Speaker 1: Wait till answer up in the morning, The Breakfast Club Morning.
Speaker 2: Everybody's thej Envy Jess Hilarious, Charlamage, the guy. We are
Speaker 2: the Breakfast Club. We got some special guests in the building.
Speaker 1: Yes, indeed we got Little brother absolutely.
Speaker 3: Big Pool.
Speaker 4: How y'all brother's feeling Man good Man were alive, so
Speaker 4: you can afore thankful, thankful they got the new documentary,
Speaker 4: Made a Lord Watch the Little Brother's Story.
Speaker 1: Why that title, I mean, first it we started this
Speaker 1: when we were making the album Made a Little Watch
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, twenty eighteen, So this was kind of like
Speaker 1: to bring into that era and it just made sense.
Speaker 1: It just really made sense, like thinking about everything that
Speaker 1: we kind of went through and survived, the Lord had
Speaker 1: to be watching over us. There was no other fucking explanation.
Speaker 1: I So no, man, that was just kind of felt
Speaker 1: just felt like a conclusion of that chapter. And yeah,
Speaker 1: five years in the making. Man. So it's out now
Speaker 1: on YouTube.
Speaker 2: But let's let's talk from the begin and for people
Speaker 2: that don't know who Little Brothers and how you got
Speaker 2: together and how you met, which is pretty dope.
Speaker 1: You your brothers met at HBCU. Absolutely Carolina unc University.
Speaker 1: Shout out Eagle pride, This Durma Carolina nineteen Well, I
Speaker 1: came in ninety seven. I came in ninety eight. We
Speaker 1: met in ninety eight. In ninety eight where we met.
Speaker 2: You're from Rialley, Virginia. From Virginia to Old Diminion's supposed
Speaker 2: to go to. My wife went to Older Minion. She
Speaker 2: graduated mo Old Dominion. That's that's how I know I.
Speaker 1: Still got my ID from when I went to orientation.
Speaker 1: You still got the ID.
Speaker 3: I want to tell your mama though, why you why
Speaker 3: you waited till the day.
Speaker 1: Before exaggerated fam. It wasn't the day before, it was
Speaker 1: a week before. Nah, I mean that was that was
Speaker 1: my first big decision, as you know, an eighteen year
Speaker 1: old was was making that decision. And I mean she
Speaker 1: let me make the decision for myself. But it's still
Speaker 1: my mom, you know what I mean. Like I don't
Speaker 1: cuss in front of my mama to this day, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. But nah, I mean, but still
Speaker 1: it's just it's one of the things like I have
Speaker 1: a healthy fear. My mom is so.
Speaker 5: Healthy healthy fear.
Speaker 1: My mom got Napoleon complex man, She not.
Speaker 2: Like HBCUs because I mean, you go to it was free.
Speaker 1: It wasn't the HBCU thing. It was the I was
Speaker 1: gonna be staying with living with my uncle, so her brother.
Speaker 1: So she knew, like, Yo, you're good, good, You're down
Speaker 1: there with family. None of us had been to Durham,
Speaker 1: North Carolina. None of us had heard of North Carolina Central.
Speaker 1: So for her it was just a shock, like what
Speaker 1: what where you going? I thought you was gonna be
Speaker 1: you know where I had a hand on you. So
Speaker 1: she went to that. Nah, my mom didn't go to college.
Speaker 1: She went to she went to nursing school, go to college.
Speaker 1: But so yeah, so it was just one of the
Speaker 1: things where it happened. I literally got in Central. It
Speaker 1: happened in like a week, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Like the whole process from asking to do you want
Speaker 1: to go to me doing paperwork and it happened in
Speaker 1: like a week. So it was just moving and I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, ship, I'm in there. I'm going Okay,
Speaker 1: now I gotta tell me mom.
Speaker 3: I would think she'd be happy.
Speaker 1: She was happy, that's the thing, Like she was happy
Speaker 1: for me. But it was just the thing of this
Speaker 1: isn't where we thought you were. This wasn't plan I had,
Speaker 1: this is this is your plan now now I think
Speaker 1: it was the realization of it goes from my plan
Speaker 1: for you to your plan for you control anymore. And
Speaker 1: I'm her you know, I'm her youngest son. So it
Speaker 1: was just one of the things of like ship, I
Speaker 1: gotta let go now, and so that's what it was.
Speaker 2: So he got to college and you guys met each other.
Speaker 2: So talk about that process. How you guys met. I
Speaker 2: know a lot of this is actually domary, but how
Speaker 2: you guys met and what attracted you guys together and
Speaker 2: then you started this rap group that became underground Legends.
Speaker 1: Man, it was, uh, it was very organic. I met
Speaker 1: pool well first, I met ninth. We met uh what
Speaker 1: we I think I met? We met first ninety eight? Yeah,
Speaker 1: we met night. Yeah, so yeah, we met through a
Speaker 1: mutual friend. Uh nine was on campus and and he
Speaker 1: was we was moving in the dorm. Like we saw
Speaker 1: each other from the dorm and uh over Source magazine
Speaker 1: we started chopping up all this is in the dock.
Speaker 1: But long story short, we basically just kind of started,
Speaker 1: you know, working together. This was at a time when
Speaker 1: you know, it was at the time this is like
Speaker 1: ninety eight, So this is when no limit is like
Speaker 1: killing everything, especially up. Yeah, so hbce you no limit
Speaker 1: at Like the Ghetto d album dropped my freshman year,
Speaker 1: that was all you heard in every room, like we
Speaker 1: was bumping that shit. Nonock body listen what listen man?
Speaker 1: We ran ghetto dope. So but so everybody was pumping that.
Speaker 1: So if you were a kid that was into like
Speaker 1: raucous or soundbomb, like, you know, meeting someone else that
Speaker 1: was into that that was kind of rare, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. So when you met somebody that was
Speaker 1: on that same wave, if it's like, oh shit, I
Speaker 1: found my people. So we just kind of linked up
Speaker 1: and just started making records and people are out there.
Speaker 2: When he said Ruckus Ruckus record, you got to tell
Speaker 2: him because somebody potentializing because this was the label that
Speaker 2: you know, I would lyrical, miracle, spiritual.
Speaker 1: Very criminal, umbilical, that type of thing.
Speaker 3: You can't help it break down, they said, rockets.
Speaker 1: Somebody might not know what it was. You know, it
Speaker 1: was very much. They were like it was an underground label,
Speaker 1: but it was you know, I mean most quality. You know,
Speaker 1: it was like pretty much all Eminem was on Rocket
Speaker 1: sound Bomb. Yeah. So so they were just you know,
Speaker 1: putting out amazing stuff that we really enjoyed, and so
Speaker 1: we just kind of started making records, put some stuff
Speaker 1: up on the internet, and uh, you.
Speaker 6: Just sounds like today. I don't know, how would you
Speaker 6: describe it sound today like now?
Speaker 1: It's not the same, it's not the same, but it's
Speaker 1: still us. It's still us. It's weird, it's like our
Speaker 1: sound has evolved musically, but it's still sound like Little Brothers,
Speaker 1: like one I had after our last album came out
Speaker 1: maylod Watch and then we just put out two singles
Speaker 1: last October October with Wish Me Well in Glory, Glory
Speaker 1: September September, September I'm Bad. And one of the biggest
Speaker 1: compliments we got was that somebody said, Yo, I can
Speaker 1: make an LB playlist from y'all stuff twenty years ago
Speaker 1: to now, and it sounds like y'all haven't missed a beat.
Speaker 1: I can't tell that it's dated. It doesn't sound it
Speaker 1: still sounds timeless, and that was something I think we
Speaker 1: always strive for. So that's if I had describe it,
Speaker 1: I would just say it's timeless.
Speaker 4: Can I ask you a question about just being from
Speaker 4: the South. When you first it is random. When you
Speaker 4: first heard Ghetto Dope, right then, you think it was
Speaker 4: kind of blaspheming.
Speaker 3: It's just a little bit, just a little yo. I
Speaker 3: love the song.
Speaker 1: I was yelling too hard man, right right, dude, man man,
Speaker 1: I played man ghetto Dope that I played. We ran
Speaker 1: that whole album trying to do something that Moby Dick
Speaker 1: was doing all the hooks I could. I was the rappers.
