No Jumper - MC Eiht Talks Fatherhood, Gangbanging, Compton and The Police

Episode Date: July 31, 2020

Adam sits down with the great legendary MC Eiht for an in depth conversation about making music now vs then, the craftsmanship, the microwave music, friendship with DJ Premier, Verzuz battles, aging gracefully in Hip Hop, street life, police brutality, and more. ----- FOLLOW US ON SNAPCHAT FOR THE LATEST NEWS & UPDATES https://www.snapchat.com/discover/No_Jumper/4874336901 FOLLOW OUR NEW SPOTIFY PLAYLIST! https://open.spotify.com/playlist/529mn7of2HBKdLfrAMUzcK?si=rWVBWCuWSXeh0TFYb2P-dQ CHECK OUT OUR ONLINE STORE!!! http://www.nojumper.com/ SUBSCRIBE for new interviews (and more) weekly: http://bit.ly/nastymondayz Follow us on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/nojumper iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/no-jumper/id1001659715?mt=2 Follow us on Social Media: https://www.snapchat.com/discover/No_Jumper/4874336901 http://www.twitter.com/nojumper http://www.instagram.com/nojumper https://www.facebook.com/No-Jumper-198283650194402/ http://www.reddit.com/r/nojumper JOIN THE DISCORD: https://discord.gg/Q3XPfBm Follow Adam22: http://www.twitter.com/adam22 http://www.instagram.com/adam22 and adam22hoe on Snapchat Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

No Jumper coolest podcast in the world, and we have the one and only legendary West Coast motherfucking icon MC8 in the buildings today. J. How you doing, man? I'm crazy, man. What's good? I'm feeling great. And I brought my fellow Compton, homie, AD here. AD in the building.

Come on, my young loco. Come on, man. All day. Suicide was cracking. Yay, there it is. So you were just telling me, I find this extremely interesting and flattering that your son is a fan of No Jumper and is excited that you're here? Yeah, Karan. What's up, Karan?

Karan, I told him I was coming to work. You know, the kids be, when you've been in this game, I guess, for quite a while. You got a teenager, you know, they kind of function on the new cats, you know. Listen to AD. There he is. He's 30. He's old school. Who else?

He loves Compton, T.G. Yep, my nigga. You know, he loves him be a young boy. He loves little baby. He loves all the new stuff. So Pops is like, you know, whatever. But you've been raising him. Like you, you were been a famous rapper since he came out, I'm assuming.

Righteous. So what was that? Like, do you remember the moment when he started to realize? Like, oh, my dad is a rapper. My dad has respect of all these people. He thought it was weird. Really? You know, as a young kid, five, six, seven years old, we pull up somewhere.

MC8? Oh, man, can I get a picture, man, respect. And, man, you know, you taught me someone. He would be sitting there like, why dudes want to take a picture with you? And I'll be like, because he'd be like, that's weird. But as he started growing, he started getting into rap music and understanding the level of, you know, artists and famous and whatever. So he understands it a little bit now, but he's still like, yeah, your pops, though.

Yeah. The dad thing's always got to be bigger than the rapper thing, right? Exactly. You try to. I mean, I put forth the dad thing. though on him you know schooling I mean his sports he plays football Norco High School shout out he's her quarterback

shout out to Norco in general that's crazy we used to be out there riding bikes all the time oh yeah they still do he I'm real particular about being involved in his growing up you know something that I didn't get you know growing up in Compton you know it's vicious

single single family you know home me mom sister little brother, you know, gang infested, whatever. So it's kind of a different approach that I take with him growing up. I try to participate in all his activities or just being a part of his life in general. So dad comes first before artists. I'm not an artist around him. Right, definitely. No, yeah, because I heard you saying that you missed out on being in one of Kendrick's videos and stuff because you had to do your thing as a father with the football game and shit, which I have a lot of respect to that. And that's gangster right there.

I mean, no disrespect. I mean, shit, I would love to be in the video. They wanted me in the being, I think the It's All right video when they were in the car and then where Terry Cruz was with them and whatever on stage or whatever they did. But I couldn't make it because I just flew back from out of town for a show and I always generally tell promoters, I got to be back first thing smoking.

Games is at 10 o'clock in the morning. So they wanted me to come get in the video, But I had just got back and then my son had a game that morning. And I'm the head coach. So I couldn't, I just looked at it as not trying to renege on my obligations to the kids. Right. You know, you know, so. It's got to be a battle because AD were not having a conversation recently.

He had one of the, was it one of the teachers, told your kid. Oh, man. Your dad is a gangbanger. Your dad is a Crip. The after school teachers told my daughter that. You know your dad's a Crip, right? She's 11, right? And then my daughter's like, my dad is not like that.

You know what I mean? And I'm like, why did you even sit there? I want to go there and fuck them up, man. Yeah, they tend to not understand. I guess they just want to put on the aspect of just the gang aspect, but they don't know the longevity of what we have been through as far as representing or trying to uplift Compton is what I say, you know. So, you know, people kind of get it misconception about who we are as far as just seeing colors.

So you get people to get that wrong perception. It's interesting because you're so far removed from it. Like with AD, you know, there's articles in the news about you getting into some shit from like, you know, a handful of years ago. But with you, do you feel like you've got that space between like you really being in the thick of being associated with some shit and where you're at now? Like, and does it still feel like it follows you? To an extent, yeah. I mean, it always follows you. It never lets down because people.

still associate, you know, I still hang with my homies from Tragnu. You know, they just have my video, you know, I get along with them, you know, so the association always stays with you, so to speak. But it's a different aspect, you know, as being a little older and trying to be in between, you know, because you look at the aspect of wanting to stay connected to the streets. But you've got to an obligation, you know, with family and kids and we're trying to work and get money. And, you know what I'm saying? We're trying to represent where you from. It sometimes might cost friction with trying to get paid or make money or because we want to stay true to where we're

from because that is what basically we build our foundation off of, that struggle right there. So it's a give and take for me because being older, I try to show my son that, you know, it's not about certain situations that I've been through or what people see, but still, I still got that connection. Because like I said, Compton raised me, Compton gave me the foundation, being involved in the gang situation. And especially when you go on tour and you go out of town or whatever, and people still living that life like we still living here. So they want to still connect you to that.

So it's like a 50-50. Definitely, yeah. I mean, some people, though, will at some point in their life sort of take on like a different perspective and not want to be even associated with their gaming and paths in any way. It's kind of like a tricky balance to like show that you respect and appreciate the culture and the history of what you're a part of without also like somehow glorifying like the negative elements of that, which I don't really think should be that controversial. Like if you're if you're like a diehard soccer fan of a certain soccer team, nobody's asking you to denounce the soccer

hooliganism of the people rioting and beating each other up and stuff. Just because there is a part of Crippin that is young guys doing crazy shit gang-making in general doesn't change the fact that there's a lot of grown adults who are still, you know, consider themselves associated with it. And it's not a negative thing in their life. I mean, yeah, I never looked at it as uplifting or trying to promote negativity as far as the gang situation is concerned. Being where I am now, I wouldn't trade it for nothing what I went through. because it gave me a lot of who I am as far as seeing what I went through and what I came through. So not to be like, oh, we want to just glorify it, but it was a stepping stone in my life that made me who I am and able me to talk to people like you and give stories and tell about the situations and what

was the realness behind gang-banging and being from a neighborhood. So I still embrace where I came from and how I grew up because it's it it it enables me to Get him say my son from certain situations that he's not gonna have to go through what I had to go through But like I say again, I wouldn't trade that shit for nothing Because that was the life you know what I'm saying that was the choices we had and what I say in one of my songs It wasn't that bad I mean, even though people might look at it as a negative, like, these were the choices we had. And I chose that route.

I don't regret it at all. Not one bit. Definitely. So from your perspective, growing up in Compton and shit, like, at what point do you start to figure out about Compton most wanted in MCA? Like, was, you know, Compton has such a rich history of rap music? At what point does it kind of like enter your consciousness as a kid? Hey, so, you know, it's crazy because I told you earlier, I said me and eight of them around the same way.

So, you know, growing up, that's all you heard. You know what I'm saying? Like, my pops used to play quick all day. He used to play eight all day. You know what I'm saying? And, you know, even like I told bro, I said, man, I chill want me to do some shit for him this week. You know what I mean?

Like all the niggas that I used to look up to, you feel? Me, it's just dope to get saluted from them and be like, okay, you're doing your thing and shit like that and you fuck with it. But, you know, just like bro said, like we don't glorify every single thing we did, but we never going to turn our back on.

You know what I'm saying, where we came from. You know, I don't tell my homies to go do nothing bad. I'd be like, look, you want to come out here with me, you want to live better and shit like that. I want to inspire you to do that because I'm the same nigga that came from the same place you came from. You know what I'm saying? Yeah.

No, it's kind of crazy how, like, rap music still offers like you know the same thing that like your initial impression of it where did you see rap as sort of like your way out of that environment because that's definitely when I talk to him how I see it having functioned to him where he very quickly realized like oh there's a big future beyond just what I see on this block or whatever I think um as a kid I had those typical dreams of who football player or policeman firemen that type of shit and growing up in Compton and seeing what was happening around me and being introduced to rap music at a young age with a Toddy Tee. Shout out my nigga Tottie T, Mix Master Spade and Cats like that.

It basically gave, it was basically to me a way of expressing what I saw on a daily. Now, did I think it was going to transform me to star status of whatever? I never looked at it like that. I was just a young motherfucker who wanted to get on tape and talk about track new. That's what I wanted to do as a young kid. Did I think I was going to be riding in limos and rap magazines and shit? Nah, because I was so just all about the neighborhood that my, songs and what I first wrapped about was nothing but that then when I started

listening to the radio hearing cats like Eric B and Raqam you know L.A. Dream Team and Curtis Blow I start going like wow what fuck's making right money off of this shit and then you get to see in the magazines with the fat gold dukey ropes and the limousine rides and the videos and then I start going with with shit. Maybe I can turn this into from just drag new rapping and Compton rapping and Crip rapping and whatever. And maybe I could just start telling stories. And so the quest turned into maybe I could get a record deal. So it started from there with wanting to turn it into professionalism shit and wanting to get videos and all that shit. But at first, I looked at rap

just as a form for me to express about where I was from. Right. I remember talking it too short in him telling me that he was basically the first rapper to have any kind of real popularity from the West Coast, obviously up north, but who were you looking at? We love too short. Right, but he was talking about how he basically had to look to the East Coast to see rappers making it.

