The Breakfast Club - INTERVIEW: Lil Jon Opens Up About Mental & Physical Transformation, Origins Of Crunk, Meditation Album + More

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

Today on The Breakfast Club, Lil Jon Opens Up About Mental & Physical Transformation, Origins Of Crunk, Meditation Album. Listen For More!YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BreakfastClubPower1051FMSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. The murder of an 18-year-old girl in Graves County, Kentucky, went unsolved for years, until a local housewife, a journalist, and a handful of girls, came forward with a story. America, y'all better work the hell up. Bad things happens to good people in small towns. Listen to Graves County on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to binge the entire season, ad-free, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Introducing IVF disrupted, the Kind Body story, a podcast about a company that promised to revolutionize fertility care.

It grew like a tech startup. While Kind Body did help women start family. It also left behind a stream of disillusioned and angry patience. You think you're finally, like, in the right hands. You're just not. Listen to IVF Disrupted, the Kind Body Story, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Jonathan Goldstein, and on the new season of heavyweight...

And so I pointed the gun at him and said this isn't a joke. A man who robbed a bank when he was 14 years old. And a centenarian rediscovers a love lost 80 years ago. How can a 101-year-old woman fall in love again? Listen to heavyweight on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, host of the On Purpose podcast. I had the incredible opportunity to sit down with the one, the only, Cardi B. My marriage, I felt the love dying.

I was crying every day. I felt in the deepest depression that I had ever had. This shit was not given to me. I worked my ass off for me. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Every day I wake up, wake your ass up. You're all finished or y'all done? Morning, everybody.

It's DJ NVV just hilarious. Salomey Naga. We are the Breakfast Club. Lon La Rosa is here as well. And we got a special guest in the building. A motherfucking icon got there. Don't play with him. I thought he was up here.

This is his first time up there, which is crazy. That's crazy. I only seen you on the road. I know, but I thought you've been up here. Ladies and gentlemen. Little John. What's up, legend?

Hey, man. Thank you all for having me. Thank you. Yeah, good morning. It's about time. Good morning, everybody. We don't say good morning. morning enough to our fellow brothers and sisters.

That's true. That's right. I was a victim of that until I started to change my mindset. Sometimes I would come down, get in the car, going, you know, on the road. I didn't say good morning. And once I started to change my mindset, I realized that's a good way to start your day and a gesture to someone, whoever you're riding with, you know, the driver, whoever. Ask them how they're feeling. And then ask them how they're feeling. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes that's also the case. Sometimes just say, how is your day? going you know I found myself sometimes I'm a I'm really in tune to my spiritual side I've been for a long time sometimes I might just be in I remember

being in the club and I might walk by a random person and I can feel that energy and I'd be like let me just give you a hug oh wow and sometimes that just changes somebody's life absolutely what about the what about when you were the person that might have been creating the energy though like if you felt like some aggressive angreness from this person but it was your fault because Because of, you're saying that you just did. Well, you know, I'm going to tell you one time, I was in South Carolina. Hey.

And a hole in the wall club way back in the day. And it was supposed to be a night where cash money was supposed to be there. And they called me because cash money couldn't come. So these folks in South Carolina was mad than a motherfucker. And we was not cash money. Little Johnny Eastside boys show up. And so I understand it's a hostile situation. but I said, I looked out on that crowd

and I said the biggest dude in this crowd I'm about to make him my best friend and I made him my best friend during the show like playing to him, giving him drinks and hyping him up and then he turned, like it turned the whole crowd around and then they were fans of us after that. But it was a way,

you can always change the energy of a situation if you approach you to a calm manner. That's why good security don't go and like try to fight somebody. They try to defuse the situation. That's the first rule. It's defuse it, not be the aggressive. And little John, I want to go back, so this is your first time. Well, real quick, though, what is the little John morning routine like? I knew you were going to ask me that.

Yeah, what is the little John morning? So this morning, I woke up, had a little water. Because, you know, I do my, I do this Korean facial stuff, so I do skin, you know, my skin is very important. My skin looks very good. My skin looks very good. It looks very good. Yeah. One rule for that is positivity, positive energy, positive thoughts.

Because if you're a negative person, all this negativity, it's going to wear the flesh down. So get up in the morning and do my skincare routine, brush my teeth, all that good stuff. And then since I'm on the road, a nice, healthy breakfast for me was two, hard-boiled eggs, some yogurt, some berries, and a grapefruit. Wow. That's simple, easy, and start with a positive mindset. It's going to be a great day. I'm always in my mind saying affirmations for the day, even before I go to bed, in my dreams.

Like last night, I was like, it's going to be a great interview. I look at this as one of the biggest interviews I've ever done in my life because it's like 50 minutes, 45 minutes, 50 minutes, a long interview. It's a lot to talk about, Charlemagne, you've seen me grow from, I think one time we talked, you were like, you came to the radio station in South Carolina. in one time. That was early on. He wasn't even on air yet. Right. Were you on air? I think it was a phoneer. You called in. You had just put out, I think you had just put out beer, beer. Wow. So that's 20 years ago. We were talking about you having the Confederate flag in the video. And I'll ask me about that. So that's, you know, you've seen the growth. And I think it's important because, yeah, you've seen the growth. You've seen it from a different

angle. You've seen it from a different angle. You've seen it from a different angle. And, you know, you guys moved the needle of culture and you've had everybody and their grandmama on this show. So I think it's one of the most important and, you know, best interviews I think I'm going to have because of all of that.

Let's claim it. Let's claim it. I want to go back. I want to start from the beginning. These are the interviews I love because for some reason I thought you've been up here before. So I want to start when you first got

in the music industry, right? Yeah. Let's start with you started working for Jermaine Dupree. Yep. 93. Start from there. So how did you hook up with Jermaine Dupri?

And what did you do for Jermaine Dupri? So I used to be, in Atlanta in the 90s, I was like the hottest DJ in the city. I was the man. I did all the parties. And I would see Jermaine all the time at the clubs. And then I did this one club called the Phoenix Nightclub, which was the hottest nightclub in Atlanta at the time. We brought Biggie. We brought Biggie.

I got Biggie and Craig Mack together when they did the Big Mac tour. Wow. So I got them. That's an interesting story. because we got we we we I worked on the radio station but I wasn't the PD and you know how back then you had to go through the PD because you wanted to get the spins for your artists so Diddy you know

he let us get Biggie and Craig because he thought I was like the PD and he'd get there and the club is slammed like a million people and he's like yo what the hell you know we need some more money because this thing is packed and then he found out that I wasn't the PD And so he was extra pissed, and then he even tried to get the rep that worked for BMG at the time fired because she got, because we got Craig and Biggie for free. Wow.

