You have a line in one of your songs, “Hustler’s Withdrawal,” that implies that your father was in the drug game also. My father used to do his thing. My father wasn’t really in my life too much growing up, but I did see that it tore my family apart. He took his money and fuckin’ blew that shit. When I was a baby – you know, I don’t remember the shit – but I seen the pictures. He was livin’ it up. When I was growing up I always seen him with a lot of women, a lot of party stuff going on. It was a lot of crazy shit. They had their own little, uh, party favors and shit. Was there a certain point where you realized what he was doing? Oh yeah, I was like six years old. I didn’t realize what he was doing, but I realized it was wrong. I seen the stuff he had on the tables, you know? Y’all could take your imagination and run from there. But I did learn from all that shit. And what’s been instilled in me was his hustle, so in the music game, there it goes again: street game, music game. Same shit. I heard you comment at your video shoot that you’ve never tried crack because you know you’d get addicted. Oh yeah. Because of certain things that happened to me before I was born. I had that shit in me, feel me? Me and my father was talking about this shit the other day, as a matter of fact. He was telling me what happened. In the 80’s they were all into that shit, including my mother and father. Since I had that shit in my system, I know if I tried it I would be hooked. Even though the shit now is nothing compared to what it used to be, it’s all stepped on now. Not that I would know from personal experience, but I know. Did you sell any other drugs? Well, the two days was just crack. I mean, cocaine was a different story. Yay’s a powder form. Crack is the hard form. You take the yay and cook it up and sell the crack. But you could sell the yay by itself. At the end of the day, it just wasn’t worth it to me. I kept saying to myself, “What, am I going to do this all my life?” I ain’t never really have no job. When I did, I hardly ever showed up. But the drug game, it made me what I am today for this music game. It’s training. You always know you’re gonna get hustled or whupped, that’s how you learn.
They get caught up with some women and some shit goes down. God knows who the fuck snitched, but they’re so petty they really don’t know about the law. So the law beats them. “Muthafucker, I’mma give you ten years for this.” And they get scared and snitch. And that’s how it all gets fucked up. On the other hand, the muthafucker that knows what the fuck he’s doing sits there and goes, “Do what you’ve gotta do, but I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Feel me? ‘Cause he’s on a different level. And that’s basically the rap game. Jigga? He’s on a different level. He knows what the fuck he’s talking about, and he could step into a room full of corporate muthafuckers and talk sophisticated. And even if he don’t talk sophisticated, they have to respect him because this muthafucker knows how to make money, and that’s all they give a fuck about. All you wanna do is make money. They say money is the root of all evil, but where do we all first read, “In God We Trust?” Money. What do you think of the theory that the United States government introduced crack into the ‘hood? Oh, they probably did. I don’t doubt that. ‘Cause who the fuck in the hood is gonna be like, “Let me put this shit with some baking soda, cook it up, and see what the fuck I make?” You know? Bullshit. They’ve probably done a lot of shit. The government has done a lot of shit that we don’t know about, but it’s better that way. I don’t think a lot of people could handle that shit. As conservative as all these muthafuckers try to be, they’re the biggest fuckin’ thieves in this muthafucker. So why do you think so many rappers rhyme about selling crack like it’s a badge of honor or something? Because they’re fuckin’ idiots. That’s what I’m here to tell these muthafuckers. Think about it like this, right? Look at the Mafia. Look how they move. Everything is silence. Stay quiet about what the fuck you do. The less you talk about what you do, the more you’re gonna get away with. Based on some of the things people rap about, do you think the police are justified in having “hip-hop cops?” Oh my God. See, it’s cool to talk about what you’ve been through. But when you start mentioning names, and what those names did, and how they did it, you’re fuckin’ silver-plattering it and shit. You can use shit in a way where it doesn’t incriminate nobody. And it influences people. Even myself, I had a moment in my life where I had entertainment and reality crossed where I’m thinking I really gotta be like these muthafuckers. Going through an identity crisis and shit, where you really don’t know who the fuck you are. But I grew out of it through paying dues, all the bumps in the road that I hit. But it’s like, look, dawg, if you love to sell crack so muthafuckin’ much, why are you rapping? Instead of rapping about how much you love to sell crack, then rap your ass off and go back to the block. No one loves to sell crack! That’s the whole point, that’s why you’re rapping. So you won’t have to sell crack, or whatever the fuck you sell. Muthafuckers don’t just get rich off crack, especially not these days because the product isn’t the same. The crack game is becoming what the rap game is becoming: everybody wants to do it.
