Speaker 1: Y'all. What up, It's Tomizza.
Speaker 2: Check me out on the Bootleg Cab podcast.
Speaker 3: That right, Hey Boulet Cab Podcast.
Speaker 4: Man special guests here a legend in the game, Domizza
Speaker 4: aka Damien Young.
Speaker 2: Legend in my own mind. Welcome, Thank you, sir. I
Speaker 2: appreciate you having me.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 4: You know what's crazy is like as a kid, I
Speaker 4: knew your name. I wasn't in radio as a kid, obviously,
Speaker 4: so I didn't know that you were the program director
Speaker 4: of Power six.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, that's actually kind of a it's interesting
Speaker 2: because I was the senior director of programming.
Speaker 3: Okay, Yeah, what were you doing at Power to six?
Speaker 3: And what years?
Speaker 4: Because I just remember you from the shade shie shit.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well it's actually a little longer story.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I okay, I was doing I was in Santa
Speaker 2: Barbara doing alternative radio.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 2: I started twelve years old under Michael Newman and Steve Smith.
Speaker 2: Ye rest p Steve Smith, Yes, rest in peace.
Speaker 1: Big dog Steve Smith.
Speaker 2: And they were the local program director of music directors.
Speaker 2: So I would just call up and bug Michael Newman,
Speaker 2: who was the night jock. I just call and a
Speaker 2: fan wanted to win stuff and stuff, and finally I
Speaker 2: became his intern, and at seventeen, I became the program
Speaker 2: director of that radio station Jesus and I broke a
Speaker 2: group called Garbage.
Speaker 3: Shout to Garbage.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Garbage was dope chicks, Yeah, Shirley Manson Syns. And
Speaker 2: you know when what I noticed was is the producer,
Speaker 2: you know, Butch Vig, who did Nevermind for Nirvana and
Speaker 2: then Smashing Pumpkin Siamese Dream. I said, well, wait a minute,
Speaker 2: if he just did those records, then this little demo
Speaker 2: that I got from Almo Sounds that just said produced
Speaker 2: by Butch Vig, it means it's probably going to be
Speaker 2: pretty big, right, you know what I mean? Yeah, So
Speaker 2: I was like, okay, well, and that's the first time
Speaker 2: I realized, okay, so producers.
Speaker 1: You know what I mean. That's when it clicked about producers.
Speaker 2: So I was like, okay, well, well I'm gonna take
Speaker 2: three songs off that album. You'll start playing them, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? And so the label was like, yo,
Speaker 2: you broke Garbage. So when they blew up and they
Speaker 2: went platinum, they said, well, we owe you a favor.
Speaker 2: What do you want you want to do? Like a Flyaway.
Speaker 2: You know, they're doing the Weenie Roast, They're going on
Speaker 2: tourards Smashing Pumpkins. You know, you want to do something.
Speaker 2: I said, no, I want them to come to Santa
Speaker 2: Barbara and do this two hundred person club. And they said,
Speaker 2: I don't think you heard us. They went platinum. They're
Speaker 2: going on tour with Smashing Pumpkins and they're doing that.
Speaker 2: And I said, well, I guess you guys aren't. Your
Speaker 2: word doesn't mean anything. And they were like, so they
Speaker 2: called Butch Big and they said, there's this like seventeen
Speaker 2: year old, eighteen year old program director in Santa Barbara Broke,
Speaker 2: you know, the records and all this kind of stuff,
Speaker 2: because even like Kevin Weatherley at k Rock and all
Speaker 2: those guys would drive to Santa Barbara, right, and they'd
Speaker 2: hear this alternative station and they'd hear these records, and
Speaker 2: you know, I'd be pulling, like when i'd go to
Speaker 2: London or something. I'd hear like pennies, ever, my pennies
Speaker 2: from Smashing Pumpkins.
Speaker 1: It was like an import.
Speaker 2: And then I'd make it a current on our station
Speaker 2: as exclusive content, and everybody would be like, where the
Speaker 2: hell is he finding these records and doing stuff like that.
Speaker 2: So that's also where I learned about exclusive content. You know,
Speaker 2: investing in artists early and having exclusive content was like
Speaker 2: the key.
Speaker 4: Especially back then because radio was like, really were you
Speaker 4: that's where you heard stuff first? Yeah, there was no internet,
Speaker 4: there's no Yeah it was yeah, it was what it
Speaker 4: was like. You read about it in the source, and
Speaker 4: then you heard about it on the radio, you saw
Speaker 4: it on BT.
Speaker 2: You know, it was nuts. So anyways, Butch Figg said, well,
Speaker 2: did you make the promise? And the rep said yes,
Speaker 2: And I said, well, I guess the one day off
Speaker 2: that we have between the Winnie Roast and the Smashing
Speaker 2: Pumpkins tour, we're doing a show in Santa Barbara. So
Speaker 2: the whole industry was like, how did this seventeen year old,
Speaker 2: you know get a platinum approaching double Butch vig in
Speaker 2: a two hundred seat club that's sold out in half
Speaker 2: a minute, and the streets flooded, and you know, all
Speaker 2: of this news press and all this.
Speaker 1: So Bruce Saint James came to that show.
Speaker 3: Bruce is who was my first p PD ever.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, I love Bruce Saint James. Hell well, he
Speaker 2: got me my job at Power. So I saw Bruce
Speaker 2: there and I said, look, I you know, I love
Speaker 2: all well. I had to do alternative because it was
Speaker 2: a rock town. I wanted to do hip hop first, right,
Speaker 2: but they said that's just not going to work. And
Speaker 2: even in LA when we wanted to switch to doing
Speaker 2: you know, West Coast s rap. I mean, you have
Speaker 2: to remember when I got to Power, they were playing
Speaker 2: everything from boys to Men one second, then Mob Deep,
Speaker 2: then Already the One Man Party, then you know, Richard
Speaker 2: Humpty vision for one show, shout out with Richard Humpty vision,
Speaker 2: my dog, bad Boy Bill, all of them. So they said,
Speaker 2: all we have is this Sunday night coach to Coast
Speaker 2: show boardop position and I was like, great, I'll take it.
Speaker 2: And they're like, so wait a minute, let me get
Speaker 2: this straight. You're programming two stations in Santa Barbara, but
Speaker 2: you want to come and board up on Sunday nights
Speaker 2: at Power and I six, I said, look, I'll sweep
Speaker 2: the damn floors, like whatever you want me to do, whatever, whatever.
Speaker 2: So I walk in to board op for this show
Speaker 2: and there's Curtis Blow.
Speaker 3: Oh shit, and I was like, so, what year is this.
Speaker 1: This is God ninety five ninety six.
Speaker 2: So Curtis saw how nervous I was and stuff, and
Speaker 2: he was like, look, just don't mess up, and I
Speaker 2: will tell you a story of hip hop every night
Speaker 2: after the show. And I was like kid in a
Speaker 2: candy store. So fast forward about a year Curtis leaves.
Speaker 2: The next one to come in to do that show
Speaker 2: is Iced Tea Crazy. His engineer for like Rickochet and
Speaker 2: all that was this guy named Vachek where when I
Speaker 2: was like fourteen, I wanted to be a rapper. So
Speaker 2: I was working in Burbank at the studio called Malagro,
Speaker 2: and the back of that studio was a studio called
Speaker 2: back Room where battle Cat was working and he was
Speaker 2: doing stuff like Quote and Tom Jones and all this
Speaker 2: kind of stuff. So like, you know, and this is
Speaker 2: why I say about mentorship. You know, this is where
Speaker 2: I learned mentorship from is because there was this one
Speaker 2: night where battle.
Speaker 1: Cat erased all of his sounds.
Speaker 2: You know, He's in the back and he's like I
Speaker 2: just lost every sound I ever made, you know, flipping out,
Speaker 2: And here comes this little kid wanting to be a
Speaker 2: rapper with white kid from Santa Barbara. You know and says, hey,
Speaker 2: but what was that guitar song sound you used on quote?
Speaker 2: Oh well, wait a minute, Michael Jackson sent over the
Speaker 2: tape and dah da da da da and totally stops
Speaker 2: all of it and takes the time to tell this kid,
Speaker 2: you know some game, right, And I'm like, click another
Speaker 2: one about mentorship Steve Smith, Michael Newman, Battlecat.
Speaker 1: You know that's okay. You know that's how that works,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: Like, and seeing interviews with Michael Jackson was saying, like,
Speaker 2: you know where I come from, in the school I
Speaker 2: come from. If you know, a kid comes up and says,
Speaker 2: that's a night shirt, you take it off and you
Speaker 2: hand it to him, right, you know what I mean? Like,
Speaker 2: that's the the artist and mentorship school that I came
Speaker 2: up in, you know what I mean. So anyways, Ice
Speaker 2: Tea does the same thing vod check. Like what I
Speaker 2: was saying about vod Check is the engineer happened to be,
Speaker 2: you know, the Iced Tea's engineer.
Speaker 1: So when I.
Speaker 2: Saw ic T the first time, I said, oh, I
Speaker 2: know Vacheck. Then we started talking and you know, blah
Speaker 2: blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: So Ice T started teaching me. Well, Bruce gets ready
Speaker 1: to leave.
Speaker 2: Power one o six to go to KKFAR, to go
Speaker 2: to KKFR as the PD, and he says to Michelle Mercer,
Speaker 2: you might want to talk to that kid from Santa Barbara.
Speaker 2: You know, I saw him at this garbage show. I
Speaker 2: think he might have you know whatever, whatever, So shout
Speaker 2: out to Bruce Saint James.
Speaker 1: He got me my job at powerwin six.
Speaker 3: Crazy.
Speaker 2: So then I became the music director at Powerwino six.
Speaker 3: So you were the MD. Who is the PD, Jimmy Steele.
Speaker 2: No, Michelle mercerche Mercer comings had just left and Michelle
Speaker 2: Mercer was the PD.
Speaker 3: So what's it like?
Speaker 4: Because I feel like people don't really grasp like radio
Speaker 4: obviously nowadays is a whole different ballgame, but in the nineties,
Speaker 4: like doing hip hop radio a Power one oh six,
Speaker 4: like that had to be like just the politics you
Speaker 4: had to deal with.
Speaker 3: Dude.
Speaker 2: When I walked in the first time, the first people
Speaker 2: that I met was like Chalk and c minus shout
Speaker 2: the fucking all mighty freaking roughnecks. Yeah, the Baker Boys,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, shout out Nick and Eric,
Speaker 2: I mean all of it, because these were the guys that, like,
Speaker 2: I mean, I grew I used to be that kid
Speaker 2: that would drive up just far enough to listen to
Speaker 2: Kdam you know, and Julio G shout out Tony G
Speaker 2: and the original mixmasters. I mean that was what I
Speaker 2: would do, you know what I mean. I was such
Speaker 2: a fan of it, you know. And then when Michelle
Speaker 2: and even the Beat and Easy and Julio and recipes
Speaker 2: ez and and Westside Radio and you know, just all
Speaker 2: of that stuff and those icons.
Speaker 1: That's what I grew up on.
Speaker 3: So you're the music director for how long? Well?
Speaker 1: Well, uh.
Speaker 2: Well, the format of the station when we first started
Speaker 2: wasn't hip hop.
Speaker 3: It was just you know, I mean, it was doing this.
Speaker 2: It was it was yeah, chr kind of but it
Speaker 2: was like already the one man Party, the Voice to
Speaker 2: Men and Mob Deep and you know, it's kind of
Speaker 2: all over the place. And I was like, we need
Speaker 2: to go straight West Coast Kankster Rep. That's what we
Speaker 2: need to do. And they told me you're fucking crazy,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. They just I was like, dude,
Speaker 2: I want to put eight No Fun in Morning Drive.
Speaker 2: And they were like, dude, what about all about you?
Speaker 2: What about life goes on? What about you know, all
Speaker 2: of these records that I knew were huge in the
Speaker 2: street because you have to remember, I started off as
Speaker 2: a DJ. I started off, you know, my first job
Speaker 2: at Khduy and Santa Barbara after being an intern.
Speaker 1: Was the night jock.
Speaker 2: So I'm going to high school, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: as the night jock programming my own show Crazy. So
Speaker 2: I knew what the streets were listening. Plus all of
Speaker 2: my friends, you know, growing up in Santa Barbara.
Speaker 3: You know, yeah, I'm.
Speaker 2: White, but you know, it was basically identifying as young Mexican,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, Like it was just that
Speaker 2: was all my friends.
Speaker 3: So growing up, you know.
Speaker 2: The first tape I heard, you know that blew my
Speaker 2: mind was Gangster Gangster, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: And I an.
Speaker 2: Easy ease, So I stole that tape, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean, And that's what my friends were listening to.
Speaker 1: So when I got to Power, that was my mission.
Speaker 2: It was like, We're going to make West Coast rap
Speaker 2: the number one format in the world. And they said
Speaker 2: that just won't happen.
Speaker 4: So this is around the time of ninety seven, So
Speaker 4: ninety seven, so this is I mean, this is.
Speaker 3: Pocking big ee past.
Speaker 1: No, no, okay. So when I'm in Santa.
Speaker 3: Barbara, because that was a Biggie died what March ninety seven.
Speaker 2: Biggie was sitting in my office the morning before he died.
Speaker 2: What he had done a radio run and he literally.
Speaker 4: Because we always see like that legendary cameo stuff he had.
Speaker 4: So then he obviously he was in La.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so he went to the Baker Boys show and
Speaker 2: he was on crutches because you know, he'd gotten out
Speaker 2: the car accident, was seized. And what we actually what
Speaker 2: happened was is he did the beating. He played Bone
Speaker 2: Thugs in Harmony and I heard it the night before
Speaker 2: and yeah, and I flipped and I called Puffy and
Speaker 2: I was like, bro, I was like, Homie, One, bone
Speaker 2: Thugs in Harmony is a power one on six artists
Speaker 2: and two we got the Baker Boys, So what are
Speaker 2: you doing? And he goes, we'll be there tomorrow morning, miss,
Speaker 2: And that was that, you know what I mean. So
Speaker 2: he came on and he played like hypnotized notorious thugs,
Speaker 2: kicking the doors break. He was just playing all of them, so,
Speaker 2: I mean, it was like crazy. And then he comes
Speaker 2: down the thing and he's on his crutches and he
Speaker 2: looks in the thing and this is the second time
Speaker 2: I met him, because we had a show at the
Speaker 2: Palace in Hollywood the night before. And I don't think
Speaker 2: you know, Snoop doesn't get enough credit for trying to
Speaker 2: kill the East West Beef. I mean literally, the night
Speaker 2: that we had this show at the Palace, Biggie's on
Speaker 2: stage in the middle of all of this stuff.
Speaker 1: He just got booted the Source rewards.
Speaker 2: I had the dog Pound on stage and I'm like, yo,
Speaker 2: guys stop by and they're like, I don't know, you know,
Speaker 2: it's a little hot, and I'm like, dude, I.
Speaker 1: Got this, just come come.
Speaker 2: Biggie gets out of the car, you know, Puffy Mace,
Speaker 2: all of them get out of the car and they
Speaker 2: come out, and I'm like, this is Snoop, this is
Speaker 2: Da Da Da. And I start realizing, like by just
Speaker 2: introducing everybody and everybody's gonna be cool. We had ice
Speaker 2: q Dare. We have all these people there, so I'm
Speaker 2: introducing everybody. Everybody's cool. Biggie goes out on stage. I
Speaker 2: go to e man heye with the bigs on stage.
Speaker 2: He's like, do not even bring any records. I didn't
Speaker 2: think he was gonna show. So he just plays crush
Speaker 2: on you, and Big does what he wrote for Little Kim,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, stuff like that, and Snoop
Speaker 2: comes out in the back and just starts dancing, and
Speaker 2: I'm like.
Speaker 1: He's West Beef.
Speaker 2: What this is in the middle of the beef, in
Speaker 2: the middle of all of it, Yeah, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean. And I had met Pac before that, and
Speaker 2: you know, I mean when I was doing Alternative. You know,
Speaker 2: they had they'd have these after the Grammys, you know
Speaker 2: they have those parties and stuff like that. Well, they
Speaker 2: MCA had one at the Four Seasons. It's a famous
Speaker 2: one where PUC was in the versace with kiss and
Speaker 2: all that. And afterwards they came to the Four Seasons,
Speaker 2: well Sugar Night and Pock and everybody comes running in.
Speaker 2: Everybody hits the walls. But I'm like, fuck, that's pucking sug.
Speaker 2: So I just walk up and I'm like, hey, Poc,
Speaker 2: nice to meet you. Should He's like, He's like, nice
Speaker 2: to meet you. He said, I love the new album.
Speaker 2: And it goes from this happy to the album doesn't
Speaker 2: come out till Monday, how the hell.
Speaker 3: Did you get it?
Speaker 1: And I was like what, and he goes, how did
Speaker 1: you get my album?
Speaker 3: Sug?
Speaker 1: Somebody got the album before release?
