Artist Friendly with Joel Madden - 2 Chainz

Episode Date: March 18, 2026

On this week's episode of Artist Friendly, Joel Madden is joined by 2 Chainz. 2 Chainz first came up in the Atlanta hip-hop scene as part of Playaz Circle in the 2000s, though he landed a solo record deal on the strength of his T.R.U. REALigion mixtape in 2011 — as well as verses on Kanye West’s “Mercy” and Nicki Minaj’s “Beez in the Trap” the following year. From there, the rapper broadened his circle, appearing in the video for Fall Out Boy’s “My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark (Light Em Up),” guesting on the remix, and bringing the band out during his Coachella performance in 2013. Stopping by the Artist Friendly studio, 2 Chainz joins Madden for a thoughtful conversation about therapy, fatherhood, and writing his first book, The Voice in My Head Is God.  ------- Listen to their Artist Friendly conversation on ⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify.⁠⁠⁠ ------- Follow Artist Friendly! IG: @artist.friendly TikTok: @artist.friendly YouTube: youtube.com/@artist.friendly ------- Host: Joel Madden, @joelmadden Executive Producers: Joel Madden, Benji Madden, Jillian King Producers: Josh Madden, Joey Simmrin, Janice Leary Visual Producer/Editor: Ryan Schaefer Audio Producer/Composer: Nick Gray Music/Theme Composer: Nick Gray Cover Art/Design: Ryan Schaefer Additional Contributors: Anna Zanes, Neville Hardman ------- Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So I just wanted my book to have a like substance. A lot of people to like my music, they like songs like I'm different birthday songs, stuff like that, where it's more like good time music, good vibes. It's meant to uplift and make you feel good. But this book is meant to uplift, make you feel good, and teach you something a little bit about yourself. And also challenge you to try a few personal methods of have you quiet down the outside noise. on bad times I don't want to have bad

First time author First time writing the book First book First book So that's cool Yeah It's cool when you When you care about something

To get out there And talk about it It's cool Yeah Different energy You know Living in different spaces Even outside of

Hip Hop It was important For me too When I was You know Putting this book together It was important That it was able to live

you know, outside of hip hop as well. Did you feel like it was like a first, not only writing the book, but like getting outside of a career that's so big and all encompassing in some ways, but like getting outside of it to do something different and getting away from it in a way is almost like, weird how you don't do that until you do it.

And then, because I've done it as well. But was that like a first for you, like stepping away from that and doing something? else and you know that was the first time for me but I also found a way to kind of tie what I love about music until the book without talking about music and I said I to say I was you know the storytelling aspect of it yeah you know even when creating an audio book I thought about you know albums that had skits and so my audio book has production throughout the scenes where you can actually feel what's going on that's cool yeah so

I was able to collide worlds kind of mix some of the things I like about creating music with creating this piece of literature. Have you ever heard anyone do that before? No, it was the first time. That's a innovation. This is a dope idea. That's a real innovation. Think about that. That just kind of hit me because I don't read.

I listen to books because I'm like dyslexic and all the things. So in order to read a book, I have to listen to it. And I always thought that audio books were a little fucking... Let's just say some are better than others. Some are better than others. But you think about it and you go, because we are like audible people. We listen to things first probably. Yeah.

And so when you go to listen to an audio, audiobook, it leaves a lot to desire. Yeah. And that's why I think, you know, a podcast is to me, I started a show. show and it is a podcast because people listen to it, but actually it's a TV show. Okay. Essentially, this is what this is. But it's listened to by a bunch of people and watched. But I think we think about sound and visual or when you listen to something, does it make you think?

Does it make you imagine? Does it make, is it like a movie? And I think coming from music, it makes sense that a musician would innovate the audiobook. space. Yeah. That's kind of watch a ton of people do what you just did with your book. Take it up a notch, man. Yeah. You know, make it cinematic. We've had those books that are interesting, but depending on who's reading it, you know. And then we've had, I'm somebody that listens to audiobooks as well. So when creating this and it was important that I, that one, I read the book. It was important that I read it. And two, adding that touch of movies.

score vibes when describing a certain scene you're able to hear in the background, whatever's going on in the scene. Yeah, it's got to kind of feel like a movie. Yeah. If I write a book, I want it to read and feel like I want it to read and feel like there's a, yeah, like there's an arc. Because I feel like I always think about whenever I have to, I don't know, when I think about my own life, I think of it in terms of.

of like if I zoom out, I kind of always say, me and my brother talk about this all the time. We're like, well, how do you want the movie to go? At this stage, at this stage, so that you keep kind of betting on yourself as the main character and, you know, you're either going to be the hero or the story or not. So, and we all got to try to be the hero of our own story. I think as artists and as people that are in creative career, we have arcs, you know, you have moments. And then after that moment, sometimes, you know, 10 years in, 20 years and 30 years in,

you go, oh, am I good for anything else? Am I done? Right. Does anyone care? And then you almost, it's like, you can't live and die by the success of a song. That's something that we do. But then you start doing other things. Yeah.

