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Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.

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Speaker 1: My guest today is New York Times reporter Joe Coscarelli.

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Speaker 1: You've got a great new book, Rack Capital in Atlanta Story. Joe,

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Speaker 1: Why the book? What inspired you? You know, Bob, this

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Speaker 1: book really came out of my reporting at the Times. Right.

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Speaker 1: I'm I'm the music reporter here in the culture section.

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Speaker 1: I started in late you know, the sort of dawn

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Speaker 1: really of the streaming era, right. And and one of

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Speaker 1: the stories I kept coming back to, uh, you know

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Speaker 1: in my time as the beat reporter was rapp in Atlanta. Right.

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Speaker 1: I did an early story on artist by the name

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Speaker 1: of Little Yachti. UM that was actually a men's style

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Speaker 1: cover because he was, you know, sort of moving through

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Speaker 1: the fashion and influencer world at the beginning. Even more

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Speaker 1: southern music. UM. I did an early story, UM when

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Speaker 1: me Goos hit number one with Bad Embugie UM their

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Speaker 1: album Culture. I profiled them on that album. I around

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Speaker 1: the same time, you know, I did a story on

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Speaker 1: this label Quality Control U down there that was you know,

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Speaker 1: both Yaddi and and me Goos came from that label

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Speaker 1: and they were sort of the homegrown talent incubators of

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Speaker 1: the moment in Atlanta. And you know, just over and

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Speaker 1: over again, you would see as streaming sort of you know,

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Speaker 1: knocked down these walls, Uh, the for what kind of

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Speaker 1: music people really wanted to hear write. Billboard charts were

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Speaker 1: changing as a result of of YouTube and and Spotify

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Speaker 1: and Apple Music. Uh, and always bubbling to the top

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Speaker 1: where these sort of you know, very raw Southern rap

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Speaker 1: albums and songs. And this is something I grew up

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Speaker 1: on as well. This is the kind of music I

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Speaker 1: listened to when I was younger, growing up in the South. Um.

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Speaker 1: And so the combination of that with my Times reporting,

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Speaker 1: I was just coming into contact with all of these characters, uh,

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Speaker 1: these labels, these sounds, and and it was just over

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Speaker 1: and over again. And you know, I had a I

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Speaker 1: had an agent and and a book editor. Uh we

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Speaker 1: can get into that. He published Gucci Main's autobiography. Um.

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Speaker 1: The the editor who ended up acquiring this book. And

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Speaker 1: you know, they kept asking me what kind of book

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Speaker 1: I wanted to write. Rap music was something that was

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Speaker 1: obviously in the conversation, but I never really found the

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Speaker 1: right story. And after a handful of these Atlanta stories,

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Speaker 1: you know, they both came to me and they said this, like,

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Speaker 1: this is this is the book. Okay, So actually they

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Speaker 1: were looking unlike the usual story where an author is

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Speaker 1: pushing the book, you already had a relationship, and it

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Speaker 1: was their idea that they should be the book. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I think that's right. You know, I I have been thinking,

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Speaker 1: you know, is a book the next step in my career? Uh?

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Speaker 1: You know, I, like I said, I started at the Times.

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Speaker 1: So now it's been almost eight years. Uh, this was

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Speaker 1: somewhere in the middle of this book was a really

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Speaker 1: long reporting process us. Um. But you know they they

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Speaker 1: saw a book in me before I saw a book

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Speaker 1: in me, I think, um. And it took some convincing honestly,

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Speaker 1: Like I wasn't sure what the story was, and I

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Speaker 1: didn't want to just retread the reporting I had already done. Um.

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Speaker 1: And I didn't want to just write a music book, right.

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Speaker 1: I didn't just want to write an unauthorized biography of

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Speaker 1: of an artist, which I think, you know, there's a

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Speaker 1: place for those, but that's you know, the music bookshelves

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Speaker 1: in in in any store are sort of overrun with

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Speaker 1: that sort of run of the mill like cradle to

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Speaker 1: grave story and so you know, I I wanted to

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Speaker 1: do something different. Um. I wanted to do a lot

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Speaker 1: of reporting, That's what I what I really like to do. UM.

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Speaker 1: And I wanted to track a story in real time.

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Speaker 1: So I think, uh, you know, a lot of a

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Speaker 1: lot of what ended up becoming the book was because

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Speaker 1: I wanted to to take what I had done in

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Speaker 1: the Times and then sort of spin it into something

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Speaker 1: that I could be along for, right. I wanted to

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Speaker 1: be along for the ride. And and I think that's

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Speaker 1: a through line that runs, uh through a lot of

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Speaker 1: the reporting I do at the Times. I like to

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Speaker 1: find people at the beginning of their career and and

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Speaker 1: see where it goes, whether it's you know, to the

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Speaker 1: top of the charts, or it's sort of founders like

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Speaker 1: I think both can be equally interesting. Now there's a

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Speaker 1: lot of reporting on the hip hop scene. And when

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Speaker 1: you wrote your first articles about Luyahti and quality control,

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Speaker 1: was there so much information in the pipeline that you

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Speaker 1: were up to speed or did this require reporting and

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Speaker 1: deep reporting by yourself? You know, there's a lot of

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Speaker 1: really good background, right like the Wrap reporting throughout the

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Speaker 1: nineties and early two thousand's. Uh, it is invaluable. Um,

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Speaker 1: you know, thinking of the Village Voice, thinking of double

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Speaker 1: XL later on the Fader. Uh. You know, ton of

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Speaker 1: ton of websites really covering regional scenes. But there's something

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Speaker 1: about hip hop media. I think that's a has been

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Speaker 1: very ephemeral um And and this goes for the music

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Speaker 1: as well, Right, there are hundreds thousands of mixtapes that

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Speaker 1: are sort of lost to time because they exist in

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Speaker 1: this liminal space between legality and illegality. Um. And I

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Speaker 1: think a lot of hip hop media has has followed

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Speaker 1: that path. You know, given how popular as music is, um,

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Speaker 1: how important these artists are, how interesting their their biographies

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Speaker 1: and their stories are, there's a sort of a real

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Speaker 1: dearth of serious reporting on these subjects. So you could

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Speaker 1: piece stuff together here and there, you know, YouTube and

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Speaker 1: invaluable resource, I think when it comes to comes to

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Speaker 1: rap music, um and so you know, you could you

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Speaker 1: could sort of piece things together, um, but there wasn't

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Speaker 1: a ton of extremely in depth, extremely rigorous journalism on

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Speaker 1: these subjects. Um. You know, they're a handful of books

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Speaker 1: as I started the research process. Um. But a lot

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Speaker 1: of these guys also become famous really quickly. Right, So

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Speaker 1: when I'm profiling Little Yati and sixteen whatever it was. Uh,

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Speaker 1: you know he he had been just a normal college

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Speaker 1: kid right like a few months prior, so, you know,

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Speaker 1: he had he had done a few quick hits here

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Speaker 1: and there. But the ability to spend a lot of

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Speaker 1: time with these people and put a lot of resources

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Speaker 1: into these stories and not just do a fifteen minute

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Speaker 1: phoner or you know, a twenty minute radio station interview

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Speaker 1: like that. That's the benefit that comes I think with

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Speaker 1: being somewhere like the New York Times where we're gonna,

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Speaker 1: you know, we're gonna put serious resources, serious time and

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Speaker 1: energy into these stories that you know, I think, especially

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Speaker 1: as in the culture section, in the music section, are

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Speaker 1: just as important as anything else the paper covers um

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Speaker 1: and we're going to bring that level of of rigor

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Speaker 1: to it. I hope, Okay. I found out about Little

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Speaker 1: Yati and Quality Control and Coach K from Steve Barnett,

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Speaker 1: who ran Capital Records until recently. I was completely out

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Speaker 1: of a loop. How Little Yadi start to fly on

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Speaker 1: your radar? When was it a story? And how did

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Speaker 1: you report the story? So Yadi was a Yeah, he's

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Speaker 1: a funny one because he's a sort of anomaly even

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Speaker 1: within the label. Right. Yadi grew up in the suburbs

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Speaker 1: of Atlanta. His dad, Shannon, was a famous hip hop

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Speaker 1: photographer in the scene, you know, photographed outcast, photographed pastor Troy. Uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, a lot, a lot of these sort of

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Speaker 1: early nineties figures. Ja made Duprie. He was in the

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Speaker 1: mix um and and was was known among some of

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Speaker 1: these people, including Coach K which is a story I

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Speaker 1: tell in the in the book and in the piece. Uh.

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Speaker 1: Coach k knew Yaddi's father, but didn't know that Yaddi

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Speaker 1: was his son. So Yadi came up independently on SoundCloud. Right,

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Speaker 1: this was really the beginning of of artists bubbling up

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Speaker 1: on SoundCloud low fi music. Uh, totally self recorded, self released. Um,

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Speaker 1: you know, he was he was, he was in college.

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Speaker 1: He didn't like it. He he liked dressing colorfully. He liked,

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Speaker 1: you know, being in the mix fashion wise. He knew

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Speaker 1: some Instagram influencers, but he didn't really consider himself a musician.

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Speaker 1: But he started making these these you know, sort of

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Speaker 1: silly People were referring to them at the time as

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Speaker 1: bubblegum trap. Right. They sounded a bit like nursery rhymes.

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Speaker 1: There's a lot of auto tune. You know, they're pretty

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Speaker 1: the jokes and the lyrics can be a little juvenile. Um.

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Speaker 1: And he was calling himself the King of the teens, right,

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Speaker 1: So this was really bubbling up on SoundCloud, on vine.

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Speaker 1: You know. He one of his one of his songs,

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Speaker 1: uh I believe called one Night soundtrack like an early

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Speaker 1: viral video around this time, and and and it was

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Speaker 1: still pretty novel, right for artists to take off this way.

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Speaker 1: You know, we'd seen it. Uh Soldier Boy was many

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Speaker 1: years prior to that. You know, they're they're there are

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Speaker 1: a ton of examples in between of dance crazes or

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Speaker 1: or viral artists and whatnot. Um. But but then being

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Speaker 1: signed to major label and turning into big stars like

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Speaker 1: that was pretty new, right. So and and then it's

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Speaker 1: funny when a kid like that who's totally of the

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Speaker 1: new generation links up with somebody like Coach K, right

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Speaker 1: who Coach K has these deep, deep deep roots in

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Speaker 1: the Atlanta rap scene, in the Atlanta music industry. He

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Speaker 1: managed Pastor Troy, he managed Gucci Man, he managed Young Jeezy.

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Speaker 1: You know, he's he's as responsible as anyone for the

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Speaker 1: sort of explosion of trap music and mixtapes in the

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Speaker 1: early to mid two thousand's. Um So, you have a

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Speaker 1: guy like that who's sort of keeping his ear to

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Speaker 1: the streets and finds out about this weird kid with

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Speaker 1: the you know, red braids and the and the beads

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Speaker 1: and calling himself the King of the teens. Coach told

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Speaker 1: me this story when I first met him, that he

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Speaker 1: was you know, he he would have he would have

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Speaker 1: people over right, he would he would host a dinner

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Speaker 1: party where he would invite young people from sort of

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Speaker 1: all walks of life around Atlanta, DJs, you know, street kids, kids,

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Speaker 1: kids doing illegal business in the street, A and R. So,

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Speaker 1: you know, he he would just bring together this sort

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Speaker 1: of network and they would play each other music. And

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Speaker 1: he said, you know, he heard he heard these little

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Speaker 1: Yadi songs and he was like his interest was peaked.

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Speaker 1: But then he saw a picture of him right, and

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Speaker 1: he had such a unique style, and he was like that, like,

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Speaker 1: I need to meet that kid. Um So he started

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Speaker 1: he started pursuing him, and it turned out not only

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Speaker 1: did he go way back with Yadi's father, but he

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Speaker 1: also went to school at a small HBCU with his mother. Um.

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Speaker 1: And not only that, but he had a message in

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Speaker 1: his I think maybe his facebok, his Facebook inbox UM

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Speaker 1: from literal Yadi himself, who said, you know I'm going

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Speaker 1: to blow up. I just need your help. Um. So

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Speaker 1: it's these sort of like small world coincidences and overlaps

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Speaker 1: in networks and stuff that I think make Atlanta such

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Speaker 1: an interance of interesting story and that I wanted to

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Speaker 1: tease out in the book. And I had just started

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Speaker 1: sort of picking them up along the way as I

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Speaker 1: was doing these one off newspaper stories, and then I

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Speaker 1: realized how interconnected everything was through the years, through the generations,

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Speaker 1: through the different sounds, there's always somebody who was involved

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Speaker 1: in the previous thing, um. And so I wanted to

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Speaker 1: really tell that story. Okay, when you talk about a

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Speaker 1: little Yadi in the book and he ultimately has success

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Speaker 1: in the traditional record chart, you whip out this amazing

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Speaker 1: statistic of double digit millions that he made within a

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Speaker 1: year eighteen months now, and you said it was not

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Speaker 1: primarily recordings, So could you talk about how much money

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Speaker 1: that was and how he made that money for those

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Speaker 1: who were out of the loop. Yeah, so Yadi, I'd

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Speaker 1: have to look up the exact, the exact the figure,

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Speaker 1: you might have it in front of you. Um. But

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Speaker 1: one of the things that was amazing about him was

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Speaker 1: that Coach right away I think saw him as a

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Speaker 1: as a brand. Right. They wanted him to be Will Smith.

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Speaker 1: They wanted him to be, uh, you know, the fresh

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Speaker 1: Prince of bel Air. I think I have it here.

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Speaker 1: They said he made thirteen million dollars in sixteen months. Right.

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Speaker 1: And even from the first time I met Yaddi, we

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Speaker 1: didn't interview at like a little Caribbean restaurant in Brooklyn

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Speaker 1: after going shopping. Um. You know, Coach's friend owned it,

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Speaker 1: and they shut down the place so we could sit quietly.

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Speaker 1: And you know, he was like a surly teenager. He

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Speaker 1: didn't really want to be talking to me at that point, um.

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Speaker 1: But he knew that he wanted to be famous, right,

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Speaker 1: He wanted to go viral. He didn't even know he

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Speaker 1: wanted to make music. That that part was a sort

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Speaker 1: of side journey for him. Um. But he also realized

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Speaker 1: the importance of being a brand, right he was. He

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Speaker 1: was very young at that time. He didn't drink, he

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Speaker 1: didn't smoke, he was he was very adamant that. You know,

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Speaker 1: he wanted his career to last as long as possible.

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Speaker 1: And and this was something Coach instilled in him, right.

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Speaker 1: I think he had that instinct already as a child

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Speaker 1: of the Internet. But then, you know, Coach told him

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Speaker 1: brands last longer than songs. He said, you know, I

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Speaker 1: tell every artist we signed him, I'm real with them.

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Speaker 1: He said, you have an expiration date on you as

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Speaker 1: an artist. Let's turn you into a brand. Right. And

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Speaker 1: so even when Yaddie's debut album on Capitol sort of

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Speaker 1: you know, didn't have a huge first week, didn't have

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Speaker 1: a smash single, he had a lot of success, as

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Speaker 1: you know, as a guest star. He had a lot

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Speaker 1: of success, uh in in bits and pieces, uh musically,

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Speaker 1: But what he really got good at was he was

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Speaker 1: in a Target commercial. He was in a Sprite commercial.

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Speaker 1: He you know, partnered with this brand, that brand. You

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Speaker 1: can go to the grocery store now and find a

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Speaker 1: little Yaddi frozen pizza. You know, he had a he

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Speaker 1: had a serial, he had a nail polished line. And

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Speaker 1: this was all happening super quickly. He's in a you know,

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Speaker 1: he's in a made for made for TV movie. Uh,

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Speaker 1: sequel of you know, famous famous hip hop film How High.

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Speaker 1: You know, they just immediately saw that what brands wanted

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Speaker 1: and what corporations wanted is access to cool, right, and

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Speaker 1: what's cooler than rap music? Uh? And Yadi was a

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Speaker 1: particularly colorful figure. Um and and they all saw this

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Speaker 1: vision very clearly, um and and it just took off.

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Speaker 1: And still you know, you you probably see more Yadi

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Speaker 1: commercials than you hear Yaddi songs. But that was all

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Speaker 1: by design. Okay. So if we talked about today, you know,

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Speaker 1: insiders would think that little Yadi has faded, but there's

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Speaker 1: mind share in the public and there's also monetary uh

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Speaker 1: considerations as a student of the game, where where's little

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Speaker 1: Yadi at? And what is his future as a career? Now?

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Speaker 1: You know, Yadi has had such an unpredictable career. He

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Speaker 1: did this very amazing thing, which is, you know, when

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Speaker 1: people were sick of his music and they, you know,

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Speaker 1: would make fun of his album for flopping or say

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Speaker 1: he couldn't wrap or whatever. You know, oh he's only

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Speaker 1: in commercials, he really buckled down and he got really

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Speaker 1: good at rapping. And not only that, but he sort

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Speaker 1: of located what the next big rap scene was going

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Speaker 1: to be. Um, he found these guys in Michigan, you know,

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Speaker 1: in Flint, in Detroit, that we're really doing a style

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Speaker 1: that comes a little bit from the Bay Area, a

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Speaker 1: little bit from the Midwest. Um, you know, rapping really quickly,

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Speaker 1: really comedically, really sharp, really funny guys. Um wrapping. You know,

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Speaker 1: people call it scam wrap. You know, they're they're rapping

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Speaker 1: off in about about you know, clothes and material games,

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Speaker 1: but specifically through you know, fraud and financial crime and

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Speaker 1: and and you know it's just this this extremely witty

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Speaker 1: new sound and subject matter. And he really embedded with

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Speaker 1: these guys. He like, you know, he he would spend

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Speaker 1: a ton of time there. He made he made an

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Speaker 1: album called, uh, you know, uh Michigan boat Boy, which

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Speaker 1: was you know, which was him sort of using his

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Speaker 1: celebrity to put on all of these regional artists from

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Speaker 1: a totally different place. Um. And along the way, like

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Speaker 1: he got really good at wrapping, and he just kept going,

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Speaker 1: and you know, he put out some mixtapes that sort

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Speaker 1: of re establish his credibility. He you know, he found

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Speaker 1: other artists and other regional scenes, uh you know, some

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Speaker 1: Los Angeles trappers. He fell in with um some New

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Speaker 1: York guys. He he just has proven himself to be

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Speaker 1: like a real chameleon um and just a really savvy operator.

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Speaker 1: And I think like people like hanging around him and

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Speaker 1: they like, uh seeing him sort of stretch his talents

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Speaker 1: in new ways. Um. And I think he's had a

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Speaker 1: lot more longevity because of that than anybody ever imagined.

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Speaker 1: Not to mention, you know, as Discuss made a lot

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Speaker 1: of money along the way on the corporate side of things.

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Speaker 1: So I think because he was making money from brand deals,

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Speaker 1: he could sort of do whatever he wanted musically. Um.

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Speaker 1: And I think that's benefited him in the long run. Okay,

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Speaker 1: you said you're from the South. Where are you from? So?

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Speaker 1: I grew up all around Florida. Um. I went to

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Speaker 1: high school in Orlando, Florida, but I lived all over

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Speaker 1: the state. My family moved around a lot. And when

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Speaker 1: I moved to New York at eighteen, my family moved

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Speaker 1: to Atlanta, Georgia. So my sister went to high school there.

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Speaker 1: I spent a lot of time there as my as

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Speaker 1: as as my little sister was going through school and

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Speaker 1: as I was as I was doing college. Um, so

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Speaker 1: I was back and forth between the North and the

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Speaker 1: South for the last fifteen years. But the my sort

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Speaker 1: of you know, my core adolescence was in central Florida. Okay,

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Speaker 1: So you and the publisher have this idea, how do

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Speaker 1: you then approach the players and what do you say?

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Speaker 1: And do they embrace you or do they are they

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Speaker 1: you know, weary at first? You know, I think I

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Speaker 1: had proven myself, um at the New York Times and

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Speaker 1: in the stories that I was doing along the way.

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Speaker 1: I think, you know, when when people see themselves reflected

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Speaker 1: accurately in a platform like The New York Times, especially

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Speaker 1: in genres that you don't think of as traditionally at

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Speaker 1: home in a prestige media place, you know, I was,

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Speaker 1: I was taking real care to say, this is the

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Speaker 1: most important music in the world. You know, I am

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Speaker 1: a relatively young person for this building at this time

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Speaker 1: and in this beat. Um, and I want to accurately

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Speaker 1: cover you know, what's going on among the youth, which

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Speaker 1: tend to drive you know, music and culture trends for

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Speaker 1: all of time. UM. So I think, you know, there

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Speaker 1: comes some credibility with that. Um And Yeah, I had

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Speaker 1: done I had done the work, and I had you know,

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Speaker 1: built the built the source relationships with a lot of

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Speaker 1: these people. Um. You know Little Baby, who's another big

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Speaker 1: character in the book. Uh, you know, I've I've followed

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Speaker 1: him on this, on this journey, and I knew that

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Speaker 1: I wanted him to be a character in the book because,

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Speaker 1: as I said, I sort of found him at the

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Speaker 1: right moment, right I did one of his first big

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Speaker 1: major interviews as part of this larger quality control feature

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Speaker 1: I did. Uh you know, he was the sort of

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Speaker 1: artistic centerpiece of that, in addition to the executives who

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Speaker 1: were guiding his career, Coach K and P from Quality Control. UM.

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Speaker 1: And I think people remember, right when you're there at

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Speaker 1: the beginning. UM. So every time I would see him

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Speaker 1: along the way, you know, I would say, I want

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Speaker 1: to keep doing this, I want to keep seeing where

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Speaker 1: you're going. And I remember pretty distinctly, you know, when

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Speaker 1: when the book was was being floated, and you know,

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Speaker 1: I had an offer to write it. I went and

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Speaker 1: I met Coach K and P and Little Baby at

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Speaker 1: the Spotify office where they were playing whatever his new

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Speaker 1: project was. Maybe. You know, he was putting on music

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Speaker 1: so quick at that point that I don't even remember

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Speaker 1: which one it was, but I think it was the

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Speaker 1: mixtape after the one I wrote about UH, and he

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Speaker 1: was there playing it for them, you know, trying to

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Speaker 1: get promo and and I sat in with them on

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Speaker 1: their meeting. And then you know, after I sat down

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Speaker 1: UH with Coach and I said, you know, I want

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Speaker 1: to I want to make this book. I want you

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Speaker 1: guys to be a big part of it. There's no

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Speaker 1: way to do this book if it's going to be

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Speaker 1: based on the present day without you. You know, not

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Speaker 1: only are you guys the ones breaking all the artists,

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Speaker 1: but but you're the you know, you open the doors

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Speaker 1: in this town, right, They're the they're the they're the biggest,

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Speaker 1: the biggest names in town at that moment and beyond

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Speaker 1: UM and you know, you just said let's do it.

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Speaker 1: So along then I followed, you know, various artists both

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Speaker 1: connected to them and not along the way. Not everything

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Speaker 1: in the book is about quality control. There's a ton

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Speaker 1: of tangential characters. Um. But like I said, because there

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Speaker 1: it is such a small town, because it is a

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Speaker 1: music scene, right, I think that that gets overlooked a

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Speaker 1: lot um when you're thinking about this this rap music

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Speaker 1: that goes internationally. But it's a music scene, just like

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Speaker 1: Seattle grunge was in the nineties, or just like you

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Speaker 1: know Athens indie rock was, or you know Laurel Canyon

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Speaker 1: or any any music scene like these are overlapping groups

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Speaker 1: of friends, collaborators, enemies, family, you know, and all of

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Speaker 1: the same creative stuff is coming out of there. So

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Speaker 1: one person would lead to the next, even if it

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Speaker 1: wasn't within the same label or within the same exact

390
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Speaker 1: music orbit. So the book really has two sides. It's

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Speaker 1: got the music side and it's got the raw cultural side.

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Speaker 1: So many people would say, because you depict a scene

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Speaker 1: where almost everybody involved has been to jail, there's a

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Speaker 1: lot of crime, what was it like being a middle

395
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Speaker 1: class white ball boy in these situations? And did they

396
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Speaker 1: accept you? Uh? I think they did accept me. Um.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I think the proof is in

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Speaker 1: the reporting. I think, you know, I got myself into

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Speaker 1: rooms by being trustworthy and being open and straightforward with

400
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Speaker 1: people about what I was doing. I said very clearly,

401
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Speaker 1: you know, this is culture, right, this is what's moving markets,

402
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Speaker 1: what's what's moving records, this is this is what people want, right.

403
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Speaker 1: What you guys are doing is important. Um, and I

404
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Speaker 1: want to preserve that for history, right. I want to

405
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Speaker 1: show people where this music comes from, and the reality

406
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Speaker 1: in the music, in the videos and behind the scenes

407
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Speaker 1: is that a lot of this music comes from poverty, right,

408
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Speaker 1: It comes from necessity, It comes from bad neighborhoods. And

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Speaker 1: you know, there's a character by the name of Marlowe

410
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Speaker 1: in the book, and you know he he came up

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Speaker 1: with a little baby. He did not make it to

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Speaker 1: the same heights that little baby did, but he was

413
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Speaker 1: open about where he came from and how he'd grown up.

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Speaker 1: And to me, that was as important as the music side,

415
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Speaker 1: because he was the real deal, you know. He he

416
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Speaker 1: was rapping about things you hear on the radio, even

417
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Speaker 1: though they may be maybe extreme, but he was also

418
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Speaker 1: living it right. And and by being there every step

419
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Speaker 1: of the way for his career, I think he saw

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Speaker 1: that I really wanted to see his life and where

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Speaker 1: he came from and how he lived on a daily basis,

422
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Speaker 1: and and he was keen to show it to me.

