QLS Classic: Prodigy

One half of the legendary group Mobb Deep, Prodigy, talks about his early jazz roots, his infamous Def Jam incident and how his new cookbook came to be with co-writer Kathy Landoli.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Of Course, Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This
classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. Ladies
and gentlemen, Welcome to QLs Classic Episode twenty seven Mob
Deep founder Prodigy May twenty seventeen. We were fortunate to
have an amazing conversation with Albert Johnson aka Queensbridge Finest

(00:23):
Prodigy from the infamous Mob Deep while he was still
with us on this earthly plane. He passed away a
month after this episode first debuted. He's promoting his Commissary
Kitchen Prison cookbook at the time, but we also got
to chop it up about his life growing up as
a duop kid, the Duop parents, his grandmother's dance school,
choreographer Michael Peters Queensbridge in the eighties, fights, beating and beats,

(00:48):
a life of diamond and guns, wake up calls and
yeah that's something. Jamescreen a special Encore presentation of QLs
Classic with rapper Prodigy and his co author Kathy Ian Deale.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
Thank you, Suprema Son something supremo role called Suprema Son Son,
Supremo role called Suprema.

Speaker 3 (01:17):
Some supremo role.

Speaker 2 (01:19):
Called Suprema Son Son Supremo roll.

Speaker 3 (01:23):
Called this is quest love.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
Yeah, yeah, Supremo.

Speaker 3 (01:33):
So I haven't an roll.

Speaker 2 (01:35):
Called Suprema something Suprema.

Speaker 4 (01:39):
Role called Fonte's in the building. Yeah, check out my rhymes. Yeah,
q L S Family. Yeah, your beef is mine.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Supreme hate, Suprema role called suprema something something suprema roll call.
Her name is Sugar, Yeah, Sugar Steve, Yeah, eat a
sugar free Yeah, commissary Supremo, Suprema Suprema.

Speaker 3 (02:10):
Roll.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
My name's Boss Bill, Winter despising, but it's spring again now,
temperatures rising, roll call Supremo something something Supremo, roll called
Supremo Supremo.

Speaker 3 (02:26):
Roll called I'm unpaid Bill, Yeah, rapidly wrapped. Yeah, I
hope you can hear me through these white roll.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
Supreme roll call Supremo Supremo roll.

Speaker 5 (02:44):
Yeah, I'm a little shook. Yeah, my verse will be better.
Yeah if I read more books.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Roll Supremo Supremo, roll call Supremo Sun.

Speaker 3 (02:57):
Supremo roll call.

Speaker 6 (02:59):
My name is Kathy, Yeah, I'll write those books. Yeah
I can read them. Yeah, I've got no more hoss roll.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
Supremo, roll Supremo, So Supremo.

Speaker 3 (03:15):
On me p Yeah, h N I C Yeah we
on this show.

Speaker 7 (03:21):
Yeah, that's mother go Ma.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Supremo, roll Supremo, Supremo, roll call Suprema, Son Son Supremo,
roll call Suprema.

Speaker 3 (03:36):
So that was not bad.

Speaker 8 (03:44):
That wasn't That wasn't. Bed came through.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to another edition of Questlove Supreme.
Is this our first double uh? Kind of our first
double guest Pete rocking smoke this Okay.

Speaker 9 (04:00):
He ain't talking much about this, so yeah it is.

Speaker 4 (04:05):
And that was also the episode where D'Angelo came in
and was yeah, it's funky.

Speaker 3 (04:10):
It's more arm Well, ladies and gentlemen. Uh, it's a
special episode.

Speaker 1 (04:17):
Well, I feel like every episode of Quest Love Supreme
is a special episode, so I don't want to make
make it like the Meredith Backs to Bernie episode, a
special Meredith Back to Bernie episode Quest Love Supreme. We have, though,
like one of my freaking heroes, like one of my
rhyming heroes, a cultural icon in the world of music,

(04:43):
not I mean above hip hop, above, I mean music
just for me, like one of the Illis writers poets.

