Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. I'm in
Speaker 1: the hair salon now, y'all.
Speaker 2: So there we go.
Speaker 3: All right, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode, a
Speaker 3: very detroit episode, yes, of Quest Love Supree. If you're
Speaker 3: if you're watching our never ending soft ones on YouTube,
Speaker 3: then you know you know why this is a very
Speaker 3: detroit episode. If you're just listening, I ain't describing nothing
Speaker 3: to y'all. Right now, we got Team Supreme in the house. Fanticlo, Bro,
Speaker 3: what man, how's it going?
Speaker 2: We're been waiting on this one for a minute, man.
Speaker 1: We've we've been waiting for this one for a minute.
Speaker 4: Yeah, man, Little Brother, we were honored recently in our
Speaker 4: city in Durham with a proclamation from the mayor and
Speaker 4: you know, so it was we're celebrating not twenty of
Speaker 4: the year as well as Hip Hops fifty year of course.
Speaker 4: And you know there would be no Little Brother without
Speaker 4: the group that we have on today.
Speaker 2: So exactly, exactly a dream come true. And I've been
Speaker 2: waiting on this in four minute.
Speaker 1: Sugar Steve, what up?
Speaker 5: Bro?
Speaker 1: What up? Everybody?
Speaker 2: How you doing?
Speaker 1: Actually I should say what up though, Sugar Steve, how's
Speaker 1: it going.
Speaker 6: Everything's good. I'm a couple of our albums have caught
Speaker 6: fire on our record label. So but now I got
Speaker 6: to spend my whole day shipping fucking records all over
Speaker 6: the world.
Speaker 1: So that's that's a good problem to have.
Speaker 3: Man, you had a dream of your own label, and
Speaker 3: it's happening, and you know that's amazing. Speaking of of
Speaker 3: albums that have set the world and movements on fire,
Speaker 3: I will say that the totality the higher legacy of
Speaker 3: our guest today just ring strong, and not only hip
Speaker 3: hop culture, but in music and everything from their.
Speaker 1: Production to their delivery, to their cadence.
Speaker 3: To be honest with you, just the love that they
Speaker 3: have for their city of Detroit, the love that they
Speaker 3: have for each other, for hip hop culture, for innovation,
Speaker 3: for like doing something original. I guess you could say
Speaker 3: that their chemistry is to me, like the most important
Speaker 3: element that has kept the legacy of this group alive.
Speaker 3: It's not about one specific member over another member. It's
Speaker 3: about just the overall chemistry and the contributions that various
Speaker 3: members have given this particular organization.
Speaker 1: And you know, me myself, nothing will ever ever ever,
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 3: It's like once you get in this end industry, you
Speaker 3: kind of see things different from a production standpoint, from
Speaker 3: a creative standpoint, Like there's a part of your life
Speaker 3: where music means something to you before you get in
Speaker 3: the industry, and then there's a part of your life
Speaker 3: when once you're in the industry, you see things.
Speaker 1: Different, like you see everyone as a peer.
Speaker 3: And I don't know when anything that this group has created,
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I just I hold.
Speaker 3: It like the Holy scriptures coming from Moses.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I can go on with a gazillion descriptions about how
Speaker 3: important the legacy of this group is, especially on hip
Speaker 3: hop's fiftieth anniversary, but you know we're going to get
Speaker 3: to just wrap. It was something we haven't done a
Speaker 3: long time. Friends of the show, y'all welcome Slum Village
Speaker 3: to Quest Love Supreme. I'm sorry that was like a
Speaker 3: lifetime achievement, right I should have been through VT wars
Speaker 3: this week. I don't know, you know, RJ, Rice and
Speaker 3: and and T three. Thank you man, Thank you for coming.
Speaker 5: What's the word man? Appreciate you having us.
Speaker 1: Thank you r J. Where are you right now.
Speaker 5: In the studio. We're finishing up this album.
Speaker 3: Okay, so you're you're still Detroit right now, Dylan Detroit,
Speaker 3: all right? And T three you the same.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I'm in Detroit at crib.
Speaker 8: I'm just happy to be here, man, and you know,
Speaker 8: happy to be a part of this wonderful show.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Wait, I gotta ask y'all.
Speaker 3: You know, I absolutely positively never miss an opportunity to
Speaker 3: talk out how important the city of Detroit was to
Speaker 3: my creativity. I mean, you know, in addition to just
Speaker 3: interacting with you guys, and you know, even for about
Speaker 3: ten for for for Dyla, anyone, I mean, even illegic
Speaker 3: like whoever has come from the city Detroit. But a
Speaker 3: lot of my creativity, like a lot of the music
Speaker 3: I worked on, I technically did in that city. That's
Speaker 3: important to me. And you know, so I feel like
Speaker 3: I have a relationship with the city as well that
Speaker 3: was instrumental, like between ninety seven and around like two
Speaker 3: thousand and six. Uh, and even like when I tore
Speaker 3: like I know places by heart, I go by myself.
Speaker 3: Detroit's a little bit different now, like from what I'd
Speaker 3: known it as twenty five years ago. Like just as
Speaker 3: residents of the city, how do you guys feel about
Speaker 3: what's happening in Detroit, Like is it progress? Like things
Speaker 3: are just different now, like former firehouses are now like
Speaker 3: five star hotels and.
Speaker 5: We rebuild it, you know, Okay, And it's a good
Speaker 5: look for the city. You know, it was desolate and
Speaker 5: bleak for so long. You know that now we're finally
Speaker 5: getting you know what I'm saying, that downtown back how
Speaker 5: it's supposed to be. We finally getting the neighbor that
Speaker 5: was run down. You know, they're tearing them down and rebuilding.
Speaker 5: So you know, it's it's good for the city, you
Speaker 5: know what I'm saying. And I'm happy to see it.
Speaker 5: You know what I'm saying. Make people want to stay
Speaker 5: in Detroit, you know what I'm saying, not ready to
Speaker 5: get up out of here and go somewhere else.
Speaker 3: Right, So the temptation has never been strong to be like,
Speaker 3: all right, well let's relocate to Atlanta or like go
Speaker 3: down south or anything.
Speaker 5: Nah nah, not for.
Speaker 8: Me, no, no, no, no, no, no, not for us,
Speaker 8: because you know what, it's just the vibe, you know,
Speaker 8: we like and you could be for yourself, you could
Speaker 8: be you could be bothered or not bothered.
Speaker 7: It's a choice.
Speaker 8: You make and I think I think that's something we like,
Speaker 8: you know, you know us, we kind of stick to ourselves.
Speaker 7: So uh yeah, Detroit is a plus for that, you
Speaker 7: know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: You know, oftentimes, like all right, take it. Take a city,
Speaker 3: a musical city like Austin. Austin takes a pride in
Speaker 3: its weirdness. For me, though, like the black version of
Speaker 3: what I see all in terms of I've just never
Speaker 3: seen a city so open. And once I realized that,
Speaker 3: you know, you guys were raised on the Electrified Mojo
Speaker 3: and if you know, you guys listening, go on YouTube
Speaker 3: and just start listening to Electrifying Mojo, you got to
Speaker 3: realize that this dude was basically one of the last
Speaker 3: of the Mohicans in terms of there was a time
Speaker 3: when radio really trusted its DJs to do whatever they
Speaker 3: wanted to do. You know, now like you kind of are,
Speaker 3: you're a prisoner of corporate radio in which the the
Speaker 3: playlists are like predetermined before you even you know, like
Speaker 3: September's playlist has already been determined for you. So whereas
Speaker 3: a guy like Electrified Mojo back in the early eighties
Speaker 3: was like just playing some of the weirdest music ever.