“[music] influences people. i had a moment in my life where i had entertainment and reality crossed.”
Some people say that selling drugs was their only way to survive. But is that really the only option? Well, here’s what happens in the hood. These muthafuckers run the hood. The drug dealers are the ones you wanna grow up to be like. Some of these muthafuckers have kids in private school with two or three cars and a nice fuckin’ house. Now, that shit makes sense. But standing out on the corner doing this shit and hanging out with your peoples and smokin’ one? That shit don’t make sense to me. That’s the hood. The hood does that to buy some fuckin’ sneakers and shit. There’s always someone who supplies someone, who supplies someone else. So as petty as the shit they pushin’, that’s how petty their mentality is sometimes. Drug dealing is like the NBA draft pick; only certain muthafuckers make it to the league. And when hood muthafuckers see another muthafucker coming up, they connect with him and then they wanna rob him. So that’s why it’s like, “That’s my only option,” cause that’s all you have around you. You’re a product of your environment. You don’t have nobody around you talkin’ about, “Yeah, look at my nice car from my fuckin’ 9to-5 job.” That’s bullshit. And a hood muthafucker probably couldn’t even get a 9-to-5 if he tried. So you’re a product of your environment.
How does the drug game turn into the murder game? Look, I’ll tell you what happens, and it’s just like being an artist. Here we go again. Ready guys? Street game, drug game. Similarities. Let’s say an artist gets a little big of money and thinks he’s a superstar. He wants to go to the clubs and fuck the bitches. So what if security stops him at the door? “Dawg, how you tellin’ me I can’t get in the club? I’m fuckin’ Joe Schmoe from the Grove, I’m that muthafucker.” On the other hand, the smart muthafucker that’s got money doesn’t have a lot of jewelry and he’s not flossin’, but niggas know he’s the muthafucker. So if he can’t get in the club, he says, “Aight, no problem, man.” Then he makes a call, asks for a favor, and he’s in. Smart muthafuckers know how to work their way around things. See, what happens is that these muthafuckers push drugs and get they hands on a lil’ bit of money. It’s called “new money.” They buy jewelry, rims, but they’re still stayin’ with their moms at the crib. A dumb muthafucker blows 15k on some stupid shit. A smart muthafucker takes that 15k and buys a low-key car for 5k, invests 5k in realty, and takes the other 5k and flips it. And there are a lot of illegal hustles on the street, but there are also legal hustles. Thank God I had older mutahfuckers to teach me this shit, cause if not I’d be one of these ignorant muthafuckers. And most of these problems start and end with women.
Describe the average drug dealer. The typical dealer is an arrogant-ass muthafucker. Made a little bit of money and thinks he’s on top of the world, basically. I see those with a lot of money that don’t know what to do with it. You’ve got those that slipped through the cracks and stumbled on a great connect, and then they’re so stupid that they fuck up the connect cause they just happened to get all this money in one shot. Then you’ve got those who are laid-back and cool, everybody respect them. Why? Cause they ain’t try to do no dirt to nobody. Good business. Feel me? He takes care of his peoples, comes back and shoots some shit to the people in the neighborhood. Those people are looked up to. Those are the ones that become urban legends, folk tales. And then you’ve got those who don’t know what they fuck they’re doing and they just fuck shit up. And they’re just doing it to be that person. They don’t even need to do it. How does the drug game affect the rest of the community? It’s destructive. It’s a domino effect. It goes from the dealer, to the fiend, and then whatever the fiend has to do to get money. They’ll steal from their own family, rob anybody in the neighborhood, and then these cats end up fighting over fiends. The dealers don’t give a fuck what they’re doing to the community. It’s all about making money. If you gotta eat you gotta eat, that’s all they know. Some of these muthafuckers can’t even read or write, but they can sell some shit and make money. They’re hustlers. But that’s why the music game is fucked up like it is right now, cause all these muthafuckers got that street mentality and they just know how to flip shit. Right now it’s saturated. And the rap game is just like OZONE MAGAZINE JUNE 2004
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