Why did you decide that was the right venue for the first UGK reunion performance? Bun B: I don’t know if we really just picked it or the situation just lent itself to that. If it’s gonna happen, then why stop it? I got nothing against you personally. I get on your back a lot just because I don’t want you to get comfortable in the position you’ve got. I want you to stay on your toes and stay on your shit. [laughing] The main drawback to success is that it gets harder to maintain everything; friendships, marriage, your cars, wardrobe, you know, you just gotta be patient and be smart about shit. You’ve got a real laid back personality and a lot of times you just seem depressed. Do you think longterm use of syrup has contributed to that? Bun B: Nah, I was pretty much a down cat before I even started sipping syrup. But I wouldn’t say I’m down all the time. You tend to see me at home a lot, in Houston, and whenever I gotta leave my house I’m like that. Cause that’s pretty much what I do – I stay at home, in my bed – when I’m not working. But I wouldn’t say I’m depressed. I’m in a really good place in my life right now. I’m a moody fuck. I’m man enough to admit that I get moody as a muthafucker. But I’m extremely blessed and I’m happy with my position in life. I play my position. I might seem down from time to time, but believe me, I’m happy to be here. If I didn’t wanna be [out], I’d be home. People get selfish sometimes and only think about themselves, but I come out to [events] for the greater good. When you’re on the road, your wife travels with you a lot. With most rappers, you don’t see that too often. How difficult is it to be married and maintain a career that requires you to travel frequently? Bun B: I think if we weren’t around each other as much it’d be more of a problem. Most rap couples have young children still in elementary school or maybe middle school, but our children are older, they’re in college, so my wife doesn’t have to sit here [in Houston] and watch babies. Lately I’ve been having a lot of opportunities to go to a lot of big cities and do big shit. The VMAs, the BET Awards, the ASCAP Awards, all these different things, and I’ve been able to take advantage of those opportunities. So why not bring my wife? Who else would I want to share these types of things with? I don’t know what the relationship is like for some [married rappers], but it doesn’t cause me any stress. When she’s not around is when it tends to be stressful for us. I got an email recently with a “Bun B interview” in another media outlet where you were quoted as saying “Fuck BET.” Bun B: First of all, I never said “Fuck BET.” That [interview] was [supposedly done by a guy] somewhere with some dog-tag jewelry on, throwing money in the club and all of that, and why would I give him an interview with no contact information? It was a lot of things that didn’t [add up]. Obviously, I’ve done a million interviews, and none of them were conducted the way that this cat tried to claim that I did this interview. He’s got no audio of the “interview.” So it really put me in the middle of a bunch of shit. I’ve got nothing but love for BET as an establishment. As far as I’m concerned, I could never really [criticize BET] because with the South blowing up right now, BET has as much to do with it as any other media outlet. We’ve had problems in the past, not just with BET, but with everybody playing videos or every magazine or whatever, as far as the South not really getting its proper coverage. But as far as singling out somebody and saying “fuck them,” you know, these people let me perform on the red carpet with Webbie – not just me, but my artist – so I got nothing but love for Kelly G, BET, and the whole establishment. I have had some problems being a Southern artist and trying to break ground, but today, everybody’s getting that play right now. I really hate that the statement “fuck BET” got attributed to me, cause anybody that knows me and knows my character knows that if I had a problem with somebody I would address them, but I would never use the internet or magazines or whatever to air my dirty laundry. You said that your New Year’s resolution is to keep UGK members out of jail, and of course you were mostly joking, but what worries you more - keeping Pimp calm or keeping yourself out of trouble? Bun B: I run just as hot as anybody else, so when I said keep UGK members out of jail, I’m trying to keep all of us out of jail. There’s a lot of hate going on right now, you know what I’m sayin’? People are really trying to back me and Pimp into a corner right now. I’m really just trying to stop all the hate that’s going on. A lot of these folks put rappers in certain positions and rappers get caught up, they’ll have to end up shooting one of these niggas. They tryin’ to rob niggas and instigate a lot of beef and make them do shit that’s gonna compromise themselves out here in this game. So my whole thing is to try to keep my eyes open and see problems coming from afar and try to move that shit out the way so that when it comes to me and Pimp, we won’t be put in a situation where we’ve gotta do some shit we really don’t need to be doing. We’re at a crucial point in 92