And it's pretty interesting when artists get, when that switch hits and they, they realize that they hit the ball really well. Yeah. And that they can, that the creative brain that they apply to music is actually a creative brain that can solve a lot of problems and innovate audio books or invest in things or create other things that's interesting. Yeah. Yeah.

I have a chapter called Remind them by rebranding. And it's just, if you start to get that business mentality, you start noticing how businesses operate. Mm-hmm. Most of the top businesses that we see out here, they rebrand themselves every three to five years. Mm-hmm. Right. They don't necessarily change the slogan, but they, the logo changes.

Something changes just to keep, you know, for refreshing, whether it's Sprite or McDonald's, whatever it is, whatever corporation. They do little small things. So I started implementing those things into my career to just. give it a boost and give it that refresh. This book, The Voice in My Head is God, is about, like, intuition and tapping into that inner voice. Mm-hmm. Tapping into what I like to call, your intuition, the gut feeling. This is just simple as that, that gut feeling of almost feeling like you have superpowers

because you can honestly say, man, I knew that was going to happen. Yeah. Or I knew something was going to like. Absolutely. you know, and when I started working on the book, I felt like some people would be able to understand and I feel like others wouldn't, right? Because this is a book I couldn't have put together

in my 20s. This book is, it has God in the title, but it's not like a religious book. It's really based on how I or how, I'm talking about God through my experiences. Yeah. You know, through my experiences. The voice is my conscience.

The voice is my intuition. It's my, man, something told me. You know, something told me, man, I'm glad to see you, man. Something told me that is that. And then God is me giving credit to something higher than myself. Because, like, me listening to that voice or me listening to my conscience has led me right here in front of you right now,

like, which is like, I feel like has led me to success. Absolutely. I think it's the language of God. Yeah. The subconscious. That's it. It's we pray to find it again. We pray to meditate to get back into, I think.

This is my perspective. Yeah. This is strict the opinion base. Right. My thought is there's a transcendent part of life, which is you could call it God. Mm-hmm. So the transcendent part of life is that there's something else, that life is worth living because there's something high.

higher than us. And what does that do? Well, if we believe in God in a higher power, okay, again, I'm just saying from what I believe, right? Because I was excited to talk to you because of the book. Of course, I love your music. But we've both been in the music business in a long time. Yeah, you meet some people. It's full of all kinds of things. So like, you don't always want to meet everybody. And sometimes you do, you know, but then you see someone do something different and you go, man, that's fucking cool. I want to talk to him. And, and, to write a book about your experience and your understanding of God, of self, of the subconscious, which is what leads all artists, all of our artists subconscious.

Whether we think we're talking about this, when you go a layer beneath it, we're actually talking about that. Right? So, and then we are, we are feeding people's subconscious. What do they do when they listen to music? They're working out. They're falling asleep. they're doing so they're driving in their car they're deep in thought most of the time when they listen to our

music so there's a subconscious thing always happening and for you to take it and actually put it into a piece of art and work and literature that people could actually take as an idea they could grasp because of your experience is brilliant because no one talks about it no one talks about did you have a feeling about that how did you feel about that or did you have a feeling about that or did you have a sense that or so so no one's training us to sense things to feel things now when you when you're in like a survival situation you're a lot more in tune with your senses because you're kind of like what is that what is that they call it animal instinct that's right and you're like in tune the problem with that can be though is when you're in a in a in a survival situation where

there's threat and then you get out of that you make it out of that and you get into to a life of whether there is no threat, right? We've mitigated, we've got ourselves to a safe place. We have everything we need. We're not in danger of food, shelter, an actual danger of predators, all that. We can become anxious people because we always think there's a threat

and then we can start actually putting ourselves into threat when we don't need to be, which is what I see with a lot of artists. They put themselves around the wrong people and the wrong places where they could literally just not be there. Right. When you take the idea of what you have in your book and the voice of God, your subconscious, your feelings, your instincts, all of that, and you put it and you, and you share that experience and thought with people, first of all, it's kind of vulnerable to do.