As far as making it? Yeah. I mean, definitely. I mean, all I listened to was fucking Pumo D and Sparky D and UTFO. Roxanne Chante. I mean, that was my first introduction. to real as far as hip hop concern. I mean because

Todd was making tapes, Spade and was making TDK tapes selling up in the hood. But they was telling us about hood life. Right. Which was so popular and which was good. But when you looked and you listened to the radio and you heard UTFO, Roxanne

and you heard Sparky D or you heard Kumo D or Treacherous 3 or early LL Kool-J and shit, that was like hip-hop music. Like, It was, I'm bad this and my chain this and we wrote, it wasn't about my block, my hood, my spot. So that sort of kind of took me to the form of rap

being a career or a job or you can make money from it. So I would listen to, like I said, everything was East Coast rap. Because our rap at the time, outside of the neighborhood rappers, our shit was Bobby Jimmy and the fucking critters and fucking, I mean, come on. I mean, we was the wrecking crew and fucking, I mean, early niggas, Tone Loak and Young MC. Our rap wasn't really significant compared to those cats on the East Coast.

So that's what I grew up on when rap turned into something real for me. Right. I was all East Coast connected, real shit. It's crazy too because I heard you talking about how, like, it just wasn't the norm or it wasn't even like a possibility back in the day for you to really be stating the specific of what gang you were associated with, what block you were from? Was it that the labels wouldn't let you do that?

Or was it more that you thought that the audience wouldn't want to know the specifics of where you were from or would it be able to relate if you were just saying shit that was super specific? I never really, I don't know, I guess for us,

labels will pull a plug on you real quick. Video channels would ban you real quick. I mean, you get your album stickered up, you know. So there was a certain thing that we couldn't do as far as, like now, as far as representing your neighborhood and claiming where you're from, and I'm from so-and-so, and I'm from so-and-so. It's more open now because the hip-hop, because the business of hip-hop is so, let's say, independently owned now.

Right. You know, AD can put out his own shit. I could put my own shit out. And I'll say what the fuck I want. But when I'm signing the epic and Sony, I can't really go in the studio and say, Trag knew this, track knew that,

and we did this. And I don't give a fuck about them and woonty-wump. Because then they're looking at it like, how I'm supposed to sell this shit? How I'm supposed to sell this shit when all you're talking about is your street, your block, your color. I mean,

at a certain point, part, it was a money-making machine, but to an extent because labels were scared. I mean, it was to the point where motherfuckers used to hire security and pull them in the lobbies because we were, a lot of us were affiliated being artists. You get me? So it was a thin line back then with labels. And with like now, you could go to your neighborhood and have your bandana and represent where you're from. I shot a video like that 20 years ago

nobody would have played that motherfucker nobody MTV would have been like are you kidding me we're promoting gang violence and he's openly saying he's a crypt from so and so and look at them they got throwing up gang something man please it would have never happened but like I said hip hop is so independently

old now like you do what the fuck you want to right you know because everyone's doing it now everyone's like I'm from here I'm from here who gives a fuck, I'm representing this, and you have more creative control with your own situation. Definitely. It's kind of crazy to think about because you

were like the rare person from that environment who was talented enough, but also was able to work the machine, which is the thing that a lot of younger artists now don't have to do as much, and like was kind of amazing when you look at a lot of earlier artists in the rap game, is that they managed to like, the music but then they also managed to be able to work with the labels and be able to pull it off because a lot of like these younger artists you know they're dope but they are it's a lot easier for

them because the labels are literally hounding them for to sign to them exactly you know back in my days labels had to go out you know a and r's had to go to showcases and you know look for whatever But now it's about a lot of artists or creating their own hype, their own lane, their own fan base, their own popularity. So labels just sit back and wait to see who's the next popular Instagram kid or who's got a lot of views on YouTube or social media or whatever. And then they go, oh, yeah, man, you see this kid? He's got half a million followers on Instagram and Facebook. and he's got a million views on YouTube. Why not go get a part of that?

Right. When I'm having that conversation with young artists, a lot of times it's just literally me instructing them on like, you should get these guys to do your videos, you should get this person to help you out with getting on, getting your Instagram more popping, getting on all the different blogs, different sites and stuff,

because the more you could build your own shit up, then you have more leverage to get more money and more effort out of the labels, whereas if you sign super early on, you're basically like, you're cutting off your own legs in the sense that you're not going to be able to really develop your career on your own you're going to basically have to rely on them the whole way but from your position you just like to be able to do that legwork on your own was so much more difficult you had to like work within the system like when you have a conversation with too short he talks about putting out you know an album a year for like 20 years with the labels and stuff and that's kind of the amazing thing is that he was able to stay on good terms and work well with the label for that long that's kind of a are like amazing. You know, that's not something that most artists in this day and age are really

even thinking about. Labels back in our days, they looked at artists as, let's say, like everybody do is cash. Okay. And when our type of West Coast music started too short,

CMW, NWA, Q, whatever, labels wanted that. It was the new thing. Ooh, hip-hop. Oh, it's taking off, whatever. So, if you sold enough of records and then back then label signed you to seven, eight year deals, you get me?

Nowadays, you know if a label sign you, three records, whatever, back in my days, I signed for seven albums with Sony. So as long as you worked and like you said, you had to work the

machine because it was a give and take. You wanted shit done, they wanted certain shit done. And if you went along with the machine and the way it worked, then your longevity lasts. And that's how it basically I looked at it. Because a lot of us didn't sell the units that cats are selling today. You know, but some of us were able to have that longevity on labels because we got along with the labels. We met that quota. You get me? And if you were able to meet that quota, then you got another

record next year. If you didn't, you got dropped. That's how labels did us back in the days. If you were able to meet that quota, because let's face it, they put their money into the pop artists. And we were the back end of a lot of labels, the hip hop. You know, we were the back end of the pearl jams and the madonnas and whoever was popular. So if we made that certain quota within that black music department of hip hop, then fuck. kid. Let's give him another record. Or he sold 350,000. To us, that's whatever won't he won't. We made our money back and got a little piece. He's not going to make none. He's still in the red. But, you know, so that's how you were able to have your longevity to me,

as far as I'm concerned. You know, it was just a give and take. You got along and you get along. That's how it was, you know. You ever think about what your career would have been like if you were, you know, a young guy in this day and age, like how you would go about it or how different? Because yeah, definitely. Think about a lot. So many, man, I mean, you would do a lot of shit so differently. Thinking about the units I sold and the connections and whatever,

there's a lot of shit you would do differently than me going to sign off to an epic records back in my days. You get me. Because being independent is, first of all, it's strong for you because you can control your career. And like I said, you can do what the fuck you want to do as far as you don't have to, I have to follow certain criteria. interior. If music switched, you had to switch with it. It wasn't, uh, uh, fuck that. I don't give a fuck. Now they doing this type of rap. Fuck that. If you didn't go along with the program,

you got dropped. It was just simple. Being independent, you have so much control over what you want to do. That's why in this day and age, if I was in this arena, it would be a better situation. because then you can connect to the fans. You can control what you want to do, what you want to see, what you want to eat. You know what I'm saying? As far as trying to follow a pattern of being signed to a major label

and being skeptical if they're going to invest enough money into you, you know everything you're putting into your independent project is you. And it's your heart, it's your soul, it's everything that you got to give to it. So fuck whatever. Definitely. Your kid's like super obsessed with the music part of it, but is he enamored with like the street angle

or that aspect of it in the same way or does he find that as fascinating as I'm sure you did as a kid? I grew up in it. Right. He didn't. So that's the difference. I try to,

I try to preach to him that there are certain things I went through at your age that you don't want to go through and that's why I'm here. I'm here to save you. Now, a 15, 16 year old, they're going to do what they because they think they know everything. At 15, 16, I knew everything.

My mom couldn't tell me shit. I don't get a fuck. Same thing with him. I just get a little more respect because I'm there every day with him and I try to save him for the pitfall. So has he made mistakes?

Of course. Kids going to do that. We all make mistakes. But being in the difference of where I came from and how I was grew up and how I was raised as opposed to where he's growing up

and the friends that he's around and the people that I know that he associates with, my mama didn't know who the fuck I was hanging with. When I walked off the porch and went down the block and she was at work, she didn't know. Motherfucker come up to her right now and tell her, your son was down the block with dope and pistols and... Who?

My son? My son don't gang bang. Me too. Same day. My son on gang bang. Same day. And to the highest heaven. His mom is mad as hell at him for having an article out of those,

calling him a Crip and shit. He's like, oh, why is that got to be on Google? It's crazy because my grandma's dying day, like, people will tell her, you know your son, and your grandson is, he's down the street with bump. She was like, no, he's not. He's coming over here. My son is the sort of the soul, you know, but that's just the way they want to depict their kids. But I'm on my son.

I'm tracking his ass. Where you at? You have so-and-so house? All right, nigga, I'm looking at you right now. I don't play because I don't want him. to go through, I was going to jail at 16, 17. You get me? Walking around with straps and riding in the back seats of cars with O.Gs

rolling through enemy neighborhoods and shit. I don't want him to go through that. You get me? If I could say face from that shit, then I'm going to try to do it. It's crazy because when I was a kid, there was just so much shit that my parents didn't know about in terms of my life and what I was interested in or what the temptations were. and it feels like that doesn't exist as much because there's so much information out there

that it's like, how could a parent be in the dark about the risk of their kid getting into drugs, the risk of their kid getting into crime, getting into God knows what? It's all out there. There's a fucking 100,000 articles written about everything that's risky that the kid might get into.

It's very unlikely that you're going to just miss it, totally, right? Definitely. You have to pick up on the stuff. Because like I said, they still think they slick. I mean, when I grew up, I thought I was slicker than my mom. Is there shit that she doesn't know about to this day probably? Mm-hmm.

But there's shit she did know about that I didn't think she knew about. So like I said, they're always going to try to pull it. You know what I'm saying? But right, like you said, there's so much fucking technology and information and shit that you can try to save your kids from. Are they still going to do some shit? Right. Hell fucking, yeah.

My son did some shit that I didn't woke up. in the mornings and I'd be shaking my fucking head. Like, I'd just be like, I don't get it. When? How? Nick, I'm like this on your ass. Like, okay, you say you here? Okay, I'm good.