Speaker 4 (04:55):
As an MC to me, he has the best opening lines.
Yes rap, Yeah, we'll talk more about but we will. Yeah,
Like I tell him these all the time. You have
like four balls to get my attention. But he kind
of made it even worse because it's like, comes in
the door. Yeah, you only got one bar, so right,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (05:12):
So yeah, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome prodigy of video.

Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yo yo, y'all. What up? Though?

Speaker 1 (05:20):
In addition, we have his co conspirator. Now, what makes
it great is that our special guests. Kathy's kind of
family to some of us quest Love supremers that have
started on the ok player boards.

Speaker 3 (05:35):
She's my favorite Lauren Hill stand of all time.

Speaker 1 (05:38):
Right off, Well, I mean that's how you came to
my attention. I was like, who I mean before the
day of social media. I mean, Okay player was like
the original Twitter, that was the original.

Speaker 3 (05:49):
That shit was gladiated school man. It was. It was
like gladiat to school.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
I feel like we pioneered the social media game before
social media was a thing, not for real, And I
just knew that this person was standing taking Lauren Hill's
stands to the next level. That's how you got my attention.
But I mean, you've blossomed to your own as a writer.
I mean you've written for a lot of periodicals and
from bt U dot Com to I mean all the

(06:17):
way to Billboard, Pitchfork, the p word pitchwork.

Speaker 3 (06:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (06:22):
Wow, that's but you've also collaborated with Prodigy on on
his book.

Speaker 3 (06:28):
Yes, the proper title.

Speaker 6 (06:30):
Is common Sarry Kitchen, my infamous prison cookbook.

Speaker 3 (06:32):
This is the first book you worked on.

Speaker 6 (06:35):
No, but legally I can say this is the first
book I've worked on.

Speaker 1 (06:40):
I see, well, welcome bout Love three. Yeah, I gotta
say Prodigy that I'm I'm really not big on hip
hop autobiographies.

Speaker 3 (06:53):
Actually haven't read one myself.

Speaker 1 (06:54):
I mean, there's a lot of books that have been
written by hip hop luminaries, but I gotta say none.

Speaker 3 (07:02):
You said you're not a fan of hip hop, but autobiography, shit,
you wrote one.

Speaker 1 (07:05):
No, I know that, but I'm just saying that it's
usually for me, like most people that are in the
genre really don't open up as much. It's almost like
a moment of their childhood and then they came to
music and then.

Speaker 3 (07:17):
And then got here. Yeah. Right.

Speaker 1 (07:19):
It really doesn't really doesn't let you like inside of
like the mechanics of what makes them work as a person,
Like you know, them as a personality, Like there's really
not much you learn from the DMX book or this
Snoop book or like those things.

Speaker 8 (07:33):
So but I'm just saying that or even the ghost Facebook.
You know what I'm saying, which.

Speaker 1 (07:38):
Exactly like this is more of a comedy book to
you than like a life story book. But I guess
that's read it like three years ago, like it's it's
a gripping ass story.

Speaker 8 (07:49):
Man.

Speaker 3 (07:50):
We listened to the audiobook on tour, like we ran.

Speaker 4 (07:53):
We had to do like a long tour run and
we had the audiobook and that got us through the whole.

Speaker 3 (07:58):
Tour like that. Shit was crazy. What's up?

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Man?

Speaker 3 (08:01):
Yeah, so Prodigy, I'm not gonna say it was the beginning.

Speaker 9 (08:07):
I'm like all in this, you know.

Speaker 3 (08:09):
But actually, my this is this is a rarity.

Speaker 1 (08:12):
My my favorite part of a Prodigy story is actually
his beginnings. I know we all like to, you know,
to the good part. But I mean, you you come
from a lineage that I didn't know. We have some
in common. We're both products of do Wop. I don't
I won't say a dynasty, but I mean, you know

(08:33):
you grew up actually with two do Op parents.

Speaker 7 (08:36):
Yeah, yeah, who was your father Bud Johnson?