No, it's just, no doubt is very well. Right. So that's powerful. Another thing I've learned is to be vulnerable is actually really powerful because it just shows strength to me. and chose power. So to me, it's pushing forward the idea that there is more to us all. And I think when we believe that there is more, when we trust that the God voice, our subconscious, we become more evolved, compassionate people. And then we are all more connected and therefore we all hurt each other less. It happens unconsciously a lot. It happens accidentally. a lot. You go somewhere and you'd be like, yo, what's up, man, you know?

Had no idea I was going to see you. And they say, oh, you know, something told me to come out of our dream. That person said, something told me too. Like, that connection is something that we just ignore too many times. All the time. We ignore it too many times. All the time. And so I'm not like someone that's just really thinking everything is coincidental.

I really feel like it's a setup. It's a, it's like, it's set for this to happen. It's divine. It's divine. And so, you know, I didn't want to put something together that was preachy, but I did want to put something together that can add to my legacy, like a piece of literature that can live way, you know, way after I'm gone. But has those teaching moments.

And we all enjoy, like, teachers that had cool ways to teach. innovative ways to teach, right? Yeah. So instead of me just doing a regular cliche autobiography and talk about myself the whole time, I'm talking about myself in here, but a lot of these stories, I started from the event, the trauma, whatever it was, and I went from that,

and I went backwards, and it led me to the voice every time. Like, I knew this was gonna happen. Now, whether I paid attention or not, It's different, but I would trace back, like, when I first started, you know, because like I said, this book is based off experience. I had to really wake him and be like, I get it now. Like, I get it. They say, you know, you're made in the image of God. God is in you.

The blessings come. You get all these like cliche things. You just be hearing why you just walking through life. You got to the truth of them, though. Yeah, it's like when you keep saying, when you get that something told me, right? Mm-hmm. Something told me not to do something. Mm-hmm.

I give you this one. This is something. that I feel like most creatives and artists have done. We get on a plane, they're having this kind of trouble. They happen in this kind of trouble. Mm-hmm. You know, they tell us to get out the plane. Every one of us has said, hey, man, it's a good thing.

You know, something probably was gone, you know, that's a sign from God. Uh-huh. You know. In our mind, we're thinking that plane was going to go down and we got saved from it. The plane doesn't go down. None of that happened. Like you not that. We'll just train to be like, we're going to try to find another plane.

This is not working. And we all like stop arguing about that. Okay. That's a, hey, man, we got to listen, man. This is what we say, must not be meant to be. That's right. Oh, man, yeah, man, you want to go, you want to do something bad. Just now I just popped up.

I had a show in Vegas. I love Vegas. Yeah. I love, I love performing in Vegas. Yeah, okay. It's a good time. I'm in Miami. I love Miami.

Yeah. I'm leaving this event, get into a car accident, like crack, like two of my rails, bro. A real bad car accident, like, they can't even wait on,

like the ambulance. They didn't have to take me in like a fire truck or something. I can't even remember, but like, I got to get there. I'm like, man, I got to get to Vegas.

They said, sir, you're not going to, you're not going to make it to Vegas tonight. I'm like, I got to get there, man, I have to do this show.

And they're like, we have to watch you, make sure you don't have any internal, blah, blah. and then, you know, somebody comes to me and say, bro, it must not be meant to be. It must not be meant for us to go. I say, okay, you're right.

You know what I mean? But it was just something I wanted to do really bad. And that's when it happens. Like, something just slows you down sometimes, something that's out of your control. So I just wanted my book to have, like, substance. A lot of people that like my music, they like songs like I'm different birthday songs,

stuff like that, where it's more like good time, music, good vibes. It's meant to uplift and make you feel good. But this book is meant to uplift, make you feel good, and teach you something a little bit about yourself and also challenge you to try a few personal methods of how have you quiet down the outside noise.

Try it. Like, it's hard to believe it because it's like talking about things you can't see. Yeah. So it's like, I'm telling you my boys be like, basically my boys be like, just do it. You know, I don't even want to argue. I don't even want to argue with it at this point.

And then stuff just seems to go smoothly. So I just challenge people to, you know, to either read or check out the really dope audio book. You're speaking my language. This is all I think about. Really? Yes. Why I do this show.

So let me ask you this. Yeah. If I ask you or if you say something told me, like what would be your something told me? I have that. It could be about anything. It could be some large, small, give me one. So I will say before I answer to that, I live in that space. I live in it and I have for probably a decade now.