Speaker 3: You paused worthy people, this is the album.
Speaker 1: Oh no, that's explainable with bourbons and lax uh weak
Speaker 1: man comment. We ran the album left the right man,
Speaker 1: So nah, it was we didn't really. I didn't think
Speaker 1: of it as blasphemous. I just thought it was I
Speaker 1: looked at his peep paying homage to that era, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, paying homage to Ride and all
Speaker 1: of them. So I love that album.
Speaker 2: But you guys also came out in the era where
Speaker 2: the DJ and the producer was part of the group, right, yeah, yeah, sure,
Speaker 2: whether it was of course running m c J J,
Speaker 2: Fresh Prince and Jazzy Jeff step Ninth Wonder was part
Speaker 2: of Little Brother in the beginning. Yeah, he's not here now,
Speaker 2: So what's the relationship with ninth wonders? They're no more relationship.
Speaker 1: There's no more relationship. But there's no no. I mean
Speaker 1: we talked about it in the dot, but no, we're
Speaker 1: just separate entities, you know what I'm saying. That we
Speaker 1: came in the game together, but we're little brother, he's
Speaker 1: ninth one, and we're just separate entity that we coexist peacefully,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And that's just what it is.
Speaker 4: But I didn't participate in the doctor because I mean,
Speaker 4: this is the little brother's story.
Speaker 1: That's a question for him.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, you know, but like I would like to
Speaker 4: have heard his perspective of it now as what did
Speaker 4: y'all reach out to it?
Speaker 1: We absolutely, yeah, we reached out, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Made it clear that you know, it wasn't this wasn't
Speaker 1: gonna be a hit piece. We wasn't coming for nobody next.
Speaker 1: You know, we're just telling our story in just a beautiful,
Speaker 1: honest way, and he just shows me how to participate,
Speaker 1: and that's his right too.
Speaker 4: I feel like y'all set them up nights, especially when
Speaker 4: you first told the early story about I forgot what
Speaker 4: album it was. But it was an album I think
Speaker 4: it was awful rock, yeah, right, produced by DJ Premier,
Speaker 4: and he was like, yo, that's what I want to
Speaker 4: be in one of y'all encourage him, like, yo, you can.
Speaker 1: Be that absolutely absolutely. Yeah. Man, we were always I mean,
Speaker 1: we're coming up. I mean, you gotta keep in mind, like, dude,
Speaker 1: we like nineteen twenty years old. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: I mean we you know, we're just trying to figure
Speaker 1: out let alone, trying to figure out how to be artists,
Speaker 1: I figure out how to be men. Yeah, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. Like, so, you know, trying to figure
Speaker 1: out all that stuff at the same time. I mean, man,
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's it's tough. So but yeah, but
Speaker 1: we tried to tell the story just as honestly as
Speaker 1: you as we could. And but you know, we can't
Speaker 1: speak for another person. We can only tell our experience,
Speaker 1: and so he chose not to And that's is right.
Speaker 6: What made y'all want to do the documentary right now?
Speaker 6: Is it anything other than the fact that y'all.
Speaker 1: Years in the game, I mean twenty years but uh now,
Speaker 1: I mean we talked about it. We just wanted to
Speaker 1: tell our story, our way. You know. We didn't want
Speaker 1: it to be uh, you know, unsung or told by
Speaker 1: somebody else, you know what I mean, or you know,
Speaker 1: so they can pick their angle, their slant or whatever.
Speaker 1: And we wanted to be our story, our voices, our way,
Speaker 1: and so we said, let's do it, and we just
Speaker 1: started the journey. We didn't know what we was doing,
Speaker 1: but we started the journey twenty eighteen, and it just
Speaker 1: took us time to kind of figure out the story
Speaker 1: we wanted to tell and how we wanted to tell it.
Speaker 1: And I think the pandemic actually helped us trum endlessly
Speaker 1: because that version of the movie now is that's the
Speaker 1: third version trying to try to knock it down, and
Speaker 1: it's just very It's something that you know, with documentaries,
Speaker 1: I mean, they're tough, and I think a lot of
Speaker 1: filmmakers they would try to do docs because they think
Speaker 1: that it's easier because you're telling a factual story, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. But it's like, even if you're
Speaker 1: telling a factual story, it still has to be compelling
Speaker 1: and you still have to arrange those facts in a
Speaker 1: compelling way, because if you're just telling facts, that's not
Speaker 1: a movie that's a fucking book report, Like nobody wants
Speaker 1: to see that, you know what I mean, You have
Speaker 1: to give a story. And so our partners on it,
Speaker 1: Holland Gallagher who's our director, and jo Phillips who's our writer,
Speaker 1: they really were our partners in it, and they're younger
Speaker 1: than us, and so we thought it was important to
Speaker 1: have people who were from a different generation to kind
Speaker 1: of catch a lot of the blind spots that we
Speaker 1: make not have solved, and we thought that was important,
Speaker 1: and so they came in and they really helped kind
Speaker 1: of shape the narrative because they were looking at this
Speaker 1: they weren't super fans of us, and that was something
Speaker 1: that we did not want. We didn't want someone that
Speaker 1: was the ultimate Little Brother fan making this movie because
Speaker 1: they feel like they already know the story and if they,
Speaker 1: you know, you you dead in the water then and
Speaker 1: that's just not the way documentary works. So they really
Speaker 1: came in and were able to just you know, tell,
Speaker 1: We told our stories, We did our interviews, the interviews,
Speaker 1: we shot our personal interviews everyone else. We gave the
Speaker 1: questions beforehand, like cause you know, it's you know, my
Speaker 1: grandmother rest in peace. Our mother's homies. You know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. It's not like you're working with actors. You
Speaker 1: working with people, you know what I mean. So you
Speaker 1: got to give them time to kind of think what
Speaker 1: you want to say. So we gave them all the
Speaker 1: questions beforehand, and then when it came time for me
Speaker 1: in Pooh interview, we told Holland and Yo, like, yo, bro,
Speaker 1: we don't want nothing, just get in get in here.
Speaker 1: Whatever you ask one take one shot. That's what it is.
Speaker 1: And so that's that's that's what y'all got.
Speaker 2: You see evolution in it. I mean you see dark
Speaker 2: skinning Leonard in there, absolutely.
Speaker 1: Living with the hair like that sounds like he was
Speaker 1: like look.
Speaker 5: I was like, oh my god, you look like one
Speaker 5: of the kids.
Speaker 1: Lean on me. What's the club? What year was that too?
Speaker 1: That was as show? That was a five five? It
Speaker 1: was five, I remember it was a five. That was
Speaker 1: the on We talked about it briefly on q LS,
Speaker 1: but yeah, that was the only interview that I missed
Speaker 1: because when we had to do that that run, I
Speaker 1: think your son, Yeah, that was when my son, the
Speaker 1: son was born. So it was just me and Knife
Speaker 1: on that run every time I see that, I think
Speaker 1: about it, because I wouldn't as polished as I am
Speaker 1: now doing interviews. I was like, b T, I.
Speaker 2: Don't know I'm gonna work there, irying to dance around.
Speaker 1: I ain't worked there. What it was like? Nah no, No,
Speaker 1: that was that was funny. That was that was blast
Speaker 1: from the past. It was five. It was on five.
Speaker 2: So when ninth one that got the call from Hole
Speaker 2: to work with him and Hope started doing production, do
Speaker 2: you think that production area kind of dismantled the group
Speaker 2: a lot?
Speaker 1: Absolutely not. Nah No, Man, like we we we was happy.
Speaker 1: We was excited for him, you know, I mean, like
Speaker 1: ship we got to go to baseline and hear it
Speaker 1: before it came out there with Hole and all that.
Speaker 1: But nah, we was we knew it. That's a big opportunity.
Speaker 1: It is fucking jay z, you know what I mean, Like,
Speaker 1: come on, man, you want stuff for your team like
Speaker 1: you want you know, if you know, studying hip hop,
Speaker 1: most of the big producers they get their starting groups.
