Speaker 1: All media.
Speaker 2: So some things just kind of come from like not
Speaker 2: being a jerk to people and treating them like humans,
Speaker 2: whether you know what.
Speaker 1: They can do for you or not.
Speaker 2: Just being a good person, which is how I landed
Speaker 2: access to All Star Weekend. So shout out the hommy
Speaker 2: BJ who works with some incredible nonprofits, and somehow another
Speaker 2: got us into a poker tournament with Kenny the Jet
Speaker 2: and Charles Barkley. So I got to go to All
Speaker 2: Star Weekend. Now the problem is All Star Weekend was
Speaker 2: also Valentine's Day weekend, so I ain't get to stay
Speaker 2: for the game, nor could they give me tickets to that.
Speaker 2: But the point is I got to see a lot
Speaker 2: of friends. Molski, who's just running it right now? Squint,
Speaker 2: who how do I explain Squints? So I did a
Speaker 2: book before Terror Form called I Am Becoming and we
Speaker 2: did a It was photojournalism and poetry. But every promo
Speaker 2: picture I had up until recently, we're pretty much Squint
Speaker 2: shot him. Squint works with beast Mode, works for the Warriors,
Speaker 2: works with.
Speaker 1: Steph Curry, andre Ward. Squint is.
Speaker 2: Like the most He's one of the most humble and
Speaker 2: most talented, the most connected, persons I've ever met. He'll
Speaker 2: be like, you need to get in text Steph. I
Speaker 2: was like, you want me to text Stephan Curry. Yeah,
Speaker 2: He's text him and I'm like, man, you text him.
Speaker 2: He's like, bro, he likes you just text him. And
Speaker 2: I'm like, all right, I'm not gonna. I've never I've never.
Speaker 2: He has never handed me his phone numbers, So I
Speaker 2: Am not going to tech Stefan Curry.
Speaker 3: You can.
Speaker 1: I'm not anyway.
Speaker 2: Uh, But what that meant was I was able to
Speaker 2: be up in the Bay Area to actually do our
Speaker 2: first terror form show and actually set it up like
Speaker 2: a video interview with the Quia Bam Bamboo de Pistola
Speaker 2: Bamboo Credible rapper part of Soul Assassins, started.
Speaker 1: A label called Beat Rock Music.
Speaker 2: I just want to talk about like the like rapper
Speaker 2: to activists, pipeline. It's it's an interesting thing because it's
Speaker 2: like sometimes rappers get rich and they get and they
Speaker 2: just become Kanye's or Elon's or just they just go
Speaker 2: that route where it's like I'm rich and nothing else matters.
Speaker 2: But then some of us get completely radicalized, like you.
Speaker 2: I mean, we just watched the Kendrick and Drake narrative,
Speaker 2: like they came up at the same time and then
Speaker 2: had this split. Kendrick was like, I'm not with all this.
Speaker 2: I want to be this other person. Drake was like,
Speaker 2: give it all. He wanted all the money, the cause,
Speaker 2: and the clothes he supposed he just wants to be successful.
Speaker 1: That's a Drake song. Anyway, y'all already know where I stand.
Speaker 2: But I think I think there's some interesting things about like,
Speaker 2: you know, one, the power of hip hop to hip
Speaker 2: hop we fell in love with, and then what actually
Speaker 2: happens off the mic and the type of activism that
Speaker 2: can come from just starting with just you being passionate
Speaker 2: about your art. So I happened to be up in
Speaker 2: San Francisco. It's just worked out perfectly, and I was
Speaker 2: able to tap in with the homie Bambooth. He's been
Speaker 2: on the show before. But like we were still kind
Speaker 2: of figure out who we were in. But we're in
Speaker 2: the game now, all right, here we go, All right,
Speaker 2: here we go. Hey, all right, I've already done all the.
Speaker 1: Introduction Wait, am I recording over here?
Speaker 2: Yes, I've already done all the introductions before you got here,
Speaker 2: So people already know who you are. This is the
Speaker 2: first time we've done like an on site, right, say.
Speaker 3: Last time we did her politics was over the phone, right, Yeah,
Speaker 3: it was a pandemic pandemic time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the show's grown a lot. I feel like I.
Speaker 2: Found congratulations, thank you man, really found a direction. Like
Speaker 2: I feel like, I mean, it's like anything, you have
Speaker 2: to do enough of them to really figure out what
Speaker 2: you're trying to say.
Speaker 1: And I think what I.
Speaker 2: The hope has always been like informative education and then
Speaker 2: altimate to see like like the end goal is to
Speaker 2: see someone run for city council. That was like that
Speaker 2: was a part of like K four P.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: That was like you know what I mean, that was
Speaker 2: one of us that is like actually, let's let's do this,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: But there's a.
Speaker 2: There's a pipeline of that, right, Like there's a way
Speaker 2: to get there that I feel like in some ways,
Speaker 2: hip hop, just being as young as it is, has
Speaker 2: not we haven't seen those statesmen yet. Like we're in
Speaker 2: a season now where a lot of our elder statesmen
Speaker 2: are being a little strange.
Speaker 3: Sure forgetting where they came from.
Speaker 2: Forgetting where they came from. Yeah, it's just some really
Speaker 2: odd things. But that being said, one of the questions
Speaker 2: I get a lot is like people really wanted to
Speaker 2: be involved, people feeling over especially from young artists, and
Speaker 2: being like, you know, how do I do more than
Speaker 2: just rap? You know what I'm saying, and they're only
Speaker 2: hearing it from me? So I know, I know my narrative,
Speaker 2: I know how I got to where I was, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. But like, I think it started
Speaker 2: when I think you you had like posted somewhere that
Speaker 2: like somebody had challenged you about like what are you
Speaker 2: really doing, and that super resonated with me and was like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I really need I need y'all to hear this story, you.
Speaker 1: Know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: And last year I started doing this thing that I
Speaker 2: was calling like I was trying to do them once
Speaker 2: a month in the between the chaos that was happening
Speaker 2: in the news. It was called like the Terraforming series,
Speaker 2: where it's like, let me just find people that are
Speaker 2: actually putting good in the world, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 2: and bring y'all on the ground.
Speaker 1: Yes, you know, in between stuff.
Speaker 2: We gott tell sometimes you need to break right, you know,
Speaker 2: you need a break from the chaos. So that's why
Speaker 2: you're here, man. And so first of all, let's see
Speaker 2: if we can rewind the clock back as far as
Speaker 2: possible to be like, I know, it's an odd question.
Speaker 2: It will be like your introduction to hip hop. Sure,
Speaker 2: your introduction like you're from the city like me, but like,
Speaker 2: where did that start?