Speaker 4: Well, then you had you had to explain I'm a
Speaker 4: radio guy labels hit, so I'm like, I'm an alternative
Speaker 4: radio so they know we're not going to play it.
Speaker 1: They sent it to me on the Friday before the release.
Speaker 2: Day and she goes a hah ha and just turns
Speaker 2: around and Pop goes, what's your favorite song?
Speaker 3: And I go, oh, song, this too.
Speaker 2: A million pair of eyes, look your heart. And he
Speaker 2: finishes the same with me and slaps my hand and.
Speaker 1: Goes to Jimmy.
Speaker 3: Snoop, did you meet so and So?
Speaker 2: You met Nate, you met Da Da Da da mc hammer?
Speaker 2: I was like EMC hammer with you guys. Yeah, you
Speaker 2: know what it was like hip hop fan overload, you.
Speaker 3: Know what I mean, Like nobody's interesting you.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna go back to the show that like, imagine
Speaker 4: if Instagram existed then and you would see Snoop dance.
Speaker 3: On stage with Biggie.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that was a moment. That's a moment. So
Speaker 1: while Snoop's there, I say.
Speaker 4: I'm assuming that this show transpired after Pop died.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yes, this is probably around February and March
Speaker 2: ninety seven.
Speaker 4: Right, so this is okay?
Speaker 3: It was It was.
Speaker 1: It was March sixth, fifth, ninety seven, was just a.
Speaker 2: Four days before three four Big was gone. So he
Speaker 2: was doing that radio run or whatever, and he came in.
Speaker 2: He just sat down, and then Nick and Eric come
Speaker 2: in and go, we need him to record a freestyle.
Speaker 2: And I was like oh, and he's like, oh man,
Speaker 2: my legs, damn.
Speaker 1: Can I just sit here for a little while?
Speaker 2: And I was, and Nick and Eric go, look, why
Speaker 2: don't you record it when he gets when he feels
Speaker 2: like it and whatever whatever. So Big sitting there, he
Speaker 2: looks over and he just says, God, I love being
Speaker 2: in California. And I'm like what and he goes the
Speaker 2: women the weed. He goes, man, I just got I'm
Speaker 2: going home soon. I just got good with faith again.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go see my daughter, you know, man. I
Speaker 2: just man, I love it. And we just sat there
Speaker 2: and we talked for like thirty minutes just about all this,
Speaker 2: and he's like, all right, man, let's go do this Dame.
Speaker 2: And I was like all right, cool, So we go
Speaker 2: in there and I go, do you need a piece
Speaker 2: of paper? And he goes, nah, I write everything in
Speaker 2: my head right, And I was like what and he goes,
Speaker 2: I'll just do the verse from Victory. He goes, pop
Speaker 2: album coming out, I wrote some stuff. I'll just do
Speaker 2: the verse from Victory, and I was like, all right.
Speaker 1: Cool.
Speaker 2: So I'm sitting there and he goes in the booth.
Speaker 2: He's like, yeah, one, two, and two. Put the headphones on.
Speaker 2: I'm watching this icon wrap and I'm just going like yo,
Speaker 2: and he's like, so what you think of that? And
Speaker 2: I'm just like, oh, yeah, great, great.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: It's like he goes, you need me to run it again?
Speaker 2: Da da da da da. I'm like cool. He's like
Speaker 2: not cool, left and whatever whatever.
Speaker 1: So E won. The next night I was I went
Speaker 1: I was going.
Speaker 2: To the Outcast party because Outcasts had just gone platinum
Speaker 2: or whatever it was with at Aliens or something yeah
Speaker 2: or our Quaminin or whatever.
Speaker 3: Or whatever.
Speaker 2: So I love those guys and shout out good kept goodie.
Speaker 2: But anyways, so I go home to bed because they
Speaker 2: didn't let me into the Roxbury because I had tennis
Speaker 2: shoes on and blue jeans and I didn't even know
Speaker 2: about the Quincy Jones party, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: the Peterson autun Museum party. I was just like, well,
Speaker 2: I knew, but I was like, look, if they're not
Speaker 2: gonna let me into this, I'm sure it's I'm not
Speaker 2: going to get into that. So I just went home
Speaker 2: and went to sleep, and about twelve thirty one calls
Speaker 2: me up. Shout out he one mad pro and nerve
Speaker 2: and all of that. He calls me up and he goes,
Speaker 2: they got Big and I was like what And he goes,
Speaker 2: they got big and I'm like, what are you talking about?
Speaker 2: I hear Puffy wailing in the background. He goes, I'm
Speaker 2: at the hospital. Puffy's on the phone with Biggie's mother
Speaker 2: right now telling him that. And I was like, wait,
Speaker 2: don't tell me. And he goes, Big is dead, and
Speaker 2: I was like, what just happened? The dude was just
Speaker 2: like here. And that was like, you know, meeting Pac
Speaker 2: and then Poc dying and then seeing Big and then
Speaker 2: Big dying.
Speaker 3: It was like.
Speaker 1: What's going on? Like right, wow?
Speaker 2: And that was kind of how I my introduction to
Speaker 2: what was happening in the street and Death Row.
Speaker 1: And Sugar Night.
Speaker 3: So I gotta ask you because.
Speaker 1: There's a lot.
Speaker 4: Well, I'm curious because you would always hear that, like
Speaker 4: you know, the magazines where radio hosts were adding gasoline
Speaker 4: to the beef. But you always would hear about like
Speaker 4: it on the hot ninety seven side. I never really
Speaker 4: heard of like the Baker Boys or anybody like stirring
Speaker 4: up the East Coast West coast beef. What was like
Speaker 4: the temperature like after Pop dies, You're obviously in there, biggies,
Speaker 4: Biggies thriving, He's about to put out, you know, life
Speaker 4: after death. And what was the temperature like being at
Speaker 4: the radio station it's the hip hop station quote unquote
Speaker 4: in La during that.
Speaker 1: How I tell you why that started.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you why that started on a radio sign
Speaker 2: because power one oh six was breaking. All these East
Speaker 2: Coast writers and the artists were going back to ninety
Speaker 2: seven saying, what the fuck? Biggie was broken in Los Angeles,
Speaker 2: Puffy was broken, but in Los Angeles, Mace was broken
Speaker 2: in Los Angeles, Big Pun was brest in Peace was
Speaker 2: broken in Los Angeles. I mean, you have to remember,
Speaker 2: Steve Rifkin comes in my office, puts in a tape
Speaker 2: of the video of I'm Not a Player by Big
Speaker 2: pun Right, and I go, oh, that's dope.
Speaker 3: Hold on a second. I popped the VHS tape out.
Speaker 2: I walk in the production room and take it from
Speaker 2: the VHS tape, put it on a CD. I walk
Speaker 2: on in the air and I sit handed to them
Speaker 2: and say play this next. I come back in hand
Speaker 2: him his video tape and he's like, what did you
Speaker 2: just do?
Speaker 3: And I'm like, oh, nothing, you know, just chilling. That
Speaker 3: song ends.
Speaker 2: All of a sudden, not a Player comes on and
Speaker 2: Steve's like, well, are you playing that on the radio
Speaker 2: And I'm like, yeah, dope song. He goes, dude, we
Speaker 2: don't have CDs press yet nine seven. I haven't even
Speaker 2: played it for UD.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So what do you think? You know what I mean?
Speaker 2: And then you know, like what Josh said, and I
Speaker 2: love John IRV. And why I love them so much
Speaker 2: is even when my own coast forgot about me, no
Speaker 2: matter what, Jah and IRV would always, no matter what
Speaker 2: they were doing any other you know, breakfast club or
Speaker 2: or drank champs or anything, they'd be like, I got
Speaker 2: broken on the West Coast, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: Like at New York with me brought Halla Holla and
Speaker 2: can I Get It and all of that stuff to
Speaker 2: to thank you Damien, you know what I mean. And
Speaker 2: jay Z and all of them was like his first
Speaker 2: like solo, well know it how many what it was?
Speaker 4: Oh well, I meant to my actual hit that I
Speaker 4: kind of like, you know, broke through as like a
Speaker 4: But we tried.
Speaker 2: With hallahala first because you have to remember IRV produced
Speaker 2: Hotspot for Foxy Brown.
Speaker 1: Then he did can I Get a?
Speaker 2: So Jay Brown brought and brought me Dame Dash and
Speaker 2: jay Z and we tried like five singles on jay
Speaker 2: Z before some cart before Hard Knock Life, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying, Like and it would it got to
Speaker 2: the point where Def Jam was talking about not renewing
Speaker 2: his budget and you.
Speaker 4: Know, well yeah, because like Volume one was like you know,
Speaker 4: but there was a lot of records and big videos
Speaker 4: that got shot like a.
Speaker 2: Sunshine shine his mind and I mean who he wit
Speaker 2: and none of those like really hit, none of the
Speaker 2: real we tried on the radio, every single one of them.
Speaker 2: It didn't work, you know what I mean. So there
Speaker 2: was a lot of that, but you know.
Speaker 4: Those were the days that like you went into the
Speaker 4: studio because you were making a radio record, and the
Speaker 4: money that you put into that radio record and the video.
Speaker 3: It was substantial. Well for the investment probably had to
Speaker 3: be so crazy.
Speaker 1: And they literally said, we're not going to renew his budget. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know. But then IRV pops up with a soundtrack record.
Speaker 4: Can I get on a Nutty Professor?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I think I don't remember, but Brettner was also managing.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, no, no. Can I get a eight?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 2: Was a.
Speaker 3: Eight? I don't remember? Was on Nutty Professors?
Speaker 1: Plenty? Yeah, I think it was Plenty sound Truck.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah A no was?
Speaker 4: Uh was on Nutty Professor? Which and that was which
Speaker 4: was before volume.
Speaker 1: One, which I think was Quest, which was Jay Brown.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So anyways, so Jay Brown keeps asking me to keep
Speaker 2: investing in this artist because he really believes in him, and.
Speaker 3: It's Jay Z.
Speaker 2: So he comes with can I get it? Can I
Speaker 2: get a? Does great for radio? Another record broke on
Speaker 2: the West Coast? You know what I'm saying, Like through
Speaker 2: a meeting IRV, you know what I'm saying. Then Jermaine
Speaker 2: comes along, does money Ain't a Thing? And all of
Speaker 2: these records and you know, all of that kind of stuff,
Speaker 2: and Jay builds brand all of this kind of stuff,
Speaker 2: does Hard Knock Life. Steve Smith comes in to me
Speaker 2: because now Michelle Mercer is gone, It's just me. And
Speaker 2: he goes, wait a minute, you're that twelve year old
Speaker 2: that I helped in Santa Barbara and Michael and I
Speaker 2: still have a consultancy. I'm still running Hot ninety seven.
Speaker 2: I got thirty two stations in the middle. Tell you
Speaker 2: what you know you're doing all this crazy promotions and
Speaker 2: Hawaii stuff and all this crazy stuff. He goes, I'll
Speaker 2: tell you what. Work with Michael on the consultancy. I'll
Speaker 2: give you Power one o six. You do whatever you
Speaker 2: want with Power one oh six, and I'll work on
Speaker 2: Hot ninety seven. Just help me with the consultancy with Michael.
Speaker 2: So I would literally do the conference calls for the
Speaker 2: thirty two stations with them and Steve and Michael and
Speaker 2: all this kind of stuff. So Steve on the conference
Speaker 2: call says, Jay Z's Hard Knock Life is not getting
Speaker 2: any research, pull it across the country, and I can't
Speaker 2: say anything outshine the master on the you know what
Speaker 2: I mean? On the call and say, wait a minute, Steve,
Speaker 2: you know, da da da da da, because you know,
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna ever disrespect my boss, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean. Like, So after the call, I go running
Speaker 2: into his office and say, Yo, it's number fifteen in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles. You know we're starting to get call out
Speaker 2: and we're two weeks ahead of New York, right, so
Speaker 2: give it a second, bro. So literally made him get
Speaker 2: on with every single program directory hold off and say
Speaker 2: hold off, give it two more weeks, that hard Knock
Speaker 2: Life record, give it two more weeks, and that shit popped,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. So then I start seeing
Speaker 2: all this and I'm like, at the time, I had
Speaker 2: met Mariah Carey and there was all that crap going on.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, you know what.
Speaker 3: What's all that crap going on? Well, she was.
Speaker 1: Coming off with Sony, Okay, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: And you know, Tommy Mottola was her husband, and you know,
Speaker 2: when you're a star of that stature and you're also
Speaker 2: going to be a free agent and a record you know,
Speaker 2: and okay, so let me rewind. So Mariah Carey goes
Speaker 2: to release Honey right, and it wasn't a power one
Speaker 2: of six record. We're a rap station, now, you know,
Speaker 2: I'd successfully like, for instance, they ain't no fun.
Speaker 3: Stuff till the remix comes.
Speaker 2: Well, okay, So what happened was what had happened was
Speaker 2: is ain't no fun and stuff like that. They told me,
Speaker 2: if I put those in our research and stuff like that,
Speaker 2: the auditorium testing, which is how radio stations decide what
Speaker 2: they're going to play as the recurrents and the gold
Speaker 2: records and the oldies and all of that, they said,
Speaker 2: if I put ain't no fun in those records, they
Speaker 2: just fire me, you know what I mean, because they
Speaker 2: were never.
Speaker 3: Going to play ain't no fun in those kind of
Speaker 3: records or more, which is.
Speaker 4: Crazy because it's fucking by ninety seven that's a classic,
Speaker 4: but not on.
Speaker 3: The radio three.
Speaker 2: But they were never radio records. So you got to
Speaker 2: remember radio. The way that it was driven back then
Speaker 2: is if it was not played as a radio or
Speaker 2: sent out as a single, then a radio station would
Speaker 2: not play it.
Speaker 3: Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: You weren't playing just cuts because you wanted.
Speaker 3: To write like I like track seven.
Speaker 2: But that's what made me famous in Santa Barbara, is
Speaker 2: that you were pulling as an alternative was such a
Speaker 2: young format that we had a huge gold base of
Speaker 2: David Bowie and all these kind of things, but we
Speaker 2: didn't have many new records, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So if something like Nirvana came out, I take four
Speaker 2: cuts off the album playing his currents, and then slowly,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, run through them and literally
Speaker 2: decide the singles basically for the labels, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean.
Speaker 1: And that's what I did with Power Is.
Speaker 2: I took album orientated rock and said, let's make it
Speaker 2: album orientated rock, but let's put a gangster twist on it.
Speaker 2: So that show with Biggie, I asked Snoop to come
Speaker 2: to weekends on Power one six.
Speaker 4: Had his radio show what was it called? I remember
Speaker 4: it was on in Phoenix for a little bit.
Speaker 3: Well this is before that, this is before all of that.
Speaker 2: So Fuzzy was Fuzzy wanted to do a show called
Speaker 2: Curb Serving Shout Out Fuzzy Shot, which connected us to
Speaker 2: Snoop Dogg. You know, because if it wasn't for Fuzzy
Speaker 2: introducing Snoop dog and bringing him to that show at
Speaker 2: the Palace, then none of it would have happened.
Speaker 3: Crazy, you know, that's I just raised with him. A
Speaker 3: couple of weeks ago. He brought he brought the dog
Speaker 3: Pound up here. Yeah, I love I love Fuzzy. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And so Fuzzy had this idea for Curb Serving, and
Speaker 2: everybody was like that West Coast gangster raps. I was like, well,
Speaker 2: what about right after Friday Night Flavors, you know, so
Speaker 2: it's like twelve o'clock, win o'clock at night, you.
Speaker 1: Know, give him the shot and see what happened.
Speaker 2: But we would get all of this exclusive content out
Speaker 2: of those shows Friday Night Flavors, and you know, Curb Serving,
Speaker 2: we would get like mid Night.
Speaker 1: He'd bring me Midnight Love.
Speaker 2: You know, they had Snoop and and Raphael Sidiq and
Speaker 2: you know, all of this kind of stuff. And I'd
Speaker 2: play him as currents, you know what I mean. They
Speaker 2: bring him to me and I'd be like, oh, let's
Speaker 2: let's play that as a current. So Snoop starts hearing
Speaker 2: this stuff, you know, like what are these guys doing?
Speaker 2: So I was like, yo, want to meet you know,
Speaker 2: da da da da come work for us, and and
Speaker 2: we put him on Saturdays.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: I saw him at that show and I said, what's
Speaker 2: going on? It's like I just got off death row.
Speaker 2: They cut off my stipend.
Speaker 4: D H yeah, yeah, because that was kind of like right,
Speaker 4: rough no limit shit happened, and.
Speaker 2: I'm like, dude, well, why don't you come to work
Speaker 2: for us a power and say you can players?
Speaker 3: What was?
Speaker 4: What was like, what is the paycheck for Snoop Dogg
Speaker 4: to do radio show in ninety si dollars an hour?
Speaker 3: Fifty dollars an hour?
