WEBVTT - JT The Bigga Figga Talks Dame Dash Stealing & Much More 0:00:00.520 --> 0:00:03.000 We like to welcome you to another episode Against the 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:07.120 Chronicles podcast and I'm with my dog. Yeah, and again 0:00:07.240 --> 0:00:09.280 for like the umpteenth week in a row, we have 0:00:09.600 --> 0:00:14.520 our special guest co host journalists extraordinary Mster Soren Baker. 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:16.840 Thank you for having me. Glad to be here and. 0:00:17.280 --> 0:00:21.400 Live you know via saturllite San Francisco, not via satall 0:00:21.400 --> 0:00:23.919 like it's he live here in person. Say to you 0:00:23.960 --> 0:00:26.000 the bigger figure, the world's greatest hustling. 0:00:26.160 --> 0:00:27.320 Come on with it, Saluke. 0:00:27.600 --> 0:00:29.800 Happy to be here for sure, for sure, Man, do 0:00:29.920 --> 0:00:31.520 me your favorite brother, grab the Michael a little bit 0:00:31.560 --> 0:00:32.520 more towards you if you can. 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:35.120 We want to make sure we definitely hear and everything, 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:40.080 yes sir, yes, sir, make sure we're hearing everything you can. 0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:44.040 So you know, we've been talking about these top fifty 0:00:44.080 --> 0:00:46.839 gangster rap albums of all time. We would kind of 0:00:46.840 --> 0:00:48.600 put that on pause this week because we do have 0:00:48.640 --> 0:00:51.800 a special guest in the house. First thing I want 0:00:51.800 --> 0:00:54.440 to ask you, man, is where did you develop your 0:00:54.440 --> 0:00:54.920 work ethic. 0:00:56.720 --> 0:01:00.960 I'm born and raised San Francisco, Fillmore District. I come 0:01:01.040 --> 0:01:06.600 up under rapid fote hewmc as the forefathers in my neighborhood. 0:01:08.360 --> 0:01:11.840 Learning the independent game. Coming from where I'm from, I 0:01:11.840 --> 0:01:16.680 got to say two short e forty as the pioneers 0:01:16.680 --> 0:01:19.280 of I'm pressing up my own product and I'm putting 0:01:19.319 --> 0:01:23.520 it out myself. So that was my first example of 0:01:23.560 --> 0:01:26.360 my pursuit in this independent game was that I had 0:01:26.400 --> 0:01:29.600 to create the product which was recorded, and then I 0:01:29.640 --> 0:01:31.440 had to get the money to manufacture. 0:01:32.000 --> 0:01:32.800 Manufacturing. 0:01:32.840 --> 0:01:35.800 My first product was in June nineteen ninety two, and 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:38.240 I always remember the price. I paid six hundred and 0:01:38.319 --> 0:01:43.480 forty nine dollars for five hundred cassettes that were duplicated 0:01:43.520 --> 0:01:46.720 at this place called Music Annex in the Bay Area. 0:01:47.480 --> 0:01:52.240 And I never knew that manufacturing you can pay. 0:01:53.120 --> 0:01:55.040 But back then I wanted. 0:01:54.760 --> 0:01:58.040 A record deal because I thought the record label pressed 0:01:58.120 --> 0:02:02.160 up the tapes. I didn't know there was a plant 0:02:02.400 --> 0:02:03.200 that they hire. 0:02:03.760 --> 0:02:05.920 So I got that knowledge at a young age. 0:02:06.440 --> 0:02:09.160 So that was my first order pressing up my own 0:02:09.240 --> 0:02:12.799 five hundred tapes. At that time, a cassette tape was 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:18.600 ten dollars, so to make the inserts I paid maybe 0:02:18.600 --> 0:02:22.000 two hundred and fifty more dollars. I used the Polaroid camera. 0:02:22.200 --> 0:02:24.760 This is all independent, This is my independent beginning. When 0:02:24.760 --> 0:02:28.280 I seen that I did this myself, it put the 0:02:28.320 --> 0:02:30.520 confidence in me of what I heard eve forty and 0:02:30.560 --> 0:02:34.320 two sure doing. But as a teenager I paid for this. 0:02:34.560 --> 0:02:37.280 It ain't a bunch of tapes, but at one time pressing. 