Speaker 8 (08:39):
He you know, my grandfather's named Bud Johnson also, but
my father was Bud Johnson.

Speaker 7 (08:44):
He was in a group called the Chances.

Speaker 3 (08:46):
Now your grandfather was a jazz musician, that.

Speaker 7 (08:50):
Bud Johnson Senior.

Speaker 8 (08:52):
He uh, he was a you know, big into jazz
and like a big band like him and Quincy started
a big being together with Dizzey Gillespie and a bunch
of different people. Man Like my grandfather used to have
all these jazz old gee's coming to the crib when
I was a little kid. So I used to be
in the crib and Dizzy used to make faceoalky for

(09:15):
me and all that. Like I was crazy growing up
around all that because I didn't realize what was happening
until I got older and think back about it, like,
oh wow, that's that was My grandfather had me around
on jazz.

Speaker 7 (09:26):
Graates like you know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (09:29):
But I ain't really get to appreciate his style of
music until I got older, you know what I mean.
It wasn't I just didn't get it when I was
a kid.

Speaker 9 (09:36):
Like I asked you, at what point in your life
did it click?

Speaker 1 (09:39):
Like I was around no one ever gets it when
like your parents' music when you're a kid, and only
when you're older.

Speaker 5 (09:44):
But right, but a high school is it like I'm
not even understanding until.

Speaker 8 (09:48):
I'm probably like probably like yeah, in high school when
when I first started making beats, then I understood like
the power of my grandfather's music because we.

Speaker 7 (10:00):
Would sample a lot of jazz records, you know what
I mean.

Speaker 8 (10:03):
And he left me like his collection, his jazz record collection,
and we made a lot of the first album, Infamous
and Juvenile Hell that we did, yeah, from my grandfather's records.
Shook Woms was made actually Hancock Records, my grandfather's records.

Speaker 3 (10:22):
Yeah, that's crazy.

Speaker 8 (10:24):
So it was like once we got to that point,
we was like actually researching the records and like using
certain samples, and we was like, oh, just I understood
the power of the jazz music. And I started listening
to it like more in depth and paying attention to it.

Speaker 7 (10:40):
Then I started to, you know, appreciate.

Speaker 3 (10:43):
What did he take your seeing any of his shows
when you were younger and.

Speaker 8 (10:46):
Hell yeah, man, I remember being at so many shows,
but once one in particular that stand out a lot
is that the blue note my grandfather used to perform there,
and I used to sit at the ball with my
pops and I should think I was drinking, you know
what I mean, I possibly ordering a real drink and
he would order me like a seven up with the.

Speaker 3 (11:06):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (11:08):
I'd be sitting at the ball drinking like little kid
like you know what I mean, at the ball. So
I got memories like that and my grandfather performing while
me and my pop sitting at the ball watching him,
and yeah, you know, just different different shows and whatnot.
And yeah, man I was I would definitely feel blessed.

Speaker 3 (11:26):
Got it.

Speaker 7 (11:27):
I got a chance to see him before, you know
what I mean.

Speaker 3 (11:29):
I remember that.

Speaker 1 (11:30):
That even makes it more special because I know earlier
you told me that you're about to do a residency
at Bluenope.

Speaker 7 (11:36):
Yeah, it's crazy. It's crazy. It's crazy being in there.

Speaker 8 (11:39):
We did the first show last month, and it's crazy
being in there because I just places like it feels
small because you know, when you're a little kid, everything
seemed bigger, like you.

Speaker 3 (11:49):
Know what I mean.

Speaker 7 (11:50):
So now me and I'm like, damn, this is smaller
than my memories.

Speaker 8 (11:53):
But it's like it's so surreal being in there and
performing in there because I just remember my grandfather doing it.
So it's crazy how you know things turn, you know,
come full circle.

Speaker 3 (12:02):
Was he a horn player?

Speaker 7 (12:03):
Yeah, clarinet and tenor saxophone.

Speaker 1 (12:07):
And even before that, I think your great grandfather started morehouse.