Speaker 3: I mean not always rhymed for me as far back
Speaker 3: as I can remember. Yeah, yeah, thirteen twelve thirteen for sure.
Speaker 3: And then you know, open mic circuits and things like that.
Speaker 3: You know, try my hand at it. But I still
Speaker 3: had one foot in the life. So you know, I
Speaker 3: got locked up from arm robbery at sixteen. When I
Speaker 3: got out, the options for me were slim.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Uh. And then there was a judge you said, strongly
Speaker 3: suggests that I joined the Marine Corps. I want to
Speaker 3: judge strongly suggests. I mean the next time I see you, yeah,
Speaker 3: doing big numbers, you know what I mean. So it's like,
Speaker 3: all right, you know, so I joined the Marine Corps.
Speaker 3: My big takeaway from that, as far as hip hop
Speaker 3: is concerned, is that I was you know, what it's
Speaker 3: like being from la You kind of just listen to
Speaker 3: La shit you know what I mean, Like that's it. Yes,
Speaker 3: freestyle fellowship was it like there was no other like
Speaker 3: back wrap, you know, quote unquote cipher rap.
Speaker 1: Outside of that, you know, don't lose your thought, but
Speaker 1: I would.
Speaker 2: I started touring the amount of just I realized I
Speaker 2: was like, I'm so arrogant. I don't believe in anyone's
Speaker 2: underground raight up. Yeah, like no one's underground straight up.
Speaker 3: So like you know, being in the military, I was
Speaker 3: introduced to cash money, really introduced to you know, cats
Speaker 3: from Alaska were doing stuff, and I was like, whoa,
Speaker 3: this is blowing my mind. So it influenced my style
Speaker 3: a lot. Yeah, So when I came home, I think
Speaker 3: my style had grown. So I started working on songs
Speaker 3: and then I think that just helped me kind of
Speaker 3: grow as m see. So I put this project out
Speaker 3: called Self Untitled. You know it was it was progressive
Speaker 3: or liberal, I should say, yeah, you know, And it
Speaker 3: came out and the community gravitated to it. And when
Speaker 3: I put it out, I was really on some like
Speaker 3: this ain't for Filipino people, this is like for everybody,
Speaker 3: you know. I was trying to do the k Ya everybody,
Speaker 3: but the community that clung to it was a Filipino community.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: They were like, Yo, this is that's you know what.
Speaker 1: Let me let me stop you there, man, I feel like.
Speaker 2: It's it's it's such a bizarre from my own experience,
Speaker 2: like and I didn't until I was an adult think
Speaker 2: about it from the Filipino perspective, being like.
Speaker 1: Things that how do I say this, like, y'all was
Speaker 1: always there.
Speaker 2: I just I just never thought about it, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying, Like, you know, uh, you know, from
Speaker 2: leaving South Central to going to Sangrapo Valley and being
Speaker 2: in like Melinda one they like, you know, and even
Speaker 2: just little stuff like on the way to school there
Speaker 2: was a Goldilocks. I never thought about the fact that
Speaker 2: that was a whole ass other you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: It was just, you know, in our mind, it was
Speaker 2: like where I live in a Mexican hood. So I
Speaker 2: just thought about it, and at least to my untrained eye,
Speaker 2: I was like, well, y'all, you're the you're the darker
Speaker 2: Mexicans that talk like black dudes, you know what I'm.
Speaker 1: Saying, Like, you know, feel me?
Speaker 2: And so I just especially out that way, So I
Speaker 2: just never I never thought about it.
Speaker 1: And then, uh, here's a funny story.
Speaker 2: One of one of my LG's he used to always
Speaker 2: talk about the first time we saw a gun was
Speaker 2: this guy named Junior from PINOI Rial and he put
Speaker 2: it in so many songs, right, and I you talked
Speaker 2: about somebody with whose stepmother's Filipino.
Speaker 1: My father's in Philippines.
Speaker 2: Right now, right, And I just did not connect the
Speaker 2: dots that Penoi Reale was Pinoy, Like I just never
Speaker 2: thought about it, you.
Speaker 1: Know what I'm saying. And then and then would it
Speaker 1: all came together?
Speaker 2: It turns out like I was, I again, never thought
Speaker 2: about it until I was a full grown adult. There
Speaker 2: was a guy that lived eight houses down from us
Speaker 2: on our block that my sister, my older sister and
Speaker 2: her friends used to say.
Speaker 1: Oh, he's so fine, He's so fine. His name was Junior.
Speaker 2: So then I'm telling this story to my old jay.
Speaker 2: He was like, was Junior Filipino? And I was like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, trying to text my sister, was Junior Filipino?
Speaker 1: She was like yeah, And I was like.
Speaker 3: Oh shit, it might be.
Speaker 1: Anyway.
Speaker 2: So just I say that to say that that the
Speaker 2: fact that the community attached to it.
Speaker 1: It to me.
Speaker 2: It was like it wasn't that we were actively trying
Speaker 2: to overlook this community.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying.
Speaker 2: I'm saying again step Filipino step mom living in West
Speaker 2: Covina and friends with breakdancers. I just didn't think about
Speaker 2: the fact that, like, oh my god, y'all were there
Speaker 2: the whole time.
Speaker 1: So I just wonder if that's.
Speaker 3: Like but I was trying to get away from that,
Speaker 3: Oh you were okay, you know, like again my you know,
Speaker 3: I'm from the oldest La Filipino gang in existence something else,
Speaker 3: you know, and you know, so my cultural perspective comes
Speaker 3: from that lens, you know, and you know, I'm embedded
Speaker 3: with It's my culture, you know. But once I discovered
Speaker 3: hip hop, hip hop did not align with what we
Speaker 3: were doing as Filipino Americans. So once I fell in
Speaker 3: love with it, and I went to school and grew
Speaker 3: up with all my best friends are black, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean, So like it just grew up in
Speaker 3: that environment. And so when I wrote and recorded this album,
Speaker 3: I didn't write it with the mindset of like fucking
Speaker 3: grab the Filipino community and shake them up. You know,
Speaker 3: it was more like accept me hip hop, you know,
Speaker 3: I mean, it was more about that. So I didn't
Speaker 3: think the hip hop community would understand my perspective as
Speaker 3: a Filipino, but I knew that they would understand if
Speaker 3: I was talking about neighborhood shit. You all go through that.