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:41.800 Four months later I dropped another tape, and this time 0:02:41.960 --> 0:02:46.400 it was fourteen songs. These fourteen songs, Now I had 0:02:46.440 --> 0:02:49.359 my big homie since I put this five hundred out 0:02:49.360 --> 0:02:52.240 and the hood messing with me. I give you the 0:02:52.280 --> 0:02:56.040 money to press up five thousand tapes. So the five 0:02:56.120 --> 0:02:59.560 thousand tapes. Now I got a full color wrapped in 0:02:59.600 --> 0:03:04.079 plastic cassette tape. I went to in a minute or 0:03:04.600 --> 0:03:09.720 Music People Distribution and then Walchers Zelnick at. 0:03:09.600 --> 0:03:11.119 City Hall Distribution. 0:03:11.400 --> 0:03:13.560 These were the two points that if you get your 0:03:13.600 --> 0:03:15.400 product there, it can go to the stores. 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:17.400 But before. 0:03:18.919 --> 0:03:22.000 Just going to the distributor, I knew where record stores 0:03:22.120 --> 0:03:25.080 was at myself. So for me to go sell one 0:03:25.160 --> 0:03:29.560 hundred cassette tapes for five hundred dollars, but I paid 0:03:29.639 --> 0:03:33.000 less than a dollar for the cassette tape, but to 0:03:33.080 --> 0:03:36.840 make five dollars per unit, So I'm looking at twenty 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:41.040 five thousand dollars potentially off of five thousand. My big 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:44.440 homie launched me probably seven thousand. I was able to 0:03:44.440 --> 0:03:47.760 give him back his seven thousand with another five added on, 0:03:47.920 --> 0:03:50.800 so he got twelve thousand out to twenty five. I 0:03:50.840 --> 0:03:52.760 don't think I made the whole twenty five because I 0:03:52.800 --> 0:03:55.880 was given some out. But the concept for a teenager 0:03:55.960 --> 0:04:00.320 to make twenty five thousand dollars legally, that is what 0:04:00.440 --> 0:04:02.920 I think stuck with me throughout all my years. That 0:04:03.160 --> 0:04:04.800 no matter if I get a deal or not, I 0:04:04.880 --> 0:04:06.160 learned the secret of let me go. 0:04:06.160 --> 0:04:06.880 Press my own. 0:04:07.400 --> 0:04:10.720 And then that same concept went to when I make films, 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:12.280 shoot my own. 0:04:12.120 --> 0:04:14.360 Film, and I got to print up DVDs. 0:04:14.880 --> 0:04:18.400 Back then it was dhs, then it went to DVDs, 0:04:18.720 --> 0:04:20.080 so it was like casseette tapes. 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:23.159 Then now a CD costs. 0:04:23.560 --> 0:04:26.840 In the store sixteen dollars, but to manufacture was a 0:04:26.839 --> 0:04:31.040 dollar twenty five. So just one thousand CDs is twelve hundred. 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:34.440 That's how we did our math. Like a drug dealer. 0:04:34.760 --> 0:04:37.000 Even if I don't have enough to press up a lot, 0:04:37.200 --> 0:04:39.719 if I need to pay my rent or if i'm behind, 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:42.880 I can remember I don't have a job, So let 0:04:42.880 --> 0:04:45.840 me make a new project and go just sell a 0:04:45.880 --> 0:04:48.839 certain amount of copies to get the money, and then 0:04:49.040 --> 0:04:54.240 a CD getting half the money was the concept. If 0:04:54.279 --> 0:04:56.920 I take it to the store, I'm getting eight dollars, 0:04:57.160 --> 0:05:00.120 so one thousand discs I can make eight thousand, and 0:05:00.160 --> 0:05:02.880 I'm selling my whole thousand pack because I ain't got 0:05:02.960 --> 0:05:04.919 no room no more to give them out for free. 0:05:05.200 --> 0:05:06.200 To get my name. 0:05:06.040 --> 0:05:09.560 Going once, your name once, you got just any kind 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:11.880 of fan base, I said, I could feed this to 0:05:12.360 --> 0:05:15.279 this population to keep some money. This would kept me 0:05:15.320 --> 0:05:18.120 from drugs, and this would make me have so many 0:05:18.160 --> 0:05:21.680 different albums and joint albums and compilations because every one 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:24.360 of them represented a certain amount of money as soon 0:05:24.360 --> 0:05:27.799 as I print them up, you know what. So that 0:05:27.800 --> 0:05:32.080 that uh that that hustling, grinding't do it your self concept. 