So, yeah. That was normal back then, when artists were on a promo to us? Yeah, but you wanted to go through the station so you can make sure you get the spin. You can get to look. And we wasn't that, but we were hot promoters. So I was doing all the hot parties, and I would just see Jermaine all the time. but even if I wasn't DJ and I was everywhere. Like I had a thing where I was,

I wanted to be from, I called it from bankhead to buckhead. I was from the boozy spots to the, the most hood you can get in Atlanta. So I was literally everywhere. And Jermaine came to me, well, one thing people don't really know,

Dallas Austin's brother came to me first. So his name was Claude Austin. He passed away. But Claude Austin came to me first and wanted me to work for Rowdy. but then Jermaine came to me around the same time and Claw ended up passing and so and Jermaine came because I was just everywhere

and he was like I need you someone like you to represent you know my label because you everywhere so he hired me in 1993 I started working at Social Dev and I was hired to do A&R and street promotions because I was everywhere right so he wanted someone that had respect in the city that could go anywhere and someone like me that I was always out

so that was represent social deaf from bank head like I said to Buckhead and what artist did you have

being in A&R for social death at that time I had I put together all of the social death based all stars

and at night I think the whole very slipped on era of Atlanta yeah

and that changed that changed music too like it gave us a whole genre that had never been created

like had never been done before and that all started because in Atlanta we used to do like it was DJ Jelly shout out DJ Jelly

shout out the J team DJ Smurf and all of those guys they would take like slow jam acape appellas like say one famous mix was Can You Stand the Rain New Edition and put it over a bass beat

so they used to do all of these mixes like that they would just do a whole mix tape It would be all bass beats and then these R&B acapellas and so I was like we love this so much in the city let's take that and make a record from that nobody made an actual song so I came up with that concept and I went to my boy

DJ Cool Collie aka Rodney and then at the same time I met Carl Moe he used to call the phone and so-so deaf and play his tracks on the phone interesting story about that so one day I'm like these tracks is dope So I called him to the office.

And he comes up there with a freaking keyboard and plays the keyboard. Like just playing the keyboard, not like no CDs, no cassette tape, just playing the keyboard. And I'm like, this is crazy. So I ended up in using him. And we did my boo. And so, yeah, I did all of the Social Deaf Base All-Stars. And then out of that, we had Player Poncho. He got signed, and we did a couple of records with Player Poncho.

And Player Poncho is actually how I met the East Side Boys. Wow. because player poncho would always when he would go out he would have a whole like 20 10 20 guys with him and the east side boys was always with him even if it was just like two or three guys with and so i was always with poncho because he was my artist you know and so me and the east side boys just one day we were in the club and i think we were in the club five five nine and uh we just started chanting this chant who you with who you with get cross who you with and then everybody in the club start chatting

and then I look at Big Sam I'm like, we need to turn this into a song and so I know I have access to people with labels and stuff so I called somebody I knew actually I called Cool Ace this guy named Cool Ace and Cool Ace connected me with this guy named Carlos Glover and we ended up going in the studio

and we made the song Who You With and that started everything for Little John as an artist. When did you start producing? When did the production book come in? Probably like 92. And you never made beats at that time. You just bought a machine and said I'm on. No, it started off with me and my partner.

I used to do a show in Atlanta called Reggae Jamming on the main station in Atlanta, B-103. And me and Paul, I was in the sound system with Paul Lewis called Four Seasons. So I was like a selector, like the Jamaican sound system. Did Jamaican music, did every type of genre of music. So we had a dance hall, we had a reggae show on Friday nights on the station. And what we would do is I would take hip-hop acapellas and put them over dance-all beats and dance-all acapellas put them over hip-hop beats. Through that, we got linked up with CigNet Records.

And we convinced them to give us the Capleton Tour Acapella. That's how I got to do the Capleton Tour remix. Like when I did verses, I remember playing it and people were like, you ain't do that. And I remember like in real time, DJ Scratch pulled the vinyl out and he put in the chat like I'm looking at the credits he actually did produce it so what we did at that time we would kind of tell somebody how we wanted to produce the records and later on we bought a drum machine I learned how to produce by the time

we got to who you wit which was 95 96 but before that we kind of just told somebody like yo chop this chop that do this da da da da da da da do you have reduction credits on my boo as well I did not okay I should have gotten some because I really co-produced the song with them. But I thought it's part of my job description as an A&R. It's the first project I'm doing that that was just part of the job. But I was really there every step of the way of inception of putting that song together. I'm glad you mentioned Sam and Boat, too, because people always seem to forget about the East Side Boys. Yeah. What did they bring to the table? What made Little John and the East Side Boys such an amazing group? We were just like, because we were the sound

of the rowdy guys in the back of the club. That's what we were. We was them niggins that were turned up in the back that you'd just be looking back like, make sure they ain't coming over here with that bullshit. So we were that. And what people don't understand about crunk music, I don't know some people are like,

why did it do what it do? Why did it spread? Why did it become big? Because it was an outlet of energy for black youth. Yes. When you went to the club, you had a hard-ass week. you had a hard life,

whatever the fuck was going on in your life, you hear that fucking crunk music and you get in that damn mosh pit and you let all of that out and you feel amazing. You know what I mean? So that's why crunk music was able to reach so many people.

That's why I still like going, like I see you talking about all the time about Knuckers, you buck as a Negro spiritual. And it is. Like it touches your soul in a certain way and I think we do in like crunk music tap into music to

the ancestor because they were chanting and so on and so forth. What did you do when you were banned from clubs? I remember in college there was some clubs that were like, you cannot play none of that in this club. Yeah, put your hood up and all that stuff. We just kept going because when you

tell somebody you can't have it, they wanted more. You know, but it was crazy that the music got people so rowdy that they were losing. I've seen people. I was in Louisiana one time we did a show and they got so turned up. They start fighting the police in the club.

Amazing times. It's an amazing time. It's amazing times, man. Yeah, it was crazy. I want to just talk about one thing real quick that it's been going viral. It's the video of the $2 bill concert that we did in Atlanta. It's a viral video of, it's be performing, get crunk, and that whole concert. And you can see the energy.

on each and every if y'all look at the video each and everybody in their face is turned up it ain't nobody not one fucking cell phone in the air everybody's enjoying the moment everybody is energized and even you can see that the ground was shaking because the camera when it's steady is like moving that's how much energy was in that place and i think it's just a testament to like we just brought something different, you know? And like, the kids now think they are turning up, but they have no idea what a real turned-up time was from the 2000. And Get Crunk was such a great record

because I didn't think you could get crunker than Kings of Crunk. You know, I'm not even joking. I didn't think you could get crunker to that, but as soon as you hear who in my, Bo Hagen, B and me, motherfucker. You're like, God, name. Yeah, Bo Hogan killed that salute to Bo Hagan out there. How did you even have the mind?

to take that to another level. How did you take that energy to another level? That beat was produced by Lil Jay, who produced Nuck of You Buck. Wow. So it was time to, you know, come and work on the album, and, you know, everybody down with B&Me. Of course, people that don't know Crime Mob, part of that was through B&E.