Speaker 2: I mean he literally came and filled out the application
Speaker 2: and did it.
Speaker 1: But it was fifty dollars an hour?
Speaker 3: And he it was this was a two hour specialty
Speaker 3: show or was it? Was it longer? I was I
Speaker 3: think for two four, two to four whatever it was?
Speaker 3: And who was programming the music? Was Snoop or was
Speaker 3: it you?
Speaker 1: He was he'll do whatever he wanted.
Speaker 3: So would he submit the song?
Speaker 1: Jeff Garcia? And you know the Flavor Unit Junior?
Speaker 3: So who was editing the songs that Snoop? And bring
Speaker 3: in Jeff Garcia? So Jeff was was was?
Speaker 1: I love Jeff? Jeff's my guy?
Speaker 3: Great?
Speaker 2: So we thought who would be the best producer for
Speaker 2: Snoop show? The first time we heard it, We're like,
Speaker 2: we need to have Jeff Garcia do this because Jeff
Speaker 2: is literally.
Speaker 3: The producer period.
Speaker 2: It's bar nothing, yes, who then became our production director.
Speaker 4: But if Cruse ever in him, ever break up, I'm
Speaker 4: taking Jeff.
Speaker 2: And I love Chris, I love Jeff Man, but Jeff
Speaker 2: is well. But he made that show work, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying. And I mean, so Snoops in there
Speaker 2: have funny story. So Snoop's in there working one day
Speaker 2: and I walk in and I'm like, so, what's up
Speaker 2: with you?
Speaker 3: Dry?
Speaker 1: You know what's going on?
Speaker 2: And he's like, oh, I just ain't talk to him
Speaker 2: and and all this kind of stuff. Okay, So master
Speaker 2: P had been coming by the station like every morning,
Speaker 2: you know, trying to get No Limit records on Power
Speaker 2: one O six, And he says to me, He's like, hey,
Speaker 2: Snoops doing weekends. And I said, yeah, what's he doing right?
Speaker 2: And I'm like, you know whatever, whatever he goes, I
Speaker 2: heard that song. I heard that song. I guess Snoop
Speaker 2: runs into mystical or something like that. And then you know,
Speaker 2: he Masterpiece says, let me get the hotline number. No,
Speaker 2: let me get the hotline number so I can call
Speaker 2: the DJs and I want to talk to now.
Speaker 4: When you say the hotline number, are talking about like
Speaker 4: the number the back door.
Speaker 1: Because you know what's so crazy.
Speaker 4: About the hotline? There's the warm line and then there's not.
Speaker 2: Let me tell you about master P. Master P when
Speaker 2: he wants something like he would show up literally every
Speaker 2: morning to Power one O six. Like when I got
Speaker 2: to work, he'd be in the lobby. Dame, I got
Speaker 2: this record, what about this one?
Speaker 3: Dame?
Speaker 2: I got to go to the studio, come back, Dame,
Speaker 2: I got this record? What about it?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 2: His goal was to get a record on powerwe six.
Speaker 2: It got to the point where I would not come
Speaker 2: through the lobby. I started going through the back door,
Speaker 2: trying to avoid Mastery because I was trying to avoid
Speaker 2: master No. But this is how crazy master P is
Speaker 2: in a good way. He figured it out. He'd wait
Speaker 2: at the back door crazy, so I would be coming
Speaker 2: in through the back door.
Speaker 3: Did you guys make him say huh?
Speaker 1: That's what did it?
Speaker 2: Nick and Eric from the Baker Boys were championing so
Speaker 2: hard master P finally brought me make him say uh?
Speaker 2: He but every morning he'd sit there, show me how
Speaker 2: the research works. Why do you make these decisions. How
Speaker 2: do you make the decision? Always the nicest guy, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean? And I had met Pete originally
Speaker 2: through a guy named Mark Benish. Rest in Peace a priority,
Speaker 2: you know, way back in the day, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean, when they first did the first deal with
Speaker 2: Independent and you know, doing it that way and Brian Shafton, Yeah,
Speaker 2: Brian my guy. I mean, I literally just got the
Speaker 2: following him. Brian was their finance well and and man
Speaker 2: just I mean all of them, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: justin but he was their finance guy. So I'd run
Speaker 2: into him in the hallway and stuff, you know. So anyways,
Speaker 2: and all this plays into a bigger story later. But
Speaker 2: but anyways, yeah, Pete would do that. Snoop was doing that.
Speaker 2: And then Nino Cucinello calls me up and says, hey,
Speaker 2: doctor Dre is shooting a video zoom zoom with cool Jay.
Speaker 3: Remember that record? What soundtrack was that? Was that bull Worth?
Speaker 1: I don't whatever.
Speaker 4: That was the Bullwarts soundtrack I think with uh yeah,
Speaker 4: it was Bullward with halle Berry with her fine as
Speaker 4: young halle Berry was in that.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, Yeah.
Speaker 4: That was a great soundtrack that I had the Ghetto
Speaker 4: Superstar Proz and.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah we played those two.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: But to me, it was about I'm trying to get
Speaker 2: Doctor Dre and Snoop dog back together some way, some shape,
Speaker 2: whether it's coming on his show. I mean, this was
Speaker 2: my master plan because I just I am a Doctor
Speaker 2: Dre and Snoop.
Speaker 1: Dogg fan, Like I just wanted to see the show.
Speaker 2: Like if I could get these two in the same
Speaker 2: room and get a picture, then my life couldn't. If
Speaker 2: I meet DJ Quick, shout out DJ Quick, and I
Speaker 2: meet Doctor Dre and Snoop Dogg and get a picture
Speaker 2: with all three, so cool, you know, my I can
Speaker 2: in my career right there, and I'm straight.
Speaker 1: So they go coming, you know whatever.
Speaker 2: So Doctor Dre shooting zoom zoom and he goes, this
Speaker 2: is Damien and I said zoom zoom.
Speaker 1: I said, what the fuck is this? And Dre looks
Speaker 1: over at me and he's like what.
Speaker 2: And I go, where's the one with Snoop Dogg on
Speaker 2: it that you lead to the Compton that's lost and
Speaker 2: swap me And he's like what, And I said, this
Speaker 2: had Snoop on It was released to the Compton, And
Speaker 2: how do you know that I said, dude, I'm a
Speaker 2: rap fan, and he's like, whoa. So we just started
Speaker 2: talking about rap music, and I knew everything that this
Speaker 2: guy did going to the DC shout out DC by
Speaker 2: the way, and I you know, I mean it just
Speaker 2: that's what started me on rap was gangster, gangster. So
Speaker 2: I knew everything this guy did, going back to the
Speaker 2: world Class Wrecking Crew and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: So I started asking those questions. I said, Yo, let's
Speaker 2: swap and I dude, I man. When I said yo,
Speaker 2: let's swap numbers, I caught myself and just went, oh shit,
Speaker 2: you just asked doctor Drey.
Speaker 3: For his number, like whatever.
Speaker 2: So I was walking around the station and a funny
Speaker 2: story about that, as he said, and I said, Yo,
Speaker 2: what assistant is this to And he goes, this is
Speaker 2: my headphone. It rings next to my head, so don't
Speaker 2: call to her, you know what I mean. Like I
Speaker 2: was like, Wow, he gave me whatever.
Speaker 3: Whatever.
Speaker 2: So he had just had the aftermath and the firm thing,
Speaker 2: and him and Jimmy weren't talking, none of that kind
Speaker 2: of stuff. So I was like, I was like, I
Speaker 2: need an excuse to call doctor Dre. So I went
Speaker 2: back in the studio and I said, hey, Snoop, I
Speaker 2: heard doctor Dre wants to work with you again. And
Speaker 2: Snoop looks at me and says, yeah, I put that
Speaker 2: food back on. And I was like okay, And so
Speaker 2: I'm like, how am I going to do this? And
Speaker 2: I go and I called Drey and I'm like, hey,
Speaker 2: what's going on? Even Damien for power Da da da
Speaker 2: da da.
Speaker 3: Hey.
Speaker 2: You know, you know, it's kind of crazy. I was
Speaker 2: talking to Snoop yesterday. He said he wanted to work
Speaker 2: with you again, and he said the exact same thing.
Speaker 1: I put that fool back on, you know what. And
Speaker 1: that's how it happened, you know.
Speaker 2: And then it and it was crazy because he's like, hey,
Speaker 2: you know, no limit or something like that and this
Speaker 2: kind of stuff. I said, well, we have a Powerhouse
Speaker 2: coming up, and Snoop is playing at the Powerhouse. Why
Speaker 2: don't you come to the Powerhouse and just be my guest?
Speaker 2: And he's like, ah, think about it. So I'm like
Speaker 2: calling talking to his wife, you know, when she answered
Speaker 2: the phone before he gives it to Dre.
Speaker 1: Hey, man, I'm really trying to get him come the show.
Speaker 1: You should come to the show.
Speaker 3: Blah.
Speaker 1: Blah blah blah blah, this is what I'm trying to do.
Speaker 1: And you know, she was great.
Speaker 2: She was like, oh, he needs that, you know, da
Speaker 2: da da all this, he needs to get out do
Speaker 2: this stuff, and you know, and it was, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean it was they both were in that phase,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, in between you know, and
Speaker 2: the death Row thing, and they just had not seen
Speaker 2: each other since it.
Speaker 1: But there was no bad bea.
Speaker 2: So what happened was is Snoop comes in and I
Speaker 2: set up his dressing room and shout out to Diana
Speaker 2: Obermeyer genius lady promotion like. She puts the name Snoop
Speaker 2: Dogg on the dressing room door, and I said, yo,
Speaker 2: I need a dressing room right next door for doctor Dre.
Speaker 2: So as soon as Snoop walks in, I switched the
Speaker 2: freaking the Doctor Drey and Snoop Dogg.
Speaker 1: Name flates, and Drake comes in. He's got two.
Speaker 3: Balls of taking.
Speaker 2: Hey damn, I'm here, you know whatever whatever, and I'm like,
Speaker 2: there's your dressing room. I opened up the door and
Speaker 2: literally just went like that, and Dad's corrupt Snoop Drey,
Speaker 2: you know, like, and they all started talking.
Speaker 3: That was the first time they had seen each other
Speaker 3: since Death Wrong the Death Row. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So I'm over there conspiring with DJ jam you know who.
Speaker 2: I love DJ jam My Dog, and I'm like, Jam,
Speaker 2: we gotta find a way to get him do a
Speaker 2: song on stage.
Speaker 3: It's powerhouse, you know.
Speaker 2: If Dray go out there and do deep cover and
Speaker 2: nothing but a g thang, Oh we got off this thing, Like,
Speaker 2: come on, bro, let's do this. And Jam's like, dang,
Speaker 2: they started the conversation, but just don't work like that.
Speaker 2: Just chill out, chill out, It'll happen, but chill out.
Speaker 2: I'm like, nah, I'm gonna make this happen. Fuck that,
Speaker 2: you know, like all this stuff. So Dre's sitting on
Speaker 2: the side of the stage on a road case. Snoop
Speaker 2: is out there performing, and I walk over to Jam.
Speaker 3: I'm like, just play deep Cover. Play deep Cover.
Speaker 2: And He's like, damn. The conversation started, but I'm not
Speaker 2: gonna do that. I'm like fuck this, And I walk
Speaker 2: over and I grabbed two mics from the guy and
Speaker 2: I hold up in front of Dre and I go, Dre,
Speaker 2: do it, like fucking do it.
Speaker 1: Look at this, Like if you walk out there right now.
Speaker 1: Do you realize what's gonna happen?
Speaker 2: He goes, ah, fuck this, and he grabs the two
Speaker 2: mics out of my hand and I look at Jam
Speaker 2: and I'm like, he's got the mikes. He's got the mics,
Speaker 2: and Jam's just like, ah fuck it.
Speaker 3: Puts it on. Fucking Dre comes out, what up? Snoop?
Speaker 3: Surprised as fuck. He's like, what the Fu's us going on?
Speaker 1: Like you know what I mean? It's like, oh hell yeah,
Speaker 1: like and they did it.
Speaker 2: So Dre walks up to me right after you, and
Speaker 2: he hands me back to mics and goes that what
Speaker 2: you wanted, motherfucker. I said no, I want an album,
Speaker 2: and he goes, don't push your luck like you know whatever.
Speaker 1: He's like, I'm out of here.
Speaker 2: And he fucking took off. But that started the relationship
Speaker 2: with doctor Dre. So then Nino calls me again. He goes,
Speaker 2: you need to come to office. You need to come
Speaker 2: to office. I'm like, all right, cool, So I go
Speaker 2: to interscope because then you know, and I have really
Speaker 2: good friends, man, so you need to come to the office.
Speaker 2: We're going up to Jimmy Iven's office. So I'm like,
Speaker 2: oh god, here we go, you know, you know something
Speaker 2: like that. Oh I forgot one one little thing. So
Speaker 2: when when after that performance, I said, we need to
Speaker 2: do a show, like we need it to be just
Speaker 2: Doctor Dre and Snoop Dogg.
Speaker 1: And he's like, well, you know where are we gonna
Speaker 1: do it.
Speaker 2: We can't do it in La No venue ensure that,
Speaker 2: you know, no venue will take a West Coast kingster
Speaker 2: rap show like that. You're never going to get Snoop
Speaker 2: Dogg and Doctor Dre in a venue in La. Right,
Speaker 2: And we don't have a current single, you know, the
Speaker 2: da Da Da Da Da. I'm like, well, you know
Speaker 2: you're making an album, you know, Da da da Da.
Speaker 2: So you know, Dre sneaks over and starts making a
Speaker 2: song with the Master Pete thing, all this kind of thing,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, this.
Speaker 3: Is probably No Limit Top Dog era.
Speaker 4: Second No Limit album, I think the first No Limit album.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well it was it like they were talking about it,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: I mean like and he started recording because Bitch Please
Speaker 3: Too was.
Speaker 4: On Well, Top Dog, I'm trying to roll that first
Speaker 4: Snoop Dog album on No Limit.
Speaker 2: I was not a yeah, but it was kind of
Speaker 2: like the conversation was starting, so you know, maybe there
Speaker 2: was some sessions.
Speaker 4: Maybe there was in the road to two thousand and
Speaker 4: one happens.
Speaker 2: Well, so then it was let's do a show, like,
Speaker 2: let's let's get this together. And Dre is like, I
Speaker 2: don't fucking do it right, And I'm like, Snoop, what
Speaker 2: do you think. He's like, all right, I'll fucking do it,
Speaker 2: and then I'll go to the and then we go around.
Speaker 2: We can't get nobody to do it so right, so
Speaker 2: I'm like, just hang out. We're going to do this
Speaker 2: this this Puffy in Paradise showing in Hawaii. If the
Speaker 2: Baker Boys came up with that idea, if we do
Speaker 2: it in Hawaii, then maybe we can fly with the
Speaker 2: winners to Hawaii like we did with this, and then
Speaker 2: we can skate past the whole venue thing do it
Speaker 2: in Hawaii.
Speaker 3: So then they're like, yeah, that's a good idea, let's
Speaker 3: do that.
Speaker 2: Well, when Drake cut the promos, Snoop cuts the promos,
Speaker 2: I go on the air with it. Jimmy Ivin calls
Speaker 2: me and he's like, bro, what are you doing? And
Speaker 2: I'm like, Jimmy Iveen Hi, like you're Jimmy Iven and
Speaker 2: he goes, Bro, he goes, I have a bill on
Speaker 2: my desk for two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, thank you,
Speaker 2: Nino for a promotion.
Speaker 3: In Hawaii that I'm hearing on the radio that.
Speaker 2: Has a producer that doesn't produce and an artist that
Speaker 2: I haven't seen since Death Row. And how the fuck
Speaker 2: did you get doctor Dre's number? I don't even have it.
Speaker 2: Like I'm trying to sell this label, blah blah blah
Speaker 2: blah blah. And I mean the rumor was that he
Speaker 2: was going to sell Aftermath because of after the.
Speaker 3: Firm and the Aftermath album and.
Speaker 2: The Aftermath album, so it was kind of like and
Speaker 2: he and I was like, look, bro, you'll get your album.
Speaker 2: Trust me, like, you're gonna get it. I've been to
Speaker 2: the studio. I know he's working on something. You know,
Speaker 2: it was the early stages of Melman and all of
Speaker 2: that kind of stuff, And just trust me, you're going
Speaker 2: to get it. And he goes, well, if this doesn't happen,
Speaker 2: I'm going to sue you for the two hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty grand, but go ahead and do it. And then
Speaker 2: I get a call from Dre saying you need to
Speaker 2: come to the house, and I was like what. And
Speaker 2: We're in the middle of all this, you know, like it's.
Speaker 3: All how's already on the air, and he.