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Speaker 1: You know, we would every time I would go to Atlanta,

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Speaker 1: I would try to get in touch with him. He

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Speaker 1: would pick me up and we would just right around

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Speaker 1: all day. Right. He would just take me to to

427
00:23:12,160 --> 00:23:15,199
Speaker 1: whatever he was doing, right, whether that was you know,

428
00:23:15,240 --> 00:23:17,399
Speaker 1: getting a haircut at the barbershop or going to a

429
00:23:17,400 --> 00:23:20,760
Speaker 1: block party or going to the recording studio. Um. And

430
00:23:20,800 --> 00:23:24,160
Speaker 1: you know, we just we we built a rapport um

431
00:23:24,280 --> 00:23:27,840
Speaker 1: and and we built a relationship of trust. And I

432
00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:29,760
Speaker 1: think he got it, you know what I mean, he

433
00:23:29,840 --> 00:23:34,440
Speaker 1: knew that it was worth it for people to pull

434
00:23:34,480 --> 00:23:38,960
Speaker 1: back the curtain and sort of see a layer of

435
00:23:38,960 --> 00:23:41,840
Speaker 1: things that you don't always see. Right, even even in

436
00:23:41,920 --> 00:23:44,920
Speaker 1: rap music, if it comes from struggle, and it comes

437
00:23:44,960 --> 00:23:49,000
Speaker 1: from poverty, then it very quickly becomes about you know,

438
00:23:49,080 --> 00:23:52,240
Speaker 1: the the material gains or you know, the success or

439
00:23:52,280 --> 00:23:55,199
Speaker 1: what I made it out from. UM. But you know,

440
00:23:55,240 --> 00:23:57,320
Speaker 1: I think whether talking about Marlow or you're talking about

441
00:23:57,320 --> 00:23:59,639
Speaker 1: Pe or you're talking about Little Riek, another artist in

442
00:23:59,680 --> 00:24:01,000
Speaker 1: the book, that I spent a lot of time with

443
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:03,880
Speaker 1: her in his neighborhood. Uh. You know, they were they

444
00:24:03,880 --> 00:24:08,919
Speaker 1: were I think excited that somebody was engaged. Uh. And

445
00:24:10,200 --> 00:24:12,359
Speaker 1: I wanted to learn right. I wanted to like be

446
00:24:12,400 --> 00:24:15,399
Speaker 1: able to use whatever platform I had to shine a

447
00:24:15,520 --> 00:24:18,720
Speaker 1: light on the reality of the situation in a city

448
00:24:19,000 --> 00:24:31,600
Speaker 1: like Okay. You depict dangerous neighborhoods. Did you ever experience

449
00:24:31,720 --> 00:24:36,719
Speaker 1: danger personally? I don't. I don't think so. Um. You know,

450
00:24:37,480 --> 00:24:40,520
Speaker 1: I it was very clear that I was there as

451
00:24:40,560 --> 00:24:43,320
Speaker 1: a music reporter, right I was. I was hanging around

452
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:48,879
Speaker 1: with musicians. Uh they are used to you know, this

453
00:24:48,960 --> 00:24:50,800
Speaker 1: is where they grew up. It's it's not dangerous to

454
00:24:50,840 --> 00:24:53,840
Speaker 1: them on a on a day to day basis. Uh.

455
00:24:54,000 --> 00:24:56,639
Speaker 1: You know, sometimes I would be in cars going really fast.

456
00:24:57,000 --> 00:25:01,040
Speaker 1: Uh you know, like young kids in fast cars like

457
00:25:01,160 --> 00:25:03,800
Speaker 1: to test the engine. Um. You know. Sometimes I was

458
00:25:03,880 --> 00:25:08,080
Speaker 1: like gripping, you know, my my arm rest a little hard. Um.

459
00:25:08,119 --> 00:25:12,879
Speaker 1: But you know, I think it's it was it was fun,

460
00:25:12,960 --> 00:25:17,080
Speaker 1: you know, it was it was mostly uh lighthearted. Like

461
00:25:17,280 --> 00:25:20,760
Speaker 1: even if if these are neighborhoods where you know there

462
00:25:20,880 --> 00:25:24,000
Speaker 1: there there can be higher rates of crime or whatever.

463
00:25:24,160 --> 00:25:26,399
Speaker 1: Like people are just living their lives, right, they wake up,

464
00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:29,440
Speaker 1: they go to work, they hang out with their friends.

465
00:25:29,800 --> 00:25:35,919
Speaker 1: On some level, that's true, but you depict mostly single

466
00:25:36,040 --> 00:25:41,040
Speaker 1: parent households. You depict a lot of these people end

467
00:25:41,119 --> 00:25:44,280
Speaker 1: up raising themselves. A lot of people are involved in

468
00:25:44,359 --> 00:25:48,080
Speaker 1: street crime, a lot of people involved in drugs, and

469
00:25:48,160 --> 00:25:55,520
Speaker 1: those illegal things usually come with violence, death, etcetera. So

470
00:25:56,880 --> 00:25:59,760
Speaker 1: let's talk about little baby, and you talk about someone

471
00:26:00,080 --> 00:26:04,440
Speaker 1: ultimately segues out of the family unit and finds their

472
00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:10,159
Speaker 1: own way, mostly in illegal ways to get ahead. And

473
00:26:10,200 --> 00:26:12,240
Speaker 1: then you also depicted in the book a lot of

474
00:26:12,240 --> 00:26:14,320
Speaker 1: people are doing so well on the street, they don't

475
00:26:14,359 --> 00:26:18,080
Speaker 1: want to focus on music. So what is really going

476
00:26:18,160 --> 00:26:21,720
Speaker 1: on in the street, in the neighborhoods that these people

477
00:26:21,760 --> 00:26:25,120
Speaker 1: you talk to live in. I mean, that's the reality

478
00:26:25,160 --> 00:26:29,080
Speaker 1: of the situation, right, Like these are places that of

479
00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:34,280
Speaker 1: America and state government, city government has forgotten. Right. These

480
00:26:34,320 --> 00:26:38,760
Speaker 1: are places with school systems that are decimated, with police

481
00:26:38,760 --> 00:26:43,840
Speaker 1: forces that are you know, antagonistic or or decimated. Uh

482
00:26:43,880 --> 00:26:47,800
Speaker 1: you know. There there's their food deserts. You know, there's

483
00:26:48,640 --> 00:26:55,000
Speaker 1: very limited economic opportunity, uh you know, and and and

484
00:26:55,040 --> 00:26:58,720
Speaker 1: everybody is doing their best right to to to get by.

485
00:26:58,840 --> 00:27:03,240
Speaker 1: And and the thing about my my subjects and the

486
00:27:03,240 --> 00:27:06,080
Speaker 1: people I spoke to, you know, they were honest, right,

487
00:27:06,119 --> 00:27:09,640
Speaker 1: they were They were saying, I'm trying to better my life,

488
00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:12,120
Speaker 1: trying to better my family's life. I'm not always doing

489
00:27:12,119 --> 00:27:15,720
Speaker 1: the right thing. Uh you know. They someone like Marlow,

490
00:27:15,840 --> 00:27:18,840
Speaker 1: like you know, he he was very clear about when

491
00:27:18,840 --> 00:27:22,280
Speaker 1: he was doing wrong. Um, but you know I didn't.

492
00:27:22,359 --> 00:27:26,000
Speaker 1: I didn't. I wasn't embedded with them on a twenty

493
00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:27,879
Speaker 1: four hour a day basis. Right. A lot of this

494
00:27:27,960 --> 00:27:31,760
Speaker 1: stuff was described to me. You know, there are a

495
00:27:31,800 --> 00:27:34,520
Speaker 1: ton of footnotes in the book. You know, there are

496
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:38,439
Speaker 1: documentaries about this stuff, other articles, books, whatever, you know.

497
00:27:38,480 --> 00:27:44,159
Speaker 1: I'm I'm cobbling together a sort of portrait of these things. Uh.

498
00:27:44,320 --> 00:27:46,840
Speaker 1: But look, this is this is the reality of of

499
00:27:46,840 --> 00:27:50,160
Speaker 1: of life in America. Right. This is the guns, their

500
00:27:50,200 --> 00:27:52,520
Speaker 1: guns everywhere, right, there are guns and white neighborhoods. There

501
00:27:52,520 --> 00:27:56,080
Speaker 1: are guns and black neighborhoods. Uh. Drug dealing, you know

502
00:27:56,200 --> 00:27:59,239
Speaker 1: what what the drug the money that comes out of

503
00:27:59,280 --> 00:28:02,520
Speaker 1: the illegal drug market, like comes from somewhere, you know, somebody,

504
00:28:02,640 --> 00:28:07,520
Speaker 1: somebody's benefiting. Uh. This is just this is just everyday life.

505
00:28:07,600 --> 00:28:09,800
Speaker 1: And I think that's part of the reason this music

506
00:28:09,880 --> 00:28:12,760
Speaker 1: is so popular. Right. Uh. At one point, you know

507
00:28:13,000 --> 00:28:16,080
Speaker 1: p P one of the quality control executives who also

508
00:28:16,119 --> 00:28:19,000
Speaker 1: comes from from this world. You know, he said to me,

509
00:28:19,040 --> 00:28:21,199
Speaker 1: there's more people in the street than anything. Right. The

510
00:28:21,240 --> 00:28:23,520
Speaker 1: reason so many people want to listen to this music

511
00:28:23,600 --> 00:28:27,520
Speaker 1: is because most people are struggling. Right, And and even

512
00:28:27,560 --> 00:28:32,560
Speaker 1: if it's a overblown version of this and artistic version, right, uh,

513
00:28:32,880 --> 00:28:37,440
Speaker 1: composite of all the good and the bad that come

514
00:28:37,480 --> 00:28:40,280
Speaker 1: out come from places like this. Like it's it's true,

515
00:28:40,320 --> 00:28:42,760
Speaker 1: and it rings true to people, and it rings true

516
00:28:42,760 --> 00:28:45,920
Speaker 1: to their struggles, and it rings true about their their

517
00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:50,160
Speaker 1: aspirations and their ambitions. Um. And you know, I think

518
00:28:50,280 --> 00:28:52,920
Speaker 1: I think I don't. I don't think the book is

519
00:28:52,960 --> 00:28:57,800
Speaker 1: heavy handed in terms of you know, whether this is uh,

520
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:01,560
Speaker 1: whether this works every time? Right, their rap is salvation,

521
00:29:01,720 --> 00:29:05,200
Speaker 1: whether you know you can everybody's gonna become famous on

522
00:29:05,200 --> 00:29:08,720
Speaker 1: on some talent. Uh. You know, I think I think

523
00:29:08,760 --> 00:29:11,600
Speaker 1: it tries to paint an honest portrait of that. Right.

524
00:29:11,840 --> 00:29:14,400
Speaker 1: Some people make it, some people don't. Like you said,

525
00:29:14,440 --> 00:29:18,720
Speaker 1: there's there are people who make more money illicitly than

526
00:29:18,760 --> 00:29:22,040
Speaker 1: they do legally. Uh and and that's a hurdle, right.

527
00:29:22,080 --> 00:29:24,000
Speaker 1: And there are characters in the book again who are

528
00:29:24,040 --> 00:29:26,720
Speaker 1: open about that, um, just like there are people in

529
00:29:26,720 --> 00:29:28,840
Speaker 1: the real world who are open about that. Um. So

530
00:29:29,000 --> 00:29:31,080
Speaker 1: you know, I I just wanted to I just want

531
00:29:31,120 --> 00:29:34,040
Speaker 1: to pay an accurate portrait of the people I met

532
00:29:34,080 --> 00:29:36,720
Speaker 1: in the way they described their lives. Okay. I think

533
00:29:36,720 --> 00:29:40,479
Speaker 1: it's little peace Mother, a little baby's mother who grows

534
00:29:40,600 --> 00:29:45,600
Speaker 1: up in a very strict household, enters the military, ends

535
00:29:45,680 --> 00:29:51,360
Speaker 1: up having a child, seems pretty intelligent, ends up working manually,

536
00:29:51,480 --> 00:29:56,520
Speaker 1: extremely intelligent, extremely intelligent, and yet still yeah, making minimum wage,

537
00:29:56,680 --> 00:29:59,400
Speaker 1: you know, cleaning the courthouse, working at the post office.

538
00:29:59,640 --> 00:30:03,960
Speaker 1: You know. She she's a single mother. Uh, as you said,

539
00:30:03,960 --> 00:30:10,360
Speaker 1: a veteran, uh you know, a marine veteran, extremely bright woman,

540
00:30:11,280 --> 00:30:15,520
Speaker 1: well traveled, spent time in Japan, you know, just an

541
00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 1: inspirational figure all around, and like you said, yeah, still,

542
00:30:19,760 --> 00:30:23,080
Speaker 1: you know, raising three children by herself on a minimum

543
00:30:23,080 --> 00:30:26,400
Speaker 1: wage salary. Like that's that's America for you, Okay. And

544
00:30:26,440 --> 00:30:28,320
Speaker 1: then there's another line from one of the people in

545
00:30:28,360 --> 00:30:31,720
Speaker 1: the book. They're talking about education, and the person says,

546
00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:34,080
Speaker 1: I can point all these people in the hood who

547
00:30:34,080 --> 00:30:37,000
Speaker 1: have a college education and work in minimum wage jobs.

548
00:30:37,880 --> 00:30:43,400
Speaker 1: Why is this the case? Man? That's that's that's above

549
00:30:43,480 --> 00:30:45,600
Speaker 1: my pay grade. I We'll have to ask my my

550
00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:49,400
Speaker 1: economics colleagues about that. But yeah, you're referring, you're referring

551
00:30:49,400 --> 00:30:52,320
Speaker 1: to offset who uh you know, was was part of

552
00:30:52,320 --> 00:30:55,040
Speaker 1: the megas that the rap trio, one of the you know,

553
00:30:55,080 --> 00:30:58,960
Speaker 1: the first major act for quality control, one of the biggest,

554
00:30:59,080 --> 00:31:01,880
Speaker 1: one of the biggest rap so the last decade. Um.

555
00:31:01,920 --> 00:31:03,360
Speaker 1: And yeah, he said that to me, you know, in

556
00:31:03,400 --> 00:31:06,760
Speaker 1: the basement of his mansion and the Atlanta suburbs. You know,

557
00:31:06,880 --> 00:31:09,480
Speaker 1: he was like, he had his first child when he

558
00:31:09,480 --> 00:31:12,760
Speaker 1: was a teenager. He was very open. He took to

559
00:31:12,920 --> 00:31:15,640
Speaker 1: crime to try to provide for his child. And he said,

560
00:31:15,680 --> 00:31:17,320
Speaker 1: you know, I could have I could have been on

561
00:31:17,360 --> 00:31:19,200
Speaker 1: the straight and narrow, But who's to say that that

562
00:31:19,240 --> 00:31:21,280
Speaker 1: would have worked for me? Right? And look, this is

563
00:31:21,480 --> 00:31:25,600
Speaker 1: this is racism. This is uh, you know, a lack

564
00:31:25,640 --> 00:31:28,560
Speaker 1: of economic opportunity. You know, you can trace this back

565
00:31:28,640 --> 00:31:32,840
Speaker 1: through through redlining and you know, mortgages and you know,

566
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:36,120
Speaker 1: hiring practices of of people of color. Like again, this

567
00:31:36,160 --> 00:31:38,800
Speaker 1: is this is a bit beyond my purview. Um, but

568
00:31:38,920 --> 00:31:42,479
Speaker 1: I think the idea that you know, not everybody is

569
00:31:42,640 --> 00:31:45,600
Speaker 1: starting from the from the same place, and not everybody

570
00:31:45,600 --> 00:31:49,240
Speaker 1: has the same opportunities, um, based on where they grew up,

571
00:31:49,280 --> 00:31:52,160
Speaker 1: where they went to school, what color their skin is. Like.

572
00:31:52,280 --> 00:31:56,960
Speaker 1: You know, I think reasonable people can disagree, but you know,

573
00:31:57,040 --> 00:31:59,240
Speaker 1: I think that that that this is not exactly a

574
00:31:59,240 --> 00:32:03,880
Speaker 1: controversial I yeah, right, Uh, income inequality in America, Uh,

575
00:32:03,920 --> 00:32:06,800
Speaker 1: you know, last time I checked, is uh it's out

576
00:32:06,800 --> 00:32:11,240
Speaker 1: of control? Okay, just drilling down one more time. Is

577
00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:14,840
Speaker 1: it the people you talked to that to pick a

578
00:32:14,960 --> 00:32:22,600
Speaker 1: dangerous lifestyle with drugs, shootings, gangs, etcetera. Or is everybody

579
00:32:22,640 --> 00:32:26,040
Speaker 1: affected in these neighborhoods, you know, a certain neighborhoods you

580
00:32:26,080 --> 00:32:28,200
Speaker 1: have to not in Atlanta maybe, but you have to

581
00:32:28,280 --> 00:32:29,880
Speaker 1: choose side. You have to be in a gang to

582
00:32:29,960 --> 00:32:33,680
Speaker 1: be protected. Are there people just living normal lives I'm

583
00:32:33,680 --> 00:32:36,840
Speaker 1: talking about? Of course? Of course, of course this is

584
00:32:36,880 --> 00:32:42,000
Speaker 1: not monolithic, right, This is this is a small subset

585
00:32:42,560 --> 00:32:46,520
Speaker 1: of people who felt like they had no choice right

586
00:32:47,000 --> 00:32:50,600
Speaker 1: and got involved in some sort of a dangerous lifestyle.

587
00:32:50,800 --> 00:32:54,680
Speaker 1: You know. Uh, Marlowe grew up in Bowing Holmes. Right,

588
00:32:54,720 --> 00:32:58,680
Speaker 1: this is a this was an infamous project in Atlanta

589
00:32:58,800 --> 00:33:01,600
Speaker 1: that was that was since has since been knocked down.

590
00:33:02,480 --> 00:33:05,160
Speaker 1: You know, his father grew up in a project in

591
00:33:05,160 --> 00:33:09,880
Speaker 1: in Philadelphia. There's you know, quotes from him in this book. Uh.

592
00:33:09,960 --> 00:33:15,560
Speaker 1: He was, you know, living between households, father in and

593
00:33:15,600 --> 00:33:19,880
Speaker 1: out of jail. You know, Uh, mother having her own issues,

594
00:33:20,120 --> 00:33:23,800
Speaker 1: living with family members, living with friends. Uh, in a

595
00:33:23,880 --> 00:33:26,920
Speaker 1: dangerous place. Right, And this was the example he saw.

596
00:33:27,160 --> 00:33:30,160
Speaker 1: You know, there's there's some there's a scene in the book. Uh.

597
00:33:30,480 --> 00:33:32,480
Speaker 1: You can find this on YouTube. Actually a little Baby

598
00:33:32,920 --> 00:33:39,880
Speaker 1: did a panel right about uh, reintegrating from incarceration right

599
00:33:40,000 --> 00:33:43,840
Speaker 1: with alongside other businessmen, you know, guys who got out

600
00:33:43,880 --> 00:33:47,200
Speaker 1: of jail and became truck drivers, open their own business,

601
00:33:47,280 --> 00:33:49,560
Speaker 1: that sort of thing. And he says, you know, if

602
00:33:49,600 --> 00:33:52,760
Speaker 1: if if you're around drug dealers, odds are you're going

603
00:33:52,800 --> 00:33:54,520
Speaker 1: to think that that's what you do? You become a

604
00:33:54,560 --> 00:33:56,800
Speaker 1: drug dealer. He didn't know any doctors, he didn't know

605
00:33:56,840 --> 00:33:59,320
Speaker 1: any lawyers. You know, he didn't he didn't see that

606
00:33:59,400 --> 00:34:03,280
Speaker 1: example or stand. Um, are there people who grow up

607
00:34:03,320 --> 00:34:08,320
Speaker 1: in these neighborhoods and become you know, uh, doctors, lawyers,

608
00:34:08,320 --> 00:34:13,240
Speaker 1: philosophers of course, engineers of course. Uh you know, but

609
00:34:13,239 --> 00:34:16,920
Speaker 1: but it's not easy. Um. And so much of this

610
00:34:17,000 --> 00:34:19,440
Speaker 1: rap music, I think that's the point, right, Like the

611
00:34:19,520 --> 00:34:21,880
Speaker 1: rap music that is coming out of Atlanta on the

612
00:34:22,000 --> 00:34:25,480
Speaker 1: largest scale, is is about these things, right, It's about

613
00:34:25,560 --> 00:34:30,120
Speaker 1: this struggle. Uh. And so it is created by people

614
00:34:30,160 --> 00:34:32,359
Speaker 1: who have seen it up close, right, or people who

615
00:34:32,360 --> 00:34:35,439
Speaker 1: have been through it themselves. Um. And so of course

616
00:34:35,480 --> 00:34:38,120
Speaker 1: it's a it's a self selecting group. But what I

617
00:34:38,160 --> 00:34:41,760
Speaker 1: wanted to tease out was why this music. Right, trap

618
00:34:41,920 --> 00:34:44,120
Speaker 1: for lack of a better term, is the sort of

619
00:34:44,280 --> 00:34:48,879
Speaker 1: umbrella genre of it within within hip hop. Just those

620
00:34:48,880 --> 00:34:53,080
Speaker 1: who don't know defined trap please, So trap comes out

621
00:34:53,120 --> 00:34:56,240
Speaker 1: of what are referred to as trap houses. Right. Trap

622
00:34:56,280 --> 00:34:59,920
Speaker 1: houses are places for you know, the making and the

623
00:35:00,000 --> 00:35:06,400
Speaker 1: selling of drugs, usually abandoned houses. Uh in in four neighborhoods. Um,

624
00:35:06,480 --> 00:35:08,520
Speaker 1: this you know came from Gucci man, this came from

625
00:35:08,560 --> 00:35:11,239
Speaker 1: Young Jesus, came from t I. These are people who

626
00:35:11,280 --> 00:35:15,280
Speaker 1: became you know, mega stars in the early two thousand's. Uh.

627
00:35:15,320 --> 00:35:18,600
Speaker 1: You know there's early mentions of of trapped in uh

628
00:35:18,680 --> 00:35:23,160
Speaker 1: Dungeon family songs, you know, Outcast, that sort of thing. Um.

629
00:35:23,239 --> 00:35:26,000
Speaker 1: And you know Big Boy of Outcast says like that.

630
00:35:26,200 --> 00:35:28,040
Speaker 1: You know that's why they call it the trap because

631
00:35:28,080 --> 00:35:32,800
Speaker 1: you're trapped, right uh. And and this music is about

632
00:35:32,880 --> 00:35:38,080
Speaker 1: that lifestyle, right that that that world, and it's dramatized

633
00:35:38,160 --> 00:35:41,280
Speaker 1: of course, it's art, of course, um, but it's also

634
00:35:41,560 --> 00:35:46,439
Speaker 1: in places, and especially with certain artists, autobiographical. Um. So

635
00:35:47,120 --> 00:35:51,080
Speaker 1: this is this is like an extremely niche, extremely local

636
00:35:51,920 --> 00:35:56,000
Speaker 1: culture that became popular culture. Right. This became the biggest

637
00:35:56,080 --> 00:36:01,000
Speaker 1: music in the world over the last ten fift twenty years. Uh.

638
00:36:01,040 --> 00:36:03,920
Speaker 1: And it comes from a small group of people. And

639
00:36:03,960 --> 00:36:08,680
Speaker 1: that's that's what the book is, okay. But almost to

640
00:36:08,760 --> 00:36:12,280
Speaker 1: a person, not a little yahni, but almost to a person.

641
00:36:13,120 --> 00:36:15,240
Speaker 1: All of the people in the book have been to jail.

642
00:36:16,680 --> 00:36:19,840
Speaker 1: So not not not quite true. I would I wouldn't

643
00:36:19,840 --> 00:36:21,440
Speaker 1: say that true. I mean, I mean the you know,

644
00:36:21,480 --> 00:36:26,400
Speaker 1: the book is about lawyers. The book is about people's friends,

645
00:36:26,680 --> 00:36:30,400
Speaker 1: The book is about people's mothers. Um. You know little

646
00:36:30,440 --> 00:36:34,239
Speaker 1: Rieck Marlowe who you know it was a self proclaimed

647
00:36:34,600 --> 00:36:38,040
Speaker 1: you know, drug dealer and career criminal. He never went

648
00:36:38,080 --> 00:36:40,399
Speaker 1: to jail. He didn't have a felony on his record

649
00:36:40,440 --> 00:36:44,480
Speaker 1: at all. Um. But you know, I think I don't

650
00:36:44,520 --> 00:36:47,759
Speaker 1: have to tell tell you the rates of incarceration of

651
00:36:48,000 --> 00:36:54,560
Speaker 1: black men in this country are completely disproportional to the population. Um.

652
00:36:54,640 --> 00:36:58,040
Speaker 1: So again that's a The prison industrial complex is the

653
00:36:58,080 --> 00:37:02,080
Speaker 1: subject of many other better, uh, more in depth books

654
00:37:02,120 --> 00:37:05,279
Speaker 1: than mine, which focuses more on the music. Um. But

655
00:37:05,280 --> 00:37:07,120
Speaker 1: I would, but I wouldn't say that that everyone here

656
00:37:07,120 --> 00:37:10,040
Speaker 1: has been to jail. Well, let me put it a

657
00:37:10,080 --> 00:37:15,719
Speaker 1: different way. Many people, especially those not interested in hip

658
00:37:15,800 --> 00:37:23,400
Speaker 1: hop believe that these judge these rappers in a negative way.