0:05:32.560 --> 0:05:34.599 And I got to get credit to the Honorable Minister 0:05:34.680 --> 0:05:37.200 Lewis far Khin because he had the Brothers of the 0:05:37.279 --> 0:05:39.880 Nation and Islam coming out. And that's when I start 0:05:39.920 --> 0:05:41.839 seeing the brothers with the papers on the corner of 0:05:41.839 --> 0:05:47.159 the pies. But they will always say something about, uh, 0:05:47.600 --> 0:05:50.440 do for self, black man, start a business, black man, 0:05:50.640 --> 0:05:53.400 like you know, telling the young people that. But you know, 0:05:53.440 --> 0:05:55.760 we in the streets, we hustling. You know, I'm part 0:05:55.839 --> 0:05:58.680 time rapping. I'm still trying to sell some weed, you know, 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:01.000 a little potter try to make some coke into. 0:06:00.800 --> 0:06:03.200 Some rocks or something. But it never worked good for me. 0:06:03.560 --> 0:06:05.920 The music worked it good. 0:06:06.279 --> 0:06:10.119 I remember printing up ten thousand discs and I'm finna 0:06:10.120 --> 0:06:13.040 go pick up eighty thousand dollars. But this type of 0:06:13.120 --> 0:06:16.680 number in the streets for a kilo dealer, that's that's 0:06:16.800 --> 0:06:21.200 basic numbers. But to a teenager with discs, I'm going 0:06:21.240 --> 0:06:23.120 to pick up kelo money. R. 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:23.960 Kelo. 0:06:24.160 --> 0:06:26.839 Guys started to look up to me, and I'm younger 0:06:26.839 --> 0:06:29.960 than them, but they had kilo money. The benz is 0:06:30.000 --> 0:06:32.159 the plug for the powder packs and all you know 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:32.600 the weed. 0:06:33.000 --> 0:06:34.120 You know how ballers get. 0:06:35.640 --> 0:06:41.480 But that came a penitentiary time and the minister said, brothers, 0:06:43.720 --> 0:06:46.880 you are being used as a distributor for drugs. But 0:06:47.600 --> 0:06:50.599 instead of a kilo of cocaine, how about you cook a. 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:54.880 Kilo of yourself. Look at yourself as the kilo. 0:06:55.360 --> 0:06:57.520 That means you have to create a product that you 0:06:57.640 --> 0:07:00.839 can sell yourself, whether that's selling dimer And you know 0:07:00.880 --> 0:07:03.119 how to make your chicken or your fish taste good. 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:06.560 Some people have a barbecue grill that been having smoked. 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:09.920 It been ten thousand barbecues been in there. When they 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:13.320 cook in here, it have a taste. People buy that barbecue. 0:07:13.320 --> 0:07:15.520 They know when I buy this plate for the ten 0:07:15.920 --> 0:07:19.840 or the fifteen or the twenty. The same concept of 0:07:19.920 --> 0:07:22.720 making the album that I'm making in my mom house. 0:07:22.880 --> 0:07:25.520 In my bedroom, I didn't put my bed out. I 0:07:25.520 --> 0:07:28.040 don't have no furniture all. I got a studio equipment 0:07:28.080 --> 0:07:29.920 in this room and I sleep on the floor because 0:07:29.920 --> 0:07:32.920 I'm so excited that if this next album w't mak it, 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:36.720 I got access to make some thousands. So the concept 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:40.680 of just doing it yourself, I gotta say, Minister Farkhan 0:07:41.320 --> 0:07:43.600 and the brothers when I heard them say, instead of 0:07:43.640 --> 0:07:46.800 cook Aquilo of dope, cook aquilo of yourself, did you 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.520 know black men, brothers, did you know that you full 0:07:50.520 --> 0:07:52.960 of talent and all your ideas is the money? 