Speaker 3: Like you just said, we were all in the same neighborhood,
Speaker 3: were all police brutality, that's all something we deal with,
Speaker 3: you know. So I was like, let me just focus
Speaker 3: on that. But like I said, the Filipino communities were
Speaker 3: gravitated to me, and was like, Yo, let's grab this
Speaker 3: dude and figure him out and see what he's about,
Speaker 3: you know. So then I eventually, you know, I'd always
Speaker 3: been going to SEATPOT, which is the Filipino Community Center
Speaker 3: in historic Filipino Town. It's an acronym for Search to
Speaker 3: Involve Filipino Americans, which is still there. Yeah, the best
Speaker 3: community center for our community, I think, and so I'd
Speaker 3: already been going there. So there was this huge show
Speaker 3: for a brother we lost named Arnold, and this guy
Speaker 3: named Kiwi was headlined in the show, and everybody was
Speaker 3: telling me, Yo, man, you gotta see this dude, Kiwie
Speaker 3: be on that kind of height, you know, And I
Speaker 3: was like, you know, MC, I like, I don't care
Speaker 3: about that, dude. I'm like, yeah, exactly was this dude about?
Speaker 3: And I opened the show. It was like a forty
Speaker 3: person lineup. So I opened the show. When he closed it,
Speaker 3: I'm waiting the whole night. Yeah, yeah, I went to
Speaker 3: show up. He showed up, and I was blown away.
Speaker 3: I was like, Oh, this dude's like he found a
Speaker 3: way to embrace his Filipino this while at the same
Speaker 3: time grabbing everybody else from any other culture in LA
Speaker 3: and making them all do the call and responses. And
Speaker 3: he was just I get goosebumps thinking about it. He
Speaker 3: changed me. I was like, Okay, I need to work
Speaker 3: with this dude. So when I started working on other
Speaker 3: music and before I dropped my first album, I said
Speaker 3: I gotta have you. And we went on tour together,
Speaker 3: a college tour. It was called the Native Guns Tour,
Speaker 3: and then we eventually just it went from like us
Speaker 3: doing separate sets and then doing a couple of songs
Speaker 3: together till like, by the end of the tour, we
Speaker 3: were like doing we weren't even doing our own songs.
Speaker 3: We were doing like Native Gun songs, and we became
Speaker 3: a group, eventually picked up DJ Fatrick and still wasn't
Speaker 3: organized or organizing. He was. He was like a pioneer,
Speaker 3: him face Antia. They were pioneers as far as cultural
Speaker 3: artists are concerned, working with grassroots people's organizations. I wasn't there.
Speaker 3: I wasn't in that head space.
Speaker 2: And so that's so yeah, interjecting the story here. So
Speaker 2: I had already knew Faith because of poetry.
Speaker 3: Right, So she was doing the rock to vote campaigns
Speaker 3: that she was in magazines like this, you know what
Speaker 3: I mean?
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then like obviously like there's for me, like
Speaker 2: the glue was you know Irene, you know, I mean,
Speaker 2: so you know, for y'all that don't listen Irene. I
Speaker 2: mentioned her on multiple albums, you know, just little you know,
Speaker 2: a couple of years younger THO were just like mesmerized
Speaker 2: like that there's an whole island.
Speaker 1: Of girls like you are you serious? Just where is
Speaker 1: this place? Yeah?
Speaker 2: And but that that for me too, like I had
Speaker 2: never seen and so Faith kind of fitting that to me.
Speaker 2: I had never seen revolutionaries that weren't black. I've only
Speaker 2: I only knew black ones, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 2: and the few sort of like Mexican organizers around, like
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: The cessor Chilvis stuff groups.
Speaker 2: But my understanding of like no, we're trying to burn
Speaker 2: the system down. They was all black people, you know,
Speaker 2: So seeing kind of what was what was happening, I
Speaker 2: guess I'm assuming this is around the same time as
Speaker 2: I was more like kind of learning that like, oh
Speaker 2: there's a whole world here. There was like you know,
Speaker 2: by someone to college. It was like I was, you know,
Speaker 2: I don't even remember the friendship games.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you know all that, and uh, because I
Speaker 1: was already in a breaking crew. Yeah I know. I
Speaker 1: mean I was there for they still do friendship good.
Speaker 2: I don't know, but I was already in a breaking
Speaker 2: crew that, you know, because by this time I had
Speaker 2: already decided kind of the same thing that like the
Speaker 2: fork in the road of like am I going to
Speaker 2: keep doing where to keep climbing over fences and write
Speaker 2: writing my name on the walls and getting in trouble?
Speaker 1: Or am I gonna take this serious? You know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So by this time I was like I just looked
Speaker 2: around and I was like all my black friends went
Speaker 2: g funk on me. You know what I'm saying. So
Speaker 2: I'm like the Bee Boys. They were all Filipino, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean. So for me, that introduced me
Speaker 2: to this whole.
Speaker 1: World and then I learned of the family.
Speaker 2: Then I learned so I have my understanding of the
Speaker 2: culture of the Philippines was through hip hop, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying, And that didn't.
Speaker 1: Like you know my prom dad. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: because that was where I'm from. You yeah, I didn't.
Speaker 2: I didn't know that origin story. I'm I'm interested in, like,
Speaker 2: so where the because I do remember the conversations with
Speaker 2: like my friends, me and merce talk about it to
Speaker 2: where at some point they like, are he weird? Because
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, Like, oh yeah, you're reading that,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, Like like, I'm interested in
Speaker 2: that conversation like where where?
Speaker 1: Where was the homis feeling?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 3: You know, I admired Kiwi and Kiwi was also from
Speaker 3: a neighborhood growing up, you know what I mean. He's
Speaker 3: from a neighborhood called jeff Rocks, which traditionally didn't get
Speaker 3: along with our neighborhood. So but he was part of
Speaker 3: the life and I'm watching him transition as an adult,
Speaker 3: uh and and kind of adopting this new gang of
Speaker 3: like community organizing. I was very attracted to that, but
Speaker 3: I still wasn't ready to put your foot in because
Speaker 3: I'm an MC so I'm very ego driven and very
Speaker 3: like prideful and like, no, I don't. I don't need
Speaker 3: to be accountable to nobody. I'm conscious, yeah, and I'm
Speaker 3: putting I'm putting good inside, right, I'm the one doing it.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So, like I said, we were on tour and at
Speaker 3: some point, we got to New York and I was
Speaker 3: sitting with a bunch of the sisters from Nan, another
Speaker 3: organization out there, and this woman named Ree, who you know,
Speaker 3: I love her to death, like Ree is my heart
Speaker 3: and she's down in San Diego right now. But I
Speaker 3: met her and we were at this table and nobody
Speaker 3: at ever, everybody was kind of I was at the
Speaker 3: stage of my career and I was like, oh, you're Bamboo,
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, yeah, And she was like who you it.
