JAE MILLZ What’s going on with your album, Back To The Future? It was supposed to come out in September, but I pushed it back to the first quarter of 2006. I got the joint with me and Jada out right now, that’s my new single. It’s on Funkmaster Flex’s The Car Show King album too. That’s the single the DJs are burning down. We trying to put the remix together with Busta Rhymes and Fabolous. I’m trying to finish up the album. I’ve got a joint with me, T.I., and Slim Thug, a joint with Paul Wall, a Cool & Dre joint, the list goes on and on. I’m still working. Do you think you’re the Most Persistent? I hope so. I can’t wait til this album drops. I can put that award next to my Most Hated trophy. You really feel like you’re hated? Yeah, I feel like that, even though I get a lot of love. My man Mac Boney always tells me, “You get too much love. Everybody cool with you. Who don’t like you?” But there’s people out there who hate me. That’s what keeps me going. I feel like it’s me against the world. I don’t wanna get lazy. I wanna stay in hungry mode, ready to grind. Not just on some rap shit, niggas is really fuckin’ with me. I get love in the South, out West, in the Midwest, I get love in New York. New rappers, old rappers, new producers, old producers, shit is cool. I’m just happy to be doing something constructive with my time. Even though you work with a lot of rappers from the South, are you trying to be the one to bring New York back? That is my intention. I’m not blocking nobody else though. I’m not saying that Papoose or Remy or Cory Gunz or Juelz or Grafh or Tru-Life ain’t gonna bring New York back. I definitely feel like I’m one of those people that’s doing it. That’s my intentions with the whole Back To The Future thing. I’m the statue moving in right now. It ain’t no more shitting on nobody else. Like I said, I fuck with everybody. But being that I’m from New York, I wanna bring that back. When you look on the TV, I wanna see down South niggas doing they lean dance. I wanna see they shoulder lean. I wanna see niggas in New York in their army jackets. I wanna see Paul Wall’s niggas with grills. Right now you can’t really solidify what’s the New York sound. Everybody else got a sound except New York.
New York don’t have an identity, and it’s up to the new dudes and the people who are veterans and the people who been around and the forefront and pioneers in the game. Niggas ain’t gotta do party records, just do your kind of music. Anybody could make a party record, but everybody can’t be theyself. That’s the crazy shit that bugged me out. Everybody in the world can make a party record and pull up in the club poppin’ bottles, but nobody can be theyself. When niggas stop being theyself that’s when the game gets fucked up. I want niggas to start being theyself again. They don’t understand why niggas like Bun B and UGK or Outkast or Goodie Mob gets so much respect; these niggas been around for years. In New York we just ain’t been respecting what niggas were doing. We wasn’t paying attention because they wasn’t selling 8, 9 million. Now they’ve got alliances and they fuckin’ with each other and helping each other sell records. That’s what shit gotta come to. Niggas is too sour in New York. We gotta swallow our pride. Everybody’s got money. Everybody’s got jewelry and cars and their own labels. But what’s after that? You gotta get money with somebody. I’m gonna be the one to bring New York back. A lot of muthafuckers is bringing it back with me, but I’m gonna do it in everything. I rep New York when I go to Tallahassee, when I go to Atlanta, when I go to Texas. Wherever I go I still rep New York and still show love to that town I’m in. Is it harder for you to come in the game without a cosigner? You’re not coming in under somebody else’s umbrella. It’s ten times harder. But that’s what’s gonna make my shit so much more powerful and potent. Look at how T.I. came in the game by himself. It’s not like he came in under somebody. He was working with niggas like Pharrell and Beenie Man, but he was still Tip. He was still doing his street shit and mixtape shit. In the back of my mind, that’s the same way I’m looking at it. I’m gonna do it on my own. When you got niggas fuckin’ with you, you don’t need no cosigner. I got niggas that fuck with me everywhere. I can name a rapper from every state that fucks with me on the rap level and the respect level. I don’t feel like I could lose. I just gotta keep doing my music. Are you coming down for Demp Week? Wow, man, I feel sorry for anybody who’s not present at Demp Week. The first time I went, I came back to Harlem like, “Yo, y’all need to fuck with my man Demp. Y’all niggas don’t know what you’re missing.” - Photo and words by Julia Beverly OZONE
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