0:07:53.000 --> 0:07:56.640 The money, not the money. It's your idea that's the money. 0:07:56.680 --> 0:07:57.480 It's the currency. 0:07:58.160 --> 0:08:02.720 Like literally that I say, damn okay. He said, do 0:08:02.800 --> 0:08:05.560 you know when you pray to God for something that 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:07.280 he might give it to you in the dream, but 0:08:07.360 --> 0:08:09.720 you still got to fulfill it. You might have had 0:08:09.720 --> 0:08:11.760 the dream of yourself seeing yourself. 0:08:12.240 --> 0:08:13.920 But now you might have to sleep on the floor. 0:08:13.920 --> 0:08:15.640 You might have to sleep, you know, you might have 0:08:15.640 --> 0:08:18.520 to h wise dishes. You might have to work at McDonald's. 0:08:18.560 --> 0:08:20.320 You might can't hang on the block no more. Wire 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:23.080 My dreams so important. I can't gamble selling dope right 0:08:23.080 --> 0:08:25.760 now to go to the pen in nineteen ninety three, 0:08:25.760 --> 0:08:27.680 you get caught with a fifty shot a crack in 0:08:27.720 --> 0:08:31.520 San Francisco, you could do five to ten years. When 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:35.560 when Bill Clinton and that Hillary Clinton made that thing 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:38.800 and something about from part of the crack or something, man, 0:08:38.880 --> 0:08:42.839 I said, I'm I'm out I could sell I could 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:45.240 sell a thousand dish and make eight thousand. Now that's 0:08:45.320 --> 0:08:47.960 ninety three, ninety two. I made my mind up when 0:08:48.000 --> 0:08:50.320 I made them first five hundred cassette tapes. When I 0:08:50.360 --> 0:08:55.400 sold that, and I probably made about maybe eighteen nineteen hundred, 0:08:55.880 --> 0:09:00.480 but I literally doubled my money right from my studio time. 0:09:00.679 --> 0:09:03.120 And then the fifteen hundred or the seventeen hundred that 0:09:03.200 --> 0:09:05.160 my homeboy gave me. Because I'm like, I'm not selling 0:09:05.200 --> 0:09:07.520 doughe I'm gonna ask somebody who got the money to 0:09:07.600 --> 0:09:10.120 help me to pay for my stuff. When I was 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:12.920 able to pay them back, then one of my other 0:09:12.960 --> 0:09:15.160 homeboys came and said, let me give you more money. 0:09:15.160 --> 0:09:16.960 Because I want to be part of your new album. 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:18.920 But I knew I want to be on my own 0:09:19.000 --> 0:09:23.679 label though, So I learned from Sugar Knight, Herry Go 0:09:24.880 --> 0:09:28.600 Doctor Dre. I looked at the components. I looked at 0:09:28.600 --> 0:09:33.280 the movie Crush Groove Russell Simmons. His brother is a rapper. 0:09:33.559 --> 0:09:36.319 He don't got the money, his family don't believe in him. 0:09:36.640 --> 0:09:40.280 But he brought five thousand from JB. But he didn't 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:42.440 pay JB back on time in the movie, and he 0:09:42.480 --> 0:09:43.240 was getting beat. 0:09:43.120 --> 0:09:45.520 Up onto the movie. So I learned from that movie, 0:09:45.600 --> 0:09:47.360 if you bought the money, you got to pay the 0:09:47.400 --> 0:09:50.199 money back. I don't know what he was thinking about. 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:52.720 They had already got some money. JB was like, I 0:09:52.760 --> 0:09:54.520 want to be part of the deal. Now I'm part 0:09:54.520 --> 0:09:56.440 of the whole thing now, Yeah, for sure. 0:09:56.600 --> 0:09:59.839 So the concept that's the movie that taught me get 0:09:59.880 --> 0:10:02.920 a money back. Mm hm, that's the movie taught me. 0:10:03.040 --> 0:10:05.160 Don't play with somebody who even trust you, even if 0:10:05.200 --> 0:10:06.240 it is a long shark. 