Speaker 1: So we just saw it's just a natural progression, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. So yeah, it was amazing just
Speaker 1: to know that, you know, one of your homies can
Speaker 1: make a beat. On his laptop and it ends up
Speaker 1: with jay Z rapping over. I mean that ship was like,
Speaker 1: oh my, like what you know what I'm saying, And
Speaker 1: it really it really for us was for me, it
Speaker 1: was a sign of the kind of the changing of
Speaker 1: the guard in terms of what constituted studio quality, you know,
Speaker 1: because for a long time, you know, you had to
Speaker 1: have When people thought of a studio, they thought of
Speaker 1: it as like, okay, it's this big, the big boards
Speaker 1: and like these big you know, big consoles and big
Speaker 1: speakers and everything, and beat makers were pretty much thought
Speaker 1: of as you know, like hardware. But for him to
Speaker 1: make something, you know, on a laptop, I mean that
Speaker 1: was the beginning of software. You know. He really pioneered that,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. So now with him with
Speaker 1: fruity loops and now, I mean that's pretty much kind
Speaker 1: of the standard with cats making records on machine and
Speaker 1: ableton and stuff like that, and so it really was
Speaker 1: it was validation for us. I mean, we made our
Speaker 1: first album literally in you know, a friend's apartment, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying with the mic, like the mic
Speaker 1: we recorded listening, it wasn't as good as this mike.
Speaker 1: It wasn't even this. It was like a little like
Speaker 1: a little three hundred dollars carnival. Yeah, yeah, we had
Speaker 1: like a little little joint on it, but described yeah,
Speaker 1: that was what it was. And you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And so but we did it. And I guess the
Speaker 1: lesson for me was just that, you know, as long
Speaker 1: as you have a taste, there is there aren't really
Speaker 1: no rules in music. You just have to have a
Speaker 1: degree of taste that can translate to an audience and
Speaker 1: if you can make it make sense to them and
Speaker 1: they get it, and that's really all you need. And
Speaker 1: we were able to do that with very limited means.
Speaker 1: And so I'm just I'm just thankful. Why why why?
Speaker 3: YouTube?
Speaker 4: That was the other thing I was wondering, Like, you know,
Speaker 4: did y'all even try to shop into like who Netflix?
Speaker 1: Anybodyuh? The writers of Stranger Things were on strike, nah,
Speaker 1: I mean in love Craft Countries on TV absolutely today.
Speaker 1: Yeah you know what I mean. I did Apollott Marathon
Speaker 1: the other night, like straight out of comptent on TV. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think for us because people always ask that question, right,
Speaker 1: and first to start off as a joke like this
Speaker 1: shit up on YouTube, but then we start thinking about
Speaker 1: it like, that's exactly that's what it's going.
Speaker 3: Like.
Speaker 1: I know seven year olds who stay on YouTube. I
Speaker 1: know sixty nine year olds who stay on YouTube. So
Speaker 1: for us, it was just like, all this shit is
Speaker 1: on the internet. It's all the same the internet to
Speaker 1: the same Internet. So the objective here was I was
Speaker 1: talking to a homier mine. I was just like, you know,
Speaker 1: He's like, yo, I got this project. I don't know
Speaker 1: what I should do. I said, listen, what's your objective?
Speaker 1: Are you trying to be validated by one of these companies?
Speaker 1: Are you looking for the bag? Or do you want
Speaker 1: people to see this shit? We wanted people to see
Speaker 1: our documentary. So the easiest way is you can anybody
Speaker 1: can go up on YouTube. You can watch You don't
Speaker 1: gotta watch it in one seton and explain how my
Speaker 1: mama had a log into YouTube. Everybody knows how to
Speaker 1: go on YouTube.
Speaker 5: You can watch it on the phone, our path.
Speaker 1: Any anywhere. And then also what we saw because we
Speaker 1: came into the industry of three when we signed the Atlantic,
Speaker 1: we saw how the music industry was changing real time.
Speaker 1: We was part of it. We're seeing the same thing
Speaker 1: happen right now for film and television. Ain't nobody trying
Speaker 1: to get caught up in that bullshit? Nah? Now, so
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to be banging trying to get the
Speaker 1: masters for my movie back in ten years, like getting
Speaker 1: the fuck out of here, you know what i mean. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was really you know, YouTube was it was the
Speaker 1: only platform that spoke directly to the Little Brother's story,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. You know, we were one
Speaker 1: of the first rap groups to go viral at a
Speaker 1: time when no one even knew what that was or
Speaker 1: even how to monetize it, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: because it was just so early, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And so a big part of that had to do
Speaker 1: with people being able to freely access our music, and
Speaker 1: it was something that was shared. And we just thought
Speaker 1: that our movie, you know, about our music and about
Speaker 1: our lives, it had to be experienced in that same way.
Speaker 1: You know. We put it out and you know, we
Speaker 1: dropped it on Black Friday on YouTube, and you know,
Speaker 1: we did the premiere on YouTube and my man shot,
Speaker 1: my man, Devin Morrison, he hit me was like, yo, bro,
Speaker 1: I'm about to stream this join on my Twitch channel.
Speaker 1: Pull up, I said, helly, your nigga, let's go, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. So I jumped on this Twitch
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, he's screening it. I'm in
Speaker 1: the chat like knowledge is in the chat shot to
Speaker 1: him like we all just chopping it up. And you know,
Speaker 1: that was just a kind of communal experience that we
Speaker 1: would not have been able to have had we tried
Speaker 1: to do it in a traditional way, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean Like that, you know that just really it
Speaker 1: just felt true to who we were and who we are,
Speaker 1: and so that was that was why we decided to
Speaker 1: go with YouTube.
Speaker 3: Even getting introduced to y'all via the internet.
Speaker 4: You know, South Carolina was right there by North Carolina,
Speaker 4: but I heard about y'all be online. People don't not
Speaker 4: understand how big All hip Hop dot Com was. Listen listens, yes, man,
Speaker 4: not realize how big that ship was?
Speaker 1: Nah man, All hip Hop s o hh okay players.
Speaker 1: I mean that really was just kind of your really
Speaker 1: just you know, where you found out about music, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, Just where all the stuff you
Speaker 1: can kind of see on the come up, that was
Speaker 1: where you found it. And you know, back to the film, Yeah,
Speaker 1: we just kind of saw like, now we have the
Speaker 1: opportunity to go direct to consumer in a way that
Speaker 1: we didn't have in two thousand and three. Like if
Speaker 1: I mean shit, if man we would have had band
Speaker 1: Camp in two thousand and three, I wouldn't sign no
Speaker 1: fucking regularly in a rap What would have made Little
Speaker 1: Brother bigger? Though? Right?
Speaker 2: Because you talked to rappers, and for most rappers, some
Speaker 2: of them will say you're one of their favorite groups, right,
Speaker 2: But a lot of the fans, a lot of the
Speaker 2: people that listen might not have heard Little Brother, Right,
Speaker 2: What do you think would have made Little Brother bigger?
Speaker 2: If it would have been maybe signing to a Ruckus
Speaker 2: that concentrates directly on underground music, it would have been,
Speaker 2: you know, a Cotch Records that's definitely under Like, what
Speaker 2: do you think would have made it made you guys bigger?
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's that's a tricky question because, like
Speaker 1: I said, the industry was changing at the time. So,
Speaker 1: you know, for us, I always say we was we
Speaker 1: was after the rockous era, but we was before you
Speaker 1: know whatever. We were the bridge the bridge from from
Speaker 1: that to you know, like the Colds and the Kindreds
Speaker 1: and all of them. So I don't know if it
Speaker 1: was in the cars for us to be bigger. Honestly,
Speaker 1: I think we are. Yeah, we was the lead blockers,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like you know, we was,
Speaker 1: you know, we was to take out the linebacker like
Speaker 1: it wasn't necessarily you're not gonna get the glory. You're
Speaker 1: not gonna get the touchdown. You're not gonna you gotta
Speaker 1: do your job, do your job well, and you'll be remembered, rewarded,
Speaker 1: honored for that, you know what I mean, respected for that.