659
00:37:23,400 --> 00:37:25,800
Speaker 1: Where to use the same word we just talked about

660
00:37:25,840 --> 00:37:29,880
Speaker 1: when you read one your book, they literally seem trapped,

661
00:37:30,719 --> 00:37:34,040
Speaker 1: and that you also talk about the cops in one

662
00:37:34,120 --> 00:37:38,640
Speaker 1: town out to get the rappers were being up one

663
00:37:38,719 --> 00:37:43,040
Speaker 1: being a parole going back. So you end up with

664
00:37:43,160 --> 00:37:47,160
Speaker 1: a sympathetic portrait. You have these people who are reasonable

665
00:37:47,200 --> 00:37:49,880
Speaker 1: sort of caught in their lifestyle as opposed to just

666
00:37:50,160 --> 00:37:53,960
Speaker 1: who are just gangsters from minute one, Yeah, look, these

667
00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:57,160
Speaker 1: are not these are these are not you know, as

668
00:37:57,200 --> 00:38:01,040
Speaker 1: as far as I can tell by on sociopaths, these

669
00:38:01,040 --> 00:38:05,960
Speaker 1: are people who grew up in tough circumstances with very

670
00:38:05,960 --> 00:38:09,120
Speaker 1: few opportunities, who then found their way out and then

671
00:38:09,160 --> 00:38:11,040
Speaker 1: you have a target on your back in a totally

672
00:38:11,080 --> 00:38:14,120
Speaker 1: different way. Right, And that's like, you know, Drew Finling

673
00:38:14,640 --> 00:38:16,560
Speaker 1: is a character in this book. He's a he's a

674
00:38:16,640 --> 00:38:20,080
Speaker 1: defense attorney in Atlanta, currently in the news, uh, you know,

675
00:38:20,400 --> 00:38:23,480
Speaker 1: helping to defend Donald Trump in the in the Georgia

676
00:38:23,520 --> 00:38:27,000
Speaker 1: election probe, which is a whole other story. Um, but

677
00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:29,480
Speaker 1: but Drew, Drew has become very close with a lot

678
00:38:29,480 --> 00:38:32,960
Speaker 1: of these guys, right. He found himself becoming a lawyer

679
00:38:33,280 --> 00:38:39,000
Speaker 1: for Hip Hop Royalty basically through early representation of various figures,

680
00:38:39,000 --> 00:38:44,520
Speaker 1: including including Gucci Man. And you know, he he said

681
00:38:44,520 --> 00:38:46,440
Speaker 1: this to me over and over again. He said, like,

682
00:38:46,480 --> 00:38:48,680
Speaker 1: I can't believe the target that's on the backs of

683
00:38:48,719 --> 00:38:51,759
Speaker 1: these guys, right, Like, these are guys who who made

684
00:38:51,760 --> 00:38:54,040
Speaker 1: their way out of what would have been a dangerous

685
00:38:54,360 --> 00:38:59,320
Speaker 1: criminal lifestyle, and yet they're still being harassed by police

686
00:38:59,760 --> 00:39:03,760
Speaker 1: for opposite right, for having fancy cars or or jewelry

687
00:39:03,920 --> 00:39:06,359
Speaker 1: or you know, smoking weed, which if you've walked down

688
00:39:06,360 --> 00:39:08,520
Speaker 1: the street in New York City or where you are

689
00:39:08,560 --> 00:39:11,360
Speaker 1: in l A, you know everyone's smoking weed. Uh. And

690
00:39:11,480 --> 00:39:14,520
Speaker 1: yet you know this is often often the pretense to

691
00:39:14,520 --> 00:39:17,560
Speaker 1: to to lock people up. Um. So yeah, I think

692
00:39:17,719 --> 00:39:24,800
Speaker 1: you know, the the the weight of American oppression and

693
00:39:25,160 --> 00:39:28,120
Speaker 1: in all in all senses um sort of bears down

694
00:39:28,160 --> 00:39:30,759
Speaker 1: on these guys. And and that's why they're you know,

695
00:39:30,800 --> 00:39:34,759
Speaker 1: they're they're resilient. Uh. And I think that's why the

696
00:39:34,880 --> 00:39:39,280
Speaker 1: art is often so so vibrant and so visceral and

697
00:39:39,480 --> 00:39:41,560
Speaker 1: people can't get enough of it, right, Like that's that's

698
00:39:41,600 --> 00:39:45,000
Speaker 1: the other thing. Like I was talking before about peace,

699
00:39:45,000 --> 00:39:47,160
Speaker 1: saying people want to listen to this music because it

700
00:39:47,200 --> 00:39:50,040
Speaker 1: reflects their reality. But it's not only them, right, Like,

701
00:39:50,920 --> 00:39:53,200
Speaker 1: rich white kids in college also want to listen to

702
00:39:53,239 --> 00:39:57,080
Speaker 1: this music because it's cool, because it's dangerous, because sexy. Right.

703
00:39:57,120 --> 00:40:00,359
Speaker 1: The same thing that that uh, you know, popular music,

704
00:40:00,360 --> 00:40:03,680
Speaker 1: and especially black popular music has always been um and

705
00:40:03,760 --> 00:40:07,160
Speaker 1: so so there's the voyeuristic component of it just as

706
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:11,440
Speaker 1: much as uh, there's the sort of autobiographical uh you

707
00:40:11,480 --> 00:40:14,600
Speaker 1: know component of people seeing themselves in the music. There's

708
00:40:14,680 --> 00:40:16,759
Speaker 1: there's people who just want a glimpse, right, people who

709
00:40:16,800 --> 00:40:19,719
Speaker 1: want to try on blackness or or or get a

710
00:40:19,760 --> 00:40:22,080
Speaker 1: taste of it or what they assume to be, you know,

711
00:40:22,160 --> 00:40:25,600
Speaker 1: a certain certain type of blackness. Um. So you know

712
00:40:25,719 --> 00:40:33,600
Speaker 1: that that cross generational, transracial, you know appeal the hip

713
00:40:33,640 --> 00:40:36,520
Speaker 1: hop has has been shown to have over the last

714
00:40:36,880 --> 00:40:40,520
Speaker 1: almost fifty years now is like it's it's fascinating, right,

715
00:40:40,560 --> 00:40:43,719
Speaker 1: and there should be countless books about about this. It's

716
00:40:43,760 --> 00:40:47,480
Speaker 1: not only it's not only Atlanta, it's not only trapped music, um.

717
00:40:47,560 --> 00:40:49,359
Speaker 1: But but this is you know, this is the story

718
00:40:49,400 --> 00:40:52,120
Speaker 1: of popular music going back to you know, I don't

719
00:40:52,120 --> 00:40:55,279
Speaker 1: know if you saw the Basil Erman's Elvis movie, Um,

720
00:40:55,360 --> 00:40:57,879
Speaker 1: but but it's it's it's the same thing I see

721
00:40:57,960 --> 00:41:01,600
Speaker 1: shaking your head, you know, which this is off point,

722
00:41:01,680 --> 00:41:06,080
Speaker 1: But Basil Rman Elvis movie, like his other movies, figure

723
00:41:06,120 --> 00:41:11,240
Speaker 1: has got to be more Basi Lerman than I'm I'm

724
00:41:11,280 --> 00:41:14,319
Speaker 1: I'm I'm mostly joking. But but you know what I mean, right,

725
00:41:14,480 --> 00:41:20,240
Speaker 1: But um, the other thing that is fascinating in the book,

726
00:41:21,280 --> 00:41:25,040
Speaker 1: you know, people know a lot about the inner workings

727
00:41:25,120 --> 00:41:27,480
Speaker 1: of the music world at this point in time, and

728
00:41:27,560 --> 00:41:31,360
Speaker 1: you hear these people at age five, they start making music,

729
00:41:31,560 --> 00:41:36,799
Speaker 1: their parents are spreading the demos. In this particular case,

730
00:41:36,840 --> 00:41:40,279
Speaker 1: you have a couple of examples where from reading the

731
00:41:40,280 --> 00:41:43,880
Speaker 1: book it sounds like they were drug dealers, and quality

732
00:41:43,920 --> 00:41:47,400
Speaker 1: Control seems to say, well, you have such experiences, you'd

733
00:41:47,400 --> 00:41:50,360
Speaker 1: make a good rapper. Is that how it went down?

734
00:41:52,400 --> 00:41:54,600
Speaker 1: That's the story of a couple of these guys. I mean,

735
00:41:54,800 --> 00:41:58,480
Speaker 1: you know, if you think back to to to young Jeezy,

736
00:41:58,600 --> 00:42:01,960
Speaker 1: who you know in early discovery of of Coach K,

737
00:42:02,440 --> 00:42:05,279
Speaker 1: he was a hustler, as as he described it, and

738
00:42:05,320 --> 00:42:09,440
Speaker 1: he was trying to fund other rappers and Coach met

739
00:42:09,520 --> 00:42:11,680
Speaker 1: him in a recording studio and said, no, no, you're

740
00:42:11,760 --> 00:42:14,279
Speaker 1: the rapper Like you have the star power, you have

741
00:42:14,400 --> 00:42:17,160
Speaker 1: the voice, you have the clothes, you have the cars,

742
00:42:17,200 --> 00:42:21,280
Speaker 1: like you're you're the guy. Uh. And then he recreated

743
00:42:21,320 --> 00:42:23,600
Speaker 1: that right with little Baby. Little Baby was known as

744
00:42:23,600 --> 00:42:27,120
Speaker 1: a gambler. Right, Little Baby was selling weed and gambling.

745
00:42:27,160 --> 00:42:29,480
Speaker 1: He would come by the studio, hang out with me,

746
00:42:29,560 --> 00:42:32,760
Speaker 1: goes take their money after they came back from from touring,

747
00:42:32,880 --> 00:42:34,520
Speaker 1: right with a little bit of cash in their pocket.

748
00:42:34,920 --> 00:42:37,040
Speaker 1: And and he he would shoot dice with them, right

749
00:42:37,960 --> 00:42:41,399
Speaker 1: and and he had such star power right like this

750
00:42:41,480 --> 00:42:44,520
Speaker 1: is this is a timeless story, right to go back

751
00:42:44,520 --> 00:42:48,000
Speaker 1: to to to Elvis or one one story I tell

752
00:42:48,040 --> 00:42:52,760
Speaker 1: in the book, Uh was Jermaine Duprie discovering Criss Cross.

753
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:55,640
Speaker 1: These were not drug dealers, these were kids in the mall.

754
00:42:56,320 --> 00:42:59,840
Speaker 1: And Jermaine dupre said, they have it right, star power

755
00:43:00,080 --> 00:43:03,440
Speaker 1: like whatever. That ineffable quality is star power, And in

756
00:43:03,600 --> 00:43:07,560
Speaker 1: raps specifically, it often comes with authenticity or the appearance

757
00:43:07,560 --> 00:43:11,080
Speaker 1: of authenticity. Right. So when Coach k would see someone

758
00:43:11,120 --> 00:43:14,080
Speaker 1: like little Baby, he would say, you know, other people

759
00:43:14,080 --> 00:43:17,279
Speaker 1: are out here wrapping your story. You should do it right.

760
00:43:17,400 --> 00:43:20,600
Speaker 1: You have a look, you have some money in your pocket,

761
00:43:21,080 --> 00:43:24,360
Speaker 1: you have you know, the carriage like the swag for

762
00:43:24,440 --> 00:43:26,799
Speaker 1: lack of a better term, like you know, just just

763
00:43:26,880 --> 00:43:28,920
Speaker 1: give it a shot, right, and Baby would say no,

764
00:43:29,120 --> 00:43:30,919
Speaker 1: like that's not for me, that's not for me. Baby.

765
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:32,760
Speaker 1: You know, he told me straight up, and his friends

766
00:43:32,760 --> 00:43:35,319
Speaker 1: told me to Like we didn't we didn't look up

767
00:43:35,360 --> 00:43:37,520
Speaker 1: to rappers. We thought they were corny and we thought

768
00:43:37,520 --> 00:43:39,720
Speaker 1: they were faking. You know, we didn't know. We didn't

769
00:43:39,719 --> 00:43:43,440
Speaker 1: know rappers like we knew whatever other hustlers were on

770
00:43:43,440 --> 00:43:47,520
Speaker 1: our block. Uh, people were more immediate to us. Um

771
00:43:47,600 --> 00:43:49,560
Speaker 1: and and for Baby, you know, it took it took

772
00:43:49,640 --> 00:43:52,560
Speaker 1: going to prison for for him to say, you know,

773
00:43:52,600 --> 00:43:54,879
Speaker 1: I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna try this, Like there

774
00:43:55,000 --> 00:43:57,600
Speaker 1: there's a safer way, there's a there's a better way.

775
00:43:57,880 --> 00:44:01,200
Speaker 1: Um and ah do people try it and they're not

776
00:44:01,239 --> 00:44:03,400
Speaker 1: only good at it, right, But this is someone like

777
00:44:03,480 --> 00:44:06,319
Speaker 1: him put in the work, had enough of the sort

778
00:44:06,320 --> 00:44:10,279
Speaker 1: of natural skill, the natural charisma, stories to tell, and

779
00:44:10,320 --> 00:44:12,600
Speaker 1: then put in the work to get good enough that

780
00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:15,839
Speaker 1: people wanted to hear his music. Uh. And you know

781
00:44:15,920 --> 00:44:18,799
Speaker 1: this is again this is like a fraction of a

782
00:44:18,880 --> 00:44:21,879
Speaker 1: percentage of people who can pull this off. But it's

783
00:44:21,920 --> 00:44:25,160
Speaker 1: not no one and and every day, the barrier false right,

784
00:44:25,200 --> 00:44:28,000
Speaker 1: like the bar of of what it takes to be

785
00:44:28,040 --> 00:44:30,359
Speaker 1: able to put out music. Right. I think, you know,

786
00:44:30,480 --> 00:44:34,200
Speaker 1: maybe we'll get to this. But the distribution channels that

787
00:44:34,320 --> 00:44:36,880
Speaker 1: it used to It used to be expensive to record, right,

788
00:44:36,880 --> 00:44:39,320
Speaker 1: It used to be expensive to print a c d

789
00:44:40,040 --> 00:44:43,040
Speaker 1: uh and have it put in best buys around the country.

790
00:44:43,200 --> 00:44:46,880
Speaker 1: Right now, record on your laptop, put it on YouTube

791
00:44:46,920 --> 00:44:48,680
Speaker 1: for free, and all of a sudden you have a

792
00:44:48,760 --> 00:44:51,200
Speaker 1: million dollar deal. You know, we see the story over

793
00:44:51,239 --> 00:44:54,439
Speaker 1: and over again in rap and and outside of wrap. Um.

794
00:44:54,480 --> 00:44:58,680
Speaker 1: But I think as these technological hurdles have fallen, uh,

795
00:44:58,719 --> 00:45:00,960
Speaker 1: you know, there's there's more and more or opportunity for

796
00:45:01,040 --> 00:45:04,760
Speaker 1: somebody with a you know, a local following, a story

797
00:45:04,800 --> 00:45:07,800
Speaker 1: to tell and and a little bit of drive and

798
00:45:07,880 --> 00:45:17,880
Speaker 1: star power to be able to make it. There are

799
00:45:17,920 --> 00:45:22,000
Speaker 1: frequently depictions in the book of large amounts of cash.

800
00:45:22,760 --> 00:45:25,600
Speaker 1: One person, I think it's a little baby, it's gonna

801
00:45:25,600 --> 00:45:28,600
Speaker 1: shoot his first video in the studio shows up with

802
00:45:28,760 --> 00:45:33,640
Speaker 1: thirty thousand dollars cash, so I think it might have

803
00:45:33,800 --> 00:45:36,759
Speaker 1: even been three hundred. Whatever it was, it was a

804
00:45:36,840 --> 00:45:39,960
Speaker 1: staggering stump thing. Then also there's another one where the

805
00:45:39,960 --> 00:45:42,839
Speaker 1: money goes out the window, never recovered. How much is that?

806
00:45:44,040 --> 00:45:45,960
Speaker 1: I think that was? That was sorry. Someone told me

807
00:45:46,000 --> 00:45:48,640
Speaker 1: about Shardie Low who rest in piece of Shardi Low.

808
00:45:48,719 --> 00:45:51,960
Speaker 1: He was He was a rapper from the mid two

809
00:45:51,960 --> 00:45:56,600
Speaker 1: thousands again you know, big reputation as as a drug

810
00:45:56,600 --> 00:45:58,920
Speaker 1: dealer and a hustler. And one of his one of

811
00:45:58,960 --> 00:46:00,920
Speaker 1: his right hand men, told me a story, yeah about

812
00:46:00,960 --> 00:46:02,880
Speaker 1: being on a car, you know, being in a police

813
00:46:02,920 --> 00:46:06,480
Speaker 1: chase and CHARTI love throwing you know, fifty grand out

814
00:46:06,480 --> 00:46:09,120
Speaker 1: of the window to just not be caught with the

815
00:46:09,160 --> 00:46:13,239
Speaker 1: proceeds from whatever it is they were doing. So, I mean,

816
00:46:14,000 --> 00:46:17,600
Speaker 1: first and foremost, to shoot a video in the studio,

817
00:46:18,480 --> 00:46:22,359
Speaker 1: it's almost hard to spend three hundred thousand dollars, and

818
00:46:22,400 --> 00:46:24,399
Speaker 1: so I should I should cut in here and say

819
00:46:24,440 --> 00:46:26,680
Speaker 1: this was not a music video. This was just a

820
00:46:26,760 --> 00:46:30,600
Speaker 1: video for Instagram of showing people that he was rapping,

821
00:46:30,800 --> 00:46:33,480
Speaker 1: right saying, this guy who you might follow or no,

822
00:46:33,600 --> 00:46:35,839
Speaker 1: from the neighborhood, like we're going to start rapping. It's

823
00:46:35,880 --> 00:46:38,600
Speaker 1: just an in studio video. It wasn't. It wasn't a

824
00:46:38,719 --> 00:46:43,040
Speaker 1: music video. It was just you know, here I am

825
00:46:43,080 --> 00:46:45,360
Speaker 1: pressing pressing record on my phone to show you what

826
00:46:45,480 --> 00:46:48,000
Speaker 1: my friend is up to. Okay, then what's the three

827
00:46:48,080 --> 00:46:51,040
Speaker 1: hundred k about? He just had that in his pocket? Yeah,

828
00:46:51,080 --> 00:46:53,719
Speaker 1: it's too it's to show off with. It's a you know,

829
00:46:53,719 --> 00:46:58,279
Speaker 1: it's a trophy. You're saying he just wanted to show it.

830
00:46:58,560 --> 00:47:01,520
Speaker 1: Did he show the three hundred k on screen? Yeah?

831
00:47:01,520 --> 00:47:07,120
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yes, But did he really have the three k?

832
00:47:07,280 --> 00:47:14,200
Speaker 1: And you know, etcetera. Look who who this cash belongs

833
00:47:14,239 --> 00:47:19,200
Speaker 1: to at any given moment? Uh, it's impossible to say. Um,

834
00:47:19,239 --> 00:47:22,680
Speaker 1: I think you know, part of this fast money lifestyle

835
00:47:22,960 --> 00:47:25,240
Speaker 1: that that's depicted in the book, and that these guys

836
00:47:25,480 --> 00:47:28,600
Speaker 1: you know, live and rap about. You know, there's a

837
00:47:28,640 --> 00:47:30,480
Speaker 1: quote in the book, you know that's how Atlanta goes.

838
00:47:30,520 --> 00:47:32,600
Speaker 1: You're up, you're down, you're up, you're down, you're up,

839
00:47:32,680 --> 00:47:37,160
Speaker 1: you're down. Uh. And and that's a you know, that's

840
00:47:37,200 --> 00:47:41,040
Speaker 1: that's an endemic I think to to being in the

841
00:47:41,080 --> 00:47:45,239
Speaker 1: street in this way. Um. And look it's a problem, right,

842
00:47:45,440 --> 00:47:49,560
Speaker 1: it's a problem. It's the same as a car, a necklace. Um.

843
00:47:49,680 --> 00:47:53,120
Speaker 1: You know, there's an Instagram trend these days of rappers, uh,

844
00:47:53,200 --> 00:47:55,880
Speaker 1: you know, bringing trying to bring a million dollars to

845
00:47:55,920 --> 00:47:58,359
Speaker 1: the hood, right, to bring a million dollars to where

846
00:47:58,360 --> 00:48:02,200
Speaker 1: they grew up with as a way to say, you know,

847
00:48:02,320 --> 00:48:04,680
Speaker 1: this world told me I wasn't never going to be anything.

848
00:48:04,800 --> 00:48:06,960
Speaker 1: And and look at me now, And not only look

849
00:48:07,000 --> 00:48:09,960
Speaker 1: at me now in Beverly Hills or you know, in

850
00:48:10,040 --> 00:48:12,600
Speaker 1: a midtown skyscraper, but look at me now where I

851
00:48:12,640 --> 00:48:16,000
Speaker 1: came from, right where where the police were throwing me

852
00:48:16,000 --> 00:48:18,319
Speaker 1: against the wall, and you know, telling me I'd never

853
00:48:18,320 --> 00:48:21,040
Speaker 1: be anything. And my teachers, you know, didn't care about me,

854
00:48:21,120 --> 00:48:23,360
Speaker 1: and you know, told me I'd grew up to be

855
00:48:23,400 --> 00:48:25,799
Speaker 1: in jail. And and and it's a you know, it's

856
00:48:25,840 --> 00:48:28,800
Speaker 1: a it's a it's a it's a talisman, it's a trophy,

857
00:48:28,880 --> 00:48:33,520
Speaker 1: it's a it's a statement to say, you know, look

858
00:48:33,560 --> 00:48:39,959
Speaker 1: what I became. Okay, stories are legion of all musicians

859
00:48:40,000 --> 00:48:43,200
Speaker 1: people the music world being ripped off. It's even worse

860
00:48:43,320 --> 00:48:48,680
Speaker 1: for black people. You depict the successful people having a

861
00:48:48,800 --> 00:48:52,680
Speaker 1: great amount of money, Is it more transparent, more equal

862
00:48:52,800 --> 00:48:55,160
Speaker 1: in it land in the world that you investigated, or

863
00:48:55,160 --> 00:48:57,319
Speaker 1: in reality a lot of money as much money as

864
00:48:57,360 --> 00:49:01,000
Speaker 1: they have, a lot of it's going somewhere else. Look,

865
00:49:01,080 --> 00:49:04,399
Speaker 1: what is a record label if not somebody reaching into

866
00:49:04,480 --> 00:49:08,160
Speaker 1: your pocket to have a piece of of what you're

867
00:49:08,360 --> 00:49:12,680
Speaker 1: what your talent rot you know, I think the music

868
00:49:12,719 --> 00:49:18,279
Speaker 1: business is unfair, right, like these contracts. Look, maybe it's

869
00:49:18,280 --> 00:49:21,240
Speaker 1: not unfair. Maybe the labels put in the research and development,

870
00:49:21,280 --> 00:49:24,239
Speaker 1: maybe they do the marketing and they take on all

871
00:49:24,280 --> 00:49:28,880
Speaker 1: the risk, like, uh, whatever it is. But traditionally we

872
00:49:28,960 --> 00:49:31,319
Speaker 1: have seen, you know, the people who have been brave

873
00:49:31,440 --> 00:49:34,480
Speaker 1: enough to talk about what their contracts are, like, what

874
00:49:34,560 --> 00:49:38,279
Speaker 1: their royalty rates are, what their advances. You know, I

875
00:49:38,320 --> 00:49:41,240
Speaker 1: talk about for people who don't know. I think anybody

876
00:49:41,320 --> 00:49:44,399
Speaker 1: listening to your podcast knows this. But but advances are

877
00:49:44,440 --> 00:49:49,319
Speaker 1: are not free money, right, They're they're they're recupable, right.

878
00:49:49,360 --> 00:49:51,520
Speaker 1: You know, you don't see another dollar until you earn

879
00:49:51,600 --> 00:49:55,640
Speaker 1: back that money that they advanced to you. It's credit. Um.

880
00:49:55,719 --> 00:49:57,960
Speaker 1: So look, I think that that's happening in this world

881
00:49:58,120 --> 00:50:01,960
Speaker 1: as much, if not more than it's happening everywhere else.

882
00:50:02,400 --> 00:50:06,920
Speaker 1: These not only not only are these artists young, but

883
00:50:07,000 --> 00:50:11,480
Speaker 1: they're really you know, these are they're rappers being signed

884
00:50:11,520 --> 00:50:14,759
Speaker 1: for millions of dollars that are fifteen years old. You know.

885
00:50:15,000 --> 00:50:18,319
Speaker 1: There's a chapter about about A and R people in

886
00:50:18,360 --> 00:50:23,279
Speaker 1: Atlanta in the book where you know, uh Ray Daniels.

887
00:50:23,320 --> 00:50:26,120
Speaker 1: This this This executive in Atlanta says, I just got

888
00:50:26,160 --> 00:50:28,879
Speaker 1: back from you know, giving giving a fifteen year old

889
00:50:28,880 --> 00:50:32,759
Speaker 1: a million dollars Like that's and he's like, that's crazy, right,

890
00:50:32,840 --> 00:50:36,920
Speaker 1: like on its face, like that's a it's a crazy proposition. Um.