0:10:06.360 --> 0:10:08.839 If you agree to the terms, pay accordingly. 0:10:09.040 --> 0:10:11.319 Because each person that gave me some money, I had 0:10:11.360 --> 0:10:14.280 to have a conversation and an understanding, and it wasn't 0:10:14.320 --> 0:10:15.000 on contract. 0:10:15.000 --> 0:10:17.880 It's whatever we say right now, that's the deal words. 0:10:18.080 --> 0:10:21.000 That's how going boy listen. So in my hood, I 0:10:21.000 --> 0:10:25.160 didn't do no plan, but I was trusted if JT 0:10:25.360 --> 0:10:27.959 need money for any one of y'all, could get JT 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:31.280 some money and he gonna bring back that plus some play. 0:10:31.559 --> 0:10:33.560 And I'm pretty sure some of them ballers up there 0:10:33.559 --> 0:10:35.720 and Frisco saw how you was just getting that money 0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:38.080 without the stress of text when you say, dope, you 0:10:38.080 --> 0:10:38.920 can't sleep at night. 0:10:39.559 --> 0:10:43.240 That's the part of the dream that I had wanting 0:10:43.320 --> 0:10:46.199 to be, Like, damn, I want to be like big Bro. Now, man, 0:10:46.200 --> 0:10:48.400 they got the packs, they you know, the money coming in, 0:10:48.480 --> 0:10:49.680 they got the guns. 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:53.240 Is yeah, they got everything that looked that be every 0:10:53.320 --> 0:10:56.000 nigg little nigga's vision in the hood. You see the 0:10:56.000 --> 0:10:59.200 big time nigga, it's like, man, shit, you don't be 0:10:59.440 --> 0:11:01.880 like I want to be the doctor, the lawyer or 0:11:01.920 --> 0:11:04.640 none of it. Like shit, them niggas down the block 0:11:04.679 --> 0:11:05.199 got it all. 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:09.520 That's exactly that, just just like you say, that's in 0:11:09.600 --> 0:11:10.560 every black neighborhood. 0:11:10.559 --> 0:11:14.199 Whoever was popping with the packs, and I won't end 0:11:14.240 --> 0:11:15.200 on that. I want to. 0:11:15.720 --> 0:11:19.320 But then I started to see the avenue of people 0:11:19.360 --> 0:11:20.920 that will say, well, I don't want to have to 0:11:20.960 --> 0:11:21.680 wait to hustle. 0:11:21.920 --> 0:11:23.560 I'm gonna break in a baller. 0:11:23.240 --> 0:11:26.959 House, I'm gonna break in this dash spot or he 0:11:27.120 --> 0:11:31.559 been fronting him, and shit, we gonna get on him because. 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:33.480 We know you getting it from him. That's the only 0:11:33.520 --> 0:11:34.559 reason why you got it. 0:11:35.280 --> 0:11:38.480 So that concept of breaking the house and find your 0:11:38.559 --> 0:11:42.200 riches and start your career. But there was groups of 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:46.120 guys and I never forget this made me don't want 0:11:46.120 --> 0:11:49.680 that life no more. A group of our young generation 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:53.760 sixteen seventeen eighteen, they hit a nigga that's probably thirty 0:11:54.080 --> 0:11:56.600 twenty eight or a little older whatever, but he got 0:11:56.640 --> 0:11:57.120 the money. 0:11:57.600 --> 0:11:59.439 Everybody know he brought out of control. 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:03.520 This group of seven or eight broken the spot, hitting 0:12:03.600 --> 0:12:06.560 for about folk kylos, about a hunting bands, some guns, 0:12:06.559 --> 0:12:08.320 some jury and whatever other little stuff. 0:12:08.640 --> 0:12:13.160 They get away with it. These dudes all go buy cars. 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:16.960 None of them had the money, and that it was known. 