Speaker 8 (12:13):
Yeah, my great I think he was like three times
great great great great grandfather.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
Was like, yo, you know how lucky you are to
even know firsthand? Man, Like I just found out who
my grades were like two weeks ago.

Speaker 8 (12:27):
Serious, man, But like the fact that you know the
history of your great great great My mother she did
the genie genealogy, and you know, she researched and if
we have some other family members that did the same
thing in research, and we we found our whole family,
like you know what I mean. Plus we got a
lot of my grandmother on my mother's side, she keeps

(12:47):
a lot of family photos and just history and stuff.
So we were able to like put pieces together to
connect dots, like you know what I mean. So it's
pretty It's pretty interesting, man. I learned a lot about
my family while I was locked up. My moms used
to write me and tell me, use this in your book.
Put this in your book. This is important, you know
what I mean?

Speaker 1 (13:05):
Or so, and your mother was a member of the Crystals.

Speaker 3 (13:15):
Yeap.

Speaker 8 (13:16):
My mom was like walking down the street somewhere if
it was Queens or whatever wherever she was at, and
somebody stopped her and was like, hey, can you sing?
And she was like no, really, and they was like,
you sure, we need an extra member for this group
because one of the members had dropped out.

Speaker 7 (13:33):
So they convinced her to do it. She was only eighteen.
They convinced her to do it, and she became a
part of the group and went right on tour, you
know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (13:41):
So it was it was kind of crazy how she
in the mid sixties. She was a wow.

Speaker 7 (13:47):
Yeah, it was just like random.

Speaker 8 (13:48):
Like somebody just she just so happened to be walking
down the street and they stopped her, like because I guess,
you know my mother she was very pretty, like with
light eyes, so they she had to look so they
stopped her. Yeah, can you sing? We want you need
you in this group.

Speaker 3 (14:02):
Come on.

Speaker 9 (14:03):
And y'all like a generational New York family, Like is
that weird? People?

Speaker 8 (14:06):
My whole family's from South Side Jamaica, Queens and before that,
they come from like Texas.

Speaker 3 (14:12):
And Virginia, you know what I mean. Yeah, the crystals
are for like our listeners.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
I would always say that like I grew up in
an oldies duop family, but similar to like parents today,
like I'll say, like comal from the roots. My keyboard
player tricked his kids into thinking like Michael Jackson was
brand new. You know, as a parent, you'd be trying
to trick your kids into like, you know, like or Eve,

(14:40):
like my production manager. Uh, like his sons think that
like Eric being rock him is new. Even Kirk, my
guitar player, would play slick Rick so much for his
son that his son actually like the first time he
ever had to reprimand his son about a school project,

(15:03):
and I heard these words. He's like, son, you can't
bite someone else's rhymes, Like I guess in kindergarten, someone
was supposed to do it right in the sun, he said.

Speaker 4 (15:15):
I thought that was gonna go somewhere. So I thought
I was about to tell him lick the ball.

Speaker 8 (15:21):
No, no, he said that he took like plagiarize like
some of the children's story and made it like it
was his own own joying.

Speaker 3 (15:29):
But like just I'm.

Speaker 1 (15:31):
Just fascinating how parents will trick you into thinking that
that's your contemporary music. So I grew up just with
you know, an oldies do op dad that would always
play like the Crystals, Harvey and the Moon Clothes like
all these groups. So like you know, I grew up
thinking like he's a rebel. It was like some new

(15:53):
ship when I came, like I had the forty five.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
At home self. Yeah, I was.

Speaker 1 (15:58):
I was surprised to find that out so well, Like
in the beginning, did you did you have any designs
of being an entertainer? Were you just like observing it
and just like that's their shit.

Speaker 8 (16:08):
That Nah, In the beginning, I really didn't know what
I wanted to do until I told her, Like man,
maybe like twelve thirteen and I first heard I think
it was when I first heard you know, ll Cool
J and Run DMC, the Sucking m Season, Rock the Bells.