So we are part of putting them out there. So, of course, I call all of the squad, you know, Trillville helped me write some of the songs. And, yeah, Little Jay sent me, I could, I think he sent me some beats and that was one of the beats. And I was like, this is insane. Wow. I thought it was one of the cruckest beats ever too.

Absolutely. I think my favorite beats that I've produced or co-produced or been on is get crunk and what you gonna do. And what you're gonna do is unique. I was in New York when I did that beat. I remember I was on TBT and Steve Gottlieb and shout out to Brian Leach, my boy Brian Leach, he was the A&R at the time. And he was like, Brian Leach, Brian Leach was like,

yo, you gotta go in and knock out this song for this, I think it was like a Christmas album or something, Christmas Crunk album that Steve Gottlie wanted to put out. And I'm like, he can't put no fucking album out called Crump without me, so I was like, fuck this guy. And so I was in New York and Brian was like, you gotta go in and record this song. So I was angry when I made that beat.

I'm never mad when I make tracks. But that's one of the only beats I've ever made when I was angry, and that's why I sound so aggressive. Because I was mad that I had to go in the studio and record this. I wanted to just go out. Like, I was like, I'm going to the club. He was like, no, you got to go in to do this song. And so that's my anger coming out through the drummership.

Did you have a trademarked the word, Crunk? I can't remember. Probably. You did all my ad lips. I know that. Because you're the face of Crunk, but to me, I would have to give, I would take 3-6 Mafia. All I know is what I've been told, and that's a half-truth is a whole lie.

For almost a decade, the murder of an 18-year-old girl from a small town in Graves County, Kentucky, went unsolved, until a local homemaker, a journalist, and a handful of girls came forward with a story. I'm telling you, we know Quincy killed her. We know. A story that law enforcement used to convict six people. and that got the citizen investigator on national TV. Through sheer persistence and nerve, this Kentucky housewife helped give justice to Jessica Curran. My name is Maggie Freeling.

I'm a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, producer, and I wouldn't be here if the truth were that easy to find. I did not know her and I did not kill her, or rape or burn or any of that other stuff that y'all said. They literally made me say that I took a match and struck and threw it on her, They made me say that I pour gas on her. From Lava for Good, this is Graves County, a show about just how far our legal system will go

in order to find someone to blame. America, y'all better work the hell up. Bad things happens to good people in small towns. Listen to Graves County in the Bone Valley feed on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to binge the entire season at free, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts.

I'm Jonathan Goldstein, and on the new season of heavyweight, I help a centenarian mend a broken heart. How can a 101-year-old woman fall in love again? And I help a man atone For an armed robbery he committed at 14 years old And so I Pointed the gun at him and said this isn't a joke And he got down

And I remember feeling kind of a surge of like Okay, this is power Plus my old friend Gregor and his brother Try to solve my problems Through hypnotism We could give you a whole brand new thing Where you're like super charming all the time Being more able to look people in the eye

Not always hide behind a microphone Listen to Heavyweight on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, host of the On Purpose podcast. I had the incredible opportunity to sit down with the one, the only, Cardi B. My marriage, I felt the love dying. I was crying every day. I felt in the deepest depression that I had ever had.

How do you think you're misunderstood? I'm not this evil, mean person that people think that I am. I'm too compassionate. I have sympathy for that fuck my man. Put so much heart and soul into your work. What's the hardest part for you to take that criticism? This shit was not given to me. I worked my ass off for me.

Even when I was a stripper, I'm gonna be the best pole dancer in here. When was the moment you felt I did it? I still, to this day, don't feel comfortable. I fight every day. to keep this level of success because people want to take it from you so bad. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Chetty on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. I started trying to get pregnant about four years ago now. We're getting a little bit older and it just kind of felt like the window could be closing. Bloomberg and IHeart Podcasts present IVF disrupted, the kind body story. A podcast about a company. that promised to revolutionize fertility care.

Introducing Kind Body, a new generation of women's health and fertility care. Backed by millions in venture capital and private equity, it grew like a tech startup. While Kind Body did help women start families, it also left behind a stream of disillusioned and angry patients. You think you're finally like with the right people in the right hands, and then to find out again that you're just not. Don't be fooled. what all the bright and shiny listen to ivf disrupted the kind body story starting september 19 on the i heart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts probably the so that's another argument going around it's an argument that says Memphis started crunk here's my here's what

i will say we in Atlanta you couldn't be Atlanta in the 90s and not be listening to eight ball MJG, you couldn't be riding around not listening to MasterP Master P. Master P changed the landscape of the South. The South. Period. That's right. He was the first one that really got us rowdy. I would say it was Master P. But we was listening to

Ball & G. And, of course, 3-6 mafia came around at our... You think P got us rowdy before 3-6? I think about it, about it. Bout it. Yeah, but tear the club up, I bet you won't hit him. Motherfucking hit him. What was 97? What year did it, about it, about it come out? I was in college, it had to be 95.

I think it was like 95. 95. I remember what happened was in the club, in Atlanta. It was playing bass music. And then when Master P came, that was over. About it, about it. That was 95. Definitely, I was a freshman in college.

That was the record. Motherfuckers in the hood was getting no limit tattoos. 1999. 95, yeah. Exactly. That's what changed it for us. So I will say Memphis is part of the influence, but our sound is different. Memphis was getting buck.

They said, body, body was 97. That's not even late, though. No, no, no, it came to 95 as a part of the album. Tear the club was a white label was 97. When we got Terry Club over, it was when they redid it, that was 97. Because I remember it says on the vinyl, tear the club up 97. So, but it started for us with Master P. Master P, that body, bowdy, body shit just changed everything.

But we are influenced, but it's all different sounds. But it all intertwines and works together. So what would you call with three, six, was doing um they called it in memphis memphis buck but three six was doing it even we wasn't even buck yeah i think it was just three six created their three six created their own lane of memphis music and then they changed the landscape of what memphis music is so salute paul juicy and the whole squad that's family too you know what the one you know what the was when you made when you were making these tracks did you try to make it your business not to sound the

same because you know when you look at your disography to see some of the records that you did like I'm so amazed because they don't sound the same right you can go to the window to the wall you can blow your whistle over here and then you like the shit is amazing yeah well it depends well a lot of it so so let's talk get low interesting story of get low get low became because I was trying to make party up I was inspired by party up I love DMX's party up so much. I was like, I want to make something like that.

Let me go in the studio. This was like 99. And so I go in and I come out with Get Low. If you listen to it, it's got the whistle, like party up. It's some similarities. I'm inspired by it, but I sat on the beat. I couldn't really come up with nothing. And then I had a session with Ying Yang and I pulled that beat out and we make Get Low.

So it comes out. Like that just came, like I said, because I was trying to do something different. but it turned from like a rowdy party up type song to a twerk song. Yeah. But then like, say, tell me when to go, E-40. We were in the studio together, and that's the energy of what he's giving me and his squad is giving me, and it comes out into the drumming shit. So every time I make the best stuff when I'm in the studio.