I changed my life when I left home at 17 with a backpack. and had nothing and set out into the world with my brother and started trying. Something told you to do that, though. Yeah, of course. So something said, go. Something said, go. This is your chance. Yeah.

Right, I had a very hard home life, not to my mom's, not my mom's fault, love my mom. It was just like one trouble after the other. And then we were getting evicted for the last time. And we said, mom, you take care of our sister. And we're out. You don't have to worry about us. we're gone. We hit the road, hitchhiked, went, fucking gone. A movie. And then that's a movie. That's a movie. That's a movie. And 1998, you know, just hit the road from the down in the sticks in

Maryland. Beautiful place. I'm not putting that place down. Just far away from the world. And just hit, this is our chance. Got to go. We got to go right now. We hit the road. Middle of the night. That kind of thing. It was crazy. Like from then, I think we've always been those kinds of something tells me guys. So most of the things we've done, including like the bad people. And we're like, oh, man, I don't care how much money he's talking about. Something's not right here. Let's go. Yeah. Lots of those stories. Yeah. This, this really helps you navigate through a lot of business situations once you tap into that. That's right. So it's what does yes feel like and what does no feel like. Here's the problem with trauma because we also had like childhood trauma.

type stuff and it was just a it was a crazy 18 you know the first 18 years were we're tough so trauma can damage you and injure you in a way where if you don't break the leg and set it it won't heal right and then you're limping around and when you're traumatized it starts you get upside down in what yes and no feel like so part of my work was was healing so I had to like go to therapy, talk to somebody, unpack some stuff. Because I never did it. I never wanted to look at it. And I think that we, if you come from a tough childhood,

you start to tell yourself a story you can live with so that you don't have to look at the ugly parts, right? And then if you go and you do the work because it's painful, admitting that you got hurt is hard to do when you have to be tough, right, to survive life. And I think if you can share, though and you can you can be vulnerable and you can say yeah it really hurt me when you know growing up without your dad around really was painful you know and now I think you you start to unpack

those things and you heal and then you and then you then you actually get past it and you can also look at all the things you got from it you gain from it you the strengths you got yeah yeah yeah yeah there's a lot plenty of that too which is great it's data in there too it's some it's some data you can used to like answer these questions for you. That's right. And then and then and then and then also like you know well what kind of father did I become a great father? Absolutely. What kind of uh you know so this made you that though exactly. So when I got turned right side up and I really got to trusting my own instincts right the voice that you're talking about. Yes feels like yes. It feels like spike the football. Strong yeah. A strong yes. And and then no feels like no feels like no.

You're like, man, I don't even care what you're talking about. I do not, for whatever reason, you came in the room and I noticed you in a bad way. And I got a bad feeling. And it doesn't matter if you're a billionaire or you're a fucking famous person or you're a beautiful girl. I got a bad feeling and I felt it right away and I don't ignore it. And so that became very clear to me once I got right side up and I wasn't all spun and upside down because of all the years of trauma and things. So I think your book is going to be very successful because you're very successful. Whether it was early on you realize this or later on in your adult life, which what makes us,

what makes us grown men? Well, we have kids. We raise them. We build lives. We do all that. On the other side of not just a success career, again, I think we're taught what success is. it is doing stuff, right? It's hit records or it's building businesses or it's,

that's one part of success. The other part of success is being a functional person who can live in the world. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And once you do, you bring those two together and you actually build a life, you become this grown man with success and wisdom and then you can write a book.

Yeah, then you're able to do. I'm not saying you can't write a book in your 20s, obviously. I'm just talking about a book of this type of magnitude with this type of information. The thesis and the message of this book, which I was, that's why I fuck with it because I was like, oh, he's speaking my language.

It's something only someone that has lived some life can share and you will listen to them. A 20-year-old could absolutely write a book like this. You wouldn't take it the same way because we inherently know when someone's lived a lot of life and when someone has it. It's just human nature.

So it's, it's, you know, you could write a book at any age, but there's some things you can only earn, gain, acquire through lived experience. True. And for you to be sitting here, you are exactly where you are in your life because of that voice, but it's also a choice to listen to that voice.