I know where he's at. And then motherfuckers still call me and be like, you know, uh, Quran, blah, blah. And I'll be like, how? Right. But they're going to get away with some shit. You just have to be like, you just have to utilize what you have.

That's what I say. You know what I'm saying? So I track him. I try to know who he hangs out with, where, what he's doing, his activities, you know. My mom didn't do all that. Not to say that she wasn't, but it wasn't as much as, you know. It wasn't impossible. She'd go to work.

I'm gone. I'm fucking five neighborhoods over. You get me? She doesn't know. And then sometimes we had snitches who would tell. I saw your son ditching this morning. He snuck back through the back fence and was in the house with a girl. and blah blah.

So it was certain shit I got away with and it was certain shit I didn't. But I think now that the youth are accessible to a lot, but then it's a catch-22, because they are accessible to a lot. You get me? Right. That same information that you're using

to be able to know what's going on in your kid's life. They know what's going on. They got that access to everybody else in the fucking world. So they're gonna try to outslick you, you get me? Because they got the same information I was gonna say funniest shit though because coming where we come from our school with high schools you go to determines you know what I'm saying you don't go to this high school so the funniest thing is that my mom told me you gotta go to summer school and the only one you can

go to was Centennial and I'll tell him my mom like mom I can't go to Centennial yeah she's like why can't you go to this school and they don't get that no they don't get that that's like in my days mom tried to check me in the Chester adult school no can't do it that. I'm like, and she's walking me through the halls, and it's already dudes. Like, they lined up. My first day. Same day.

They lined up. Like, really? Like, really? You fin of check in? And I'm like, she don't know shit. Right. Like, boy, I don't give a damn. You got to go here.

And I'm going, like, what can I come up with to let this woman know? I will not make it the. first fucking day here without fighting about 50 niggas. Like, like, but they don't get it. Like, I can't tell her, oh yeah, I'm banging from the neighborhood

across the street and this is the enemy neighborhood and all these dudes you see in here knows we associate it with the motherfucking neighborhood across the street and if I go here, I might not be around in six weeks.

Right. And mom, you're going to feel pretty bad if that happens but you can't tell her that because she a woman from the south they come from different times and different and gang banging in colors boy please i slapped the shit out one of these motherfucking niggas talking about some gang banging and shit right you fin to get checked in this they don't understand so it's different times and shit but my son told me some shit like that right i'd be like oh hell yeah you can't go to this motherfucker no way but it was different times for them then Like I said, the kids have we have a lot of knowledge of what's going on as parents than our parents did. And that enables me to be able to school his ass a little better than I was schooled in the predicament I was.

My parents didn't come from gang banging and living in neighborhoods like that. My parents came from Gulfport, Mississippi, you know, back in the 40s. What the fuck is a gang bang? Right. You get me? My mom's migrated, Pops migrated to California and then had me in the 70s

and next thing you know, niggas is banging. But they don't, you know what I'm saying? What the fuck is that? But I have to live that now. You get me? So I have to maneuver through that

and me being able to go through that and enables me to have children and go, okay, I can't let my kids be subject to that Because nine times out of 10, they're going to be subject to that. Right. To result of our younger generation banging in that aspect. Because you grow up into what you live, period.

Do you ever think about how crazy it is that, like, L.A. gangbanging has basically been exported all over the country and the world. To the point where, like, it doesn't even surprise me at all when there's rappers from down south talking about their grapestriended. creeps, whatever. That don't even register in my brain as out of the ordinary at this point. Our shit is popular. You get me? Not to glorify our shit, but our shit is popular. Hey, you get me? Come on, man. They love our shit. Hey, niggins tap again. Not to, not to be like, let me go again. Not to glorify or make people believe that our situation that we, we, that was our choice. of our situation or the product of our environment. You get me?

Had I grew up in Cerritos. Been perfect. I've been a doctor. I probably wouldn't be here with you today had I grew up in Cerritos. Had I grew up in fucking Lakewood? Come on. It goes down to Lakewood Mall. It is.

Yeah. Because that's our, that's our motherfucking. That was our mall back then. That's our mall. Right. The captain had to swole. spot me. And when they took that away from, but we've been going to Lakewood Mark

getting busy because that was just the spot. We ain't going to Cerritos. Hell no. They ain't letting us either. But Lakewood, that's right outside of Compton. It's just because knickers don't like to drive too far nowhere either. So that

was good enough for us to be able to, yeah, Lakewood. But we had, like I said, different products, different environments is what we had to go through. And like I said, we don't glorify it. It's loved everywhere now. You get me. It's worldwide. Go to Japan. Oh fuck, I haven't been to Germany, Frank. I haven't been everywhere. Niggas is bandanas.

Some niggas is cripping. Some niggas is blood. And it's like the motherfucking tight-of-wave shit effect. It started. I don't get fuck what nobody say. Cripping and blood started California, West Coast. Okay. And it fluctuated. because some niggas either migrated out or some people just felt like we're going, this is a way for us to represent. Now I've been over in all, now I could say now when I was going back to New York in my early rap days,

I really didn't see too much of cripping and blood. I saw clicking and crewing and project niggas and whatever, whatever, and you know, South Bronx niggas and you know, whatever, I didn't see too much of Cripping in blood. As far as I went down south, as far as my career started going, I started seeing more. I would go to Milwaukee, see Bloods. I would go to Texas, see Crips. I would go to New York Crips Bloods. So not to try to dish me, because some niggas have a problem when you try to put the authentic tag on California niggas as being the gangsters.

So I don't want to offend any other sets or clicks in any part of the country that might feel that, hey, we are as authentic as whatever. I just go back to my yester years and as far as I've been crawling and walking, gang banging started in the west.

You know, Compton, L.A. Watts, whatever. It migrated because of niggas, migrating out or people being fascinated with the style or just niggas feeling like fuck that. We're going to represent shit too.

I've gone to Chicago. You got GDs, you got vice lords, you got what, you know, everybody has a different title, but everybody's red or blue. So don't want to glorify it, but it's just something that has turned into a fascination

as being niggas who stand up for each other, you get me? So that's what I look at it is. I've never put it into the aspect of niggas is banging because of a color or whatever.

It's more, it's deeper than that. It's always been deeper than that. I just looked at it as niggas, you know, a lot of us who were lost, who didn't have older brothers, a family lost or dead. It was a way for us to become one

and represent our part of where we grew up. up and protect our home base. So that's what I always looked at it as. Definitely. Do you feel like the new generation of fans, are they adequately educated about the history of rap? Do you feel like hip-hop as a whole has sort of let down the younger generation?

Because, you know, if you look at a lot of forms of music, if you're like a rock fan, it's probably pretty common for you to listen to, you know, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, be familiar with all this classic stuff. Sometimes it feels like in rap, there's such an obsessive. session with what's new. And we do see the culture being celebrated by a lot of institutions and stuff. When you see something like straight out

comp in the movie and stuff, it gives you a lot of hope that like, okay, there are people who care about documenting the history of this art form. But do you feel like that's sometimes something that's kind of lost and the moments, the high points of your career, maybe sometimes aren't like put on display to the same

extent that they should be? I feel that as far as that some some artists of the new generation because some artists do respect the old ways of the hip-hop and respect what was built or put before them and understand about that.

Thus you have NWA movies and the younger generation can see where that aspect came from. I feel that some artists in the newer generation don't like to respect the old ways of hip hop because they feel it as competition because I've gotten it

from certain new artists or move over you shouldn't rap no more you should just let the new niggas handle it and I always try to put my perception I always probably put my perspective in street shit

you were older nigger 36 you've been in your spot since you was 15 team. It's your block, it's your corner. You got your clientele. New dude moves two blocks over. Now, y'all from the same hood, rap, so to speak. But this is the block. So y'all dealing in the same profession. You've had clientele for 20 years. Come to you, always buy your product. Have no problem with it. New cat around the corner got some new product. It's pretty good.

clientele is liking it too. You're not in competition with him. You got your clientele. I'm good. No problem. He for some reason don't like that you still can sell to your clientele. He wants your clientele. So he feels you should shut your spot down and tell all your clients,

that's the new product in the neighborhood. Don't buy my shit no more. Go buy his shit. But why? Nobody's complaining about your product. Your clientele for 20 years has no problem with coming to buy your client. And I don't give a fuck about your clientele. You can have yours.

I'm not trying to steal them. But why should I tell my niggas to stop buying my shit? Because you done moved on the block two with the same shit. shit I'm selling. Would you do that? Would you tell your clientele? Don't buy for me no more. Fuck it. Go buy his shit.

I'm still selling my dope until we run out. Until, until, until a motherfucker. Until I die. Until your motherfucker tell you, your shit is whack. Your dope whack, Adam. Just fuck it. This shit's fire. But if your shit, but if niggas still knocking on your door every time

you release new product and you still got 100 niggas knocking going, where is it? Why the fuck you should you stop? And I think that's what this, they have a problem with, is that when they look down the street, you still got niggas knocking on your door. That's competition for the new kid, right? Because I don't want them to even bother with your, nigga, you're so fucking old. You saw what you, 50 now, still serving? But why are you worried about it?

My clientele don't even like your shit. Not that it's bad because you got a gang of motherfuckers coming to your door too. But leave my clients alone. Stop hating on my fucking shit. Stop telling motherfuckers, oh, that nigga old, he can't sell, he can't rock it up, he can't bag it up no more. Why are you telling them that when shit? When I tell a nigga, hey, I got new shit, they still lining the fuck up. Because some people might not realize, though, that your shit, when you put it on YouTube,

like, your videos still have, you know, half a million, million views and stuff. I mean, that's very, very impressive when you consider how long you've been in the game that there's still that many people tuned in. That really says a lot. Leave my product alone. My shit's still selling. You get me? And I'm not even hating on you.

I'm not telling. That's crazy. Come on. You got to put it into real street perspective. for niggas who come from the streets because there's a lot of street niggas who're doing this rap shit now. So I put it in that perspective.

Now put your young self in the old man's shoes when you 10, 15 years from now and you're still trying to sell your product. Are you going to let that new nigger come in and go, stop buying AD's fucking product because I'm the new nigga on the block now.

AD got good dope. I still like AD shit. Every time I like every time I'm park that shit up, it's bombing me. When I put the motherfucking headphones on, I stick that motherfucker shit in my tape deck and I turn it up, it's still feeling good. So why the fucking my feeling to stop?