Speaker 3: I'm like, you know, I'm from this neighborhood. And she's like,
Speaker 3: but who you organized and who are you accountable to?
Speaker 3: You're making all this like music, but who's keeping you
Speaker 3: in check? That was the change, right, Who's like keeping
Speaker 3: you in check? And who's informing you of all this stuff?
Speaker 3: And I'm like, well, you know, I pick it up
Speaker 3: from homies here and there, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: I work with K and B and L a kind
Speaker 3: of you know, and it was just straight out like,
Speaker 3: well that music is very weightless, you know what I mean,
Speaker 3: Like you you're not accountable to nobody. It doesn't really
Speaker 3: mean anything, you know.
Speaker 2: And I was like, because it really it really hits
Speaker 2: the like it hits on both levels in the sense
Speaker 2: of like, okay, you you you saying you.
Speaker 1: From this block, I go to that block and don't
Speaker 1: nobody know you?
Speaker 3: Right? Right?
Speaker 1: Then where are these stories coming from? You know what
Speaker 1: I mean?
Speaker 2: So it was kind of so it resonates to where
Speaker 2: it's like you talk about all this change, all these
Speaker 2: like you know you want to see this, Okay, so
Speaker 2: what do you, right, what are you.
Speaker 3: Actually going from? You know what I mean? Like, what
Speaker 3: are you actually what's the goal of your music? And
Speaker 3: I didn't really have an answer to make other people
Speaker 3: conscious for what to do, you know, so everybody just
Speaker 3: kind of for the purpose for what And I didn't
Speaker 3: really have an answer. So then I kind of brought
Speaker 3: this up to Kiwi, and I was like kind of bothered,
Speaker 3: you know, because again I was infatuated with Rhea. I
Speaker 3: was like, oh, she is somebody special, yea, yea, And
Speaker 3: for her to tell me that really hurt, you know.
Speaker 3: I was like, I'm talking to Keywi, and it wasn't
Speaker 3: just hurt, it was the whole table of people kind
Speaker 3: of like uh huh uh right, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: And and still in my patriarchal mind, I'm like, wow,
Speaker 3: these women talking to me this way, you know what
Speaker 3: I mean.
Speaker 1: We ain't got there yet. Yeah. I wasn't there yet.
Speaker 3: I was why are they challenging me in this way?
Speaker 3: You know? And so I brought it up to Kiwi
Speaker 3: and he's like, well, you should just organize. He's like,
Speaker 3: you should go and when you get home, when we
Speaker 3: get home, because we're in Boston at the time, He's like,
Speaker 3: when you get home, you should sit down and fill
Speaker 3: out that application and take your oath and you know,
Speaker 3: really get out there and start organizing. And I did.
Speaker 3: As soon as I got home. I got with the group.
Speaker 3: The organization amachabayani K and B, which is translates to
Speaker 3: pro people youth. And I got I got to work,
Speaker 3: you know, and then that became the primary and the
Speaker 3: music was the secondary, you know, where it was flipped before.
Speaker 3: And so now I was using my music as the
Speaker 3: cultural arm for this work that I was actually doing
Speaker 3: on the ground. So you know, I had worked my
Speaker 3: way all the way up to the secretary general that organization,
Speaker 3: and you know, it really did hold me accountable, like
Speaker 3: it really like people. I would say something on a record,
Speaker 3: put it out and somebody tug at me and say, hey, man,
Speaker 3: like you probably shouldn't have said this. You probably should
Speaker 3: have said this. Yeah, this will affect people back home
Speaker 3: in this way, and it was good for wow, you know.
Speaker 3: And that's kind of where the growth comes from.
Speaker 2: So let me ask you some more like logistical like
Speaker 2: practical questions. So like I'm remembering the things that you know,
Speaker 2: questions that people have asked me. So it's like literal
Speaker 2: like time of day, you know, in the sense that
Speaker 2: like we still got to pay the rent, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. So so like me explaining, I'm like, no,
Speaker 2: I still worked, like I still had it, still had a.
Speaker 1: Job, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: And then since this is strictly volunteer, how to balance
Speaker 2: those things. So that's the first thing I want to ask, Like,
Speaker 2: so if you could think back to like how you
Speaker 2: were managing your time now granted like single, no wife,
Speaker 2: no kids at the time, so I was really.
Speaker 3: Able to say, you know what I'm saying, yeah, but.
Speaker 2: And then having to now like learn how to like
Speaker 2: sort of calibrate my time to be like you know,
Speaker 2: that's I always say, like, man, you know, the marches
Speaker 2: are for the young thes like, you know what I'm saying, Like, so,
Speaker 2: but that doesn't mean I'm not involved. So anyway, So
Speaker 2: like I want to ask about the practical part of
Speaker 2: like those beginning stages, and then secondly, like what were
Speaker 2: some of the things that you did a lot of
Speaker 2: times we say like, oh we're organizing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so what does that mean?
Speaker 1: What does that mean? Yeah?
Speaker 3: So back then, I mean I may my money. I
Speaker 3: worked in reality television. I was a video logger, yeah,
Speaker 3: you know, and that kind of inform It was still
Speaker 3: in the world of Hollywood. Yeah, this is after I
Speaker 3: got out of the Marine Corps. It just came home
Speaker 3: from the war and I tried to be a paramedic.
Speaker 3: Didn't really work out for me. You know, dealing with
Speaker 3: adults who were hurt are different than dealing with children,
Speaker 3: and you know someone's old grandma. That's a completely different world.
Speaker 3: Kind of messed me up. And I was dealing with
Speaker 3: a lot of PTSD. So I got into Hollywood a
Speaker 3: whole different beast. But you know, being from LA that's like, yeah,
Speaker 3: I was going to say, like, I find a job.
Speaker 1: You're gonna find it. I always had to explain that
Speaker 1: to people. I'm like, that's really like.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you'll find it your year's work. Yeah. So I
Speaker 3: was doing that for a long time. But because I
Speaker 3: was organizing with folks, I got into the nonprofit world,
Speaker 3: which was pretty easy. You know, most of those people
Speaker 3: that were organizing in grassroots people's organizations also had jobs,
Speaker 3: as you know in five and one c three, So
Speaker 3: I naturally jumped into that People's core, which is people's
Speaker 3: community organization for reform and empowerment. His work, I kind
Speaker 3: of thrived, and I always talk about that being like
Speaker 3: my dream job. I really enjoyed it. And here I'll
Speaker 3: give you some concrete stuff that we did there, so
Speaker 3: we you know, the there was a big lawsuit on
Speaker 3: the tobacco industry, so part of their their retribution was
Speaker 3: they'd have to distribute bread to all these community organizations
Speaker 3: to do anti smoking campaigns. We took that and we said, okay,
Speaker 3: we're going to Artisia, We're going to Crito's and we're
Speaker 3: gonna do an anti multi unit housing, anti smoking in
Speaker 3: multi unit housing campaign.