Speaker 7 (16:24):
When I heard those songs, that just changed every thing.

Speaker 8 (16:28):
In my life, you know what I mean, that made
me I was like, all right, this is what I
want to do, This is this is what I like.
I used to play the songs for my mother, like
your mom checked this out. You know what I mean
I used to play ah, you know, paid it full.
Matter of fact, I used to say rock Kim's rhymes
till my moms act like I wrote it?

Speaker 1 (16:45):
And did you always have this deep Deapan voice as
a kid, just like you are, like vocal.

Speaker 8 (16:52):
I don't know, that's just that's just my voice. Yeah,
hell yeah. So I used to say. I used to
say rocking ron my mom's she used to be like,
oh my god, you're really good. And I used to
be like, I ain't say nothing to us, just like, yeah, yeah,
I'm raped. I'm an rap. But I first got turned
on the hip hop. I mean when I was like
twelve thirteen before that, you know, like like you said,

(17:16):
it was a lot of there's a lot of duop
in the crib, like you know, soul music, you know
what I'm saying, A lot of church church music.

Speaker 3 (17:24):
You know what I mean. You were born was it?
Were you born in Long Island or I was born
in Hempstead, Yeah, long ago. I know that Chuck d
and Flavor was talking about Hampstead and.

Speaker 7 (17:33):
They Chuck did from the town right next to.

Speaker 3 (17:36):
Me and Roosevelt.

Speaker 8 (17:38):
Okay, that's right next to Hampstead. So we all liked.
I know that someone about PMD was Brentwood. It was
from Brentwood. Hempstead. Remember Son of Berserk? Yes, yeah, wow,
Son of Fromstead.

Speaker 3 (17:54):
Yes you wait, I love that you just brought up
Like for me, Son of Berserk.

Speaker 1 (18:00):
I feel like I'm the only person that got that
record and worshiped the ship out of it.

Speaker 3 (18:05):
Like I used to see.

Speaker 8 (18:05):
I used to go outside to the store and Son
of observed to be outside where he's like, yo, shutting
up like.

Speaker 3 (18:11):
The old man voice. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (18:13):
Because we was like the little dudes using the studio.

Speaker 8 (18:15):
It's a famous studio in Hempstead that Public Enemy.

Speaker 3 (18:18):
Started in their pre production out there.

Speaker 7 (18:22):
It was called five to ten.

Speaker 3 (18:23):
Yeah yeah, so that's what we all started. Buster would
be out there sometimes, so that's what we all started.

Speaker 8 (18:29):
So everybody used to be over there, like and we
used to see everybody over there. But yeah, man like Hempstead. Uh,
I think messing Man from Hampstead. He's from Terrace Terror's ad,
you know what I mean. Trying to think of who
else from out there, Rock Massy from Hampstead.

Speaker 7 (18:46):
You know, those are the few that I can remember.

Speaker 1 (18:50):
The top So like what eventually brought you to the
city to Queens.

Speaker 7 (18:59):
When I turned like eleven twelve, my mom's moved to
Left Rack.

Speaker 3 (19:04):
She moved to Left Rack City.

Speaker 7 (19:06):
My pops had split up because my pop said did
some crazy shit.

Speaker 8 (19:09):
My pops was wild man. He uh, he had kidnapped me.
Took me to Detroit. He was living in Detroit for
a minute, balling out of control. He was working in
the stock market, doing some crazy shit.

Speaker 3 (19:20):
And when did you live in Detroit? Man?

Speaker 8 (19:23):
This is like early eighties when scarfid what year the
Scarface came out?

Speaker 3 (19:27):
Three? Three?

Speaker 7 (19:28):
Because my pops took me to the way.

Speaker 3 (19:31):
You three.

Speaker 8 (19:34):
My pops took me to the movies in Detroit when
at the premiere when Scarface first came out.

Speaker 3 (19:39):
So that's when I was out there in age.

Speaker 4 (19:41):
When you were nine, I was not so the lyrics
pop talked you try to shooting me?