Speaker 1: And so yeah, I don't I don't know if bigger
Speaker 1: was in the cars for us, honestly because I know
Speaker 1: who we are, you know what I mean, and you
Speaker 1: know and I know who we are is I don't
Speaker 1: know if that's conducive. No, it wasn't like I remember
Speaker 1: having I remember Minister Show came out and we did. Uh,
Speaker 1: I think what was the first week. It was like
Speaker 1: eighteen eighteen and something like that, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: eighteen thousand records and you know back then that was
Speaker 1: just your worst Yeah, straight up, but you said eighteen
Speaker 1: thousand now, like thank you man. But I remember like
Speaker 1: we did it and it came out and I remember
Speaker 1: talking to a mirror shout shouts to the mirror, man,
Speaker 1: that's that's big bro for real. And you know, he
Speaker 1: was saying, he was like, listen, man, y'all gonna have
Speaker 1: to go crazy, like y'all gonna have to perform at
Speaker 1: the label. Y'all gonna have to do this, like y'all
Speaker 1: gonna have to you know, even in the lobby, like
Speaker 1: y'all gonna have to do this, do this. And the
Speaker 1: thing was he was right, he was absolutely right. And
Speaker 1: I just talked to I remember, had a conversation. We
Speaker 1: were just like, we ain't doing that ship. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I just made an album called The Mistress. You think
Speaker 1: I'm about to be in a label dance.
Speaker 3: I'm not.
Speaker 1: You know, that's just not who we all up at
Speaker 1: your label in the video. Nah. So you know, it
Speaker 1: was just one of those things. And it's really just
Speaker 1: as an artist, you know, throughout our journey, you really
Speaker 1: just have to decide what's for you and what's not
Speaker 1: and the things that are for you. You know, I
Speaker 1: tell her all the time, you can't ever look at
Speaker 1: someone's success and and you know think that, Okay, that's
Speaker 1: what I want because you don't know the price that
Speaker 1: they paid for that success, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: You don't you know, that may not be something that
Speaker 1: you're willing to do, or it just may not be
Speaker 1: it may not align with who you are as a person.
Speaker 1: And so I think the biggest lesson for us, which
Speaker 1: is the beauty of this era now, which I think
Speaker 1: a lot of artists don't get. You know, they're frustrated
Speaker 1: because it's like, man, it's just so much content, is
Speaker 1: so much to compete with everything. But the beautiful thing
Speaker 1: about it for us is that you have the ability
Speaker 1: to go direct the consumer and whatever it is that
Speaker 1: you're into, you can just find an audience around that.
Speaker 1: It's like the difference between you know, in our era,
Speaker 1: it was trying to hit a moving target. It was
Speaker 1: trying to hit a moving bullseye, and this era is
Speaker 1: just you fire a shot and wherever it lands, you
Speaker 1: just paint the target around that bullet. You know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. You just you know, and that's what we've
Speaker 1: been able to do. And it just makes for in us,
Speaker 1: you know, it makes for better art and just mix
Speaker 1: for happier people.
Speaker 4: Also stopped when the game shifted to every then y'all
Speaker 4: already was on like like, y'all, it was like nine
Speaker 4: years between projects, right. Twenty ten is when you really
Speaker 4: got introduced to the Kendricks and the Coles and the Drakes.
Speaker 1: That was y'all.
Speaker 3: That's y'all energy.
Speaker 4: Like you said, y'all, they all was inspired by you
Speaker 4: what y'all was doing.
Speaker 3: But y'all stopped.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that was that was That was definitely
Speaker 1: a frustration of mine. Was just like we fought so
Speaker 1: hard to get up that proverbial heel and we got
Speaker 1: up there, it was like, all right, we're done. It
Speaker 1: was yeah, because you had that moment like you just
Speaker 1: you know there moment.
Speaker 3: Brot this night show.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know this audience, My audience is laughing with me.
Speaker 1: They're not laughing at me, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: But no, it was very much that. I remember we
Speaker 1: did a show, our last LA show. This is what
Speaker 1: before we broke official. This was twenty teeny Yeah, twenty Kendrick.
Speaker 1: Kendrick is in the doc It's a Sexual with Me,
Speaker 1: Kendrick and ap So that was from that show. We
Speaker 1: had Kendrick opening on that show. It open, and that
Speaker 1: was like we were in the worst shape ever, we
Speaker 1: were like we weren't even talking. We wasn't even it
Speaker 1: was the energy was just it was just foul. And
Speaker 1: I remember like Kendrick coming up afterwards and he was like, Yo, man,
Speaker 1: I fuck with y'all. I'm a big fan, Like let's
Speaker 1: link whatever. I'm like, yeah, bro, like cool, you know,
Speaker 1: DApp him up, game home. I'm like, love what you do.
Speaker 1: And like that was it. But I really know, we
Speaker 1: look back on it now and it was really you know,
Speaker 1: I just hate that. I wish they could have seen
Speaker 1: us in a better place because by that time twenty ten,
Speaker 1: we was just over like this shit. We ain't like
Speaker 1: each other. We was side of the game and everything.
Speaker 1: It was like, gotch What got you to.
Speaker 2: The point where the group boys cool anymore?
Speaker 1: Weren't communicating? Yeah, we had different goals. We didn't know
Speaker 1: how to communicate. I'll say that, like, you know, we
Speaker 1: didn't have the tools or at the time. I mean,
Speaker 1: look yeah, because I mean you got to think about it,
Speaker 1: and I and I think about this for all the time,
Speaker 1: Like with artists like now, like the younger generation, they
Speaker 1: keep thinking of, Okay, I want to go viral, like
Speaker 1: going viral and like dude, A lot of times that
Speaker 1: shit is not what you think it is. It's like,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. It really it can be
Speaker 1: the kiss of death sometimes, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And so for us, you know, back then, this is
Speaker 1: two thousand and two, you know whatever. You know, we
Speaker 1: went viral and so your music goes further and faster
Speaker 1: than you have the time to develop as a person,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And so it's like, bruh,
Speaker 1: this again. Me and Pool knew each other a grand
Speaker 1: total of probably what two years before we got signed,
Speaker 1: So we didn't know each other, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And again, it's one thing to be like, this is
Speaker 1: my man, like we in the calf, we kicking it,
Speaker 1: we in the room, freestyling. But to go from this
Speaker 1: is my man to now this is my business partner
Speaker 1: and we are contractually bound together. That sucks, dude, you
Speaker 1: know what I meant. I mean, looking back, you didn't
Speaker 1: realize it then when you in it, But looking back,
Speaker 1: you're like, yo, that was a fucking lot. Like that
Speaker 1: was a lot. We was trying to navigate together. We
Speaker 1: didn't know each other really honestly, and we didn't know
Speaker 1: the game. We didn't know shit.
Speaker 5: And personal lives y'all.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I had two kids. Yeah my boys were young
Speaker 1: at the time, but yeah, it was we was a
Speaker 1: lot were trying to figure out. So we just didn't
Speaker 1: have the time the tools to really know how to
Speaker 1: communicate with each other to understand what was going on.
Speaker 1: Like shit, we didn't know each other. So like even now,
Speaker 1: my big thing is I need to understand why right
Speaker 1: your answer is your answer. But if I understand you,
Speaker 1: I know why you answered that way, So now I
Speaker 1: know ship he going to say and why he gonna
Speaker 1: say it before I even asked the question. But I
Speaker 1: didn't know that then, so he didn't know that about me.
Speaker 1: So to be things where in the doc we talk
Speaker 1: about to learn each other, Yeah, it's like doing the labels.
Speaker 1: So when we got off Atlantic, we had Capitol Records,
Speaker 1: one of the signers, I was talking with Shaka Zulu's assistance.
Speaker 1: We were supposed to met with Shaka, so we had
Speaker 1: all these things moving after we got off Atlantic. But
Speaker 1: he don't understand why I'm like, shit, let's give it
Speaker 1: another go. And I don't understand why he like, fuck
Speaker 1: that shit, I'm off that Like I do my own thing.
Speaker 1: So just not having that understanding and not knowing how
Speaker 1: to talk to each other. Man, that was I tell
Speaker 1: people all the time. And it's not just in a
Speaker 1: relationship with a partner's spouse, significant other, it's all your relationships.
Speaker 1: If you don't know how to communicate and talk and
Speaker 1: actually listen, because communication listening, if you don't know how
Speaker 1: to do that, that shit gonna it's not gonna end
Speaker 1: up well. And that's kind of where we was.
Speaker 3: We can't be afraid to talk though, like you got to.