Speaker 1: Wow, we did that.
Speaker 3: We went in there and we organized door to door.
Speaker 3: We're knocking on people, say hey, you know, like someone
Speaker 3: smoking an apartment b could affect someone in the apartment
Speaker 3: seeks a centralized air, and then we would disguise that
Speaker 3: in creating small people's organizations. We'd go from there to say, hey,
Speaker 3: you know, the tobacco industry they kind of do this.
Speaker 3: Then by the end of their meeting, they're talking about
Speaker 3: capitalism and hyper capitalism is destroying their community, and we bounce.
Speaker 3: So there you go. We did it. We got a
Speaker 3: community org built and some of them are still working
Speaker 3: to this day. Yeah, so those kind of things, Those
Speaker 3: are concrete things that we did with money that was
Speaker 3: given to us, and we would just disguise it and rerouted. Yeah,
Speaker 3: the grassroots organizational level, our goal was to connect the
Speaker 3: issues that were happening locally to the issues happening in
Speaker 3: the Philippines. So raising the awareness and then getting those
Speaker 3: few that kind of rose up, grabbing them, getting them organized,
Speaker 3: getting them in the organization to start doing the work,
Speaker 3: and then just helping it spread, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: And then you know, raising support for the movement that
Speaker 3: was happening in the Philippines. You know, there's still a
Speaker 3: movement happening in the Philippines. We have one of the
Speaker 3: longest standing revolutions on the planet, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So we did an episode on Oh Boy that was
Speaker 2: a they just captured that was running the colt, running
Speaker 2: the church colt, and then built the homie homi'es hilarious.
Speaker 2: He was a full on, like Pentecostal preacher.
Speaker 3: I'm not hip, Oh bro, I gotta send you.
Speaker 1: It's funny.
Speaker 2: It's like it's like he's I mean, he's a bastard,
Speaker 2: like a horrible being, but the city is funny.
Speaker 1: And he ended up becoming best friends.
Speaker 3: With the old the last president.
Speaker 2: Last President's oh yeah, yeah, you know homegrow with all addresses, Yeah, Marcos, yes, Marcos.
Speaker 2: He ended up being cool with them and that's really
Speaker 2: what what kept him safe for a while. But now
Speaker 2: that they are terrible people, yes, horrible human beings. But man, anyway,
Speaker 2: that's I'm off topic.
Speaker 3: But yeah, so, but that was kind of what the
Speaker 3: you know, all of our ogs were fighting that regime,
Speaker 3: they were fighting the Marcoses. So you know, we learned
Speaker 3: a lot of lessons from that. And I'm gonna get
Speaker 3: to the other question you asked. So you know, you
Speaker 3: mentioned just letting young knees and yeah, yeah, and that's
Speaker 3: really true. It's more to me, it's more about getting
Speaker 3: out the way as an elder facts, you know, like
Speaker 3: let the youth. I don't know what it's like to
Speaker 3: organize in a time of crazy social media. Yes, I'm
Speaker 3: from door to door, knocking on the door, going to colleges,
Speaker 3: breaking into classes and talking to you know, I'm from that.
Speaker 3: I don't know what how to navigate this space, and
Speaker 3: I shouldn't know how to do that, and I should
Speaker 3: kind of inspire and hold up the youth who do
Speaker 3: know how to do that. You know, the youth ceiling
Speaker 3: is like thirty five, they say, which is crazy to me,
Speaker 3: right right, But they say, you can organize youth up
Speaker 3: until thirty five, I say, like stay out of it
Speaker 3: and when you hit thirty. But you know, so you
Speaker 3: know that's kind of where I'm at now. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 3: I support folks like I got a show coming up tomorrow.
Speaker 3: I'm you know, opening up tables for a lot of
Speaker 3: these younger folks to come and organize and grab folks
Speaker 3: because I do the ultimate goal of my music is
Speaker 3: to get people to organizee you know, I don't need fans. Yeah,
Speaker 3: you know, we need comrades more than I need fans,
Speaker 3: you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 2: One thing that really resonated with me is like I
Speaker 2: found that what sort of worked well with sort of
Speaker 2: my gifting what I was good at is like in
Speaker 2: like like recognizing talent, you know what I'm saying, in
Speaker 2: just finding those like those hungry like you know that
Speaker 2: that I think in the same probably the same for you.
Speaker 2: They gravitated to you anyway, one carried yourself and what
Speaker 2: we were talking about anyway. And for me, a lot
Speaker 2: of the stuff it came out of my work anyway.
Speaker 2: So like when I like fresh out of college, I
Speaker 2: worked at East Lake, So I was worked in juvenile halls.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, so that.
Speaker 2: Obviously, like was like, well, there's already an audience here
Speaker 2: of people who want to hear something different, you know.
Speaker 2: So then out of that, you know, you start helping
Speaker 2: them build their own communities and stuff like that. And
Speaker 2: then from East Lake then I was like it, Matt
Speaker 2: taught at Camp Rocky, Like I taught all these camps
Speaker 2: and then finally landed at this school in Pomona, and
Speaker 2: then there I just fell into.
Speaker 1: One of the youngest teachers.
Speaker 2: You know, obviously I'm black, I'm from the city, so
Speaker 2: like I fell into a lot of the gang intervention
Speaker 2: stuff over there, you know, and you just one just
Speaker 2: because I knew where I was, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 2: Like it'd be little stuff like there's a big chunk
Speaker 2: of our audiences from California, so I could be real
Speaker 2: specific about stuff like this, where like I remember the
Speaker 2: school was trying to set up a after school thing
Speaker 2: at the Boys and Girls Club on Mission, right, So
Speaker 2: it's like Mission and whole No No, No Mission and Gary.
Speaker 1: So it's Gary and Mission and.
Speaker 3: This.
Speaker 2: I remember some of the administrators were like, why aren't
Speaker 2: why aren't these kids going? And I was like, well,
Speaker 2: you have to cross tenth Street.
Speaker 1: Right, She's like, what you have to cross tenth Street?
Speaker 2: Like I was like, they're not you like you have
Speaker 2: to have you either have to have three of these
Speaker 2: places or maybe maybe you shouldn't work here, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. So there was those those those friendships,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean that Sometimes it's just started
Speaker 2: off as being like I was just the cool teacher,
Speaker 2: you know, dovetailed into like.
Speaker 1: A essentially radicalizing these.