Speaker 3 (19:46):
Was seven? That was real? That really?

Speaker 8 (19:47):
Oh yeah, the pop man, he was off the man
that that that boy is something else?

Speaker 7 (19:53):
He was something else.

Speaker 3 (19:54):
Man. Was he a musician as well?

Speaker 8 (19:56):
Or like, yeah, he was a singer, you know what
I mean? Like I said, he had group, the Chances
do Our group. They had a couple of dope songs,
you know what I mean. But my father's things was
computers from the early eighties. He I remember, being like
probably five six years old. My father was working on
Mcinitar's writing programs.

Speaker 7 (20:15):
You know what I'm saying. Really, he was really, really
dope with it. I think it's a school called t
c I. I think it's called t c I.

Speaker 8 (20:24):
My father went there and he actually got so good
he became like a professor there. He started teaching. He
was in the commercials and all that. Like after a while,
he got really nice with it. And you know, that's
what he was into. Computers, heroin, alcohol, karate. My father
had an a doojo on Jamaica Avenue, you know what

(20:44):
I mean. So he used to teach karate.

Speaker 3 (20:46):
You just said that convo back then. Computer. It's very crazy, man.
My pop's life was wild. It was wild.

Speaker 7 (21:06):
That was his thing.

Speaker 8 (21:07):
He loved computers and he loved fighting and just doing
wild shit.

Speaker 3 (21:11):
He was crazy, man.

Speaker 1 (21:12):
And I know that you have a closeness with your
grandmother as well, that she was in the artist.

Speaker 7 (21:18):
Yeah, my grand My grandmother was ill.

Speaker 8 (21:20):
She was one of the first Cotton Club dances when
they first opened the Cotton Club way back and you know,
she was friends with Lena hornle Horn used to dance
there early before she became famous, you know. And that's
how my grandmother met my grandfather because my grandfather used
to play in the band at the Cotton Club, so

(21:41):
that's how they met. And you know, after my grandmother
started a dance school business in the basement of crib
on a god Brewer and she started with like five students,
you know what I mean, And it just grew and
grew over the years until to a point where she
started renting the building and then it grew to a
point where she actually bought her own commercial building in Queens.

(22:02):
She was like the first black woman to own a
commercial space in Queens. So you know, it was a
dance school business, you know what I mean. She was
that was her thing, dancing. So a lot of her students, man,
she has some famous students that she, uh that she raised,
like Ben Vereen is one of she raised, seen like
you know what I mean. And uh, he used to

(22:23):
you know, be in the house all the time, like
you know what I mean, anytime he had something going on.

Speaker 7 (22:28):
We used to watch it in the crab. I don't
seen roots thousands.

Speaker 3 (22:31):
Of times TV. You know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (22:34):
That's like everybody get together watch Ben ben is on.
You know Michael Peters, he was the famous choreographer Michael
Michael Peters was that's my grandmama's. That was one of
my grandma's students.

Speaker 9 (22:48):
He did beat it.

Speaker 7 (22:51):
So like that was like events same thing like with
Ben Veren.

Speaker 1 (22:55):
Matter of fact, Peters is the and the beating knife battle.

Speaker 3 (23:00):
He's the one in all white be the one that
got their hands tied up there.

Speaker 5 (23:05):
When I was six, my dad introduced me to him
and I was like, but you can't dance better than
Michael Jackson.

Speaker 9 (23:09):
And he walked away with me with so much app
toude like.

Speaker 8 (23:14):
Like I remember when I was a little kid, like
we used to fly to Cali because a lot of
her students live in Cali and whatnot, So we used
to fly to Cali and visit them, and she used
to take care of some business. And Michael Peter used
to take me to Universal Studios all the time.

Speaker 7 (23:26):
That was my favorite place when I was a little kid,
Like let's go again, Let's go again.

Speaker 8 (23:31):
I've been there like a hundred times. When I was
a kid, that was my favorite ship, like you know
what I mean. But yeah, so this is my grandma.
This is like my grandmother's life. She uh you know,
this is her her thing in the dance world. And
she got a lot.