0:12:17.600 --> 0:12:20.160 These the dudes that did it one by one, he 0:12:20.280 --> 0:12:24.520 killed them niggas or sent somebody to kick however, went 0:12:24.960 --> 0:12:26.160 until all of them was did bro. 0:12:26.280 --> 0:12:27.720 This man killed all them. 0:12:27.640 --> 0:12:31.120 Dudes and the hood never you know, I'm pretty sure 0:12:31.160 --> 0:12:32.680 they family won't get back whatever. 0:12:32.720 --> 0:12:33.280 But for the. 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:37.400 Concept of man, niggas hit, but you hit your own folks. 0:12:38.000 --> 0:12:40.760 And I watched that man didn't sleep till all them 0:12:40.840 --> 0:12:43.760 niggas was dead. All them cars and jewelry they had 0:12:43.840 --> 0:12:45.480 because their name was pop. It might have been a 0:12:45.520 --> 0:12:49.400 little bit more because they always able to buy cougars 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:53.200 in and sky larks with candy paint. Now and niggas, 0:12:53.200 --> 0:12:54.920 where did you get candy paint money? 0:12:54.960 --> 0:12:57.560 How did you buy such and such car? So the 0:12:57.640 --> 0:12:59.480 word you know, it ain't no secrets in the street. 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:02.840 So all these niggas got money now, all of a sudden, 0:13:04.000 --> 0:13:04.920 one by one. 0:13:06.559 --> 0:13:10.319 That killed my thought process of because I saw a 0:13:10.360 --> 0:13:12.440 few niggas in my hood that I felt like shit, 0:13:12.559 --> 0:13:13.480 I breaking this shit. 0:13:14.120 --> 0:13:17.000 That ain't the move. So I stayed on the music. 0:13:18.000 --> 0:13:21.640 But I watched others hit licks and become, you know, 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:23.839 the guy that we wanted to become. They got bricks 0:13:23.920 --> 0:13:25.480 now or they got the weed, They got the whole, 0:13:25.559 --> 0:13:27.200 they got the druid, they got the cars, they got 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:30.240 the clout, They got the name buzz it, but the 0:13:30.320 --> 0:13:35.160 price tag for that. The music definitely kept me. And 0:13:35.200 --> 0:13:37.319 that's why I think I developed so much with people. 0:13:37.320 --> 0:13:39.240 Be like, Bro, you just hustling that nigga. I say, Bro, 0:13:39.280 --> 0:13:41.400 I don't sell weed. I don't sell pussy. I don't 0:13:41.400 --> 0:13:45.240 sell credit cards. I don't steal. I want God blessing 0:13:45.320 --> 0:13:49.720 off my talent. And sometimes you know, the hunger kicking 0:13:49.920 --> 0:13:52.600 and things ain't going right, and then that shit do 0:13:52.720 --> 0:13:53.240 look good. 0:13:53.440 --> 0:13:55.400 The other option, the other word, fuck it. 0:13:55.480 --> 0:13:57.760 Just sell weed. It's legal, yeah, but when you I 0:13:57.760 --> 0:13:59.760 live in Atlanta, you know what I mean? CALLI niggas 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:04.400 got in Atlanta bringing packs. The first five they bought, 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:09.120 it was good, the next five it was good. The 0:14:09.160 --> 0:14:12.520 next time it's ten, it's good. It's about to be 0:14:12.559 --> 0:14:15.560 a twenty five pack coming in. That's when they get killed. 0:14:17.880 --> 0:14:20.280 That's that's that's the way. And I'm pretty sure Cally 0:14:20.320 --> 0:14:22.240 niggas do them niggas when they come here and thinking 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:25.800 shit sweet or whatever. But the weed at one point 0:14:26.040 --> 0:14:28.760 was coming from right here, and one of them pounds 0:14:28.800 --> 0:14:31.000 down there in Atlanta was going for five thousand. So 0:14:31.120 --> 0:14:34.200 niggas saw that as the golden ticket and a lot 0:14:34.200 --> 0:14:35.200 of men were able to. 0:14:35.240 --> 0:14:40.760 Golden sick golden. It's always the golden ticket though coming 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:44.040 from here with the work, going out of state somewhere, 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:47.280 you can always double your money. So that that'd be 0:14:47.360 --> 0:14:52.200 the ambition of a nigga who don't, unfortunately have that 0:14:52.480 --> 0:14:56.360 talent to be an artist or whatever, you know, typical 0:14:56.440 --> 0:15:01.240 or basketball nigga or yuckball or whatever. Some niggas just 0:15:01.680 --> 0:15:04.920 and then some niggas don't know their potential. Like you say, 0:15:06.680 --> 0:15:08.880 some niggas just be stuck in the neighborhood because that's 0:15:08.960 --> 0:15:10.920 that be the life to them. You know what I'm saying. 