Speaker 3: Kids, you know what I'm saying, And you know it
Speaker 3: ain't too far off. I always say, like I always say,
Speaker 3: gangs are just community organizations, you know what I mean,
Speaker 3: That's really all they are. They just they haven't been
Speaker 3: brought the awareness hasn't been brought to a lot of
Speaker 3: them to like these street beefs are real beefs. First
Speaker 3: of all. I always got to say that. I think
Speaker 3: a lot of elders look at them as like just
Speaker 3: silly kids, you know what. But these beefs are generational,
Speaker 3: you know, and and they're very real. People have lost
Speaker 3: uncles and aunts to this violence. And it is not
Speaker 3: as simple to say let's just stop the violence, you know,
Speaker 3: It's not that easy. There's there's a wombs that need
Speaker 3: to be here. Yeah, you know, and there's trauma that
Speaker 3: needs to.
Speaker 1: Sit a Ukrainian and a Russian down and tell them
Speaker 1: to just stop it.
Speaker 3: By it's not that not that, it's not that simple,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean. And then compounded with what
Speaker 3: we deal with on a regular basis, you know, not
Speaker 3: feeling human, not feeling a part of a real community,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, Like life is cheap at
Speaker 3: the end of the day. Sometimes, you know.
Speaker 2: I think you're you're a good example of like I
Speaker 2: think I said it the first time of what I
Speaker 2: mean by hood of politics in the sense that to
Speaker 2: your point, you know, I use one of the kids
Speaker 2: from that I'm talking about now, uh At he's shooting
Speaker 2: a video. He could shoot out a hundred he can
Speaker 2: shoot out of text, like, hey, I need a hundred
Speaker 2: people on like you know, Florence and Normandy. I'm like, Nigga,
Speaker 2: where the riot started. You're gonna shoot a video where
Speaker 2: the LA riots started, And.
Speaker 1: You're just.
Speaker 2: Right, You're gonna shoot one right there, and one hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty people show up, and two hundred people show up,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, you're an organizer, Like that's real power.
Speaker 3: That power.
Speaker 2: I was like, you know, politicians pay for that. That's
Speaker 2: called astroturfing. They pay to have people show up. I'm like,
Speaker 2: you can actually do it.
Speaker 1: That's real power.
Speaker 2: So you could say, Pomona Unified School District, Hey, with
Speaker 2: a hundred of us, we need to pull up to
Speaker 2: this meeting to say we need this for our schools.
Speaker 1: You can do it, you know.
Speaker 2: So and and and seeing like I said, like seeing
Speaker 2: you evolve from like as i' mean asdultad fans I
Speaker 2: was a professional rappert.
Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: But like, it's not what I'm here for. There's a
Speaker 2: there's a there's a greater thing happening here.
Speaker 3: To wrap it up, you know, While I appreciate folks
Speaker 3: who enjoyed my floor sick, you know, I think, like
Speaker 3: I said, the ultimate goal is to turn you into
Speaker 3: a comrade at some point, you know what I mean,
Speaker 3: even if it's in your own life. Yeah, because we
Speaker 3: need this change. We need to impact social changes that way.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: So in what ways could you le'ma get soupy on you, like,
Speaker 2: could you see you know obviously, just I looked up
Speaker 2: seven fifty Sacramento Street over here, for the Supreme Court
Speaker 2: case about birthright citizenship with the Chinese immigrant, like eighteen
Speaker 2: ninety six. It was fresh on my mind, so I
Speaker 2: was like, I know, it's so such a deep cut,
Speaker 2: but the story I think it's next week's episode. But
Speaker 2: the story is like this guy, you know, was born
Speaker 2: in San Francisco at seven fifty, you know, comes back,
Speaker 2: you know, going back and forth see his family, and
Speaker 2: he comes back and because of the Chinese Exclusion Act,
Speaker 2: happened while he was gone.
Speaker 1: So he comes back and they're like, yop, he can't
Speaker 1: come in.
Speaker 2: He's like, I literally see my house like I was
Speaker 2: born right there.
Speaker 1: So just while that's.
Speaker 2: Being challenged again, and just you know, and just just
Speaker 2: some of just the absurdity that's happening here we're watching.
Speaker 2: Like I give an example of like if you buy
Speaker 2: it it's Valentine's that you buy a bouquet of roses
Speaker 2: and you put them in a vase. The roses are dead,
Speaker 2: thirty dead. It's just a matter of time, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying. And you're just slowing it down. So
Speaker 2: when I look at like American democracy, I'm like, it's
Speaker 2: it's been dead, you know what I'm saying, but and
Speaker 2: we're watching it be rebirthed into this like you know,
Speaker 2: technocratic oligarchy, like and we're you voted for this, Like
Speaker 2: I watched y'all choose this.
Speaker 1: You know, this man looked you in the face.
Speaker 2: It was like, I'm finn lower yo yo yo grocery
Speaker 2: prices and none of y'all like nobody.
Speaker 3: And he's like, here's Golf of America.
Speaker 1: Yeah, here Golf of America. This man, I'm like, none
Speaker 1: of y'all got an issue with that.
Speaker 2: Like nobody y'all with this Patriot groceries, Like I'm supposed
Speaker 2: to pay more?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 1: What do you anyway?
Speaker 3: So?
Speaker 2: Uh, in what ways are like you sort of kind
Speaker 2: of continuing on finding hope? Like like I said, everybody
Speaker 2: hear from me all the time, So like what ways
Speaker 2: are you kind of like finding enjoy or.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean that's a tough one, you know, but
Speaker 3: I wasn't asleep during the Obama administration. I wasn't asleep
Speaker 3: during Joe Biden's administration. That's you know, my my my
Speaker 3: mentor Joe Navidae used to always say, same dog, different
Speaker 3: collar facts. You got to kill the dog, you know.
Speaker 3: So the goal has always been systemic change, and you
Speaker 3: know you just kind of have to dismantle it and
Speaker 3: separate it all. You know. The way we can do
Speaker 3: it as MCS as artist is the cultural aspect each
Speaker 3: you know, the cultural, the political, and the economic all
Speaker 3: have to support each other. That's why the music we
Speaker 3: hear ISYP is based on consumerism, you know what I mean,
Speaker 3: it upholds consumerism, it has to. So what we can
Speaker 3: do is change that narrative is start to, you know,
Speaker 3: make music that that challenges that, and then eventually one
Speaker 3: of those is going to have to fall or at
Speaker 3: least start to. And we were getting there's there were
Speaker 3: small moments, you know, there were little moments where we're like, okay, cool,
Speaker 3: you know we have socialist things in our government now,
Speaker 3: social security, yeah, yeah, you know, fire department, right exactly,
Speaker 3: those kind of things. And you know, so I find
Speaker 3: hope in small victories like that. And I do believe
Speaker 3: that this is not a you know, I think when
Speaker 3: you're young, you want it to happen yesterday, and you
Speaker 3: don't understand it's gonna be generational. You know, this is
Speaker 3: gonna be generational change. So I'm patient, Yeah, it probably
Speaker 3: won't happen in our children's lifetime. But if they keep pushing,
Speaker 3: it's gonna happen.