Youngblood's damn, we were in the studio together. And it took two days for us to get that song done. Like I did the beat the first day. We had the verses the first day, but we did. did not have the hook. And then the second day, we just threw a party in the studio. And then Bo Hagen, again, shout out Bo Hagen, he was like, everybody was throwing hooks out,

and then he was just kind of mumbling something. I was like, what you got? Because I'm shooting everybody's shit down, like, that shit's trash. And then he's just mummling son. I was like, what's that? That's it. That's it.

Go lay that. And then I got the second part. And sometimes that's how some of the records happen too. Like, you just stumble onto it. the whistle blow the whistle i did that bit that i did that beat the same week that i did tell me when to go damn yeah so i was working on e40s album and i think we had done muscle cars that day so too short too short had came to the studio a couple days after that so before like earlier in the week i was making beats and i was going through sounds and i found that sound and i was like

Ooh, this sounds like Freaky Tales bass line. Like, this is a bass like that. I was like, let me make something with that. And I don't know what made me, instead of making it slow, make it fast. Because I like to do stuff different. I don't like to be expected. So I was like, let me make it 100, whatever BPMs. So I put it to the side.

And when Too Short came to the studio a couple days later, I was like, here you go. You know, I got something for you. But first, 40 turned it down. So 40 didn't want it? 40 had to remind me just the other day. that he was like, you know, you gave me that beat first, and I was like, this sound like Todd, so give it to Todd, so that's what happened.

Basically, he should include production credit as well. I hate no credit. No, I had no credit. I did the beat, I got it until he didn't want it. What moment made you realize Crump had officially crossed from sovereign energy to a global movement?

Coming up doing MTV, they let me get in Times Square on a double-deck of bus with little scrappy, on TRL doing what you gonna do. Brud, MTV. I was gonna say MTV too, because I remember watching the video music awards. I forgot what year was, they played Get Low going in the commercial break.

And the audience went crazy and Justin Timberlake was wilding. And I just remember thinking to myself, oh, Get Low is out of here. Yeah, and then we end up performing Get Low at the MTV Video Music Awards. Get Low, yeah. lean back and what else we did that year I can't remember but that was that was a big time and Dave Chappelle was the host so that was pretty insane that was a pretty insane year for me

and when when you touched when you started doing R&B did you think you could do R&B or was one of the things how did you get introduced to say let me try to make R&B records but doing all it was already doing them with the social base also well that was different so here's what happened so Sean Garrett shout out Sean Garrett incredible songwriter he reached out to, I guess he was trying to get in touch with me, and he couldn't get in touch with me. So he knew somebody that worked with me. Her name was Delicia.

Delicia had all my beats. So she gave him a beat CD, and that's how he got the beat, basically the Freak Elite beat, which turned into Yeah. So she gave him the beat. So thank you Delicia for giving Sean those beats. And Sean wrote, yeah,

to that Freakleek beat. So crazy thing about that is, That beat was for mystical. Freakleague's beat was for mystical. So I did, though, I used to, like, have labels book me in Circle House, shout-out BB Circle House in Miami. And I, like, take a week, and I just go and do as many beats as possible, and the label could take all the beats, put them on whatever artist they want. So these particular sessions was for Mystical. That beat was in there.

He passed on it. And so I think CO, shout-out CO, he got the beat, and he wrote Freakily. leak. I don't even know this, but he wrote that and submitted it to the label, Petey Pablo. He ended up recording, but I don't even know this. So Sean Garrett has the beat. He writes yeah. Usher don't want to record no more songs. He's done with the damn album. He's like, I'm good. I'm good. I got Byrne. I got all these other songs. I'm good. We good. L.A. Reid's like, no, go record the damn song. So he goes and records the song. And, um, We come out with it.

I remember going in and doing the session, too. Like, I think we recorded in L.A. And we were like, this is a smash, right? And so the song is in the can. And then I remember it was around Christmas time. The album was done. L.A. Reed is in Miami. And he calls J.D. going insane.

And J.D. called me on three-way. And L.A. Reed is like, why am I hearing this Usher record on the radio? And basically, it was the first. Freakleek instrumental playing as a bed. They had released the song as a single, Freakleek, and we didn't even know, I didn't even know they had used to beat. So L.A. Reed is going crazy, and then we're like, all right, we're just going to go in and do a new beat.

Thank God we did because yeah over Freakaleak is not as good as yeah now. That's how God worked, though. And crazy story is when I went into the studio to, like, redo the beat, I'm like, that P.D. Pablo record ain't going to be that big. Just take all the keys off. Let's just play a new Simpli. Damn. I don't know. Because it's

Usher. You know what I mean? And I don't, you know, I just didn't think it was going to be that big. It could have been a cool record. Right. But I didn't think it was going to be a number one song like it was. So that's why the beats sound similar is because I just used the same

exact drums. But I played a different synth line. So, well, I got my boy, Elrock. My boy Elrock played the synth line. So we just played a new synth line. And here we are with two monsters at the same time. Well, yeah, probably helped Freakleague, though, because you play, yeah, now you want to play freaky league. Mix them together, all that.

Lovers and friends. Ah, so that, I was going to get to that. Yes, that origin story, tell them. So when we, when I can't, we were working on my album, Crunk Juice, right? So, instead of going with. with another up tempo, I like to be different, I could have certainly went to Usher John and Luder with another fast song.

I said, let's do something different. And in Atlanta, we go to the strip club for everything. So we always, you know, I was in the strip club one day and the DJ played the Michael Sterling lovers and friends and I was like, huh, that could be pretty cool for Usher to do. So let's back up. So this is before Usher's album is done.

I give Usher the Michael Sterling on the CD like, check this out. We should do this over. This nigga don't listen to it. He don't listen to it. So we're on my album. So I'm like, I'm going to take that lovers and friends idea

and do it for my album. So I do the beat over and I let Usher know, yo, I got this joint for us. Like, come, you know, let's do it. So he flies in, he records it, and he's out. And after he does his part, so I'm just like, wow, this is a smash.

So I call Luda. I'm like, bro, we got enough. Like, I need you on this ASAP, saying it's Luda, he did his parts, and then I go in last because I'm not the rapper. And so I was like, I need to take my time to make sure my verse is as catchy as possible because I can't compete against ludicrous. And then it's usher, like, come on. So I was like, let me take something from this record.

We had a record called, it's a record we did with Ubi. I forgot the name of it. Nothing three? Nothing's free. Oh, how you forget that? That's a classic. Nothing's free. So we did nothing free like in the 90s.

And so I was like, that shoddy part was really catchy on that song, but it was regional. Nobody really heard it out of the South. I was like, let me take that same little thing and put that in lovers and friends. And that will be the little catch for my verse to make it catchier. And little did I know that I was going to be like people's favorite verse in the car. It's so simple. It's so simple and it's catchy. And yeah, that's one, that song went number one without a video.