891
00:50:37,120 --> 00:50:40,040
Speaker 1: But but that artists are earned back that money, right,

892
00:50:40,080 --> 00:50:43,880
Speaker 1: And there's managers to pay, there's lawyers to pay, there's

893
00:50:44,280 --> 00:50:47,000
Speaker 1: early investors, right. I talk about the sort of the

894
00:50:47,040 --> 00:50:50,960
Speaker 1: culture of you know, uh, street guys putting money behind

895
00:50:51,840 --> 00:50:55,960
Speaker 1: an emerging artist, whether it's to record a video or

896
00:50:56,040 --> 00:50:58,160
Speaker 1: get the money or excuse me, to get the song

897
00:50:58,200 --> 00:51:00,520
Speaker 1: played at the strip club or whatever it is. You know,

898
00:51:00,600 --> 00:51:04,960
Speaker 1: everybody wants their piece. Um. And and that's the same

899
00:51:05,000 --> 00:51:09,160
Speaker 1: I think across genres. Um. This just happens to be

900
00:51:09,520 --> 00:51:12,359
Speaker 1: the most lucrative and the most popular genre right now,

901
00:51:12,400 --> 00:51:15,279
Speaker 1: so the amounts are higher. Um. You know, we saw

902
00:51:15,320 --> 00:51:20,279
Speaker 1: this sort of gold rush of of deals around the

903
00:51:20,320 --> 00:51:24,080
Speaker 1: streaming era as the record companies you know, rebounded after

904
00:51:24,200 --> 00:51:29,600
Speaker 1: the dark times of of the post napster years. Um.

905
00:51:29,680 --> 00:51:33,880
Speaker 1: So you know, this is not primarily a book about

906
00:51:34,000 --> 00:51:37,400
Speaker 1: recording contracts, So I didn't get two into the nitty

907
00:51:37,440 --> 00:51:40,120
Speaker 1: gritty there um, and I think a lot of these

908
00:51:40,120 --> 00:51:42,560
Speaker 1: guys are doing well, but just as many of them are,

909
00:51:42,640 --> 00:51:46,120
Speaker 1: you know, signing bad deal, signing horrible deals. Have have

910
00:51:46,120 --> 00:51:49,719
Speaker 1: have no experience, no guidance. Uh. And and when a

911
00:51:49,800 --> 00:51:53,240
Speaker 1: label comes to you and says, you know, here's grand

912
00:51:53,400 --> 00:51:57,320
Speaker 1: for the rights to your smash viral single on TikTok,

913
00:51:57,800 --> 00:51:59,920
Speaker 1: and you know your mom needs to pay the rent

914
00:52:00,160 --> 00:52:03,680
Speaker 1: and you know you have no career prospects at the moment,

915
00:52:03,880 --> 00:52:06,160
Speaker 1: like if you're going to sign you know, so that

916
00:52:06,160 --> 00:52:10,239
Speaker 1: that's where the that's where the uh, the exploitation, I

917
00:52:10,280 --> 00:52:13,480
Speaker 1: think really comes in here. Now they talk about income.

918
00:52:13,520 --> 00:52:15,600
Speaker 1: We talked about little Yahdi, but he had his own

919
00:52:15,640 --> 00:52:20,400
Speaker 1: look using my air Quotes brand. But in the traditional

920
00:52:21,560 --> 00:52:24,759
Speaker 1: mainstream music business, which is now becoming you know, this

921
00:52:24,880 --> 00:52:26,960
Speaker 1: is the mainstream business. What I'm trying to say is

922
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:30,439
Speaker 1: you have the record contract, if you have an endorsement deal,

923
00:52:30,480 --> 00:52:36,440
Speaker 1: it's publicized sponsorship product. Your grosses are in poll star.

924
00:52:37,520 --> 00:52:41,120
Speaker 1: You talk about these guys going on the road, maybe

925
00:52:41,200 --> 00:52:45,560
Speaker 1: dropping in multiple gigs a night, just making a two

926
00:52:45,600 --> 00:52:50,279
Speaker 1: track appearance, like it's a whole another subculture that's not reported.

927
00:52:50,920 --> 00:52:54,080
Speaker 1: So what can you tell us about that? Look, I

928
00:52:54,160 --> 00:52:57,600
Speaker 1: can't speak to how this stuff is reported on taxes, right,

929
00:52:57,680 --> 00:53:02,960
Speaker 1: and how this income is is logged. Um. Again, that's

930
00:53:03,160 --> 00:53:07,520
Speaker 1: beyond my pay grade. I'm not an accountant. Um. But

931
00:53:07,520 --> 00:53:10,319
Speaker 1: but look, yeah, this is there's a cash business here, right,

932
00:53:10,360 --> 00:53:13,080
Speaker 1: whether it's like you said features right, a rapper pay

933
00:53:13,120 --> 00:53:16,800
Speaker 1: is another rapper ten grand, twenty grand, fifty grand, a

934
00:53:16,880 --> 00:53:19,439
Speaker 1: hundred grand to to get on the track with them

935
00:53:19,480 --> 00:53:22,319
Speaker 1: for extra attention. You know, you make a club appearance.

936
00:53:22,480 --> 00:53:25,440
Speaker 1: You know you you hear a lot of rappers these days. Um.

937
00:53:25,480 --> 00:53:27,919
Speaker 1: You know, getting getting a little wonky with economics talking

938
00:53:27,920 --> 00:53:30,319
Speaker 1: about the back end, right, So you get a get

939
00:53:30,320 --> 00:53:33,480
Speaker 1: a certain a certain amount of the of the payment

940
00:53:33,560 --> 00:53:36,160
Speaker 1: to show up and wrap two songs at a club

941
00:53:36,160 --> 00:53:38,799
Speaker 1: in the V I P. Section. Uh, you know up

942
00:53:38,840 --> 00:53:41,080
Speaker 1: front when you sign and then you go, and then

943
00:53:41,719 --> 00:53:43,560
Speaker 1: as you're walking out they hand you the rest in

944
00:53:43,600 --> 00:53:48,040
Speaker 1: cash and that's the back end, right. Um. So yeah,

945
00:53:48,080 --> 00:53:52,000
Speaker 1: I think just like this culture comes from mix tapes, right,

946
00:53:52,080 --> 00:53:54,839
Speaker 1: this this this world this is and I think this

947
00:53:54,920 --> 00:53:57,640
Speaker 1: is why. One of the reasons why rap music was

948
00:53:57,680 --> 00:53:59,719
Speaker 1: so quick to adapt to streaming, right is it was

949
00:53:59,800 --> 00:54:02,480
Speaker 1: you too moving quickly. It was used to being a

950
00:54:02,560 --> 00:54:05,759
Speaker 1: volume business. It was used to being about market share, right,

951
00:54:05,800 --> 00:54:10,359
Speaker 1: And these were homemade recordings, tapes, c d s uh

952
00:54:10,640 --> 00:54:13,080
Speaker 1: sold out of the trunks of cars, so that flea markets,

953
00:54:13,080 --> 00:54:18,000
Speaker 1: at barber shops, you know, covers printed on a ink jet.

954
00:54:18,520 --> 00:54:23,160
Speaker 1: You know, beats taken from online and not cleared, um

955
00:54:23,360 --> 00:54:26,880
Speaker 1: cash changing hands like this is ah, these these are

956
00:54:26,920 --> 00:54:30,399
Speaker 1: these are underground economists uh and and there's a ton

957
00:54:30,440 --> 00:54:33,080
Speaker 1: of them that overlap I think uh in in in

958
00:54:33,160 --> 00:54:36,960
Speaker 1: wraps specifically. So yeah, you know, whole star is one thing,

959
00:54:37,080 --> 00:54:39,759
Speaker 1: but you know, good luck to good luck to them

960
00:54:39,800 --> 00:54:43,200
Speaker 1: and and the Forbes list to really get to the

961
00:54:43,200 --> 00:54:45,920
Speaker 1: bottom of how a Southern rapper makes money on the

962
00:54:45,960 --> 00:54:51,279
Speaker 1: club circuit. Okay, another thing you talk about is how

963
00:54:51,400 --> 00:54:55,560
Speaker 1: really it's not gag oriented. And then a game comes,

964
00:54:55,600 --> 00:55:02,359
Speaker 1: I believe from Detroit and really permeates Atlanta and Florida

965
00:55:02,520 --> 00:55:06,600
Speaker 1: until it's ultimately busted. And you're talking about today the

966
00:55:06,680 --> 00:55:09,560
Speaker 1: flourishing of strip clubs. To what degree is at a

967
00:55:09,640 --> 00:55:12,000
Speaker 1: side show? To what degree does that have an effect

968
00:55:12,080 --> 00:55:16,359
Speaker 1: on the flourishing of rap in Atlanta? So you're you're

969
00:55:16,360 --> 00:55:19,759
Speaker 1: referring to be a meth black mafia family. This is

970
00:55:20,160 --> 00:55:23,359
Speaker 1: you know, this is a a well known story. At

971
00:55:23,360 --> 00:55:25,600
Speaker 1: this point, I don't I don't spend too much time

972
00:55:25,600 --> 00:55:27,960
Speaker 1: on it. Um. You know, there's a there's a great

973
00:55:28,000 --> 00:55:33,000
Speaker 1: book about BMF, there's television series about BMF. Countless documentary

974
00:55:33,160 --> 00:55:36,359
Speaker 1: is Amelian YouTube videos. Um, but this is yeah, this

975
00:55:36,440 --> 00:55:40,879
Speaker 1: is street lore right of a big meache coming down

976
00:55:40,880 --> 00:55:45,920
Speaker 1: to Atlanta after building his his cocaine syndicate uh out

977
00:55:45,960 --> 00:55:49,879
Speaker 1: of Detroit with his brother. The two brothers run run

978
00:55:49,920 --> 00:55:52,840
Speaker 1: the business together. One of them moves to Atlanta and

979
00:55:52,840 --> 00:55:55,000
Speaker 1: he decides he wants to get into wrap right. And

980
00:55:55,040 --> 00:55:59,359
Speaker 1: they they have an artist Blue Da Vinci, who never

981
00:55:59,600 --> 00:56:01,840
Speaker 1: comes in anything. But they also have a sort of

982
00:56:01,840 --> 00:56:06,520
Speaker 1: off paper alliance with young Jeezy who really really makes

983
00:56:06,520 --> 00:56:09,520
Speaker 1: the most out of out of this association, um and

984
00:56:09,960 --> 00:56:13,200
Speaker 1: becomes a big star even though he wasn't technically signed

985
00:56:13,200 --> 00:56:15,160
Speaker 1: to their label. But you know, they have a they

986
00:56:15,200 --> 00:56:19,000
Speaker 1: have a magazine. As you said, like you know, according

987
00:56:19,040 --> 00:56:22,200
Speaker 1: to everybody, the clubs were flushed with money. The nightlife

988
00:56:22,280 --> 00:56:26,440
Speaker 1: was crazy. Uh you know this this was It's the

989
00:56:26,520 --> 00:56:29,480
Speaker 1: same thing you saw in Miami, right, cocaine cowboys. You

990
00:56:29,480 --> 00:56:32,960
Speaker 1: know you even going back to prohibition, right, this is

991
00:56:33,000 --> 00:56:37,560
Speaker 1: what Boardock Empire is about, which is you know, money

992
00:56:37,640 --> 00:56:41,560
Speaker 1: trickles down right from from illegal enterprise when it hits

993
00:56:41,560 --> 00:56:45,319
Speaker 1: a certain level and and everybody wins, right the restaurants,

994
00:56:46,120 --> 00:56:50,920
Speaker 1: the clubs, the recording studios, the you know, uh, the

995
00:56:51,040 --> 00:56:54,279
Speaker 1: luxury stores at the mall. Um. So yeah, when you're

996
00:56:54,320 --> 00:56:58,360
Speaker 1: talking about what you're talking about Atlanta. You know, the

997
00:56:58,360 --> 00:57:02,160
Speaker 1: the first wave that I that I talked about in

998
00:57:02,200 --> 00:57:04,840
Speaker 1: the beginning of the book. You know, that's that's Jermaine

999
00:57:04,920 --> 00:57:09,440
Speaker 1: dupri that's Outcasts, that's the Face Records ELI read baby Face,

1000
00:57:09,560 --> 00:57:14,200
Speaker 1: you know TLC not really not really street wrap uh

1001
00:57:14,560 --> 00:57:17,640
Speaker 1: as as as we know it now. Um. But but

1002
00:57:17,760 --> 00:57:20,920
Speaker 1: when when trap takes over right in the in the

1003
00:57:21,000 --> 00:57:24,560
Speaker 1: late nineties, early two thousand's, a lot of that comes

1004
00:57:24,720 --> 00:57:27,360
Speaker 1: from B m F and the lifestyle that they were,

1005
00:57:27,680 --> 00:57:31,080
Speaker 1: you know, propagating around the clubs, around the venues um

1006
00:57:31,160 --> 00:57:35,360
Speaker 1: and people were either affiliated, uh you know, tangential. They

1007
00:57:35,360 --> 00:57:37,560
Speaker 1: wanted to keep up, they wanted to be in the mix.

1008
00:57:37,680 --> 00:57:40,320
Speaker 1: You know. I think so that that I think is

1009
00:57:40,320 --> 00:57:45,360
Speaker 1: is extremely influential, um, both economically, but also culturally and

1010
00:57:45,360 --> 00:57:48,680
Speaker 1: and stylistically. This idea of of you know, glits and

1011
00:57:48,800 --> 00:57:52,680
Speaker 1: flash and Glamour. Um. You know people wrap about it

1012
00:57:52,720 --> 00:57:55,240
Speaker 1: to this day, right, Big meatch having tigers at his

1013
00:57:55,320 --> 00:57:58,480
Speaker 1: birthday party. Um. And I spoke for the book to

1014
00:57:58,480 --> 00:58:03,000
Speaker 1: to this party planner, Hannah Kang, who's still the biggest

1015
00:58:03,120 --> 00:58:07,240
Speaker 1: best you know, black celebrity party planner. And she she's

1016
00:58:07,360 --> 00:58:09,440
Speaker 1: she's a Korean woman. But but she she says in

1017
00:58:09,480 --> 00:58:11,640
Speaker 1: the book, you know, I've never worked for a white

1018
00:58:11,640 --> 00:58:14,439
Speaker 1: person in my whole career in Atlanta, which I which

1019
00:58:14,480 --> 00:58:17,160
Speaker 1: I just which I loved, and I think really gives you,

1020
00:58:17,160 --> 00:58:20,320
Speaker 1: you know, a portrait of this place as as Black Mecca,

1021
00:58:20,400 --> 00:58:24,760
Speaker 1: black Hollywood, whatever you want to call it. Um. But

1022
00:58:24,760 --> 00:58:27,320
Speaker 1: but yeah, you know, the BMF legend just sort of

1023
00:58:27,400 --> 00:58:30,800
Speaker 1: looms really large to this day. You know everybody I

1024
00:58:30,840 --> 00:58:32,720
Speaker 1: talked to her like, oh, it'll never it'll never be

1025
00:58:32,800 --> 00:58:36,000
Speaker 1: like that again. Um. And and you know, whether that's

1026
00:58:36,200 --> 00:58:39,120
Speaker 1: whether whether that's completely accurate or not, Like, that's that's

1027
00:58:39,120 --> 00:58:45,400
Speaker 1: how that's that's how myths build and and and carry on. Right. Okay,

1028
00:58:46,000 --> 00:58:51,640
Speaker 1: you depict the strip clubs, you say, when the the

1029
00:58:52,280 --> 00:58:57,280
Speaker 1: the Mafia family ultimately gets taken down, strip clubs get

1030
00:58:57,320 --> 00:59:00,800
Speaker 1: taken down, but still you know they're cutting track they'll

1031
00:59:00,840 --> 00:59:03,280
Speaker 1: go to the strip club to demo it. Then you

1032
00:59:03,360 --> 00:59:06,400
Speaker 1: have another guy at the strip club talking about the

1033
00:59:06,480 --> 00:59:10,480
Speaker 1: right way to make it rain to this day, what

1034
00:59:10,640 --> 00:59:14,120
Speaker 1: is the status of strip clubs and how much influence

1035
00:59:14,160 --> 00:59:16,760
Speaker 1: do they have visa VI the music and the culture.

1036
00:59:18,120 --> 00:59:20,640
Speaker 1: So this is again something that that's been written about

1037
00:59:20,640 --> 00:59:22,600
Speaker 1: many times over the years. I didn't want to linger

1038
00:59:22,640 --> 00:59:24,280
Speaker 1: on it too much in the book because I felt

1039
00:59:24,280 --> 00:59:26,880
Speaker 1: like it's pretty well established. My my close friend and

1040
00:59:26,880 --> 00:59:30,280
Speaker 1: colleague John Carmonica did a great story about Atlantic strip

1041
00:59:30,280 --> 00:59:33,480
Speaker 1: clubs as a as a proving gun for records. Another

1042
00:59:33,520 --> 00:59:36,800
Speaker 1: one of my colleagues, Richard Fossett, did one uh when

1043
00:59:36,880 --> 00:59:40,000
Speaker 1: when when he was at the l A times I believe, Um,

1044
00:59:40,000 --> 00:59:42,680
Speaker 1: but but this has happened for decades at this point,

1045
00:59:42,760 --> 00:59:45,439
Speaker 1: which is uh, you know, this is like I said,

1046
00:59:45,480 --> 00:59:47,880
Speaker 1: this is a proving ground, right, This is this is

1047
00:59:47,920 --> 00:59:50,400
Speaker 1: party music often right, This is music for dancing to.

1048
00:59:50,520 --> 00:59:52,640
Speaker 1: This is music for that you know, makes people want

1049
00:59:52,680 --> 00:59:56,840
Speaker 1: to spend money. Um, and it's its own economy, Like

1050
00:59:56,880 --> 00:59:59,560
Speaker 1: we were talking about the illicit economies. You know. You

1051
00:59:59,560 --> 01:00:03,160
Speaker 1: you go, you slip the DJ a little money, he

1052
01:00:03,240 --> 01:00:06,840
Speaker 1: plays your track. If the dancers like it, they dance

1053
01:00:06,920 --> 01:00:10,640
Speaker 1: better to the track. That then makes customers spend more

1054
01:00:10,680 --> 01:00:12,800
Speaker 1: money on them. Right, and then they want to hear

1055
01:00:12,840 --> 01:00:16,200
Speaker 1: your song again, so they requested again. Uh. And and

1056
01:00:16,560 --> 01:00:19,040
Speaker 1: you know it's it's this whole it's a whole economy.

1057
01:00:19,080 --> 01:00:23,360
Speaker 1: I I spent a night um at a club called Follies,

1058
01:00:23,400 --> 01:00:27,840
Speaker 1: which no longer exists, uh, with with this guy DJ John. Uh.

1059
01:00:27,880 --> 01:00:30,360
Speaker 1: And this didn't make the book. This could be its

1060
01:00:30,360 --> 01:00:35,440
Speaker 1: own book. Honestly. DJ John Uh, amazing guy, big white guy,

1061
01:00:35,800 --> 01:00:39,320
Speaker 1: started djaying and strip clubs. You know when they were

1062
01:00:39,360 --> 01:00:42,240
Speaker 1: not allowed to play rap music, right, he said. When

1063
01:00:42,280 --> 01:00:45,720
Speaker 1: he started at Folly's, it was it was a rock bar. Right,

1064
01:00:45,760 --> 01:00:49,280
Speaker 1: it was like a bon Jovi motley crew, you know,

1065
01:00:50,160 --> 01:00:53,040
Speaker 1: the you know, airport workers would go there and and

1066
01:00:53,240 --> 01:00:58,560
Speaker 1: rap was banned. Right. DJ John worked in Follies every

1067
01:00:58,640 --> 01:01:02,160
Speaker 1: week for more than twenty years. Right. I wanted to

1068
01:01:02,200 --> 01:01:05,200
Speaker 1: call him the cal Ripken Jr. Of Atlanta strip clubs

1069
01:01:06,440 --> 01:01:09,200
Speaker 1: because and and he guts to see the whole thing change. Right.

1070
01:01:09,400 --> 01:01:11,880
Speaker 1: By the time I spent a night with him at Folly's,

1071
01:01:11,920 --> 01:01:15,320
Speaker 1: he was managing a rapper himself. He had no interest

1072
01:01:15,360 --> 01:01:18,200
Speaker 1: in in rap music when he started there, but he

1073
01:01:18,240 --> 01:01:21,000
Speaker 1: would he would take money to play whatever songs people

1074
01:01:21,040 --> 01:01:23,960
Speaker 1: wanted to hear. Usually that means their own song, but

1075
01:01:24,000 --> 01:01:26,120
Speaker 1: it could just be a request, right if if Bob,

1076
01:01:26,160 --> 01:01:28,400
Speaker 1: if you rolled in and and you wanted to hear

1077
01:01:28,720 --> 01:01:33,800
Speaker 1: uh you know, uh shake your tail feather by Nelly,

1078
01:01:33,920 --> 01:01:37,840
Speaker 1: you could you could send John uh money on PayPal

1079
01:01:38,120 --> 01:01:40,240
Speaker 1: and he'll play it right then and there. Um. So

1080
01:01:40,320 --> 01:01:42,960
Speaker 1: people do it as a as a promotional tactic because

1081
01:01:43,080 --> 01:01:44,920
Speaker 1: I think you know, one of the things that makes

1082
01:01:44,960 --> 01:01:48,880
Speaker 1: Atlanta so special, uh is that there really is a

1083
01:01:48,880 --> 01:01:52,680
Speaker 1: local scene and things break on the ground before they

1084
01:01:52,680 --> 01:01:56,720
Speaker 1: break nationally. Right. And that's something that's like an age

1085
01:01:56,760 --> 01:01:59,920
Speaker 1: old tale in the music industry, but has has been upended.

1086
01:02:00,160 --> 01:02:03,680
Speaker 1: Right now. You can be from Singapore and you can

1087
01:02:03,720 --> 01:02:06,240
Speaker 1: drop a song it sounds like Atlanta rap on YouTube

1088
01:02:06,520 --> 01:02:08,880
Speaker 1: and maybe you get big before anybody even knows who

1089
01:02:08,920 --> 01:02:12,200
Speaker 1: you are, right, your song goes viral on TikTok or

1090
01:02:12,240 --> 01:02:17,480
Speaker 1: whatever you know. Uh. And yet these artists and these

1091
01:02:17,560 --> 01:02:21,480
Speaker 1: labels in Atlanta, like they still see the value in

1092
01:02:22,040 --> 01:02:26,200
Speaker 1: building an audience, right, building a groundswell of people, because

1093
01:02:26,360 --> 01:02:29,000
Speaker 1: because that's how you build careers, right instead of one

1094
01:02:29,040 --> 01:02:33,160
Speaker 1: off hits, uh, you you you you get a loyal

1095
01:02:33,240 --> 01:02:37,080
Speaker 1: fan base. And and this happens in nightlife, right and

1096
01:02:37,120 --> 01:02:39,760
Speaker 1: so whether it's whether it's a strip club or a

1097
01:02:39,760 --> 01:02:43,760
Speaker 1: club club or somewhere in between. You know, they want

1098
01:02:43,800 --> 01:02:46,560
Speaker 1: their music to work there first because they feel like

1099
01:02:46,600 --> 01:02:49,120
Speaker 1: once they have the neighborhood behind them and then they

1100
01:02:49,160 --> 01:02:51,280
Speaker 1: have the city behind them, that that's going to serve

1101
01:02:51,320 --> 01:02:56,000
Speaker 1: them well when they break nationally. Okay, on the other

1102
01:02:56,080 --> 01:02:58,720
Speaker 1: side of the fens from the artists, you talk about

1103
01:02:58,800 --> 01:03:03,680
Speaker 1: quality control, talk about Coach K and you talk about

1104
01:03:03,800 --> 01:03:07,440
Speaker 1: p and you talk about where they came from. What

1105
01:03:07,720 --> 01:03:12,080
Speaker 1: is so special about them that they can engender success.

1106
01:03:15,560 --> 01:03:19,040
Speaker 1: I mean, I think they're really really, really really bright

1107
01:03:19,120 --> 01:03:22,240
Speaker 1: business minds right first and foremost, I think they also

1108
01:03:22,320 --> 01:03:26,760
Speaker 1: make a great pair, a really complementary pair, right Um.

1109
01:03:26,960 --> 01:03:30,960
Speaker 1: Coach you know, Coach grew up in in Indianapolis. Uh.

1110
01:03:32,040 --> 01:03:35,600
Speaker 1: He he came to Atlanta, you know, as a young man,

1111
01:03:35,880 --> 01:03:38,600
Speaker 1: drawn in by Freaknik, which is the sort of big

1112
01:03:38,640 --> 01:03:42,000
Speaker 1: black college spring break thing that really you know, put

1113
01:03:42,080 --> 01:03:45,160
Speaker 1: put put Atlanta nightlife on the map. Uh in the

1114
01:03:45,200 --> 01:03:48,600
Speaker 1: early nineties. Uh. And he spent a lot of time,

1115
01:03:48,640 --> 01:03:53,040
Speaker 1: as I've mentioned, sort of you know, working artists after

1116
01:03:53,160 --> 01:03:58,840
Speaker 1: artists after artist as a manager, building these relationships with radio,

1117
01:03:59,080 --> 01:04:02,960
Speaker 1: with their labels, with other artists, with producers, you know,

1118
01:04:03,120 --> 01:04:08,720
Speaker 1: just years, decades right of groundwork, and you know, grew

1119
01:04:08,760 --> 01:04:13,080
Speaker 1: into a godfather of of the scene. Right. Everybody knows him.