That's what I don't understand about motherfuckers because if, because Ashanti ain't telling motherfucking Patty LaBelle don't make no motherfucking records no more. You get me? That's real. That's real. shit because she old only by my shit.

Rap is just like that. I just don't get it. We are kids. But you know a lot of artists don't study and write. They don't have real heroes and rap. I feel like a lot of niggas that get on now, they just, it's so much shit now. Like, you know what I'm saying? Me growing up and getting into music, I had to study and see it.

And I wanted the respect from niggas like, hey, you tell me to be like, hey, I salute you. And that's why Kendrick will be like, hey, hey, hey, hey. I need eight on this motherfucker. The first nigga that I fucked with was Exhibit. Exhibit, you know, when the exhibit saluted me, I'm like, damn, I'm doing the right thing. Eight salute me, I'm doing the right thing. You feel me? You bring me in the room with Dr. Dre?

I'm like, okay, I'm doing the right thing. The foundation for the niggas who started it, where I come from, if they can say you doing it right, I'm doing the right thing. And these niggas is coming up now. They're not respecting it. And they got too many distractions. They got new drugs that's fucking their minds up at the end of the day. And they have all these different, you got Instagram there, like, you know what I'm saying?

Like, when I started rapping, social media wasn't even out. You know what I'm saying? MySpace. I want to tell kids sometimes that the best way that you could learn about the world around you is to learn about shit that happened that before, like, the moment that you're wrapped up in, where everything right now feels very new and very controversial and shit, like, no, if you go back and look at the history of music, if you were to read about a rapper that you don't even, you know, necessarily have a real reason to know about or whatever, you are going to learn the lessons from

his life story that are going to be painful and expensive and time consuming for you to learn on your own. Definitely. It's always good to go back and learn from shit before you. I mean, that's how you learn a lesson. And how you get respect, really, at the end of the day. Like, if you, a lot of times I'm interviewing younger rappers and their list of rappers that they respect are all people who basically came out within like the last two, three years. You're not going to have that much of a perspective on how far rap music can go if you're only looking at people that have been that are popular right now and came out within the last couple years. But see, then too now, for the kids, there's so many rappers now.

You know what I mean? So, you know, you growing up with hip hop and I'm growing up with hip hop. It probably was like 15, 20 top rappers. You know what I'm saying? Now you got two, 300. Every week, somebody dropping 20-30 songs. So these kids is like, okay, this is instant. This is instant.

This is instant. You don't really like, I remember going to the conference swap meet, picking up a CD, reading the booklet, listening to only that for a month or two months and reciting it. And that's what make you, you know what I'm saying, stay listening to a person and becoming a real fan. And now niggas don't have real fans anymore. Because this niggott dropped now, they're over here now.

They're like, okay, when he drop again, I'm going to come back over here now and it's all over the place. They don't understand the level to which our hero. are heroes, like an 8 or a snoop or a Dre is what it is to us because I might have really listened to Doggy Style like 2,000 times. Exactly. I don't think any kid, no matter how dope your record is.

Word for word. Not 2,000 times. You might get the Spotify song that is number one on the playlist. You might listen to that mad times. But to really consume a project to listen to it the whole way through, even the songs you don't like,

you're listening to a million times because it's a pain in the ass to skip through the tape or whatever. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. And you're reading the book. We had to learn how to appreciate music. And we had to learn how to appreciate crafting an album. And like you said, the joy from opening up the CD and seeing the pictures and reading the credits and who produced what and where was produced that and who mixed it. And oh my God, he had so-and-so produced this song and so-and-so wrote this. And we took a joy in that and craft. than that. And I think a lot, like you said, a lot of younger cats today, I mean, let's face it, we all at one point thought we were the baddest motherfucker on the planet. Nobody could stop me. You get me? I felt that at that one point, I think around, you know, 17, 18, 19, you know,

I was making rapping records, you know, I had a video on the box and shit and, you know, one time gaffled them up I had to homies at Compton High School and I felt like King Kong You couldn't so My aspect too probably was Man I'll fuck so and so And fuck so because I just had that mentality

Like I'm you know It's me You get me But you learn to I guess it takes time And learning to appreciate The shit before you And the shit around you

And just getting respect from other artists who you feel are great artists. And I think once that started happening to me, it started turning me to the aspect of appreciating hip-hop, you know, and listening to fucking ultramatic emcees or listening to fucking UTFO or listening to Blue Cheese or listening to Tribe called Quest. And then going back and then listening to Cube or NWA or Too Short.

or fucking souls of mischief, you know. I was one of the motherfuckers who could just listen to everything and listen to all kind of shit across the board. So it made me have more appreciation for other artists and respect for music. And like you said, it's just so many motherfuckers today. And you don't even have to be the popular motherfucker. You could just be some young motherfucker that, fuck it.

I got a Draco and I just shot up a thousand niggas. and I fucked your bitch and she fucked me and after that we popped some pills and did it all over again. The kids is like, oh my God, that shit is bomb. That's the bombest song ever. And I'll be in the car with my son and I'm sure people pull up on the side of me

and see, why has he got his head this like this? And my son be over there going crazy and shit. I fuck that bitch and then I did her like this and then I shot a nigga and then we came through and shot 20,000 more people I'd be like, is that what my mom used to do when I used to be in the room playing fucking Curtis Blow and all them?

Because I didn't used to play that type of shit. I was playing y'all's shit. I was getting in trouble. Yeah, your mom probably was mad at playing our shit. But I was playing like UTFO and shit like that. So the shit that these kids have a choice to listen to. And that's why I say that's what run the fucking hip hop right now. That's what motherfuckers be wondering like, why is this motherfucker so popular?

or why is this motherfucker so popular? And you'd be wondering like, God damn, my shit is conscious and it's making sense. And I'm putting words together that motherfuckers can understand, but they're not eating my shit up like they eating up this. I fuck a block, like that fuck a fucking block block.

You don't understand like, but the kids run this shit right now. Like I said, back in my days, I had to have this to go buy a tape or something. Now, I'm gonna fucking do this. Fucking block, black, black, if you watch something for three seconds and you don't like it, next, next, next.

The kids control it, do you get me? No commitment. They could go to YouTube, Spotify, they can go to Pandora, and like you said, you go to YouTube, it's a, fuck a million. It's a trillion niggas rapping right now. Why? Because a nigger on the block,

him sell his shit, make him a little money, and go, fuck that, I'm going to buy me a microphone. I'm going to buy me a computer. I'm going to buy me there, and now I'm going to get in my motherfucking kitchen and start going, la, la, ha, ha, ha, ha. And then what's bad about that

is you got three or four niggas around them that know that shit is garbage as fuck. But won't nobody stand up and go, hold up, homie. This shit garbage. Them four niggas is behind them like, yeah, my nigger, yeah. And riding the wave.

And that's how we get, flooded with so much bullshit that niggas get confused and think that's the fucking music that we trying to represent. That's why so many people are tired of that shit. I see them all day. You might not know it, but there's a lot of people tired of it because music used to have substance. Yeah, well, fuck if I told you we used to pull dry buys. Motherfuck, I'm fin to explain to you why we pulling fucking drybys.

I'm not just fin to tell you I'm gonna wake up this morning, eat a bowl of fucking pill pop cereal and then go grab my Draco and they just go shoot up the fucking block because I'm the hardest nigga. I'm gonna tell you why we're gonna pull this drive by. Last night, so and so happened, this happened, God damn it, fuck it, womp, there you go.

The moral to the story is this what happens in the end. That's my music. You get me? But you know, we got kids like we're in, I'm superman to the world. I got me a microphone, nigger, and you can't tell me shit. Right. I'm the hardest nigga on the block.

I'm gonna represent my hood, blood a Crip. I served me some dope, and I bought me a pistol. And I fucked your baby mama. So, nigger, what? It is, right? It is. That's why I like yesterday, watching the DMX and Snoop a versus battle, because they said,

they was like, all you young niggas are here, like, like put the pain in your music you know what I mean like put the pain and for them to go 20 songs back to back have two three million people watching them definitely you can't sit there and say them old niggas won't because there ain't too many young niggas that can get that many people watching them consume their music or can play 20 records you know what I mean that people are going to stay connected to even when Teddy Riley and all them went did that shit look at all the people that are consider old, look at the type of numbers that they're raking in. You know what I mean? That's because they have longevity in this game. You know what I mean? There's a lot of artists

I don't think 10 years from now they're going to be able to go tour because they're shit so consumable and it didn't really touch anybody the way that it's supposed to. You know what I mean? When music touches you, you fuck with that for life. And it's not a lot of that that's happening right now. Exactly. You've been tuned in to any of those versus battles because getting I was thinking a little bit, I'm like, hmm, who would be a worthy opponent for MCA to go up against in this world? Quick, nigger. Them too, nigger. I feel real, yeah.

I love that. Damn. I've been watching some of the versus battles. I mean, they're good for hip-hop. I mean, it's something we need right now as far as the situations with being stuck at home and not being able to get out and socialize and go to concerts, whatever. it's a good thing because a lot of it has been focusing on music from our past. So it's getting a chance to introduce some of these new cats or some of these, you know, new generations or people who ain't focusing in on the, you know, the DMXs or the snoops or the Telly Rallies and baby faces or whatever.

It's getting a chance for them to really see the foundation of where your music came from. because basically this is what came before you. These cats came before you and set the foundation. So it's kind of funny to see that because it's now showing the youth or the younger generation of what we came from and what was established. And you can see the kind of generational gap between our music, you get me.

Some cats get it. Some cats know how to, let's face it. Some cats know how to rap and how to create music. That's my thing first. Create music that people can enjoy and not just some shit that you and five niggas in the studio feel is hard. Right.

No, yeah, that's a crazy thing about the verses shit is because you always need a way to take older existing content in general and make it feel new again, make it exciting again. And for me, like the Jada kiss battle, like, I love fucking Jada kiss. That was a huge rapper for me when I was like 18, 19, all through my early 20s. To hear and to see how much his verse or his songs mean still and how like effective that can be is amazing but like a lot of people don't necessarily have a reason to dig back 20 years into the the music that exists or go back

into Spotify and listen to an album from 20 years ago when they could be listening to some shit that came out last week I mean we need that we need like things to explain that's why the straight out of common shit made an existing story that maybe a lot of people felt like they already knew everything they needed to know about it and introduced it in a new way and made a cultural moment out of it, you know. Yes, it's like it's always good to go back and see your history of what was created before you. I've always told my son, you know, that's why he's now, he listens to, you know, he'll

go back every now and then, you'll catch him in his room, listening to some old school snoop or he'll maybe throw on one of my old songs. You'll even hear him throwing some old Michael Jackson or some prints or some shit like that because just by me showing him and people telling him, oh, your pops is this, man. You don't know what your pops is and woonty-oom and explaining to him. It makes him go back and wants to see, you know, what's the curiosity of people with the longevity and the history of what my pops did or whatever. So they come around a little bit.