Speaker 2: Goes, you need to come to the house. And I'm like, like,
Speaker 2: I know where you live. You have a fucking stalker,
Speaker 2: like you know whatever. So I end up coming to
Speaker 2: the house. I walk in and there's this little white
Speaker 2: kid in the booth going slim shady you a base
Speaker 2: head while your face red. And I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: wait a minute, he's writing for you. And he goes, ah,
Speaker 2: let me talk to you outside for a second, and
Speaker 2: I'm like what. He goes, let me talk to you
Speaker 2: outside for a second. I'm like, oh, no, you signed
Speaker 2: the White Boy. And he goes, how do I break
Speaker 2: the White Kid? And I was like, haven't you never
Speaker 2: heard of an hour ice? And he goes, bro, how
Speaker 2: do I break the White Kid? And I was like,
Speaker 2: all right, I'll tell you what you tell me the
Speaker 2: story of NWA from beginning to end, and I want
Speaker 2: to know if everything from the World Class Wrecking Crew Lonzo,
Speaker 2: what the room was like, when Easy did Freaking Boys
Speaker 2: in the Hood, when Cube wrote it, who wrote this
Speaker 2: who did that? What happened with Doc blah blah blah
Speaker 2: blah blah blah blah. He goes, dude, you got all night.
Speaker 2: I was like, yeah, I do. And he's like, all right.
Speaker 2: So I sat on his washer and dryer. He sat
Speaker 2: on his stairs, and he proceeded to tell me the
Speaker 2: entire story of NWA from World Class Wrecking Crew and
Speaker 2: all and Warren in the house and you know Jinks
Speaker 2: and you know everything up until that point about six
Speaker 2: o'clock in the morning, and comes out and goes, look, guys,
Speaker 2: I'm going home. I've been sitting here for hours, y'all
Speaker 2: have been telling these stories.
Speaker 3: I'm out of here.
Speaker 2: I said, no, you're going to the Baker Boys show,
Speaker 2: and you're gonna announce that you're doing the Friday Night
Speaker 2: Flavors ten year anniversary and we're going to break that record.
Speaker 2: He goes, the record's not ready yet, so we'll at
Speaker 2: least go do the show, set it up, and we'll
Speaker 2: talk about this later when you have the record.
Speaker 1: And he was like cool.
Speaker 2: So then we added M to the show in Hawaii Crazy.
Speaker 2: So then M cut all all the drops and we
Speaker 2: added M to it. Dropped how my name is.
Speaker 3: So this was before Hi my name is? You already
Speaker 3: added in.
Speaker 2: By so well we did it right as we dropped
Speaker 2: how my name is? Because you really have to remember
Speaker 2: MTV for all intents and purposes, broke eminet for sure,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. So you know, and I
Speaker 2: remember this one story. M came in my office and
Speaker 2: called me up and.
Speaker 3: Let me shout out to Sway and Tech who had
Speaker 3: him Oh.
Speaker 1: No, the early Oh yeah, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: I mean.
Speaker 2: Sway and Tech and a wake up show all of that.
Speaker 2: But I'm saying my name is broken. You know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying, as as that which made us know who
Speaker 2: he is. Yet, so shoutouts were in Tech, no disrespect,
Speaker 2: you know. I love those guys, but they're getting ready
Speaker 2: to drop how my name is? And you know, EM
Speaker 2: used to call me a lot like what's this mean?
Speaker 2: What's that mean? You know, come to the studio and
Speaker 2: listen to this or you know, dre all of them did.
Speaker 2: So EM calls me up, he goes go, can I
Speaker 2: stat by the office? I was like yeah, I was like,
Speaker 2: Fo's going on? And it shows up. He's like, yo,
Speaker 2: what's a buzz clip? And I'm like, what do you mean,
Speaker 2: and he's like, what's a buzz clip? I mean, everybody's
Speaker 2: so excited at the office, They're all saying congratulations and shit,
Speaker 2: and that mean. I said, oh, dude, that's hot rotation
Speaker 2: at MTV. You're about to become a megastar. So if
Speaker 2: you want to go take your daughter to Taco Bell
Speaker 2: or McDonald's or whatever the hell you want to do
Speaker 2: right now, do it now because tomorrow morning you're not
Speaker 2: going to be able to go anywhere. And he's like,
Speaker 2: and he had this half look of like wow, I
Speaker 2: made it, and half kind of like wait a minute,
Speaker 2: what is that?
Speaker 3: Wait?
Speaker 2: I can't go out in public anymore? Right, And then
Speaker 2: he was like yeah, cool and he leaves. Right the
Speaker 2: next morning, m was everywhere and I get the record
Speaker 2: hot ninety or MTV just national, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So we broke it at the same time that they
Speaker 2: broke it on MTVA. They literally did it at the
Speaker 2: same time. So then we had him do the drops.
Speaker 2: I called him back, said get back over the area. We're
Speaker 2: add him to the show. Do the drops. And that
Speaker 2: was the Chronic two thousand and one tour. So when
Speaker 2: they got done with the Hawaii Showzy well, but check
Speaker 2: this out.
Speaker 1: So they and this is how synergy works.
Speaker 2: Okay, this is why I always say consistency and repetition
Speaker 2: breeds familiarity.
Speaker 1: Familiarity breads a relationship.
Speaker 2: A relationship reads teamwork or synergy, and synergy teamwork wins games.
Speaker 2: So we add him to the show, right then, Dre
Speaker 2: after the show calls me up and says, we want
Speaker 2: to take this on the road, but no venue will
Speaker 2: take us across the.
Speaker 4: So Hawaii was kind of the the braak, the test run,
Speaker 4: the test run of what ended up being up in
Speaker 4: Smoke Tour. Yeah, yeah, which I fucking I remember. I man,
Speaker 4: I've worked so hard as like a twelve year old
Speaker 4: kid or however old I was to get the money
Speaker 4: to go to the.
Speaker 3: Warehouse and buy those tickets.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and it sucks because the date I went to
Speaker 4: when Phoenix ice Cube wasn't on the tour, he wasn't
Speaker 4: on the But that shit was crazy, dude. It came out.
Speaker 2: Imagine being wait but watch this, imagine in Hawaii. It's
Speaker 2: two hundred and fifty people.
Speaker 1: Okay's it? Yeah, that's it in a hotel ballroom.
Speaker 4: So two hundred and fifty people got to see Eminem
Speaker 4: Dre and Snoop in Hawaii.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what the fuck?
Speaker 2: Exclusive content for Power one oh six that's crazy and
Speaker 2: the reunion and you've got m blowing up with how
Speaker 2: my name is at that time?
Speaker 3: Crazy?
Speaker 2: Then the records still dre okay. Now here's the funny
Speaker 2: thing about that. So Dra called me one night and
Speaker 2: he's like, yo, I think I got the record, and
Speaker 2: I was like what, and he goes, you need to
Speaker 2: come to the studio. I got the record and I
Speaker 2: was like, and keep in mind, during the recording process,
Speaker 2: jay Z wrote a song called Malibu Dre first okay,
Speaker 2: didn't come out right. So J's like, I'm not doing that,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean?
Speaker 4: For people wo don't know.
Speaker 2: Jay Z wrote, well, we'll get, we'll get. It's getting there.
Speaker 2: So so he's we're at A and M. He calls
Speaker 2: me to A and M. It's Scott Storch's first night
Speaker 2: and he's sitting in the back and smell man. I
Speaker 2: think Doc was there some other people and you hear
Speaker 2: him in the back just going bling bling bling bling
Speaker 2: bling bling bling bling bling bling bling and the drum
Speaker 2: beat is playing. But I'm sitting there just going like,
Speaker 2: what the hell is going on? And he goes, well,
Speaker 2: jay Z's supposed to write a song. I don't know
Speaker 2: about the mout. Do you remember the Mala Blue Dre
Speaker 2: I Am Malibu Dre was all right, d d Well,
Speaker 2: we're gonna give him another shot, you know Jay, you know,
Speaker 2: because I had just broken Jay, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So he was like, is this the beat? And I
Speaker 2: was like, oh, hell yeah, that's the beat. And he
Speaker 2: goes me and snoop and I'm like, oh, hell yeah,
Speaker 2: that's the beat. Here's you could tee off on this.
Speaker 2: I'm like that's the beat and he's like, okay, sign
Speaker 2: it off. Two days later, he calls me out goes,
Speaker 2: you need to come back by the studio.
Speaker 1: I'm like what.
Speaker 2: He goes, I think we got it and I was
Speaker 2: like what and he goes still d r E and
Speaker 2: I was like, what's still d r E? He goes
Speaker 2: the fucking single We got it and I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: I'm on my way.
Speaker 1: So we go to record one or encore one another two.
Speaker 2: I walk in, I hear that record and I said
Speaker 2: thank you, and I literally took it out of his hands.
Speaker 1: He's like, where are you going?
Speaker 2: I said, I'm gonna go play it, and he was like, okay,
Speaker 2: and that I just put it on the radio.
Speaker 4: I would love to hear the jay Z reference tracks
Speaker 4: to dr I've heard it crazy.
Speaker 2: It's hilarious to hear Jay doing it Andre's voice, right,
Speaker 2: you know, which is also kind of funny to hear
Speaker 2: em doing like you know, uh to a new house
Speaker 2: on a new hill and how would you feel a lift?
Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Right? I mean those references, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: Like m wrote, I mean, uh, you know, what's the
Speaker 2: difference between me and you? You know, like all of
Speaker 2: those kinds of all that's that he wrote all that
Speaker 2: stuff for DRAG. I mean, think how genius eminem is,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? Bitch Plea's part two. He
Speaker 2: wrote the whole fucking record, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: snoops parts and his I think you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: he wrote the whole I know, he wrote Nate's part
Speaker 2: and they told me, you know what I mean, like
Speaker 2: that's crazy, And even until I collapse, he wrote that
Speaker 2: for Nate Nate and they just came in and sang it.
Speaker 5: I love doing my session work. Now I'm like going
Speaker 5: on to see I'm gonna go do my session work.
Speaker 5: Rest peace man to go one of my best friends
Speaker 5: ever and I loved him.
Speaker 3: Yeah he was great man.
Speaker 2: But yeah, so that's how it all started. And then
Speaker 2: I started playing. Literally that's when I realized how much
Speaker 2: power we had because I took Still dre handed it
Speaker 2: to Steve Smith and they played it on Hot ninety
Speaker 2: seven in New York. But it was like, just hit
Speaker 2: him over the head. But then Power win of five
Speaker 2: came on. This is a little bit later. Power one
Speaker 2: of five came on in New York and jay Z
Speaker 2: immediately went over there because you know, people weren't fucking
Speaker 2: with Hot ninety seven like that. They weren't breaking their
Speaker 2: records and they were threatened to take records off and
Speaker 2: they just had the little Kim shooting and.
Speaker 1: All this kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: So I get a call and it's like, yo, you
Speaker 2: need to go to Hot ninety seven and fix all
Speaker 2: this shit. And I was like what, and they go
Speaker 2: summer Jam's not booked, Flex won't sign his contract. Jay
Speaker 2: Z's on this new station called Power one on five
Speaker 2: saying fuck Hot ninety seven and they don't have a
Speaker 2: music director. And if you're going to New York, and
Speaker 2: so I went to New York and cleaned up the
Speaker 2: little kim stuff, finished booking, Summer Jam, pulled jay Z
Speaker 2: off a Hot ninety seven and got Flex to sign
Speaker 2: his contract.
Speaker 4: For people who don't know Power One of six and
Speaker 4: Hot ninety seven were owned by the same company for
Speaker 4: a long time called AMS Communications.
Speaker 2: But Steve was the consultant behind both of them. Now
Speaker 2: what's even crazier is so when Dre called me about
Speaker 2: the test run two thousand and one, keep in mind
Speaker 2: I was working at Summer Jam they did.
Speaker 1: Hot ninety seven.
Speaker 2: I see that Steve Smith owns the company with Brad
Speaker 2: Patrick and Randy Bizzelli that's doing all the staging. So
Speaker 2: that's what I used in Hawaii. Do you see what
Speaker 2: I'm saying? The Summer Jam infrastructure to do the chronic shit. Right,
Speaker 2: So when Dre said I want to go on tour,
Speaker 2: He's like, well, I'll just use the people that we
Speaker 2: used in Hawaii because that was a great test run.
Speaker 2: Now how do I get it across the country. Well,
Speaker 2: I'm like, wait a minute. I'm like Jay Brown, who
Speaker 2: manages jay Z. His wife works for Magic Johnson. So
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, why don't we get Magic Johnson to
Speaker 2: be the promoter and then he'll open up all the
Speaker 2: venues for us, because because he's fucking magic, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. And he's like, good idea, can you
Speaker 2: make it happen? And I was like, yeah, Jay Brown Johnson,
Speaker 2: doctor Dry want to talk to him.
Speaker 3: And we were on the road. It's crazy.
Speaker 4: I wonder, tell me, did you ever have any you know,
Speaker 4: when you're in radio or specific give you a program director,
Speaker 4: artists labels takeshit personal? Did you ever have any beef
Speaker 4: with anybody or did anyone ever have beef with you
Speaker 4: when you.
Speaker 3: Were at the helms of power one of six.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't call it beef. I would say, like disagreement. Well, okay,
Speaker 2: I'll tell you a funny story. How I met Buster
Speaker 2: Rhymes Baker Boys broadcasting live from MTV Awards or something
Speaker 2: like that, and Buster is there and you know, he's
Speaker 2: doing the interview or whatever and are doing interviews and
Speaker 2: goes to Baker Boys and all of a sudden they're
Speaker 2: on the air doing the interview and I hear fuck
Speaker 2: Damian Young live on the air, and I'm like.
Speaker 1: What the fuck was that? So I walk in this
Speaker 1: what the fuck?
Speaker 2: And Baker's go talk back, you know, through through the
Speaker 2: you know whatever we the board or whatever. I don't
Speaker 2: know what happened with you and about rhymes, but da
Speaker 2: da da da da And I'm like, neither.
Speaker 1: Do I tell him come back?
Speaker 2: I want to talk to him right And he said
Speaker 2: he got back and he's there and I was like, yo,
Speaker 2: this is Damian Young and he's like, well fucking no, no,
Speaker 2: d D.
Speaker 1: I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Speaker 2: I'm at twenty six hundred West Olive Avenue in Burbank.
Speaker 2: Come to the office, and whatever your issue is, let's
Speaker 2: discuss it in person. And he said well. I was like, stop,
Speaker 2: twenty six hundred West Olive. When you're done, come over
Speaker 2: and we will sit down and talk. Shows up to
Speaker 2: the station, shuts the door, blah blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 2: I was like, wait, what is the issue and he said, well,
Speaker 2: the label said, you said my new single, dadda.
Speaker 1: I said stop.
Speaker 2: I said, it's like my third fourth day, bro, I
Speaker 2: have not heard anything that you have put out. And
Speaker 2: he goes oh, I said do you have the single?
Speaker 2: He said, yeah, said bring it in, opens the door.
Speaker 2: Tells the rep give me a single, Okay, put the
Speaker 2: single in. I think it was like it was woo ha,
Speaker 2: or put your hands on my eyes can see something,
Speaker 2: or the flip mode record or one of those. I
Speaker 2: put it in and I go, hmmm, press a jack,
Speaker 2: take the CD out, hand it to him and he goes,
Speaker 2: what do you think? I said, well, I think you
Speaker 2: should stop at the on air studio on your way out,
Speaker 2: do an interview and play that motherfucker. And he's like,
Speaker 2: you like it? So I fucking love it? Right, I said,
Speaker 2: next time, just fucking call and ask.
Speaker 3: That's crazy.
Speaker 2: And I never you know, I never had an artist
Speaker 2: nobody ever. I never had an issue with anyone, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean? Like I was always you know,
Speaker 2: it doesn't matter whether it was the street, It doesn't
Speaker 2: matter that. I would never take Paola. I would never
Speaker 2: fucking play something that wasn't right for my radio station.
Speaker 2: I would never compromise. You couldn't intimidate me. You could not.
Speaker 1: I mean how many streets.
Speaker 3: Did a lot of people try to intimidate you? Oh?
Speaker 3: Fuck yeah?
Speaker 2: Because you know you have to understand every West Coast
Speaker 2: gangster rapper affiliated with a gang, So you know, the
Speaker 2: first thing that would happen is the intimidation thing, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, I'd be like kickback, like, you know.
Speaker 4: Dude, did sug Knight ever feel the type of way
Speaker 4: that you were behind the scenes trying to obviously besides
Speaker 4: the Tupac story.
Speaker 2: Well, I met him through the Anaheim Police Department really
Speaker 2: oh yeah. So what happened was is we had Snoop
Speaker 2: and all these guys on Powerhouse, right Sugar gets out
Speaker 2: of jail and the Anaheim Police Department Diana show up
Speaker 2: to my office and they're like, we're going to cancel
Speaker 2: Powerhouse And I'm like, for what And they're like, sug
Speaker 2: Knight just got out of jail and there's a rumor
Speaker 2: that he's going to come to power one oh six
Speaker 2: and fuck up the show or the Powerhouse the show.