Speaker 1: And so.
Speaker 3: You know, once his listeners are growing up in immersed
Speaker 3: in this music, it's it's like, no wonder Detroit is
Speaker 3: such a creative hub where people just think different. Is
Speaker 3: that weirdness still prevalent in Detroit right now as we speak, or.
Speaker 7: I think it's still happening.
Speaker 8: I think a lot of a lot of the people
Speaker 8: that are the younger people that are kind of weird,
Speaker 8: they came up after they came up on us. I
Speaker 8: get a lot of that from people like Curtis Roach
Speaker 8: and a couple of other camps from Detroit.
Speaker 7: But then you know, Dray has a whole another side,
Speaker 7: which is is hood, you know, from.
Speaker 8: These creative people to just hood, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 8: And then then you got the creative hood, which is
Speaker 8: kind of a merge of both, which is like the
Speaker 8: side of baby, you know, something like that.
Speaker 1: So see, that's the thing.
Speaker 3: I even though I think you guys in the very
Speaker 3: beginning might have been slightly defensive towards how we saw
Speaker 3: y'all because you know, like the music was one way,
Speaker 3: but you guys were saying something like crazy outlands ship
Speaker 3: on top of it, like y'all justicehood and creative.
Speaker 1: But I don't know what The.
Speaker 3: First time I came from Detroit, I'm like, yo, this
Speaker 3: this is like a city that will listen to Thomas
Speaker 3: Dolby and do the Carlton but they're also going to
Speaker 3: beat your ass if you fuck with him, like and
Speaker 3: that's the ship I couldn't.
Speaker 7: Right, Yeah, I mean, because you know he's always.
Speaker 8: Been a collected Uh. We always been uh. I mean
Speaker 8: we grew up on Tribe and NWA at the same thing.
Speaker 8: It wasn't or, it wasn't rock jazz, it was any
Speaker 8: music that we can find creatively, we there and then
Speaker 8: we grew up on techno, which is totally something else,
Speaker 8: you know in itself.
Speaker 1: Thing that's key.
Speaker 3: I think you guys embracing electronic music and techno is
Speaker 3: the key to why Detroit so crazy.
Speaker 7: Yes, yes, creatively, yes.
Speaker 5: See, you had it at one point where they would
Speaker 5: play all the hood stuff during the day, you know
Speaker 5: what I'm saying, the commercial stuff. Then at nighttime when
Speaker 5: people going to the clubs was like all techno, you
Speaker 5: know what I'm saying, stuff like that, So our prime
Speaker 5: time getting ready for the party was techno music. So
Speaker 5: you know, we had the opportunity that had that balance,
Speaker 5: you know what I'm saying, Like T was saying.
Speaker 3: Can you take us back to the beginning to where
Speaker 3: like if I'm looking, I guess in archaeology terms, like
Speaker 3: if I'm looking for the spark, you know, the sticks
Speaker 3: and students that like built the spark, Where does the
Speaker 3: actual where does this story of slum village begin?
Speaker 8: I would say it began in Persian High School where
Speaker 8: we were.
Speaker 7: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 8: The school, uh, you know, Persian High School, which is
Speaker 8: this because when I was coming up to be a rapper,
Speaker 8: you know, it was weird that was considered weird to
Speaker 8: be a rapper, you know what I'm saying, Because it's
Speaker 8: just so like even though it was a few rappers,
Speaker 8: hood rappers that was out there, but what we was
Speaker 8: on we was extra loe as extra you know, So
Speaker 8: we were walking around you know, extra close, extra, you know, dreadlocks,
Speaker 8: you know, we we were very were out there you.
Speaker 7: Know early, you know, you know you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: So when I.
Speaker 8: Heard about other guys that were like me, I was like, oh, okay,
Speaker 8: now we got a squad, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 8: So now that you know, I ran into Dyla because
Speaker 8: I heard about him through this guy, through that guy
Speaker 8: heard about by ten and then was and it just
Speaker 8: all clicked up.
Speaker 3: So it was it wasn't a neighborhood thing, like they
Speaker 3: weren't your next door neighbors, like you heard about them
Speaker 3: from the other side of town or.
Speaker 7: I mean we're in the same neighborhood believe it or not.
Speaker 8: But I did not know that, which is like, I mean,
Speaker 8: in Detroit, you're not gonna come outside.
Speaker 7: Your house and just walk around and you know, you
Speaker 7: know what I'm saying.
Speaker 8: So you going to your house, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 8: to your destination of back because you don't want no static,
Speaker 8: you don't want nothing to happen, So you just going
Speaker 8: to where you go.
Speaker 7: So I even though we closed it, we all in
Speaker 7: KNA Guardens, it was just.
Speaker 8: Like different random parts like and had them everyone for school,
Speaker 8: you know.
Speaker 3: So r J Yo actually our listeners out there should
Speaker 3: know that. I mean, you come from a lineage of
Speaker 3: you know, Detroit hip hop being as though you know
Speaker 3: your father is you know, the legendary RJ of RJ's
Speaker 3: latest arrival, Like I grew up listening to shackles.
Speaker 2: Heavy in your arms is the one for me?
Speaker 4: That's the one, Like, yeah, exactly my rotation right now,
Speaker 4: still on my spot.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So can you talk about just growing up as sort
Speaker 3: of like lineage of Detroit culture, Like what is your
Speaker 3: childhood like with your parents that are popping, Like, you know,
Speaker 3: I have them on Soul Training, I have them on
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, Like they were national, they
Speaker 3: were always played on radio.
Speaker 1: So what was it like just growing up in that environment?
Speaker 5: I grew up on the road, So between them touring
Speaker 5: and stuff, you know, like I was like out on
Speaker 5: a Fresh Fest and you know, stuff like that with
Speaker 5: them as a kid, with Fat Boys and run DMC
Speaker 5: and all of that. So that's kind of how I
Speaker 5: grew up.
Speaker 1: So were there Jermaine sightings as well?
Speaker 3: Because I thought Jermaine was the only kid that was
Speaker 3: like allowed in the Fresh Fest.
Speaker 1: Did you get to see him at all? Like nah?
Speaker 5: Because remember I'm I'm I'm ten years younger than Tea,
Speaker 5: ok So I was like two, okay, three years old,
Speaker 5: so Jamine dupri was like eleven twelve, Okay, I get it. Yeah,
Speaker 5: So between that and then you know, when they would
Speaker 5: be on the road, when I got to a certain age,
Speaker 5: I would be my grandmother, and my grandmother stayed in
Speaker 5: Coney Gardens because that's where my father grew up at.
Speaker 5: So that's how all of everybody kind of came together.
Speaker 1: Y'all describe Cooney Gardens like we I know it as
Speaker 1: a song.
Speaker 3: But what is the neighborhood of kinder Gartens?
Speaker 8: Uh, it's a hood, but it's not like you know
Speaker 8: what I'm saying. It still got good people. It still
Speaker 8: had a good batch of people there. It wasn't overly violent,
Speaker 8: but it did have its hood aspects, you know what
Speaker 8: I'm saying. We always had a nice park. I lived
Speaker 8: right right across the street of a nice park. We
Speaker 8: had a nice you know, place to play in whatever.