Speaker 4: You gotta know, you can fix your phone up to
Speaker 4: all your people say what you need to say, and
Speaker 4: even if they feel a way, that's still gonna be
Speaker 4: a people.
Speaker 1: And I think this generation now, you know, like I mean,
Speaker 1: it's my boys, my sons are. They're twenty three and
Speaker 1: I was at twenty three and eighteen. And the thing
Speaker 1: I noticed to their generation, they are they're far more
Speaker 1: emotionally uh intelligent than we are, in tune than we are,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like they got they got
Speaker 1: all the TikTok terms and the therapy term like these
Speaker 1: niggas know all that shit, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So yeah, they're they're far more emotionally. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: avaible to gotta remember we came up off the a
Speaker 1: man gotta be a man and you don't show your
Speaker 1: feelings and you don't cry. Do that work? That is
Speaker 1: not that don't work? That don't work. And know what
Speaker 1: you was saying, Sean, like about the just that time,
Speaker 1: like you said, we left kind of before that wave.
Speaker 1: You know that nine year span that span from twenty
Speaker 1: ten to twenty nineteen. You know when we came back.
Speaker 1: You know, that just gave us time to grow up.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. And you know it's it
Speaker 1: was a bill that was gonna it was comeing, do
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? So it's like we paid
Speaker 1: it then. You know we needed those nine years because
Speaker 1: we had such a quick kind of ascension. But yeah,
Speaker 1: we just needed that time to just grow up.
Speaker 4: I saw Donald Glover say recently that all new, most
Speaker 4: most new rappers now, and I think he's kind of
Speaker 4: meant like that generation that started in twenty ten. Yeah,
Speaker 4: we're because of Kanye. I would say, Kanye and little brother.
Speaker 1: Absolutely what I would absolutely yeah, man, Kanye was Uh,
Speaker 1: we had got Kanye. He first came to Durham two
Speaker 1: thousand and four. Three four, yeah, three or four. It
Speaker 1: was before uh I think College Dropout came out. It
Speaker 1: was because get oh yeah, yea, yeah, that might have
Speaker 1: been two three something. It might have been three then yeah,
Speaker 1: three he it was before College Dropout. The Yeah, and
Speaker 1: he had at the time the records that was bubbling.
Speaker 1: He had the stand up by Ludicros that was out,
Speaker 1: and he was about to put out the dis Way
Speaker 1: record he had did with Dilated People's but he was
Speaker 1: in Durham doing some kind of like conference or whatever,
Speaker 1: and so he was there and you know, this is
Speaker 1: before anything. Like he's just you know, chilling, and he
Speaker 1: just would walk around just like wrapping out of nowhere. Okay,
Speaker 1: my knig you find Kanye and Fonte is like like
Speaker 1: he would just be rather like bro. But and I
Speaker 1: thought he was you know, acting, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: But now you know, twenty plus years later, it's claim like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that wasn't an act. He's the same. It's just on
Speaker 1: a higher platform exactly. But he's the same he's always been.
Speaker 1: But yeah, but back then, we you know, we did shows,
Speaker 1: you know, we toured with him. Uh you know, we
Speaker 1: opened up and everything and Yeah, man, it was a
Speaker 1: it was a fun time, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: You know you could kind of see just him putting
Speaker 1: the pieces together, and you could see him also really
Speaker 1: kind of struggling with fame to some degree. Like I
Speaker 1: remember we were at man, this was like south Beat.
Speaker 1: It was on the billboard hip hip hop boys. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we were in like southeast. He was in Miami for
Speaker 1: like a weekend whatever, and he had his Rockefeller chain
Speaker 1: and he was we was going to a club. We
Speaker 1: were going to club, and he would take his chain
Speaker 1: out and you know, have his chain out in the club,
Speaker 1: but then the minute we left, he would tuck it
Speaker 1: back in. And that was just something that I always saw,
Speaker 1: you know, when you speak, you know, you ask about
Speaker 1: you know, why weren't we bigger? I think one of
Speaker 1: the things, Well, first of all, it was a choice.
Speaker 1: It definitely was a choice. And that was something that
Speaker 1: we really want to make clear in the documentary that
Speaker 1: the Little Brother story is not a sad story at all,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. You know, it was really
Speaker 1: you know, choices that we made, and I think for me,
Speaker 1: I kind of had my you know, ghost of Christmas
Speaker 1: past present screwage kind of thing. And that I saw
Speaker 1: a lot of these guys when they were kind of
Speaker 1: on the come up and was able to kind of
Speaker 1: see what fame if they did to him. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: did to him or and I just you know, like
Speaker 1: they were just you know, prisoners or some of me.
Speaker 1: But to see the effect that had on their lives
Speaker 1: and how they had to really live. It wasn't just yeah,
Speaker 1: everyone wants the money, everyone wants that, but that ain't
Speaker 1: all it come with.
Speaker 3: You know, being scared of fame is just not wanting
Speaker 3: to get robbed.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean it was probably a little bit.
Speaker 5: Like he wasn't an image that you have to have
Speaker 5: in certain places.
Speaker 1: Leave that it's over. And because I mean because when
Speaker 1: we was when he was like kicking it with us,
Speaker 1: I mean we just we just kicked it. We're just
Speaker 1: kicking it. But when the camera's on, he knew how
Speaker 1: to become Kanye. I gotta I gotta be me a
Speaker 1: different way, much a different way. Yeah, amplified version of
Speaker 1: who I am without the lights in the camera. The
Speaker 1: little brother wasn't willing to perform nah nah man, because
Speaker 1: that's not that's not you know, this is a long game.
Speaker 1: First of all. That's just exhausting, fam and unsustainable, very unsustainable.
Speaker 1: You burn out quick.
Speaker 3: But y'all have always shown y'all humor, especially in video.
Speaker 1: But that's who we are naturally. Like who I am
Speaker 1: in this interview is who I am when his interview
Speaker 1: is over, is who I am when I get on
Speaker 1: this plane to go home. It is who I am
Speaker 1: when I get home, Like I am who I am.
Speaker 1: And it's not, well, I talk to people when the
Speaker 1: lights come on. I don't really talk to people when
Speaker 1: the lights go off. But that's the difference. So I
Speaker 1: don't like people.
Speaker 3: That's why would you be in the room, dark room
Speaker 3: with strangers.
Speaker 1: That that that not the conversation having not the conversations.
Speaker 1: It's not the conversation. We're here for, no, man, I mean,
Speaker 1: we just you know, I just saw, like when I
Speaker 1: looked at a lot of the people that you know,
Speaker 1: I looked up to in the game and looked at
Speaker 1: the people that were able to have that longevity, that
Speaker 1: was something that was always important to me, you know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, Really being able to stand the test
Speaker 1: of time and be in the game. And you know,
Speaker 1: this is a game where with music and just entertainment
Speaker 1: just art in general. I really do believe that it's
Speaker 1: a game that the longer you play, the luckier you get.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, the longer you stay in it.
Speaker 1: But you're only going to stay in it for a
Speaker 1: long time if you're doing things that you enjoy, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean? You otherwise and like I don't
Speaker 1: care like people they say, you know, looking from the outstanding, like,
Speaker 1: oh man, if I had that opportunity, I would do anything.
Speaker 1: I would do whatever I would And it's like.
Speaker 3: Nah, says.
Speaker 1: Yo, listen man, seriously, and you have to you have
Speaker 1: to make those choice because it's this game like me
Speaker 1: and Pool, like we was talking, you know in you know,
Speaker 1: in the in the break room. You know, man, this
Speaker 1: game it don't know what to do with niggas that
Speaker 1: ain't thirsty, Like they don't know what to do with that.
Speaker 1: Like when you are not you know, the whole thing,
Speaker 1: just oh yo, you do whatever. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: that's hungry. That's hungry. You gotta be hungry. That's not
Speaker 1: I'll do whatever. That's not hunger. That's thirst You should
Speaker 1: never be thirsty.
Speaker 4: And what you're saying is so true, because when you
Speaker 4: talk about these recording contracts or just contracts people be signing.
Speaker 4: In general, you can't get somebody to sign some bullshit
Speaker 4: if they're not extra thirsty, Like if they our leverage
Speaker 4: and you know they don't need it, they'll negotiate what
Speaker 4: they want.