As they get older, they get a little bit more. Exactly. More ability to understand why shit matters. Yeah, because a lot of the thing that we love about rap music, like my friend Rico Reco's had his kid in here, like an eight-year-old kid one time. The kid was watching Low Pump, Matt Ocks, Tay-K, it was a couple years ago, but like the way where to him, this is almost like kid music, you know, it's not even necessarily, like the kid is watching it like the same way that I would have been watching fucking Sesame

Street when I was his age, you know? Exactly. But they're making these fun jingle type of songs that I'm not surprised. And they're presenting a very exaggerated, dramatized, very exaggerated, dramatized, version of what it is to be a young man. And that's very appealing to them. Like, they're looking for answers. They're looking for people to sort of conceptualize and

explain what it is to be a man. And, you know, they're finding that through rap music. All the kids on TikTok, man. You know what I mean? TikTok, and, like I said, yeah, they are looking for the identity of searching for something. And then, like they said, they're looking at

the colorful, like you said, some shit I would look at on Saturday mornings, eating a bowl of Captain Crunch. They're so fascinated by what they're seeing and thinking that's the lifestyle of what reality is. And, you know, some of the motherfuckers take pills and die off and shit. That's the reality of their motherfucking life in their situation.

It's happened to a fuckload of rappers that became popular around the same time. We started doing this podcast. So if a kid needs an example of why you shouldn't do drugs, it's like, well, I could show you a whole bunch of rappers that you appreciate their catalog. And they passed over the past few years. We don't even need to go back to H-IBMs. We don't even need to go back to PIMC. That's ancient history in comparison to the people who died in the last couple of years, you know?

Yeah, that shit is ridiculous. It just happened rapidly. I don't condone shit. I'll smoke weed. I don't get a fuck. I'll smoke weed. But I just don't get the fascination with the fucking, the lean and the fucking peel popping shit. I just don't get to fast.

Like, I don't. I just don't get it. Yeah, because anybody who is a famous former lean head, anybody who was famous for drinking a lot of lean 10 years ago, I guarantee you that they got a Blad TV interview right now talking about how they don't drink lean anymore because the shit is not a good long-term plan. Yeah, I just don't get it.

Like, I hated taking fucking cough syrup as a kid. I don't understand the fascination with just, motherfucker, you just want to be medicated high, like just out of existence. like just I just don't get it. I'm glad I didn't know about it when I was 16. Man, I'm glad that shit didn't flow through our motherfucking. My teenage years of trying to, you know,

motherfucker said, here goes some weed, smoke some weed. And I was like, oh, okay, that's good. And I couldn't understand. Even with back in the days with the crack and some of the homies doing, you know, hitting the wet. I could not understand it. Like, who the fuck won't be that high? Like to where you don't even know you fucking high, you just zonked out.

What is that? Like I just don't get to understand. Like I said, I know some people have problems and something, but a lot of it now is like, we got a lot of motherfucking niggas advocating for this shit. And we got a lot of big motherfuckers who advocate for pill popping and lean drinking and shit. And I just don't get it because the end result is, nigga, you fucked up. Just just the end of it. You get me?

Nick, you smoke some weed or have you a cocktail. You're good. Wanting to be that high? You got some serious emotional issues, I think, that you're trying to deal with. And maybe the pressures of this being where you're at and then you got pushed in this situation. And now you're this popular motherfucker. And you notice a lot of motherfuckers can't handle that shit.

They make it look good. You got the chains on and the diamonds and the women around. and we got the fancy champagne, but then a lot of the motherfuckers, like you said, you hear about them later on, and they didn't either died off or something bad didn't happen because they can't deal with the realities

of what this shit brings. This fucking music shit will bring you to a point to where you can't handle certain shit if you're not level-headed. If you fucked up all the time, then shit, that's a bad fucking transition. Yeah. And I told my, like with me,

my big homies used to tell me, nigger, you need to be alert at all times. So I wouldn't take nothing that's going to keep me off deck. You know what I'm saying? Because the one second that I can be high as fuck sleeping, slipping in the car, a nigger can come knock me down. And I'm off of this earth after that.

And we ain't got a lot of new homies that fell off like that. Just like that. Especially being in that lifestyle and being in that predicament. You've got to be alert all the time, back against the wall, checking your surroundings. and everything. That's what motherfuckers used to trip off me in the early days when I used to go out of town and go to clubs. And the first thing as I do is I look for the back door. I look for the exits. I still do that.

And then I get somewhere where my fucking back is against the wall. No doors behind me and I can see everything coming in front of me. That's just being, that's just neighborhood smart. Fuck that. And having that allowed me to go out. Motherfone's be like, damn, you don't do the non. I'm not. Because I don't know where I'm at. I don't know what these niggas is about. And I got to be on dead. Niggas coming over with bottles of drink and all that shit. And I'd be like, no, I don't drink.

Nicker, you don't drink? Nicker, you ain't you supposed to be? I'm like, no, I don't know. And I'm like, you don't want no drinkers. I don't know you're getting over with buckets of just fifts of liquor and niggas is down. And I'm standing there like, I do it every time. I still do it to his day.

Right. Because you just have to be curious. Like, I don't want to be nowhere that fucked up to where niggas gotta carry me to the car, or I'm passed out at the table or some shit like that. You're in a business where a lot of motherfuckers ain't to be trusted. And even though you might be cool with everybody,

I guarantee you, it's a couple of motherfuckers that don't like you. And they can't even tell you why. You still got that in you though, that when you're in a new place or whatever, that you're very, very alert. Like, I'll bring him right. I'm still, even though I feel I'm older and I, you know, I don't, like, I go wherever

fuck I want to now. Back in the days, I just be like, no, we can't go over there. Like, motherfucking rap, you know, they didn't know shit. You know, back in the days, we used to promo tour. You used to put you in a van and drive you all around the city, different record stores. You have to sign motherfucking autograph. I just be like, no, we can't go to that record store. We can't go over there.

We can't go. And the record labels be like, why? you have an in store we have to sign autograph and I used to look at the lid and I used to tell them send me the shit before you before we go

because motherfucking nigger my early rap days man they pulling us up in Englewood at the fucking warehouse record store I'm like we can't go up in there they're pulling us up in Westside you know at the record store in the shopping center

off of Rosecrans and Central we can't go up in there I got my fucking record out and shitting videos all out and niggas standing in front of counting high and blue rags and niggas know we bang from over here and you niggas want to get out and go sign

autographs up in here. Like you understand their perspective like I'm thinking about it from that dude's perspective and hell now like that does seem kind of disrespectful. And then it was the crazy shit. He's to put up fucking posters in the window. Let motherfuckers

know you're coming and shit. So now you got niggas in the parking. They wait. Oh, yeah, the niggas supposed to be up here today. At what time you, at 4 o'clock, they'd be up in. Then you pull in the parking lot in the van and be looking. There's a car right there. There's another carload of niggas.

There's another. Man, if y'all don't go up in there and tell the motherfuckers, we can't come in. Here, let me sign these motherfuckers in the car right here. Take the motherfuckers in and we're pulling out to the next spot. You don't play back in them days, man. Real shit. So you had to be cautious of where you. It's all times, even today.

I don't give fuck. I could be in the whitest of whitest neighborhoods or whatever. I'm still like, where we're at. If I'm at a game, my son's game, and it's at football, sports shit, no, whatever. But I'm still like every fucking 10 seconds, I'm looking around, I'm checking to see who coming through the gate, who was them motherfuckers who just walked up.

Oh, okay, I see niggas over there in the car. is three niggas on the other side of the field aren't peeping out everything because I want to if it go down I want to know who, where, what, and how and full control. That's it. That's why I'll tell him too.

When I come over here, I tell him all the time, I say, I bring my gun in the car because I don't know what rap are you going to have in here? Who the fuck going on? You all I'm saying? I circled a block twice. Here? I circle the block twice.

Check out my surroundings. See where I'm mad. I pull through the ass. Allie, look at everybody getting out their cars, go to the end of the alley, busser you, come back. Then sit in the car for a minute and be like, okay, I'm peeping. I see baby right there. I see my homeboy right there getting out. Okay, let me check, check.

Then let a nigga know. Yeah, I'm over here right here. I'm in the back. I'm in the alley. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Bingo. Anything go down, nigga, no. Where I'm at, where I'm at who I was with, bingo.

You have to be. I tell my son that shit all the time. Where you at? Oh, I'm over so-and-so house. Who there? Who you went? Name the niggas. Because if I know somebody there that dang, nigger, I'm on my way to come get your

ass right now. Right. I'm like, just because you straight, you don't know who, you don't know the motherfuckers around. You're straight. Right. I used to say that about taking certain niggers when I used to go on tour, taking certain niggas from the neighborhood. Mm.

And it's a gang of them. Hmm. Who am I going to take this week? I know this nigga gonna start trouble I know he's gonna blah blah I know you have to pick certain because you

not that I can control nigga I know who gonna be able to handle dumb shit when it really can just be you know certain nigga as soon as a nigga go boo he ready to bop

bop bop and I don't get fuck no explanations it's just some niggas like that because of what you went through so you have to know who you're around who's

able to be whatever in the situations. And that's, like I said, going through that type of shit and enables me to give my son them lessons. You get him? Even though you might not be in the surrounding, it's always a slick motherfuck in the bunch, I'm telling you.

I don't get a fuck. That's smart. It's always a slick motherfucker in a bunch. So watch it. That's why I tell him all the time. You might not be growing up in gang banging infested shit. You and some good shit. But still, you never know with the intentions of the niggas are around you.

So watch what you, you, a perfect example. Nigger asked me one day, I won't go to the mall with my friends. I'm gonna go buy some shit. I go, but you don't need one with money. Why them other three niggas wanna go with you? Why do you wanna hang out with them three niggas? They ain't got no money.