Speaker 8: So I mean, you know, I don't know why. Uh,
Speaker 8: you know, we had so much respect for And it's
Speaker 8: the only neighborhood really in the hood where you see
Speaker 8: where they got the actual the actual banner where it
Speaker 8: says Coney Gardens, Like they named this hood. You know
Speaker 8: what I'm saying. They really don't do that. It usually
Speaker 8: be like East West that you know, whatever the the streeters,
Speaker 8: but they actually named the whole neighborhood so once we
Speaker 8: saw that, you know, we just gravitated to it because
Speaker 8: you know, we had found each other and you know,
Speaker 8: in this awkward little place as.
Speaker 3: Late children of the seventies and eighties, just in your
Speaker 3: general childhood, how aware of you guys, of the lineage
Speaker 3: of Detroit, Like was living in Detroit just like to
Speaker 3: you growing up in the early eighties, Like ah, man,
Speaker 3: this town used to have something and then everyone left it,
Speaker 3: like there's no more music left like that, was there
Speaker 3: still a strong presence of the music lineage that the
Speaker 3: world knows as like Detroit.
Speaker 8: I definitely say, yeah, man, I grew up on a
Speaker 8: Motown sound. That's it was definitely part of my household,
Speaker 8: part of everybody. Everybody was still very proud of that.
Speaker 8: Even though Motown had left went to Cali, you know
Speaker 8: what I'm saying, we were still very proud of that.
Speaker 8: We still had the Motown Museum, we still had you know,
Speaker 8: we're still proud of all the musicians that came through.
Speaker 8: So that was the definite just soul music in general.
Speaker 8: We was we all grew up on that. That was
Speaker 8: definitely part of our you know, our our bringing up.
Speaker 4: You know what I would saying, I want to ask
Speaker 4: y'all man specifically when you're talking about tech No earlier
Speaker 4: New Dance Show and the scene, break that down, like,
Speaker 4: what what.
Speaker 2: Did that mean to to Detroit culture?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 7: That was everything.
Speaker 8: Everybody used to run in the house and tune in
Speaker 8: our version of soul trained.
Speaker 7: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 8: When you see answers who became popular in the neighborhood
Speaker 8: for showing up and and and also it broke a
Speaker 8: lot of rappers too, a lot of up and coming
Speaker 8: rappers they got a chance to perform on that. So
Speaker 8: the New Dance Show was everything for us. My wife
Speaker 8: worked at the museum now for the for the New
Speaker 8: Dance Show, So it's it's still a part of my
Speaker 8: life today, you know what I mean? Yeah, man, it's
Speaker 8: it's inspired us in many ways.
Speaker 3: I will say that the scene, you know, if you
Speaker 3: to our listeners out there, if you've not watched it,
Speaker 3: just to describe it. Like most most territories parts of
Speaker 3: the United States would have their local dance show. Detroit
Speaker 3: had the scene. I know, Chicago had a show that
Speaker 3: was more geared to stepping. Okay, Philadelphia we had our
Speaker 3: show called Dancing on Air, which found some success and
Speaker 3: actually became national known as Dance Party USA. And that's
Speaker 3: where like Kelly Rippa used to dance on the show whatever.
Speaker 3: But oh wow, a lot of local eyes back when
Speaker 3: dances were regional. You know, how they danced in Detroit
Speaker 3: is not how they were dancing in Texas. And you know,
Speaker 3: you you would only know when you were like visit
Speaker 3: cousins in the summertime, like what kind of dance is that?
Speaker 1: Or whatever?
Speaker 3: So like for Detroit and dancing, do you guys know
Speaker 3: the history of the Earl Flynn? Like what is it
Speaker 3: about there? And then there is the Earl Flynn still
Speaker 3: a Detroit move or is that just like one specific
Speaker 3: generation even your history were dancing? Like I know and
Speaker 3: and by Ten's version of Pregnant on the first Slim
Speaker 3: Village album, it's an interlude where he's rhyming over the
Speaker 3: Roger loop, right, you know, it's only like forty five seconds,
Speaker 3: but he literally I read the lyrics and basically he's
Speaker 3: saying that I came to a jit, like I came
Speaker 3: to a party to show.
Speaker 1: Them how I dance and they looking at me like
Speaker 1: I'm a weirdo.
Speaker 5: And you know, digit is a Detroit dance kind of
Speaker 5: like Chicago got footwork, you know what I'm saying, Detroit
Speaker 5: has its own version, you know what I'm saying, a
Speaker 5: little more technical than the footwork. And that's what he
Speaker 5: was talking about. He said, when I walk in there
Speaker 5: doing my jit, they looking at me crazy, you know
Speaker 5: what I'm saying, because he jitting and he got dreadlocks,
Speaker 5: you know what I'm saying. So jitting was like a
Speaker 5: cultural thing here, I'm saying, like everybody did it for
Speaker 5: the most part, So that's kind of how it worked.
Speaker 5: Earl Flynn was like, if I ain't mistaken to you,
Speaker 5: that wasn't that like the gang.
Speaker 7: Earl Flynn, he can't called the Earl Flynns. And that
Speaker 7: was they move that they used to do to List,
Speaker 7: That's where it came from. Yes, that's where it came from.
Speaker 7: It was a gang.
Speaker 1: So answer me this.
Speaker 3: Around the Parade album period, you know, I would routinely
Speaker 3: like Prince's relationship with Detroit is just on some other level.
Speaker 3: Even when I would go back to old album credits
Speaker 3: at least like from Controversy nineteen ninety nine, Purple Rain
Speaker 3: and whatever. I mean, I didn't even realize that Prince
Speaker 3: was Princess love for Detroit, Like all this Detroit shoutouts
Speaker 3: start with what up though, you know? And I'm like,
Speaker 3: Prince knows to speak? Like what does Prince know? And
Speaker 3: if you watch like concerts in eighty six, assuming that
Speaker 3: this is the earl Finn like where you wave your
Speaker 3: arms back and forth, Prince was routinely So that was
Speaker 3: Prince's version of doing.
Speaker 1: The brother spilll a certain way like that or like no.
Speaker 7: They have overwhelming love for him.
Speaker 8: See you gotta think, like you said, go back to
Speaker 8: the uh to the mojo.
Speaker 7: Mojo broke Prince.
Speaker 8: He would play a whole Prince album on you know
Speaker 8: you know what I'm saying sometimes even with the curse words.
Speaker 1: And yeah, that was like how does that happen?
Speaker 8: And Prince call him. He would pick up the phone
Speaker 8: and call him and thank him. So they developed a relationship,
Speaker 8: you know what I'm saying, and they became really close.
Speaker 8: So he helped he helped Prince break in Detroit. Man,
Speaker 8: So you know, they they became great friends.
Speaker 7: Man.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 7: So it's it's just.
Speaker 8: A dope that had that Prince incorporated so much detroited there. Yeah,
Speaker 8: it was incredible Yeah.
Speaker 3: When the Roots first visited. Detroit was the second American
Speaker 3: city that we visited when we first started touring, and
Speaker 3: the place that they took us was a spot called
Speaker 3: the Hip Hop Shop, Okay, which I mean by that point,
Speaker 3: Mari's Malone. You know, hip hop fashions were starting in
Speaker 3: ninety four ninety five starting to become a little national.