Speaker 1: People will negotiate with you, But that's if they have leverage.
Speaker 2: But most of these contracts, especially back in the day,
Speaker 2: you find somebody that got a little spark that wants
Speaker 2: to be the next artist. They feel like that'll be
Speaker 2: an opportunity for them, and they'll feel like, you know what,
Speaker 2: I'll get to that opportunity and then I'll make it right.
Speaker 1: But then they don't.
Speaker 2: Realize they signed for ten years.
Speaker 1: Take advantage, take advantage of that naive man. There's a
Speaker 1: story here. I feel like I feel like there's a story.
Speaker 5: Here's who I am.
Speaker 6: But they don't have nothing to do with what I'm
Speaker 6: So I'm about to ask right now, what how important?
Speaker 6: With all that being said, how important is like awards?
Speaker 6: So you like, because you guys are very very very
Speaker 6: stern on who y'all are, know that and like you
Speaker 6: said earlier, you don't know who you are?
Speaker 5: Is conducive to some.
Speaker 6: Ship like this or you know, especially nowadays and the
Speaker 6: thirst and universus hunger.
Speaker 5: So how important are shows and like getting.
Speaker 1: Awards to man, I was I'll go first. I was
Speaker 1: nominated my other group, the Foreign Exchange R and B group,
Speaker 1: we were nominated for a Grammy in twenty ten, and
Speaker 1: I had the opportunity to go to the Grammys and
Speaker 1: really see what that experience was. And I think having
Speaker 1: that experience just showed me like, yeah, this is kind
Speaker 1: of a racket. Basically, I'm just keeping in a band.
Speaker 1: Like that shit was. I mean, it was, you know,
Speaker 1: it was great to be honored. But again this is
Speaker 1: just the behind the scenes stuff that people don't get,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. You know, when you go
Speaker 1: to these shows first and foremost, you know, at least
Speaker 1: at that time, you know, you still gotta buy tickets,
Speaker 1: you still gotta pay for like this shit don't come
Speaker 1: with a check at all. You can get out there
Speaker 1: and you can try to make something shake on your
Speaker 1: own if you want to do like I know, the
Speaker 1: Routs they do their Grammy Jam session every year whatever,
Speaker 1: So if you want to kind of do that, you can.
Speaker 1: But generally speaking, just as a nominee, like everything is
Speaker 1: on you. So this is you know, you gotta.
Speaker 2: Pay to go to the Grammys if you're nominated.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like tickets once you get buy a ticket there,
Speaker 1: you get tickets for you. So at the time and
Speaker 1: when they get some discount tickets, right, So it's like
Speaker 1: so if it's me and you were me and him
Speaker 1: just Grammy nominated, it's like, Okay, y'all get free tickets
Speaker 1: to the show, but anyone you want to bring to pay,
Speaker 1: y'all gotta pay, and we'll let you get it for
Speaker 1: half off. But you still got to pay half off still,
Speaker 1: like one hundred dollars. Oh no, no, no, that not at
Speaker 1: the time. But I did it well, I know when
Speaker 1: when I don't know what it is. When dream Bill
Speaker 1: was nominated and Luke when he got a ticket. I
Speaker 1: think dog got a ticket, And I think any extra
Speaker 1: tickets would have been like one hundred dollars or something.
Speaker 1: It might have been more. I don't remember.
Speaker 6: I know it was tickets even for the b tables
Speaker 6: at some point, like you had to pay. Imber wanted
Speaker 6: to go one year and I had to pay, like
Speaker 6: it was like three forty or something like that.
Speaker 1: I didn't pay. Yeah, so we might've been getting a
Speaker 1: super dupe you know at the time when I went
Speaker 1: at the time when we went the tickets for the Grammys,
Speaker 1: and again this is twenty ten, so you know, I
Speaker 1: don't know what is now, but yeah, it's twenty ten.
Speaker 1: Like tickets for the Grammys, this was twelve hundred dollars
Speaker 1: a piece. And so in order for us to go,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, we met me and Nick
Speaker 1: Nicko l in my partner shops to him. We went
Speaker 1: into Our tickets were free. But then everyone else, like
Speaker 1: we brought you know, family, everybody, that was six hundred
Speaker 1: dollars a pop, you know what I'm saying. So that's
Speaker 1: twelve hundred one tickets. Then you got you know, hotels, flights,
Speaker 1: like you know, we got bout clothes everything we had
Speaker 1: to pay like a pr person, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: To like to talk about to walk through the red carpet,
Speaker 1: to talk up your nomination and everything, and you know,
Speaker 1: and I've never like we never talked about it. You know,
Speaker 1: it was something that we didn't just have time to
Speaker 1: get into the dock. But like, man, after I came
Speaker 1: back from the Grammys, like Nigga had to take out
Speaker 1: a loan. Yeah, I had to take out like a person. Alan,
Speaker 1: I'm like, god, damn, I just spent by damn eight
Speaker 1: thousand dollars at this bitch, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: And so so for me so to rig a question
Speaker 1: with the Awards, I think that and just in my
Speaker 1: experience it was I was glad I got to see it,
Speaker 1: but ultimately I'm just like, nah, I don't Yeah, I'm good,
Speaker 1: I don't care and its yeah, And I mean, listen,
Speaker 1: it's all, you know, to be nominated for a Grammy,
Speaker 1: like to be you know, amongst you know, to sit
Speaker 1: amongst you know, be in that room and see it.
Speaker 1: Like I'm watching the show and it's like Kenny g
Speaker 1: Is like standing right there like same hair, like say everything.
Speaker 1: And that's another thing too with the Grammys, dude specifically,
Speaker 1: like y'all watch it on TV at home and it's
Speaker 1: that ship like three hours, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: It's longer, it's longer and with no and you it
Speaker 1: ain't no. At the time when we went, the Staples
Speaker 1: Center was like closing down, so like they have like
Speaker 1: the pre Grammy brunch before and you know, you get
Speaker 1: a little food whatever, and then they take you over
Speaker 1: to the main hall to the Grammy ceremony, and all
Speaker 1: the vendors in the Staples Center they shutting down. So
Speaker 1: it's no food like it's niggas, Like it's niggas the
Speaker 1: for real. For hours. It was like one dude we
Speaker 1: caught that had like the little uh he had like
Speaker 1: some candy and ship. He had like you know, little
Speaker 1: snicker bars and damn Eminem's and ship. So we bought
Speaker 1: like a couple, like a bag of eminems and some
Speaker 1: snickers and ship were sitting in that bitch got damn
Speaker 1: taking the eminem's, passing the ship down. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: niggas is supposed to be music great this night and
Speaker 1: don't even got them eminem's in the Staples Center, not
Speaker 1: when we went. I'm just telling I've never been to
Speaker 1: the Grammars, but I've been to a BT Hip Hop
Speaker 1: Awards and it was about damn recording. That was about
Speaker 1: five hours and I was like.
Speaker 3: No food.
Speaker 1: We went.
Speaker 3: I walked out.
Speaker 4: I left taking too long, man, Oh my god, he
Speaker 4: really left like we supposed present.
Speaker 2: He was like, I'm giving y'all ten minutes there all
Speaker 2: day like, nah, that's.
Speaker 4: Really I I'm like, you know, love, I'm like, yeah,
Speaker 4: I'm not beating for none of that stuff, no, man.
Speaker 1: And I mean like for me, you know, yeah, it'd
Speaker 1: be cool to be nominated for a Grammy. I ain't
Speaker 1: never been nominated. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: it's hey, look, I'm I can't be somewhere too long
Speaker 1: and not just say what the fuck I need to say.
Speaker 1: So listen, I just don't go to places where I'm
Speaker 1: going to be there a long time because.
Speaker 3: You might have to say something.
Speaker 1: It might have to say something and let me tell
Speaker 1: you the truth. Yeah, and then learning kind of learning
Speaker 1: what all this is, you know what I mean, Like
Speaker 1: it's a campaign. It's a campaign. It's not a meritocracy.