I can take you to the mall, get what you want. No, I wanna go with you. I'm telling a nigga. Something gonna happen, watch. Don't go. You call me an hour later. Dad. I said, what I fucking tell you?

Was somebody robbed him? No. Shoplifting shit. I said, motherfucker, what I tell you? I already know what's going to happen before it happened because I haven't been putting that shit before. So I'm already telling you for what's been to happen. You're going to go buying shit and motherfuckers with no money. It's going to want shit because they see you buying shit too.

It's the mentality of a young mom. the fucking. I want to. You ain't got a dollar in your pocket. I don't give a fuck. You just bought a $200 pair of so and so. That's some real ass shit because I knew people who got arrested for exact

same thing. And when you're 14 and you just are in the store and stuff, you don't have that like safety precaution in your brain that's like maybe I shouldn't shoplift this. I got rest of a shoplifting at 13. This camera's all over the goddamn store. I didn't even know. I didn't know over the cameras yet. You ain't thinking. You ain't giving a fuck.

Your mind stayed at 14 or 15 as I don't get I want Especially when you see a homie whipping out and buying And you can't buy oh I'm still come up I don't give a fuck and I'm like I try to tell you I'm trying to save you from certain shit Because I don't want to see you have to go to What I was going to jail every fucking two weeks Just for standing on the block

Lordering they call it I'm having to call my I'm having to call my motherfucker and you don't want to call my motherfucking mama talking about you gotta come bail me out of dude what the fuck and I'm talking about back

in our day it was less regular motherfucker police come through and you're on the block you're going to jail that night don't give a fuck and I ain't doing nothing but standing here yeah niggas call loitering Get your motherfucking ass in the car.

Take you down to Compton PD station and your ass sit in the holding tank with a couple of enemies for fucking two, three hours, and then they want to call your mom at three in the morning and tell her come get you. Man, I used to get cussed the fuck out for that shit. Tell them about the Tuesdays.

Growing up, Tuesdays gang sweep day. Better not be outside of conference. Oh, that's when you're going to jail. On Tuesdays. On Tuesdays and Compton growing up, they're coming through. They're sweeping up everybody that they can find. They don't even care where you from.

They ain't going to ask you nothing. You ain't got to do. You had no drugs on you, no warrants, no fuck, nothing. You own the streets on Tuesdays, they come in through your hoods, and they take in everybody they can. It's a way for them to clear the streets. And if you were on probation, you may do some time for just walking outside. Wow. So, yeah, you go to Subst.

You go to Conton Sub Station. And this was back when it was Compton PD, the white cars. The crooked people. Yeah. Yeah. That's where they got rid of them. Yeah, man. Cock the PDs. I told you that the other day.

Yeah. They come pick you up, come through the hoods, pick niggers up, take them to the sub stations. And we just in a holding tank for hours. So how is your perspective on the state of policing in L.A. or to the extent that you're associated with it or even in the know about it? Like, how has it changed over the years? And what's your opinion? It ain't changed.

It ain't changed. Ain't it changed. And let me tell you something. Not to disrespect because it's fucked up that George Floyd had to lose his life. No disrespect to the Black Lives Matter shit. We've been seeing this fucking shit since I was a fucking kid. Not to downplay. Lord, I swear not to downplay.

This shit been going on since I was fucking able to crawl. motherfucker getting beat up and choked and fucking fucked up by the police are you fucking kidding me? That's normal. For where I'm from

it's normal. You didn't even trip off of it because it happened. You didn't trip off of if the police picked you up and fucked you up and kicked your fucking ass or broke your jaw

or kicked your fucking teeth in with steel-toed boots and none of that. We never complained about the shit. We never told or reports or nothing because nobody did shit about it. It wasn't going to get done. Now, in

the day of social media and so many people and eyes on everything and just so much uprest of just bullshit because it's publicized now. You could have came through

Compton on a daily and filmed that shit every day. Like the George Floyd thing, they got a really, really good video of it, and that's what made it what it was. Because that situation unfolds probably all the time. But the media chooses to put that in your face now. Right. Because they had that video to go on. Like, that's what made the people upset, and that's what gave the media something to work with.

Let's face it, if there wasn't a motherfucker standing out there with their camera, it wouldn't have been just another motherfucker who got killed by the police. They would have swept it under the rug and you'd have found no evidence. The Ahmaud Arbery situation from Georgia. We didn't know anything about it for months and months, and then the video comes out and it becomes hugeness. And now thus we have Brianna Taylor. We have everything, you get me. But like I said, to some people who are able to visualize now

because it's put in their face, it's so fucking shocking. Oh my God, fuck, really? That's what they did? Motherfucker, come here on a daily. You'll see this shit every day before now. everyone's attention. You get me? Because now motherfuckers is on like,

you better not beat a motherfucker's ass because there'll be a nigga watching you or be a for whatever. But like I said, before that shit happened, before George Floyd happened, I guarantee you could have rode through the motherfucking town on any given day and seen a nigger's ass

stone on the ground, choked, beat up, blah, blah. You get me? It happens. It's been happening. I got down like that. I got that like that. It happened before me.

We all went through it. If you was gang banging in my day and you was hanging out, you either got, took into the holding sale, threw in the holding cell with enemies. You got dropped off in fucking enemy neighborhoods.

What I just tell you. They didn't give a fuck. He said that was the worst thing they ever did you, right? I said, I told them one time I was driving, I was driving, I don't know, I forgot. I think I was driving through Southside, right? And I was going home, and the cop pulled me over, and he looked at me. He looked at him to address.

He said, oh, you from, I'm like, no, no, I'm chilling. Went 20, 30 minutes, ain't said nothing. Came back, tried to break my key. Because he knew I was in the wrong neighborhood. He tried to really break my key, so a nigga, it gets you. And he was like, he broke your key. I'm like, nigger, the cops and Compton is, the niggas is crazy. It's just been, like I said,

it's been something we just been having to deal with and go through for whatever. I mean, like, it's no different. I mean, shit, up until shit, 10 years ago, I'm living in fucking probably the whitest neighborhood around. I go to a subway, tattoos on, tank top on,

highway patrol walks in. He couldn't even order his food because he's so busy, looking at me and watching looking at my tattoos and whatever whatever so i'm ordering my food he couldn't even help himself he had to ask me what are you doing out here and straight up where was this again murrietta oh okay so you what are you doing out here and i turned around and looked at him and i said i'm ordering food he said no what are you doing because he saw the big content on the back of my arm and what he said what did you get paroled out here straight up

up. Like, motherfucking, like, why are you in Murrietta? Like, you're black. You're fucking tattooed up with Compton all over. So, you must have someone who live out here that you got paroled to. I said, motherfucker, I moved out here.

Right. He said, you did? Like, why? I said, because I bought a house. He was like, oh, like, I'm like, damn. But, like, situations like that, that make me go, it's no different.

Like, it ain't no different. Motherfuckers just don't understand that certain people or our race of people, we shouldn't be in certain places or certain situations or whatever. So it's really odd for them to have to witness that. Like, damn, you're able to leave Compton and move to Murrietta? Like, and you're not here because you were forced to be here? Like, it wasn't a prison sentence or whatever. You're here voluntarily.

Like, motherfuckers don't understand that. But we know him a motherfuckers too. If I was at Burger King and I saw a dude with a big ass Compton tattoo, there would be a part of me if I was in Marietta for some reason. There would be a part of me that would just want to be like, so what are you doing out here? Like, why is like, you know, you just don't see a lot of Compton tattoos. I can kind of.

Exactly. I'm sure the cop was coming from a place of a big, and small-mindedness, but there would be like a part of my mind that I'd want to be like, what's going on? Why do you do it? It's like the Trayvon Martin situation. He's seen a guy, right, that he don't, he sees a young black kid with a hoodie on walking in his neighborhood and instantly, like you said, the bigotry comes out.

Now he's like, he must be up to trouble because look at this guy. Right. Come on, man. If it was a little white kid, same hoodie. You know what I mean? Just strolling down the street. He wouldn't attack him in any. You know what I mean?

Our position of being racial profiled, like I said, has been around ever since I was able to step off the porch as an adolescent and get on my bike and just ride down the street and being associated with being in a gang. It just the neighborhoods you live in, you're black, I mean, they gang bang over here. So why would I assume that for any different, that you were any different from any other black male I've been? encountered over here. So that's the mind state that they get. So it's just, it's a everyday cycle for them to be like, we're patrolling the streets of Compton, everybody gangbangs, everyone sells dope, no one's innocent, everyone's guilty, and no one's going to care if we fuck over people or fuck them up or whatever, whatever, because this is why we came. or we were put here to patrol this fucking jungle.

You get me? Tame the motherfucking animals and shit. Make sure everything is not an uprest. And long as we keep motherfuckers the way, nobody's going to tell us that we can do anything different. You get me? We've been doing this shit for years. So, fuck it.

Beat up a couple of motherfuckers, harass and abused a couple of motherfuckers. Who's going to tell? Who's going to listen? Right. What do you tell your kid about how to deal with the police? You know, he's like his dealings with the police are probably going to be very different than the ones that you had as a kid, but how do you prepare him for the tricks and the weird shit that they might try to pull? I tell him, you know, you're getting ready to start driving. You're going to have to be aware of racial profiling from police. I'll say you just have to, you know, you're a black kid. And you are in an area where, you know,

it's not as bad, but you still can be profiled because of your skin color and who you are as a fucking African-American kid. So I tell him, just be aware of police harassment. You get me? You're not no different than me or AD or anybody else of my skin color. So just learn to be accepting of police harassment because it might come. So don't get adamant, don't get overwhelmed, don't get to, you know, because you have to treat this shit like, I treat it like getting a common code.

It might come. You're going to be sick for a minute, but long as you can withstand the bullshit, then you'll be out of your, it'll be out of your hair, and you can get on with your business. But thinking that you can be in a position to,

express yourself about that shit, don't bother. Because regardless of what you see on TV, motherfuckers ain't around every day with cameras and shit. So you have to be aware of that shit. You might get a good cop one day. You might get a bad one. I've done it. I've been able to be in situations to where motherfuckers go give you

your license registration. Nothing wrong. Here you go. Have a nice day. You get some motherfuckers that first thing they ask you is when they walk up on the car what the fuck you doing over here and you already know it's bad from there so it's it's just it's basically who you have to deal with a lot of motherfucking cops is unhappy who knows why i'm unhappy too sometime when i got to go to go to the studio and sit up to three four in the morning

i'm not happy about that right got to go home at four o'clock then get up at six to get a kid to school and i'll be like man fuck this shit man i'd be mad as hell but you're not in a position to like to inflict that upon somebody you know i mean i might yell at a motherfucker and cuss at a nigga yeah yeah yeah motherfucker who get the delayed rogue or turn the two goddell slow man move motherfucker caran my son like dad the light's red like oh shit because my fucking motherfuckin ain't turning fast enough you know i might get a little pissed off but i know where motherfuckers have to be able to know when and where to exert their aggression you know or their frustration. I'm not going to be frustrated because something else happened and take it out on my son.