A video? Why we never got a video for that record? Because it was the labels and superstartists and superstar that and da-da-da-da-da. But number one, rap song of the year without a video in the 2000s is impossible. Mm-hmm. I was about it. Oh, real quick, you got three of fans, and you made me think of it when you said nothing's three. You got three artists that I feel like she'd have been way big. Yeah.

China White. Yeah. Ubi and Boahagan. Yeah. What do you think was, why those dots didn't connect? We worked hard. Like, Ubi was with me for a long time. We did a lot of records, but we just never got the right one.

It just happens like that sometimes with artists. China went to jail right when we shot the video for Bea Bia, and me and my boy Rob Mack left the video. At the end of the video shoot, we drove her to prison after the video shoot all the way in Louisiana. I don't remember how much time It was at least five years That sound on brand though

When I hear China Based off the lyric She went to fad time for gun running Damn Yeah so she She didn't even get to perform the song At its peak at all So that messed her window up

And then Bo Hagan The same thing We were just trying to get the records We just never got the records You know I set them up nicely on get crunk and you know he did the hook on damn but we just never was able to translate those are things that you know hurt me to this day because those are people that are down with me

for a long time and I was pushing pushing pushing and working and make the records but sometimes they just it just don't come out you know um I was going to say with the lovers and friends video when I talked when I watched you tell the story you talked about I know you mentioned labels loosely but you said that the labels didn't look at you as a comparable artist who which when I heard you say that at that time you like I just I mean I don't know it made me upset when I heard you say it well you got to think ludicrous is a rapper deaf jam in the 2000s usher is fucking usher at monster biggest guy in R&B and I'm this guy doing crunk music you got it's not the time it's not the same times now as I'm known I'm established I've proven myself over and over again yeah but early in those in those days it hadn't happened yet so really yeah they feel like you helped define that whole

sound of the early but they didn't i don't feel like you know deaf jam you know i mean they didn't get it usher i don't think nobody got it back there no yeah little john was it was he wasn't looked at as an artist per se like luda or usher he was a host dj yeah like you should love his music production yeah that's what it was hype man producer yeah you know i can't imagine the clubs without you. You know what? You like to know. What was the clubs without

punk music? Little John back then. Like, no. A lot less energy. That's right. Was there ever a low period for Little John? Yeah.

I got burnt out probably after after E40s album and I think I tried we tried to do a second Trillville and scrappy album and I just was fried from all, you know,

you got to think about I've been going since the 90s, 93, you know, producing to, what's that, 2008 or 2008? And I'm just depleted. I have no creative juices left. I go in the studio, I'm trying to produce and trying to make stuff. I think, yeah, nothing's coming out.

I think that's also what happened with two with those artists too, because I might have gotten to the point where I was just, I had nothing left. I couldn't create it. And then, so what I started to do was just go back to the foundation DJ and go back to the clubs right and what happened was Reggie Bush invited me out to the first game in the Super Dome after Katrina so I went there and that night he had after party went to the after party and it was a DJ DJ and I was just like this dude is freaking dope so I met the dude and he was cool and so the next day I was in

airport no no I'm gonna say his name oh okay all right uh his name is DJ Spider So the next day, I was in the airport and this nerdy white dude come up to me like, hey, remember me? I'm like, who the fuck are you, bro? He was like, oh, Spider. I was DJing last night. I was like, oh, shit. So what happened was he really inspired me

to get back into DJing, by the way he was mixing. So me and Spider linked up. He, like, got me on Cerrado. He started, like, gave me help me get my music library up, and we started DJing together. And so I started to kind of get back into DJing. And so DJing, brought my producer creative energy back.

Is that when the record's like shot, shot, shots and all that though, can? That came just by me being out and meeting people and, you know, learning this, you know, open format world and EDM world. And yeah, I ended up meeting LMFAO. I was kind of following their story and a mutual friend of ours named Eric Deluxe

who kind of, he wrote shots too. He reached out to me and sent me to record and I was like, this record is a smash. But around that time, I think I first met them when we did a Pitbull video. We were on like, I think it was crazy. I think they were in that video. So I was kind of working with Pitbull because we did the anthem. We did crazy.

Then, yeah, shots came. So I was still, I started to move into another world because I saw that EDM world. I kind of jumped in right as it's starting to get crazy. And I end up getting a DJ residency in 08 in Vegas. So I've been in Vegas doing a DJ residency since 08, and I'm still there now. So that was a place where I could really, you know, learn a different style, this open format world,

and just get my energy back from just being in the midst of the people and understanding what makes people move and groove again. Because DJ is the foundation of my production. Like, I think I started playing the drums when I was in elementary school, So drums and DJing are the two key elements to my production style. That's why it's more beat-driven and that's why they're all club record because of the DJ side. When you choose the pivot, because you know, you pivoted a lot. When you choose the pivot, is it because of where music is going or where you're going as a person?

Where my spirit leaves me. My spirit, you know, when I started to get back into DJing, God put these people in my path to say, okay, you should now start moving over here. And I remember, like, telling my manager and my lawyer, I want to go over here and do this DJ stuff. They were like, bro, you're making $100,000 a beat. What the hell is wrong with you? I was like, I can't do it no more.

But I saw the future. And I just trust, I always trust my spirit. Ladies and gentlemen, don't listen to your mind. Listen to your spirit. And you got to learn the difference between the two. And when you learn the difference, your spirit is never going to lead you wrong. Trust it and it's going to be fine. And that's what I've been doing, you know, pretty much my whole life.

And everything's been okay, you know what I mean? Like I've been able to now have a number one edium song, hip-hop song, R&B song, AC song. How many people, you know, had a hit song in every, in four decades? Right. I don't know. You know, we had a hit with even the Usher Glue song. I think it was an AC hit number one.

I take it. And then I had a song with Pitbull that came out two years ago called Jumping. That was like number one on some chart. So, yeah, since the 90s I've been doing this. And I'm just thankful every day to wake up and to still be able to do this. And also like right now is the time where the 2000s is on fire. Yeah. Like a surgeon.

It's on like I'm doing so many shows that and for crowds that I haven't seen. and, you know, or maybe not have done as a headliner. I have never headlined for 10,000 people until, like, the last couple years. They just headlined this week. You know, tacos in tequila. Yeah, so it's like, it's amazing that people, the memories that people have from that era, the fun times they had is making this music, you know, now come back and it's in a major way. What made you do the meditation of them?

because that's totally far the other end of the spectrum yeah turning 50 turned 50 a lot of things started to happen in my life first thing I it hit me was like I ask myself what makes you happy and I said damn I'm making making sure everybody else good but that's not what makes me like what makes me happy I couldn't really tell myself And so I was like, you know what? I need to kind of put myself first. Like, I'm not happy in this marriage. Like, so I said I wanted to divorce.