Speaker 3: It wasn't just localized, but was the Hip Hop Shop
Speaker 3: sort of just like a localized hub for NMC back
Speaker 3: in the early nineties or like, how talk to me
Speaker 3: about the relationship of that establishment.
Speaker 8: Well, we had a few establishments, but that was one
Speaker 8: of the main ones, and that was the one that really,
Speaker 8: you know, had the breakout artists, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 8: That's where Royce, Eminem and D twelve L and just
Speaker 8: everybody was at this spot.
Speaker 7: So this was the spot for MC's.
Speaker 1: You go there.
Speaker 7: It was only on Saturdays. They sold closed during the week.
Speaker 8: Maurice made his own clothes and sold them and then
Speaker 8: he let us have an open mic on on Saturdays.
Speaker 8: It was hosted by Proof Recipes to Big Proof, and
Speaker 8: you know what I'm saying, It was just it was
Speaker 8: just something that we had some of the Illis Battles
Speaker 8: now Swam Village.
Speaker 7: We didn't really battle, but we used to like.
Speaker 8: Premiere songs and play certain joints and do stuff like that.
Speaker 8: But it was it was some dope battles there, you know.
Speaker 8: Em had a few battles there, a bunch of people,
Speaker 8: so it was it was it.
Speaker 7: Was our spot.
Speaker 8: It was our only spot really at that time. We
Speaker 8: had a couple of nighttime spots, but that was the time.
Speaker 8: And it was in seven mile, which is kind of
Speaker 8: scary if seven miles.
Speaker 7: It's like a.
Speaker 8: Martin Luther King Boulevard, you know, type of right, But
Speaker 8: at that time, it was all up you know what
Speaker 8: I'm saying. Everybody went there. Did they think you had
Speaker 8: some guys smoking weed in the car? You have some
Speaker 8: people drinking their little beers and then going there and
Speaker 8: do their hip hop, you know what I'm saying. And
Speaker 8: then it was just a dope spot for us to
Speaker 8: do it. So shout out to Marowice Malone for doing that.
Speaker 8: Man setting that up.
Speaker 3: In your opinion, like how how is hip hop translated
Speaker 3: in terms of like, Okay, so a song like Ain't
Speaker 3: No Future in Your Front? Like was that just universally
Speaker 3: accepted by the entire hip hop community or did you
Speaker 3: know was it like, Okay, well, you guys are more
Speaker 3: West Coast sounding, so you know that's y'alls thing, and
Speaker 3: we're more East Coast sounding, so this is our thing.
Speaker 5: No, it was universal because we Detroit is like the
Speaker 5: melting pot of every sound. We listened to Luke Intwo
Speaker 5: Live Crew on the radio, we listened to Doctor dre
Speaker 5: Snoop Dogg, we listened to Trot Twister, and they played
Speaker 5: everything in Detroit. So it was just like a dope song.
Speaker 5: Detroit just accepted it as a dope song. It wasn't
Speaker 5: a out It sounded more Cali. It was just, you
Speaker 5: know what I'm saying, represented the city as a whole.
Speaker 3: Speaker on the first moment in which it's like, okay,
Speaker 3: let's start a group. Now I know before it was
Speaker 3: slum Village, that the name was sound.
Speaker 5: Cinepon y.
Speaker 2: All right, doess backwards?
Speaker 3: Okay, oh okay. So explained to me how like the
Speaker 3: year that starts and the group in that formation, and that.
Speaker 7: Formation it started off, like I said, I heard about
Speaker 7: these cats.
Speaker 8: Number one we was dancing tiam But speaking of dancing,
Speaker 8: everybody in my crew dance too.
Speaker 7: By the way, you had to dance.
Speaker 1: I can attest to this.
Speaker 7: Yes, you know what I'm saying, So everybody in the
Speaker 7: crew dance.
Speaker 8: But anyway, I heard about some cats, I about Dyla
Speaker 8: and this, and I heard about by ten. But first
Speaker 8: it was like me and by ten and I got
Speaker 8: with bout ten and why g first and we had
Speaker 8: a group called hard to Pose, which one he did
Speaker 8: two songs, but yeah, it was it was more West
Speaker 8: Coast gangster sounding a little bit, but yeah, we had
Speaker 8: those couple of songs. We did that, and then then
Speaker 8: we heard about Dyla about the beats, and then while
Speaker 8: she introduced me to that, then we decided to do
Speaker 8: official cinepod stuff, which means we went to the studio
Speaker 8: Mold's studio, this Hood studio, and we recorded these couple
Speaker 8: of records and one of the records had a Flip
Speaker 8: Wilson sample in it, so it's very zany. It was
Speaker 8: very element that is what you what you heard from
Speaker 8: uh uh centerpore. So the CENTERPID lineup was me, Uh,
Speaker 8: why was uh by ten? Deyla QUD was this?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 8: QD was in this because that's when dancers was really
Speaker 8: a part of it. And QD started off dancing first,
Speaker 8: so he was a part of it.
Speaker 1: So you're saying that at this point, Ellmeness was kind
Speaker 1: of all north Star.
Speaker 8: Yeah, never stop between them and uh organized early yes,
Speaker 8: but definitely Ellen.
Speaker 7: S for sure.
Speaker 1: Okay. Yeah.
Speaker 8: So and so we made our couple of first records
Speaker 8: on which was called rat a Tat tat the sound
Speaker 8: of the Whack.
Speaker 7: And you know, we all doing a chance we do
Speaker 7: it and uh, you get you know all.
Speaker 8: That, you know all that because everybody was doing that
Speaker 8: at that time, and uh and then we did a
Speaker 8: couple of records that cinepop only that before we form
Speaker 8: Slan Village.
Speaker 1: Sure their records, I.
Speaker 7: Said, only two records on two records literally to.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, I mean like physical like I can
Speaker 1: find this own eBay records.
Speaker 7: Oh no, not physical records.
Speaker 1: Okay, y'all just made something. I was about to say, man,
Speaker 1: okay records back then, Like what was the sense of
Speaker 1: making music?
Speaker 3: Like who was because you're naming a lot of NCA's
Speaker 3: and a lot of beat makers, so like what was
Speaker 3: what was the division of labor at least for that
Speaker 3: particular project, Like.
Speaker 7: I think why j produced one and Dyla produced one.
Speaker 8: Put only did backgrounds and me ten Dila rapped and
Speaker 8: U featured this one guy, this guy who was a
Speaker 8: who turned out to be an R and B singer,
Speaker 8: I forget his name.
Speaker 7: Uh yeah, but yeah.
Speaker 2: I was like, all right, right, no, I mean he underground.
Speaker 7: He didn't he didn't blow.
Speaker 3: Up big, but he okay, I see. And that configuration
Speaker 3: lasted for how long? And then how did it morphed
Speaker 3: into the second phase of the group, which I guess
Speaker 3: is slum village.
Speaker 8: And it maybe lasts for a few months before everybody
Speaker 8: decided at that time that you know, dancing was kind
Speaker 8: of been getting played out a little bit, maybe maybe
Speaker 8: a year. Maybe dancer was getting played obviously, we don't
Speaker 8: really need to dance with no more. And Andy was
Speaker 8: like Dyla's beast is incredible. I don't need to be
Speaker 8: doing no beats no more. And then it was like, well,
Speaker 8: we only people left, so it was basically there. So
Speaker 8: we was in the basement one day and.