Speaker 7 (23:45):
Of choreograph choreographers and she h.

Speaker 8 (23:48):
She helped out a lot of people as far as
that in that world. So I grew up a lot
around her concerts. She would do these concerts every year
at Lincoln Center, at the Apollo at uh Carnegie Hall,
you know, every year she would do like a big concert.
And so you were a backstage kid. Yeah, me and
my cousins be backstage wild looking at the girls getting dressed.

Speaker 1 (24:12):
In my backstage, I used to watch old old ass
dudes you know, smoke reefers in the well.

Speaker 3 (24:22):
Yo.

Speaker 8 (24:23):
But he had a better backstage experience. Yeah, especially at
my grandmother's dance school, like hundreds of girls from Queens
like that was like that was man.

Speaker 7 (24:33):
I used to love that place when I was a
little kid.

Speaker 8 (24:35):
Man, we had so much fun running around Jamaica Avenue
and you know, having fun, man with all the girls there.
And it was crazy crazy growing up, like you know
what I mean.

Speaker 3 (24:45):
So when when did you officially you you moved to Queens, and.

Speaker 8 (24:49):
So I moved the Queens after Detroit or yeah, there
had to be like eighty four, okay, eighty four eighty
five and moved the left rack with my mom's. She
got divorced from my pops after he kidding at me,
and she was tight.

Speaker 3 (25:02):
She was like, man, I ain't doing this ship no more. Man, wait,
how does she find you?

Speaker 8 (25:07):
My pops had actually took me on the robbery. Well,
he went and robbed the jury store. I was in
the car, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (25:15):
And.

Speaker 8 (25:22):
That ship pisched my mom's off because you know what
I mean. We got into the hospitation. National County Police's
chasing us, and he finally pulls over because he realized,
you know, I'm in the car. He jumps in the
car and throws a big ass bag of jewelry in
my hand. I'm like this hold onse, jurry sh and
he's flying through himstead like it was out on Long Island,

(25:43):
and you know, finally he pulls over. You know, I
remember the cop put me in the back and my
pop's hands was locked up on his back. I remember
holding my pops hand. They had me in the back
seat with him. I didn't know what was going on.
I'm like, I was too young to even compute with
the buck was happening. Get to the precinct. Police gave

(26:04):
me a soda. I remember sitting there drinking the soda.
My moms came to get me, and I remember her arguing,
my pop's flipping on him, like and then my pop's
kidnapped me right to that, you know what I mean,
because she was like, I.

Speaker 3 (26:14):
Can't be with you no more.

Speaker 8 (26:15):
So he took me to Detroit, and my mom found
out where I was at. She threatened, you know, call
the cops on him, and so he sent me back
or whatever my mom's Then we moved to left Rack,
and then I went to school and left Rack and
went and went to Junior high school and left right
said he went to Halsey right across the street from
you know, right across the street from the l I E.

(26:36):
You got across the lie to get over to the
high school.

Speaker 1 (26:39):
I'll say that the picture that I always think of
when I think of Queens, there's more or less the
picture that you guys paying it on the infamous. But
was it always like that? Like when you first got
to Queens. Was it that because you paying a dark

(27:02):
what was Queen's Like?

Speaker 8 (27:03):
I mean that this is when crack first came out.
When I'm over the Left Rack, crack just hit the street.
It was brand new. You know what I'm saying. I'm
in junior high school. I'm twelve years old. All the
little kids my age was selling crack in the neighborhood.
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (27:20):
I used to go to school and she sees little
niggas with rope chains and levees and ed max. I'm like,
what the fuck.

Speaker 3 (27:28):
Is these niggas doing?

Speaker 8 (27:29):
Like you know what I'm saying, Like these little kids
like you know what I'm saying, with big jewelry on
looking like Eric being Rocky in on the cover of
the album, Like you know what I'm saying. And then
you know, I started getting cool with people out there
and they started telling me what they're doing, you know
what I mean. And Left Rack was big time for
like selling crack. Like It's well known that left Rack

(27:51):
City was like big, big, big time cracked neighborhood, Like
you know what I mean?