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, why didn't somebody call him, invite him?
Speaker 2: At least we'll know where he's at. And the way
Speaker 2: I got that idea is when we were in Hawaii,
Speaker 2: the Bua tribe showed up, you know tribe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that's how I met them.
Speaker 2: Rest in Peace, you know Read and Godfather and you know, Giant,
Speaker 2: one of my best friends like, I love giant giants
Speaker 2: come and stayed at my house, knew my grandma, came
Speaker 2: to grandma's funeral, you know what I mean? Like those guys,
Speaker 2: I love them, Cobra, you know great guys, Biggatti, love
Speaker 2: you bro, love you bro, Who've had my back unconditionally
Speaker 2: through everything, and I just I love those guys. So
Speaker 2: they show up, Snoop starts coming out and he's like,
Speaker 2: will you try downstairs? We're gonna go da da da
Speaker 2: da da. And I'm like, WHOA said, let me go
Speaker 2: deal with it because I had heard of the Buya
Speaker 2: tribe back when they did a record with.
Speaker 1: E YC on MCA, so I knew they were rappers.
Speaker 2: So I was like, look, at some point they're going
Speaker 2: to want the record played, you know. So the best
Speaker 2: way to do this is for me to go down
Speaker 2: to introduce myself, you know, acknowledge and show them respect
Speaker 2: and maybe they will do the same, do you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: So I go down the thing and I think it
Speaker 2: was a giant was standing right there and he was.
Speaker 2: I come down the escalator and they're arguing with the
Speaker 2: police department to let them in or whatever it is.
Speaker 2: In Hawaii and I say, back out, motherfucker before I
Speaker 2: knock you out to the biggest one that I see.
Speaker 2: You know, just little kid, white kid thought it would
Speaker 2: be funny, you know what I mean, like whatever whatever,
Speaker 2: and they're like what and I'm like, yo, I remember
Speaker 2: when you guys were making records with E YC. I said,
Speaker 2: you on the Janet Jackson video, you know Cobra, you know,
Speaker 2: And that's the way love goes like, yeah, what's going
Speaker 2: on with your music?
Speaker 1: By the way, and who the fuck are you?
Speaker 2: I said, I'm Damian Young And then Godfather comes out
Speaker 2: through the middle rest in peace and he's like, ah,
Speaker 2: we have heard of you, and I was like yes,
Speaker 2: And I said, are you guys ever going to put
Speaker 2: another record out?
Speaker 1: And they said well, yeah, da da da da da.
Speaker 2: And I'm like, well, why don't you guys come in
Speaker 2: as my guest and the next time you have a record,
Speaker 2: you won't have a problem, right, And they're like, come
Speaker 2: inside as a guest, and I'm like yeah. So they
Speaker 2: came in and I didn't know them yet, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. So I was like to the police department,
Speaker 2: I'm like, you should put security around them because they're famous,
Speaker 2: and I don't want any fans to fuck with.
Speaker 3: Them, got it? Smart?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the police put a thing around them and
Speaker 2: I go backstage and Snoop goes, you know what happened
Speaker 2: to bulliad tribe?
Speaker 1: And I was like, it's handled And he was like,
Speaker 1: what are you talking about?
Speaker 3: Where are they?
Speaker 2: And I said they're in the audience and he goes
Speaker 2: what And I was like, dog, at least we know
Speaker 2: where they are. They have a look through the thing,
Speaker 2: they have police all the way around them.
Speaker 1: They'll just enjoy the show. I took care of it.
Speaker 2: And he goes, well, if you sure, da da da
Speaker 2: da da, well I'll trust you because blah blah blah
Speaker 2: blah blah. You know, went off without a hitch. But
Speaker 2: from then on, the Bullard tribe and I were great. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. So no, I've never had
Speaker 2: an issue with anyone.
Speaker 3: That's interesting.
Speaker 2: But you know, through that, I met everybody. I met,
Speaker 2: big U, I met you know mugs that ran with
Speaker 2: Mac ten.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Englewood Muggs.
Speaker 2: One of my mentors, you know what I mean, Like,
Speaker 2: and you know, they would make jokes like the white
Speaker 2: boy you want to come to the hood and you know,
Speaker 2: dah da da dah.
Speaker 3: So I'm like, yeah, let's go.
Speaker 2: So Mugs one time we go over see Gotti, you know,
Speaker 2: at the at the shop, and then we're standing on
Speaker 2: Mugs's porch. I just met Muggs's mom and we're standing
Speaker 2: in Inglewood and I was scared for my life, so
Speaker 2: I had a gun and the weed on me just
Speaker 2: in case, you know what I mean, because I didn't
Speaker 2: know where the.
Speaker 1: Fuck they were taking me. I just met these guys,
Speaker 1: I know they're you know.
Speaker 2: How I met him was through mac ten and it
Speaker 2: started kind of with an argument, you know, not an argument,
Speaker 2: but like you know, you ain't da da da da
Speaker 2: you afraid you white program director won't come here all this.
Speaker 2: I'm like, fuck it, let's go. So Mugs picks me
Speaker 2: up one day. It takes me to Inglewood to his
Speaker 2: house to meet you know, all of his friends and
Speaker 2: you know, all of that kind of stuff. So we're
Speaker 2: standing in his driveway and rest in peace to his mom.
Speaker 2: We're standing there the driveway and a freaking lapd cart
Speaker 2: pulls up and just stops and hops out and they
Speaker 2: look at Mugs, they look at everybody, and then they
Speaker 2: look over at me and they're confused, like.
Speaker 3: The hell is going on?
Speaker 2: And back then, I wore tan Dickies, Casewiss shoes and
Speaker 2: a white T shirt to everything.
Speaker 1: That's just what I wore, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: And they just got back in the car and took off,
Speaker 2: and Muggs tells a funny story. It's like yeah, and
Speaker 2: he's the one that had the guns and weed on him,
Speaker 2: like you know what I mean. And if that would
Speaker 2: have gone down, my career would have been over, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean. But that's what it was.
Speaker 3: Crazy.
Speaker 4: You've mentioned Paola, like I think that the I'll please
Speaker 4: bring this up.
Speaker 3: Well, I think that.
Speaker 4: Back in the day, like you know, the the I
Speaker 4: think you know, Paola was widely known, that it was
Speaker 4: happening at a high level.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you know.
Speaker 4: I always hear like yo back in the day, Like
Speaker 4: you would like rock radio back in the day, you
Speaker 4: drop off like a fucking eight ball coke to the
Speaker 4: PD or to the DJ or But I'm like, how
Speaker 4: how much of Payola in the nineties early two thousands
Speaker 4: was actually happening? And you know, like you said, you
Speaker 4: if you say you never took Paola, that's.
Speaker 3: Like that shit.
Speaker 4: To be in the nineties and then not take any
Speaker 4: money is crazy because it felt like everybody was doing
Speaker 4: it back then, right.
Speaker 2: Let me explain it to you like this, I don't know,
Speaker 2: and you know why, because since the time that I
Speaker 2: was seventeen, every label knew you can't buy him, right,
Speaker 2: He's gonna do what he's gonna do, right, Like you're
Speaker 2: not like you're playing album cuts. I'm playing album cuts.
Speaker 2: I'm going crazy. Well, how can we get Damian to
Speaker 2: do this?
Speaker 4: Like, oh, this is the priority? Well what if I
Speaker 4: don't want to play the priority?
Speaker 2: Well yeah, And that was the thing, is, like they
Speaker 2: may give me a single, but when I heard the album,
Speaker 2: you know, I'd be like, fuck it, I'm not playing that,
Speaker 2: but I'll play this right, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: And so I started kind of getting a name for
Speaker 2: just being this guy that just would do whatever the
Speaker 2: fuck he wants and you better just get on board,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. So honestly, I swear to
Speaker 2: God on my grandmother's soul that I've no one has
Speaker 2: ever approached me and offered the money because they just
Speaker 2: knew better, you know what I mean. And then after
Speaker 2: the things like with mugs or meeting Big You or
Speaker 2: you know, any of these kind of things they knew
Speaker 2: are and the Bluyah tribe thing or any of this
Speaker 2: kind of stuff. They're like, Okay, well, we can't intimidate him.
Speaker 2: We're not going to be able to buy him, so
Speaker 2: maybe we should just back this motherfucker, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean.
Speaker 1: So, and I would every.
Speaker 2: Year at Powerhouse, I would not only invite all of
Speaker 2: the artists, but I'd say bring your homies to you
Speaker 2: know what I mean. So I'd be running around introducing everybody.
Speaker 2: So I'd hear like this person is beefing with that person,
Speaker 2: or this set doesn't get along with that set, and
Speaker 2: be careful putting you know snoops homies next to you know,
Speaker 2: these people's homies. And I the first thing I would
Speaker 2: do is say which ones? And then I'd walk up
Speaker 2: and in those two people right and say I'm Damien
Speaker 2: from power blah blah blah blah blah, nice to meet you.
Speaker 2: Oh you're so and so. Oh do you know so
Speaker 2: and so from so and so? You know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So that started to get around too. So then Stan Shephard,
Speaker 2: good friend of mine. God bless you. Stan, I'm glad
Speaker 2: you're feeling better. He calls me up one day because
Speaker 2: he's managing DJ Quick and I just want to be Quick.
Speaker 2: But Quick was a beat artist, you know, THEO who
Speaker 2: worked at the Beat and Quick were hella close and
Speaker 2: I needed Quick on Power, like that.
Speaker 3: Was another one I needed.
Speaker 2: And Stan saw the stuff happening, and I was talking
Speaker 2: to Stan one day, and you know, we brought Quick
Speaker 2: to Power one oh six and Stan. If you don't
Speaker 2: know Stan's history, Stan's father, I mean, black music was
Speaker 2: basically created the in Stan's basement. His dad was Bunkie Shepherd.
Speaker 2: I mean they did bad Mammajama in his basement, you know.
Speaker 2: So Stan was deeply rooted. I mean he he ran
Speaker 2: Jackson Communications for the Jacksons, you know.
Speaker 1: So he calls me up one day and he goes,
Speaker 1: come to this address on Haven Hurt.
Speaker 2: So I pull up the freaking Michael Jackson's estate, you know,
Speaker 2: the Jackson House, and I'm like, the hell is going
Speaker 2: on here? Like what what are we doing? You know,
Speaker 2: like what's up? And he goes, I want you to
Speaker 2: go to this address on Sunset Plaza And I'm like,
Speaker 2: for what, And he goes, I want you to meet
Speaker 2: this guy Jim Brown. And I said, Jim Brown, Who's
Speaker 2: Jim Brown? And everybody in the room like looks at me, like,
Speaker 2: I'm not a sports guy.
Speaker 1: I don't know nothing about.
Speaker 4: Sports the legendary running back.
Speaker 2: Right, So they all look at me like, it's Jim Brown,
Speaker 2: right whatever. So I show up in the room, is
Speaker 2: Jim Brown, Harry Belafante rest in Peace and James Ingram
Speaker 2: rest in peace? And I'm like, James Ingram will p
Speaker 2: yt from Michael Jackson. Harry Belafonti wrote deo And Okay,
Speaker 2: Jim Brown is this guy from that I've seen in the.
Speaker 3: Movies with Ojack? Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: And I walk out in the back and they've got
Speaker 2: all of the gang leaders sitting there and the or
Speaker 2: some of the gang leaders sitting there at a table
Speaker 2: and they go, we just started the American Foundation. It
Speaker 2: does gang intervention. What do you think? And that's what
Speaker 2: you've been basically doing at these shows and putting all
Speaker 2: these people together and you're, you know, mixing up all
Speaker 2: these colors. Like what are you thinking? I said, I
Speaker 2: think they're like, how do we label it? And I said,
Speaker 2: you don't fucking label it. It's gang intervention, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean, Just fucking do it, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean. Stop saying about it, you know, just that's
Speaker 2: what it is, you know what I'm saying. And they
Speaker 2: were like, Jim looks over at me and goes, I
Speaker 2: never knew when you were gonna come.
Speaker 3: But here you are.
Speaker 2: And from then on, you know, Jim and I were
Speaker 2: great friends. And Harry and Stan and Connie Rice and
Speaker 2: Harry Belafontee's daughter was recording her you know thang and
Speaker 2: you know, I mean, just all of that kind of
Speaker 2: stuff happened.
Speaker 4: So how crazy was like the radio war between the
Speaker 4: Beat and Power? Was it ever like a beau because man,
Speaker 4: I've been a part of a one radio real beef.
Speaker 1: There was beef there, you know. That was on the
Speaker 1: court though.
Speaker 2: But what was so funny is like Michelle last is
Speaker 2: one of my best friends, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: But when we were on the court, we played ball,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. No, it was back radio
Speaker 2: beef was crazy. But here's the thing is, I got
Speaker 2: along with everybody. I didn't give a fuck about nothing,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. It was like, look, we
Speaker 2: play hard on the field and yeah, I you know,
Speaker 2: I just made it, so I mean i'd cut them out. Like,
Speaker 2: for instance, because Doctor Dre, I helped Doctor Dre with.
Speaker 1: Two thousand and one.
Speaker 2: The two two thousand and one shows that were in
Speaker 2: LT were powerhouses.
Speaker 4: They weren't up, they weren't up and smoke.
Speaker 1: They were powerhouses.
Speaker 2: Because I was literally on the phone with Dre as
Speaker 2: the first one selling out, with Dre saying when do
Speaker 2: I have the second show? They're asked me about a
Speaker 2: second show. Hold On, I'm checking ticket Master. There's still
Speaker 2: sea available. Hold on, well guess what. They just sold
Speaker 2: out the first one. Go ahead and make that call.
Speaker 2: And he goes, yeah, that one's a powerhouse too. And
Speaker 2: I was like, wait, wait, wait, I said, Dre, wait wait,
Speaker 2: I said, dude, you just did Hawaii for us.
Speaker 1: You just did this.
Speaker 2: I would not be mad if it was a neutral show, Like,
Speaker 2: you don't have to do that for us, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean? Like, I know that's going to put
Speaker 2: you in political hot water with the other stations, right, Like,
Speaker 2: I appreciate what you did, but I'm not trying to
Speaker 2: fuck your shit up.
Speaker 1: And he was like, fuck, damn, click powerhouse, you.
Speaker 3: Know what I mean?
Speaker 1: And that was how the relationship was done.
Speaker 2: And so I was literally in every sessions we were,
Speaker 2: and we were basically the radio because we had so
Speaker 2: many stations.
Speaker 4: Would something like that affect because EMUs at that time
Speaker 4: is a lot bigger than what it is obviously, would
Speaker 4: it end up? Benbah would like a decision like that affect?
Speaker 4: How still dri did nationwide a clear channel?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 2: Really, you have to also have to remember we had
Speaker 2: Power on six Hot ninety seven thirty two stations and
Speaker 2: Mint we had Power ninety two in Phoenix.
Speaker 1: Oh we had owned bis. No, you're right, Emmis was
Speaker 1: that fucking we were a beast.
Speaker 4: You especially if you were a hip hop artist?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you had and we were breaking the record.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right.
Speaker 1: Do you know what I'm saying?
Speaker 4: Okay, so for instance, format you don't wears off.
Speaker 2: So let's go back to joh rule between me and
Speaker 2: you for instance, So after Hallahalla, I break between me
Speaker 2: and you, and I'm in the video and I pop
Speaker 2: my collar and it's a power one on six logo.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: In the video walking with Shade checks and Kevin Lyles
Speaker 2: gets on the phone and he's like, God, damn it,
Speaker 2: Damien Radio One, which owned the Beat and all these others.
Speaker 2: They're gonna drop all Clear Channel whatever it is. They're
Speaker 2: gonna drop all of our records across the country. Because
Speaker 2: you're in the video with a power one on six
Speaker 2: logo and I'm like, blurre it just blur it and that.
Speaker 3: Was that is it blurred? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So I mean it was my suggestion. Nerves like fuck them.
Speaker 2: I then dropped my record, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: Damien's been loyal, so drop the record. But see, even
Speaker 2: like with the street shit and you know, all of
Speaker 2: this kind of stuff. I mean, I knew everybody, So
Speaker 2: everybody just knew that guy's untouchable, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: if something happened, you wouldn't know where it came from.
Speaker 2: He's friends with the Buoya Tribe's helped start murdering Rockefeller
Speaker 2: and aftermath like, so there wasn't much anyone could say,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, like what are you going
Speaker 2: to drop every hot artist across They played the records
Speaker 2: they had to play like you know, and just to
Speaker 2: say like for instance, even like when Ja Ruled did
Speaker 2: the Jennifer Lopez record, you know, they literally stole that
Speaker 2: record from Glitter you know, when I was rebuilding Mariah,
Speaker 2: you know, and Tommy did that to sabotage Mariah, and
Speaker 2: it just happened to be the song that I.
Speaker 1: Made with Jaw and brought Jaw to the table.