And it's a choice to go forward. It's a choice to go upward. It's a choice. Along the way, you've made a bunch of little, decisions and big ones that got you here versus, and I would say this for everyone, it's choose your own adventure. There's so many different paths, but good, solid choices on top of each other is how you build a good, solid life. And it's one at a time, you know, and obviously

we all made mistakes and stuff, but it's getting back up from those mistakes pretty quickly and recovering from them and trying to learn from that information. But listening to that voice is hard to do for a lot of people because of the noise like you said there's a lot of noise a lot of bad information out there too yeah i mean you you differ and it's a lot of voices you know and you because you can get influence from the neighborhood you can have you know you can get voices from different situations i i differentiate the voices by saying that love if it has some type of love in it then they got they got god in it you know and so a lot of time when you crash out. It's not a lot of love there, so I can't say that the voice that's here and say,

man, crash out. I don't think that's the voice. So, yeah, you know, I think we may be overcomplicated some things along the way I try to simplify them. And I know it's like, man, it's too simple. It can't be that easy. But what if it is? What if the something told you is? What if that, what if that is God whispering? What if it is? Yeah. I don't know. So it's just about simplifying some things in life and making it very digestible to read and understand from my perspective from someone that's lived it like I'm not talking about someone else's life or experiences like I had a roller coaster and I had a doozy myself and actually this book would go on record and say this is my first therapist I haven't

haven't sat down with anyone yet but that's that's cool I can tell that during this promo in this run that I probably normalized a lot of trauma. Like, I mean, I just normalized, just a lot of, normalized just a lot of stuff that just was far from normal. I mean, just, just, this is what I'm seeing. This is what I'm, you know, it's just, you know, just all you, a lot of times, all you know is what you see or what you're around, you know. So I can't really fall anyone for that.

But, yeah, you just get to going around and get to, oh, oh, well, you know, it just became a lot of behaviors just became normal man. Mm-hmm. Yeah. But it's funny how that works. Yeah. That's interesting, dude. I bet you any amount of money, your subconscious leads you down all the roads you've been down.

I know, I know, I know, I know, because I know that you've diversified and you do a lot of things. And I think that's like, to me, I think really highly intelligent people, they get bored. especially if they're really good at something. You've had plenty of success in music that you could say. It's not that you're bored with it, but it's not necessarily challenging you, the game that you, when you started out in music,

it was a game that was new to you and you, but you beat the game. And then you beat it again. And then it's a game, you know the game. It's not that we don't like to play the game. I love music. I love the music business. It's not that it's boring.

But then you go like, I wonder if I can play that game. And then you go do that and you have success there. And that's still the voice. But this book is so funny. So you've never been to therapy. But I mean, as I keep doing a tour, like listening to you,

you know, I can tell you. I mean, it seems like you've probably been through some stuff to leave home at 17. And, you know, and then, you know, I don't know what I'm scared of. It'll probably be some good conversations. I actually have a degree in psychology, too. So sometimes I think I like self-evaluate and self-medicate myself.

Obviously, I self-medicate myself a lot. But I'm still in a weird place where I don't even want to be fixed. Right. I'm just like, I don't want the edge. Like, I still want my edge. I don't want it knocked off, you know. I think identifying that I do have triggers. Yeah.

But knowing I got them and knowing like in my mind that like really telling myself this, we're going to let it trigger you. Like this is me talking when a trick is trying to trigger me. Like the inside of myself is like. So that's what I mean like. And once again, this is an opinion-based show, y'all. This is like just how I've been operating out, but I literally just something will be. you know something to happen and I'll just be like

it'll be this drunk-ass fan and they'd be like, dude, you know, yelling in my ear. Yeah, yeah. They'd be like, can I take a picture? And I'd be like, yes, they'd be like, do you mind if I take a picture? And I'd be like, yes, they'd be like, it's okay if I take a picture. I said yes. You know, and it's like, shoo, you know, I said yes, eight times, you know what I mean? It's like, but it's like

that is calm down. Okay, this is triggering for you. Okay, calm down. But most of the time, I'm not a Libriot. I don't really drink like that. So it's like... Yeah, me either. I'm like this. You're like, you know, you're a fan, but you're been drinking all day.

Yeah. Then you're not even, not even listening to me. You asking me, but you're not like... So then sometimes... So I got a funny little triggers, man. I'd say that's pretty... That's someone who's in touch with themselves. Yeah.

I'd say it's a grounded perspective where you're... you as much success as you've had you're still on the ground and i think when someone is not grounded in their behavior that it probably triggers you because your sanity yeah i'm just so cool it's just so much stuff that i wouldn't do no matter who i saw like that yeah so it's like man um the way i look at therapy i'll just share with you the way i look at it after 12 years um you've been getting therapy between 12 years. I look at it like going into, I look at it like martial arts. Let me ask you this. Is it the same person? Are you switched there? Same guy. I had to look for a few and then I found a guy who's incredible.

