Speaker 1: Question.
Speaker 2: Love Supreme is a production of iHeart Radio Sad Depressed,
Speaker 2: Getting Killed.
Speaker 3: Virum So Suprimo, roll called So three Sun Sun Subrivo,
Speaker 3: role called Supremo So So Suprivo ro called.
Speaker 1: Subrivo as you can tell. Yeah, we got ll yeah
Speaker 1: and for the first time in history. Yeah, my roll
Speaker 1: call fell subrivo called so.
Speaker 4: My name is Fante and my rhymes is vicious. But
Speaker 4: I'll also say yeah, pudding is delicious.
Speaker 1: Supprivo suprivo soun s brivo.
Speaker 5: My name sugar. Yeah, I need a beat, Yeah like
Speaker 5: Quincy Jones needs like.
Speaker 1: His feet up here? Bill, Yeah, back for more, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Sugar Steve, Yeah, happy.
Speaker 6: Port like yeah, more like Chris Robinson Yeah l L yeah, smoking.
Speaker 7: L L Yeah, I say bless up. Yeah, I'm with
Speaker 7: the tribe. This one's quest love.
Speaker 1: So so so.
Speaker 3: Supo Son Son sun Sel.
Speaker 1: Damn like you speaking what rhymes with Robinson?
Speaker 6: Smoking Son? Oh smoking.
Speaker 1: Level.
Speaker 7: We were both like, wait none rhymes and Robin we
Speaker 7: started with smoking son and Robinson.
Speaker 2: All right, okay, so look all right, all right. First
Speaker 2: of all, yes, we're we're live and lost Ange. We're
Speaker 2: taming Los Angeles with No No A C. But it's
Speaker 2: all good.
Speaker 7: Uh.
Speaker 2: This is the Quest of Supreme podcast of course with
Speaker 2: Fon Tickeelo, North Carolina's Finest Little Brother.
Speaker 1: How's preparations going for for with Charlotte Dave Riley. What's
Speaker 1: the Durham Durham made and Durham?
Speaker 4: No, it's going well, man, It's just you know, we're
Speaker 4: at the last kind of the stretch before we go,
Speaker 4: so you know, you know how I go.
Speaker 1: I mean a million to use the cross, you know.
Speaker 1: I and you're organizing it too.
Speaker 4: Yeah, not by myself. Okay, we have a team, but
Speaker 4: but me and Pool were overseeing it from tip to tip.
Speaker 4: Headaches out the ass get But it's going well though, Sugar.
Speaker 4: Steve House, how's life in jazz business? Everything's good. It's
Speaker 4: nice to be here. They don't let me have them
Speaker 4: Manhattan much, so it's good to get away.
Speaker 1: Okay, Steven Weed free right now?
Speaker 6: Bro?
Speaker 5: Yeah, there's that. There's that too, So I may talk
Speaker 5: more during this.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I was about to say, you seem very clear
Speaker 1: today for some reason.
Speaker 5: Took a shower.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, that's that's good. You've been released from Sesame
Speaker 2: Street prison. Yeah, where have you been at the Muppets?
Speaker 2: Been holding you hostage.
Speaker 1: Hostage. Yeah, I got negotiated out from Sesme Street and
Speaker 1: I'm here.
Speaker 5: I'm excited.
Speaker 1: Really nothing not, everything's fine. No, no, I've been driving
Speaker 1: my kids the volleyball. I was about to say, did
Speaker 1: the strike even affect Sesame Street?
Speaker 2: Not, that's that's what None of the muppets are unionized, No,
Speaker 2: they all it's they're free from that, which is good.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's that's good to hear.
Speaker 2: Well, as is this speaking of course, you know, we
Speaker 2: resolve to strike and you know who like wants me
Speaker 2: back at thirty Rock immediately like yeah, exactly, Like how's
Speaker 2: it going?
Speaker 6: I am going good? Now are we getting this week started?
Speaker 1: I was about to say, how long did it take you?
Speaker 1: Ritty and l story?
Speaker 6: First of all, shout outs to call you got a
Speaker 6: shout out to the people that make it happen that
Speaker 6: it took months, but it was so worth it, of course.
Speaker 6: But yes, it's the perfect way to start our adventure.
Speaker 1: With a legend.
Speaker 2: I've been having a what's what's the term a t
Speaker 2: d T tet A tet uh with with a very
Speaker 2: passionate I would say over zealous person in in in
Speaker 2: the I g d ms about how we always disrespect Yeah, okay, so.
Speaker 5: I it's not talking about her feet or anything like that.
Speaker 2: Right, it's an l a callback it is anyway, all right.
Speaker 2: So look, I'm gonna do this Stephen A. Smith's out
Speaker 2: because I'm world famous for the intros or lack of
Speaker 2: intros or the over enthusiastic intros. But I think that
Speaker 2: it's important that our listeners understand why we should address
Speaker 2: our guest today in terms of royalty without making him
Speaker 2: cringe or whatever. So basically, I will say, in the
Speaker 2: past seven years of doing this podcast, you know, we've
Speaker 2: had presidents and musical pioneers and actors and sports figures
Speaker 2: and whatnot. For out of nine Jackson's we've had on
Speaker 2: the show, Wow, But this is probably the episode I've
Speaker 2: been waiting for. I mean, from a guy that has
Speaker 2: co authored a song about hip hop being the love
Speaker 2: of his life, I will say that who better than.
Speaker 1: To have what I deem?
Speaker 2: Probably I call him a junior pioneer only because he's
Speaker 2: the reason why my definition of the pioneer never gets
Speaker 2: the glory. But it's the person that comes behind it
Speaker 2: that improves on the pioneer. Literally, our guest today is
Speaker 2: the reason why I think that because and I had
Speaker 2: to write this part down basically, you know at nausea
Speaker 2: that yeah, okay, Curtis Blow was the first goal selling
Speaker 2: rapper on a major label, but our guest today has
Speaker 2: improved on that twelvefold. And also he literally built the
Speaker 2: deaf Jam empire. Without his success, I don't know if
Speaker 2: there would have been budget or whatever for the Beast's
Speaker 2: down to public and me down, you know, literally built
Speaker 2: an empire. Not to mention literally so many firsts that
Speaker 2: our guest has achieved. If you want to say, the
Speaker 2: three minute rap song, the idea of course, the skit
Speaker 2: emotions on Wax.
Speaker 1: Whatever, true, I have my only pair of troops. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was gonna say.
Speaker 2: Smith him the idea of pivoting to something else besides
Speaker 2: wrapping the comeback the remix. Like literally I made a
Speaker 2: list and it was like over twenty but I would
Speaker 2: bore you all, and I know he's like, yo, I
Speaker 2: can't wait to get the funk out of here. Lad,
Speaker 2: please welcome James Stop Smith a l.
Speaker 1: Cool day to Let's love Supreme, Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2: You're also going to realize that the reason why we
Speaker 2: really haven't had our first true conversation yet. Was I
Speaker 2: was waiting for this play because I didn't want to like,
Speaker 2: oh my god, I didn't want to freak you out
Speaker 2: by like nerding out on you because I will go
Speaker 2: cuckoo for Coca puffs.
Speaker 1: But no, just save it, save it, save it for
Speaker 1: the podcast notes.
Speaker 6: Every time he thought that, well, why y'all want to
Speaker 6: every time he thought, I hope he took a note
Speaker 6: like yet.
Speaker 2: No, literally, he would come and out hide like I
Speaker 2: don't want to because I don't want him think like
Speaker 2: I'm ignoring him whatever, not return his phone calls. But
Speaker 2: I'm also the kind of guy that wants to know
Speaker 2: like twelve things about his career in a casual moment.
Speaker 1: And you know, I've always scared off many an R.
Speaker 2: That's hilarious that way. So on the road, yes, we did, yeah,
Speaker 2: oh man. And not to mention, I'm I'm back from
Speaker 2: camp cool Jay talk about yeah we got to hear
Speaker 2: about it. I heard about it, but talk about it.
Speaker 2: How the regiment put people tour. The tour was just
Speaker 2: it was rigorous.
Speaker 7: I mean, you know, quest worked so hard, man, I mean,
Speaker 7: rehearsing forty hours a day, you know, twenty four hundred
Speaker 7: hours a day just bringing artists in and bringing guests
Speaker 7: in and fitting them into the set, and like on stage,
Speaker 7: I would call him my general every night because he was,
Speaker 7: you know, just working so hard and so tirelessly to
Speaker 7: make it look effortless, you know what I'm saying, for
Speaker 7: the audience, and to make it a show where everybody
Speaker 7: could just come in and once they get in, they
Speaker 7: once they stood up, they basically never sat down for
Speaker 7: two three hours and didn't mit three four hours and
Speaker 7: didn't miss a beat.
Speaker 1: It was It was a lot of fun. It was dope.
Speaker 1: We put up.
Speaker 7: It worked. It worked. It works for real. We still
Speaker 7: got a couple more, but it really was serious. Like,
Speaker 7: so you did a great job on that, man, Like
Speaker 7: it was amazing. It was amazing, all.
