time, so it made him look bad because I had been right there under his nose all the time. So people were lookin’ at him like, “This was the same lil’ dude you had around this whole time, and you didn’t sign him, but you gave him a hit record and let him move on to somebody else?” I think it hurt because I had gotten through his fingers. When he first signed Miss B I was like, “Yo, you need to sign me too.” He didn’t think I was hot. He didn’t think I had the work ethic. I was like, “How can I not have the work ethic? I’ll outwork you and anybody else around you.” I’d go day in and day out with no sleep just trying to get on. If that ain’t work ethic, then what do you call it? I was doing shows for weeks at a time and still worked a regular job. Why do you think he didn’t want to sign you? He just wasn’t interested. I think he got what he wanted, which was Miss B. He wasn’t interested in me as an artist. But once the record started bubbling, he knew it could’ve been something. So by the time he wanted to do the deal, I had been up under him for long enough to know how he operates. I felt that we really didn’t have the same vision. The only thing that was negative about the situation was that once he realized I had moved on, it hurt. I think he may have looked bad amongst his cohorts so that kind of pissed him off and he wanted to stop the success of the record. It’s sad because at that moment he didn’t realize that, to date, that was gonna be the biggest record he’d ever done in his life. I don’t think he realized that was the most money he had ever made and was trying to stop the record. He was trying to stop it so he could’ve had leeway to get the things he wanted out of the deal. If he had just asked for whatever he wanted without doing all the other stuff, he and I would probably still be working together today. But after that, it felt like he was trying to take food out of my mouth so it left a bad taste in my mouth. And this is the most I’ve ever spoken on [Nitti] to anybody. I promise you, I never even told anybody this much in-depth in an interview. You can do your homework and check and see. I’m only doing it now because it don’t even matter no more. Everybody knows I’ve never talked bad about him. I think he just got so hot cause nobody was comin’ to him like, “Yo, you did this track
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from the actual music industry and what percentage is from these other hustles you have? All of that is from music. That’s record sales, ringtones, touring, and other endorsement deals of that nature. If you think of all the features I’ve done, cameos, endorsements, publishing deals, label deals, and album deals I’ve done, that’s money right in my pocket. Gross, that’s a lot of money. What’s your reaction when you hear the stories about artists who sold millions of records and ended up having to file bankruptcy? My reaction is to make sure I keep hustling and make sure I put some of this up. That’s the key. I mean, if you come from nothing and all of a sudden you’re making $30,000 - $40,000 a show and you’re touring and doing shows 300 days out of the year, you feel like that’s a lot of money. When you start getting that kind of money you start spending it frivolously. Hey, that’s a new watch, it’s only $60,000. I’ll make that in two shows and still have some left over. That’s how cats start thinking. You walk in the club and you’re looking at everybody else’s table, and everybody has liquor which is only $25 a bottle in the regular liquor store but in this particular club it’s $125. But you’re here in New York and there’s a bottle of Cristal that costs $750, so since you just did a $40,000 show, you say, “Bring me ten bottles.” That’s $7,500 you just spent, and you’re doing that every night of the week. And let’s not even talk about your jewelry game. Let’s not even talk about your groupie expenses. You’re just ballin’ out, buying cars, clothes, whatever. Where did you get your hustle from? Your parents? Hell yeah. My father once owned a men’s undergarment line – boxers, briefs, undershirts, t-shirts, stuff like that. My dad had a million dollar situation on the table and he sent out every piece of clothing he had on this one run. This was ‘bout to make him a millionaire. At the time I think UPS was just getting started, and there was this one other parcel service operating, this fly-by-night parcel service, and they had a way cheaper price. This was going to be the deal that made him a millionaire. He sent his entire inventory out.
MAKING NO ’T IN A U O Y E ND STAY LOOK AT IT LIK A A Y T R T G O N G U E H ’V Y U A T F. YO ’S HOW YOU S E TO CHALLENGE YOURSEL T A H T . Y E N O M D CONTINU N A E IV S S E R G AG
and we wanna get interviews with you.” It didn’t happen like that so when he finally started surfacing on one or two interviews here and there, he made sure to talk bad about me. I don’t know if he thought it was gonna create some hype for him or what, but I guess it must have worked, because you’re asking about it now. And I’m so over that. What does Hustlenomics mean? It’s Hustlenomics because I didn’t get here sitting on my ass. I got here by hustlin’. I just wanted to try to break down the basic fundamentals of hustlin’ to cats, and that’s what Hustlenomics is. I had to hustle my ass off to get here. You’ve gotta know that one plus one equals two, right? One plus one is supposed to equal two, but if there’s already 20% gone and another 10% gone off those dollars, it ain’t gonna equal two. It’s gonna equal 1.7, and if you add 1.7 to 1.7, you do not get four. That might not even make sense, but what I’m saying is that even though you might feel like you’re making money, you’ve gotta look at it like you ain’t making no money. That’s how you stay hungry and stay aggressive. That’s how you continue to challenge yourself. I’ve always hustled like that from day one. I don’t think I’ve done anything differently from the beginning. I’ve matured – I’m older now, I’m a little wiser in my decisions. Hustlenomics, that’s what it is. What’s the most expensive luxury purchase you’ve indulged in? It would have to be Import Rentals, the car company, even though it’s a business. I had to make a lot of purchases to make this business work, and that’s a lot of Jags, Mercedes, BMWs, Range Rovers, and vans. And you made the Forbes list this year of the wealthiest celebrities, right? How did you pull that off? Yeah, to make the Forbes list for 2006, you had to gross over ten million dollars. If you know any other rappers who grossed over ten million dollars, they need to report it [to the IRS] and they can be on the Forbes list too (laughs). So, if you grossed ten million dollars last year, what percentage of that comes
This was it. This was the motherload. He kept getting calls all week because nobody received their merchandise, and he didn’t understand why. He kept calling the parcel service to find out what was up with the tracking and it would just ring and he’d get an answering service. So finally he goes to the location himself. There had been a trailer there before with loading ramps for the tractor trailers, and none of it was there anymore. The only thing left was the spots in the concrete where the trailers had sat, and while the rain and the weather had left a mark on the concrete, there was just a rectangle there. So I saw him go from that to selling incense. He’d get his three youngest sons together and put us in a car and we’d sell air fresheners. We’d get a box each. Fifty air fresheners in each box, five different scents, which meant there were ten bottles per scent. We’d sell ‘em for $2 a bottle, so when you finished you should have $100. He’d take $50 and we’d take $50. I saw him go from aboutto-be-a-millionaire to nothing. So we hustled. Then he started a haircare line called Claudio St. James and that’s what he’s been doing forever. And my mother, I’ve seen her hustle. My momma was working for the railroad getting $13-14/hour. She had an accident and reported it, and they fired her, so she sued. She took that money, flipped it, lost it, and then came back. So I’ve seen the power of Hustlenomics. Tell me about the album itself, Hustlenomics. I had to spend time making this album. I’ve got some records on there for the streets. I’ve got some records on there for the cats who want to take time to think about the real issues. I’ve got records on there for cats who wanna party. I’ve got records on there for the cats who are really trying to hustle. Do you think “hustlin’” is misinterepreted by most people as being drug-related? To a lot of people I’m sure it is. But it’s not just a dope thing. I’ve hustled everything. I used to sell Gucci bags, Louie bags, Prada, Dolce & Gabbana, shoes, belts, wallets, women’s clothes, men’s clothes, children’s clothing. I’ve sold everything. It wasn’t all about dope for me. I was that dude. I was out the trunk with it. The first time I ever made a thousand dollars within two hours, OZONE MAG // 65