Speaker 1: That's my thing.
Speaker 2: When I hear myself saying things my father said, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, wait, you know what I'm saying. Yeah, But
Speaker 2: at the same time I can say, like you said,
Speaker 2: like that, my my felt life experience is different, you know.
Speaker 2: And and then to me, like I get excited when
Speaker 2: I'm seeing like again, like these these young leings like
Speaker 2: being hungry and understand things at understanding new luance is
Speaker 2: at a level I, you know, didn't at their age
Speaker 2: where it's like, you know, for me, it was like
Speaker 2: all things that everything's a hammer. You feel me, it's
Speaker 2: all on nails, So just straight up beat the door.
Speaker 2: Now they you know, they got a little finesse, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. I'm like, you understand nuance earlier
Speaker 2: than I did.
Speaker 3: You know that well, even in regard to art, like
Speaker 3: it's so independent. We're sitting here right now holding microphones
Speaker 3: like we couldn't picture that as a kid like you had.
Speaker 3: I had to get a task ambrol and like bring
Speaker 3: it to a studio in the valley and pay this
Speaker 3: dude thirty dollars an hours I can get one song out,
Speaker 3: you know where Now kids are recording in their bedroom
Speaker 3: and it's amazing people are putting you know, you dream
Speaker 3: about being on TV for sure, Now I'm on YouTube phone,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean. It's that simple.
Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah, man, that's that's that's good to hear.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 3: So that's where I'm ad. You know, that's where I'm at,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, Like, that's that's what gives
Speaker 3: me hope. And yeah, just pointing a dad, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean? Like that, that's another big thing for me,
Speaker 3: you know, being a dad and watching my kids and
Speaker 3: them changing just a little bit more, you know, just
Speaker 3: turning the needle just a little bit. You know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love love watching my children put together some
Speaker 2: sentences that I'm like, me and my wife look at
Speaker 2: each other like hmm, kids gonna be all right. It
Speaker 2: also helps to I would say, because I honestly couldn't
Speaker 2: imagine like experiencing it, like if my partner in life,
Speaker 2: like if my wife wasn't about the revolution, sure as
Speaker 2: as I was, Like we realized like as we've gotten older,
Speaker 2: like a lot of.
Speaker 1: Our interests, interests have differed.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying like we're just not into
Speaker 2: a lot of the same stuff we used to be into,
Speaker 2: where I'm like, she don't want to she don't want
Speaker 2: to go see some underground wrapper. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: I'm good, you know what I mean. She wants to
Speaker 2: hike on Sunday. You feel me, And I'm like, I'm good.
Speaker 2: I'm entering my like my the old age. I'm like
Speaker 2: buying tools and figuring out to fixate like I never
Speaker 2: wanted to yard work was punishment, like kidding me, I'm
Speaker 2: not fing to do that now you feel me, I'm like,
Speaker 2: how many gears? But yeah, but we understood that like
Speaker 2: with being like mission focused, like everything's been about mission
Speaker 2: and just vision, like being like that's whatever jobs we've
Speaker 2: chosen for to support ourselves, whatever things we put our
Speaker 2: name on. It's like if it's not if it's not
Speaker 2: mission first, we's not into it, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: which meant that we was willing to sacrifice, you know,
Speaker 2: vacations as part of why she didn't come this trip
Speaker 2: was just like money's.
Speaker 1: Got to go somewhere else, right, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: So I see that with y'all too, like that I mean,
Speaker 1: I can't.
Speaker 2: I wish you could give abody advice, like, yo, marry you
Speaker 2: a rider, you know what I'm saying, Like I just
Speaker 2: sometimes not like that, but I would say that that's
Speaker 2: something that's beautiful for y'all too. That like my wife
Speaker 2: and I look like from a foreigner, like, yeah, we
Speaker 2: understand that word.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I appreciate my relationship, you know. I appreciate her
Speaker 3: as a partner and as a co parent, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean, Like we idealistically there's things that we
Speaker 3: don't see eye on all the time, you know what
Speaker 3: I mean, but we have at least the foundation for
Speaker 3: how to have those conversations in those conflicts, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean. So I appreciate that. Yeah, that's about
Speaker 3: my relationship with her, and she's she's a great MC.
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't know, I think you are around
Speaker 3: more mcs than I am. But I'm really not like
Speaker 3: I'm alone. I'm in the house, I'm with the kids,
Speaker 3: so rap for me, there was nothing really motivating me,
Speaker 3: but I live with somebody. So when she was recording
Speaker 3: a record, I'm like, man, I don't want to write
Speaker 3: some bars too, you know. So that's kind of where
Speaker 3: this new record came from was just me listening to
Speaker 3: her make long kids, good night and motivating me to
Speaker 3: be like you, I want to get back to right.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: As a matter of fact, let's let's end on that,
Speaker 2: like so us tell us about this album, which is
Speaker 2: the greatest album name ever. At first I thought sharpest
Speaker 2: to him, this jet was the best ever, And then
Speaker 2: then it's massa.
Speaker 1: If you see someone stealing food, no you didn't.
Speaker 3: I think it definitely was birth for me looking at
Speaker 3: the Internet and looking at social media and seeing people
Speaker 3: just like stealing things and people shitting on them, like, yo,
Speaker 3: this this dude gets crack. He came in here and
Speaker 3: started taking shampoo. He's taking shampoo. Yeah, he's taking shampoo,
Speaker 3: stealing steaks. I was like, he's loby doll, Like they're
Speaker 3: gonna throw that out.
Speaker 2: You know, if you had a little less Melanie, you
Speaker 2: would call that forging straight up. There you go yourself
Speaker 2: saying there, straight up you call forging and survival, and
Speaker 2: especially out.
Speaker 3: Here in the Bay that was inundated because you know,
Speaker 3: they were really trying to build this. Uh. You know,
Speaker 3: this is such a progressive city up here in there.