Speaker 2: Right, So let me get to the nerd part. Okay,
Speaker 2: So without the usual rigmund like where were you born?
Speaker 1: On? Stuff?
Speaker 2: I actually I want to know what was your life
Speaker 2: like in nineteen eighty three, one year before you started
Speaker 2: your journey to your path, Like what was typically happening
Speaker 2: to you in eighty three.
Speaker 1: By that point?
Speaker 7: Yeah, So in eighty three, I was just running around
Speaker 7: the city networking with you know, other MC's and DJs
Speaker 7: and producers, and spending a lot of time in Harlem.
Speaker 7: I would go up to like see my man Silver Fox.
Speaker 7: He lived across He had a record store across from
Speaker 7: Grant Projects. This guy named Julio Gina had a record
Speaker 7: store on a label CCL Records, And I was I
Speaker 7: spent a lot of time in Harlem at the record store,
Speaker 7: just kind of holding my craft, talking to Fox about
Speaker 7: cadences and couplets and stuff like that. Like you know,
Speaker 7: me and Kouji Rapp would be like down at this
Speaker 7: place called Joe Grant one hundred tienth Street and Harlem
Speaker 7: rhyming together and you know what I'm saying, Me and
Speaker 7: him and Fox and you know that.
Speaker 1: So I basically spent a lot of time.
Speaker 7: And then i'd be if I was in Queens, I
Speaker 7: might be in like Herbie Lovebugs basement, you know what
Speaker 7: I'm saying, Like when he was like just making beats
Speaker 7: he had and he didn't have any records out or anything,
Speaker 7: but he was down there, like so we'd be down
Speaker 7: there and just hanging out.
Speaker 1: And you were born in Queens, No, I was born
Speaker 1: in Long Island.
Speaker 7: I was born in base Show base Shore, Long Island,
Speaker 7: and then you know, I would go back and forth
Speaker 7: between Base Show, Long Island and Queens and then you know,
Speaker 7: spent obviously most of my time in Queen's ultimately, but
Speaker 7: for many years I went back and forth, you know
Speaker 7: what I'm saying to school, So because we.
Speaker 1: Always hear the folklore of hip hop and.
Speaker 2: All the Bronx stories, the Bronx Monks, marks Monks, Bronks
Speaker 2: and all these tapes, tapes, tapes, how is the rest
Speaker 2: of the Burroughs getting spread of this creative pandemic?
Speaker 7: Like yeah, yeah, so create That's a good way of
Speaker 7: looking at it, right, So what happened actually is me
Speaker 7: being in Long Island, I was in North Babylon. I
Speaker 7: would go back and forth between North Babylon and Queens.
Speaker 7: When I was in North babylin next door to me
Speaker 7: was a bunch of foster kids, so a woman, a
Speaker 7: couple of them of colors, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: They had like five or six forster kids like in
Speaker 1: the house.
Speaker 7: And they were from Brooklyn, the Bronx uptown like everywhere,
Speaker 7: and a lot of them like my man Kenny from
Speaker 7: Brooklyn and Wayne was from the Bronx and Reynard and
Speaker 7: them were, you know, so I would hear all the
Speaker 7: tapes my manor Eric Ward and all them.
Speaker 1: They would play all of the tapes from the Bronx.
Speaker 7: So I was exposed to hip hop from day one,
Speaker 7: like I was exposed to like Flashing, the Furious Four
Speaker 7: and the Foursome Seas way early, like before the records,
Speaker 7: before Raptors, the Light, before all that.
Speaker 1: I was already hearing everything that was going on in.
Speaker 7: The city first before yeah, there was the Furious Four
Speaker 7: before they were the Furious Five. Yes, yeah, So I
Speaker 7: was you know, I was hearing all these records and
Speaker 7: hearing the Cold Crush.
Speaker 1: So I got into it real early.
Speaker 7: So at like nine years old, I was already like
Speaker 7: rhyming and trying to rhyme like those guys and trying
Speaker 7: to make up rhymes and stuff like that. So by
Speaker 7: the time I was eleven or twelve, I actually started writing,
Speaker 7: you know, at eleven or twelve, I started really getting
Speaker 7: into it. So that's why I was actually ready when
Speaker 7: I was sixteen to start death jam because I had
Speaker 7: already been doing it like like, you know, maybe eight
Speaker 7: years at that point. You know, at sixteen, I had
Speaker 7: already been in hip hop like eight years, like trying
Speaker 7: to you know, get good at it.
Speaker 1: Who was your north star in terms of like that's
Speaker 1: the MCI.
Speaker 7: Like it was a mix of all of them. It
Speaker 7: was a mix of all of them for different reasons.
Speaker 7: It was more like mixed martial arts than it was
Speaker 7: like one style. It wasn't just karate. It was mixed
Speaker 7: martial arts, you know what I'm saying. So it was
Speaker 7: you know, and funny, you know, I actually picked that
Speaker 7: up from Bruce Lee, you know what I'm saying, because
Speaker 7: G Condo was like the first MMA, right, Like it
Speaker 7: was the way of the intercepting fists and it was
Speaker 7: all about taking all of these very styles and putting
Speaker 7: them together. So that's why, like you know, early on
Speaker 7: I was able to do stories, love records, hard records,
Speaker 7: this and that.
Speaker 1: That's why, like I can do any kind of song now.
Speaker 7: So it's like, you know, it's like a guy on
Speaker 7: a basketball court who could play defense, who could shoot,
Speaker 7: who could go left, who can go right?
Speaker 1: Who could do threes? Who could dunk?
Speaker 7: Who could you know, like pride in myself and doing anything,
Speaker 7: you know, avant garde records like anything. So and that
Speaker 7: came from just listening to all of them, right, listening
Speaker 7: to hearing Spoony and hearing Mail and you know, hearing Mo.
Speaker 1: But then like in.
Speaker 7: DLB for different reasons, like in Tito for a different reason,
Speaker 7: like and pays for a different reason, like in JDL
Speaker 7: because of what he does, like in Ad for certain
Speaker 7: reasons like like a cast for other you know, like
Speaker 7: it was all these different people Shah Rock for the
Speaker 7: Echo Chamber and you know hearing like so it was
Speaker 7: all of these different people that you know, just kind
Speaker 7: of I just absorbed all of it, you know what
Speaker 7: I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Well, I gotta ask you now, did you ever in
Speaker 2: your wildest dreams ever imagine that, like one of the
Speaker 2: one of the pegs of the ladder of your whole story,
Speaker 2: that you actually go toe to toe with one of
Speaker 2: those pioneers like in the beginning.
Speaker 7: Definitely not definitely not man, Listen, you talked about Modi, right, Like,
Speaker 7: oh definitely not, of course, not like I love Mo.
Speaker 1: You know, I still love Mo. But you know it's
Speaker 1: like basketball right or boxing.
Speaker 7: I mean, you know, de la Joya had to fight
Speaker 7: Chavez like regardless, so you know that was just it
Speaker 7: just came with the territory. But I didn't lose any
Speaker 7: respect for him. I never lost respect for him. I
Speaker 7: never felt like personally insulted. Always took it as part
Speaker 7: of the game.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I see that.
Speaker 2: So, I mean I've heard Ruben's side, I've talked to
Speaker 2: ad of rock like them might be in NYU whatever.
Speaker 2: So first of all, how did you even have And
Speaker 2: we heard the story about like your grandfather getting you.
Speaker 1: What equipment did he get you? Exactly? You got me too.
Speaker 1: I wanted techniques, but you know my grandfather, you know
Speaker 1: I wanted technique.
Speaker 7: You know you're getting to Sheba's, right, Yeah, I got
Speaker 7: I got to to Sheba's and I wanted I wanted
Speaker 7: the Gemini he got me a uh.
Speaker 1: It wasn't a new Mark, I forget the name of it,
Speaker 1: but it was a different one.
Speaker 7: It had a crossfader and a a and a turn
Speaker 7: on it, and it didn't have a slide fada, had
Speaker 7: a turn knob on it. But yeah, so I had
Speaker 7: the mixer so you can dj oh yeah, okay, oh yeah,
Speaker 7: oh yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 7: I started off that way because see my grandfather, he
Speaker 7: was a jazz musician and He used to take me
Speaker 7: in the basement when I was laby six five sixty
Speaker 7: seven and record me like doing little jazz things, and
Speaker 7: he would like mess with stuff, and he had like
Speaker 7: a reel of reel and I'd be down there doing little.
Speaker 1: Jazz stuff and all that, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: So I came up listening to like Jimmy Smith at
Speaker 7: the Penthouse and you know, all of these.
Speaker 1: But then I'd be listening to Smothers brothers, like Comedy records.