Speaker 2: And then Tommy said, well, okay, well I'm gonna make
Speaker 2: JA do this record with Jennifer Lopez to fuck Mariah.
Speaker 2: But it put me in the middle of it. And
Speaker 2: IRV came to me and he goes, what do I do.
Speaker 2: We've never been offered two hundred and fifty five hundred
Speaker 2: thousand dollars for two songs, you know what do I do?
Speaker 2: I said, you do the fucking song. And they came
Speaker 2: to me and they said, well are we gonna play?
Speaker 2: Steve called me into a meeting and he goes, well,
Speaker 2: Jennifer Lopez just released this song. I know the background
Speaker 2: story because he was there when I told him what happened,
Speaker 2: you know, And he's like, and I said, it's right
Speaker 2: for the radio station. We have to play it, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. So I've never engaged in
Speaker 2: any bullshit. I just won't do it, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean. That's just who I am. So whether it's that,
Speaker 2: whether it's I just that's not me.
Speaker 3: So I saw something you said.
Speaker 4: I didn't know because I had always sat with Shade Schist,
Speaker 4: your artist.
Speaker 1: Who signed to MS Broadcasting.
Speaker 3: Which is crazy to think that. So I start producing
Speaker 3: records from right, it'd be like if like Apple had
Speaker 3: like a record label or so.
Speaker 2: Rick Cummings comes to me and he says, look, there's
Speaker 2: all this outside money that you're making, and I was like, no,
Speaker 2: I didn't charge for for I still believe I'm not
Speaker 2: accepting any money for production. Like when I produced records,
Speaker 2: I'd say, no, I'm not taking any money because I.
Speaker 3: Don't want to.
Speaker 2: You're THEOL program directory and I don't a music director.
Speaker 1: A music Steve Smith was the program direct you were.
Speaker 3: But you were controlling the music of Power.
Speaker 1: Of six yet, so I never wanted it to be.
Speaker 2: And that's why I wasn't the program director of Power
Speaker 2: one oh six Okay, because I was producing records. I
Speaker 2: did not want to be the final say right, okay, clear,
Speaker 2: got it, so cover in your ass and my deal
Speaker 2: went through the FCC.
Speaker 1: When I renegotiated my deal.
Speaker 2: When I started producing records, I contacted the FCC through
Speaker 2: my attorney and said, is this a conflict of interest
Speaker 2: that I'm producing records and hold this possession. They said,
Speaker 2: as long as you are not the final say, then
Speaker 2: it is not a conflict of interest.
Speaker 3: Ah.
Speaker 2: So Shade is somebody that I met, you know, just
Speaker 2: on the and we'd hang out on the weekends and
Speaker 2: do records and you know whatever whatever, just as fun producer,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. Mariah Carey says to me
Speaker 2: one day, Hey, what else.
Speaker 1: Do you do?
Speaker 2: I said, oh, you know, play with beats, you know,
Speaker 2: and da da da da. Oh send me a tape.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: Well, one of them became I still believe, you know,
Speaker 2: with her Crazy Bone in the Brath, the first record
Speaker 2: I ever produced, shout out of Mariah, thank you for
Speaker 2: giving me my shot, you know, all of this kind
Speaker 2: of stuff. So they see that, and Rick comes to
Speaker 2: me and goes, well, you produced on Jah Rule. You
Speaker 2: did this record with Mariah Carey, Like, you know, are
Speaker 2: they making offers for labels? Like you know, we want
Speaker 2: to cut this, you know what I mean. And I'm like, well, okay,
Speaker 2: it goes well, we'll make you the senior director of programming.
Speaker 2: We'll bring in someone else to be the program director,
Speaker 2: and you keep doing what you're doing, but we want
Speaker 2: to label. Find out how much much you could get
Speaker 2: for us getting a label, and I said, well you
Speaker 2: need an artist, and they go, well, who's that kid
Speaker 2: that you hang out with?
Speaker 1: And I'm like what.
Speaker 2: And it was that simple, like you make some records
Speaker 2: with some kid, right, And I'm like, yeah, Shade, that's
Speaker 2: my friend. He's like, well, he's the artist. Go find
Speaker 2: out if you can get him a deal. And I'm like.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: So I go and I ask Fred Davis, who's Clive
Speaker 2: Davis's son, who was my lawyer. I said, what do
Speaker 2: you think? He goes, send me four songs and call me,
Speaker 2: you know, in a week. So I go and I
Speaker 2: make Where I Want to Be? Okay, I put Shade
Speaker 2: on it. I go and make a song of Corrupt,
Speaker 2: another song of Corrupt, a couple other songs you know
Speaker 2: in KG from Naughty by Nature. So when they gave
Speaker 2: me the beat for Where I Want to Be, you know,
Speaker 2: he produced the beat, I just put the vocals on it.
Speaker 2: And then I said, I, well, here's a couple of songs.
Speaker 2: Fred Davis calls and says, London Sire wants will give
Speaker 2: you seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and so I
Speaker 2: go to Brick Cummings and say seven hundred and fifty
Speaker 2: thousand dollars.
Speaker 3: And by the.
Speaker 2: Way, IRV Gotti says, they'll give us another you know whatever,
Speaker 2: forty fifty grand to give him the Nate Dog song
Speaker 2: that we're not using. And this other song that I
Speaker 2: did with jah Rule called Life Ain't a Game. But
Speaker 2: I'll do it under the MS deal because I don't
Speaker 2: want to, you know, I don't want to, you know,
Speaker 2: look like I'm taking the money for producing and I'll
Speaker 2: just do it all everything that I'm doing under MS,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, outside you know whatever.
Speaker 3: Whatever.
Speaker 2: So they're like, yeah, great, well Where I Want to
Speaker 2: Be comes out, it's the number one rap single in
Speaker 2: the fucking country, and London Sire goes bankrupt and I'm like, shit,
Speaker 2: what do I do?
Speaker 1: So they say, but.
Speaker 3: You guys already got the seven to fifty right, Yeah.
Speaker 2: So and the single's out and it's all over the place.
Speaker 2: So I say, look, I'm not going to put Shade out.
Speaker 2: Let's just call it a Domesic Presents album and say
Speaker 2: it's just you know, a one off whatever whatever.
Speaker 1: And then I was just presenting a.
Speaker 2: Bunch of artists because that's what Flex does on his
Speaker 2: mixtapes or you know whatever whatever, So let's just call
Speaker 2: it that. That way, it won't burn the artist's name,
Speaker 2: and it just it'll fall on me and we'll just
Speaker 2: keep moving. And then MCA pops up and says, we'll
Speaker 2: give you a million dollars and I'm like what. And
Speaker 2: they're like, we'll give you a million dollars for Shade Shist,
Speaker 2: plus another two hundred and fifty for the video. So
Speaker 2: I go to Rick Cummings and I go, well, here's
Speaker 2: another one point too, and he's like do it and
Speaker 2: so I'm like all right.
Speaker 3: And this was so all that money was going to MS.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they say fifty cent was the first artist to
Speaker 2: get a million dollars.
Speaker 3: No, Shade Shist was.
Speaker 2: One point seven when it was all said and done,
Speaker 2: two million between two albums.
Speaker 3: That's crazy. I mean, how much of that did he
Speaker 3: get to keep? Huh? How much of that did he keep? Though?
Speaker 4: Like what was his like, what was his deal?
Speaker 1: No, he got the regular artist deal.
Speaker 2: He got like what twenty five to fifty grand up
Speaker 2: front for each project, you know, something like that. So
Speaker 2: he did all right, amis was eating Oh they were
Speaker 2: eating crazy because not only that, but I was giving
Speaker 2: them all my production I was doing.
Speaker 1: Dude, you got to think about it.
Speaker 2: This the Drey and Snooper union promotion, right, think about
Speaker 2: that alone. They were selling it as packages to the
Speaker 2: rest of the country under the consultancy and taking their
Speaker 2: tax on it. Do you know what I'm saying, the
Speaker 2: two power Look when Dre said they were the two
Speaker 2: powerhouses in Los Angeles, you don't think the sales department
Speaker 2: sold that and made like thirty million each one.
Speaker 3: And then if you're the consultancy, you can say.
Speaker 4: Hey, you know, we'll fly you in if you're in Rally,
Speaker 4: North Carolina and we're you want to you want your
Speaker 4: folks to go.
Speaker 2: To Why I made a lot of people rich. Let's
Speaker 2: just say that.
Speaker 3: Do you regret moving in that way? No?
Speaker 2: Do you know why? My grandma raised me and I
Speaker 2: looked her in the face till the day she died.
Speaker 4: I just think in terms of the MS thing, it's.
Speaker 1: Like, I don't give a fuck because I never did
Speaker 1: this for money. I did this, Yo.
Speaker 2: There's a funny story about doctor Dre. Doctor Dre was
Speaker 2: on stage when they were at the two thousand and
Speaker 2: one reunion, they walked out on stage right and I
Speaker 2: took off. I said, my job is done. I took
Speaker 2: off my pass and I went to the front row.
Speaker 2: I started losing my fucking mind. Doctor Dre almost falls
Speaker 2: over the monitor looking down, going what's wrong?
Speaker 3: What's wrong? Right? You know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Like, and I'm sitting there just going like, what are
Speaker 2: you talking about? Everything's right? He's like, what's wrong? What's wrong?
Speaker 2: And I'm like, oh shit. He thinks like I'm trying
Speaker 2: to get his attention. Like, so I ran to the
Speaker 2: back of the thing to watch. Right after the show,
Speaker 2: Dre walks up to me and he goes, Yo, what
Speaker 2: what the fuck was that?
Speaker 1: What was a sound?
Speaker 3: Fucked up? What happened?
Speaker 2: I go, Bro, you think I did this because I
Speaker 2: wanted to make money? I said, bro, I wanted to
Speaker 2: see the fucking show, you know what I mean? So no,
Speaker 2: I don't regret shit because I know I can sleep
Speaker 2: at night and I know my Grandma raised me right,
Speaker 2: and know what, Look, I don't care what the fuck
Speaker 2: the narrative is. I have never taken an artist dime
Speaker 2: from a motherfucker.
Speaker 1: I have never done anything that is not right for
Speaker 1: hip hop.
Speaker 2: And when I came back and when she died January sixth,
Speaker 2: by January eighth, I was back in California. When I
Speaker 2: got here, I turned on the radio and when it
Speaker 2: was like a dad coming home off of vacation and
Speaker 2: the kids trashed the motherfucking house. When I left, DJ
Speaker 2: Quick had the very first independent deal through Fontana where
Speaker 2: he owned his master's and eighty percent of the revenue
Speaker 2: and got an advance ants with Brian Shafton. Because when
Speaker 2: Brian and Fontana started that independent distribution shit DJ Quick,
Speaker 2: they came to me and said, who's the first artist
Speaker 2: that had sound scan history that you could put through this.
Speaker 2: I said, oh, DJ Quick, mad science, Astevan Oriole cartoon
Speaker 2: doing the logo the red vinyl.
Speaker 3: That's all me crazy.
Speaker 2: So I said, here we go, and I said, now
Speaker 2: the artist is straight. I had enough power to create
Speaker 2: the independent deal for the artists where they own their
Speaker 2: own fucking masters, they're getting a higher eighty percent of
Speaker 2: the revenue, and the fucking I was pissed when I
Speaker 2: got home.
Speaker 3: Let's just say that crazy.
Speaker 2: And I went, okay, so this is the narrative, this
Speaker 2: is what's going on Hi. Then I hit that little
Speaker 2: button on Instagram and here we are.
Speaker 4: So let me ask you this, like you're obviously, you know,
Speaker 4: break down because you left powerwin oh six on your own, will.
Speaker 3: Or give me? Give me because I know.
Speaker 4: You would win it because I saw you you pretty
Speaker 4: much wud to go work with Mariah.
Speaker 2: Right, I'm not gonna get in the Ryan story. That's
Speaker 2: way too long. Will be here all night. But what
Speaker 2: happened was is when they brought in Jimmy Steele and
Speaker 2: vow Mackie. Okay, Mackie, this is two thousand and two
Speaker 2: ish one ish whatever. Everything had already happened, the drad
Speaker 2: Snoop stuff, and you know all of that history, and
Speaker 2: you know all the big promotions. We're already number one
Speaker 2: and we basically went number one before any of these
Speaker 2: motherfuckers got there, right, So they come in and.
Speaker 1: The first thing that I noticed is Val says.
Speaker 2: The DJ or the mixers, they should be paying us
Speaker 2: because they're going to Hollywood and getting all these gigs
Speaker 2: a cut of that, and why should I mean they
Speaker 2: should be paying us? And I'm like, Yo, this bitch
Speaker 2: don't get it. And we started it for the love
Speaker 2: of hip hop, you know what I mean. And I
Speaker 2: start to realize that that's not the game anymore. This
Speaker 2: is now corporate, right, And my first meeting with him,
Speaker 2: she looks at me and goes, I can't equate you
Speaker 2: to a number.
Speaker 3: What do you do here? You're like what?
Speaker 1: And I'm like what do you mean?
Speaker 2: And they're like, what, you picked the songs or something,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, oh, okay, so this is how this
Speaker 2: is going.
Speaker 1: Jimmy Steele comes in from an AC.
Speaker 2: Station, the Cougar and Dallas, and I said okay, and
Speaker 2: he's like, oh, I hear you're the most important person
Speaker 2: at the station, but I don't understand what you do.
Speaker 1: And for instance, before them, they brought in Mike Tierney.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 2: Mike Tierney comes in, stays about a week. At the
Speaker 2: end of the week, he goes, dude, what did they
Speaker 2: expecting me to do here?
Speaker 1: Babysit you? And I'm like, what do you mean?
Speaker 2: He goes, well, you're making all the decisions, you're doing
Speaker 2: all the promotions, like I mean, they hired a babysitter.
Speaker 1: And he just and then he goes. He just leaves.
Speaker 2: He doesn't resign, doesn't do nothing, just fucking leaves. So
Speaker 2: Val Macki comes in and says, Yo, anybody heard from
Speaker 2: Mike Tierney And I'm like no, and he's like, well,
Speaker 2: he hasn't showed up for a week. And I'm like,
Speaker 2: I don't know. So I finally get a hold of
Speaker 2: Mike Tierney and goes, Dude, that bitch don't know what
Speaker 2: she's doing. Dog Like she's telling me all this crazy shit,
Speaker 2: how we need to cut this and charge mixes this,
Speaker 2: and babysit's crazy, you know, like doesn't understand what you
Speaker 2: do and why you're making this, and why we have
Speaker 2: a record label, and you know, wants to take the
Speaker 2: record company money and just put it straight to the
Speaker 2: bottom line, and why you're working in a studio, and
Speaker 2: why don't we just make a studio at the office
Speaker 2: and make the artists do the songs, and you know,
Speaker 2: all this kind of shit. And I'm like, I go
Speaker 2: to Rick Commans, I'm like, bro, you got her running
Speaker 2: the record company with me. Now do you see what
Speaker 2: I'm saying and telling me this stuff and trying to
Speaker 2: A and R the records and tell me what I
Speaker 2: need to be doing and now all of it. So
Speaker 2: the label folds and well, keep in mind, when I
Speaker 2: started helping Mariah Carey and we started the record label,
Speaker 2: some people in New York got mad.
Speaker 3: We'll just leave it at that, Okay.
Speaker 2: So they call their friends at the LA Times and
Speaker 2: they plaster on the LA Times airplay raises disclosure issue
Speaker 2: and they say I'm more powerful than Radio Disney and
Speaker 2: that Shade Schie is my artist, and I'm getting all
Speaker 2: this money from Mariah Carey and all these people in
Speaker 2: dah da da and blast me on the fucking thing.
Speaker 2: Rick Cummings doesn't back me up. He doesn't say Shade
Speaker 2: like really like that, go out there and bang and
Speaker 2: say no, it's our artist. He throws me under the bus,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, oh, this is how this is gonna go.
Speaker 1: Okay, you don't know what you're doing.
Speaker 2: You're my new babysitter, and this bitch is crazy, all right,
Speaker 2: So I'm like whatever whatever. So then they come to
Speaker 2: me and he says to me, He goes, We're going
Speaker 2: to flip the country station and make it MEGA, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, no, I don't think you should do that
Speaker 2: because then it would be an upper demo R and
Speaker 2: B station, which would take our upper demo at Power
Speaker 2: one oh six. Ah, you don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 2: I'm like, okay, you do that, we're going to have
Speaker 2: a problem.
Speaker 3: Nah.
Speaker 2: And by the way, I rented a spot on the
Speaker 2: stick and I'm like, what, I rented a spot on
Speaker 2: the antenna. We're getting like five thousand dollars a month
Speaker 2: from another station that's going to come on the air.
Speaker 2: And I said, well, we're x percentage Hispanic in Los Angeles.
Speaker 2: You don't think whatever they put on that signal is
Speaker 2: going to come at us because we're the number one
Speaker 2: Latino rhythmic station. The beat is a black station, so
Speaker 2: you don't think that's going to come right at us.
