have to stick with that. I
Speaker 2: have to be myself. I don't want to be fighting
Speaker 2: for my lyrical life on every song. That's not what
Speaker 2: it's about because people don't need that for me. For me,
Speaker 2: what they need is to be touched in their souls.
Speaker 2: So whatever the song requires, that's what I'm gonna do.
Speaker 2: You already do that for now.
Speaker 1: I have one point five questions because you already mentioned
Speaker 1: his name and I forgot what was it like? Cay
Speaker 1: telling the process of making serious effect with Michael Jackson.
Speaker 2: Mike is hilarious man. So like, first of all, you
Speaker 2: walk in the studios a ladies traffic, I'm like, yo,
Speaker 2: Mike's in traffic is hilaric. Like, but we had a
Speaker 2: good job, man, Yeah, we had sobody, you know, we
Speaker 2: had so much fun. And just what year was that made?
Speaker 2: Like I found this around on around the I'm bad
Speaker 2: around the bad a little bit after the bad area, like, no,
Speaker 2: my bad, there's a bad battle, yeah, Radio Lee Bay.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, they came out on Radio School. I came
Speaker 2: out first, the Battle the bad albums. It's going to
Speaker 2: be right here, Yo, No, it definitely ain't. And so
Speaker 2: I was like, yo, you know, just working with Mike
Speaker 2: was just it was just a lot of fun, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. We had a good time in
Speaker 2: the studio. We hung out, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: We were always cool. It was great. Plus, you know,
Speaker 2: I spent so much much time with Quincy Jones. You know,
Speaker 2: he taught me a lot about career between him and
Speaker 2: Lino Richie. So now it was amazing. It was amazing.
Speaker 1: Okay, So my my final question is when when we
Speaker 1: first started rehearsing, we of course had to put off
Speaker 1: a few days because you just became a yeah yeah
Speaker 1: three times over, which made me think, like, how what
Speaker 1: advice could you give us those who are in budding relationships,
Speaker 1: dice who are newly married and whatever, how to maintain uh,
Speaker 1: your sanity and your family and also career be a
Speaker 1: career because I think I think it's rather like notable
Speaker 1: and applause worthy that you know, you and Simone have
Speaker 1: made it through the storm.
Speaker 2: You have kids and and all that successful business too.
Speaker 2: I would love some ear rings. We could work that out.
Speaker 2: I think. I think, Look, man, I think what I
Speaker 2: what I've learned, man, is where I'm starting as I
Speaker 2: ain't playing detective. Okay, it ain't gonna be no detective
Speaker 2: work involved. I'm not doing that. Okay, it's no detective work.
Speaker 2: So it's gonna be what it's gonna be. All right,
Speaker 2: I'm starting it. Let's go because I need sanity and
Speaker 2: I need to be calm and relaxed, and that's it.
Speaker 2: So I'm not doing no detective work. Okay, I ain't
Speaker 2: coughing nothing, and I ain't playing detective. So I'm out
Speaker 2: that game. Okay, So now you just take it off
Speaker 2: about fifty percent of your drama everything, right. I put
Speaker 2: that with that, just like, Okay, no detective work. That's
Speaker 2: first thing. Second thing is I'm gonna try to help
Speaker 2: facilitate your dreams, make your dreams come true, right, help
Speaker 2: you with your dream make sure you write. And then
Speaker 2: the third thing is I'm gonna always go after my
Speaker 2: dreams and my purpose wholeheartedly you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: And the better I take care of me, the better
Speaker 2: I can take care of you. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: And then you know, then there's little things. You know,
Speaker 2: you can't be afraid of silence, man, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying, Like, we ain't got to be talking. Man,
Speaker 2: It's all right.
Speaker 1: When I tell you, when I tell you, there's one
Speaker 1: point by day for where the roof a daily tab
Speaker 1: on ll idioms her way past, like wake up and
Speaker 1: smell the coffee. I'm not playing literally, I'm going I
Speaker 1: missed out.
Speaker 2: Oh all right? In the house, yeah yeah, the one
Speaker 2: the pants leg? How did that? Was that? Just something? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I did it? Listen the bike messages in New York
Speaker 2: did it? I liked it because they used to do
Speaker 2: it for that episode of Oil. Wouldn't get on their chain,
Speaker 2: the chain, so I'm like, yo, I'm rolling my joint up.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 2: I just started wearing it like that and it took
Speaker 2: on the life of his own. But my favorite thing
Speaker 2: about that is that's my son on the theme song
Speaker 2: in the house. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, wow, last
Speaker 2: yeah I put them on there. Debbie did a sitcom too, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I did the sitcom with Debbie Allen the last time
Speaker 2: she acted in the sitcom. It was amazing. Working with
Speaker 2: Debbie was great. She's she's amazing.
Speaker 3: Okay, last last question, No more films, because you've been
Speaker 3: asked for a minute.