our career where we could really take this South shit to another level, so we’re not tryin’ to get caught up in no dumb shit. We do what we have to do – always have and always will – but right now we’re really tryin’ to see the bullshit from afar and avoid the shit before it even gets to us. Just really trying to keep the hate out the way. When you say there’s a lot of hate right now, are you referring to issues you have with other rappers? Street beef? The whole North vs. South thing that seems to be brewing? Or what, exactly? Bun B: I’m talking about minions of the devil. I’m a child of God, and minions of the devil are people who try to get into your life and fuck your life up. Whether it’s homeboys, women, enemies, rappers, gangstas, random cats on the street. There’s a lot of people trying to stir up shit with the South and the East coast right now. Me, I’m not going after nobody. The South is in a good place right now. A lot of people wanna take attention away from what we’re doing and put that attention towards what everybody else is doing, which kills the point of what we’re trying to get across right now. I don’t see any reason why anybody [in the South] would wanna try to get into it with somebody from another region right now. Everybody needs to concentrate on what their region is doing to try to take they shit to another level. I’m concentrating on the South; I’m not paying attention to what anybody else is doing. I’m not worried about what they’re doing or not doing. I’ve got respect for a lot of people and love for a lot of people [in the North] but right now I’m just trying to move the South forward. But just because I’m pro-South doesn’t mean I’m anti-East, West, Midwest, or whatever. I’m pro-South, that’s all that is. Some Southern rappers are upset at Nas’ album Hip-Hop Is Dead because they felt like that was a shot at the South, and Pimp kinda spoke on it on the “Hatin’ The South” record. Do you consider your music “hip-hop”? Bun B: I don’t really pay attention because it’s not my argument whether hip-hop is dead or not. First of all, I think a lot of people are getting hip-hop misunderstood. Hip-hop is a lifestyle that consists of DJing, breakdancing, graffiti, and emceeing. That’s hip-hop, it encompasses all of that. Outside of that, what we’re doing down South, it’s rap music. If we wanna be hip-hop, we need to be DJing, breakdancing, and all that. That’s hip-hop. What we do down here is make rap music, and as far as I’m concerned, the state of rap music is great. Now, if hip-hop is dead, that’s something that’s really outside of my realm. It ain’t got nothing to do with me, so whoever does hip-hop needs to be concerned with whether hip-hop is dead or not. I’m a Southern rapper, I make rap music, I respect hip-hop, but as far as whether it’s dead or not that’s really not something for me to be concerned about. But I got a lot of love for hip-hop and if it is dead, that’s something that they need to be taking care of. In last year’s interview you spoke about the idea of the new Confederacy – do you still feel that the South should actually secede? Bun B: Well, yeah, but that was never a rap issue. That was concerning Katrina and the government. I was never talking about Southern rappers seceding, I was talking about the Southern states of America and the way that the Southern states weren’t getting federal funds during Katrina. I’m talking about the residents of Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi, nothing as simple as rap. I’m talking about the fact that when it came time for Southern residents to get the funds and the help that they needed, the government wasn’t there to help them. If you listen to the intro to my album Trill, it wasn’t about rap. It was about the government. The Southern states of America, in terms of fund allocations. They need to get relief funds out here to these disaster victims. It’s nothing as simple as a separation of rap music. Rap ain’t even that serious. When the Black Panthers and civil rights movements were gaining power, there’s actually documented cases of the government planting letters and rumors and such to put them at odds with each other. With all the beef and rumors that come about in rap today, do you think the government has anything to do with it, or are we bringing it on ourselves? Bun B: It’s not the government. I think it’s record labels knowing that controversy sells. When they see these cats going down these paths [and having beef] instead of telling them, “Concentrate on your craft. Concentrate on making good music,” they fuel the fire. They give them room to do the dumb shit that they’re doing sometimes. Real men are gonna have beef sometimes but a lot of this shit is petty and it coulda been talked about and discussed [to clear it up]. But the people who make money off the records choose to let bullshit get big just so numbers can sell. That’s why a lot of unnecessary shit starts happening. As a legend in the game and sort of a mentor to a lot of rappers, do you ever get involved with the petty beefs and try to smooth things over? Bun B: I talk to people here and there. Phone calls and stuff. But I ain’t no rap nigga’s daddy. They may look at me as an uncle, but that’s about it. I