And it's like y'all been locked in for 12 years. And it's like we, it's like we're in the gym. It's not sitting on a couch and crying, even though I have once or twice or three times. Or, you know, who's kind of? Every week. But it feels to me like I'm learning martial arts. If I can master my own inner self, what it's done for me is it slowed the game down so slow. I can process in real time what something feels like. And I can also see something coming a mile away. I can see someone who's anxious.

I can see someone who's got low self-esteem. I can see someone who doesn't. I can see a lot in learning myself because we're all the same kind of. Okay. And I think it's made me more, one, obviously, it's made me happier. And I've also gotten to a place where I do really, truly understand how my brain works, what my triggers are, what things I got to look out for, you know, old stuff that's, it's still there. It's not like it ever goes away, but you become acutely aware how the past influences the

present and what you could be getting in the way of if you if you don't keep an eye on it you know so i would always i would say if you find someone that you respect you can get a lot of really good work done but um i think the book like you recognized it as like a therapeutic process there's a lot other ways to do therapy okay you know and i think that this was a for me like to to hear that you've never done therapy which it was it was not like i'm like you could never do therapy and still do therapy. Yeah. And you become aware of what's therapeutic for you and what's not. But it is like, it's like this trend that, that sin where a lot of people doing therapy and it almost makes it seem like, I don't, like, oh God. Another, another podcast, another this. It's almost like,

you know, I kind of, I kind of feel that way when I, I kind of tiptold through there like, yeah, no, I feel you had. know I hadn't done the work because I see so many people like I've done the work I've done the work I've done the work like I know like I'm smart enough to like know some of these things like well you have a degree yeah I think that that that that too and then that's what so I had to go to that that was maybe my college I probably got a degree by now because my therapist is like a teacher as well but you went and learned so I'm saying the style of therapy maybe you haven't done but you you haven't done you have done there. Yeah, I got you. I got you. I got you. I can see that. I think it's necessary

to grow to work on ourselves, whatever that means. Some people, it's physical. It's like they are in the gym or they're doing martial arts or they're doing whatever. To do something that causes you to grow is why I was excited to talk to you because anyone that would create a book that's not just another. Look, you have an interesting life. right it goes without saying because of who you are it's an interesting life but to take that and put it into a book in a way that's more thoughtful and more what i think is therapeutic yeah because what you're doing is that you're allowing people to take with something that you've realized and apply it to their life in hopes that they maybe find and you know improve their life yeah like whether

they listen to it or not try to hear it first yeah That's a start. Yeah. Or if you have heard it, acknowledge it, you know, you can call it. You can give it a name for all I care. Yeah. You can really have an imaginary. That's what, you think about it as some of the imaginary friend ideas probably,

or that kind of thing might have came from. You see people talking to themselves. You don't know. Well, you think about kids. They're like the most honest beings on the planet. And you're probably right. like their imaginary friend is likely. Yeah, it's just really like playing with a dog, like,

yo, you know, move. You stop. They just be in their own little world, you know? Yeah. It just depends on how you see stuff. You know, man, it was something. Are you happy with the result? I am.

I am because it's a conversation piece, and that's something that we need, man. What's going on in the world is something to get the conversation started, man. It's definitely not going to solve the problems that we're dealing with in the world. but I think this is my way of giving back to my community and even people outside of, like I said, outside of hip hop by like, you know, it's my legacy play.

Me giving them like, it's almost ultimately like my cheat sheet. Like how you keep getting A's on the exam? Like, all right, you know, something told me to just like do this and then it worked, you know? And so that's what it's doing. I feel like you get an A plus for your career. Yeah, that's dope. We need a 4.

point on. Yeah. Yeah, we need that valedictorian, man. Are you happy with it? I'm very happy, man. I'm happy with it, man. You have a great career. Yeah. It's awesome, man. Yeah. It's not easy to get that. No, longevity is, you know, sometimes you look up and you got a career. You've been doing it long enough to call it the career. But it says a lot. It's a consistent person

that works hard because people see the highlight reals always. They don't see the in between. They don't see practice. Yeah. It's interesting because like, and if anything, the world has a tendency to celebrate our falls, our injuries. It's like we watch sports. We see someone get injured and we're like, oh, it's, it's, oh, shit, we have compassion. We can feel the pain of like this incredible athlete just ended their career and everyone. It's like a sad moment. But what's the part is when they come back. Yep. And we are scared. Not the person that comes back. We're looking like, man, is he coming back too early but they know the work they put in yeah they know the sleep they know what they do so we're not privy to a lot of that so that's what this

is man it's like sometimes it's about showing the practice footage too you know and that's kind of what this is I'm just you know rebuilding some layers back I still very much love music I have an album coming out this year called players only live once

because hey man that's what I feel like I am man but I'm leaving my mark. This is a legacy play for me. This is something that, like, had to figure out something, man. And I'm not done. But this was something. This is something that I'm highly confident in the work that I put in from the

artistic cover. And that cover was created by artist by the name of Dorese Walker. He does pastel art. So he drew that cover from me, man. And it's just like everything about it is artistic. Everything about it is. Yeah, it's great. It's different. It's me as a musician expressing myself in the book world, you know?