You get me? I try to control that shit. It is what it is for what the frustration comes from. So you have to learn how the motherfucker, if you're mad because you've got to come into work today, oh well, I get it. But that don't be mad at her, him, and him because motherfucker, I had to come here today too, just like you. So you have to give people that same level of respect that you will want when you were in a place of not being happy. You get me? Because I don't know what the fuck is wrong with you. I can just tell that today ain't a good fucking day.

Go to McDonald's and motherfucker. Fuck your order up on purpose. Anything. I mean, shit, we all go through that. Humans and motherfucking. It's not one motherfucker around here that can say they go through every day is a good fucking day. We all have certain days where shit is fucked up.

But we have to learn how to not push that aggression on other motherfuckers who might like your girl, your kids, the fucking mailman. You get me? Motherfucker, my check ain't here yet. I don't get me. Niggily like, dude, I just deliver the fucking mail.

So I think with police, they already have a certain authority feel. You get me? and I've never got that, you get me. You might be in a bigger position to me, but I don't feel that a cop should have

to get more, like, I'm not in the military or you're not my father or whatever. So the respect you give me, I give you back. Some dudes feel that that represents a higher authority than regular motherfuckers. And I think that's where policing gets confused and it gets twisted because when they put the uniform on,

it makes them think that I have a certain authority over the common motherfucker. And it's typically a dude who's like the most ordinary fucking dude in the world. Like I was reading the New York Times profile of the Derek Chauvin, the guy who killed George Floyd. This sounds like the most ordinary fucking boring ass life that you could ever imagine from someone and then to see the way that he acted when he all of a sudden was in a position where he could physically manhandle somebody it just really clues you in they're like a lot of these people who end up in these positions it's not a job it's a job where it demands the best of people but there's nothing about that job that would attract the best people you know like if you were to

go to fucking NASA or Tesla or some shit there's going to be some of the smartest people in the entire world working there because you're getting paid for you're getting a smarty motherfucker going to be a cop. Because you're not going to be making that much money. It's a hard fucking job. Yeah. You could have been a fucking brain surgeon. Why are you patrolling the streets of, like, it's just like something wrong with it.

And I get it. It takes a certain level of motherfucker. But like I said, it takes a certain motherfucker who also goes, I'm feeling it going to be a policeman. Okay. What? Right then and there, I think motherfuckers. should be, why do you want to be a cop?

I mean, honestly, why? Here's 10 other jobs, though, would make you the same amount of money. Exactly. They'd probably be easier. The better schedule, less hours. Why do you want to be a cop? What is it exactly? I feel like a lot of cops, you know, they was bullied as kids.

You know what I mean? They never had that authority over nobody. I mean, do a motherfucker have the mentality of are there any motherfuckers who go, I want to be a better police. I want to be able to because I've seen, I mean, it might be some people with that mentality,

but they get overshadowed because the reputation that we have and not just anyone who's had an experience because I don't want to keep putting it on black people. Anybody who's had a fucked up experience with the police feels like

police is fucked. You ever seen Serpico? Like if you try to be the good cop, it's not going to be good for you. And that's how I feel about people who enter this, I don't know, this fucking, this fucking shit of going, okay, you know, like I said, when I was a kid, when I was five or six, I'm going to be a policeman. I don't be a fireman, you know, because that's that typical American dream of the kid, apple pie, baby. baseball because I grew up with that mentality. My father worked at General Motors. My mom was a fucking nurse.

I mean, I could have been a good kid. I grew up in Compton, though. You get me? And my father left the home. So I got introduced to the pitfalls. But as a young kid, my dreams of being the All-American fucking Apple Pie, baseball, being a,

doctor, lawyer, that's because that's the program that I followed in school, elementary school, you know, well the cops are the good people, the firemen, or the doctor or the lawyer, so that was my trait. And then the

older I got, I'm fucking with me. I didn't do none. I'm just riding my bike. But because I fit the criteria I fit the profile of being a young black kid in a fucking gang infested neighborhood. So you must be one too.

So my attitude turned to, damn, police is fucked up. And I never even had a bad experience up until I started banging. You know, my perception was, but then to hear the stories, you start going, damn, police is fucked up. So you start thinking, do anybody go out to be a policeman to be good? Or is it just to feel the authority figure over the place you're feeling? a patrol and police. I know it ain't for nothing but a gang of gang banging ass niggas and Mexicans and, you know,

white trailer trash people and whatever. So fuck it. I'm going to be able to be the fucking authority over that fucking land and that community because now I get to patrol around in my car. Untouchable. You get me? You're illegal gangster.

And then ain't nobody going to fuck. Who would dare to fuck with a police? You get me? your mentality hanging on the block even when they come through is man fuck shirts up shirts up we didn't done today you just went from telling niggas

fuck you cuss and whatever whatever to sitting on the corner telling the nigga yes sir yes sir yes sir oh no sir oh yes sir and I'd be feeling like why are we siring these motherfuckers like you're not my father you work a rent you work in a nine

to five like like you work in your job and my father going to work every day and that man and that man and that man. But they feel the authority. And I think that's sometimes where it get confused because

you give anybody a little feel of power. They're gonna, they're gonna power around this motherfucker shit. Oh, nigga, they bang over there. Nick, watch this. Pull my car up over there. Get out of my car.

Pull up my belt a little bit. Show that shiny, Niggas is in panic when I pull up. You get me? Everybody else got a hide their gun. You got yours on the outside. Yeah, my shit, nigga, I'm shining. Bigger, I'm showing you that big motherfucker right there.

Like, yeah, what's up? What's cracking over here today? What y'all doing? Yeah, yeah. Nobody got no dope, no good. Just over there to fuck with niggas. You get me? But that's to pull up and show that authority.

Because watch all these niggas bow down when I hit this block. Thanks. You get me? Ain't one and one and the nigger who think he bad, to be in the back of my motherfucking car going to shit on for sure.

It might be crying. Come on, man. So, like, who chooses to be in that position? And like I said, of course, I've knew cops. I've knew cops being

a hip-hop artist. Niggas who grew up in the hood or grew up in Compton or whatever turned to cops and was going on tour with us and being private security. Niggas is cool as motherfucker. I would never on any day worry about running into that motherfucker on the street.

That's cool as fuck. But then it's certain, like I said, there's just certain dudes who enter this profession who might feel this need for authority, this need for feeling I'm superior. And you have to question those applicants or those motherfuckers who come in to join the force who really like, motherfucker, I could tell you ain't fin to try to be no good motherfucker.

I know you just want to roll through the neighborhoods and fuck with motherfuckers and beat up on a couple of motherfuckers and show your authority. You gotta be able to question that. Right. They don't live in our communities either.

And you as a, and you as a motherfucker who's going to hire this person is supposed to be doing this psychiatric evaluations? You can't tell me that half of these motherfuckers that you let come through here,

You already know they bad for business. But fuck it, we need, we need cops. Right. Because like the best thing that could kind of happen for policing would be for there to be a very motivated, mobilized percentage of people of young people who wanted to become cops and wanted to be better cops. But it feels like every single thing associated with having that job,

having to fit into that organization, not to mention the types of people that would be drawn to that. You're just not going to get that. You're not going to get this big, swelling of people who have better intentions for society taking on that job. See, my grandma used to tell me all the time that when they were growing up, the police lived in their community. They live next to the same people that they were supposed to protect and serve.

And that made them respect the police. That made the police respect them because they had to see these people every day at the grocery stores and stuff. These motherfuckers don't know us when they coming down our block. They getting off their shift, they're going to the valley somewhere. Hell yeah, they jump in on that freeway driving 40 minutes away. They go. That's another thing.

I feel like people, when you police in these areas that you know, drug infested, gangbangers, whatever, you have to have someone police in those areas who knows what those motherfuckers are going through and why they in those situations. So it wouldn't be right it wouldn't be it Wouldn't be it visible to put a motherfucking White cop in a neighborhood Where it's nothing but gang infested niggas at It's not cool They're already gonna be feeling like As opposed to seeing a young black kid coming through there

Understanding like oh well shit nigg I grew up in in in LA Oh I grew up in Watts So I could understand So I could better police this area And knowing that when I pull up on niggas Who's standing outside That it's not a fishy situation And I don't have to pull up and harassed niggas.

I know niggas hang out. You get me? Or when I see two or three niggas in the car Do I really have the racial profile And to think they're fin to go do a drive-by on a nigger Or could they just be three niggas in the car Ride together? You get me?

Those, they have to put those type of motherfuckers in those areas that have lived, known somebody, dealt with somebody who deals with the situation of where you grow up. Niggers are products of their environment. So if you get somebody who knows what the environment is, then the policing could be better and you won't have as much racial profiling, fucking abuse and all else. shit and then it would only be situations where we would need because the niggas wouldn't feel like it would have to be so much uprest that's facts i'm very glad we got to get your perspective on that for sure sure glad we brought that up hey i wanted to ask you this have you watched menace with your kid i haven't watched it with him but he has seen it did he have uh thoughts on it no it fit in pretty well with everything you knew about you as a kid that's just dad Yeah, that's a motherfucker.

Like, why y'all watching this shit? I see this motherfucker every day. So, you know, he watched it. I mean, his friends be like, all your pops, you know, the movies, you know. But my son, I think that because I lived, I try to do normal shit. I try to not, you know, depict the, you know, that's why I don't bring him the shit like this. And I try to keep him out of my soul. we have the regular dad and son connection.

So it's not him just being fascinated by this lifestyle. And next thing you know, he want to be a rapper and all this other shit. And I got so I try to keep my music shit away and my profession and just try to be dad at home with him. So that's why he's normal with me. And he doesn't trip off of my dad got plaques on the wall or my dad was a. the movie or my dad did a song with Kendrick or you know he's like why y'all tripping off of him so and i kind of like it that way because then i get that normal shit with him i don't get the you know i wish i got the normal shit when they came to finances and shit with his ass you get me you know but i get the normal

shit you know i get to nah dad don't drop me off right here or let me go on my friends house or you don't have to stay. I'm like, nigga, I want to come see you work out or throw the football. No, you can sit in the car and shit like that. Because I think he feels it takes away from him. Right.