Speaker 3: Did you know it was like when you're hearing this
Speaker 3: stuff and I've heard even in the what what we
Speaker 3: call the camp, the camp amp Era shout out to
Speaker 3: amp Fiddler yeah, the camp Amp era of Dyla's musical development.
Speaker 3: Were you guys at all aware, like, all right, this
Speaker 3: is a weird ass shit, Like I live in a
Speaker 3: territory and still to this day, I know that a
Speaker 3: part of my production has to appease the need to
Speaker 3: please the barber shop in Tarik's head, you know, whereas
Speaker 3: like sometimes I want to do some crazy, off kilter shit,
Speaker 3: but then I'll give it to Tariqu like he ain't
Speaker 3: gonna fuck with this because it's just too weird sounded.
Speaker 3: But it's almost like like all those I think the
Speaker 3: earliest song I heard from you guys is was it
Speaker 3: here come the drums or bring the drums or.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, I know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1: Yes about the drips, which is crazy shit, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean.
Speaker 3: Even the early demos of the songs that wound up
Speaker 3: on Fantastic were just super weird, Like how is there
Speaker 3: no filter for especially coming from Detroit, which I imagine
Speaker 3: you have to have a protective shell of hardness to
Speaker 3: get respect. You guys were just like anything goes and
Speaker 3: if it's weird, it's dope, Like, yes, this is true.
Speaker 8: I mean, I think, like I say, most of our
Speaker 8: albums were based on comedy, so just us making each
Speaker 8: other live is what we was really doing. So we
Speaker 8: had dad, so we would you know, when we was
Speaker 8: working our little factory jobs together, we basically laughing all day,
Speaker 8: creating ideas using that for songs, just you know.
Speaker 7: So it just basically came out of humor and it
Speaker 7: was enough.
Speaker 8: Of us where we felt like we could just stay
Speaker 8: in our bubble and never be a part of the
Speaker 8: real world almost, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: So we were just in our bubble just period.
Speaker 3: Like when you play it for your boys and there's
Speaker 3: no cringing, like that's a demo fast forward, Like.
Speaker 7: All my boys was just as weird. So it was
Speaker 7: just like we was all found each other.
Speaker 8: It was a good hundred of us eventually, but you
Speaker 8: know what I'm saying, But the core was like a
Speaker 8: good team. So yeah, we was all just as weird,
Speaker 8: and they was like the weird of the best. Oh man,
Speaker 8: it's you know what I'm saying, Because to us, hip
Speaker 8: hop was all new. We didn't kind of grow up
Speaker 8: on no structure like New York did when hip hop
Speaker 8: was a certain type of way, and you know what
Speaker 8: I'm saying, it was just whatever I creative you can get,
Speaker 8: you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: And that's that's kind of what we incorporated for people
Speaker 3: that so immersed pop culture? How are you getting this
Speaker 3: stuff where? And from my first fifteen years of coming
Speaker 3: to Detroit, there really wasn't nothing like I knew you guys,
Speaker 3: So you guys were entertainment enough.
Speaker 1: But for the average person, like what do you what
Speaker 1: was there for culture?
Speaker 7: Well? The cultures we're building this thing up, you know.
Speaker 8: You know what I'm saying from from stone by stone,
Speaker 8: So you you saying, Okay, when Club Gillna started coming up,
Speaker 8: we started building up our audience where we had.
Speaker 7: A literal following of people.
Speaker 8: At least we can we can get one hundred people
Speaker 8: to come to our show, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: And that's why when you hear when you hear the
Speaker 7: Look of Love and you hear.
Speaker 8: You hear an audience singing it, that's just fans before
Speaker 8: we even got it got on, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 8: because we had already pulled up a base. He's by piece,
Speaker 8: you know what I'm saying. As far as the movie
Speaker 8: it is, it was one theater in the hood that
Speaker 8: you could go through called.
Speaker 7: A bel air.
Speaker 1: No, no, I didn't go there. I know about the
Speaker 1: bel Air.
Speaker 8: I used to have to catch a bus to get
Speaker 8: to it. But yeah, it's nice theater though, But yeah,
Speaker 8: that's the spot. And I knew you was the movie
Speaker 8: man because you know, we went to the movies one time.
Speaker 8: We was on the road together somewhere.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's my thing. I was like, damn nothing, what
Speaker 1: do y'all do up here?
Speaker 3: So all right, So the thing is is that when
Speaker 3: Fantastic is finally coming to Fruition, so what's what's the
Speaker 3: discussion in.
Speaker 1: Terms of like, let's we we gotta make our own tape.
Speaker 3: And I heard there was a rumor that you guys
Speaker 3: were initially about to sign to Ruben Rodriguez's Pendulum label.
Speaker 8: Yeah, that was that was the possibility, but that was
Speaker 8: that was later though a little bit later now, But yeah,
Speaker 8: I was.
Speaker 1: Was earlier before because I think Pendsulum came out like
Speaker 1: ninety two.
Speaker 5: Correct, Yeah, Pendulum is before volume uh Fantastic Volume one.
Speaker 7: That was way popsic. Yeah Sally, that was true. Okay, Yeah,
Speaker 7: that's what happened. Well, we were signed to John Sally
Speaker 7: and his Dad.
Speaker 8: They had a uh they had a place called Hoops Studio, Okay,
Speaker 8: and uh basically they were gonna sign us they was
Speaker 8: was it was between us and uh diggable planners.
Speaker 3: Oh wow, oh WOWE and y'all almost Yeah, this explains it.
Speaker 3: The thing is is that you guys sounds like when
Speaker 3: I heard Fantastic, we were more amazed that like this
Speaker 3: isn't it doesn't feel like a demo. This sounds it
Speaker 3: sounds like this group has had experience before. Y'all sounded
Speaker 3: like professional. Now Fantastic winds up in my hands in
Speaker 3: like ninety six ninety seven, So even by ninety two,
Speaker 3: you guys were at least set or poised to make
Speaker 3: your grand rival or whatever. So yeah, now that makes sense.
Speaker 3: Do you think you guys were ready for that back
Speaker 3: then or.
Speaker 7: No?
Speaker 1: Are you glad how how it turned out? Yes?
Speaker 8: Absolutely, because if we would have came out, we had
Speaker 8: this song called is It the Magic? And it had
Speaker 8: the upright base and it was it was everything you wanted,
Speaker 8: a jazz slash.
Speaker 7: Rap it could be.
Speaker 1: It was all that.
Speaker 8: You know what I'm saying, am Philip was on the planet.
Speaker 8: Shout out to Phila always shown us Love. Yeah, so
Speaker 8: that was that was that record. No, I don't think
Speaker 8: we was ready because we were still developing styles and
Speaker 8: I just think.
Speaker 7: We weren't ready at that time. What do you think, Jay.
Speaker 5: Hey Man, Yeah, that's what I say. I think it
Speaker 5: worked out exactly how it was supposed to.
Speaker 6: I was recently doing this radio show about the Milestone
Speaker 6: Records label and McCoy tyner specifically, and the guy who
Speaker 6: owned that label or and keep News, said something to
Speaker 6: the effect of when he first met McCoy, you know,
Speaker 6: McCoy was like, you know, you gave me this one session,
Speaker 6: then you never called me again until until later on,
Speaker 6: and he said, well, back then, you weren't McCoy yet.
Speaker 6: You weren't McCoy tyner yet, meaning you know, he hadn't
Speaker 6: developed his unique style, et cetera.
Speaker 1: He found his voice.