Speaker 2: Well, I just we just wrapped and c I asked,
Speaker 2: we did fourteenth seasons.
Speaker 3: I have a.
Speaker 2: Well, I guess I could talk about a little bit
Speaker 2: with the tentative deal. I got to reoccur role on
Speaker 2: n CIS Hawaii, and then I got some films that
Speaker 2: that I'm looking at. Yeah, I got some films. I
Speaker 2: got some films I'm looking at for sure.
Speaker 1: I think we've asked absolutely everything. Cool, James Todd smith Man, No,
Speaker 1: for real. I I know every time we like thank
Speaker 1: you whatever and like give you the presidential but for real,
Speaker 1: when I say thank.
Speaker 2: You, I'm happy to be here. Man.
Speaker 1: You're literally one of my favorite creative human beings ever.
Speaker 1: And the thing is is that, as we said before,
Speaker 1: you make it look so effort like literally it's like
Speaker 1: Steph Curry, Like after a while you're.
Speaker 2: Just like, all right, great, it's going in like a
Speaker 2: big deal.
Speaker 1: All right. But yeah, and I think now, especially in
Speaker 1: light of the onslaught of death that hip hopics experience
Speaker 1: a lot of premature careers. Cut and Frank also seeing
Speaker 1: a lot of brothers just self sabotage their things, like
Speaker 1: that's why I'm watching people, and like you're you're a
Speaker 1: really exemplary of human beings that aren't afraid even if
Speaker 1: you make.
Speaker 2: A misstep, like it's like, okay, well that didn't work.
Speaker 2: What else is there in the territory? Right? And I
Speaker 2: would say this, I would say in terms of the
Speaker 2: self sabotage, just to just to put some words out
Speaker 2: there in the universe for people. You don't limit yourself, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, You don't limit yourself. You
Speaker 2: have to be comfortable with them. We're seeing something bigger
Speaker 2: for your life, and you have to be comfortable with
Speaker 2: that idea. A lot of people think they're comfortable with it,
Speaker 2: but the reality is when they every time they say
Speaker 2: that they self talk to themselves about doing something big,
Speaker 2: there's a little voice that jumps in there and says
Speaker 2: it's not possible because it's gonna require you to change.
Speaker 2: It's gonna require you to change, And a lot of
Speaker 2: it is also just fear based and kind of feeling
Speaker 2: like everybody, a lot of people feel success is like
Speaker 2: hitting a lot of and it's not. You know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying, it's it's the effect is like hitting the
Speaker 2: lot of But the journey isn't, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So so, so, you gotta be willing to believe in
Speaker 2: yourself and that aspect of yourself, and you gotta really believe.
Speaker 2: You gotta believe, man, you can't be limited. You gotta
Speaker 2: believe in yourself and believe in the power inside of
Speaker 2: you to do something greater with your life. You know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying. And that really is something that you
Speaker 2: know when you when you're drifting off to sleep at night.
Speaker 2: You have to envision something greater for your life. You
Speaker 2: have to take make a conscious effort to control your
Speaker 2: thoughts on a daily basis so that you're seeing yourself
Speaker 2: go to the to the height you want to go to.
Speaker 2: You can't just be your Your mind shouldn't be like
Speaker 2: a cork just thrown in the ocean, just randomly bouncing around.
Speaker 2: You should be very intentional about what you want out
Speaker 2: of life. I need you to gather everyone in hip
Speaker 2: hop and just lock them in camp and just op. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I just yeah, that was a moment that was definitely
Speaker 2: put that off because they you know, they was, you
Speaker 2: can't do it. They can't I own this, Okay, so
Speaker 2: they knew no owned it, but ing below, I get it.
Speaker 2: I was the car side, didn't know what's your car?
Speaker 2: All right, I'm gonna be.
Speaker 1: Having Fan Tigelow and Sugar, Steve Man, unpaid Bill and
Speaker 1: Light yea man, I mean you don't want to rate?
Speaker 1: Why do what I do?
Speaker 2: Thank you great James Stott Smith has finally come on
Speaker 2: this question. We don't need no more. Episodes were good.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. We appreciate it.
Speaker 5: Till on, loan bro, thank you, thank you for listening
Speaker 5: to The Quest Love Supreme. This podcast is hosted by
Speaker 5: a mere quest Love Thompson like Saint Claire, Vante Coleman, Sugar,
Speaker 5: Steve Mandell, and myself.
Speaker 2: Unpaid Bill Sherman.
Speaker 5: The executive producers are Mer just walked into the goddamn
Speaker 5: room Thompson, Sean g and Brian Calhoun. Produced by Britney Benjamin,
Speaker 5: Jake Pain and Ia Sinclair. Edited by Alex Conroy I
Speaker 5: know Alex Conroy. Produced for iHeart by Noel Brown and
Speaker 5: Mike Johns. Auto engineering by Graham Gibson at Iheart's La Studio.
Speaker 5: Thank You very Much.
Speaker 1: West Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
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