Yeah, it's got style to it. He's got style. He's got grace. It's putting on a display of how you should put a book out, how you should do an audio book, how you should do an audio book. How you should, it's a creative, it's an artistic. It's just, you think about it, like artists are just like that. Yeah. We have an eye for style. We're not afraid to say things different.

And so I think I'm very happy you did this book. When's the album come out? The album is coming out in August. I would like to describe my album because I feel like you're a creative, you can feel it. Yeah. My album sounds like an all-white suit

or an all-white party that's serving red wine. Yeah. It just feels like that. It's just upscale, it's high-end, and you know a white suit and red wine it's diabolical it's almost inside it's crazy

it's intense you can get back home without that stain on you that's a good that's that's you know it's precision it's a it's a like it's a kind of challenge in there but it's kind of a vibe in there's precision yeah and so that's what this is man you can't feel that you know you can't feel it up too high you know you just got to know how to hold it yeah you know what I mean and so I'm this is what my music

sounds like it feels like this but it sounds like this and it's just me being inside my head again and just me being me and just this is the best way I can describe the project that I'm putting out this year so it falls in line with what I'm doing what I'm doing when we get to that point the album in the book are somehow connected yeah because when I talk about players only live once when I talk about players for people who want to like what's up player does it it's not like I'm like dressing up like a pimp player like that. Players more like a demeanor.

Cool laid back. Oh man. Players are like looked at as like people who can have a source of game teaching. They're like man it's endearment. And when I say you know, players only live

once just like a comment like real players when they leave they are felt like they felt by all because they touch so many people. They touch so many people along the way. Everybody got a good story about them. And so

in this project, I have a song entitled Pops, which tells like this, I mean, I don't even know how I can fit a story like this in such a short, you know, three minutes span. But, you know, it has that

kind of content. I have a song. I'm married, but I have a song on there that not talk about me being having infidelity but it just it talks about uh being in the industry and and having someone that you love you know what I mean so it just I touch on a lot of lifestyle stuff and then I touch on you know just where I am is pop about your dad yeah that's cool yeah my dad was like well like well most kids you know like my first person I kind of looked up to it oh course like Even like he and stories about him and knowing like his DNA was like I had that in me like somewhere like he ended up like the first maybe seven years of our life we probably were together together.

And then like the last seven years when he got out of prison, I moved him in with me and then he eventually ended up passing in front of me. And so I talk about that but in a way that it's a very similar paths. Yeah. Interesting, right? Yeah. Interesting. Who knew? We were together. Me and my dad were together in the beginning when I was young, and then I didn't see him until the last 10 years of his life, which were actually great.

What? What? Because you kind of swallow that little, you kind of want to be around them or be, you know, I was so happy. Like, I picked him up from prison and I was like, man, you're staying with me now. I was excited to know him. Yeah, it's like, he moved. in the house and like I mean I knew we talked on the phone yeah but it was just like a lot

and I listened to a lot of the stuff he said you know I mean I'm like I wasn't but when he moved in it was like able to you were able to really bond yeah bond riding the same car together we smoke we smoked together yeah that's cool we you know it's bonding it's it's something that you have to be to bonding that's the word and it's weird with men we we we we can't really talk about it but like because it's like I don't know it's weird we all have to kind of be tough but yeah like when you're little and you're just a kid and you don't know any better what do you want you want your dad to hug you yeah you want to like you're five years old you want to hold his hand yeah you feel safe he's your hero you you you all you want is your dad to say like uh good boy good at good job or

yeah or like and i didn't get to have that but um because he was tough he was really tough boys don't cry error yeah yeah yeah yeah you get not a lot of hugs Not a lot of hugs. Don't let them, yeah, let them. You know, you fall down. You know, it's not like, you know. I'm from the same. You know, I feel like we just from that.

And so. That generation of men. Yeah, yeah. So we don't, you know, now they, they encourage the boys and stuff to cry now. But it's, it's, it's, it's. Like, go ahead. Just cry. Boy, like, I don't want to cry.