Speaker 6: So when when you all were starting out this time
Speaker 6: period that we're talking about, was dilla dilla yet? Is
Speaker 6: what I'm asking, like his earliest beats had he found
Speaker 6: what we now know as what he did? The quest
Speaker 6: could probably answer this question.
Speaker 3: I think I think as a as a listener, there
Speaker 3: were already signs of what was coming in the future,
Speaker 3: So sort of like and you know, I've gotten my
Speaker 3: hands on a lot of these, like ninety two beats,
Speaker 3: ninety three beats. Yeah, even for back then, that was
Speaker 3: a really unorthodox thinking that.
Speaker 8: You know.
Speaker 3: I was like, wow, even early, like I'm pressed to
Speaker 3: find something that I'm like that's not really whack, Like
Speaker 3: you see that he was searching for it.
Speaker 1: Of course he perfects it, but I don't know that's
Speaker 1: that to me, Like coming out the gate, it was.
Speaker 3: An immediately like a jarring thing of like, this isn't
Speaker 3: like how the hip hop I grew up sounding is
Speaker 3: made so but it didn't sound like an amateur making.
Speaker 1: It sounded like someone doing it on purpose.
Speaker 6: Right, But you all recognized at that, even early on
Speaker 6: that he was a special talent.
Speaker 7: Yes, when I heard its beat, I was like, this
Speaker 7: is it. This is it.
Speaker 8: Early early, first of all, you think it just you
Speaker 8: and your neighborhood, like, oh, he's just good for your neighborhood.
Speaker 8: But then you started it started branching up. You're like,
Speaker 8: wait a minute, this guy is really incredible and like
Speaker 8: you know, like I said, he started off with just
Speaker 8: a pause and Cassette took that was then went to
Speaker 8: this and went to that learner. It was like, man,
Speaker 8: I was amazed. I was just happy to be alone
Speaker 8: for the ride. For the most part, before we even
Speaker 8: got a chance to develop what slum village would come
Speaker 8: to be.
Speaker 7: I was just looking at him like, how's this kid?
Speaker 7: Who my age? Well, how's he doing? You know what
Speaker 7: I'm saying. I'm looking right away the same age, you know.
Speaker 7: You know know what I'm saying. And he was just
Speaker 7: killing it.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. What year were you born?
Speaker 7: R Jay?
Speaker 1: Like, how old were you at the time when this
Speaker 1: is happening?
Speaker 7: Ninety two?
Speaker 5: I'm about eight nine years old.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 3: So when you're first hearing this, does it hit you different?
Speaker 3: I think as an adult, that hits me different simply
Speaker 3: because you know, I knew what the lay of the
Speaker 3: land was. For me, the lay of the land was
Speaker 3: like what tribe was doing, and what Dayla was doing,
Speaker 3: and what public enemy was doing, what Morley mal was doing.
Speaker 3: And so Dyla's arrival was more akin to that of
Speaker 3: like Godzilla come to town, like wait, what the hell
Speaker 3: is that over there? You know, that sort of thing.
Speaker 3: But for you to come, you know, to be much younger.
Speaker 3: It's not like you had an established lay of the
Speaker 3: land of what once was like, oh, black and white television,
Speaker 3: Suddenly like and the Wizard of Ours, everything turns to color.
Speaker 1: So for you, though, like, how are you receiving this At.
Speaker 5: A young age, I knew it was dope because he
Speaker 5: was producing for my kids group. So he was doing
Speaker 5: some of our demos.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, wait, really for sure? Tell me about this.
Speaker 1: I didn't know this.
Speaker 5: I had a group called First It went from rich
Speaker 5: Kids Kids you not. You know what I'm saying, And
Speaker 5: it's always and he was and he was producing the
Speaker 5: demos for us because of the studio. We was all signed,
Speaker 5: so my proms had us signed. He had slum sign,
Speaker 5: he had Paul Rosenberg, Eminem's manager, was signed to the label.
Speaker 1: And he was rhyming.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was rhyming.
Speaker 1: I need evidence.
Speaker 7: It was dope too, Paul Bullet. Yes, it's as Skinny Supreme.
Speaker 1: Did you know this?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, it's in Dan's book he talks about it
Speaker 4: a little bit.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: No, No, I just never heard the music.
Speaker 2: I never heard the music, but I've heard the story.
Speaker 1: Okay. Yeah, So it was all of us up there
Speaker 1: and this Barack Recordings.
Speaker 5: No, this is hoo sounds. This is in ninety two
Speaker 5: when he opened the studio with Sally. We would go
Speaker 5: up there and I would see him. You know, I
Speaker 5: come home from school and seeing the make beats in
Speaker 5: my kitchen, you know what I'm saying. So it was
Speaker 5: just like, Okay, this is like a big brother and
Speaker 5: I'm seeing him, you know what I'm saying. Record and
Speaker 5: then he was making demos for us, so I always knew,
Speaker 5: you know what I'm saying, he was dope.
Speaker 1: So who's teaching you how to make beats at this time?
Speaker 5: Like?
Speaker 3: How old were you when you started messing around on machines?
Speaker 3: What technology was at the studio?
Speaker 5: I start making beats the first time I was on
Speaker 5: the DMX drum machine, just programming in the drum machine,
Speaker 5: and I was just picking up pops equipment. When I
Speaker 5: actually started producing was around the age of thirteen fourteen,
Speaker 5: and just being at the studio, I was like, man,
Speaker 5: I might as well give it a shot. So I
Speaker 5: asked my Pops and he was like, man, I'm not
Speaker 5: teaching you nothing, you know what I'm saying, Get the machine,
Speaker 5: figure it out if you want to do it. So
Speaker 5: I sat there and figured it out. Eventually the guys
Speaker 5: come to studio. He like playing some beats. This is
Speaker 5: around like ninety seven okay, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 5: and ninety eight, and I played them and they laughed
Speaker 5: at the beats. Deyla vout ten and t was just
Speaker 5: fell out laughing, and you know, they like these beats
Speaker 5: funny as hell. So after they leave out, you know
Speaker 5: what I'm saying, Dylan like, yo, man, let me show
Speaker 5: you some stuff. So he showed me, you know what
Speaker 5: I'm saying, how to work the three thousand.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 5: So I'm like, okay, So he like, work on that,
Speaker 5: and when I come back, I'm gonna show you some
Speaker 5: more stuff. I want to hear what you're doing. So
Speaker 5: he would come back in check up, Okay, what you got? Okay?
Speaker 5: This is how you work the effects in the three
Speaker 5: thousand to get delays and stuff. And then eventually, you
Speaker 5: know what I'm saying, Corrupt came to Detroit and I
Speaker 5: ended up producing some songs for Corrupt.
Speaker 1: How old were you the time?
Speaker 5: Fifteen?
Speaker 1: Wow? Okay.
Speaker 5: So when Dylan heard the beats that I did for Corrupt,
Speaker 5: he was like, okay, now you ready. And then that's
Speaker 5: when you know it just I kind of got in
Speaker 5: a mix with that and then producing a climax with
Speaker 5: Dylan right and mixing the record and all of that stuff.
Speaker 5: That's how I ended up at the video shooting with
Speaker 5: you all.
Speaker 1: Ah nice nice damn. So you were literally young RJ. Sure, yes, literally?
Speaker 1: So can you tell me how?