1120
01:04:13,120 --> 01:04:16,000
Speaker 1: Everybody respects him, They respects a year, they respect the

1121
01:04:16,000 --> 01:04:21,440
Speaker 1: way he does business. Um, and and piece of pieas different. Right,

1122
01:04:21,480 --> 01:04:24,280
Speaker 1: he didn't start as a musician. He started in the

1123
01:04:24,280 --> 01:04:26,720
Speaker 1: streets like he'll he'll, he'll tell you that, you know.

1124
01:04:26,800 --> 01:04:30,000
Speaker 1: And and he's one of these guys who saw music

1125
01:04:30,200 --> 01:04:32,720
Speaker 1: as a way out right. He wanted to invest the

1126
01:04:32,720 --> 01:04:36,040
Speaker 1: money he'd made. He had some real estate, he bought

1127
01:04:36,040 --> 01:04:40,120
Speaker 1: a studio. He tried to make it work. He wasn't

1128
01:04:40,120 --> 01:04:44,040
Speaker 1: sure what to do. I wasn't finding success. Realized you

1129
01:04:44,080 --> 01:04:46,560
Speaker 1: know that as as much money as you can make

1130
01:04:46,600 --> 01:04:49,640
Speaker 1: in music and rap music, you can lose it just

1131
01:04:49,680 --> 01:04:54,280
Speaker 1: as quickly. Right, total gamble um. But when he partnered

1132
01:04:54,320 --> 01:04:59,200
Speaker 1: with Coach and they discovered megas, they just both bring

1133
01:04:59,280 --> 01:05:02,960
Speaker 1: something different at the table, right. Coach coaches plugged, coaches

1134
01:05:02,960 --> 01:05:06,520
Speaker 1: plugged in in the boardrooms and the radio stations. And

1135
01:05:06,520 --> 01:05:09,400
Speaker 1: and he's a talent scout, right, He knows. He knows

1136
01:05:09,440 --> 01:05:13,480
Speaker 1: what's going on in in these neighborhoods. He he he

1137
01:05:13,600 --> 01:05:17,640
Speaker 1: meets young kids, artists, people who you know, show him

1138
01:05:17,760 --> 01:05:20,520
Speaker 1: what's happening. And he's a motivator. Right. I saw him

1139
01:05:20,680 --> 01:05:22,280
Speaker 1: do it over and over again. I saw him do

1140
01:05:22,320 --> 01:05:24,400
Speaker 1: it with a little baby firsthand. I saw him do

1141
01:05:24,440 --> 01:05:27,720
Speaker 1: it with Marlowe firsthand. He's the one who can say

1142
01:05:28,000 --> 01:05:30,640
Speaker 1: I've been where you've been, right, I've seen what you've seen.

1143
01:05:30,720 --> 01:05:33,520
Speaker 1: I've gone through these things, and I promise you you

1144
01:05:33,640 --> 01:05:36,880
Speaker 1: listen to me and you follow what I tell you.

1145
01:05:37,640 --> 01:05:39,160
Speaker 1: Not only are we going to make a lot of money,

1146
01:05:39,240 --> 01:05:41,000
Speaker 1: not only are you going to be able to help

1147
01:05:41,040 --> 01:05:43,200
Speaker 1: your family, but you're going to be safer. Right. And

1148
01:05:43,240 --> 01:05:45,960
Speaker 1: he's he's really taking it upon himself, I think too.

1149
01:05:47,000 --> 01:05:51,440
Speaker 1: You know uh mentor these artists right, and what they

1150
01:05:51,520 --> 01:05:54,240
Speaker 1: talk about is is artist development, Right, This is something

1151
01:05:54,280 --> 01:05:58,760
Speaker 1: that is nearly extinct in the record business. And why

1152
01:05:58,840 --> 01:06:02,880
Speaker 1: we see you know, one hit wonder uh every day

1153
01:06:03,080 --> 01:06:05,880
Speaker 1: right on TikTok or you know a half a hit wonder,

1154
01:06:05,880 --> 01:06:08,360
Speaker 1: like sometimes they're not even making the billboard chart. Um.

1155
01:06:08,920 --> 01:06:12,800
Speaker 1: And and one funny story, I think it didn't didn't

1156
01:06:12,840 --> 01:06:15,600
Speaker 1: make the book might be in a Times article. Um,

1157
01:06:16,520 --> 01:06:18,360
Speaker 1: but they had to they have to stop themselves right

1158
01:06:18,360 --> 01:06:20,480
Speaker 1: from going after some of these viral things. There was

1159
01:06:20,520 --> 01:06:22,960
Speaker 1: a moment when I first started reporting on these guys

1160
01:06:22,960 --> 01:06:25,640
Speaker 1: when I think he said, you know, uh, there was

1161
01:06:25,880 --> 01:06:28,520
Speaker 1: the girl known as the catch me outside girl, right,

1162
01:06:28,600 --> 01:06:31,280
Speaker 1: she became she became bad baby. She went viral on

1163
01:06:31,320 --> 01:06:34,680
Speaker 1: a Dr Phil clip, and they were like, maybe you know,

1164
01:06:34,760 --> 01:06:36,960
Speaker 1: she started rapping, because you know, what do you what

1165
01:06:37,000 --> 01:06:39,280
Speaker 1: do you what do you do after you have a

1166
01:06:39,360 --> 01:06:42,439
Speaker 1: viral moment, Maybe maybe you start you start rapping. And

1167
01:06:42,520 --> 01:06:44,040
Speaker 1: you know, I think I think it was p one

1168
01:06:44,040 --> 01:06:46,040
Speaker 1: of them was like, maybe we should go after her,

1169
01:06:46,120 --> 01:06:48,400
Speaker 1: like maybe we should do this and and and coach

1170
01:06:48,440 --> 01:06:50,680
Speaker 1: said like no, like that's not what we do. Like,

1171
01:06:50,800 --> 01:06:52,720
Speaker 1: let's keep our eye on the ball, right. What we

1172
01:06:52,800 --> 01:06:57,480
Speaker 1: do is we build artists, we build careers, we build brands. Um.

1173
01:06:57,560 --> 01:07:00,880
Speaker 1: And yeah, they're with these guys. They're with these guys

1174
01:07:01,000 --> 01:07:04,640
Speaker 1: every day right there, constantly sending new music back and forth,

1175
01:07:04,880 --> 01:07:09,160
Speaker 1: constantly pushing them do more shows, record more, another mixtape,

1176
01:07:09,160 --> 01:07:13,640
Speaker 1: another video. And yeah, it's just a it's a it's

1177
01:07:13,680 --> 01:07:18,600
Speaker 1: a unit a yang duo um that you know everybody

1178
01:07:18,600 --> 01:07:21,400
Speaker 1: on the label responds to either. You know, they may

1179
01:07:21,440 --> 01:07:23,360
Speaker 1: be closer with one, they may be closer with the other,

1180
01:07:23,960 --> 01:07:26,280
Speaker 1: but they respect both of them. And I think, you know,

1181
01:07:26,400 --> 01:07:29,520
Speaker 1: at this point, they've turned out so many artists who

1182
01:07:30,920 --> 01:07:34,640
Speaker 1: again don't have a hit song, but have real careers. Uh,

1183
01:07:35,360 --> 01:07:37,360
Speaker 1: you know, I put them up there with you know,

1184
01:07:37,520 --> 01:07:41,960
Speaker 1: uh no limit or cash money or a G unit whatever,

1185
01:07:42,000 --> 01:07:44,120
Speaker 1: you know, whatever. These rap crews and labels over the

1186
01:07:44,200 --> 01:07:46,360
Speaker 1: last twenty years who have been able to make more

1187
01:07:46,400 --> 01:07:49,520
Speaker 1: than one star, like to do it once as a miracle,

1188
01:07:49,640 --> 01:07:52,000
Speaker 1: right to do it five times. It's like it's a

1189
01:07:52,120 --> 01:08:02,440
Speaker 1: it's a it's a system. Now. Another thing you depict

1190
01:08:02,520 --> 01:08:05,480
Speaker 1: in the book that is different from traditional conception of

1191
01:08:05,520 --> 01:08:11,960
Speaker 1: the music business is the recording. Now, traditional music business,

1192
01:08:12,000 --> 01:08:14,440
Speaker 1: you know, maybe you'll have pre production to work on

1193
01:08:14,480 --> 01:08:16,280
Speaker 1: the song, and I said, well, we have ten songs

1194
01:08:16,320 --> 01:08:19,640
Speaker 1: when we record them, you know. But here people are

1195
01:08:19,720 --> 01:08:23,000
Speaker 1: running around with hard drives and you know, depict one thing,

1196
01:08:23,040 --> 01:08:25,240
Speaker 1: Oh there's a famous studio in New York. Well let's

1197
01:08:25,560 --> 01:08:27,799
Speaker 1: you know, we got an hour free, let's go record.

1198
01:08:28,760 --> 01:08:33,560
Speaker 1: So you know, they're constantly recording, and a great percentage

1199
01:08:33,560 --> 01:08:39,320
Speaker 1: of the stuff never even comes out right so yeah,

1200
01:08:39,720 --> 01:08:43,599
Speaker 1: it's how much do these people alter. Let's say you're wanting,

1201
01:08:43,600 --> 01:08:46,400
Speaker 1: you know, one of these guys in quality control, how

1202
01:08:46,439 --> 01:08:52,400
Speaker 1: much will you record before they release something? Dozens, hundreds,

1203
01:08:53,240 --> 01:08:56,840
Speaker 1: thousands of songs, probably on hard drives. Right, This is

1204
01:08:56,960 --> 01:09:01,760
Speaker 1: it's a it's a volume business. It's you know, they're

1205
01:09:01,760 --> 01:09:03,760
Speaker 1: putting out a ton of music. Right if you look

1206
01:09:03,800 --> 01:09:07,160
Speaker 1: at look at Little Babies discography, the first whatever, it's

1207
01:09:07,200 --> 01:09:10,160
Speaker 1: been five years of his career, right, stack that up

1208
01:09:10,160 --> 01:09:13,080
Speaker 1: against you know, of course they're there are rock bands

1209
01:09:13,120 --> 01:09:15,559
Speaker 1: that that put out a ton of music whatever I

1210
01:09:15,560 --> 01:09:18,639
Speaker 1: guided by voices or you know, some something like that. Sure,

1211
01:09:19,240 --> 01:09:24,479
Speaker 1: but traditionally a major label chart topping artists, right, what

1212
01:09:24,479 --> 01:09:27,599
Speaker 1: they're going to put out twelve to fifteen songs every

1213
01:09:27,640 --> 01:09:32,439
Speaker 1: eighteen months? Will Baby put out five mixtapes in ten months? Right,

1214
01:09:32,520 --> 01:09:36,360
Speaker 1: each of them probably between fifteen and twenty tracks. Um,

1215
01:09:36,400 --> 01:09:39,160
Speaker 1: this is what the audience wants, right, they're responding to

1216
01:09:40,120 --> 01:09:44,519
Speaker 1: they're responding to the audience. They're there, they're churning at

1217
01:09:44,560 --> 01:09:48,080
Speaker 1: this rate. And and it's an artistic choice as well, right,

1218
01:09:48,120 --> 01:09:51,599
Speaker 1: Like the guys that they are emulating, the guys who

1219
01:09:51,640 --> 01:09:56,599
Speaker 1: who started this, uh, this practice of recording in this

1220
01:09:56,640 --> 01:10:01,200
Speaker 1: way improvisationally, uh, putting a ton of music out. This

1221
01:10:01,240 --> 01:10:04,400
Speaker 1: is this Gucci Man, this is Little Wayne, Uh, this

1222
01:10:04,479 --> 01:10:10,479
Speaker 1: is young Thug. These guys are all We're putting out many,

1223
01:10:10,520 --> 01:10:12,760
Speaker 1: many mixtapes a year. Guci Man was putting out three

1224
01:10:12,760 --> 01:10:15,800
Speaker 1: mix tapes on the same day at one point, at

1225
01:10:15,800 --> 01:10:20,360
Speaker 1: the peak of his career. Um. And there's just there's

1226
01:10:20,400 --> 01:10:25,600
Speaker 1: a lack of preciousness um about the art. Um. But

1227
01:10:27,080 --> 01:10:29,760
Speaker 1: I think the important thing to realize is, like that

1228
01:10:29,800 --> 01:10:33,040
Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily make it worse, you know what I mean? Like,

1229
01:10:33,120 --> 01:10:39,640
Speaker 1: I think the the the the audience, like the it

1230
01:10:39,760 --> 01:10:43,000
Speaker 1: showed like people people care about this music as much

1231
01:10:43,040 --> 01:10:46,360
Speaker 1: as you might care about a Beatles song, right that

1232
01:10:46,439 --> 01:10:49,280
Speaker 1: they spent six months working on, Right, we see it

1233
01:10:49,400 --> 01:10:52,880
Speaker 1: and like they get back music video. But but that

1234
01:10:52,960 --> 01:10:58,040
Speaker 1: doesn't that's not like a one isn't necessarily better than

1235
01:10:58,080 --> 01:11:00,200
Speaker 1: the other, right, And I think that that's you know,

1236
01:11:00,240 --> 01:11:04,040
Speaker 1: there's a there's this idea that it's that it's disposable, um.

1237
01:11:04,080 --> 01:11:07,960
Speaker 1: But it's only as disposable as as as the audience

1238
01:11:08,160 --> 01:11:10,439
Speaker 1: wants it to be. Right, Like I I think I

1239
01:11:10,479 --> 01:11:13,920
Speaker 1: think we'll be playing bad em bougie at weddings in

1240
01:11:13,920 --> 01:11:18,920
Speaker 1: in fifty years, right, Um, and maybe you know it

1241
01:11:19,000 --> 01:11:23,200
Speaker 1: was made in one take in offset spacemen, but uh,

1242
01:11:23,240 --> 01:11:25,679
Speaker 1: you know, I think it's it's incredible to watch also,

1243
01:11:25,840 --> 01:11:29,559
Speaker 1: just the the way they sort of start and stop

1244
01:11:29,640 --> 01:11:33,040
Speaker 1: without writing anything down, uh, and sort of creating these

1245
01:11:33,080 --> 01:11:36,960
Speaker 1: these melodies, these flows, these rhymes, uh, these jokes, these

1246
01:11:37,000 --> 01:11:41,000
Speaker 1: stories in real time. So I feel truly, truly blessed

1247
01:11:41,040 --> 01:11:42,920
Speaker 1: to have been able to to to see it in

1248
01:11:42,960 --> 01:11:45,760
Speaker 1: person as much as I have. Okay, so you have

1249
01:11:45,800 --> 01:11:49,200
Speaker 1: all these rappers, where's all the where all the beats

1250
01:11:49,280 --> 01:11:52,920
Speaker 1: or of the music coming from? You know, That's something

1251
01:11:52,960 --> 01:11:54,800
Speaker 1: I wish I got into more in the book. Right,

1252
01:11:54,840 --> 01:11:58,200
Speaker 1: there's a whole other book to be written about Atlanta producers. Um.

1253
01:11:58,439 --> 01:12:01,680
Speaker 1: But they're working at a similar pace, right. You have

1254
01:12:02,240 --> 01:12:05,879
Speaker 1: you know, guys like Metro booming, Um, guys like Murder Beats,

1255
01:12:06,160 --> 01:12:10,720
Speaker 1: Guys like Zethoven. You know, a classically trained pianists who

1256
01:12:10,439 --> 01:12:14,720
Speaker 1: who played in church with his parents. He's you know,

1257
01:12:15,040 --> 01:12:21,880
Speaker 1: instrumental to the careers of future Gucci Man, Negosh and

1258
01:12:21,880 --> 01:12:25,000
Speaker 1: and and they're working similarly, right, They're making hundreds and

1259
01:12:25,080 --> 01:12:28,599
Speaker 1: hundreds of beats, dozens of beats maybe you know, thousands

1260
01:12:28,680 --> 01:12:31,680
Speaker 1: of beats over the course of their career, and and

1261
01:12:31,720 --> 01:12:35,679
Speaker 1: they're spreading them around their network right there. File sharing

1262
01:12:35,760 --> 01:12:38,720
Speaker 1: so easy, drop box, you know. I remember being in

1263
01:12:38,720 --> 01:12:41,280
Speaker 1: the studio with Marlowe who's trying to find something that

1264
01:12:41,320 --> 01:12:43,800
Speaker 1: inspired him. He just pulled up a Gmail, right. I

1265
01:12:43,840 --> 01:12:47,120
Speaker 1: guess you know you post looking for beats posted Gmail

1266
01:12:47,120 --> 01:12:50,320
Speaker 1: address on your Instagram story. Dozens of kids will hit

1267
01:12:50,400 --> 01:12:54,479
Speaker 1: you, you you know, with with a beat within five ten minutes,

1268
01:12:55,000 --> 01:12:58,240
Speaker 1: just clicking around attachments, trying to find something that inspires him,

1269
01:12:58,240 --> 01:13:01,720
Speaker 1: trying to find something that that catches the year. Um.

1270
01:13:01,840 --> 01:13:05,719
Speaker 1: There are guys who make very bespoke versions of this right, Um,

1271
01:13:06,080 --> 01:13:09,920
Speaker 1: people who will work months on the same beat, you know,

1272
01:13:10,000 --> 01:13:12,200
Speaker 1: get getting the high hat just right, getting the base

1273
01:13:12,320 --> 01:13:14,280
Speaker 1: just right. And then there are people who will just

1274
01:13:14,479 --> 01:13:17,320
Speaker 1: you know, make three beats in an hour. Uh, and

1275
01:13:17,400 --> 01:13:19,839
Speaker 1: there's no telling which one is gonna become the basis

1276
01:13:19,840 --> 01:13:22,000
Speaker 1: for a hit song. Right, So it's like it's a

1277
01:13:22,000 --> 01:13:26,400
Speaker 1: grab bag. Yeah. Like I said, you know, the producers

1278
01:13:26,880 --> 01:13:29,960
Speaker 1: were not as big of a role in this book.

1279
01:13:30,000 --> 01:13:31,439
Speaker 1: I spoke, I spoke to a lot of them, and

1280
01:13:31,520 --> 01:13:33,720
Speaker 1: I saw a lot of them work. Um, but they

1281
01:13:33,760 --> 01:13:36,280
Speaker 1: just didn't fit as much with the narrative. But you know,

1282
01:13:36,320 --> 01:13:39,719
Speaker 1: i'd gladly, gladly read that book to you know, I

1283
01:13:39,720 --> 01:13:43,040
Speaker 1: I get into some of this um in the video

1284
01:13:43,080 --> 01:13:45,760
Speaker 1: series I do for The Times Diary of Song, which

1285
01:13:45,800 --> 01:13:48,200
Speaker 1: is about about the making of tracks, and you know

1286
01:13:48,240 --> 01:13:51,360
Speaker 1: how how stuff is created and then it's made marketed

1287
01:13:51,439 --> 01:13:55,080
Speaker 1: and it goes viral sort of uh in this era. Um.

1288
01:13:55,120 --> 01:13:57,080
Speaker 1: But you know you think of something like Old Town Road,

1289
01:13:57,760 --> 01:14:02,280
Speaker 1: which funnily enough was know was recorded in an Atlanta

1290
01:14:02,320 --> 01:14:06,519
Speaker 1: studio um by Little nos X, but the beat came

1291
01:14:06,600 --> 01:14:10,240
Speaker 1: from a Dutch teenager who he never met before, who

1292
01:14:10,400 --> 01:14:13,120
Speaker 1: sampled the nine Inch Nails song that he'd never heard

1293
01:14:13,160 --> 01:14:16,400
Speaker 1: before that he pulled off YouTube you know, um so

1294
01:14:17,320 --> 01:14:21,960
Speaker 1: and and then sold or least even for what like

1295
01:14:22,040 --> 01:14:25,320
Speaker 1: fifty seventy five bucks. Um. You know, they are endless

1296
01:14:25,320 --> 01:14:28,840
Speaker 1: sites for free beats, for cheap beats, for you know,

1297
01:14:29,120 --> 01:14:31,800
Speaker 1: beats you can lease for a month, see if it

1298
01:14:31,840 --> 01:14:35,920
Speaker 1: takes off six months. Um. And you know, the business

1299
01:14:35,920 --> 01:14:39,080
Speaker 1: of the stuff gets gets super naughty when it comes

1300
01:14:39,120 --> 01:14:44,520
Speaker 1: to to clearing and samples and rights holders and publishing

1301
01:14:44,760 --> 01:14:46,920
Speaker 1: and all of that. Like I don't know, you know,

1302
01:14:47,160 --> 01:14:50,680
Speaker 1: I don't envy the people behind the scenes who have

1303
01:14:50,720 --> 01:14:53,120
Speaker 1: to clear all this music. Um, but it's a it's

1304
01:14:53,120 --> 01:14:58,519
Speaker 1: an extremely fascinating and fast paced way to to create. Now,

1305
01:14:58,560 --> 01:15:01,759
Speaker 1: you make the point you referenced earlier that these guys

1306
01:15:01,760 --> 01:15:05,000
Speaker 1: in Atlanta a great degree are recording differently from people

1307
01:15:05,040 --> 01:15:09,000
Speaker 1: previous in rap in that they're literally doing it. Not

1308
01:15:09,320 --> 01:15:12,599
Speaker 1: sometimes we're by we're but usually phrase by phrase. They're

1309
01:15:12,640 --> 01:15:14,919
Speaker 1: not starting up with a whole thing. Can you amplify

1310
01:15:14,960 --> 01:15:17,960
Speaker 1: that a little bit? Yeah? Correct? So so, I mean

1311
01:15:18,080 --> 01:15:21,280
Speaker 1: jay Z famously, you know, says he never writes his

1312
01:15:21,400 --> 01:15:24,720
Speaker 1: lyrics down, right. But but the amazing thing about jay Z,

1313
01:15:24,840 --> 01:15:26,920
Speaker 1: according to you know, people have seen it. I've never

1314
01:15:27,000 --> 01:15:30,439
Speaker 1: I've never watched jay Z record other than in you know,

1315
01:15:30,520 --> 01:15:33,400
Speaker 1: The Fades of Black documentary and in various YouTube videos.

1316
01:15:33,439 --> 01:15:36,200
Speaker 1: But he's wrapping whole verses at a time, right, things

1317
01:15:36,200 --> 01:15:38,280
Speaker 1: that he comes up with in his head and remembers.

1318
01:15:38,439 --> 01:15:42,280
Speaker 1: Um And and I think little Wayne uh Is is

1319
01:15:42,320 --> 01:15:45,559
Speaker 1: the same way. Um. He another one I think, having

1320
01:15:45,640 --> 01:15:48,040
Speaker 1: learned from jay Z, you know, it's a point of pride,

1321
01:15:48,080 --> 01:15:50,160
Speaker 1: right that he never wrote down his lyrics. But you

1322
01:15:50,200 --> 01:15:52,320
Speaker 1: think of you know, some people might think of rap

1323
01:15:52,360 --> 01:15:54,599
Speaker 1: as you know, a guy with a with a black

1324
01:15:54,640 --> 01:15:58,439
Speaker 1: and white journal pad right scribbling down stands as like

1325
01:15:58,479 --> 01:16:01,440
Speaker 1: they're a poem, and then wrapping them into a microphone.

1326
01:16:01,840 --> 01:16:05,639
Speaker 1: But the Atlanta style, especially over the last ten years,

1327
01:16:06,000 --> 01:16:08,960
Speaker 1: um following the footsteps of those guys that I named,

1328
01:16:10,120 --> 01:16:14,519
Speaker 1: is extremely improvisational, and it happens directly into the microphone, right.

1329
01:16:14,720 --> 01:16:17,200
Speaker 1: Sometimes you know, some little baby said. You know, every

1330
01:16:17,200 --> 01:16:19,120
Speaker 1: now and then I'll get hired to do a feature

1331
01:16:19,200 --> 01:16:21,519
Speaker 1: for a song or whatever. I'll have an idea, I'll

1332
01:16:21,640 --> 01:16:24,880
Speaker 1: write something down, but almost always they're just playing the

1333
01:16:24,880 --> 01:16:29,360
Speaker 1: beat on loop and wrapping their ideas directly into the mic, right.

1334
01:16:29,400 --> 01:16:32,320
Speaker 1: So they'll they'll often start with like a gibberish sort

1335
01:16:32,360 --> 01:16:35,320
Speaker 1: of thing, which I've seen pop top liners do as well, uh,

1336
01:16:35,360 --> 01:16:40,400
Speaker 1: sort of syllabic melodic uh, you know, get a rhythm

1337
01:16:40,479 --> 01:16:43,720
Speaker 1: down with just a just a nonsense phrase, and then

1338
01:16:43,760 --> 01:16:45,519
Speaker 1: they start to fill in words, and then they start

1339
01:16:45,560 --> 01:16:47,880
Speaker 1: to fill in phrases, and they start to fill in lines,

1340
01:16:48,439 --> 01:16:50,960
Speaker 1: and they'll just go sort of like you know, piece

1341
01:16:51,000 --> 01:16:54,360
Speaker 1: by piece by piece, um. And you know I described

1342
01:16:54,400 --> 01:16:56,200
Speaker 1: I described me goes doing this in the book and

1343
01:16:56,520 --> 01:16:59,360
Speaker 1: their their relationship with their engineer, right, has to be

1344
01:16:59,439 --> 01:17:04,240
Speaker 1: like basically basically telepathic. Right, the engineer knows when they

1345
01:17:04,240 --> 01:17:07,639
Speaker 1: want to go back, uh and do something, over keep something,

1346
01:17:08,120 --> 01:17:10,360
Speaker 1: you know, move on to the next thing, um and it.