And also around the same time, me and my good friend, Doug Davis, we talk like every year because he calls and gives me shit because he's like a couple months younger than me. So he's like, oh, you're old man. So we're talking and he was telling me he wanted to introduce me to some. that was in this space and I was like oh that's interesting because I've been listening to like all of this like binaural beats to sleep and relax and ocean and rain and all of this type of stuff so me and this guy Kabir his name is Kabir Segal we connected and so I'm going through the divorce and like

I didn't like where my mental state was that because I'm angry I'm like I Why can't she just do this and that? So I'm, like, mad, and I don't like, that's not me. I'm a positive at all times person. I don't think negatively. So I'm like, I started to, like, meditate every day. I started to say affirmations every day. And it helped me to be in a better mental state,

as well as having good people in my corner, like my queen. Her name is Jamila. She was there for me at that time, and she would give me like also like just positive she would just keep me try to keep me in a positive mindset and she had been through a rough divorce too so she can give me some insight and just you know help me keep my head up so the affirmations every day i would literally get a cup of tea and i had a copper pyramid on my deck i would drink get my tea go sit in this copper pyramid and meditate and just say these affirmations i'm happy i'm healthy i'm at peace everything

day and throughout the day and so all it is happening at the same time i meet kabir and me and kabir talking he's like let's do we should do meditation so i was like yeah let's do that i'm down with that i think that's great because i was saying these affirmations i meditated so um we went in recorded a bunch of stuff but yeah it was because it was i needed it was time for a change in my life i needed to be in more positive mindset one thing that i also did was i was like I would say affirmations of I negativity can't live inside of me I I like I don't I try to get rid of all negative thoughts right and when I did that when I really got rid of the negative thoughts I ain't not even saying the word hate I didn't even use that word so I'm always trying to change anything that happens to me in any negative situation it's some positivity you can pull out of that. focus on that so i would always pull that positivity out and i've learned if you pull that out pull a positivity out of any negative situation and you let god drive don't try to drive and trust

god everything going to always be all right that's right and so we went in we recorded these albums and uh you know this time of my life is feeling like i'm doing what god intended me to do But what's amazing is everything that got me here I was supposed to do and even like all of the music that I've given people, gave people positivity. So it's always been positivity but it's meaning more now

when someone tells me I never meditated. You help me meditate. I was having trouble getting over this grief of losing someone. Your meditation about grief help me. I'm inspired to, you know how many people have called me about getting in the gym Yeah.

It's insane. Like celebrities, all kind of people are like, you inspired me to get healthy. So I feel now like I'm doing what God intended me to do. It took me a long time to get here, but this is the time it's supposed to be. And crazy, I was thinking about this the other day, I met Mr. Farrakhan at the Source Awards.

Luton-I won Tariqan. And he basically told me, he said, you got power, you got a voice. and he basically was kind of trying to tell me like use it and that like that stuck with me like I'm like okay but now I'm using my voice and my power in a good way to push positivity into the world so that is what makes you happy that's what that's what you know what all I know is what I've been told and that's a half truth is a whole lie for almost Almost a decade, the murder of an 18-year-old girl from a small town in Graves County, Kentucky, went unsolved,

until a local homemaker, a journalist, and a handful of girls came forward with a story. I'm telling you, we know Quincy Kilder, we know. A story that law enforcement used to convict six people, and that got the citizen investigator on national TV. Through sheer persistence and nerve, this Kentucky House was. wife helped give justice to Jessica Curran. My name is Maggie Freeling. I'm a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, producer, and I wouldn't be here if the truth were that easy to find.

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All the bright and shiny. Listen to IVF disrupted, the Kind Body story, starting September 19 on the IHeart Radio. app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Yeah, it makes me happy that. Just to do good, you know, just to do good because all that comes back. And when you, like a guy came to me, I did the Coligard thing, right? A guy came to me in the club one night, in the club and was like, I did that Coler guard test because of you and it came back positive and he did he didn't have colon cancer but he

had polyps so just stuff like that it just makes me feel like I'm doing good in the work you know my brother you're sure and being a good role model to my son I have a daughter now you know she's 10 months old congratulations I look at life like with health like I got to be here for her You know what I'm saying? I got to be here for her first day of school. I got to be here for high school graduation. Walk her down the aisle. So health is even more important to me.

It was something I was doing to just, you know, live a long, full life. But even more so now I have even more motivation because of my daughter and her mother. I got to be here for them. Yeah. It's crazy to see you cry because a lot of people who never even thought you had eyes. No, you know what? No, you know what? Black men, we need to cry more.

I agree. We need to cry. When you get more in tune to your higher self, and you stop vibrating at these low frequencies, you can let yourself let the energy flow because we should. We don't have to be tough all the time. And you're an advocate for therapy.

I push all brothers. We don't have to suffer in silence. We suffer in freaking silence. Call your homie sometimes. It'll just be like, my nigga, you good? How are you doing? Not just, period, but how are you mentally doing, bro? Because that one little conversation

could make him not go do some stupid shit or take his life or whatever. You know, so I started doing therapy. I pushed anything, any knowledge that I got, I try to share with everybody because we got to help each other. That's right. We all we got. For sure.

What's the gym? What's the gym mean? This is Satrine. This is positivity, abundance, and it's also my daughter's birthstone. That's right. Yeah. I want to ask you a question about marriage. Like you never hear men say,

They were tired of the marriage. Like, they wanted to walk away. What happens is when you start to walk on those eggshells, it's just not a positive environment. And then when you get to the point where a lot of times in marriage, we're just there making sure everything's good. And who the hell is checking on us? Who's making sure we okay?

Who's coming to us and saying, what do you need today? What can I do for you to make you happy? You know, I know we're the providers and all of that, but we need that love too. We need that assurance. Sometimes women, go to your men and just make them feel like appreciated. Because to live in today's society to go out and make that money and all of the things a husband and a father has to worry about every single day.

Like I said, suffering in silence that y'all have no clue about. Just be that positive life. Make that house a home. Make it radiate positivity. You know? So, yeah, man. Y'all got me up here crying. Yeah.

It's good. You said today was going to be a good day, great interview. You might have needed to release. Really good. You know what I wanted to know when Dave Chappelle was doing the skits? At first, did you take it as disrespect or did you always was like, oh, this is great? No. Cipher Sounds called me and he was like, when he did the first one, he was like, yo,

Day Chappelle did this skit on you, bro. It's crazy. It's hilarious. I was like, on me? I'm like, why he do a skisking? on me like I ain't nobody and he's like bro trust me and so when I saw it I was like that's really me that is really me yeah and I got on this show because I went one day to just tell Dave thank you for doing the sketches because we have a mutual friend's name

Corey Smith with the Corey and Corey is the reason Dave is part of the reason Dave does the sketch too because I think they might have heard this like what song was it uh I don't give a F. Yeah, I don't give him. He might have heard it, and he probably was like, this would be interesting if that's all he says, but he's actually intelligent. And then Corey was like, yeah, John,

Corey thought I went to Morehouse. I just was always hanging out in the AUC, because back in the 90s, if you're from Atlanta, you went to the AUC, Clark, Spellman, all of that, to just get girls. You know what I mean? So you just used to go hollet the girls. So I used to be always up there.