Speaker 3: And the whole process of making Fantastic one, because for me,
Speaker 3: the bomb at Dyla dropped on me was that he
Speaker 3: made the music for Fantastic Volume one. After the vocals
Speaker 3: were done. He was like, he would just do a
Speaker 3: high hat and you guys would just rhyme to the
Speaker 3: high hat.
Speaker 8: I would say this number one. It is what happened though.
Speaker 8: Volume one got done because a beat, a dumb beat.
Speaker 8: It was the group five Ella.
Speaker 3: Shout out to them and this saf i ella that's
Speaker 3: on all of y'alls on hey five Ella?
Speaker 7: Wait?
Speaker 1: Are y'all singing?
Speaker 5: Wait?
Speaker 1: Is this five four three two one ll thing again?
Speaker 1: Are y'all like beefing with each other on the song?
Speaker 7: Yes? Yes?
Speaker 1: Wait wait wait? I was only playing are you serious?
Speaker 8: First of all, every song on Volume one is me
Speaker 8: to talk about Dylan Dyla, talk about me or him
Speaker 8: talking about boxing.
Speaker 3: I don't even ask that question. I'm talking about other crews. Yeah,
Speaker 3: you guys are just basically using the microphone as a
Speaker 3: pulpit bully like method. Yes, yes, yes, you gotta give
Speaker 3: me specifics because when.
Speaker 7: Dylan saying, I'm still sicking niggas popping up in my crib, but.
Speaker 8: He talking about to announced the ship about me because
Speaker 8: this nigga he told me, he said, he'll tell you
Speaker 8: to come to his crib and then he won't ask
Speaker 8: it the dog.
Speaker 7: And then he's saying, I'm pumping up, but I'm not
Speaker 7: popping at the crib you're talking to. I walked over here.
Speaker 1: Never knew this ship like that.
Speaker 7: Man us to stuff like that.
Speaker 1: Yes, and so counterfeit. Niggas be running like, yeah.
Speaker 7: Come back, yes we That's all we did all day
Speaker 7: was talk about each other on the bus.
Speaker 1: You were lightly ranking on each other.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, you know, because that's kind of niggas.
Speaker 8: We was when I don't know why the fun I'm
Speaker 8: fucking with you, Well, that's that was a chick that
Speaker 8: the Deyla was messing with.
Speaker 7: That's that it was. It wasn't it wasn't, I ain't
Speaker 7: talking about it.
Speaker 8: But then by ten threw a couple of slick lines
Speaker 8: in there too, though A yeah, all we used to do.
Speaker 8: But like I said, it started off with a beef
Speaker 8: with them, and Dylan had produced a whole tape now
Speaker 8: Man you and came out with official nothing yet, and
Speaker 8: they was bragging like Dyla did our stuff before he
Speaker 8: did y'alls boom, So here come watch the hyping us up.
Speaker 8: The first song we're gonna do is players talking about them.
Speaker 8: That's the first song we did.
Speaker 7: Players.
Speaker 8: We were talking about them and this other guy from
Speaker 8: the old hip hop scene that I was talking about
Speaker 8: personally because we was dating the same girl, and he
Speaker 8: got mad and I tried to anyway, but yeah, something
Speaker 8: like that. So so that's how it all kind of started.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 1: After that, what is the seven eight eight.
Speaker 8: Seven eighty eight is our birthdays, So I'm I'm Dela's
Speaker 8: February seventh, I'm uh November eighth, and by Tennis March eighth,
Speaker 8: so it's it's just our birthdays.
Speaker 1: So weird, all right.
Speaker 7: So it was inspired by that. So we we did
Speaker 7: like half of the take to just clicks and then
Speaker 7: half we did beats. So I went off. But even
Speaker 7: with the beats that we did. He's still remixed. It
Speaker 7: wasn't the same either. So so that's how we did volume,
Speaker 7: and we did it, like I said, we did.
Speaker 8: It in a week because we had all these rhymes
Speaker 8: that we and songs, you know what I'm saying, just
Speaker 8: from ten years of being together. You gotta we was
Speaker 8: together for a long time before we actually came kind
Speaker 8: of out, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So what did that record? Volume went on? Because it
Speaker 2: sounds like y'all just recording on like headphone mic, like all.
Speaker 7: Type we recorded.
Speaker 8: We record part of it on hand phone mis we
Speaker 8: because we had two mics, and then we had to
Speaker 8: do part of it straight to that. So it's stuff
Speaker 8: right to that that mean one takes. That means if
Speaker 8: you fuck that, we had all over again, do it
Speaker 8: again because we're doing straight to that. Then we took
Speaker 8: part over to our ja's studio room once we got
Speaker 8: some time to do that.
Speaker 7: So it's all over the place with that. Yeah, that's
Speaker 7: why we had the role because we didn't did it
Speaker 7: like twenty seven times like oh fuck that figure?
Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean, but I enjoyed the process and when
Speaker 8: we made it, or we made it, if you listen
Speaker 8: to me at the end, I was like, Ooh, I
Speaker 8: already knew. I already like in the UH or one
Speaker 8: of those thugs, I already knew it was gonna be
Speaker 8: a classic.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 7: I was like, ooh, this is it?
Speaker 1: So question all right?
Speaker 3: I always wanted to know this, and I know I'm
Speaker 3: like asking you to remember like inside jokes from like
Speaker 3: almost thirty years ago, but so on fat Cats song
Speaker 3: or at least at the end of how We Bullshit
Speaker 3: after listening to this song for like twenty five years,
Speaker 3: I listened. I listened to UH Fantastic, like it's entirely
Speaker 3: last night for the first time in like maybe like
Speaker 3: maybe like five years, Like it's it's been a minute
Speaker 3: since I just sat down and listen to any album,
Speaker 3: and it's in its entirety.
Speaker 1: But it finally hit me.
Speaker 3: Am I correct in assuming that you guys, at the
Speaker 3: time that you recorded it, the Soul Train Awards must
Speaker 3: have just came on, because you're obviously talking about escape.
Speaker 3: Like at the very beginning, like you guys are trying
Speaker 3: to remember their name. You're like, you know the group,
Speaker 3: the sings get back you see LEXI, Right, But then
Speaker 3: there's a moment where I believe that you guys are
Speaker 3: mocking Color Me Bads first single of their sophomore album,
Speaker 3: Time and Change.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, that's true. That's true. Yeah yeah, because comedy.
Speaker 8: Everything was comedy.
Speaker 7: That is true.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 3: Do you remember the second album that Colored Me Bad?
Speaker 3: Did Fonte where timon Chance? Yeah, when they they decided
Speaker 3: to enlist Bootsy in the Pfunk All Stars as their band.
Speaker 3: Oh I missed that point, but it was really weird,
Speaker 3: like anywhere they were going, like literally like I'm looking
Speaker 3: at Gary Mupp and Walker and Bootsy Collins and Catfish,
Speaker 3: but just be side guys to call me bad, not
Speaker 3: like hey, like at least in Delight, like Delight was
Speaker 3: like yo, yo, we got run Bouc's robber band as
Speaker 3: our band. But literally I saw performance on the Soul
Speaker 3: Trade Awards. Finally I looked it up, and I believe
Speaker 3: that that's what you guys were mocking, because like, at
Speaker 3: no point, dude, did you guys think that that was
Speaker 3: ever going to get out or get back to them
Speaker 3: or anything like that.
Speaker 7: So I think I think we thought we was being
Speaker 7: so coded that people was gonna really be.