Speaker 7: But then I'm listening to like So I I got
Speaker 7: exposed to a lot of different kinds of music, whether
Speaker 7: it was Miles or Charles, Charlie Parker or bird or
Speaker 7: Birdland stuff and Ella Fitzgerald and Duke Ellington all this
Speaker 7: stuff count Basi records, so I got and it was
Speaker 7: a lot of big band too, So it wasn't just
Speaker 7: the normal jazz. It was a lot of big band jazz.
Speaker 7: But I say that to say that's where I kind
Speaker 7: of got into it, you know what I'm saying. And
Speaker 7: then I ended up getting the equipment because I fell
Speaker 7: in love with it. Because I got hit on a
Speaker 7: mini bike and my grandfather wanted to keep me in
Speaker 7: the house, and it was a choice either money.
Speaker 1: No, No, it was settled.
Speaker 7: They were just trying to keep me in the house
Speaker 7: because you know, we used to have a mini bikes
Speaker 7: and all that with the you know, with the with
Speaker 7: the shoelace tied to the throttle with no brakes on it,
Speaker 7: just running around the block. And I got hit on
Speaker 7: one of them joints, and then you know, they was
Speaker 7: like my grandmother was going crazy and the neighborhood's talking.
Speaker 7: That was like headline news. And then so he got
Speaker 7: me some equipment to keep me in the house.
Speaker 6: Because its household.
Speaker 1: No, no, did they know what hip I was to be?
Speaker 8: Like?
Speaker 7: No, well, well, the only resistance came later when I
Speaker 7: started becoming professional, because my grandmother didn't really believe that
Speaker 7: it was real and she wanted me to stay in school.
Speaker 7: And my mother secretly had made a pet with her
Speaker 7: that she would let me stay out of school for
Speaker 7: two years because remember I dropped out in the ninth
Speaker 7: grade the store. When Radio came out, I was sixteen seventeen.
Speaker 7: When when it dropped the single, when the when I
Speaker 7: Need a B came I was sixteen Radio I was
Speaker 7: turning seventeen.
Speaker 1: I was around seventeen, because.
Speaker 7: You had a deal that you would secret No, my
Speaker 7: mother had a secret deal that she would let me
Speaker 7: stay out of school and pursue my dreams for two years,
Speaker 7: and if it didn't work out, she would make me
Speaker 7: go back to school. Because I asked her, I'm like,
Speaker 7: why did you let me do that? And she said,
Speaker 7: because you were really, really passionate about it. And I
Speaker 7: knew you were young enough to be able to go
Speaker 7: back to school, So that that was a she took
Speaker 7: that shot.
Speaker 1: I'm glad she did. That's I'm glad she did.
Speaker 5: Curious about your grandfather, what instrument did he play?
Speaker 1: Tenor saxophone? Played the tennis sacks?
Speaker 7: And so I used to, you know, grow up and
Speaker 7: just change learning how to change the reads and how
Speaker 7: to clean it, and you know, mess around with it
Speaker 7: stuff like that. Well you would play sax I would
Speaker 7: mess around with it, but nothing of any consequence. I
Speaker 7: mean I used to mess around with it, but nothing.
Speaker 7: You can at least play like love roller coaster. You know,
Speaker 7: you know, you know, nothing, nothing of any real consequence.
Speaker 7: But I but I did grow up around a lot
Speaker 7: of instruments. He would buy me guitars. I would break
Speaker 7: them and pop the strings and stuff like that, And
Speaker 7: it was just he had a love for music, and
Speaker 7: my grandmother loved music, and my mother wrote poetry, you
Speaker 7: know what I'm saying, so you know, and play the
Speaker 7: the accordion and you know, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: So we don't understand, like this makes sense exactly?
Speaker 2: How did you even haven't wherewithal to know that? Let
Speaker 2: me hand deliver these tapes. First of all, what's on
Speaker 2: the tapes? Are you just like freestyling and piece to
Speaker 2: president or like no?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 7: So I was about to quit because I couldn't get
Speaker 7: any make any headway because labels. A lot of labels
Speaker 7: were turning me down. Well it wasn't that many, but
Speaker 7: it was the first label you went to. I sent
Speaker 7: something to sugar Hill. I tried to get on sugar Hill.
Speaker 7: And when I started trying to get on sugar Hill,
Speaker 7: I was probably like fourteen, maybe thirteen.
Speaker 1: Do they know this? Now? They do now, you know?
Speaker 7: And so when I was like thirteen fourteen, I started
Speaker 7: sending demos to sugar Hill trying to get on them.
Speaker 1: They responded, though they were polite.
Speaker 7: They said, you know, we just want to inform you
Speaker 7: that we're not interested in your material at this you know,
Speaker 7: it was a standard letter, so it was cool. And
Speaker 7: then after that, I was about to quit because I
Speaker 7: had been trying since I was like fourteen years old
Speaker 7: and it had been two years and now I'm sixteen
Speaker 7: and I'm about to quit because I'm like, you know,
Speaker 7: it's just I'm not making any headway. And I had
Speaker 7: made a decision to go pro and be a professional
Speaker 7: recording artist. And so my mother, you know, she found
Speaker 7: one of the letters. I had balled it up and
Speaker 7: threw it in my room and she walked in and
Speaker 7: found it somehow and was reading it. And then she
Speaker 7: came over and she was like giving me hug because
Speaker 7: I was depressed. She's like, what's wrong, b blah blah
Speaker 7: blah blah. I'm like, nah, you know, you know I
Speaker 7: can't you know, I don't have no equipment. I can't
Speaker 7: make a good demo this and that. So she said, well,
Speaker 7: what do you need? And I told her I need
Speaker 7: a drum machine so I can this and that I
Speaker 7: need to beat. Yeah, I need to be exactly. And
Speaker 7: that was the demo. So I went out and I
Speaker 7: did a demo. She bought me a call drum machine,
Speaker 7: and I went to my man spin Master Fanessa's house
Speaker 7: in his basement and we played it manually because we
Speaker 7: didn't wait to want to wait to learn how to
Speaker 7: program it. So we just played everything manually and did
Speaker 7: a pause tape over dub and I made I need
Speaker 7: a beat the demo? What yeah, yeah, I made I
Speaker 7: need to beat the demo. But he didn't even know
Speaker 7: a sequence it nah. Nah, I just did it by hand.
Speaker 7: And then once I did it by hand, by feel,
Speaker 7: then I went back and rhymed to what I did
Speaker 7: by hand. And then I went back and my man
Speaker 7: did some scratching on it, and I went back. I
Speaker 7: just did it that way, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: And then I sent that in and uh, the rest
Speaker 7: is history. So ad Rock heard it. Ad Rock heard it.
Speaker 7: Then he took it. Obviously they had the real drum machines,
Speaker 7: you know, that took it to another level.
Speaker 1: Took it. Was a similar beat, but he took it
Speaker 1: to a whole other level. Him and Rick and you know, well,
Speaker 1: number one, do you still have those rejection letters? I
Speaker 1: probably do in my house, in my grandmother's house somewhere.
Speaker 7: Yes, I would say yes, yes, I would say, I
Speaker 7: would say, yes, okay, yeah.
Speaker 1: I got them.
Speaker 5: What about that demo? Did that ever come out?
Speaker 7: It's around, It's around because that's you know, it's funny.
Speaker 7: That's where where they got dropped, like you know and
Speaker 7: all that.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, because I did all that on my demo.
Speaker 7: Yeah yeah, yeah. So when the Beastie Boys did that,
Speaker 7: all that those little some of those little lines they
Speaker 7: did a lot of that was you know, based on
Speaker 7: the demo.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm saying, wait, while and while.
Speaker 2: I'm remembering this, Okay, so during the Grammy fifty celebration,
Speaker 2: I overheard this is what really made me run out
Speaker 2: the room because I didn't want to hear the story.
Speaker 2: Can you please tell them the story? And I'm skipping
Speaker 2: a little bit ahead. Tell me the story of how
Speaker 2: you named Chun King Studios. Oh so Chun King So wait,
Speaker 2: just that alone, like heed, yeah, So.
Speaker 7: Chun King obviously was owned by John King, right, so,
Speaker 7: but it was in Chinatown and I can never remember
Speaker 7: his name, and I'm like, so we just started calling
Speaker 7: it Chun King because it's a Chinatown and we used
Speaker 7: to get all the good Chinese food around there. We
Speaker 7: loved it, so I started calling the Chun King studios.
Speaker 7: I'm like, Yo, we're going to Chunk King. We're going
Speaker 7: to Chunk King. And one thing led to another, and
Speaker 7: John just named the studio Chunk King, and they just, yeah,
Speaker 7: it became it became Chunk King because we just, you know,
Speaker 7: we used to get Chinese food around there all the time.
Speaker 1: You know, it could have been that, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying.
Speaker 2: It could have been that, like when you get a
Speaker 2: call back from them, is this an instant Okay, let's
Speaker 2: make it happen, or like, are you going through the
Speaker 2: regular process of what the artist goes through.