Speaker 2: And he goes, nah, we have a contract with him,
Speaker 2: and I said, so we'llsue them if they do. And
Speaker 2: I go, well, how did you put racism in a contract?
Speaker 2: And he's like, well, they just can't do anything Latino,
Speaker 2: trust me. Latino ninety sixty three comes on the air.
Speaker 2: Next I look at him everybody and I'm going, oh
Speaker 2: my god, like what the fuck is going on?
Speaker 1: And then it was Thanksgiving.
Speaker 2: Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, I go home have Thanksgiving with
Speaker 2: my grandma and she falls down putting down. She was
Speaker 2: getting out the she was putting away the Thanksgiving stuff,
Speaker 2: and she was taking down the Christmas stuff, and she
Speaker 2: fell and I just said, okay, I'm done. I said,
Speaker 2: from now on, I'm taking care of Grandma. Remember when
Speaker 2: I said, Look when I was a year old, I
Speaker 2: was abandoned on her doorstep. When I was seven years old.
Speaker 2: I told her, you take care of me. Now I'll
Speaker 2: take care of you. Then the second she hit the ground,
Speaker 2: I said, I'm done with all of it. Then I started.
Speaker 2: I just started being her full time caregiver, her bodyguard,
Speaker 2: or whatever the hell you want to call it, her whatever,
Speaker 2: and just started hopping around the house. Well, my two
Speaker 2: little brothers are in high school. They all have friends
Speaker 2: that are rappers and shit. They come to me. They
Speaker 2: start bringing all the kids. I start w here, you
Speaker 2: guys are hanging out with gangs in Santa Barbara. They
Speaker 2: start stealing my plaques and shit. So I'm like, look, oh,
Speaker 2: doctor dre Plack, Oh go ahead.
Speaker 3: Take that.
Speaker 1: Just stay the fuck out of the street.
Speaker 2: And I start producing these kids, start doing gang intervention
Speaker 2: what I was doing with Jim and all this stuff
Speaker 2: at home. My friend Wino comes along, rest in Peace
Speaker 2: introduces me to Bams and Skippy, and you know that's
Speaker 2: how it all started. BAM's parents were both incarcerated. He
Speaker 2: starts staying with us. Next thing, you know, I meet
Speaker 2: my best friend. You know what I'm saying, start developing him. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. That's how long it took
Speaker 2: to develop Bams. I left in two thousand and four
Speaker 2: or five something like that. But Bams wasn't a rap,
Speaker 2: just a.
Speaker 4: Rap so four o five And when you leave the station,
Speaker 4: do you also just like mentally check out from like everything,
Speaker 4: just all the music.
Speaker 2: It just became about Grandma. I literally resigned. And that's
Speaker 2: why I like, you know, people dislike me so much.
Speaker 2: You know, is I just I literally told Mariah, I
Speaker 2: put Mariah with Benny Medina and fixed all that stuff.
Speaker 2: Senator to Atlanta and said, bring me back an usher record.
Speaker 2: Have Jermaine just do we belong? And that was we
Speaker 2: Belong together, set her up with Benny Medina and said bye,
Speaker 2: then power one oh six. Obviously you guys are the
Speaker 2: Titanic at this point, I can't even do anything with that.
Speaker 3: Bye, you know.
Speaker 2: And Drey and Snoop, it was just like they were
Speaker 2: already doing what they were doing.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: The last thing I did with Dray and Snooper in
Speaker 2: that group is Eminem calls me up and says, do
Speaker 2: you know fifty cent? It's like, no, he goes, I
Speaker 2: need to do a kmart shoppers on Power one oh six, And.
Speaker 1: I'm like, what's that meaning?
Speaker 2: He goes, I need to go on Power one oh
Speaker 2: six and say somebody find me fifty cent. That was
Speaker 2: the last thing that I did, I think in that click,
Speaker 2: you know. And so then I just walked away from
Speaker 2: everything and it became about my grandma. My dad, would
Speaker 2: you know, was still a biker, he was drunk, you know,
Speaker 2: their mom whatever, whatever, you know. But my little brothers
Speaker 2: ended up coming living with me. So I ended up
Speaker 2: raising my little brothers and taking care of my grandma.
Speaker 2: The only thing I cared about the music business is
Speaker 2: when I could use the music business or what I
Speaker 2: had done in the music to help get the kids
Speaker 2: off the street.
Speaker 1: Do you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So if there was a concert like Little rob would
Speaker 2: come through Santa Barbara or something like that, and all
Speaker 2: the kids would get excited that I'd make a phone
Speaker 2: call the fingers and say Hey, could you hook this up?
Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Because the kids want to go. Yeah, that was the
Speaker 1: extent of it.
Speaker 3: That's crazy.
Speaker 4: Were you able to parlay your production stuff into like
Speaker 4: pubs situations or no?
Speaker 2: Because every cent that I made during my record time,
Speaker 2: you have to remember, first off, I made it the
Speaker 2: height of my career of power one o six, I
Speaker 2: was making two hundred and fifty grand, maybe three hundred. I
Speaker 2: never took the only money that I ever took was
Speaker 2: to fix glitter, and that was like two hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So I probably made five hundred.
Speaker 2: But most of the people around me were embezzling and
Speaker 2: doing all kinds of crazy shit anyway, So sure you know,
Speaker 2: I literally nighties are crazy, yeah, you know, but you
Speaker 2: know I had little royalties like mix.
Speaker 3: Your Power Summing I heard was nuts. You don't even know.
Speaker 3: Oh no, I've heard. I heard there was like a
Speaker 3: room full of fucking dude.
Speaker 1: There was all kinds of shit.
Speaker 2: But you know, but you know, you would you go
Speaker 2: to Obviously I went to all of them gap But
Speaker 2: that's the thing about you know.
Speaker 3: The lookers are real thing? Oh hell yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean it was part of the whole, you know.
Speaker 4: Like I heard if you went to mix some power
Speaker 4: somewhere back in the day, like and they were just
Speaker 4: a room and like everybody was fucking like, yeah, go
Speaker 4: grab you a bitch the l I.
Speaker 3: Know what any of those you know.
Speaker 2: Someone asked me about Puffy the other day, and someone asked,
Speaker 2: you know, did you ever see anything or did you
Speaker 2: ever go to those parts?
Speaker 1: No, it's just not who I am.
Speaker 3: I did.
Speaker 1: I went to work. When the job was done, I
Speaker 1: went home.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 4: And the thing with Puffy too is like I know
Speaker 4: hell of people that have been to ditty parties. It's
Speaker 4: not like just because you went to a diddy party.
Speaker 2: Let me tell you this did He looked out for
Speaker 2: me a lot, you know what I mean? And I'm
Speaker 2: not look what happened with Cassie and all that shit.
Speaker 2: Of course he deserves whatever, you know, whatever, whatever, But
Speaker 2: and his kids don't. By the way, I agree, do
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, Like, don't treat the sins
Speaker 2: of your father. I love Quincy. Quincy and I talk
Speaker 2: a lot, you know what I mean. I love his
Speaker 2: son Christians. Another friend of mine, Miles Gaines, works with
Speaker 2: with with Christian a.
Speaker 3: Lot, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: Like, so you know, I look whatever whatever, and I
Speaker 2: love and.
Speaker 3: Let me just say daughters that are in high school.
Speaker 1: But check this out.
Speaker 2: When my grandma had to have knee surgeries, right, Puffy
Speaker 2: and I were supposed to have a meeting, and I
Speaker 2: said to Puff, I can't go. I got to go
Speaker 2: to Santa Barbara. I gotta go do this thing. You know,
Speaker 2: my grandma's in the hospital, so what's wrong? How her
Speaker 2: needs done?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 3: Da, He's like, oh no, no, go ahead, go ahead.
Speaker 2: What hospitals someplace, cottage hospital, you know whatever went dude.
Speaker 2: When I got from LA to Santa Barbara, the whole
Speaker 2: floor was buzzing, and I'm like, what the hell's going on?
Speaker 2: Flowers everywhere and all this stuff, and nurses or two
Speaker 2: nurses are in there like taking care of grandma, and
Speaker 2: Grandma's like smiling and shit, and I'm like, the hell
Speaker 2: just happened? And she's like, Puffy called and I was
Speaker 2: like what she goes? Puffy called the nurses sent me
Speaker 2: flowers and said I needed to be treated very special
Speaker 2: because I'm an important person. That's the kind of shit
Speaker 2: he did, you know what I mean? So this guy
Speaker 2: I don't know, you know what I mean. So what
Speaker 2: I saw, I was mortified because I've never seen that guy, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. So, but I know when
Speaker 2: I wanted to do Puffy and Paradise back in the day,
Speaker 2: which was my first big promotion, I know, he put
Speaker 2: two hundred and fifty grand behind me to do it right,
Speaker 2: you know, or the station, not me, excuse me, you know,
Speaker 2: and paid for the promotion, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And that's how I met Benny Medina.
Speaker 2: So fast forward when he left Jennifer Lopez right after
Speaker 2: Glitter with Mariah Carey. I knew him through Will Smith too,
Speaker 2: So I just said, perfect thing to do here is
Speaker 2: put Benny and right together.
Speaker 3: That sh it's crazy.
Speaker 2: And did jay Z's first number one too, put jay
Speaker 2: Z and Riah together for Heartbreaker.
Speaker 1: Come on, bro, we don't play over here.
Speaker 3: What do you? What do you?
Speaker 4: What are your thoughts nowadays when you hear you know,
Speaker 4: LA radio, like, what are your thoughts? Just radio in general?
Speaker 4: Obviously you were a part of an era of radio that.
Speaker 1: Was why do you think I came back so tough?
Speaker 2: I was just gonna just come back and hang out,
Speaker 2: and you know, slowly get back, you know, to figure
Speaker 2: out what I wanted to do. My grandma just died
Speaker 2: two months before that, Rest in peace, angel. My little
Speaker 2: nephew dies overdoses. My dad died the year before. When
Speaker 2: I came back. Two weeks after that, when I from
Speaker 2: getting home, my dog dies, you know, the poodle, Grandma's poodle,
Speaker 2: realizes that she's dead.
Speaker 1: She guys. You know, thank God for bam skipping.
Speaker 2: My family, my friends, Gabe, you know, everybody, his wife,
Speaker 2: Talia and everybody that you know. When I got I
Speaker 2: was a wreck when I got back, right, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean?
Speaker 1: Like, come on, that's my it's granny, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 2: Like the last five years I spent in Louisiana just
Speaker 2: hur and me in the house, being a full time caregiver.
Speaker 1: That's it.
Speaker 2: We didn't really have internet like that because in rural Louisiana,
Speaker 2: a town of two hundred, it's a cloud in the sky.
Speaker 2: You don't get fucking internet, you don't get direct TV.
Speaker 2: So it's just me and a ninety six year old
Speaker 2: lady just sitting there rapping. But that's my dog, that's
Speaker 2: my grandma, that's the homie. You know what I mean like,
Speaker 2: so we had a blast, we made it the best
Speaker 2: of anything, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: So I whatever.
Speaker 2: So I get back, I hear all this shit, I'm like, God,
Speaker 2: what the fuck did y'all do?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 2: And I just start tearing off, like what do I
Speaker 2: think of it? I think, dude, the same Rick is
Speaker 2: still in.
Speaker 4: Charge of of power.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, you don't know who the consultants are? Rick
Speaker 2: and Jimmy.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I know.
Speaker 3: Jimmy was a consultant.
Speaker 1: They ad into what two years right, because.
Speaker 4: No one will zones it now and yeah they're.
Speaker 1: Okay'm gonna shut up.
Speaker 3: I don't want to listen. They want to be negative.
Speaker 4: Their leadership, you know. And I'm real tight with the man.
Speaker 4: That's my dog.
Speaker 2: Look, I love I thought into it from a mixture
Speaker 2: into the music.
Speaker 4: That kills the PD. Now great, Yeah, but they didn't
Speaker 4: have a PD for a while, and it was like,
Speaker 4: why what't you guys?
Speaker 2: Okay, but look at the Hot ninety seven's ratings right
Speaker 2: now and tell me that was a good move.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I am not hip two Hot ninety sevens ratings,
Speaker 4: So I can't tell you.
Speaker 2: Okay, but I'm going to leave it at that. I'm
Speaker 2: just gonna say radio is not programmed correctly. And you
Speaker 2: have to understand the reason why we have not had
Speaker 2: a hit in the fifty one years of hip hop
Speaker 2: or fifty years anniversary of hip hop is because only
Speaker 2: twenty six percent of Americans have in inner city neighborhoods
Speaker 2: and low income areas and rural areas like I came from, have.
Speaker 1: Data plans on their phones.
Speaker 2: Right, So they're not sitting on TikTok, they're not sitting
Speaker 2: on Spotify. They can't afford YouTube and all of those
Speaker 2: because they're at work every day.
Speaker 3: What do they have?
Speaker 2: Ninety six percent of America still listens to the radio.
Speaker 2: Radio is not breaking records, it's automated. And they fired
Speaker 2: all the DJs. The record company has fired all the
Speaker 2: radio promotion people, and radio is programmed like shit.
Speaker 4: I think that the main issue, though, is a revenue
Speaker 4: and radio has fallen off of a cliff.
Speaker 3: Do you know why it's fallen off of a cliff? Well,
Speaker 3: it kind of started.
Speaker 2: How many DJs do you know that's under twenty Well
Speaker 2: in the core demo, how many people you know in
Speaker 2: the court that are programming radio in the core demo
Speaker 2: of any of these radio stations. U A few for
Speaker 2: sure that are in the cord that regionally, not programming regionally,
Speaker 2: that are sitting in the radio station in the demo,
Speaker 2: programming to the audience that will go out in the
Speaker 2: streets and know what that radio station is.
Speaker 4: There's a few, there's but I would say, I would
Speaker 4: say this, I'd see Big Bear.
Speaker 2: Maybe you're not in the demo, but he knows what
Speaker 2: he's doing.
Speaker 3: DJN and dj AO, Oh no, those.
Speaker 1: Guys, those two look, there's probably.
Speaker 4: I think this.
Speaker 3: I think you gotta like I think.
Speaker 1: Rate they're programming regionally.
Speaker 4: Well, they're also programming locally like Amen Handles Real ninety
Speaker 4: two three.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'm not talking about that one, no, no, But
Speaker 2: what I'm saying is what Doc does is fucking amazing.
Speaker 4: What I'm saying is uh, with the revenue in terms
Speaker 4: of like these networks and the and the buys that
Speaker 4: used to happen back in the day. It's just when
Speaker 4: I say, it's not the met like the qumate there anymore. Right,
Speaker 4: So the cube is falling off of a cliff. The
Speaker 4: listenership is falling off of a cliff because you know, listen,
Speaker 4: there's it hasn't evolved. That's why it hasn't evolved. But
Speaker 4: also like the competition is at a high your level,
Speaker 4: because like you said, obviously ninety six percent of people
Speaker 4: still listen to radio, whether they know it or not.
Speaker 4: They might hop an uber, but they might be in
Speaker 4: a cab.
Speaker 3: Look. But at the same.
Speaker 4: Time, you know, like it's very very like you. I
Speaker 4: feel like YouTube is the new radio because it's free.
Speaker 4: Spotify you gotta pay for you, got it?
Speaker 1: But I feel like radio is free.
Speaker 3: I understand that, but radio is like.
Speaker 4: Almost like I'll say this, there's kids in gods are
Speaker 4: popping on TikTok right now, got it? Because they're able
Speaker 4: to document what's happening.
Speaker 3: On their understand most people have access.
Speaker 4: To their phone.
Speaker 2: Is that fair to say? Let me let me put
Speaker 2: it to you like this. I'm not going to give
Speaker 2: them the prescription on this show, but I will tell
Speaker 2: you right now, there is a way to do it.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 4: I think that radio unfortunately has become overly simplified.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Astradized is the way to put it.
Speaker 4: As to where there isn't necessarily a one size fits
Speaker 4: all fixed to every radio station, and at times they're
Speaker 4: treated like.
Speaker 3: Well, if we do it here, we do it here,
Speaker 3: we do it here. It's gonna work as opposed to you.
Speaker 3: Remember ninety seven, it was the same thing.
Speaker 2: Oh why ninety seven? I was ten, But I'm just
Speaker 2: saying it was the same thing. It was fragmented like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and.
Speaker 4: I do think you know, radio is heading to a
Speaker 4: place where most stations are depreciating assets. So you have
Speaker 4: to figure out ways to try to just increase. Like
Speaker 4: you said, you figured that out when that lady came
Speaker 4: in and said, well, I can't put a dollar figure
Speaker 4: on what you do. And unfortunately, at the end of
Speaker 4: the day, most of these radio stations are corporately owned.
Speaker 4: They are businesses, and the culture aspect, or the edges
Speaker 4: that make it make sense aren't necessarily understood or quantified
Speaker 4: in a dollars and cents spreadshet where it's like, hey,
Speaker 4: well we know if we can cut this and we
Speaker 4: can have this, we can make X amount of money
Speaker 4: and we're profitable.