0:15:10.920 --> 0:15:13.200 It is the life, that's the life. And shit, you 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:17.760 know a lot of us at some point, Uh was like, 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:20.360 that's the life for me to be the nigga down 0:15:20.400 --> 0:15:22.840 the block with all the work and like you say, 0:15:22.880 --> 0:15:25.560 the bitches and he got all the cars, and he 0:15:25.640 --> 0:15:28.680 and niggas got the nigga. Dayton's was fresh out and 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:32.600 niggas was on Dayton's hand paint. And you you, your 0:15:32.720 --> 0:15:35.400 ambition is to be that nigga. Don't fucking be no 0:15:35.720 --> 0:15:38.720 cause niggas, it'll be niggas in in your in your 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:41.840 click or your hood, whatever and they be like rapping 0:15:42.000 --> 0:15:45.960 nigga making music. Nigga better get with this hustling and 0:15:46.000 --> 0:15:49.480 its claiming the neighborhood and shit. So yeah, it's kind 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:53.840 of difficult to set yourself apart from you know, from 0:15:54.160 --> 0:15:57.760 from the typical als of of the neighborhood. You feel me? 0:15:58.560 --> 0:16:02.240 You know, go ahead, jayg No, That I was what 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:03.040 I was gonna say. 0:16:03.640 --> 0:16:06.760 I think I got very lucky that I always was like, 0:16:07.000 --> 0:16:08.880 I want to be a CEO. I want to be 0:16:08.960 --> 0:16:11.680 like shit Night, I want to be like goddamn Eat forty. 0:16:11.760 --> 0:16:13.480 I want to be like too short, I want to 0:16:13.520 --> 0:16:17.520 be like ice Cube. Because this is a reality that 0:16:18.160 --> 0:16:20.720 can happen if you pursue your shit. It happened for them, 0:16:20.760 --> 0:16:23.080 So it was like evidence you feel me. 0:16:23.320 --> 0:16:27.320 So then how did the vision expand from the in 0:16:27.360 --> 0:16:31.200 a minute city hall to trying to go throughout California, 0:16:31.360 --> 0:16:36.360 throughout you know, the Pacific Northwest. 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:40.200 At that point in time, you know, when cassette tapes 0:16:40.720 --> 0:16:44.880 CDs you could see the logo of the major label 0:16:45.040 --> 0:16:47.440 or whatever label, right, I. 0:16:47.360 --> 0:16:48.360 Wanted to have one of it. 0:16:48.480 --> 0:16:51.440 When I seen Eat forty slash JIB three million dollars, 0:16:51.520 --> 0:16:53.080 He's sitting at the coffee table. 0:16:52.840 --> 0:16:53.520 With his feet up. 0:16:53.560 --> 0:16:54.680 I'm like, God, damn it. 0:16:55.560 --> 0:16:57.360 But I end up doing a deal with Priority for 0:16:57.480 --> 0:17:01.560 half a million, with no marketing, no district or only distribution. 0:17:01.560 --> 0:17:03.360 And they just gave me a shot. 0:17:03.400 --> 0:17:06.960 But I was so young, I didn't comprehend the workload 0:17:07.080 --> 0:17:10.359 of having a national distribution, where now I got to 0:17:10.400 --> 0:17:14.080 have reps or some type of asset or communication with 0:17:14.119 --> 0:17:16.640 people in other parts of the country. But back then 0:17:16.680 --> 0:17:20.120 it was no Internet. It was no uh, it wasn't 0:17:20.160 --> 0:17:21.840 no Facebook or no email. 0:17:22.400 --> 0:17:24.520 You had to do that. 