Speaker 3: It's such a progressive area that conservatives really use this
Speaker 3: as like the target of like this is why you
Speaker 3: can't have a progressive government because people are stealing and
Speaker 3: bipping cars, but they were failing to kind of recognize
Speaker 3: the underlying Yeah, you're taking you know, look at Oakland,
Speaker 3: Like you've taken all the teams away from Oakland. You're
Speaker 3: taking all the industry out of Oakland, you know what
Speaker 3: I mean. And then you're like, why are they stealing
Speaker 3: so much ship? Why are people poor? Well, yeah, there's
Speaker 3: nothing here, you know, So that kind of birth that
Speaker 3: like stop snitching, you know what I mean, Like turn
Speaker 3: the other cheek, doesn't it don't affect you, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean? Like, and then we can have the
Speaker 3: nuanced conversation I've had comments on like what about a
Speaker 3: small business? Sure we can, we can talk about that.
Speaker 3: That's exactly you should know if you listen to record
Speaker 3: as not what I'm talking Aboueah, you know.
Speaker 2: And if you and if you're from the city, you know,
Speaker 2: nobody's stealing from mister Johnson.
Speaker 3: Nobody's nobody Walgreens, and you know that's where they're taking sticks.
Speaker 3: And so that's where the title of the album comes from.
Speaker 3: And then like, you know, just I just wanted to
Speaker 3: kind of stream a consciousness to make music. But then
Speaker 3: there are things like Intifada, which you know, deals with
Speaker 3: the Palestinian situation, and you know, I didn't lin Manuel
Speaker 3: kind of messed it up for a lot of rappers
Speaker 3: because when when I was writing, and I'm like, man,
Speaker 3: this is very Hamilton Is you know what I mean,
Speaker 3: Like this sounds kind of corny, but I put it
Speaker 3: out anyway. I just put it on the table. I
Speaker 3: was like, let's just put it out there. So it's
Speaker 3: got a lot of dates on it and whatnot. So
Speaker 3: but now, really, you know this, I didn't think this
Speaker 3: record would have such a great reception. I thought it
Speaker 3: was going to be like a mixtape. I was calling
Speaker 3: it a mix tape. I was telling the label like, hey,
Speaker 3: I'm just putting out this mixtape, you know, And when
Speaker 3: it came out, you know, folks really messed with it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It was timely, man, it was like right on time.
Speaker 2: And it like I think it cuts through a lot
Speaker 2: of like a lot of times, I think even for
Speaker 2: US mcs that really want to say something. Sometimes I
Speaker 2: found which some of the motivation with the podcast, who
Speaker 2: is like my commitment to making a dope song sometimes
Speaker 2: gets in a way of what I'm trying to say.
Speaker 1: So sometimes you like, you just got to say it,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. But I feel like it's
Speaker 1: a great way to put it. You understand what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So I feel like this it cut through in a
Speaker 2: way that it's like, oh, no, he's saying it. You
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying and it's not. But it's not.
Speaker 2: The rap didn't get in the way, like you feel
Speaker 2: me like appreciate that, you know, and I as that's
Speaker 2: what I appreciated about it.
Speaker 1: I was like, no, you know, he said it. And
Speaker 1: I also appreciate.
Speaker 2: About like, uh, because there there there there's music I'm
Speaker 2: sitting on that we're not sitting on. It's just in
Speaker 2: the pipeline of coming out to where I'm like, I
Speaker 2: don't understand why y'all can't just like just say with
Speaker 2: y'all jazz, like if this like y'all dancing around like
Speaker 2: y'all are real quiet.
Speaker 3: I think because people think they they're gonna live forever,
Speaker 3: and I understand that my time is limited. Yeah, my time,
Speaker 3: that's something I can't get back. You know, I'm never
Speaker 3: gonna get that back, you know. So I cherish all
Speaker 3: those moments, and at the same time, it also pushes
Speaker 3: me to say say it, what's your fucking chest? Like,
Speaker 3: just say it, bro like you know, and and be
Speaker 3: open to having convers and that's the other things I
Speaker 3: don't think artists. I think artists put themselves on this
Speaker 3: pedestal where they don't think they can have conversations with
Speaker 3: regular people. And if someone challenges you want to have
Speaker 3: that conversation. I'm not talking about like in the comment section.
Speaker 3: I'm talking about like, you know, I've had people come
Speaker 3: up to me at shows and say, hey, why you
Speaker 3: keep saying guys? You know, and I'm like, what, because
Speaker 3: that's you know, but I have to have that conversation,
Speaker 3: and it challenges me to be like, yeah, maybe I
Speaker 3: am like isolating people or you know, yeah, genderizing people
Speaker 3: by saying guys. Maybe people do feel the type of way,
Speaker 3: and I have to challenge myself on that. So I
Speaker 3: think as an artist, that's what we should be. You know,
Speaker 3: we're we're a cultural arm of something that's happening, you
Speaker 3: know what I mean. We're not above all of this,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, We're not informing the people.
Speaker 3: The people are informing us how to make this music.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm a member of the community.
Speaker 3: Right I just happen to be able to wrap and
Speaker 3: make something palatable for you to hear.
Speaker 1: You know, thank you for your time, man.
Speaker 3: I appreciate you. Man.
Speaker 2: Man, it's Valentine's You need to get to take care
Speaker 2: of your business before all of us get in trouble.
Speaker 1: Anyway. Appreciate you, man.
Speaker 3: I love you, brother, Love you too. Brother.
Speaker 2: All right, now, don't you hit stop on this pod.
Speaker 2: You better listen to these credits. I need you to
Speaker 2: finish this thing so I can get the download numbers. Okay,
Speaker 2: so don't stop it yet, but listen. This was recorded
Speaker 2: in East Lost Boy Heights by your boy Propaganda. Tap
Speaker 2: in with me at prop hip hop dot com. If
Speaker 2: you're in the Coldbrew coffee we got terraform Coldbrew. You
Speaker 2: can go there dot com and use promo code hood
Speaker 2: get twenty percent off get yourself some coffee. This was mixed,
Speaker 2: edited and mastered by your boy Matt Alsowski killing the
Speaker 2: beat softly. Check out his website Matdowsowski dot com.
Speaker 1: I'm a speller for you because I know m A T. T.
Speaker 2: O s O W s Ki dot com Matthowsowski dot com.
Speaker 1: He got more music and.
Speaker 2: Stuff like that on there, so gonna check out the heat.
Speaker 2: Politics is a member of cool Zone Media, Executive produced
Speaker 2: by Sophie Lichterman, part of the iHeartMedia podcast network. Your
Speaker 2: theme music and scoring is also by the one and
Speaker 2: nobly Mattowsowski. Still killing the beat softly, so listen, don't
Speaker 2: let nobody lie to you. If you understand urban living,
Speaker 2: you understand politics. These people is not smart and you.
Speaker 2: We'll see y'all next week.
Speaker 3: H