Speaker 7: I used to first of all, after I sent him
Speaker 7: the demo, I would call Rick every single day for
Speaker 7: like two weeks to ask him if he got the
Speaker 7: demo yet, And sometimes he would answer, sometimes he wont
Speaker 7: he wouldn't, but I'll be like, Yo, Rick, you get
Speaker 7: the demo yet? Nope, didn't get it yet. Okay, you're Rick,
Speaker 7: you get the demo. I used to call him every
Speaker 7: day following up, like for like for like two weeks.
Speaker 7: Then when when he finally called me, called my grandmother.
Speaker 1: I came in the house.
Speaker 7: My grandmother told me some Rick calls I'm like going crazy.
Speaker 7: So you know, I called him from my kitchen. He
Speaker 7: called me, yo, he said, Yo, come down. I said this,
Speaker 7: He said, what's up? I said, Yo, what's up? Man?
Speaker 7: He said, Yo, come down. We're gonna make it, make
Speaker 7: a demo, make a record, blah blah blah. So I'm
Speaker 7: going crazy. And then I went down there and I
Speaker 7: made the first the demo. This first demo was called
Speaker 7: catch this Break and if you're looking for Jenna and
Speaker 7: make you ate by this record and catch this break, right,
Speaker 7: And so I took that, We took that, and he
Speaker 7: took that to Russell. So Russell was like, ah, it's
Speaker 7: the same old thing. It's the same old thing. By
Speaker 7: bye bye bye. So me and Rick went back in
Speaker 7: the studio and that's when he revisited the demo and
Speaker 7: we made I Need a Beat, and then we made
Speaker 7: I Need a Beat and that song just kind of
Speaker 7: they decided because what was happening was Deaf Jam Productions
Speaker 7: was having problems collecting their money from Party Time street Wise,
Speaker 7: the label that they were being distributed by, right that
Speaker 7: I don't know, but that was what Tela Rockets Yours
Speaker 7: was was Deaf Jam Productions.
Speaker 1: It was on Street Time Party it was on Party
Speaker 1: Time street Wise. That was the label, and so.
Speaker 7: And so they were having the problems collecting the do
Speaker 7: so they ended up making death Jam independent or turning
Speaker 7: Death Jam into a label because it was a production company.
Speaker 7: Then it became a record label with no distribution, and
Speaker 7: we made our need a beat, and then we made
Speaker 7: another song. I made my first couple of songs with
Speaker 7: no contract, okay, because I you know, I didn't want.
Speaker 1: Like like nothing was stopping me. Like, we'll get to that.
Speaker 1: It's it's it's called pressing up the records and putting
Speaker 1: them out. We did. We sold. Okay.
Speaker 2: If I'm a budding yard artist and I want to
Speaker 2: put out my own joint, how much is that gonna
Speaker 2: run me?
Speaker 1: It is damnly impossible. It was.
Speaker 7: It was just like it was almost impossible because if
Speaker 7: they were, there are too many other hoops to climb through.
Speaker 7: At that time, there was no First of all, you
Speaker 7: got to remember there was no access to information. You
Speaker 7: don't even have the access to the information to know
Speaker 7: how to go about figuring out how to make a record.
Speaker 1: Like then you talk about they know or are you
Speaker 1: there a guinea pig?
Speaker 7: Well, they knew to a certain extent because remember Russell
Speaker 7: had been dealing with Curtis, he managed.
Speaker 1: He hadn't had any you know stuff, but he had
Speaker 1: managed his groups running them.
Speaker 7: Had I think maybe one album at that point, right,
Speaker 7: you know, or well, yeah they have one album. They knew,
Speaker 7: but they I was a guinea pig in the sense
Speaker 7: of being the first artist on the label for sure,
Speaker 7: Like they didn't never had ran a label like that before.
Speaker 1: We didn't. You know, nobody knew what we would.
Speaker 2: But I'm just saying in terms of like knowing that,
Speaker 2: so there's four stores in Philly that I need to
Speaker 2: put this in armnds.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, No. They did a good job with that.
Speaker 1: We did a good job.
Speaker 7: I mean, I need to Beat came out, and you know,
Speaker 7: we ended up selling, you know, fifty one hundred thousand
Speaker 7: records independently, and then we put Dangerous out and sold
Speaker 7: a little less, but did okay.
Speaker 1: Creatively, when when you're making these songs, do you explain
Speaker 1: the process of how you and Rick are creating me songs?
Speaker 1: Like is he just like making a beat and you're like,
Speaker 1: I like that part and not that part. It's exactly
Speaker 1: what it is. Was, you know, pretty much through all
Speaker 1: of my music.
Speaker 7: But with Rick, what we would do is I would
Speaker 7: give him the basics of what I wanted to do,
Speaker 7: like the foundation, rather of what I wanted to do.
Speaker 7: I'd say, oh, I want to beat like this. I
Speaker 7: would hum a beat or a mouth a beat, you know,
Speaker 7: or something like that.
Speaker 1: Right, he would go. He would he would take that
Speaker 1: as the foundation. Then I would rhyme to it.
Speaker 7: I would you know, if I had most of the
Speaker 7: time I had rhymes already written, sometimes I would write
Speaker 7: to it.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. I'd write to it. I
Speaker 1: do that.
Speaker 7: Then Rick would go in the studio by hisself and
Speaker 7: play with a lot of different overdub ideas. He would
Speaker 7: go in and put surprises on it. He'd find guitar bits,
Speaker 7: you find horns. He plays stuff for me. I'd be like,
Speaker 7: I don't know about that part. I like that part,
Speaker 7: and he'd be like, okay, well what do you think
Speaker 7: about this part? I say, I like that, and he
Speaker 7: would go back. Nearly a collaboration.
Speaker 4: It was very much If you talk about that when
Speaker 4: you gave your speech, Yeah, when you got your I
Speaker 4: think it was a lifetime achievement.
Speaker 1: Award.
Speaker 4: It was Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, right, And
Speaker 4: you talked about like collaboration. Definitely, work with your producers, definitely, all.
Speaker 7: Of them, always, always, because you know, we change each
Speaker 7: other when we work together, right, So it's not just
Speaker 7: add water, it's but I like to leave room for
Speaker 7: the producer to do what they do, don't.
Speaker 1: I'm not a believer in bullying producers.
Speaker 7: A lot of people, as they get established, they put
Speaker 7: more and more pressure on the producers, and they bully
Speaker 7: the producers into a corner where they can't be free
Speaker 7: to create.
Speaker 1: And I learned early on working with Rick to just
Speaker 1: let the.
Speaker 7: Producer do what they do and give them opportunity and
Speaker 7: then see what it is and then work from that space,
Speaker 7: you know what I mean. So I always approached it
Speaker 7: from a place of humility when it comes to creating,
Speaker 7: all right.
Speaker 2: So the thing that I really want to know is
Speaker 2: and notwithstanding and I mentioned at the top that yes, okay,
Speaker 2: so full force comes in and does something unprecedent before,
Speaker 2: and they turn like the nine minute song, the ten
Speaker 2: minute song into like a four minute song. So who
Speaker 2: knew between the two of you the art of editing,
Speaker 2: Because even on the album credits, right, it says reduced
Speaker 2: by Rick Ruth. Yeah, so was it weird to you
Speaker 2: writing just sixteen bars and now you got to have
Speaker 2: a hook and another sixteen bars, because you know, before
Speaker 2: you rappers just rap for it forever.
Speaker 7: It wasn't weird to me because I loved Rick James,
Speaker 7: and I loved you know, Michael Jackson and Lonald Ritchie
Speaker 7: and the Commodorees and the OJ's, and all of them
Speaker 7: had choruses and all of them had songs and it
Speaker 7: was arrangements. So I was very comfortable with the idea
Speaker 7: of making songs, you know, and I knew the difference
Speaker 7: between you know, I knew what I was doing. I
Speaker 7: was very conscious when I would do a song that
Speaker 7: was a song or when I'd just be doing a
Speaker 7: thing where I'm rhyming, and I always understood the difference,
Speaker 7: but without.
Speaker 1: The standard of knowing like, oh, I need a hook
Speaker 1: so this audience gets me, or no, how do you know?
Speaker 1: You follow the light? You follow the light. You know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. You just get out of the way
Speaker 1: and follow the light.
Speaker 7: So you know, when you're making music and when you're
Speaker 7: creating something, you know, everything is now it's science and art, right,
Speaker 7: it's ourn and science and his soul land science right,
Speaker 7: and you have to remember both. And there's a time
Speaker 7: to get out of the way. There's a time for science,
Speaker 7: and then there's a time to just follow the light.
Speaker 7: And so, you know, with a lot of those songs,
Speaker 7: it just felt like that's right, that's it, you know
Speaker 7: what I'm saying, Like you know, I mean even years later,
Speaker 7: I mean Rick Rubin was like, you know, he was
Speaker 7: ready to jump off a roof about I need love,
Speaker 7: you know really, but yeah, but I but I wanted
Speaker 7: to follow the light.
Speaker 1: You're like, you're like that much put it out first.
Speaker 1: He hated it. He thought it was crazy.