So Corey was like, no, he's smart. He comes from this and that. Dave ran with it and so I went to the show to thank Dave and they was like man hang out I want you to let's do a sketch like he didn't even have and he didn't even know I was coming and so we would just we did one sketch and then we he had an idea to do another one so he just had me on camera and he was off camera and we was improvving back and forth and that's how we got the little John and little John sketch and to think that I was able to improv with one of the greatest comedians of our time

how many people get to do that, not many, you know? So that was amazing and Dave took me places that music would never, ever be able to take. How did that change everything for you? Yeah. Just that sketch. It just opened me up to more people that didn't get it or didn't, would have never listened to the music. I remember just being in the airport and like all kind of white people

coming to me, like the whole families and all, just all types of people, because he was moving the needle. at that time for culture so and it just yeah it just opened up a lot more doors and that's when they started putting the teas in the name little jump that's when you started hearing that yeah so and shout out to cat williams too because he he co-signed me too when um he did his pimp chronicles i think that's his greatest special too absolutely i'm going on record saying that and uh you know we he brought me out and let me do my catchphrases and we ended up going in the studio working on some songs together. He just come by the house. Shout out the cat. I need to get you in the gym with me,

cat. You can go work out. You can run, but can you put some weight up, cat? Yeah. Do you get tired of doing that too? Do people come up to you all the time, like, come on, one time? Oh my God. Does that bother the issue? I could be, yeah, man. They don't do it as much as they used to. Okay. But, like, people that used to hang out with me, like, say, early 2000s or, you know, 2010 used to be like, bro, you don't get tired of that? And I'm like, I don't even hear it no more. I zoned people out. But like, yeah, I used to be at like TSA, a grocery store.

They're like, yeah, oh! Exactly. And they do it till they expect me to do it. So they keep doing it and I might just be like, what's up, bro? But even in the meditation album, you do, it's a soft, yeah, but you say, Telling Universe, yeah. Yeah, so that's the new meditation album.

Yeah. So when we did the first, we recorded a bunch of stuff when we, you know, early two, well, sorry. When I did the first meditation album, I recorded a couple other projects. Gotcha. So one of the projects was something that my guy, Doug Davis came up with. He was like, you should take your songs and remix them into meditations. And I was like, okay.

So we recorded it, but I was like, this don't need to come out first because nobody's going to take me serious. So I'm doing like, say yeah to life. Right. Get low and ground. You know, so I was like, we're not going to do that first. So now at the time, we're going to drop that. I think it's a fun project, but it's real meditations,

but it's just a playoff of the songs that you know and love. I just got a couple more questions. You know, the industry rewards constant energy, right? Like, you got to always be on. How did you learn the difference between performance energy and just personal peace? I just am myself. It's spiritual again. Like, I just know when to be.

Crazy little John. I know when to be just cool, chill. It's just, just let my spirit guide me everywhere, you know what I'm saying? So. And you're talking about the meditation and the mindfulness, like, what I want to ask when you were at the height of crunk, did you even have the language for like stress and anxiety

and burnout back then? No. I was just go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go. It was all just, because I don't, I don't know where the peak is, you know what I mean? And I don't expect to get where I got, you know. You know, because I just started off. Me and the East Side Boys, we did that first song,

Who You With, just to make something for the clubs of Atlanta. And then that turned into, okay, now you got to do an album. And then that turned into being on Anger Management tour with M&M and 50. And then 50 Cent even took me to Australia. I went on a tour with 50 in Australia. You know what I'm saying? So it's like, I'm just happy to be here. I'm just going to keep going because, and that's how I am.

Like, I just, I got to work. I got to keep working, you know, because these are opportunities. that are coming to me so I don't want to you know somebody sitting at home right now wishing they could be out or somebody else could take this opportunity and use it if I don't use it so I'm going to take advantage of all of that now you were a big drink at one time and totally stop yes yeah what made you stop that drinking turning 50 so you're at 50 to 50 to stop drinking man why you judge you're still drinking in it yeah so I turn 50 and for a while like a year or two I had this constant like discomfort excuse me discomfort in my side and I

didn't know what it was so 50 like I need to go get a I need to go to the doctor right so I went to the doctor and the doctor is like okay for one is I thought it was my liver because I'm like I drink too much it's got to be my liver and I'm scared as well so he's like your liver's on the other side it's not your liver and then he's like I it's probably um inflammation in your gut he's like you're you're 50 years old you need a colonoscopy anyway to check for polyps so when i'm in there i can check i can do an endoscopy and check your gut right so comes back and i have inflammation in my gut so i had stopped drinking because i was scared of the liver so i had already stopped so by the time i had the colonoscopy it'd

been like six months and i was like i'm good i'm just going to not drink no more So I think I was going like three months and I was like, ah, six months. I was like, nah, then I was like, maybe I go nine months. Then I went to a year and I was like, when I got to the year mark, I was like, I'm good. I don't even need to drink no more, you know. And I think one thing that kind of, that, that like brought some insight to me, like health has been like important to me for a while because I know like a guy that had a triple bypass. He was like 35. So that started me first on my, like I need to start correcting stuff with myself before it's too late because the older you get, the harder it is to reverse what's going on.

So that's that started. And then when I was dating my partner, Jamila, she really pushed me into, I think she saved my life because she pushed me into getting my blood work done and getting lab work done. I found out I had inflammation in my gut. like I knew I had inflammation in my gut but I candida gut is the key to a lot of problems in your body so you got to get the I saw the rock talking and he said his gut was messed up too

so no healthy bacteria in my gut candida inflammation and then I found other like markers in my blood work that I was like oh I got to change this or take this out of my diet so all of that helped me to like hone in

on exactly what I needed to do also to get my health like more tuned tuned in to I saw you say it was like you came up out of a haze

or a fog when you stopped drinking because if you think about it I was drinking every weekend so I never fully got over the drinking like I would drink a bottle of 42 a night

Jesus like so Friday Saturday a bottle of 42 first of all I ain't going to let none of these alcoholics and here talking about some goddamn Jesus

I be drinking but all the nights a whole bottle Because I'm doing shots with everybody. We might do a couple shots, but we ain't doing no whole body. I'm the six-up. I'm the party guy. We don't want to drink with me. And I got to drink with everybody.

If I turned down a shot, they were like, bro, come on, man. So I got a damn near a bottle of night. So I'm always constantly getting over, the hangover, or the getting, my body is still trying to recover. So I never am recovering. So when you lay off the alcohol, you come. you come out of that fog and it's like, it's like everything is clearer. Your mind is clearer, everything, you know?