Speaker 8: Like, ah, you know what I'm saying, you know, it
Speaker 8: took me a minute as possible trying to be and
Speaker 8: that was and that was shout out to frank Nick.
Speaker 8: That was frank Nick.
Speaker 7: That was saying that too. That was frank Nick.
Speaker 8: Okay, so, I mean, like I said, everything was based
Speaker 8: on jokes comedy. I don't know why we decided to
Speaker 8: say that before the song that that we was getting
Speaker 8: ready to record, but we just.
Speaker 1: Kept it like, oh, okay, what was your level of
Speaker 1: shock that not only.
Speaker 3: Is this going to take off in your city, but
Speaker 3: at what point do you realize that this cassette demo
Speaker 3: might actually be not only hip hop's most important creative
Speaker 3: shift very quietly though, I mean not like in terms
Speaker 3: of Doctor Dre like turning the whole world around with
Speaker 3: the sound of the West Coast the g funk sound,
Speaker 3: but at what point do you realize that this thing
Speaker 3: is going to be bigger than just something local or
Speaker 3: something that's dope for hip hop, but almost like damn
Speaker 3: nearrow its own genre or a way of life, Like,
Speaker 3: at what point does that hit you?
Speaker 7: Believe it or not?
Speaker 8: Once we got that demo or that volume one to
Speaker 8: Q tips hands right, and he started calling this person
Speaker 8: and people like you and the people like yeah, Jelo,
Speaker 8: all of these people saying, oh man, that's what I'm
Speaker 8: looking like. Okay, these are people that I admire, you
Speaker 8: know what I'm saying, and I love their music. And
Speaker 8: that's when you know, Okay, we do got some legs,
Speaker 8: you know. You know what I'm saying, We got something
Speaker 8: to stand on. But you know how long that takes
Speaker 8: because it's word of mouth. First of all, you had
Speaker 8: to mail the tape.
Speaker 2: Remember, you got to add yes.
Speaker 7: Citizism. Okay, now you gotta wait. Then they gotta listen
Speaker 7: to it.
Speaker 2: Then they gotta play.
Speaker 8: Hey boy, y'all ain't in the same state. So he
Speaker 8: but you Tip single handedly played it for everybody.
Speaker 7: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 5: He did.
Speaker 3: I can attest that the first time I heard Fantastic
Speaker 3: Volume one, I was in Germany and living off of
Speaker 3: per diem and weekly stipend. So you know, like you know,
Speaker 3: to be a broke star musician living on about three
Speaker 3: hundred seventy five dollars a week on your own defin
Speaker 3: for yourself, and the temptation, you know, to pick up
Speaker 3: the phone to call the United States long distance for
Speaker 3: twenty five minutes right right. No, literally, like I told them,
Speaker 3: like set up a microphone to the speakerphone. I want
Speaker 3: to hear this whole entire thing that was.
Speaker 1: That was That was a one.
Speaker 3: Hundred and sixty eight dollars phone call that I could
Speaker 3: not afford. And no, seriously, I was like, Okay, I
Speaker 3: can live off of Pomfrets. There's a joke in the
Speaker 3: roots community Pomfret's buku tamat usually after midnight when bodega's
Speaker 3: or like those those like late night spots that are
Speaker 3: about to close, right before they closed, they might like
Speaker 3: sell the food for cheap. When you're touring Europe, you know,
Speaker 3: you'll go to the kebab dude and he'll cut off
Speaker 3: half the price. So I was like negotiating my meals,
Speaker 3: like I can live off of street street kebabs, buku
Speaker 3: tamats and pomfretes. And at the venue, I knew I
Speaker 3: was good for a turkey sandwich, like you know, they
Speaker 3: give you food at the venue. So nah, man, I
Speaker 3: had to starve one week for some village over the telephone, but.
Speaker 7: Thanks uh.
Speaker 1: But on the other side of things, so is it
Speaker 1: jarring to be in this bubble?
Speaker 3: That's so influential in which on one hand people are
Speaker 3: embracing you, but on the other hand it's almost like
Speaker 3: we get to sample and taste the nectar of the
Speaker 3: fruit before you yourself get to.
Speaker 1: Enjoy that.
Speaker 7: Well, it's it's a lot. It was a lot for us.
Speaker 8: Number one out the gate got We got kicked in
Speaker 8: the in the in the rump because Hugh to decided
Speaker 8: when he we did finally get him on the record day,
Speaker 8: he wants to use our record as a platform to
Speaker 8: leave the hip hop right.
Speaker 1: Anyway, when I heard that verse, I was like, wait
Speaker 1: a minute, Right.
Speaker 8: So guess what New York said to slum village boom
Speaker 8: you you got rid of try god class.
Speaker 7: I was like, no, I didn't. I just wanted the first, right,
Speaker 7: you know what I'm saying. I just wanted the first.
Speaker 7: I didn't know. When I went down there, he was talking.
Speaker 7: I was walking with Q two Donald Street.
Speaker 8: He was going to to Borrow's Pizza and we was
Speaker 8: going to some studio or something after that, and he
Speaker 8: was like, man, you know, I'm really thinking about quitting.
Speaker 7: Man, I'm out, and then he loops up the original
Speaker 7: hold tight.
Speaker 3: Spittney's sentimental lyrics it's something about this group that makes
Speaker 3: people want to you know, some some sort of ours
Speaker 3: is release that happens that makes everybody confrontational on a
Speaker 3: slim Village tote. Yeah, it's it's weird. So right now
Speaker 3: this is this is twenty five years of of of
Speaker 3: a legacy of of of of this brand, way of
Speaker 3: this brand name, a way of life, amazing influential music
Speaker 3: that I deem very refreshing. Can you guys tell me,
Speaker 3: especially in hip hop's fiftieth year, how is hip hop
Speaker 3: still refreshing to you right now?
Speaker 8: I'm slum Villish is a space where we're just creating
Speaker 8: whatever we feel that that's not in the market.
Speaker 7: I can do me like to the total.
Speaker 8: So because because the label situation ain't there no more,
Speaker 8: you don't have to nobody said, hey, make sure you
Speaker 8: do it hit single or you know, make sure it
Speaker 8: is nobody know, where's nobody coming.
Speaker 7: It's wild, wild West. Everybody out there with the pistols.
Speaker 1: That they like.
Speaker 2: Anything you can hit, anything you can hit.
Speaker 4: It don't matter what it is. It's just you can
Speaker 4: deliver it to the audience and present it in a
Speaker 4: compelling way. It don't matter if it's trap shit, boom bapshit, whatever.
Speaker 7: I love it. I love that West.
Speaker 8: Yes, I'm out there with my with my my pistols.
Speaker 8: I'm ready to go. So right now I'm having the
Speaker 8: best time of my life making music. Right now, slum Village, I'm.
Speaker 1: Just living in your heart.
Speaker 3: It's like the beginning, Like what what you feel that's
Speaker 3: dope and incredible for you in your heart.
Speaker 1: That's what you're given to the world.
Speaker 6: Okay, QLs listeners, this is sugar Steve. That's where we're
Speaker 6: gonna stop. Part one of this two part interview with
Speaker 6: slum Village. Check back next week or on your podcast
Speaker 6: feed for Part two of this quest Love Supreme conversation
Speaker 6: with T three and Young RJ. In part two, they
Speaker 6: discussed slum Village's evolution through the years, new music, and more.
Speaker 1: See you there. What's Supreme is a production of iHeart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.