Speaker 7: But well, it's a very soft record, I mean emotional,
Speaker 7: it's vulnerable. It's like the exact opposite. It's the antithesis
Speaker 7: of rock the bells, it's the antithesis of some of
Speaker 7: the other songs I've had done.
Speaker 1: So it was very different, you know.
Speaker 7: And but my thing was range and doing different stuff
Speaker 7: and following the light and trusting that.
Speaker 2: But the thing was like we really weren't stopped because
Speaker 2: you did. I can give you more and I want you,
Speaker 2: which we're leaning towards that.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's the it's the execution, you know, it's not
Speaker 7: just the idea, it's the execution. So the execution was
Speaker 7: a lot more romantic, a lot softer, a lot more gentle.
Speaker 7: I could give you more, you.
Speaker 6: Know what I mean?
Speaker 1: I want you because I want you originally was over
Speaker 1: in between the sheets.
Speaker 7: You were thinking of sampling back. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 7: wrote that.
Speaker 1: To in between the sheets.
Speaker 7: Ship m okay, okay, you know, and if you listen
Speaker 7: to it, if you put I want you vocals over
Speaker 7: in between the sheets, would have it would have been
Speaker 7: like it would have been crazy Jesus Christ.
Speaker 6: Like after I did successive, I Need Love. I'm so
Speaker 6: curious about everybody else's revelation because you already knew.
Speaker 1: How the depth GM field when they first heard it.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was Yeah, it was a
Speaker 7: great You had to sell it on.
Speaker 6: In the room.
Speaker 7: It just was like, you know, context is everything, right,
Speaker 7: So it's kind of like it's like seeing a basketball
Speaker 7: player after they've been wearing them tidy white forever and
Speaker 7: then the basketball player walks out.
Speaker 1: With the long shorts. It's like, yeah, what's that, you know,
Speaker 1: So it was just like very new. It was just new.
Speaker 7: It was.
Speaker 1: On you know, besides Faith knew men. There was no
Speaker 1: women in the room at that time. I don't even
Speaker 1: know if Faith was there yet. I don't even think
Speaker 1: Faith was there yet.
Speaker 7: It was more like Heidi Smith secretary, you know what
Speaker 7: I'm saying, like the receptionist. You know, they were growing,
Speaker 7: we were still we were still very new at that point.
Speaker 7: Because that was like I had only I was only
Speaker 7: one album. Men and Rick and Russell were gonna going
Speaker 7: through some things.
Speaker 6: But but radio must have been radio then, not the song,
Speaker 6: but actual radio that made I need.
Speaker 1: Oh No Exploded Exploded. Exploded. Exploded was one of the
Speaker 1: first rap songs I remember hearing on you No Exploded.
Speaker 1: That was one of the first rap songs I played
Speaker 1: GERI Exploded. So the way the way that records, that's hilarious.
Speaker 2: The way that records work is that you would have
Speaker 2: to put it out three months ahead of time.
Speaker 1: All Right is conk created real named Brian, Yeah j
Speaker 1: brother Philip. All Right.
Speaker 2: So I went to school with Creator's cousin, so he
Speaker 2: would always come in with almost damn near demo quality stuff.
Speaker 1: I heard like you can't dance. I heard like all
Speaker 1: this stuff on. He bringing a cassette whatever. He was
Speaker 1: like the popular kid in school, so he had a
Speaker 1: copy a bigger endepthor and I begged him again five
Speaker 1: bucks to double the join for me. When I heard
Speaker 1: I Need Love, I was like, yo, man.
Speaker 6: Zoom.
Speaker 1: Yeah, first verse read it was all good was number
Speaker 1: one for like month. That's hilarious for the first two months. Boy,
Speaker 1: I was the man.
Speaker 4: It's just surprised to me that that record that they
Speaker 4: didn't get it, because especially like with Russell, because what
Speaker 4: he was doing with you know.
Speaker 1: Well, I think ob R.
Speaker 4: I don't know if that was around the time that
Speaker 4: seemed to be alone in his wheelhouse of like the
Speaker 4: kind of R and B, you know, BR the.
Speaker 1: Original recordings, but that was magic and I got you Yeah,
Speaker 1: yeah that was later. That was later.
Speaker 7: That's when he got Rush associated labels and yeah, that
Speaker 7: was later.
Speaker 1: I thought they would have been right down his lane though. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean he was, he was with it, Russell was
Speaker 1: with it.
Speaker 7: But you know, you know, like you'd be surprised, man,
Speaker 7: like how many songs I have like that, Like there
Speaker 7: are a lot of songs around the way. Girl. They
Speaker 7: wanted to give up on wait what Yeah, because it
Speaker 7: was slow at radios. Radio was like resisting it because
Speaker 7: it was new doing it. They didn't want to.
Speaker 1: They was unsure about like Brenda's got a big old
Speaker 1: but yeah, yeah.
Speaker 6: They like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah they did actually.
Speaker 2: You know, so it is crazy because like I would
Speaker 2: think as an n R, there weren't no who I
Speaker 2: was gonna say, were you your on n R?
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was no an R.
Speaker 7: You gotta remember we you know at that time, you
Speaker 7: know in hip hop, there weren't no managers. I mean,
Speaker 7: Russell was the only guy that was even in that space,
Speaker 7: and that he got in that space later. So when
Speaker 7: when I first started, there were really no managers. He
Speaker 7: was a promoter, there were there was no an R.
Speaker 7: There was no industry. There was no hip hop industry.
Speaker 7: So so they you know, it's a it's a completely
Speaker 7: different type of mindset. Nobody knows anything now. Every you know,
Speaker 7: now it's like everybody can kind of come off like
Speaker 7: a genius because they know, you know, they got this
Speaker 7: Monday morning quarterbacking and everybody's Mogo and all this history.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was no industry, so you know, it's like
Speaker 1: no America. You know, it's just like you know what
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 7: It's it's like Woods, you know, it's very different like
Speaker 7: at that point, you know, you know, now we're like infrastructure.
Speaker 6: Was just that's not a thing. No more like your
Speaker 6: favorite producer or.
Speaker 7: Well he it wasn't. Yeah, yeah, no it's not. It
Speaker 7: was you know, he wasn't even known like that, you
Speaker 7: know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: So it wasn't he was.
Speaker 2: He wasn't known. It was he had one song with
Speaker 2: Tela Rock. This is a question I've been dying, dying
Speaker 2: to know. Okay, so it was eighty five and Rick Rubins,
Speaker 2: your producer. A year later, Rick Rubin's gonna helm the
Speaker 2: Raisin Hell record. So all right, just for my satisfaction,
Speaker 2: at any point while making the song rock the bells,
Speaker 2: did you ever think to use Bob James's Take Me
Speaker 2: to the Mardi Gras well the actual bells on it.
Speaker 7: I mean, that's really I've kind of got into this
Speaker 7: before with the story, but the reality is that was
Speaker 7: what the song was.
Speaker 1: Noway, no, it was take Me to the Mardi Gras.
Speaker 7: I wrote it to that, and Rick, me and Rick
Speaker 7: planned on doing it and then Rick did Peter Piper
Speaker 7: and I'm like, yo.
Speaker 1: Way, why didn't you win the tug of war Matt.
Speaker 7: Between Peter because Run DMC had a gold album. They
Speaker 7: were coming off of two albums. Two albums at that point, right,
Speaker 7: like maybe yeah, it was two albums and it was
Speaker 7: just a no no to no no. What it was
Speaker 7: was It's like it's kind of hard to like, look,
Speaker 7: Jay is from my neighborhood, like running them from my neighborhood.
Speaker 1: We all know, take me to the Mardi Gras. I
Speaker 1: can't really argue that, like they don't know what it is.
Speaker 7: I just had plans for it, and when Rick, I guess,
Speaker 7: you know, decided to you know, do that with them,
Speaker 7: and one thing led to another and they ended up
Speaker 7: with Peter Piper. But that's why I made two Rock
Speaker 7: the Bells, because that's why I made the original and
Speaker 7: didn't like it because it wasn't what I wanted, and
Speaker 7: then made the second one because I was changing Almos
Speaker 7: the B side. The original was never gonna happen because
Speaker 7: I was gonna do it to Marti Gras. I got
Speaker 7: it so once I didn't do it to Mardi Gras,
Speaker 7: I went in and we had to figure out another
Speaker 7: one I did. Originally I didn't like it, and I
Speaker 7: was like, this ain't good enough because I wanted Marti Gras.
Speaker 7: So then we made another song, the second one that
Speaker 7: everybody cuts up.
Speaker 1: How long did it take you to finally settle on
Speaker 1: the Trouble Funk Go Go version.
Speaker 7: It didn't take long. It kind of came together that,
Speaker 7: you know, God had other plans. They came together, well,
Speaker 7: they came together.
Speaker 1: It was all good. You know what I'm saying. You
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. I loved Listen, I loved I
Speaker 1: was just talking to somebody about that the other day.
Speaker 1: I love Go Go.