So I just, I like the way that felt. And then, you know, when I started working out, it's like, I can work out. Like, you can't work out when you hung over. And then you put an alcohol in your body, that's sugar. That's not going to help you get the goals. So if you write a book, you know, it should be, have a chapter turned down for what

and you talk about exactly all the reasons why your ass should turn down. Yeah. Especially when you get in your up there in the years, you know, because right, I'm 53. I'm going down the hill. You know what I mean? I want to have, that's another thing at my 50s. I was like, I'm over that top.

I don't know how much time I got. I want to enjoy my life. I want to enjoy my life. I want to do stuff that makes me happen. Do you think people truly understand the loneliness that can come with success and entertainment? No, because they just see the private jets and. the trips and all that, they don't realize, you know, sometimes you can't go nowhere because people bugging you.

You can't spend time with your loved ones without people bugging you. Right. Or the, the, I got to make another hit record. Or, you know what I mean? Like, or even when you start to go down, you're not as hot as you were, people not picking up the phone and all that. Yeah, it's a lot of people, most people couldn't deal with this life. They could not deal with it because there's too much pressure. then people on the internet with all their opinions

and all of this and that and it's a lot of pressure that you cannot be built weak to be in entertainment. So, yes sir. My last question, when you think about legacy now, how much of it is about peace and purpose

rather than, I guess, the plaques and the parties and all that? I think my legacy is going to be all about positivity because every step of the way, it's been, Crunk was positive, it was a positive release, Then, now, EDM stuff was positive, positive part. It was all partying based initially, but it wasn't like I was saying, go do a drive-by on the ops.

You know what I mean? It was just like, hey, go release, turn up, you know. And then, you know, now in my latter years, it's meditation, mindfulness, get therapy, fellas. I'm going to tell everybody out there, get therapy. That's right. get a therapy, if it's going through it, you should not be left to your own devices

to deal with some serious issues. Sometimes you need to talk to someone that's a qualified person. And I did EMDR. Did you ever do EMDR? I never did EMDR. EMDR is amazing because it taps into your subconscious. When I did EMDR, stuff came out

that I didn't even really didn't know what's there. So it can tap to the, it can find the root of why you got that trauma. And then like, I did that with ayahuasca. Yeah, I have not done any of that yet. I don't want to do it. I'm thinking about it, but I don't want to,

I don't want it to change me. It won't. Because I just feel like I'm already at a certain place. Yeah. But I do want to go tap into those things that I have locked deep, deep, deep away. A lot of people who've done EDMR tell me that the I-Wi-Wi experience is pretty similar

because everything that is in your subconscious that you suppress, right. God is like, no, look at it here. It's all on the table now. Is that a scary feeling though when you've got to face all that stuff? No, it's just, it's profound. EMDR is profound because it's like, that's why I act like that.

Or that's why my mother treated me that way. Or this is why that happened. It helps you. And then like EMDR, like, when I did it recently, I was able to go to my childhood self and say, it's okay. Wow. I'm here. It's fine. You're loved, you're appreciated, you know, all of that.

And it helped me to get past whatever. whatever that was. So that's why I like it because it's stuff that, you know, because I was kind of, not forced, but I was like, someone was like, you should, you know, go. You should try it, you know, because it helped them. And I did it and I was like, man, I'm good, I don't need it. And then I was like, damn.

Yeah, yeah. It was like, I did not know that. And the more you do it, the more stuff comes to you and you just realize this is why I'm the way I am, I can now get past this and I can change these habits, you know, and I can be living more, I can live a better life. Wow. Man, little John, you are an icon living.

That's right. You're an icon living. You're one of the greatest producers of all time. You bought people so much joy in this next chapter of your life where you are helping people heal. I think it's going to be your best work yet, my brother. I think so, too. I do too.

I do too. It feels so good when people come to me and say, you help. That's what it is. Without me even directly doing anything for them, I'm helping so many people and inspiring people. Like with the fitness journey, with the bodybuilding thing coming in third in this competition, it was just, it was hard to just do it, period.

It was hard to just even get there, and I was just happy to be a part of it. And I just want to inspire people to say, that say, I can't work out, I don't have time. I'm on the road. I'm a new father. I'm in a studio.

I'm doing a million things, and I'm able to go to the gym and transform my body, eat right, do all these things. So you can do it too. You can be the new Billy Blanks, man. You can do training,

hit training, where it's your music, playlist, all the crunk music. We can do that. Body by John. Hey, body by John.

I love it. Okay. Help me out with it, Solomon. I got you. It can make you happy, Oh, no, I love it. I love it.

There you go. Well, Little John, we appreciate you for joining us. And also, December 18th, you're performing for our sister station. 96.1. Jingle ball. Yeah. I'm coming. So what should the people expect for Little John in that show?

Crunk. Period. They want it. Because it says Little John and Friends. It's Crook, Crunk, Crunk and Friends. Crock and Friends. Crock, Crunk, Crunk. I can't wait.

There's no commercial just, it's Atlanta. and I got to hit them hard you know Jermaine talking crap all like ah but Jermaine my that's family Jermaine actually called me was like who you bring it out

I was going to ask because y'all got friends that are friends so but I'm just going to bring the crunk that's what they want that's what I'm going to give them that's what they ain't seen in a while so that's what I'm going to give them

I ain't trying to do nothing crazy crunk could that era ever come back like the way Metro Boomer just did futuristic summer could that trunk era ever come back if it did it'll I don't know if people can handle it.

I think we need it. Like grown people who don't get the release. You know what I'm saying? Maybe you have somebody put their phones up. But you don't heal the same way. You can't be jumping around. Yeah. Everybody gets to be.

And I don't know how that was sprinkled down to the YN's. Like, how would they heal? We don't need your. It's going to sprinkle. TikTok on getting it. I don't think that Kron could be recreated, but I'm glad that we do have these Krunk classics that will never die.

So we go. I don't think it could come back. Maybe I do something next year. Maybe I do something like. Why not? You know, Metro did. Maybe I will. Why not?

I was talking about it, but it's just got to be the right. Everything with me is the right time. Yes. You know, when the universe tell me it's time for it, that's when it happened. That's right. All right. Well, 96.1. Get your tickets.

He will be performing at the Atlanta's Jingle Ball. Can't wait to see you guys. It's the Breakfast Club. Good morning. Hold up. Every day I wake up. Wake your ass up. The Breakfast Club.

Do y'all finish or y'all's done? The murder. of an 18-year-old girl in Graves County, Kentucky, went unsolved for years, until a local housewife, a journalist, and a handful of girls came forward with a story. America, y'all better work the hell up. Bad things happens to good people in small towns. Listen to Graves County on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And to binge the entire season, ad-free, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Introducing IVF disrupted, the Kind Body story, a podcast about a company that promised to revolutionize

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And a centenarian rediscovers a love lost 80 years ago. How can a 101-year-old woman fall in a... love again listen to heavyweight on the iHeart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts hey i'm j setty host of the on-purpose podcast i had the incredible opportunity to sit down with the one the only cardi b my marriage i felt the love dying i was crying every day i felt in the deepest depression that i had ever had this was not given to me i always Work my ass off for me. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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