Speaker 3: I understand what you're saying. So telling you there is
Speaker 3: a way to do.
Speaker 4: It, I'm not saying that there's not. I'm not saying
Speaker 4: that there's not. And again, this is.
Speaker 3: We're talking hip hop radio. There's so many formats around.
Speaker 2: There's AMFN, but there's a there's a look everybody is.
Speaker 2: Like you said when we first sat down there, you
Speaker 2: saw a video of mine where I said, it's absolute,
Speaker 2: it's either red or blue, Republican, Democrat, blood crypt there's
Speaker 2: nothing in the fucking.
Speaker 4: Middle, right, and you're right about black with radio. The
Speaker 4: answer somewhere in the middle.
Speaker 1: Right between tech and radio.
Speaker 2: There is a handshake and there is a way that
Speaker 2: it could happen very easily. Yeah you're asking, I mean literally,
Speaker 2: like I know exactly what to do, and everybody would
Speaker 2: make money.
Speaker 3: But the problem.
Speaker 2: Is is these corporations are attached to the DSPs, and
Speaker 2: the DSPs are putting out a narrative that there is
Speaker 2: no resurrection to radio.
Speaker 4: Yeah, no, DSPs, definitely it is in there. It's in
Speaker 4: DSP's best interest if radio is dead.
Speaker 2: Okay, So two days ago, Jermaine Dupree and I were
Speaker 2: having a discussion on or he was having a discussion
Speaker 2: and Tega shout out, Tega want taga. The mobster posts
Speaker 2: a thing tags me and Jermaine and it says I'd
Speaker 2: like to be broken on radio and immediately gets flagged
Speaker 2: and taken down.
Speaker 1: On Instagram.
Speaker 3: It's weird.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for what I posted on my thing, take a
Speaker 2: look at it sometime. But the narrative of I bet
Speaker 2: you Facebook's going to try to come up with something.
Speaker 2: But whatever, I would say this, like Spotify doesn't want.
Speaker 3: You listening to the radio.
Speaker 2: Let's say that a lot of a lot of those
Speaker 2: platforms do not want you listening to the radio.
Speaker 4: I don't disagree with that because it's against their I mean,
Speaker 4: they want people on their platform.
Speaker 3: Why would I want people listening to the radio. I
Speaker 3: have them listening to my product, and vice versa.
Speaker 4: What I'm telling you is if I'm if I'm iHeartRadio,
Speaker 4: I want you listening to my ship and not listening
Speaker 4: to a playlist on Spotify. And so that's my thing
Speaker 4: is like nowadays, like yo, like at the end of
Speaker 4: the day, like you said, you know, you got you got,
Speaker 4: you got your answer. It's it's just an interesting time
Speaker 4: because we've never had to compete with so much. Like
Speaker 4: as a radio personality, you have to compete with.
Speaker 3: All of this. I totally understand what you know.
Speaker 4: The the bandwidth grab of people's attention is like everyone's
Speaker 4: attention is up for grabs.
Speaker 3: I totally understand what you're saying.
Speaker 4: It's like, well, like I lay down at night and
Speaker 4: I might put Netflix on or play my PS five,
Speaker 4: but my wife is scrolling on TikTok just looking at bullshit,
Speaker 4: you know, and I'm.
Speaker 3: Like, yo, let's watch this movie. It's it's it's just in.
Speaker 4: All forms of entertainment, man, the bandwidth is up for
Speaker 4: grabs more than ever, right, So, like, how do you
Speaker 4: make radios?
Speaker 2: And also there's also a very big hole that could
Speaker 2: be filled. And that's all I'm saying. It might just
Speaker 2: happen soon.
Speaker 4: I look forward to seeing what you got up your sleeve, sir.
Speaker 4: What else are you working on? Obviously you're working with
Speaker 4: with BAMS man.
Speaker 2: I'm just you know what, I've met soulists and left
Speaker 2: the gun Play and OTR, and you know, I've had
Speaker 2: a lot of fun work with them. I have fun
Speaker 2: doing some projects with Poon, I'm having friends with, you know,
Speaker 2: just all kinds of fun stuff.
Speaker 1: So but really my focus is BAMS.
Speaker 3: You know. I enjoy making music. I enjoy doing that kind.
Speaker 2: Of stuff, working on some I'm gonna in October, I'm
Speaker 2: going to be doing a synergy marketing seminar in Los Angeles,
Speaker 2: Michelle S and Power Talent Agencies helping.
Speaker 3: Me put it together.
Speaker 2: But what I've basically done with the Instagram thing and
Speaker 2: giving up the game, I'm going to do with Syracuse
Speaker 2: University and where Michelle teaches. Uh, they have a campus
Speaker 2: here in Los Angeles. I hope that everything goes as planned.
Speaker 2: And Michelle S and myself and Power Talent and kool
Speaker 2: Aid and.
Speaker 3: I just saw you do yesterday. Yeah, we're gonna We're
Speaker 3: gonna do some work. Yeah, that's cool. It's one of
Speaker 3: my best friends.
Speaker 4: First time I ever got paid to do anything in
Speaker 4: radio that wasn't set up a tent was to be
Speaker 4: a board up to throw her show on Board upped
Speaker 4: Pocost Pedal.
Speaker 2: Locals and when you know when it was funny because
Speaker 2: when I when quill Aid first brought Pocost Pedal Locos,
Speaker 2: they said no, And that was one of the first
Speaker 2: specialty shows. I mean, it's very special to me because
Speaker 2: it was a project that I got green lighted.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think that, I think right now. The another
Speaker 6: thing they told me, there was absolutely to that. I
Speaker 6: told you did that yesterday. I was like, yo, Like
Speaker 6: the Mexican Rapture is hotter than ever.
Speaker 4: Right now, there might be a.
Speaker 3: Missing specialty show.
Speaker 1: It's definitely something missing.
Speaker 4: Yeah for sure. Man, So all right, we'll go follow
Speaker 4: this guy. You know, appreciate some of the stories.
Speaker 2: Didn't mean I know you got some crazy stories, oh crazy.
Speaker 4: Many more? Would you ever write a book or anything
Speaker 4: like that?
Speaker 2: I did write a book. You didn't write by association.
Speaker 2: And you know what's funny is I wrote Guilty by
Speaker 2: association and you know it. It was like twenty twelve, fourteen.
Speaker 2: But as soon as I said I was writing a book,
Speaker 2: you know, they said, oh, it's going to be a
Speaker 2: tell all on my Riah Kerry always going to get
Speaker 2: you know, do write a tell? I was like, bro,
Speaker 2: there's different chapters about the twelve chapters, you know, it's
Speaker 2: not even like that, Like it was just a story
Speaker 2: about a kid from Santa Barbara write a dream that
Speaker 2: made it, you know what I mean. Like, for instance,
Speaker 2: my friend Pharaoh in the juvenile detention centers here in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles during COVID, they gave my book to the
Speaker 2: kids in the juvenile hall and then I went to
Speaker 2: so to talk. I mean, I'm heavily involved in the
Speaker 2: juvenile system, like I mean, I mean, I've been working
Speaker 2: in gang intervention and the systems since Jim Brown, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. And Pharaoh, who happened to
Speaker 2: be an intern for me at Baby Ree when he
Speaker 2: was a kid it you know, now works in the system.
Speaker 4: For people who aren't aware. What was your relationship with
Speaker 4: Mariah for the people who don't know, obviously outside of
Speaker 4: working with her.
Speaker 3: Uh, that's an interesting question. We were.
Speaker 2: Anything that you could say happened, you know, whether it
Speaker 2: be friendship, whether it be working, whether it was dating,
Speaker 2: whatever the fuck it was.
Speaker 3: It all went down.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we were best friends and it turned into something
Speaker 2: really cool that ended up being bullshit. I mean, I
Speaker 2: started around the time of Glitter. I even introduced her
Speaker 2: to eminem and went through all of that, and.
Speaker 3: She essentially went to working with her to get in romance.
Speaker 2: Everything we were in the hall, we were the best
Speaker 2: friends that ended up in a and then we were
Speaker 2: both being attacked from two different sides. And when I
Speaker 2: chose to help her, I went against the system, the
Speaker 2: Sony system to begin with, do you see what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So that's where a lot of the narrative of some
Speaker 2: of the bullshit started. You know is when I the
Speaker 2: first Okay, let me I'll tell you one Mariah Carey story.
Speaker 2: The first time I went to dinner in New York
Speaker 2: with Mariah Carey. I get a phone call from Steve
Speaker 2: Stout and he was the president of Black music for Sony,
Speaker 2: and he says, what are you doing in New York?
Speaker 2: And I'm like, what are you talking about? Do you
Speaker 2: having dinner with Mariah Carey right now? And I said, what,
Speaker 2: how do you know that I'm in New York? And
Speaker 2: how do you know who I'm having dinner with? He goes,
Speaker 2: come next door, I want you to meet somebody?
Speaker 3: Said who?
Speaker 2: I walk in and Tommy Mottola is sitting there. The
Speaker 2: first thing out of his mouth that says, so you
Speaker 2: know my ex wife? I was like, yeah, he goes,
Speaker 2: you fucking her? That's how that started. And if you
Speaker 2: know me, you know that, like yo, I'm all about
Speaker 2: the underdog.
Speaker 1: I helped the kids in the street.
Speaker 2: If I see somebody you know, first shot, you know,
Speaker 2: I give them advice. I sit there and give up
Speaker 2: free game all day on my Instagram. If I see
Speaker 2: something wrong like that, and especially when it comes to
Speaker 2: a woman and someone that is a kid a woman,
Speaker 2: you know, an unfair advantage which I feel this music
Speaker 2: business is. I sit there and I talk about it.
Speaker 2: And that's how we became friends. And when glitter happened,
Speaker 2: she said, look, I need you to help me fix this.
Speaker 2: So I literally spent the next however long up to
Speaker 2: we belong together, helping her rebuild that career. Now along
Speaker 2: that path, we became best friends. Right, that turned into
Speaker 2: something a little more right. It happens when you spend
Speaker 2: twenty four hours a day and seven days a week
Speaker 2: with a person like I would. If I was in
Speaker 2: New York. I was staying at her house. Then I
Speaker 2: go to hot I walked to hot in ninety seven.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying. If she was in La
Speaker 2: she say at the Beverly Hills Hotel, I stay with
Speaker 2: her and go to work at Power when I was six,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. Like it just that's what
Speaker 2: it was.
Speaker 3: What resulted in you guys parting, if you.
Speaker 2: Will, because I said I'm leaving. I'm going home to
Speaker 2: Santa Barbara to take care of my grandmother. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: I don't want to be in this situation anymore. Became
Speaker 2: that was Look, I could not sit there and take
Speaker 2: care of my grandma and also take care of the
Speaker 2: highest maintenance artist in the world, and she could not
Speaker 2: process that.
Speaker 1: And then everything became like, for.
Speaker 2: Instance, when I said I want to write a book,
Speaker 2: I get a lawyer, a letter from her lawyer.
Speaker 3: I'm like, yeah, make sure, yeah yeah, and I'm.
Speaker 1: Like, I put it up.
Speaker 2: I thought it was a joke at first, so I
Speaker 2: made it my MySpace fucking profile picture. And then I
Speaker 2: find out she thinks that I'm going to go spill
Speaker 2: her being means like you obviously didn't know me, bitch, right,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Sorry, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Like you, I'm the best friend you've ever had, Like
Speaker 2: I know what really happened, and I've kept all of you,
Speaker 2: all of these people's secrets, and you're out there talking
Speaker 2: shit about me.
Speaker 3: Bro.
Speaker 2: That's what I'm finding out now, because since I've been back,
Speaker 2: I start hearing.
Speaker 1: All this shit. I'm like, oh, that's the narrative. Oh
Speaker 1: that's what happened.
Speaker 2: Oh okay, Like I ain't like you, so I'm not
Speaker 2: gonna go out there and start spilling shit. But when
Speaker 2: I see you, let's see you try to say that
Speaker 2: to me. You know what I'm saying. Let's see what
Speaker 2: they say when I see you in your face because
Speaker 2: the dog.
Speaker 3: Nah crazy.
Speaker 4: Well listen, man, you've had a I look forward to
Speaker 4: see you obviously have had a legendary run.
Speaker 1: Sorry to get serious, I really but let me say this.
Speaker 2: When I had breakfast with Big Boy when I first
Speaker 2: came back, and I love big You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 2: because great guy, greatest guy on the planet. And when
Speaker 2: I came back, you know, kool Aid is the first
Speaker 2: person I sat down with and I was in an
Speaker 2: emotional director. She said, you just got to keep showing up,
Speaker 2: keep showing up, just go, just work, do something, and
Speaker 2: she got me off the couch.
Speaker 1: I went and saw a.
Speaker 2: Big Boy and Big Boy brought you up, like literally
Speaker 2: two seconds after.
Speaker 1: It was high.
Speaker 3: How you're doing and stuff.
Speaker 1: Your biggest fan is big Boy, big Man and so
Speaker 1: and I love.
Speaker 2: What you're doing. I watch what you're doing, yo, dude,
Speaker 2: you're doing it right.
Speaker 3: Appreciate it, buddy, Thank you.
Speaker 1: And I love the syndication stuff you're doing.
Speaker 3: I love all of it.
Speaker 2: And you have a and from the people that I
Speaker 2: run into, you're doing it right.
Speaker 3: I appreciate it. Man.
Speaker 4: Trying all of.
Speaker 2: These other places and some podcasts and stuff. They have
Speaker 2: the internal stuff whatever whatever. You always keep it clean
Speaker 2: and I appreciate it. What you're doing for hip hop,
Speaker 2: I appreciate well.
Speaker 3: I appreciate you man. Thank you for pulling up and.
Speaker 1: Sharing it, and thank you for what you did for
Speaker 1: my little brother.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because my grandma and BAM's or my grandma and
Speaker 2: Whino and sweet Pea is the little doggie is happy
Speaker 2: as shita.
Speaker 3: Know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Yeah, big bands and big skips.
Speaker 4: We'll look be on the lookout for your summit obviously
Speaker 4: if you're not following this guy with your igs with people,
Speaker 4: because you've you've been giving out a lot of dope
Speaker 4: game on online.
Speaker 2: At the Mizza on Instagram, Uh the Mizza Presents on
Speaker 2: on YouTube and.
Speaker 3: At the Mizza on Twitter or Shade Tristet no idea.
Speaker 2: At some point, you know, when I did it was
Speaker 2: funny when we did what would you Do? That's where
Speaker 2: the split was when we did what would you Do? Uh,
Speaker 2: he did not like that song. He said, I said,
Speaker 2: it's Mariah Carry and Nate Dog. You know, you know,
Speaker 2: when we were talking about another artist and substances and stuff,
Speaker 2: like that. I think at that point in his life,
Speaker 2: you know, there was some stuff going on and he
Speaker 2: said I don't like that song, and I was like,
Speaker 2: he goes, you write it, I'll do it.
Speaker 3: I was like, all right, So I wrote what would
Speaker 3: you do?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 3: Crazy?
Speaker 1: I laid the reference vocal.
Speaker 2: He said, I'll do the third verse, you stay on
Speaker 2: the first verse and whatever.
Speaker 1: So that's me rapping what.
Speaker 3: Would you do? That's fucking crazy and.
Speaker 2: Cruising and well, forget it, crazy man.
Speaker 3: Last question, just random?
Speaker 2: Was there a few records I wrote that nobody knows
Speaker 2: for a lot of artists during that era?
Speaker 3: That's crazy.
Speaker 4: Who's the biggest what if could have? Should have would
Speaker 4: have been artist? In your opinion?
Speaker 3: What do you mean?
Speaker 4: Like, which artist do you feel like had everything that
Speaker 4: it took to be just massive but either got in
Speaker 4: their own way or shit got cut sure or.
Speaker 3: I'd never put someone on blasts like that.
Speaker 4: I'm not about put somebody on blasts, like you know,
Speaker 4: I think to myself, like, you know, I just you know,
Speaker 4: but there's there's artists like in my like not even
Speaker 4: like necess I will I'll take out there, you know
Speaker 4: what I was talking about this, I'll take out the
Speaker 4: narrative of getting in their own way as hard as
Speaker 4: you think should have been bigger.
Speaker 2: Okay, Nate Dog rest in peace because if he had lived,
Speaker 2: none of this ship would be happening.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And Andhale, his son is a fucking beast.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, Nay, I mean shit, dude, Nige is a beast.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Loson, Nate Dog just changed like what a lot
Speaker 4: of people's radio records would sound like for years.
Speaker 1: And I don't hear it enough. Nate Dog rest in peace.
Speaker 1: And I love you.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Shout out to Dimiss.
Speaker 4: Appreciate you man, Thank you, sir, Yes, sir, Fire, thanks you.
Speaker 3: Boom