1347
01:17:10,479 --> 01:17:13,559
Speaker 1: And it's the sort of this lego block process, whether

1348
01:17:13,560 --> 01:17:16,760
Speaker 1: they're just building and building and building um and then

1349
01:17:16,760 --> 01:17:18,880
Speaker 1: all of a sudden you have sixteen bars and and

1350
01:17:18,880 --> 01:17:21,840
Speaker 1: and you move on to the next one. Now, historically

1351
01:17:22,200 --> 01:17:25,240
Speaker 1: popular music has not been about the lyrics. The lyrics

1352
01:17:25,280 --> 01:17:30,360
Speaker 1: are secondary and the success of these songs, how much

1353
01:17:30,400 --> 01:17:33,080
Speaker 1: of it is the beat? How much of it is

1354
01:17:33,160 --> 01:17:38,240
Speaker 1: the lyrics in terms of the appeal? I think it

1355
01:17:38,280 --> 01:17:41,120
Speaker 1: really depends. I think you know, Southern rap gets a

1356
01:17:41,320 --> 01:17:46,160
Speaker 1: reputation for being non lyrical. You know, there's the term

1357
01:17:46,200 --> 01:17:48,679
Speaker 1: mumble rap that was in vogue a few years ago,

1358
01:17:48,800 --> 01:17:52,280
Speaker 1: talking about people like Yaddi and future um and me

1359
01:17:52,400 --> 01:17:56,479
Speaker 1: goes um. You know, I think that's sort of in

1360
01:17:56,600 --> 01:18:01,200
Speaker 1: line with biases against Southern people, and especially southern black

1361
01:18:01,240 --> 01:18:03,960
Speaker 1: people throughout history, right, this idea that you know, they

1362
01:18:03,960 --> 01:18:08,040
Speaker 1: have a country accent, therefore they're not as bright as

1363
01:18:08,120 --> 01:18:11,280
Speaker 1: you know, someone like Naz or whatever, who's a you know,

1364
01:18:11,840 --> 01:18:18,479
Speaker 1: northern storyteller. Um. But I mean to me, like, most

1365
01:18:18,479 --> 01:18:24,360
Speaker 1: of these guys are lyrical geniuses, right, and that's you know,

1366
01:18:24,360 --> 01:18:27,400
Speaker 1: from Gucci Man Too Young Thug to two Little Baby.

1367
01:18:27,479 --> 01:18:29,240
Speaker 1: Like I think if you you see the way they

1368
01:18:29,280 --> 01:18:32,839
Speaker 1: play with language, you see the way they they they

1369
01:18:32,880 --> 01:18:38,040
Speaker 1: describe an image, right, there's often economy in the writing. Um,

1370
01:18:38,120 --> 01:18:41,120
Speaker 1: you know, the way they're putting phrases together, the way

1371
01:18:41,160 --> 01:18:44,160
Speaker 1: they're birthing new slang. You know, someone like Future I

1372
01:18:44,200 --> 01:18:48,200
Speaker 1: think is like completely unparalleled when it comes to like

1373
01:18:48,680 --> 01:18:54,000
Speaker 1: lingo and just the way he's inserting new idioms into

1374
01:18:54,160 --> 01:18:56,840
Speaker 1: popular culture, right, Like this is a skill. This is

1375
01:18:56,880 --> 01:19:01,360
Speaker 1: not like, this is not anything to be sneered at. Um.

1376
01:19:01,400 --> 01:19:03,160
Speaker 1: And I think you know, people get turned off by

1377
01:19:03,200 --> 01:19:05,719
Speaker 1: the auto tune, but if you listen to even someone

1378
01:19:05,760 --> 01:19:08,679
Speaker 1: like Little Baby, I think it's just a really sneakily lyrical,

1379
01:19:08,960 --> 01:19:13,839
Speaker 1: intricate rapper. Um. You know, his his his phrasing, his timing.

1380
01:19:14,240 --> 01:19:17,120
Speaker 1: He's so wordy. You know, you go see him in

1381
01:19:17,200 --> 01:19:20,719
Speaker 1: concert and in the and the breath control is amazing.

1382
01:19:20,760 --> 01:19:24,120
Speaker 1: He's just you know, these these sort of run on versus.

1383
01:19:24,240 --> 01:19:29,840
Speaker 1: Even even the choruses are often extremely wordy. Um. And yeah,

1384
01:19:29,920 --> 01:19:34,160
Speaker 1: there's just there's so many different flavors of this um,

1385
01:19:34,200 --> 01:19:37,000
Speaker 1: even within Atlanta, even within guys who might sound the

1386
01:19:37,000 --> 01:19:41,760
Speaker 1: same uh at at first at first glance. But you know,

1387
01:19:41,840 --> 01:19:44,000
Speaker 1: of course the beat is important, right, This is a

1388
01:19:44,240 --> 01:19:46,200
Speaker 1: this is like a music that is made to be

1389
01:19:46,320 --> 01:19:49,160
Speaker 1: felt often. You know, you you feel that you feel

1390
01:19:49,200 --> 01:19:54,000
Speaker 1: the baseline, you know, the melody, the high hats, um,

1391
01:19:54,439 --> 01:19:57,080
Speaker 1: the cadences, the patterns. Like you know, I think it

1392
01:19:57,080 --> 01:20:00,920
Speaker 1: wouldn't be as popular internationally uh as it is without

1393
01:20:01,080 --> 01:20:04,000
Speaker 1: a lot of that stuff. Um. You know they people

1394
01:20:04,000 --> 01:20:07,280
Speaker 1: in other markets might not even be following the slang

1395
01:20:07,280 --> 01:20:10,320
Speaker 1: in the lyrics. UM. But I think you you get

1396
01:20:10,320 --> 01:20:12,240
Speaker 1: out of it what you put into it. Like I

1397
01:20:12,240 --> 01:20:15,120
Speaker 1: think if you invest in these guys, you see sort

1398
01:20:15,160 --> 01:20:19,400
Speaker 1: of how they're how they're building uh stories, characters, narratives,

1399
01:20:19,600 --> 01:20:21,679
Speaker 1: not only within a song, but sort of over time

1400
01:20:22,240 --> 01:20:26,160
Speaker 1: on mix tapes, uh, you know, on albums, on guest

1401
01:20:26,280 --> 01:20:31,040
Speaker 1: versus you piecing together um, a story, a mythology and

1402
01:20:31,160 --> 01:20:37,559
Speaker 1: narrative sort of you know, internal um world right there.

1403
01:20:37,600 --> 01:20:43,520
Speaker 1: You know characters that recur um. You know, street names, geography,

1404
01:20:43,640 --> 01:20:45,840
Speaker 1: it's a you know, it's it's like a it's a

1405
01:20:45,840 --> 01:20:49,080
Speaker 1: folk tradition. Um. I think in a lot of ways.

1406
01:20:49,920 --> 01:20:53,120
Speaker 1: Now you recite essentially thirty years worth of history in

1407
01:20:53,120 --> 01:20:55,840
Speaker 1: the book, and from those who are not deep in

1408
01:20:55,880 --> 01:20:59,120
Speaker 1: the scene, it appears that a lot of these acts

1409
01:20:59,160 --> 01:21:03,599
Speaker 1: had a commercial and social peak and then it's past.

1410
01:21:04,120 --> 01:21:06,920
Speaker 1: Now the music business, to a great degree, that's the

1411
01:21:06,960 --> 01:21:09,800
Speaker 1: way it's run, but since to a degree it's an

1412
01:21:09,880 --> 01:21:14,240
Speaker 1: underground economy, some of it's not monetized. Are these people

1413
01:21:14,439 --> 01:21:18,360
Speaker 1: peak peeking and disappearing or are they being kept alive

1414
01:21:18,439 --> 01:21:23,760
Speaker 1: in this subculture and able to continue to monetize their

1415
01:21:23,960 --> 01:21:28,000
Speaker 1: quote again, Brands, I think you're seeing a lot more

1416
01:21:28,160 --> 01:21:32,920
Speaker 1: longevity these days, right, I think music industry in general,

1417
01:21:33,720 --> 01:21:39,400
Speaker 1: um but in in raps specifically, there wasn't often the

1418
01:21:39,479 --> 01:21:42,080
Speaker 1: super long tale for these things, right you think of

1419
01:21:42,360 --> 01:21:46,360
Speaker 1: you think of the the the early New York rappers, Right,

1420
01:21:46,880 --> 01:21:50,839
Speaker 1: they didn't rap into their forties or even into their thirdies.

1421
01:21:50,920 --> 01:21:54,200
Speaker 1: You know, they were not celebrities in the same way

1422
01:21:54,360 --> 01:21:57,120
Speaker 1: that that you see Now you have guys who you know,

1423
01:21:57,200 --> 01:22:00,360
Speaker 1: put out their their best album twenty years ago who

1424
01:22:00,400 --> 01:22:02,840
Speaker 1: are still on the blogs and in the clubs and

1425
01:22:02,920 --> 01:22:06,720
Speaker 1: on TV every day. Um So, I think there is

1426
01:22:06,760 --> 01:22:09,840
Speaker 1: a there's a longer shelf life for these people, for

1427
01:22:09,920 --> 01:22:13,760
Speaker 1: these artists, especially as celebrities. UM. But I think rap

1428
01:22:13,920 --> 01:22:17,080
Speaker 1: music is still very much a young man's game, right.

1429
01:22:17,080 --> 01:22:21,559
Speaker 1: There's always somebody fresher, There's always somebody doing something slightly different,

1430
01:22:21,680 --> 01:22:25,640
Speaker 1: something new. There's always somebody you know, SEXI or more dangerous,

1431
01:22:25,680 --> 01:22:31,320
Speaker 1: more experimental. Um and and these cycles go really quickly, right,

1432
01:22:31,360 --> 01:22:33,759
Speaker 1: I think even you know, you look at quality controls

1433
01:22:33,760 --> 01:22:38,639
Speaker 1: existed since uh you know when when when Mega started

1434
01:22:38,680 --> 01:22:41,160
Speaker 1: to blow up, and and and then you look at

1435
01:22:41,160 --> 01:22:44,599
Speaker 1: someone like Little Baby who's now in the A list himself,

1436
01:22:44,680 --> 01:22:47,280
Speaker 1: and they have many many rappers that have come after

1437
01:22:47,360 --> 01:22:49,599
Speaker 1: that that are you know, on their way up, like

1438
01:22:49,760 --> 01:22:52,920
Speaker 1: the churn, even within one label, uh, and you can

1439
01:22:52,960 --> 01:22:55,439
Speaker 1: see sort of you know who who's peaking at any

1440
01:22:55,439 --> 01:22:59,720
Speaker 1: given moment or or or who's coming from behind. Um.

1441
01:22:59,800 --> 01:23:02,960
Speaker 1: You know, I think the audiences are always in search

1442
01:23:03,000 --> 01:23:05,799
Speaker 1: of the next thing. Um But I think the idea,

1443
01:23:05,960 --> 01:23:08,880
Speaker 1: right is that at a at a label like this,

1444
01:23:09,000 --> 01:23:11,639
Speaker 1: and if if if you put out enough good work,

1445
01:23:12,640 --> 01:23:14,880
Speaker 1: even if it's in a quick period of time, and

1446
01:23:14,920 --> 01:23:17,680
Speaker 1: you sort of build your quote unquote brand, and you

1447
01:23:17,800 --> 01:23:21,639
Speaker 1: establish your relationships and your fan base, you can continue

1448
01:23:21,680 --> 01:23:23,960
Speaker 1: to tour. You can continue to get endorsements, you can

1449
01:23:24,000 --> 01:23:27,280
Speaker 1: continue to you know, be on television and show up

1450
01:23:27,320 --> 01:23:29,519
Speaker 1: at a word shows. You know. Luckily, I think for

1451
01:23:29,520 --> 01:23:32,840
Speaker 1: a lot of these rappers, the sort of mainstream mono

1452
01:23:32,880 --> 01:23:37,280
Speaker 1: culture uh in American popular culture is still pretty slow. Right,

1453
01:23:37,640 --> 01:23:40,719
Speaker 1: So even if you're considered a little bit uh passe

1454
01:23:40,760 --> 01:23:43,519
Speaker 1: a or you know, no longer the hot new thing

1455
01:23:43,520 --> 01:23:48,400
Speaker 1: and wrap, you're still going to be on network television. Okay,

1456
01:23:48,520 --> 01:23:52,479
Speaker 1: So music in general in this sort of grows out

1457
01:23:52,479 --> 01:23:57,719
Speaker 1: of what you're saying is overwhelming. You know, the hits

1458
01:23:57,800 --> 01:24:01,320
Speaker 1: and the Spotify top fifty never meant less used to

1459
01:24:01,400 --> 01:24:03,639
Speaker 1: have a hit in the old days, everybody knew it

1460
01:24:03,760 --> 01:24:05,640
Speaker 1: something you mean number one people haven't even heard of

1461
01:24:05,680 --> 01:24:10,280
Speaker 1: the act. So if one has not been following this

1462
01:24:10,520 --> 01:24:16,200
Speaker 1: music and an uneducated it just looks overwhelming. First their SoundCloud.

1463
01:24:16,680 --> 01:24:20,840
Speaker 1: There are mixed tapes continuing to come out, never mind

1464
01:24:20,920 --> 01:24:24,120
Speaker 1: the history. There's a lot of people in the game.

1465
01:24:25,520 --> 01:24:28,599
Speaker 1: Does one follow it without making it a full time job?

1466
01:24:31,160 --> 01:24:33,240
Speaker 1: I think this goes for any culture, right that you can.

1467
01:24:33,320 --> 01:24:35,559
Speaker 1: You can say the same thing about TV. Right, I

1468
01:24:35,640 --> 01:24:38,040
Speaker 1: might be watching a show that I think is is

1469
01:24:38,160 --> 01:24:40,479
Speaker 1: the best thing in the world on one streaming service

1470
01:24:40,760 --> 01:24:43,160
Speaker 1: and you don't even have a log in for that one, right,

1471
01:24:43,200 --> 01:24:45,400
Speaker 1: and you have no idea what I'm talking about. We

1472
01:24:45,479 --> 01:24:47,280
Speaker 1: think of, you know, I think you've written about this

1473
01:24:47,280 --> 01:24:49,599
Speaker 1: in the newsletter. You think of something like the bear, right,

1474
01:24:49,760 --> 01:24:52,519
Speaker 1: The bear in my world was a huge hit right

1475
01:24:52,560 --> 01:24:58,160
Speaker 1: among people in the media in you know, relatively young

1476
01:24:58,479 --> 01:25:00,680
Speaker 1: something like industry or the bear is like, that's what

1477
01:25:00,720 --> 01:25:02,880
Speaker 1: people are watching, that's what people are talking about. If

1478
01:25:02,880 --> 01:25:05,040
Speaker 1: I go home and see my parents, they don't know

1479
01:25:05,080 --> 01:25:07,320
Speaker 1: what the bear is, you know, or or maybe they

1480
01:25:07,320 --> 01:25:09,680
Speaker 1: clicked on it on Hulu and they accidentally found it.

1481
01:25:09,720 --> 01:25:14,720
Speaker 1: They didn't know it was trendy. Right, Um, Look, I

1482
01:25:15,080 --> 01:25:19,479
Speaker 1: think the monoculture that I just referenced, like it barely

1483
01:25:19,520 --> 01:25:22,080
Speaker 1: exists anymore. Right with you? On that, I would say

1484
01:25:22,080 --> 01:25:24,599
Speaker 1: it doesn't exist at all. But okay, Yeah, Like, you know,

1485
01:25:24,640 --> 01:25:27,920
Speaker 1: they're a handful of things that breakthrough, right, Rihanna is

1486
01:25:27,920 --> 01:25:30,439
Speaker 1: going to play the super Bowl, Like that's a monoculture event,

1487
01:25:30,640 --> 01:25:34,320
Speaker 1: right Arguably, you know, maybe the Beatles documentary that Peter

1488
01:25:34,439 --> 01:25:37,120
Speaker 1: Jackson Beatles tument. I feel like that that broke through

1489
01:25:37,160 --> 01:25:42,719
Speaker 1: as much as I'd seen anything breakthrough in years right. Um,

1490
01:25:42,720 --> 01:25:45,959
Speaker 1: going back to two me goes, I think that Embouge

1491
01:25:46,120 --> 01:25:48,400
Speaker 1: was a number one song in the world. Did my

1492
01:25:48,479 --> 01:25:51,800
Speaker 1: grandparents know it? Probably not. I think it had a

1493
01:25:51,960 --> 01:25:58,160
Speaker 1: huge amount of permeation into into the mainstream. Um. And yet,

1494
01:25:58,880 --> 01:26:01,360
Speaker 1: like you're saying, and was that was five years ago,

1495
01:26:01,400 --> 01:26:05,000
Speaker 1: it's only gotten worse. Um. I think people choose their spots, right,

1496
01:26:05,080 --> 01:26:08,120
Speaker 1: they know what they're interested in, they know what Spotify

1497
01:26:08,240 --> 01:26:11,559
Speaker 1: serves them. They either listen to the radio or they don't.

1498
01:26:11,720 --> 01:26:15,160
Speaker 1: You know. I think look radio, like some of this

1499
01:26:15,280 --> 01:26:19,320
Speaker 1: music trickles up onto the radio usually after finding success

1500
01:26:19,360 --> 01:26:22,680
Speaker 1: on streaming. UM, sticks around for a long time, right.

1501
01:26:22,720 --> 01:26:25,640
Speaker 1: We see like the charts are pretty stagnant, especially the

1502
01:26:25,640 --> 01:26:29,040
Speaker 1: airplay charts. UM. But someone like Little Baby, He's found

1503
01:26:29,040 --> 01:26:31,479
Speaker 1: a ton of success on you know, what's referred to

1504
01:26:31,520 --> 01:26:35,519
Speaker 1: as urban radio, like many, many, many number one songs there,

1505
01:26:35,720 --> 01:26:38,240
Speaker 1: which means, you know, people driving home from work, they

1506
01:26:38,640 --> 01:26:40,720
Speaker 1: know the sound of his voice, even if they don't

1507
01:26:40,760 --> 01:26:45,000
Speaker 1: know his biography. UM. But I think that there remains

1508
01:26:45,080 --> 01:26:48,080
Speaker 1: this question of like superstars, right, is there a next

1509
01:26:48,120 --> 01:26:51,120
Speaker 1: generation of superstar? Who is who is the next superstar?

1510
01:26:51,240 --> 01:26:54,360
Speaker 1: You know, I'm I'm looking at a little Baby's career.

1511
01:26:54,360 --> 01:26:56,200
Speaker 1: Now he has an album coming out right ahead of

1512
01:26:56,200 --> 01:26:58,800
Speaker 1: this book, and in mid October, he's you know, he's

1513
01:26:59,280 --> 01:27:01,400
Speaker 1: the he's in the theme song for the World Cup.

1514
01:27:01,720 --> 01:27:04,920
Speaker 1: Is he's he has a Budweiser sponsorship, right, It doesn't.

1515
01:27:04,960 --> 01:27:07,160
Speaker 1: It doesn't get much bigger than that. And yet if

1516
01:27:07,200 --> 01:27:10,439
Speaker 1: you ask you the average person on the street, depending

1517
01:27:10,479 --> 01:27:13,559
Speaker 1: on their age and where they're from in Times Square,

1518
01:27:13,640 --> 01:27:15,559
Speaker 1: I still don't know if they if if they know

1519
01:27:15,600 --> 01:27:18,200
Speaker 1: who he is? Right Like, it's a it's a dice

1520
01:27:18,320 --> 01:27:24,439
Speaker 1: roll um. But I think, you know, if you want

1521
01:27:24,479 --> 01:27:27,920
Speaker 1: to pay attention, you can just pick a city, pick

1522
01:27:27,960 --> 01:27:30,800
Speaker 1: a YouTube account, pick a pick one artist, listen to

1523
01:27:30,880 --> 01:27:32,760
Speaker 1: the artist featured on their song. You know, I think

1524
01:27:32,800 --> 01:27:36,640
Speaker 1: there's there's a million different paths to follow, um, and

1525
01:27:36,680 --> 01:27:39,120
Speaker 1: you can get a decent picture of of where hip

1526
01:27:39,120 --> 01:27:41,800
Speaker 1: hop is at, where regional rap is at. But I

1527
01:27:41,840 --> 01:27:46,400
Speaker 1: agree in terms of you know, the what what what we?

1528
01:27:46,520 --> 01:27:48,599
Speaker 1: What I grew up on and certainly what you grew

1529
01:27:48,720 --> 01:27:52,719
Speaker 1: up on. That idea of like a discreete a list

1530
01:27:52,760 --> 01:27:55,880
Speaker 1: of artists, Uh, that doesn't exist anymore. You know, I've

1531
01:27:55,920 --> 01:27:59,759
Speaker 1: I've I've written about someone like NBA Young Boy who

1532
01:28:00,000 --> 01:28:01,760
Speaker 1: one of the biggest trappers in the world. You know,

1533
01:28:02,000 --> 01:28:05,840
Speaker 1: more YouTube streams than Taylor Swift, you know, and yet

1534
01:28:06,640 --> 01:28:11,160
Speaker 1: no radio play, zero television appearances. Nobody under the age

1535
01:28:11,160 --> 01:28:14,880
Speaker 1: of thirty knows who he is, and certainly not white people.

1536
01:28:15,520 --> 01:28:18,600
Speaker 1: Um So, you know, I think, I think it's a

1537
01:28:18,600 --> 01:28:22,839
Speaker 1: different world, but I think that applies across all media. Okay,

1538
01:28:22,880 --> 01:28:26,519
Speaker 1: but let's go back to your TV analogy. You're talking

1539
01:28:26,560 --> 01:28:30,479
Speaker 1: about hipster's media people knowing the bear. I hear from

1540
01:28:30,520 --> 01:28:35,400
Speaker 1: a lot of people regularly, and there are not many

1541
01:28:35,560 --> 01:28:40,479
Speaker 1: students of the game of streaming television. So they'll have

1542
01:28:40,560 --> 01:28:43,760
Speaker 1: watched the same shows even though got horrific reviews. They'll

1543
01:28:43,840 --> 01:28:49,479
Speaker 1: watched the offer, They'll watched ted Lasso, etcetera. You start

1544
01:28:49,600 --> 01:28:55,000
Speaker 1: talking about Borgan, even one of the legendary and foreign shows,

1545
01:28:55,200 --> 01:29:00,519
Speaker 1: they have no idea what you're talking about. Sororitive organ obsessive. Right,

1546
01:29:01,920 --> 01:29:05,160
Speaker 1: that's another that's another podcast. But staying with the concept

1547
01:29:05,200 --> 01:29:10,600
Speaker 1: of music, theoretically you could pay attention to the Spotify

1548
01:29:10,760 --> 01:29:15,800
Speaker 1: top fifty. That could be your thing. And even narrower

1549
01:29:15,840 --> 01:29:21,280
Speaker 1: than that is terrestrial radio. At the other end of it.

1550
01:29:21,320 --> 01:29:26,600
Speaker 1: In the book, there's multiple people creating a plethora of

1551
01:29:26,760 --> 01:29:31,360
Speaker 1: product outside it looks like a lot of people are

1552
01:29:31,439 --> 01:29:34,680
Speaker 1: in that deep is the truth that there are a

1553
01:29:34,720 --> 01:29:37,200
Speaker 1: lot of people and this is just their passion or

1554
01:29:37,240 --> 01:29:39,200
Speaker 1: really there's a limited number of people who are very

1555
01:29:39,240 --> 01:29:47,479
Speaker 1: passionate about it. That's a great question, you know, I

1556
01:29:47,520 --> 01:29:50,880
Speaker 1: think because this is a local scene, right that that

1557
01:29:50,920 --> 01:29:54,360
Speaker 1: I'm writing about, Like there's a way to be famous

1558
01:29:54,560 --> 01:29:58,280
Speaker 1: in Atlanta specifically, where you're only famous in your city,

1559
01:29:58,400 --> 01:30:01,439
Speaker 1: right I can. And there are there a handful of

1560
01:30:01,560 --> 01:30:03,840
Speaker 1: artists at any given moment who if you went to

1561
01:30:03,880 --> 01:30:07,000
Speaker 1: the mall there down on the West End, like that's

1562
01:30:07,000 --> 01:30:09,280
Speaker 1: a celebrity, you know what I mean, that's a that's

1563
01:30:09,320 --> 01:30:12,280
Speaker 1: a that's a hero that's getting played out of cars

1564
01:30:12,320 --> 01:30:16,760
Speaker 1: in the parking lot. And yet there's no even in

1565
01:30:16,800 --> 01:30:19,439
Speaker 1: the Spotify era, even in the YouTube ere, there's no

1566
01:30:19,520 --> 01:30:24,040
Speaker 1: sort of permeation outward. Uh. And I think I think

1567
01:30:24,040 --> 01:30:27,320
Speaker 1: that exists in in most American cities. I think like

1568
01:30:27,720 --> 01:30:31,559
Speaker 1: there are still subcultures there, especially in music. There are

1569
01:30:31,600 --> 01:30:37,400
Speaker 1: still local scenes. There are you know, hometown heroes. Um.