Speaker 7: Like when when Chuck Brown and the Soul searches that
Speaker 7: I'm bad over, I was like, Yo, that was crazy.
Speaker 7: I love EU, you know, junk Yard, you know what
Speaker 7: I'm saying, like Chuck, all of them, Like I loved
Speaker 7: the the Go Go scene, So that was always influencing
Speaker 7: a lot of what we did too, you know what
Speaker 7: I'm saying rhythmically.
Speaker 1: So okay, you.
Speaker 2: In all the first that I mentioned. You know, I'll
Speaker 2: also say that what's different about your success is.
Speaker 1: That unlike.
Speaker 2: Other pioneers, Sam Cook, Ray Charles James Brown, who kind
Speaker 2: of had to watch the and I'll say the alternative
Speaker 2: versions themselves blow up. I either Elvis syndrome, where like
Speaker 2: you really became like the first solo teen idol. I mean,
Speaker 2: you just got to experience stuff that neither Spooning nor
Speaker 2: Curtis blowing them.
Speaker 1: Got so in eighty five, as this thing is clearly
Speaker 1: going to be like.
Speaker 2: Important, what is stardom on that level like that none
Speaker 2: of your peers in hip hop or experience maybe an
Speaker 2: occasional run DMC will know it.
Speaker 1: But I think it's different when you're singular. So what
Speaker 1: is that like?
Speaker 2: Because I know by this point, because the thing is
Speaker 2: like you have a cool factor, a danger you know,
Speaker 2: I think rappers a danger of factor, a cool factor.
Speaker 1: And all the things. Yeah, and all that stuff.
Speaker 2: So I know that people are trying to insucubist manner
Speaker 2: like like just pull from your energy and so hey,
Speaker 2: come hang with us, come party with us too.
Speaker 1: You wanted to what is it like in eighty five
Speaker 1: doing what.
Speaker 2: I would consider the most not the botchers, but right
Speaker 2: that period of a lot of the botchery.
Speaker 7: So you know, it was two things. It was like
Speaker 7: when I'm on toring them on the road, like you know,
Speaker 7: if I go to a sneaker stores, like crowds of
Speaker 7: kids outside, you know what I'm saying, and you know,
Speaker 7: banging on a limo and chasing the limo, and I doubt.
Speaker 1: How long did it take for you to like, oh,
Speaker 1: I can't be normal anymore? Oh no, eighty five? That
Speaker 1: was pretty much the beginner. Yeah yeah, or.
Speaker 7: On like no hat, no glass, It doesn't matter. They
Speaker 7: know it's okay, yeah, okay, it was okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 7: Yeah, So they knew, they knew, and so it was
Speaker 7: that and then you know the other side was, you know,
Speaker 7: just I was in Harlem a lot when I was home,
Speaker 7: hanging out with you know, you know, all the guys
Speaker 7: that ultimately became the Payton Full movie. So so you know,
Speaker 7: it was like, yeah, you knew those dudes. Oh no,
Speaker 7: that was who I hung out with every day. I
Speaker 7: hung out with, you know, my man Chuck and Rich
Speaker 7: and I'll poem a Z. And that was where I
Speaker 7: kind of as a young man, those are the guys
Speaker 7: that were around me. They kind of like took me
Speaker 7: in and I had you know, I got rocked the
Speaker 7: bells out and running around and Harlem with them all
Speaker 7: the time whenever I'm home. And then I go on
Speaker 7: the road and do my shows and stuff like that,
Speaker 7: and that's where, you know, so I started getting the
Speaker 7: big cool j rings and the ice and the jewelry
Speaker 7: and the firs and that, and all the cars and
Speaker 7: the benches and all that. I was bringing all of.
Speaker 1: That hustler stuff to hip hop because that's who I
Speaker 1: was hanging out with.
Speaker 7: You were more Harlem home based than at that point. Yeah,
Speaker 7: I'm always Queens forever. I'm an always be a Queen's
Speaker 7: God Queen's by all means. That being said, I did
Speaker 7: hang a lot, you know, I formulated a lot of
Speaker 7: my you know that energy. I learned a lot in Harlem.
Speaker 2: So when when Queens is going through their first you know,
Speaker 2: for an outsider like me hearing the the Shan versus
Speaker 2: BDP war thing like which, now I clearly understand what's happened,
Speaker 2: you know, Shan's Like, I didn't say that hip hop
Speaker 2: started in queens or whatever. But do you feel some
Speaker 2: sort of way on the sidelines watching someone kind of
Speaker 2: go at queens when Queens had nothing to do with
Speaker 2: the battle or whatever, Like, did you feel at any
Speaker 2: point like let me step in.
Speaker 7: And no, because you know, you know, to be honest
Speaker 7: with you, you know, especially you know the mindset I
Speaker 7: had back then.
Speaker 1: He was smart to put my name in it and
Speaker 1: be complimentary on South Pronks. I totally forgot trying to
Speaker 1: take I didn't even think.
Speaker 7: About that, so so he you know, that was smart,
Speaker 7: you know, especially the way I was built my mindset,
Speaker 7: like it was best that that was.
Speaker 1: The right approach that kept me.
Speaker 7: So you did sort of feel like, hey, yeah, but
Speaker 7: it was but I was I was cool because, you know,
Speaker 7: instead of tied to take out else, I was like, okay,
Speaker 7: now that I mentioned it, I totally forgot.
Speaker 1: Did you pay attention at all to the Shan thing
Speaker 1: at all? Oh? Yeah, of course, of course. Are you
Speaker 1: ready to respond to that?
Speaker 7: No, no, because I didn't feel I didn't feel disrespected
Speaker 7: like you just talking.
Speaker 2: You know the record we never Lady Beaton never played
Speaker 2: that song in Philly, so I didn't know about oh.
Speaker 1: You mean with Shane when he went at me right,
Speaker 1: Oh no, I didn't care about that. Man. I thought
Speaker 1: it was funny, really, I mean, I mean a limo,
Speaker 1: you know, like it was hilarious, like.
Speaker 7: I'm laughing at this ship like you know, at that time,
Speaker 7: Come on, be like heat bite up. Okay, besides, I
Speaker 7: like the pattern though, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Besides, like you know, like the folklore of busy bee
Speaker 1: and mod like beef really really wasn't a thing. Besides
Speaker 1: like the rock sand.
Speaker 2: But for you, it's like obviously there's something in you
Speaker 2: that makes people want to like, Okay, he's at the
Speaker 2: top of the pile, so let me try and take
Speaker 2: him out.
Speaker 1: Like how how did that feel?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 1: Did you have a by that point? Did you have
Speaker 1: a not a crew? But I just mean like your
Speaker 1: native tongues like okay, well no, because like I told you,
Speaker 1: I was joe It on ecstasy.
Speaker 7: Or no, I have my dude, like I told you
Speaker 7: who I hung out with. So that was my mindset.
Speaker 7: So if anything, it was more like, you know, just
Speaker 7: making sure that I'm.
Speaker 1: Protecting my territory.
Speaker 7: That's the way I looked at it, Like I'm just
Speaker 7: not gonna let nobody step on my toes. You know,
Speaker 7: it's all good, but if you say something about me,
Speaker 7: I gotta I gotta you know, you gotta get this
Speaker 7: cause I gotta protect my territory. That's the way I
Speaker 7: looked at it. It's very simple.
Speaker 1: Now I see I know the history of it, but
Speaker 1: I never knew how the modem thing you started. Well, mo,
Speaker 1: the more thing.
Speaker 7: Look, first of all, I love them right, Like Silver
Speaker 7: Fox took me down to a studio one time he
Speaker 7: was down there. I started rhyming in the studio. He's
Speaker 7: he was doing doing a session or something. I think
Speaker 7: we no, actually I wasn't. I was at scratched that
Speaker 7: went to his session and we were watching and he
Speaker 7: kicked me in Silver Fox out the studio.
Speaker 1: He didn't want to sit there and all that, you know,
Speaker 1: Oh okay, so you know, but I still never said nothing,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. That was on him.
Speaker 7: And then he just decided I'm bigger and better than
Speaker 7: all this, you know, and forget about that.
Speaker 1: Put the kno on to the.
Speaker 7: You know. And that's when I just started doing, you know,
Speaker 7: going back and forth with him.
Speaker 1: But he was like in your because even then it
Speaker 1: was in my ear. I heard like I heard your
Speaker 1: response after the fact, like again, like who's in your head?
Speaker 1: I didn't nobody. I didn't need nobody to tell me that.
Speaker 7: It's it's kind of like, uh, you know, there's some
Speaker 7: people they just built to like they'll hide in the
Speaker 7: bushes and wait for you, and nobody got to tell
Speaker 7: them to Some people were built like that. Everybody don't
Speaker 7: need to be told stuff like I've never been a
Speaker 7: guy that I don't need you to tell me, nothing
Speaker 7: like like I'm paying attention.