Because when dad show up, all the attention goes from his ass to RMC up. So he won his shine and I want him to have that shit. We all know that when you meet someone whose dad is famous or rich or powerful or whatever

that kind of changes how you think of their kid because you kind of know that they had a different specific experience growing up and it does it triggers your brain. Like if you were to meet somebody right now and you thought they were cool and then you found out like, oh, that's Dr. Dre's kid. You're going to be like, wow.

You're going to have so many assumptions about what his life has been like and so many questions and that as a kid you want to be independent of that. You want to be your own little island. You don't want to be the product of your father. And I think the beauty of that is a lot of his friends because I started out with him, like I put him in sports at three years old. And then I, my connection was head coach in the teams. So I think because a lot of his friends been around me since they were little kids and couldn't fathom what MC8 was or movies or whatever because they have grown up with him too, they walk in the door like, what's up, coach?

what's up coach that's it I get nothing else so I try to be I keep the normal shit with him motherfucker take the trash out clean your room up you know all kind of just try to be normal because I don't want him to get caught up in oh my dad's this and then then that turns his shit differently and then that what makes people to start looking at him like he's a different kid or privileged kid and what nigger you ain't privileged I went through, nah, nah, they're my shit. This is, they're my shit. You got to earn your shit.

So that's why you playing football and you doing your, that's your thing. This is my thing. That's your thing. So that's how we keep it. But is there a part of you that wants to get in this, like make a song with your kid just because it's fun? No, no. He doesn't look at rap as just like a fun thing you can mess around with.

He wants to rap. He wants to rap all the time. You're hearing him in there with his little block, block, block, block. I'm like, man, man, what the fuck you in there playing the shit? Turn that shit down. And I've already talked. Yeah, he's came to me with, you know, we weren't rap and me and the homies and we should do this. And it got about that far.

And I'm, man, come on, man. You play football. Your thing is sports. Going to school. You can get you a college education. You're going to do something on that level. And this shit ain't. This shit ain't for anything.

Everybody, man. Hell, no. See, when I listen to your music now too, though, I very much, like, get the feeling and it's why I think that you're still relevant is because it feels like you're just really doing the shit that you're having fun with. Like, you're working with Premiere.

I'm hearing you with Lady Arraged. It really feels like- I'm about to drop an album right now called Lessons. My first single I just did with Conway. We just shot a video last week. Oh, yeah, I forgot about that, because we were supposed to interview him today.

It's actually happening next week now, but that, I just, I can't wait. to hear that that sounds crazy i'll play it for you i'm supposed to be shooting a video with davies this weekend my niggins amazing too i'm i'm just trying to stay relevant and like you said i'm not looking for accolades right i'm not looking for the billion dollar paycheck you get me i've been through this hip-hop shit for a while right to where i'm comfortable of all i never came into it with i was going to be the next big thing. Never had that mentality. Even

when I was whatever, I never, I just like to make it music. Like right now, if I didn't make a dollar, I still want to go to the studio, turn the equipment on and make a rap song because I can do it. Right. And that's what, because it's fucking easy

to me. The product is good. Yeah. Still good. My dope shit. My shit ain't buck. You get me? Niggas still get home. I ain't selling no bunk. I ain't selling no Bunk's bullshit, I'm telling you. My shit is still potent. And that's one of the reasons why. And then when I hear motherfuckers, when I say,

I might not do no more shit, I might just concentrate on trying to get my son to college or working on my clothing line or whatever. And motherfuckers go, why? You still make good music. You still make good music. And it's relevant. So I do it because of that.

Right. And I mean, somebody like Premier, like, what was that relationship like? because that was genuinely exciting for me as a... I've been knowing Primo since I started. You get me? He was one of the first dudes on the East Coast who accepted me as an artist, but as a, like, real friend.

Like, Primo would come pick me up from the airport, like shit like that. Stay at his crib, you know. Everybody used to hang with Prebo and that. And I used to fuck it with Nas when he was first started and treach and, and Buster and they all used to be. So we used to, man, pick us up in the MPV van and we go rolling around smoking. Primo first introduced me to Blunts.

I didn't know what the fuck Blunts was. I go to New York in like 89, 90, and I'm like, the fuck y'all smoking the weed out of. And he's like, oh, y'all don't smoke blunts in L.A.? I said, hell, fucking, nah. Nigger opening up, and that was the big Philly blunts back then. He split in the Philly with the razor and then dumped all the shit out.

And I'm like, I'm like, oh, nah, hell no, Primo. He's like, I'm telling you, nigga, after you hit this, you'll never smoke. And I swear to God, never again from that day. And that was 20 years ago. Wow. So Primo was one of the first motherfuckers I met on tour. We connected. Like I said, we would do promo tours together.

I would see him and Google all the time on the road. Shytown, Texas, Florida. We always connected. And from there, man, we've been, you know, I could call Primo right now. now. But, all eight, what's up? I'm in my son's baseball game and blah, blah, blah. And we just, we just, he's one of the people I call a real friend outside of fucking music. There's a motherfucker I can call in the middle of the night with no problem. He's going to pick up the phone. And if he don't answer within 10 minutes, he'll call me right back. So that's the respect I have

for Primo. And I could call him right now. I need this done. I need a mix. I need a scratch. I need a beat. Give me two days and I'm on it. And he doesn't put himself in that, well, you know, I'm a DJ Premier. You know, you're asking me for a beat. You're asking me for eight, I got you. So that's why me and him connect so good. That's my dude. That's a beautiful thing. I love saying people age gracefully into their older twilight years in the music game, you know, because there's a lot of people who try to appeal to a younger audience and they're just not able to really, if you're not true to yourself at that point, you're just not going to be able to pull it off convincingly, you know? You have to stay true to yourself because that's what brought you here. And I try to remind dudes

of that. Like, don't ever forget what got you to hear. You get me? You got to remember you came from here. So you can't remember those steps that you went through. And like I say, yeah, that's why I call my new project lessons. The lessons we've learned over the transition of being in this hip hop or just growing, you have to. to be able to adapt to the lessons you learn as an adolescence or as a young adult and to now. You get me? And I think with going through that, it gives me a brighter aspect on trying to write wraps for either the younger generation, not to the fact that I'm going to do what y'all do,

but I'm going to speak to y'all of how somebody would speak to me if they was my grandfather or father. And I'm going to tell you, yeah, all that shit is this and that. but let me tell you the lesson I learned from doing the same shit 15 years ago. So like I said, I just like making music, so fuck it. I do what I do because I got a love for. It's not because I want to, you know, buy the newest Lamborghini or fly on a private jet or glorify the financial status of being a hip-hop rapper. I like making music.

It was a talent that I could do, you get me? Trying to discover myself as a young kid. What am I going to do? You get me? And next thing you know, bingo, I started writing rap. And then the shit wasn't corny. So that's why I feel like, oh, fuck it. I can probably do this a little bit because it's one thing about me is like,

you got to make sense when you make records. You get me? My nigga Quicks said, if it don't make dollars, it don't make sense. But God damn it, if you ain't making sense, it don't make sense. I just don't want to hear a nigga bragging about his new car and it's fucking, and it's fucking. Bank account and shit. Yeah, niggas, so what?

You're a grown-ass man. You gotta get past that at some point, right? So what? Yep, you got a trillion. I don't. Next. Next? So what you're gonna do after that? Now you're gonna tell me all the money you got

and how many cars you got and how many times you flew on the plane high and okay, now what? What are you gonna do next year? You're gonna tell me the same shit? Because that's when you figure out niggas don't got no substance. Facts.

You get me? On this first record, I'm from to blow you up. We're going to dance and party and I'm going to show you the bank account what bitch I fucked and blah blah blah and then watch the next year and they're going to come with something oh god damn you got a new car

you got another check you got another diamond ring oh fuck it you bought you another bottle of champagne oh fuck you got some new model bitches you fuck it but you see it over and over and over that the audience gets sick of it if the artist doesn't keep evolving or staying true to themselves

that's one thing our audience does do they'll let you go for a minute but when you start doing the same shit they start going man next next you're seen having a million times yeah we we this young this new generation they like lose interest fast you know one thing about us is we kept longevity motherfuckers with substance you always keep longevity motherfuckers who just hear to cash a check and just be braggardoscious you won't be known about two years from now. I'm telling you. Thanks.

I hear that. All right. Yo, MCA, it was an honor, honestly, to be able to do this interview. Good for having me, man. I'd just appreciate being on some shit. You get me? I'm an old nigger in the house all of that. I get to come out and fuck with the youngsters on the no jumper and shit.

Like, I told you, Karad was like, you're going to see Adam. Man, fuck that. I got to go. So shout out to no jumper, Adam. boy AD. Good luck. Yeah, happy to make a competent connection here as well. I feel like I'm doing something right for the community. I want you, I want you in here with eight.

I say, oh, come on, man. Oh, that's official, man. Yeah, official. All right. Hey, well, I appreciate it, man. I'm gonna be honest with you. I'm gonna be honest with you. Who you tell me?

I ain't, I ain't ate today, nigga. I just wanna tell everybody the new record is coming out. It's called Lessons. I mean, we got Conway, Dave East, Talib Kuali. Oh, shit. I got havoc from my deep. What? I got a cocaine.

Mitchie Slick. Hey. Gitch, Mitch, Mitch, I got yuck mouth, I got corrupt, and DJ Premiere. So,

and be real. Don't let me forget about Be Real. It's a lovely project. Shout out Laura. Shout out to Laura. Hey, man, we can't forget Laura.

She's been on deck all day. So it's all good. So it was in Cyprus Hill back in the day, yes indeed. I heard. New project is Lessons. It'll be your way

in your minute. Thank y'all for having me. Appreciate you. MC8, No, No, The World Check us on YouTube, SoundCloud iTunes, like, comment,

subscribe, nojummer.com, if you want to support. Shout out to I-A-D, I-I-T-S-A-D. Two, niggas, Nick, too-I-T-S-A-D. Oh, shout-out my boy Matt Conway. Good looking. There it is. Appreciate y'all.