Speaker 1: Like the minute you and that was I guess the
Speaker 1: thing for me. But once I saw that, you know,
Speaker 1: it was really you know, it's super political, it's super
Speaker 1: you know who you know, like it's a lot of
Speaker 1: those things. But you know, for for for me, all
Speaker 1: I cared about was just making the music. And you know,
Speaker 1: if my music is standing up against somebody, you know,
Speaker 1: just judging on the basis of the music. Once you're
Speaker 1: getting all this other shit. It's just like again it
Speaker 1: was educational. It's like, okay, I know that's what it is. Now,
Speaker 1: all right, cool, I'm good on it, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. And that's the thing I want to make clear.
Speaker 1: It's not that we don't care. We just understand what
Speaker 1: it is and what it's going to take if you
Speaker 1: want to make that run. It's like running for president,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean.
Speaker 4: I don't understand why don't Like, I know y'all got
Speaker 4: to go, but why why couldn't y'all just consistently be y'all?
Speaker 4: Like I said, you can watch the doc and see
Speaker 4: the finality, see the humor.
Speaker 3: I was watching the old video that I don't even
Speaker 3: know why I just went.
Speaker 4: I was watching old videos this weekend and the video
Speaker 4: where you let your mom speak the verse.
Speaker 3: I like, y'all do stuff like y'all do your own thing.
Speaker 3: That's personality driven.
Speaker 1: Why not? We're not thirsty, That's the key. We're not
Speaker 1: because it's been things people like yo, you want to
Speaker 1: do this and be like nah, you know like you
Speaker 1: as how pr got be like yo, I got I
Speaker 1: got I got this. We can do this. We can
Speaker 1: do this and we would go right through the list.
Speaker 1: No no, yeah, no, no no, and like anybody else
Speaker 1: will be like, oh, ship, I'm doing all that we like,
Speaker 1: Like it's far more intentional, you know, curate it, Yeah,
Speaker 1: to curate the kind of experience that you want to
Speaker 1: give your fans. So like come in to breakfast club,
Speaker 1: like you know, we both Carolina, Like there's a connection there,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. So it's like you don't
Speaker 1: just do everything. It's not just you know, coming in
Speaker 1: with a oozy and just like nah, very targeted shots
Speaker 1: because at this point in the game, you know, we're
Speaker 1: twenty year vets, and you know, the energy that you have,
Speaker 1: you know, you really have to conserve and you only
Speaker 1: got to use it on the ship. That really fucking matters,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. You can't just be out here,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, you can't just be out here just
Speaker 1: moving crazy and just you know, expending all your energy
Speaker 1: and your time on not half an unlimited amount of
Speaker 1: bullets in the chamber at forty forty five years old.
Speaker 4: I don't believe that's no, no, no, you mean time
Speaker 4: like physically, how we feel about doing things, because yeah, okay,
Speaker 4: because I feel.
Speaker 1: Like you can do whatever you can. You can do it.
Speaker 1: I mean you see, like someone like nas is on
Speaker 1: a run right now performance a sweet Absolutely you can.
Speaker 1: You can do whatever you want to do. What we
Speaker 1: what I'm saying is you gotta be very you gotta
Speaker 1: be strategic about what you're doing, because the energy like
Speaker 1: just putting energy into things that don't make no sense.
Speaker 1: You know, when you're twenty, you got all the fucking
Speaker 1: energy in the world. Forty you like, hold up now,
Speaker 1: and you have to be specific and strategic like you
Speaker 1: were saying, because I'm a firm believer that the work
Speaker 1: you do is the work that you're gonna create more
Speaker 1: for yourself. So if you start doing sucker ship, you
Speaker 1: just gonna get more sucker opportunities, you know. I mean,
Speaker 1: so I'm like, nah, like we're just gone to set
Speaker 1: this ship up off break like this. What we're doing
Speaker 1: is what we're not doing and just hold that boundary
Speaker 1: and uh again it just speaks to just I think
Speaker 1: just the sustainability of it. You know, we really wanted
Speaker 1: to do this for a long time and uh you know,
Speaker 1: we knew we wasn't gonna do that just doing moving
Speaker 1: like how we saw a lot of other rappers were
Speaker 1: moving and just a lot of just entertainment was moving.
Speaker 1: We had to kind of come and do something that
Speaker 1: was very specific to who we were, and we kind
Speaker 1: of had a chance to go through that again with Luke.
Speaker 1: You know, absolutely, you know, but yeah, it's working with
Speaker 1: Luke signed to Dreatville and just doing his album, and
Speaker 1: he was very adamant, like I'm gonna do me like
Speaker 1: like I'm not. I'm not you know, yes, I want things,
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna do what's comfortable for me, like who
Speaker 1: It was a key point conversation we had and he
Speaker 1: was like, yo, I want to be able to be
Speaker 1: me everywhere. And I said, well, if that's what you
Speaker 1: want to do, this is this is kind of the
Speaker 1: road map for it. And and that's just who he is,
Speaker 1: Like he's not a big mixy person. He's not you know,
Speaker 1: he deals with anxiety. He talks about it, and so
Speaker 1: we have to be very strategic and how we move
Speaker 1: with him, and it's just traces of how we move
Speaker 1: and who we are. I see that and him and
Speaker 1: so I was kind of perfect for that because I'm like,
Speaker 1: I know what this is, don Bro. And it was
Speaker 1: just one of the things where it was like, yo,
Speaker 1: this is this is day ja vu like a muff
Speaker 1: because you can't because the thing is like and that's
Speaker 1: again with the artists. Now, I just kind of treat
Speaker 1: kind of keep telling them like, bro y'a don't understand.
Speaker 1: I know this shit is crazy, but whatever it is
Speaker 1: you're into, you can find an audience for that, Like
Speaker 1: you know, in particular cars and he's the cars painting.
Speaker 1: It's like, dude, if you if you don't want to
Speaker 1: do breakfast club, like if you if that's not your
Speaker 1: thing and you just want to get your Bob bross
Speaker 1: on and do little Instagram snippers and you paint, you
Speaker 1: can do that and that shitll go off. You'll find
Speaker 1: a community people that are into it. There's a market
Speaker 1: for it, and you can go directly to them. And
Speaker 1: that was just something that wasn't really you know, back
Speaker 1: you know to your original question earlier about you know,
Speaker 1: why we weren't bigger. I just think at that time
Speaker 1: there were choices, definite choices that we made. But also
Speaker 1: it was very much marketing back then wasn't really tailored
Speaker 1: to the artist. It was just kind of a one
Speaker 1: size fits all. This is album coming, This is what
Speaker 1: needs to happen.
Speaker 3: Hold his bottle knowledge you going to this radio.
Speaker 1: Station and it's like bru, Like we don't even drink
Speaker 1: like that, Like this doesn't make sense. You know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, don't you know, no moral objection to it,
Speaker 1: but I'm like, this doesn't translate. And you just didn't
Speaker 1: really have the latitude to figure that out back then
Speaker 1: in a way the artists do now, and so it
Speaker 1: really is a beautiful time. And that's why we wanted
Speaker 1: to take advantage now of just being able to go
Speaker 1: direct to consumer, go directly to our audience with the documentary,
Speaker 1: and it's just been it's been a beautiful experience.
Speaker 5: How many young boys are like just like this, like
Speaker 5: we don't want to change.
Speaker 6: We don't want to I don't want it to do
Speaker 6: all of this that X Y Z is doing to
Speaker 6: get where X Y and Z is at.
Speaker 5: And you know if I never get there, I never get.
Speaker 6: There, Like this interview and your documentary is definitely gonna
Speaker 6: like that. That's good for people because other guys like
Speaker 6: you out there, young boys who like underground Wrap and
Speaker 6: they have about things that they feel like won't be
Speaker 6: accepted or conducive to what today's hip hop is or
Speaker 6: today's rap or whatever, and it's his inspirational to a
Speaker 6: lot of boys in a lot of.
Speaker 1: Roman Thank you. That was that was part of the hope,
Speaker 1: was that people can hear our story and see some
Speaker 1: of themselves in our story, and that's that's something we
Speaker 1: have that we didn't have that rop. Yeah, yeah, it
Speaker 1: was like, hey man, it's the way you gotta do it.
Speaker 1: Do it.
Speaker 4: I got too more questions because I know jefs hungry
Speaker 4: and she want to go. But one hundred three thousand
Speaker 4: said he doesn't rap anymore because he's forty eight and
Speaker 4: he has nothing to talk about it being ol g's
Speaker 4: and y'all forties.