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:27.880 You had to work, and you had. 0:17:27.800 --> 0:17:30.120 To use a Yellow Pages and make a phone call, 0:17:30.400 --> 0:17:33.080 and if that didn't work, you had to call the 0:17:33.160 --> 0:17:35.959 operator and say, can you patch me to New York 0:17:36.400 --> 0:17:38.399 I'm looking for this record label or I'm looking for 0:17:38.440 --> 0:17:40.760 this record store. You know, can you tell me some 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:41.720 record stores. 0:17:41.440 --> 0:17:42.040 In the area. 0:17:42.640 --> 0:17:46.000 Man, that that workload is way different than somebody workload 0:17:46.040 --> 0:17:49.400 now posting something on their page and now it's you. 0:17:49.400 --> 0:17:52.919 You can get pre orders off of that from the 0:17:53.000 --> 0:17:56.200 world expanding and wanting that. 0:17:56.760 --> 0:18:01.800 Once I got that distribution, though with Priority, I felt good. 0:18:01.920 --> 0:18:04.520 Then I felt more pressure than I ever felt because 0:18:04.520 --> 0:18:07.919 I got the dream deal. Man, Doctor dre chronic album 0:18:07.960 --> 0:18:09.120 came through here you. 0:18:09.040 --> 0:18:12.840 Know nwa hes q all this shit. 0:18:12.960 --> 0:18:16.919 You feel Me jay Z when I signed, he signed 0:18:16.960 --> 0:18:20.320 through a company called Freeze. It wasn't even Rockefeller Records. 0:18:20.320 --> 0:18:24.320 It was Freeze through Priority. It didn't even say Rockefeller 0:18:24.359 --> 0:18:28.520 on it. And I remember him and Dame Dash's first 0:18:28.520 --> 0:18:31.879 show was in film and I got that footage and 0:18:31.920 --> 0:18:34.119 I just when I look at it and see the 0:18:34.160 --> 0:18:36.800 little ass chain, just the beginning they trying to get 0:18:36.840 --> 0:18:43.680 on you feel me our conversation. When that didn't go right, 0:18:44.080 --> 0:18:46.639 I was forced to go back to what people expected 0:18:46.680 --> 0:18:50.720 of me, JT, the bigger figure Independent. So now I'm 0:18:50.800 --> 0:18:53.119 back in what I said that I wanted in the 0:18:53.160 --> 0:18:56.480 first place, but now I'm actually stuck in it. But 0:18:56.720 --> 0:18:59.520 I never lost the drive, So I continue to do 0:18:59.600 --> 0:19:04.800 different type of products, joint albums, everything, independent, whatever type 0:19:04.800 --> 0:19:08.479 of collaboration, compilation. Then I start spinning over to the 0:19:08.520 --> 0:19:13.240 movies when I see going doing movies in CALLI okay. 0:19:13.240 --> 0:19:14.600 It was a little baby impact. 0:19:14.680 --> 0:19:15.920 It was a matter of fact, it was a big 0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:18.320 impact because master P came out when I'm about it, 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:21.040 and then I came out with be Where Those a 0:19:21.080 --> 0:19:25.720 few months later and that was the first hip hop 0:19:25.840 --> 0:19:32.040 rap movie with a rapper from the Bay. Then moving 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:35.880 to Atlanta some years later and making movies down there. 0:19:36.960 --> 0:19:39.320 That's when I got to feel like a movie star 0:19:39.440 --> 0:19:43.720 because bootlegging movies down there. They still had stores, but 0:19:43.920 --> 0:19:45.440 they were bootleg stores. 0:19:46.040 --> 0:19:47.480 Some guy that got all the. 0:19:47.520 --> 0:19:50.160 Movies and DVDs up in here and all the albums, 0:19:50.200 --> 0:19:52.440 some of them bootlegs, some of them got plastic on it. 0:19:52.560 --> 0:19:56.000 But he got his own burning machine right there. Any 0:19:56.040 --> 0:19:58.800 album you want, he can make it right on the spot. 0:19:58.960 --> 0:20:01.000 So when I would make my films at first, I 0:20:01.080 --> 0:20:04.920 was trying to sell them to the stores. Right I 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:06.840 would come to the store, they got all my movies 0:20:06.880 --> 0:20:10.400