1570
01:30:37,640 --> 01:30:40,080
Speaker 1: And that's one of the things that draws me so

1571
01:30:40,160 --> 01:30:43,360
Speaker 1: much to to wrap. I don't know, you know, if

1572
01:30:43,400 --> 01:30:46,680
Speaker 1: the same thing happens in rock, right, I don't know

1573
01:30:46,840 --> 01:30:50,799
Speaker 1: really definitely there. I I agree with you. I think

1574
01:30:50,880 --> 01:30:53,439
Speaker 1: you know, as much as we used to say, like

1575
01:30:53,479 --> 01:30:56,280
Speaker 1: you could find a punk scene, you know, in any

1576
01:30:56,320 --> 01:30:59,960
Speaker 1: any metropolitan area or even a small town. I think

1577
01:31:00,040 --> 01:31:03,479
Speaker 1: they're fewer and further between now. But I think rap

1578
01:31:04,200 --> 01:31:07,519
Speaker 1: works in that local and I think you do a

1579
01:31:07,680 --> 01:31:11,800
Speaker 1: very good job of depicting that. Let's talk about you specifically.

1580
01:31:12,240 --> 01:31:15,080
Speaker 1: This year you were beat. You wrote a book about Atlanta.

1581
01:31:15,120 --> 01:31:17,840
Speaker 1: But Atlanta is not the only epicenter of hip hop,

1582
01:31:17,880 --> 01:31:20,280
Speaker 1: if it might be the most prominent at this point,

1583
01:31:21,240 --> 01:31:26,000
Speaker 1: To what degree do you listen to the mix tapes

1584
01:31:26,560 --> 01:31:30,360
Speaker 1: of hip hop artists in New York l A never mind? Before?

1585
01:31:30,600 --> 01:31:34,800
Speaker 1: Do you keep up on all these people or go on?

1586
01:31:36,080 --> 01:31:38,719
Speaker 1: I keep up less than I used to write. I'm

1587
01:31:38,840 --> 01:31:41,799
Speaker 1: I'm getting I'm getting old, right, this was I'm I

1588
01:31:41,880 --> 01:31:45,439
Speaker 1: grew up file sharing, right. I grew up on the Internet.

1589
01:31:45,520 --> 01:31:48,920
Speaker 1: I was downloading music on Napster when I was you know,

1590
01:31:49,040 --> 01:31:53,320
Speaker 1: ten eleven years old. I'm the problem, you know. But

1591
01:31:53,439 --> 01:31:57,080
Speaker 1: I also was an obsessive fan. I was discovering music

1592
01:31:57,120 --> 01:32:00,000
Speaker 1: on message boards. I was, you know, on every social

1593
01:32:00,080 --> 01:32:04,160
Speaker 1: network that that that that was growing. Um And and

1594
01:32:04,200 --> 01:32:07,320
Speaker 1: I prided myself on keeping up right on knowing what

1595
01:32:07,560 --> 01:32:10,160
Speaker 1: was hot, on knowing what was going to be big

1596
01:32:10,200 --> 01:32:12,519
Speaker 1: before it was big. And that's you know, part of

1597
01:32:12,520 --> 01:32:14,240
Speaker 1: the reason I end up getting the job that I

1598
01:32:14,280 --> 01:32:16,840
Speaker 1: did is because I was honing those skills as a

1599
01:32:16,840 --> 01:32:19,960
Speaker 1: as a fan first, um and then you know, you

1600
01:32:20,040 --> 01:32:23,040
Speaker 1: learned about the industry, you read, you you develop an

1601
01:32:23,040 --> 01:32:26,599
Speaker 1: ear um and that's really helped me on my beat.

1602
01:32:27,600 --> 01:32:30,240
Speaker 1: But look, I mean I had a book to write,

1603
01:32:30,280 --> 01:32:33,120
Speaker 1: you know, I I have I have a dog, I

1604
01:32:33,160 --> 01:32:36,080
Speaker 1: have a life like I'm not spending as much time

1605
01:32:36,280 --> 01:32:40,479
Speaker 1: sort of um trawling the internet for obscure regional artists

1606
01:32:40,520 --> 01:32:42,639
Speaker 1: as I used to. But I think I keep up

1607
01:32:42,800 --> 01:32:48,040
Speaker 1: more than people. Okay, let me ask the question a

1608
01:32:48,080 --> 01:32:52,280
Speaker 1: different way. Prior to the Internet, anybody in the music

1609
01:32:52,360 --> 01:32:55,960
Speaker 1: business knew every record on the chart. We may not

1610
01:32:56,080 --> 01:32:59,519
Speaker 1: have literally heard it, but they know about it. Whatever

1611
01:33:00,040 --> 01:33:03,439
Speaker 1: anybody today says, they especially the album start. Anybody who

1612
01:33:03,439 --> 01:33:05,640
Speaker 1: says they know every album, they're just lying. Nobody does.

1613
01:33:05,680 --> 01:33:11,120
Speaker 1: There's always stuff there you don't know. John Parrellis knows. Well,

1614
01:33:11,120 --> 01:33:13,320
Speaker 1: we'll leave it to that, but not only don't debate

1615
01:33:13,400 --> 01:33:17,840
Speaker 1: this issue right now, I continue. So when I look

1616
01:33:17,880 --> 01:33:23,160
Speaker 1: at hip hop, is it the same thing that really

1617
01:33:23,200 --> 01:33:27,439
Speaker 1: they're different people in different things. Or is there a cadre,

1618
01:33:27,520 --> 01:33:31,519
Speaker 1: whether small or large, who literally have their finger on

1619
01:33:31,600 --> 01:33:34,120
Speaker 1: the pulse in the nation about hip hop? Oh yeah, man,

1620
01:33:34,160 --> 01:33:38,280
Speaker 1: I listen to all the mixtapes. Does that even exist? Look?

1621
01:33:38,280 --> 01:33:41,200
Speaker 1: There are a few people you know that I could

1622
01:33:41,200 --> 01:33:44,760
Speaker 1: point to online who are younger and better than me,

1623
01:33:44,800 --> 01:33:47,280
Speaker 1: who I read, who I feel like, you know, they

1624
01:33:47,680 --> 01:33:52,120
Speaker 1: they really really really, you know, have their eye on things. Um.

1625
01:33:52,160 --> 01:33:55,280
Speaker 1: You know Alphonse, that Pitchfork you know, writes a weekly

1626
01:33:55,360 --> 01:34:02,479
Speaker 1: rap column. I'm continually continually blown away by his ability

1627
01:34:02,600 --> 01:34:06,240
Speaker 1: to keep up right, his ability to to find these

1628
01:34:06,360 --> 01:34:10,120
Speaker 1: these scenes, whether it's you know, Jersey Club or you

1629
01:34:10,160 --> 01:34:13,280
Speaker 1: know these Flint guys or you know San Jose and

1630
01:34:13,400 --> 01:34:16,320
Speaker 1: go down that rabbit hole. You know, there's wrap websites,

1631
01:34:16,600 --> 01:34:20,479
Speaker 1: you know, something like Passion of the Weiss where you

1632
01:34:20,520 --> 01:34:26,519
Speaker 1: know there's a new young, first time freelancer every week

1633
01:34:26,800 --> 01:34:31,439
Speaker 1: who's uncovering, Uh, you know a scene I've never heard of. Um,

1634
01:34:31,800 --> 01:34:34,400
Speaker 1: But I think even those people have to pick their

1635
01:34:34,439 --> 01:34:37,760
Speaker 1: spots right. You know what you like? You follow, you

1636
01:34:37,880 --> 01:34:42,360
Speaker 1: follow a rabbit hole, uh in in a direction it

1637
01:34:42,479 --> 01:34:45,760
Speaker 1: leads you, you know to maybe various scenes that are

1638
01:34:45,800 --> 01:34:49,000
Speaker 1: in dialogue with with the one you're into. Um. But

1639
01:34:49,080 --> 01:34:51,760
Speaker 1: I don't think there are completest. I think there's just

1640
01:34:52,080 --> 01:34:56,080
Speaker 1: too much music, right. And there's the thing that's interesting

1641
01:34:56,120 --> 01:34:59,679
Speaker 1: about rap is that in some of these these streaming sites,

1642
01:34:59,760 --> 01:35:03,960
Speaker 1: some like SoundCloud, like it's affecting the aesthetic right there

1643
01:35:04,000 --> 01:35:08,479
Speaker 1: there artists that flocked to specific places that have a

1644
01:35:08,520 --> 01:35:11,800
Speaker 1: specific sound, right, and that sound is only growing in

1645
01:35:11,840 --> 01:35:16,120
Speaker 1: this one ecosystem. Um. And and you know that's that's

1646
01:35:16,160 --> 01:35:18,920
Speaker 1: now regenerated. A couple of times we had what was

1647
01:35:19,000 --> 01:35:22,280
Speaker 1: referred to as SoundCloud rap in is not the same

1648
01:35:22,320 --> 01:35:25,360
Speaker 1: thing we we we talk about now when when you

1649
01:35:25,400 --> 01:35:29,519
Speaker 1: say SoundCloud rap um. But but you know, the idea

1650
01:35:29,520 --> 01:35:32,599
Speaker 1: of a completest, it's it's it's just not I just

1651
01:35:32,680 --> 01:35:34,920
Speaker 1: it's just not possible right with the with the amount

1652
01:35:34,920 --> 01:35:38,960
Speaker 1: of stuff coming out, Okay for the uninitiated to find

1653
01:35:38,960 --> 01:35:42,360
Speaker 1: the difference in status between Atlanta and New York and

1654
01:35:42,520 --> 01:35:45,320
Speaker 1: l a rap or any other scene that I might

1655
01:35:45,360 --> 01:35:52,479
Speaker 1: have overlooked. So New York right has come back around.

1656
01:35:52,520 --> 01:35:55,680
Speaker 1: Actually New York is the birthplace of hip hop, you

1657
01:35:55,720 --> 01:36:01,120
Speaker 1: know very much the initial arbiter of you know, authenticity,

1658
01:36:01,120 --> 01:36:05,240
Speaker 1: of lyricism, of of beat making. Uh, you know, the

1659
01:36:05,800 --> 01:36:11,760
Speaker 1: the legacy is here. Um and and then for the past,

1660
01:36:11,920 --> 01:36:14,680
Speaker 1: you know, two and a half three decades, it's been

1661
01:36:14,720 --> 01:36:17,160
Speaker 1: what happened to New York rap? Who's the next savior

1662
01:36:17,240 --> 01:36:20,280
Speaker 1: of New York rap? Right? You you had a moment,

1663
01:36:19,479 --> 01:36:23,240
Speaker 1: you know you you you had a moment with pop

1664
01:36:23,280 --> 01:36:28,479
Speaker 1: smoke um and the and the Brooklyn drill stuff. And actually,

1665
01:36:28,720 --> 01:36:31,040
Speaker 1: you know, the drill rap coming out of New York

1666
01:36:31,120 --> 01:36:33,479
Speaker 1: now is very much at the center of things. Right,

1667
01:36:33,600 --> 01:36:37,400
Speaker 1: Even even kids in the deepest undergrounds in Atlanta are

1668
01:36:37,439 --> 01:36:41,280
Speaker 1: now making songs that sound like New York drill. But

1669
01:36:41,360 --> 01:36:46,240
Speaker 1: of course New York drill comes from Chicago, comes from London. Right,

1670
01:36:46,320 --> 01:36:48,759
Speaker 1: This is a sound that traveled all around the world

1671
01:36:48,840 --> 01:36:51,080
Speaker 1: before New York sort of took it back and put

1672
01:36:51,080 --> 01:36:56,120
Speaker 1: their own spin on it. Um l A obviously vibrant

1673
01:36:56,120 --> 01:36:59,120
Speaker 1: through all time, h through through the history of hip

1674
01:36:59,120 --> 01:37:02,040
Speaker 1: hop New York versus l A. The sort of you know,

1675
01:37:02,120 --> 01:37:07,240
Speaker 1: the traditional rivalry of of nineties rap, you know, or

1676
01:37:07,320 --> 01:37:10,320
Speaker 1: you do you like Biggie, do like tupac Um you know,

1677
01:37:10,720 --> 01:37:14,599
Speaker 1: a huge renaissance UM in in recent years. You think

1678
01:37:14,640 --> 01:37:16,960
Speaker 1: of someone like Kendrick Lamar, one of you know, one

1679
01:37:16,960 --> 01:37:20,400
Speaker 1: of the biggest stars of our era, UM and and

1680
01:37:20,439 --> 01:37:23,320
Speaker 1: a ton of people under him. You know, someone someone

1681
01:37:23,360 --> 01:37:25,680
Speaker 1: like Draco the Ruler really was putting l A on

1682
01:37:25,720 --> 01:37:29,360
Speaker 1: the map again before before he was killed a couple

1683
01:37:29,360 --> 01:37:34,240
Speaker 1: of years ago. UM. The thing that's amazing now is

1684
01:37:34,320 --> 01:37:39,439
Speaker 1: that it's not just Atlanta, New York, Chicago, Detroit, the

1685
01:37:39,439 --> 01:37:44,360
Speaker 1: Bay Area, right, Memphis, the sort of traditional hip hop

1686
01:37:44,400 --> 01:37:48,160
Speaker 1: strongholds like you have scenes in tiny towns in Florida.

1687
01:37:48,640 --> 01:37:52,439
Speaker 1: You have you know, scenes in North Carolina place it

1688
01:37:52,520 --> 01:38:00,840
Speaker 1: was notoriously uh barren with of of stars. Um. You know, Arkansas,

1689
01:38:01,560 --> 01:38:05,160
Speaker 1: you can find a hip hop see like the proliferation

1690
01:38:05,439 --> 01:38:11,080
Speaker 1: of regional hip hop right now and places doing original, amazing,

1691
01:38:11,520 --> 01:38:15,240
Speaker 1: extremely distinct things. Milwaukee, you know, places that have never

1692
01:38:15,280 --> 01:38:19,000
Speaker 1: traditionally been in the conversation are now as vibrant as

1693
01:38:19,040 --> 01:38:21,840
Speaker 1: anywhere else. I think the reason you continue to hear

1694
01:38:21,880 --> 01:38:25,639
Speaker 1: about New York, l A, Atlanta, to a lesser extent, Chicago,

1695
01:38:25,920 --> 01:38:29,719
Speaker 1: maybe you know, New Orleans, Memphis is that there's an

1696
01:38:29,760 --> 01:38:32,880
Speaker 1: infrastructure there, right, and that's that's The other thing that

1697
01:38:33,280 --> 01:38:38,120
Speaker 1: you know, the book really tries to. The argument I

1698
01:38:38,160 --> 01:38:40,360
Speaker 1: tried to make in the book is that the explosion

1699
01:38:40,400 --> 01:38:44,400
Speaker 1: of Atlanta and the streaming era was really prepared for

1700
01:38:44,680 --> 01:38:47,880
Speaker 1: in the nineties, right when places when labels like l

1701
01:38:47,920 --> 01:38:51,800
Speaker 1: A La Face Ela reads l face maybe face so

1702
01:38:51,800 --> 01:38:55,960
Speaker 1: so Deaf Germaine dupre outcasts and the Dungeon family, you know,

1703
01:38:56,320 --> 01:39:00,280
Speaker 1: when they were opening studios, they were bringing the record

1704
01:39:00,320 --> 01:39:03,599
Speaker 1: business to them, and that lays the groundwork right for

1705
01:39:03,600 --> 01:39:05,680
Speaker 1: for there to be places for these kids to go

1706
01:39:05,840 --> 01:39:10,280
Speaker 1: to to record music and and make videos and meet executives.

1707
01:39:10,320 --> 01:39:12,200
Speaker 1: And it's still not in New York or l A,

1708
01:39:12,280 --> 01:39:15,599
Speaker 1: where the where the majors are based. But compared to

1709
01:39:15,960 --> 01:39:18,280
Speaker 1: a lot of these smaller regional scenes which you know

1710
01:39:18,439 --> 01:39:21,639
Speaker 1: don't end up breaking through on a national level unless

1711
01:39:21,640 --> 01:39:24,519
Speaker 1: you're really paying attention. A lot of that is because

1712
01:39:24,840 --> 01:39:29,880
Speaker 1: because of the physical infrastructure, right, whether it's venues, studios, clubs,

1713
01:39:30,200 --> 01:39:33,639
Speaker 1: strip clubs. As we discussed. Um, So I think there's

1714
01:39:33,720 --> 01:39:36,000
Speaker 1: music coming out of all out of all of these

1715
01:39:36,080 --> 01:39:39,280
Speaker 1: all of these towns, all these these little crevices, um,

1716
01:39:39,320 --> 01:39:49,400
Speaker 1: but not all of it is reaching the radio. Okay,

1717
01:39:49,760 --> 01:39:51,720
Speaker 1: used to Peo, we have a new scene prior to

1718
01:39:51,760 --> 01:39:56,280
Speaker 1: the Internet every three to five years. So have we

1719
01:39:56,400 --> 01:40:00,960
Speaker 1: run even though everyone's making music. Ah, we're running out

1720
01:40:00,960 --> 01:40:05,559
Speaker 1: of the highway on hip hop and something else will

1721
01:40:05,600 --> 01:40:08,840
Speaker 1: come in? Or is there really so much innovation there's

1722
01:40:08,920 --> 01:40:13,800
Speaker 1: mills to go. I think people have been you know,

1723
01:40:14,240 --> 01:40:18,519
Speaker 1: uh predicting the end of hip hop's reign for twenty

1724
01:40:18,520 --> 01:40:22,679
Speaker 1: five years now, right, but it's always almost about to end. Um.

1725
01:40:23,080 --> 01:40:29,480
Speaker 1: But you know, I think we've seen the slow, sad

1726
01:40:29,520 --> 01:40:32,640
Speaker 1: death of rock, right, Like I don't I don't know

1727
01:40:32,640 --> 01:40:34,880
Speaker 1: about you, but like it's just so hard for me

1728
01:40:34,960 --> 01:40:40,799
Speaker 1: to imagine us like guys capturing chart topping rock band

1729
01:40:40,840 --> 01:40:45,519
Speaker 1: that's for white guys playing analog instruments. Uh, you know.

1730
01:40:46,040 --> 01:40:50,519
Speaker 1: So look, it had a good run. I think I

1731
01:40:50,640 --> 01:40:55,120
Speaker 1: bop has proven to be more adaptable, um, at least

1732
01:40:55,160 --> 01:40:58,120
Speaker 1: in recent years. Uh. You know. I think when you

1733
01:40:58,120 --> 01:41:01,479
Speaker 1: think of people who are succeeding in pop or or

1734
01:41:01,640 --> 01:41:04,599
Speaker 1: rock or whatever, they're often drawing from a rap tool

1735
01:41:04,680 --> 01:41:08,360
Speaker 1: kit right there. They're borrowing, whether it's uh, you know,

1736
01:41:08,640 --> 01:41:12,880
Speaker 1: trap high hats and drums or the release schedule. Right,

1737
01:41:12,960 --> 01:41:15,360
Speaker 1: the sort of more is more than Morgan Wallans of

1738
01:41:15,400 --> 01:41:19,040
Speaker 1: the World putting out thirty track deluxe albums that that

1739
01:41:19,120 --> 01:41:21,200
Speaker 1: comes from rap music, you know what I mean? Uh,

1740
01:41:21,600 --> 01:41:26,439
Speaker 1: not to mention his his his sound in places, um So,

1741
01:41:26,479 --> 01:41:29,960
Speaker 1: I think you know it's been it's been picked over

1742
01:41:30,000 --> 01:41:35,439
Speaker 1: for parts. Um. But it's extremely, extremely resilient. Um. And

1743
01:41:35,479 --> 01:41:37,479
Speaker 1: I think a lot of that is is about where

1744
01:41:37,479 --> 01:41:41,799
Speaker 1: it comes from, right, Like it comes from people who

1745
01:41:41,880 --> 01:41:44,760
Speaker 1: are struggling. Right. The basis of hip hop is is

1746
01:41:44,800 --> 01:41:49,439
Speaker 1: in economic despair, right Uh. And and it comes from

1747
01:41:49,479 --> 01:41:52,280
Speaker 1: necessity and in a lot of places and and in

1748
01:41:52,320 --> 01:41:54,680
Speaker 1: a lot of cases. Um So I think like you

1749
01:41:54,720 --> 01:41:57,160
Speaker 1: can never you can never count it out because it's

1750
01:41:57,200 --> 01:42:00,920
Speaker 1: always it's always regenerating because people need it. So how

1751
01:42:00,960 --> 01:42:02,639
Speaker 1: did you get your job at the New York Times?

1752
01:42:04,840 --> 01:42:07,640
Speaker 1: You know, I started out writing about music when I

1753
01:42:07,680 --> 01:42:10,320
Speaker 1: was a teenager because it was the thing I knew about, right. So,

1754
01:42:10,360 --> 01:42:12,880
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people default to music writing

1755
01:42:12,920 --> 01:42:15,040
Speaker 1: when they when they first start because it's the thing

1756
01:42:15,120 --> 01:42:17,720
Speaker 1: that they're into the most. Um. You feel like you

1757
01:42:17,760 --> 01:42:22,360
Speaker 1: have some ownership and expertise um over it. But I

1758
01:42:22,560 --> 01:42:24,360
Speaker 1: very quickly realized I didn't want to be a critic

1759
01:42:24,960 --> 01:42:27,280
Speaker 1: um and that you know, I grew up in the

1760
01:42:27,360 --> 01:42:30,920
Speaker 1: sort of blog Era and P three blogs, Pitchfork, you know,

1761
01:42:31,479 --> 01:42:34,719
Speaker 1: the proliferation of music criticism online. And I was like, WHOA,

1762
01:42:34,800 --> 01:42:37,639
Speaker 1: Like this seems unforgiving, right, Like all these people are

1763
01:42:37,640 --> 01:42:41,360
Speaker 1: writing so many words all the time with you know,

1764
01:42:41,520 --> 01:42:44,680
Speaker 1: very little return. Um. All the magazines that I grew

1765
01:42:44,760 --> 01:42:49,400
Speaker 1: up with were dying um as as they still are UM.

1766
01:42:49,479 --> 01:42:52,519
Speaker 1: And I very quickly decided, you know, I should learn

1767
01:42:52,800 --> 01:42:54,240
Speaker 1: if I'm going to write, I should learn how to

1768
01:42:54,280 --> 01:42:57,280
Speaker 1: report um. I should learn a practical skill within this.

1769
01:42:57,439 --> 01:42:59,640
Speaker 1: I'm not a critic um, even though I have a

1770
01:42:59,680 --> 01:43:03,760
Speaker 1: lot of a opinions. Uh So I stopped writing about music.

1771
01:43:03,800 --> 01:43:06,839
Speaker 1: Basically I learned how to report um. I was a blogger.

1772
01:43:06,880 --> 01:43:08,760
Speaker 1: I was a news blogger for many years. I worked

1773
01:43:08,800 --> 01:43:10,320
Speaker 1: at the Village Voice. I worked in York. It was

1774
01:43:10,320 --> 01:43:12,920
Speaker 1: a little bit slower. You left Florida, you went to

1775
01:43:13,000 --> 01:43:16,040
Speaker 1: college where sure, I moved to New York. I went

1776
01:43:16,080 --> 01:43:18,559
Speaker 1: to n Y U to what to greeted in while you,

1777
01:43:19,560 --> 01:43:22,040
Speaker 1: uh push you forward in your career, it was four

1778
01:43:22,160 --> 01:43:25,120
Speaker 1: years you would just go to college? Oh no, I

1779
01:43:25,120 --> 01:43:27,439
Speaker 1: mean I always tell people like I would not have

1780
01:43:27,800 --> 01:43:30,720
Speaker 1: the job that I have, especially when I got it.

1781
01:43:30,840 --> 01:43:33,080
Speaker 1: You know, was still in my twenties. I would not

1782
01:43:33,280 --> 01:43:36,760
Speaker 1: have that opportunity without having got the head start of

1783
01:43:36,840 --> 01:43:40,400
Speaker 1: living in New York beginning when I was eighteen. You know,

1784
01:43:40,520 --> 01:43:42,920
Speaker 1: I A lot of people moved to New York to

1785
01:43:42,960 --> 01:43:45,559
Speaker 1: try to make it in whatever field after college, and

1786
01:43:45,720 --> 01:43:49,519
Speaker 1: I was here first. So for me, n y U

1787
01:43:49,760 --> 01:43:55,439
Speaker 1: was a very very very expensive path to living in

1788
01:43:55,439 --> 01:43:58,800
Speaker 1: the city and having internships. And you know, I took

1789
01:43:58,840 --> 01:44:02,000
Speaker 1: on a lot of student loans and you know, fortunate

1790
01:44:02,080 --> 01:44:04,320
Speaker 1: enough that my my parents could help me out. UM.

1791
01:44:04,720 --> 01:44:07,360
Speaker 1: But I was. I was working from right when I

1792
01:44:07,400 --> 01:44:10,559
Speaker 1: got here, right, I was writing for free magazines around

1793
01:44:10,560 --> 01:44:15,040
Speaker 1: the city, UM, websites earlier. Some of the earliest music

1794
01:44:15,040 --> 01:44:18,679
Speaker 1: reporting I did was for an Australian website that doesn't

1795
01:44:18,680 --> 01:44:23,559
Speaker 1: exist anymore. UM or for tiny mixtapes for free. You know,

1796
01:44:23,800 --> 01:44:27,519
Speaker 1: I was. I had a blog spot, UM, I had

1797
01:44:27,520 --> 01:44:31,519
Speaker 1: a tumbler. I was just trying to practice basically, UM.

1798
01:44:31,600 --> 01:44:35,160
Speaker 1: And and as I was finishing school is when I decided,

1799
01:44:35,320 --> 01:44:38,360
Speaker 1: you know, music writing seems like a very very very

1800
01:44:38,439 --> 01:44:41,400
Speaker 1: unforgiving space. And that's when I branched out. Did you

1801
01:44:41,439 --> 01:44:44,599
Speaker 1: study journalism at n y U? I did. I studied

1802
01:44:44,640 --> 01:44:47,800
Speaker 1: journalism undergrad although I did like a media criticism track.