Speaker 3: How did that statement make you feel?
Speaker 1: We talked about it on something else. Man. It's like,
Speaker 1: we look at ourselves as writers and you don't have
Speaker 1: an a's limit. You know, we're not athletes. We're not
Speaker 1: you know, out there trying to dunk, and we're right,
Speaker 1: you should be getting better with time or even to
Speaker 1: your point about killing Mike and just you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, your head, you know when you get old.
Speaker 1: There was a there's an arc I read like years
Speaker 1: ago that talked about how most creative breakthroughs were artists.
Speaker 1: Most creative breakthroughs happened in like your late thirties early forties,
Speaker 1: because that's when both sides of your brain learned to
Speaker 1: talk to each other, you know what I mean. And
Speaker 1: so that just I was like, damn, that's right. And so,
Speaker 1: you know, it really is a thing where in this
Speaker 1: business again, it just goes against everything because if you
Speaker 1: ain't owned by twenty five, you know, you you done
Speaker 1: lost it. And you know a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: labels and just you know, a lot of industry people
Speaker 1: they're reluctant to work with older talent, what they perceive
Speaker 1: as older talent, when that's the time when you know
Speaker 1: you're at your best, you know what I'm saying, because
Speaker 1: you've lived a life. I remember we interviewed Chris Rock
Speaker 1: on QLs sometime back, and he was talking about how
Speaker 1: Supreme Quest of Supreme. Here I'm just talking another iHeart
Speaker 1: property but yeah shouts the Quest Love and my people's
Speaker 1: team Supreme. But yeah, we was he was interview Chris
Speaker 1: Rock and he was talking about how, you know, in
Speaker 1: the early days of his stand up, he didn't really
Speaker 1: have shit to talk about He was like, you know,
Speaker 1: your early age stand up, it's just it's just dick
Speaker 1: jokes shit, because it's like, what do you have? But
Speaker 1: it's not until you go and you live and you
Speaker 1: get divorced, you have kids, you damn like, you know,
Speaker 1: you really have things to talk about. And so that
Speaker 1: was kind of for us, you know, with the Andre statement,
Speaker 1: we talked about it, but yeah, I mean, it's kind
Speaker 1: of all in the eye to be holder. If he
Speaker 1: feels that he doesn't have anything to say at forty eight,
Speaker 1: that's his creative journey. That's how he feels, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean it and it takes time to figure out.
Speaker 1: You know. With Johnwick rap, we've heard so long that
Speaker 1: rap is a young man's game and who you are
Speaker 1: you know when you're young, so much of that is
Speaker 1: driven by hunger and like anger and just trying to
Speaker 1: make it. You know, nigga, what what do you rap
Speaker 1: about that? After you done sold ten million records and
Speaker 1: he ain't struggling no more, And it's.
Speaker 3: All about what you are willing to share, right like that?
Speaker 4: Absolutely, I don't we don't have to get on this
Speaker 4: radio and talk about our family. We don't have to
Speaker 4: talk about our kids. We do, but we don't have to.
Speaker 4: I don't got to talk about mental health and going
Speaker 4: to therapy. But it's about what you are willing to share.
Speaker 1: Share.
Speaker 3: And my last question is what does twenty years feel like? Ya?
Speaker 1: Like a good night's sleep? Absolutely, like legit, A lot
Speaker 1: of this feels like a year ago, two years ago.
Speaker 1: I mean we lost two years, but with the pandemic
Speaker 1: we lost a little bit of the time. But nah,
Speaker 1: it don't feel it don't feel like twenty years at all.
Speaker 1: Like it's it's one of them things where you look
Speaker 1: back and be like, shit, like I'm about to be
Speaker 1: forty four, man, I was just twenty one, Brian like
Speaker 1: walking around like what's going on here? And so it's
Speaker 1: and that's a blessing, you know what I mean. Like
Speaker 1: it ain't been a hard twenty for us. I mean,
Speaker 1: we've been through our share of things, but you know
Speaker 1: we ain't have you know, no overdoses, no nah man,
Speaker 1: you know, nobody locked up. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: We ain't had none of them type of issue. So
Speaker 1: it's just one of them things, you know, you blessed
Speaker 1: that it feels like it only been a short amount
Speaker 1: of time because that means we got twenty more plus
Speaker 1: to go. It's just gratitude. I think that's what it
Speaker 1: feels like for me. It's just gratitude just looking at
Speaker 1: you know a lot of cats that we came in
Speaker 1: the game with that you know, didn't make it for whatever,
Speaker 1: for various reasons, you know what I'm saying. And you know,
Speaker 1: and guys that were and that were like crazy talented,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, It's just like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: why didn't this person get this? And you know, it
Speaker 1: really is just a lesson. You know, Man, the race
Speaker 1: ain't always to the swift, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: it really is. You know, when you see somebody that's
Speaker 1: on or popping or whatever, there are a million different
Speaker 1: factors that play into that person having that platform, the
Speaker 1: least of which is probably their talent. Yeah you know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, Talent, don't. I mean that shit is
Speaker 1: oh yeah, you know, so so for us to just
Speaker 1: you know, still be here and you know, twenty years
Speaker 1: later and just to be not just still here and
Speaker 1: still like revelepment, but just sharper mentally, Like I really,
Speaker 1: I really feel like as a writer I'm just getting started.
Speaker 1: Like there's just things and that you know as an
Speaker 1: MC and you know, just as a creator. There's just
Speaker 1: tools in my toolbox that I have now that I
Speaker 1: didn't have twenty years ago. And uh it just I
Speaker 1: just feel reinvigorated, you know what I mean? And even
Speaker 1: to that point for me, like people told me my
Speaker 1: best two albums writing has been my last two? You
Speaker 1: like wine?
Speaker 3: Will we ever get a Fonte Pool Knife one?
Speaker 1: Dude? Nah, damn. I didn't even think about it.
Speaker 2: It was like maybe there was a possibility a couple
Speaker 2: of years.
Speaker 5: Why, Like they don't know, they don't understand.
Speaker 1: You know what is we gotta.
Speaker 3: Watch the die?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's in the doc. I mean, we talked about everything.
Speaker 3: But it don't seem like it's none of y'all can't recordize.
Speaker 2: It seems like they could be like at least maybe
Speaker 2: it's it's.
Speaker 1: Not as y'all. It's not everything about reconciling anything. It's
Speaker 1: just live. It's just that's just not what it's gonna be. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know little brothers Fante and Pool and Knife Wonder
Speaker 1: is nfe Wonder and you know, we wish him all
Speaker 1: the best and you know whatever, all his endeavors and
Speaker 1: we're gonna keep doing us and that's just what it is.
Speaker 6: You Beyonce, what's up with Michelle and Kelly and Farah and.
Speaker 1: Come on, like she said, Pharah, that ain't might got
Speaker 1: a shot? You know.
Speaker 3: They started with.
Speaker 5: Yes, they say no, you're gonna be like damn for real.
Speaker 1: Nigga said no.
Speaker 4: But it's it's not the same because definitely, child, we
Speaker 4: we got like it felt like we.
Speaker 3: Got closure with that. You know, I don't we got
Speaker 3: closure with Little Brother.
Speaker 1: The documentary is closure documentary. It's all sometimes we're not
Speaker 1: we're not afforded the closure we want. I'm a girl,
Speaker 1: get the closure you get. Check out the documentary. Learn
Speaker 1: about Little Brother.
Speaker 3: Made the Lord watch the Little Brother.
Speaker 4: That was fun that that that took me like watching
Speaker 4: videos because you know, we weren't even thinking about video.
Speaker 3: I wasn't see that.
Speaker 1: I was like, damn and were surprised we even had that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, hell know, he wasn't think an't you know who
Speaker 5: he was?
Speaker 1: And I was not.
Speaker 3: He ran over there and got some cream for.
Speaker 1: I said, yeah, I was, he was. You got you
Speaker 1: got three three it's Little Brother. Thank you for having
Speaker 1: us congratulations than I love the Baltimore. I was hearing
Speaker 1: to tears and I was like yes, so congratulations, Breakfast Club.
Speaker 1: Good morning. Wake that ass up in the morning. Breakfast
Speaker 1: Club