Speaker 2: So it's like, you know's you a different animal because
Speaker 2: I'm s But then the reason why I'm asking you
Speaker 2: this because I think it's amazing vote for starters. You
Speaker 2: know when we talked about this briefly on the tour
Speaker 2: that you know, because I too was wondering, well, how's
Speaker 2: this iced teething gonna work? Like you know, but then
Speaker 2: I realized, like, wow, that's crazy. Like LL has amicable
Speaker 2: relationships with everyone. Clearly it was a sport.
Speaker 1: Oh definitely, I never ever ever.
Speaker 2: But we also come from a culture in which blood
Speaker 2: has been easily shd without even thinking about it.
Speaker 1: So let me let me tell you. I can explain
Speaker 1: that to you.
Speaker 7: So one thing I learned right and this is this
Speaker 7: is the honest to god truth by me hanging out
Speaker 7: with gangsters so much as a youngster, I learned that
Speaker 7: the last thing you want to do is walk around
Speaker 7: trying to be tough.
Speaker 1: That's how you get yourself in trouble, trying to be
Speaker 1: a tough guy. So what does that mean?
Speaker 7: That means that now, mind you, if somebody tries to
Speaker 7: do something to you, that's a different conversation. We're not
Speaker 7: talking about that. But I'm talking about the wondering around
Speaker 7: which your chest poked out. That's how you get yourself
Speaker 7: in trouble. So when I see mo or when I
Speaker 7: see it, it's not I'm not beefing, it's what it is. Okay,
Speaker 7: you said that, that's where we're gonna leave it at,
Speaker 7: and we're gonna leave you know what I mean, Like,
Speaker 7: it's not I don't have to get it, doesn't have
Speaker 7: to go further than that, because I'm confident in my
Speaker 7: skill set on the mic to handle this. Okay, that's
Speaker 7: how it felt, and I didn't see any reason to
Speaker 7: try to go further than it. Plus yeah, because why
Speaker 7: I'm not gonna test you as a man.
Speaker 1: I don't need to do that.
Speaker 7: I don't need to try to test ice tea as
Speaker 7: a man, or test mode as a man, or put
Speaker 7: them in a position where they got we gotta gotta
Speaker 7: go further, because then that's just that's kind of what
Speaker 7: speak to my weakness. It's more about like, Yo, this
Speaker 7: is what you said. Okay, so we're gonna settle it
Speaker 7: like this, that's where you want it now.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, man, and I wouldn't go go
Speaker 1: for everything if everyone else has.
Speaker 6: Followed to fast forward thirty or more years seeing him
Speaker 6: on that four store in the form that was a
Speaker 6: moment and also realizing that y'all have been these men
Speaker 6: who you are today longer than anything before being famous.
Speaker 6: So I'm so curious like in that moment, I know
Speaker 6: y'all greeted each other the backstage and everything, but did
Speaker 6: y'all have a moment of like damn, first of all,
Speaker 6: hip hop built this and second of.
Speaker 7: All, brother, yeah, I want to look. I told I said, listen, man,
Speaker 7: do what you do?
Speaker 1: Man. I told him, like, yo, Ice, get out there,
Speaker 1: do what you do. Remember, I'm like, yo, do it
Speaker 1: you want in this And Ice came to me like, yo, man,
Speaker 1: I don't want to do that. Like you know, I'm.
Speaker 6: So we'd watching him because he's too too olda to
Speaker 6: most people in real life anyway, So him do those
Speaker 6: songs is also kind of.
Speaker 7: Like but I loved it, like my thing is like Yo,
Speaker 7: it was like, that's why I still did I shot you.
Speaker 7: I still said crush crumb. I love him, but that's
Speaker 7: my man. I love Ice, I love him, but I'm
Speaker 7: gonna still do the songs like I'm not gonna respectfully,
Speaker 7: Like you always got to ask yourself this question.
Speaker 1: If you did then what you're doing now, would you
Speaker 1: be hearing now? I'm not. I'm not changing that.
Speaker 7: I'm not gonna be editing my songs and pretending that
Speaker 7: the song was something different because I've gone to a
Speaker 7: different stage in life.
Speaker 1: I'm not doing that. You know what. I'm doing the
Speaker 1: song miss right, I'm doing the song. This is the
Speaker 1: song now.
Speaker 4: I was so happy to see at the show because
Speaker 4: that first of all, that was my first time ever
Speaker 4: seeing you live, and so I was so happy to
Speaker 4: see you do. Jack the Ripper, I knew he was
Speaker 4: gonna do the hits. He's like, Okay, no, we're gonna
Speaker 4: get him bad. I know we're gonna get Mama.
Speaker 1: Said knock you out. But bro Jack the Ripper missed
Speaker 1: the good ball. I was like yo, I was like,
Speaker 1: oh this here we did Candy. I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: he that was for us that his filler is just
Speaker 1: as important. As the Hitle. Yeah, you said it.
Speaker 2: Also shout out to you know, the Z Trip also yeah,
Speaker 2: but you did say it. You guys both said it's important.
Speaker 2: It was important to do both, all right. So what
Speaker 2: I want to know is, uh, god, we're still in
Speaker 2: the eighty seventh.
Speaker 1: How did you meet the l A Posse? Right? And
Speaker 1: why didn't Rick produce the second album?
Speaker 6: So?
Speaker 7: Rick and Russell got into a beef over I don't
Speaker 7: know what it was about. Whatever it was, they started
Speaker 7: having ten in their relationship. Rick was angry and you know,
Speaker 7: somehow they separated or and Rick didn't want to produce
Speaker 7: it because of that reason.
Speaker 1: So it was political. It had nothing to do with me, mind.
Speaker 7: You we later you want to work with him, of course, absolutely.
Speaker 7: I mean it was a comfort zone at that point,
Speaker 7: you know. I mean we had just had this platinum album,
Speaker 7: like it was. Everything was great, but you know, politics.
Speaker 7: So it was time for the second album and in
Speaker 7: the LA Posse were working on records with another artist.
Speaker 7: In the records, was sounded like they were trying to
Speaker 7: make ell sounding songs. It sounded like they were making
Speaker 7: ll sounding songs to Russell. So Russell played, gave me,
Speaker 7: told me to get with them. And so I got
Speaker 7: with them and we started talking and vibing and you know,
Speaker 7: we were all you know, there was just some dudes
Speaker 7: from California, which I loved.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Now, how strange of an adjustment was that?
Speaker 7: It wasn't strange at all, because you know, my father
Speaker 7: had moved out to Cali and I had when I
Speaker 7: was fourteen, you know what I'm saying. I had been
Speaker 7: out there already with my pops a little bit, and
Speaker 7: so you know, getting with Bobcat and getting with Muffler
Speaker 7: and getting with all of those guys in California, I
Speaker 7: loved it. And they would take me down in the
Speaker 7: hood and all that, and you know, Bob Cat would
Speaker 7: have me down there over this set and all this.
Speaker 1: Oh man, it was the while out. So you know,
Speaker 1: we you know, I love Cali.
Speaker 7: So that's why I have such great relationships and friendships
Speaker 7: in California and so many, so much love out there.
Speaker 7: So my second album, This is eighty seven, I made
Speaker 7: him bad. I need love all them songs with Cali producers.
Speaker 7: So I was already kind of with like getting outside
Speaker 7: of the box. It didn't it was about the music
Speaker 7: for me. It wasn't about where you're from, because I
Speaker 7: felt like I was gonna write the songs and bring
Speaker 7: bring to it what I needed to bring to it,
Speaker 7: you know what I mean. So that was the vibe,
Speaker 7: you know what I'm saying. Wow, And we ended up.
Speaker 7: So that's when we you know, you had KD and
Speaker 7: Greg Mack and you know, you know, world on wheels
Speaker 7: and did you live out there? You just no, no,
Speaker 7: Actually I brought them to Queen's and they lived across
Speaker 7: the street from my grandmother's house.
Speaker 1: I got them a room and then yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: got them a room.
Speaker 7: And the lady across the street from me her house
Speaker 7: in the basement, so they was living across the street.
Speaker 2: You got to answer this one question for me, what
Speaker 2: is a recording budget? So Pots told me on tour
Speaker 2: the three ft Hind Rising was made for fourteen No No,
Speaker 2: No three Rise of May for twenty one thousand to
Speaker 2: save money because Possa told me that a Q tip
Speaker 2: verse got to raise from Afro Connections at a high
Speaker 2: five because Paul was trying to save two inch tape.
Speaker 2: So he told me dyl Sous Dead cost fourteen thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: What is what was a budget for a record.
Speaker 7: Back then, Well it varied, so you know, I mean
Speaker 7: on around that second album, I don't know, maybe somewhere
Speaker 7: between one hundred and fifty and two and fifty, okay,
Speaker 7: somewhere around there.
Speaker 1: It seemed like it was fairy for them. Correct. It
Speaker 1: was crazy, I mean it was, I mean it was
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, you get a bench for thirty
Speaker 1: g's It was crazy.