1803
01:44:47,880 --> 01:44:50,120
Speaker 1: So I was more reading a door now than I

1804
01:44:50,160 --> 01:44:55,080
Speaker 1: was out on the street like beat reporting. Okay, and

1805
01:44:55,160 --> 01:44:57,080
Speaker 1: it was at the end of your education or did

1806
01:44:57,080 --> 01:45:00,200
Speaker 1: you get a master's or anything. No, that was the

1807
01:45:00,280 --> 01:45:02,479
Speaker 1: end of my education. I was, you know, as I said,

1808
01:45:02,520 --> 01:45:05,000
Speaker 1: I was working throughout all of undergrad as much as

1809
01:45:05,000 --> 01:45:07,000
Speaker 1: I could. I was starting to get paid here and

1810
01:45:07,040 --> 01:45:12,080
Speaker 1: there for freelancing online mostly um. And you know, if

1811
01:45:12,120 --> 01:45:16,840
Speaker 1: I've figured I would learn more and not rack up

1812
01:45:16,880 --> 01:45:20,080
Speaker 1: any more student debt just doing it as opposed to

1813
01:45:20,439 --> 01:45:23,320
Speaker 1: go into grad school. So you graduate from n hyle

1814
01:45:23,400 --> 01:45:27,719
Speaker 1: U in the next step is graduated into her session. Uh.

1815
01:45:27,760 --> 01:45:32,160
Speaker 1: You know, was not a great time to to try

1816
01:45:32,200 --> 01:45:35,000
Speaker 1: to be in journalism. Uh. You know, this was this

1817
01:45:35,080 --> 01:45:39,880
Speaker 1: was the dark days, especially for for print media US.

1818
01:45:39,920 --> 01:45:42,880
Speaker 1: The Internet was taking over and they hadn't really figured

1819
01:45:42,880 --> 01:45:46,559
Speaker 1: out what to do yet. But I was really good

1820
01:45:46,600 --> 01:45:49,800
Speaker 1: at being online. I could, you know, write fast, I

1821
01:45:49,840 --> 01:45:53,640
Speaker 1: could spot trends. I knew what was you know, going

1822
01:45:53,680 --> 01:45:57,719
Speaker 1: to go whatever proto viral um I And I really

1823
01:45:57,760 --> 01:46:04,120
Speaker 1: marketed myself as a sort of ex generation uh internet journalists.

1824
01:46:04,120 --> 01:46:08,120
Speaker 1: You know, I could get on Facebook and find somebody

1825
01:46:08,560 --> 01:46:12,240
Speaker 1: you know, both quicker than you know a reporter who

1826
01:46:12,280 --> 01:46:15,759
Speaker 1: was not native to those spaces. Um and so you

1827
01:46:15,520 --> 01:46:19,240
Speaker 1: I tried to really use that right. And it was

1828
01:46:19,280 --> 01:46:23,320
Speaker 1: also a real time of like democratization among writers, right

1829
01:46:23,439 --> 01:46:26,719
Speaker 1: like Twitter was starting. I was on Twitter very early,

1830
01:46:27,400 --> 01:46:30,519
Speaker 1: um tumbler, like I said, blog spot, this is a

1831
01:46:30,560 --> 01:46:33,760
Speaker 1: way for me to like interface with writers who I admired,

1832
01:46:34,240 --> 01:46:37,240
Speaker 1: uh in a in a pretty direct way, right Like

1833
01:46:37,680 --> 01:46:41,080
Speaker 1: you could reblog them, you could retweet them, you could

1834
01:46:41,120 --> 01:46:43,640
Speaker 1: add commentary, you could chime in, you know. So I

1835
01:46:43,680 --> 01:46:45,880
Speaker 1: was I was annoying. I was like I was in

1836
01:46:45,920 --> 01:46:49,320
Speaker 1: the face of people who I think, you know, I

1837
01:46:49,600 --> 01:46:54,160
Speaker 1: looked up to or whose careers I wanted um and

1838
01:46:54,160 --> 01:46:56,439
Speaker 1: and yeah it was it was. It was like a

1839
01:46:56,560 --> 01:47:01,639
Speaker 1: much more innocent time I think online Um, the pool

1840
01:47:01,720 --> 01:47:07,120
Speaker 1: felt smaller. UM. So I made some headway that way. UM.

1841
01:47:07,200 --> 01:47:09,439
Speaker 1: And then, like I said, I became a blogger. Right

1842
01:47:09,640 --> 01:47:12,639
Speaker 1: people needed content for their websites. So I was writing

1843
01:47:13,360 --> 01:47:16,400
Speaker 1: eight ten posts a day um for the Village Voice,

1844
01:47:16,560 --> 01:47:19,799
Speaker 1: first on the weekends while I had a day job. UM.

1845
01:47:19,920 --> 01:47:23,000
Speaker 1: Then then as a full time news blogger, um, you know,

1846
01:47:23,080 --> 01:47:26,960
Speaker 1: offering metro stories. What was your day job. I worked

1847
01:47:27,000 --> 01:47:29,640
Speaker 1: at Life dot com. So Life dot Com was a

1848
01:47:29,720 --> 01:47:34,120
Speaker 1: partnership with Getty Images. It was what remained of Life magazine.

1849
01:47:34,560 --> 01:47:37,960
Speaker 1: And I ran the homepage photo carousel. So I would,

1850
01:47:38,200 --> 01:47:40,920
Speaker 1: you know, with the help of an editor, pick seven

1851
01:47:41,120 --> 01:47:44,320
Speaker 1: to ten photos that represented the news of the day,

1852
01:47:44,479 --> 01:47:48,040
Speaker 1: something from the archives for an anniversary, something from a war,

1853
01:47:48,479 --> 01:47:52,040
Speaker 1: tragedy abroad, something more lighthearted, and then I would write

1854
01:47:52,040 --> 01:47:56,160
Speaker 1: a you know, two word caption for it. Um. So

1855
01:47:56,200 --> 01:47:58,400
Speaker 1: I was running the homepage of Life dot com, which

1856
01:47:58,400 --> 01:48:00,519
Speaker 1: I don't know if anybody an I don't know if

1857
01:48:00,520 --> 01:48:02,759
Speaker 1: anybody was visiting Life dot com. But we were updating

1858
01:48:02,800 --> 01:48:05,800
Speaker 1: the homepage every day, um and then and then on

1859
01:48:05,800 --> 01:48:09,439
Speaker 1: the weekends, I was Saturday and Sunday. I had control

1860
01:48:09,479 --> 01:48:13,640
Speaker 1: of the Village Voice website for whatever reason, because they

1861
01:48:13,640 --> 01:48:17,639
Speaker 1: needed content, you know, they needed traffic. So um, that's

1862
01:48:17,680 --> 01:48:19,840
Speaker 1: when I started. You know, I wrote a little bit

1863
01:48:19,880 --> 01:48:22,519
Speaker 1: about media. I wrote about politics, I wrote about crime,

1864
01:48:22,640 --> 01:48:27,800
Speaker 1: metro stories, um, pop culture. Sometimes they would give me

1865
01:48:27,840 --> 01:48:30,000
Speaker 1: the keys to the music blog as well. UM, so

1866
01:48:30,000 --> 01:48:33,280
Speaker 1: I would keep up with that a little bit. Um

1867
01:48:33,360 --> 01:48:35,120
Speaker 1: and yeah, I was just writing a lot. I was

1868
01:48:35,240 --> 01:48:38,519
Speaker 1: learning how to how to write quickly, how to write cleanly,

1869
01:48:38,680 --> 01:48:40,760
Speaker 1: how to pick up the phone sometimes, how to make

1870
01:48:40,800 --> 01:48:45,040
Speaker 1: a little joke, you know. You know, uh, aggregation was

1871
01:48:45,520 --> 01:48:47,920
Speaker 1: less dry back then. It was about sort of like

1872
01:48:48,040 --> 01:48:51,759
Speaker 1: adding voice. Um. So I was trying to develop developed

1873
01:48:51,840 --> 01:48:54,080
Speaker 1: that way. Um and I just got a lot of

1874
01:48:54,120 --> 01:48:56,679
Speaker 1: reps in. You know. I was just I was meeting people,

1875
01:48:56,880 --> 01:49:00,360
Speaker 1: I was making waves when I could. I was making

1876
01:49:00,400 --> 01:49:02,400
Speaker 1: fun of the New York Times for not printing curse

1877
01:49:02,439 --> 01:49:06,080
Speaker 1: words from the Village Voice website. You know, just just

1878
01:49:06,080 --> 01:49:11,160
Speaker 1: just being pesky, um and working my way up from there. Um.

1879
01:49:11,200 --> 01:49:14,760
Speaker 1: So after the Voice, I did this a similar thing

1880
01:49:14,800 --> 01:49:17,280
Speaker 1: in New York Magazine. I worked for their Daily Intelligence

1881
01:49:17,360 --> 01:49:24,320
Speaker 1: or blog, uh as a news blogger. You know, school shootings, terrorists, attacks,

1882
01:49:24,360 --> 01:49:28,000
Speaker 1: covered Benghazi, you know, covered media, covered the New York Times,

1883
01:49:28,000 --> 01:49:31,519
Speaker 1: covered Conde nas covered internet culture, just a real grab

1884
01:49:31,560 --> 01:49:33,680
Speaker 1: bag of stuff. And I wasn't doing a ton of

1885
01:49:33,720 --> 01:49:35,960
Speaker 1: culture reporting. But I always had my eye on that.

1886
01:49:36,240 --> 01:49:39,519
Speaker 1: And when I first started contributing here and there for

1887
01:49:39,560 --> 01:49:43,400
Speaker 1: the magazine, Um, I would you know, I did a

1888
01:49:43,400 --> 01:49:46,519
Speaker 1: piece about Angie Martinez, a New York radio figure. You know,

1889
01:49:46,560 --> 01:49:49,599
Speaker 1: I had I still had sort of one eye on

1890
01:49:50,240 --> 01:49:53,679
Speaker 1: music and culture because I knew that was my main interest,

1891
01:49:53,800 --> 01:49:56,920
Speaker 1: even though I was on the news side of things. UM.

1892
01:49:56,960 --> 01:50:02,919
Speaker 1: But I think that ultimately being functional in both worlds

1893
01:50:03,720 --> 01:50:06,960
Speaker 1: is what allowed me to get my job at the Times. Right,

1894
01:50:07,040 --> 01:50:10,120
Speaker 1: because when when The Times is looking for a music reporter,

1895
01:50:10,400 --> 01:50:13,880
Speaker 1: they're looking for a reporter first and foremost. Right. Anybody

1896
01:50:13,920 --> 01:50:17,280
Speaker 1: has can have an opinion about music. Um. We have

1897
01:50:17,320 --> 01:50:22,960
Speaker 1: no shortage of music critics online, amateur and professional. UM.

1898
01:50:23,000 --> 01:50:25,640
Speaker 1: But I think the fact that I knew how to

1899
01:50:25,920 --> 01:50:27,840
Speaker 1: do a public record search. I knew how to pick

1900
01:50:27,920 --> 01:50:29,760
Speaker 1: up the phone. I knew how to like get on

1901
01:50:29,800 --> 01:50:32,639
Speaker 1: the street and and and interview someone, how to track

1902
01:50:32,720 --> 01:50:35,799
Speaker 1: someone down, um, how to how to cover breaking news.

1903
01:50:36,040 --> 01:50:40,840
Speaker 1: All of that really came into play. So a lot

1904
01:50:40,920 --> 01:50:45,200
Speaker 1: of your working career was not actually music focused. You've

1905
01:50:45,280 --> 01:50:48,519
Speaker 1: done this, You've written this book. There are people like

1906
01:50:48,600 --> 01:50:51,120
Speaker 1: John Perellis who've continue to do with their whole lives

1907
01:50:51,120 --> 01:50:54,360
Speaker 1: and at the Times, what do you see going forward

1908
01:50:54,400 --> 01:50:59,720
Speaker 1: and what would you dream would go forward. I've gone

1909
01:50:59,720 --> 01:51:01,680
Speaker 1: back on fourth on this a lot because I feel like,

1910
01:51:01,880 --> 01:51:04,360
Speaker 1: you know, December will be eight years for me on

1911
01:51:04,439 --> 01:51:08,000
Speaker 1: the music beat at the Times. On one hand, I

1912
01:51:08,040 --> 01:51:11,160
Speaker 1: saw the book as potentially like a capstone to my

1913
01:51:11,400 --> 01:51:13,320
Speaker 1: time on the beat. You know, I think I could

1914
01:51:13,360 --> 01:51:16,040
Speaker 1: cover other things. I could write about other other stuff.

1915
01:51:16,240 --> 01:51:18,120
Speaker 1: I don't know how many more Grammy Awards I have

1916
01:51:18,240 --> 01:51:20,720
Speaker 1: in me. I don't know how many more rock star

1917
01:51:20,760 --> 01:51:24,320
Speaker 1: obituaries or Beyonce album cycles. You know, there's something about

1918
01:51:24,320 --> 01:51:26,920
Speaker 1: the music world that you know, as you well know,

1919
01:51:27,040 --> 01:51:30,559
Speaker 1: it's very cyclical, uh, covering the same thing every every

1920
01:51:30,600 --> 01:51:34,519
Speaker 1: every year, every few years. Um So part of me

1921
01:51:34,600 --> 01:51:37,519
Speaker 1: saw the book as like a capstone project um to

1922
01:51:37,600 --> 01:51:40,320
Speaker 1: my time on the beat, and at the same time,

1923
01:51:40,360 --> 01:51:43,280
Speaker 1: like I feel like I'm I know the music world

1924
01:51:43,360 --> 01:51:46,120
Speaker 1: better than I have. You know, the thing about about

1925
01:51:46,160 --> 01:51:48,840
Speaker 1: being a beat reporter is you you accrue knowledge. You

1926
01:51:48,840 --> 01:51:52,320
Speaker 1: you gain sources, You get how things work, you can

1927
01:51:52,360 --> 01:51:56,240
Speaker 1: see things before they happen, you know the patterns. Um. So,

1928
01:51:56,880 --> 01:51:59,080
Speaker 1: you know, I think it's all up in the air. Um.

1929
01:51:59,479 --> 01:52:02,040
Speaker 1: I love the team that I work with, U Karen

1930
01:52:02,080 --> 01:52:05,160
Speaker 1: Gans the music editor John Perellis who we've mentioned chief

1931
01:52:05,200 --> 01:52:09,200
Speaker 1: pop critic John Karamonica, you know, uh, the other pop

1932
01:52:09,240 --> 01:52:12,960
Speaker 1: critic has been a huge mentor friends, champion of me

1933
01:52:13,080 --> 01:52:15,840
Speaker 1: since I was very young, helped to bring me in

1934
01:52:15,880 --> 01:52:19,200
Speaker 1: here at the Times Ben's serio covers the music business

1935
01:52:19,439 --> 01:52:21,639
Speaker 1: for us came it came over from the business section

1936
01:52:21,720 --> 01:52:25,040
Speaker 1: works with us in arts. Now. UM, we have a

1937
01:52:25,160 --> 01:52:27,759
Speaker 1: very very very tight and I think, you know, pretty

1938
01:52:27,800 --> 01:52:31,160
Speaker 1: thorough team for for how few of us there are. UM.

1939
01:52:31,240 --> 01:52:34,080
Speaker 1: And I love working with them on a day to

1940
01:52:34,160 --> 01:52:38,400
Speaker 1: day basis. UM. But the short answer is, I don't

1941
01:52:38,479 --> 01:52:41,080
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think you know. Times likes for

1942
01:52:41,120 --> 01:52:43,080
Speaker 1: their reporters to move around, but they also like for

1943
01:52:43,080 --> 01:52:47,640
Speaker 1: you to have expertise. So I've I've gained some expertise

1944
01:52:47,680 --> 01:52:50,000
Speaker 1: on this beat. Uh. And I don't know how much

1945
01:52:50,040 --> 01:52:52,400
Speaker 1: longer I'm going to use it, but hopefully hopefully a

1946
01:52:52,400 --> 01:52:57,120
Speaker 1: little while longer at least. Okay, the New York Times itself, Hey,

1947
01:52:57,160 --> 01:53:00,800
Speaker 1: you have the vilification denigration from the right of the

1948
01:53:00,800 --> 01:53:05,240
Speaker 1: New York Times become a pejorative. Ironically, they use the

1949
01:53:05,240 --> 01:53:09,240
Speaker 1: New York Times for all their factual news. Okay. You know,

1950
01:53:09,280 --> 01:53:11,559
Speaker 1: if you can tune in, Fox are always saying getting

1951
01:53:11,600 --> 01:53:13,400
Speaker 1: all the new they don't do any reporting. They get

1952
01:53:13,439 --> 01:53:15,719
Speaker 1: it from the New York Times. So at one level,

1953
01:53:16,160 --> 01:53:20,840
Speaker 1: the New York Times it's fact. You know, New York

1954
01:53:20,880 --> 01:53:24,960
Speaker 1: Times sets the agenda for America. Brings up the issues.

1955
01:53:25,560 --> 01:53:29,599
Speaker 1: But there's the issue of the right wing backlash, and

1956
01:53:29,640 --> 01:53:35,559
Speaker 1: there's also concommitantly a smaller footprint. Used to be if

1957
01:53:35,560 --> 01:53:38,800
Speaker 1: The New York Times weighed in on something like hip

1958
01:53:38,840 --> 01:53:44,000
Speaker 1: hop music, everybody interested in that would read that article.

1959
01:53:44,640 --> 01:53:46,160
Speaker 1: And it's not only the New York Times. You know,

1960
01:53:46,200 --> 01:53:48,120
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles it's even worse. It was in the

1961
01:53:48,280 --> 01:53:51,160
Speaker 1: l A Times everybody. So now people in l A.

1962
01:53:51,240 --> 01:53:55,560
Speaker 1: Most people don't see it. So what is your experience

1963
01:53:55,640 --> 01:53:58,120
Speaker 1: working for The New York Times said it opens doors

1964
01:53:58,280 --> 01:54:02,840
Speaker 1: in Atlanta is generally a good thing or a bad thing.

1965
01:54:03,280 --> 01:54:06,400
Speaker 1: And how do you feel writing articles in terms of

1966
01:54:06,439 --> 01:54:09,120
Speaker 1: their impact? You feel like you have a big footprint.

1967
01:54:09,200 --> 01:54:11,960
Speaker 1: You wish you had a larger footprint. What's going on

1968
01:54:12,000 --> 01:54:16,120
Speaker 1: all there? I still think the platform is unparalleled, right,

1969
01:54:16,280 --> 01:54:18,880
Speaker 1: it's still the New York Times. Even people who don't

1970
01:54:18,920 --> 01:54:20,760
Speaker 1: read The New York Times know what the New York

1971
01:54:20,800 --> 01:54:23,360
Speaker 1: Times is. They respect it. You know, there are people

1972
01:54:23,360 --> 01:54:25,839
Speaker 1: in Atlanta who only know me as the New York Times.

1973
01:54:26,000 --> 01:54:28,680
Speaker 1: You know it's New York Times this year, you know. Uh.

1974
01:54:30,200 --> 01:54:33,480
Speaker 1: I think as far as a brand name, like it's

1975
01:54:33,520 --> 01:54:36,440
Speaker 1: just in the news business, like it doesn't you know,

1976
01:54:36,880 --> 01:54:41,800
Speaker 1: there's there's there's a few other places at this level. Um,

1977
01:54:41,840 --> 01:54:44,880
Speaker 1: you know, do I wish more people saw some of

1978
01:54:44,880 --> 01:54:48,640
Speaker 1: my stories, especially my more obscure culture stories, my non

1979
01:54:48,720 --> 01:54:52,080
Speaker 1: Beyonce Taylor Swift coverage. Sure, but I think we can

1980
01:54:52,080 --> 01:54:55,800
Speaker 1: still move the needle. And I think, you know, one

1981
01:54:55,800 --> 01:54:58,360
Speaker 1: thing I really love about our team is that we

1982
01:54:58,440 --> 01:55:05,920
Speaker 1: don't just cover the big stuff. Really do follow stories, news, passions, subculture.

1983
01:55:06,480 --> 01:55:09,480
Speaker 1: We break artists. We often do first interviews that people

1984
01:55:09,520 --> 01:55:11,960
Speaker 1: have ever done. You know. Uh, I wrote a big

1985
01:55:11,960 --> 01:55:14,640
Speaker 1: feature about a you know, a young woman named Ethel Caine.

1986
01:55:15,320 --> 01:55:19,600
Speaker 1: Recently she you know, was living in small town Alabama

1987
01:55:20,240 --> 01:55:23,560
Speaker 1: putting out her first album. You know, people came up

1988
01:55:23,600 --> 01:55:25,160
Speaker 1: to me at the show and said, I learned about

1989
01:55:25,200 --> 01:55:27,200
Speaker 1: this from the New York Times. You know. Like that,

1990
01:55:27,320 --> 01:55:29,720
Speaker 1: I think I think we can still have that impact.

1991
01:55:30,320 --> 01:55:32,960
Speaker 1: We just have to pick our spots because we have

1992
01:55:33,000 --> 01:55:36,920
Speaker 1: such a small staff. Um, you know, especially in music,

1993
01:55:37,600 --> 01:55:40,960
Speaker 1: there's so much happening at all times. We can't cover everything.

1994
01:55:41,000 --> 01:55:43,720
Speaker 1: I think, you know, and and this goes for the

1995
01:55:43,720 --> 01:55:46,920
Speaker 1: paper in general. But I think like we often make

1996
01:55:47,040 --> 01:55:49,680
Speaker 1: as much of a point in what we don't cover

1997
01:55:50,040 --> 01:55:54,400
Speaker 1: as as in what we do. Um, you know, it's

1998
01:55:54,960 --> 01:56:01,000
Speaker 1: it's it's an expert driven section, you know, very critic heavy,

1999
01:56:01,040 --> 01:56:05,360
Speaker 1: the art section, movie critics, art critics, classical critics, pop

2000
01:56:05,400 --> 01:56:09,920
Speaker 1: critics like I think, you know, we're still hopefully top

2001
01:56:09,920 --> 01:56:11,960
Speaker 1: of the heap, uh in a lot of ways, and

2002
01:56:11,960 --> 01:56:14,000
Speaker 1: and can set the agenda. You know, you think of

2003
01:56:14,040 --> 01:56:17,120
Speaker 1: something like Broadway. Obviously not not a lot of people

2004
01:56:17,120 --> 01:56:19,920
Speaker 1: setting that agenda more than the Times. Um. You know,

2005
01:56:19,960 --> 01:56:23,360
Speaker 1: I think I think our our our culture covers coverage

2006
01:56:23,440 --> 01:56:26,720
Speaker 1: is strong across the board. Um. But look, of course,

2007
01:56:26,840 --> 01:56:30,640
Speaker 1: like the fragmentation of of media has has affected us all.

2008
01:56:30,760 --> 01:56:35,360
Speaker 1: And you know, if you you put into Google any

2009
01:56:35,360 --> 01:56:38,200
Speaker 1: topic of the day that you're going to find dozens

2010
01:56:38,200 --> 01:56:43,520
Speaker 1: and dozens and dozens of seo garbage. UM, but I

2011
01:56:43,520 --> 01:56:46,280
Speaker 1: think you'll probably still most of the time find the

2012
01:56:46,320 --> 01:56:50,000
Speaker 1: best or the definitive or even the first story uh

2013
01:56:50,720 --> 01:56:54,520
Speaker 1: from us. Okay, we've been talking to where I've been

2014
01:56:54,560 --> 01:56:58,240
Speaker 1: talking to Joe Coscarelli has a new book, Rap Capital

2015
01:56:58,360 --> 01:57:01,840
Speaker 1: and at Lanta story. Even if you think you're not

2016
01:57:01,960 --> 01:57:05,360
Speaker 1: interested in hip hop or don't know anything, it is

2017
01:57:05,600 --> 01:57:09,200
Speaker 1: very insightful in terms of what is the genesis of

2018
01:57:09,280 --> 01:57:11,600
Speaker 1: this music? The people were making it, the people who

2019
01:57:11,600 --> 01:57:14,960
Speaker 1: are marketing it. So thanks for taking the time to

2020
01:57:15,080 --> 01:57:17,880
Speaker 1: talk to me in my audience here, Joe. It's been great.

2021
01:57:18,680 --> 01:57:22,040
Speaker 1: I really really really appreciate it. Uh. You know, you

2022
01:57:22,080 --> 01:57:24,040
Speaker 1: gave the book such a close read and and in

2023
01:57:24,080 --> 01:57:26,040
Speaker 1: a lot of ways, you're my ideal reader. I didn't

2024
01:57:26,040 --> 01:57:29,520
Speaker 1: want this to be a book for rapp aficionados, for

2025
01:57:29,560 --> 01:57:32,160
Speaker 1: super fans, you know. I wanted I wanted to explain

2026
01:57:32,200 --> 01:57:34,640
Speaker 1: this culture in a human way, uh in in a

2027
01:57:34,720 --> 01:57:37,560
Speaker 1: way that sort of transcended people who would think they

2028
01:57:37,560 --> 01:57:40,160
Speaker 1: would read a book about rapping. Six So, thank you

2029
01:57:40,200 --> 01:57:43,280
Speaker 1: so much for for your time. Well you certainly succeeded.

2030
01:57:43,680 --> 01:57:46,160
Speaker 1: Until next time. This is Bob left Sex