No, but cry to make you feel like a, like a, but no, you should get in tune with your, you're, just go cry. Just go cry. You're sensitive. Just go figure. But my dad was like, man, and it's crazy for him to be on some don't cry soon as he he passed. I just like needed windshield wipers.

I was crying so. Man, I was too. Yeah, but it's like, oh, I was bawling. Yeah, but it's, it's tough. Yeah, it is, man. But we don't, no one, we don't talk about it at all. And we definitely don't make songs about it. So for like a rap dude to be like, man, I'm glad you did.

You know what I'm saying? I'm really glad you did. In a cool way, yeah, man. Because I don't care who you are, man. man, you'd be the toughest guy in the world. You started as a little kid. Yeah, no, people had late. They just came out 14.

Yeah, you were just born, yeah, 21 and gangster. But see, that's what my dad, but he's so, because he got a little gangster. He really told me like, you know, shit, man, I had myself, you know. He claimed wasn't no darkness, and he just dolemite. He just kind of came out. Yeah. And it was just him, man.

You know what I'm like? Get out of here, dude. But that's a defense mechanism for, for not getting love. Oh, I think. So my dad was the same. My dad,

my granddad was a World War II vet, and he was a tough house, and he didn't get a lot of love either. He didn't get any affection. He didn't get any, are you okay? Or like, hey, you know, whatever. So then put, you know,

drinking on top of that. And he was a very tough guy. And then when I got back with him later on in life, I was able, because I was a grown man, and I had kids and I'm pretty tender with my kids, man. I'm like, I like hug them and well now, you know, my son is a teenager and he's, he's like, but he's a dude.

So I back, I back off. You do, right? Yeah, because he's like, he's on his, like, he's a grown man type thing. But when he was little, I was like, he was on my shoulder. He was like, you know. You forgot dude? Like, did he forget? You know what I mean?

I was living vicariously through the relationship. Absolutely. doing everything I wished I had, like, whether it was fucking going and buying up Toys R Us or going to the whatever. I was just living vicariously through my kids when I had my kids because there was so much I felt I missed out on in my childhood that I would see in movies or I would see and I secretly like was like, I wish I had that, you know? So then when I got an adult and had success and everything, it was like a big fucking kid in a candy shop. Every time my kids when me would do something, it was like me. I was the biggest kid in the equation.

And so when my dad, the last 10 years of his life, we were really good friends. And we got to talk about it a little bit. He was pretty tough, but he heard me. And I know he heard me. And then when he passed away, it was a, it was sudden. And I was really sad. Those hurt. The sudden ones hurt. My dad was getting sick. And so it's like, you, you kind of know something's wrong. But the sudden, sudden death. I didn't get to say goodbye. sudden deaths are the I didn't I felt like I did my dad was in the hospital

and he told me because I was about to go to a show so I'm like you cool and he told me out of his mouth I'm not about to die anytime soon he literally said I'm not about to die on time so when I came back he was on like a breathing

he had a tube down his throat and his chest was going fucking up now and shit like I'm like what happened since I've been you know since I've been gone so yeah it's painful My dad used to say, man, I'm healthy as a rat. Don't worry about me.

And I was like, Dad, I'm kind of worried about you because he was drinking. Healthy as a rat is. Man, I'm healthy as a rat. I'm just like, nothing's going to kill me. And I'm not sure to take. That's kind of our rats healthy. I mean, they do survive. They do survive.

I don't know what he meant by it, but it seemed like he was like, I'm fine. That's one of them good old country little backroads said. He used to say that, man, I'm healthy as a rat. I thought I heard everything. I never heard, though. That was the first time I heard it too. But I do feel like after he passed away, going back to the spiritual, like, nature of life and the transcendent part of life, I feel closer to him. I feel like he's getting to be the father.

He didn't get to be on earth somehow spiritually. If you believe it, it is what it is. Yeah. But it sounds like we have very similar relationships with our dad. Similar paths. We've all seen plenty of people come. and go and it's not a luck thing. It is absolutely a work thing and taking every single opportunity and analyzing it and deciding,

should I do that? Should I do that? That is how a career is built. So when I see guys like you, I always respect because I know the work, the hours, the minutes, the dedication it takes to the craft, to the work, and what you have to sacrifice sometimes to have it. So you get all my respect. Congrats on the book.

I can't wait to listen to it. Thank you, man. Thanks, bro. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for watching artist friendly. If you like this episode, please make sure you hit the like button.

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