Speaker 7: It was you rocking like you are out of control
Speaker 7: with that, like you sky's the limit baby, whoa, we're
Speaker 7: in here now?
Speaker 1: Do you still own your grandmother's house? Yeah? So what
Speaker 1: is it about that environment?
Speaker 2: Because I believe that you said that you always write
Speaker 2: your best when you're in that environment, so.
Speaker 1: So you know, you know, my my uncle told me
Speaker 1: there was some magic there.
Speaker 7: So you know, I just believe if you're gonna if
Speaker 7: you're gonna write songs for people, you have to be
Speaker 7: able to relate to the people. Even even nowadays, you know,
Speaker 7: jumping in and out of you know, uber blacks and
Speaker 7: town calls or being fancy, you're not connecting with the
Speaker 7: world and the thing that you lose sight.
Speaker 1: Of all of y'all. Literally right, he's here.
Speaker 6: But I feel like maybe out like you.
Speaker 7: Know what I mean, that's about you, not about you know, gid.
Speaker 8: I so you gotta be a nice car too, by
Speaker 8: the way, very nice, very nice. I was like, yo,
Speaker 8: I gotta get one of them. That was very nice,
Speaker 8: very nice. Maybe quest got a very nice Maybe that's
Speaker 8: this is nice.
Speaker 1: Mean, that's just mean. K let him cook, let him cook.
Speaker 7: So I'm like, yo, so, but you know, I just
Speaker 7: I just feel like you got to connect with the people.
Speaker 7: And the thing you lose sight of is danger, and
Speaker 7: danger makes you write differently.
Speaker 2: Wait, did I hear a rumor that you once entertained
Speaker 2: the thought of writing at Rikers or some ship like, Well, I.
Speaker 1: Visited the jails a lot. I visited the jails a lot.
Speaker 1: I did. I visited the jails quite.
Speaker 7: But did I imagine that you actually said, like I
Speaker 7: gotta know, I would.
Speaker 1: Visit the jail and then go to the studio. I
Speaker 1: did that during the Gold album.
Speaker 6: Actually you visited the folks there and to somebody personally.
Speaker 7: Both I knew guys in that I didn't know it
Speaker 7: was in there, and just yeah, I went up norf
Speaker 7: Right now, I probably know half to do that.
Speaker 2: Joy Like three decades after there were three decades plus
Speaker 2: after the fact, do you find okay? So I understand
Speaker 2: that some might see and I'm not one of these people.
Speaker 2: As evidence of how many songs I'm trying to throw
Speaker 2: from from Panther in the set right, that people's relationship
Speaker 2: with Panther is different. After the fact that it came out,
Speaker 2: Light told me the story about your involvement with self destruction.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, and I didn't realize that you wrote lights
Speaker 2: verse and he told d nice like, look not for nothing.
Speaker 2: But when I come back, I got to come back
Speaker 2: on something. Yeah, so you like, can you tell the
Speaker 2: self destruction? Yeah, self destruction.
Speaker 7: So basically, you know, they asked me to be a
Speaker 7: part of the song, and at that time, I just
Speaker 7: didn't want to do it.
Speaker 1: I just didn't.
Speaker 7: I just didn't feel like that was the right way
Speaker 7: for me to reintroduce myself to everybody coming off of
Speaker 7: this record that had been kind of you know, panned
Speaker 7: and people sleeping on me and all that. But at
Speaker 7: the same time, I wanted to make a contribution of
Speaker 7: some sort, so I wrote mc Light's part, you know,
Speaker 7: Scott's table to raise a blade, tape.
Speaker 1: To your collar and all that. You know, Yeah.
Speaker 7: Yeah, So I did that for Light and you know
Speaker 7: I felt great. You know, people didn't know, and I
Speaker 7: was cool with that, you know what I'm saying, Like
Speaker 7: I've done that a lot.
Speaker 4: You know, saying the self Destruction joint that made me
Speaker 4: think the Heal record, the Human Education Against Lies, Why
Speaker 4: weren't you in the video for that one of those records.
Speaker 7: I was busy and then you know, I man, my
Speaker 7: schedule back then, you know, was different from most rappers.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: I was on a different level. Yeah, so I was
Speaker 7: on a different level. So I just was busy and
Speaker 7: I just couldn't do some things and I would say
Speaker 7: no to other things. And you know, I'm unapologetic about it,
Speaker 7: you know what I'm saying, Like it is what it is, bro,
Speaker 7: Like I did it many times, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like two years ago, I just someone's like, you know,
Speaker 1: that's not ll and no, it is, it is, that's you.
Speaker 1: That's absolutely me in the video.
Speaker 7: Absolutely then my listen, the real story is that you know,
Speaker 7: at that time, I was in I think I was
Speaker 7: in contract negotiations.
Speaker 1: I was midway through it.
Speaker 7: My father just who was my manager at that time,
Speaker 7: just absolutely did not want me in that video and
Speaker 7: just drove me absolutely bananas, and I said, well, we
Speaker 7: got to figure something out. So, you know, I finally
Speaker 7: just say, you know what, let's just just put a
Speaker 7: silhouette there. I do it for a silhouette because I
Speaker 7: can't play these guys like that, right, And so I
Speaker 7: did it with the silhouette, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: So that was my way of doing something for Confise,
Speaker 7: you know what I'm saying. That was my way of
Speaker 7: doing something for them, because my pops was driving me bananas.
Speaker 1: And yeah, what was that light having him as your manager?
Speaker 7: Bro?
Speaker 1: My father was. He was funny man. He was something else.
Speaker 7: He was something else because remember he had his own
Speaker 7: label before that, he had you know, he had a label.
Speaker 7: He's yeah, my father, you know, had labeled Sauce of
Speaker 7: ple Conte and records, and you know he used to
Speaker 7: you know, work with you know, different artists like the
Speaker 7: Coasters and different people, and he was, yeah, my father, Yeah,
Speaker 7: my father was a singer.
Speaker 1: He was a singer.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he's a soul singer. And so he was you
Speaker 7: know what I'm saying. And so, you know, but he
Speaker 7: was funny man. You're gonna get this kid his money,
Speaker 7: pulling out knives on the record company.
Speaker 1: These bananas. I loved him. I loved the man. He
Speaker 1: was something else. He was Oh he was. Oh he
Speaker 1: was a piece of work.
Speaker 6: Was He managed you until he couldn't anymore.
Speaker 1: He managed me until it got over his head.
Speaker 7: It just, honestly, it just it just to be honest
Speaker 7: with you, to give you the real honest answer that
Speaker 7: the the the career and the money that was the
Speaker 7: stuff that came. It got beyond his ability to handle.
Speaker 7: You know what I'm saying, And it's you know, I
Speaker 7: get it. You know, I gotta pay my taxes, y'all.
Speaker 7: My taxes gotta be paid. Like we can we can
Speaker 7: talk about all that tough guys ship he stops and
Speaker 7: equity are Did you pay your taxes?
Speaker 1: Like like, let's start there, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: So I gotta pay Yeah, I gotta pay my taxes.
Speaker 1: So I was like, yo, you know, I start getting
Speaker 1: little calls like how much what I'm asking him? And
Speaker 1: he don't worry about it.
Speaker 7: My bad wine from trading Joe's on the corporate card.
Speaker 7: I'm like, yo, come on, beat, it ain't that big
Speaker 7: of a deal. But it was just like, come on,
Speaker 7: you know, I feel I love him. Though I love him,
Speaker 7: he was a good guy. What up?
Speaker 6: Quls fam Okay, So I think this is the perfect
Speaker 6: place to stop Part one. Can you believe one hour?
Speaker 6: And we only got to nineteen ninety yep, believe it.
Speaker 6: But we wanted to take our time with this one
Speaker 6: cause y'all know this is years in the making. So
Speaker 6: come back next week or check out your podcast feed.
Speaker 6: Part two of ql Les and l L Cool check
Speaker 6: This one was definitely worth the way. Shout out to
Speaker 6: l L and make sure you stay tuned for his
Speaker 6: album The Force.
Speaker 4: Thank you for listening to quest Love Supreme. This podcast
Speaker 4: is hosted by Amir quest Love, Thompson, Boss Man, Laia,
Speaker 4: Saint Clair, So Black and the Black Myself, Fontigelo, Fonte Coleman, Sugar,
Speaker 4: Steve Mandell and Unpaid Bill Sherman. The executive producers are
Speaker 4: a Mere quest Love, Thompson, Sean g and The Unbothered
Speaker 4: Brian Calhoun. Produced by Britney Benjamin, my Dog Cousin, Jake Payin,
Speaker 4: My Motherfucking Man and Like It's Saint Clair my work Wife,
Speaker 4: edited by Alex Conroy.
Speaker 1: Produced for our Heart by Noel Brown and Mike Johns.
Speaker 4: Audio engineering by Graham Gibson akauble g at I Heeart's
Speaker 4: La Studio.
Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning in. Check us out next week.
Speaker 2: M's Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
Speaker 2: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 2: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.