Speaker 1 (27:55):
And left Rackets is proper name left Rack. Yeah, Okay,
because I always I think when right, Yeah, like I thought.

Speaker 7 (28:01):
That was did you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (28:04):
They used to they call left rack IRAQ. That's that's
what say. Left Rack is irack.

Speaker 7 (28:09):
Queens Bridge is Kuwait you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (28:11):
Okay, okay, but.

Speaker 8 (28:13):
Yeah, so left rack that's how I was out there.
This is when crack first hit. So you know, all
my friends I'm going to junior high school, they sell
the crack. And you know, once I got cool with
them and they told me what they was doing, I
was like, man, you know, let me try my hand
at that. I want someone want to chain too, you
know what I'm saying, don't want a little fly like yeah.
So I hooked up with one of my homies from school.

(28:36):
He gave me a few vows.

Speaker 3 (28:37):
He was like, start with this. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (28:39):
If you could do this off good come back. I
gave you some more like you know what I mean.
So I went out. I'm twelve years old. I'm looking
like I'm eight. When I was twelve, a little like
I was eight.

Speaker 3 (28:49):
Yeah, So yeah, you definitely found the fountain of youth. Man.
So figure in your thirties and forties now, like.

Speaker 8 (28:55):
I go outside with the little cracks on me and whatnot,
and I'm super pad annoyed. I never sold a crack
in my life, you know what I'm saying. So I'm like,
I'm looking around, I'm nervous. Motherfucker's walking up to me like, yo,
you guys. I'm like, I don't know. It's like that
scene from Paying Full everyone he was like scared when
he first old, just like that. I was fucking Parannoyd yoe.

(29:18):
So anyway, I think I sold one vow and the
police ran up on me, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (29:23):
First time.

Speaker 8 (29:23):
First time police ran up on me, grabbed me. Yep,
fuck you doing out here? Found the cracks. They was like,
how the fuck? How old are you? I'm like, I'm twelve.
They're like, what the fuck? You look like a little kid, Like, dude,
like a real little kid, like go home, man, fuck
you doing out here? And he just took the crack
and sent me on. So now I gotta explain to
this nigga what happened with the crack crack?

Speaker 3 (29:46):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (29:46):
He like, Yo, what happened? I'm like, yo, police just
took it and they let me go. He's like, yeah,
now you gotta get me that brush. Son, So we
have a scrap, you know what I'm saying. At school,
he want to scrap. I lost, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (29:59):
I was taking I'm taking my jacket off. He snuffed me.

Speaker 8 (30:01):
I'm like, oh shit, So these girls breaking up, some
girls I knew from the hood broke it up, like
leave him alone. Leave So anyway, I ain't fuck with
the cracks no more. Why is this for a minute?
Four minute?

Speaker 7 (30:17):
And you know, I just I just was just cool
with everybody after that.

Speaker 3 (30:21):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (30:21):
I wasn't trying to, you know, really sell on drugs
and get caught. That was too much for me, Like
you know what I'm saying. And then once I went
to high school and I met half so they had
brought me out to Queensbridge when I first you know,
I went to high school when I first met him
and he introduced me to that.

Speaker 7 (30:40):
Whole world was just different.

Speaker 8 (30:43):
Now, mind you, when I was when I was a kid,
my mother, you know, my mother whole life, she worked
for the housing Authority, So she worked in all the
projects in New York, Brooklyn, Harlem, and you know what
I mean. Queens and Queensbridge was one of the projects
that she worked in. Her job was she would get
people to approve for their apartments, you know.

Speaker 3 (31:00):
What I mean. So they come to her to apply
for She worked in the.

Speaker 8 (31:03):
Office on the hill on Queensbridge, and you know, people
gotta come to her, and.

Speaker 3 (31:07):
She decided we signed them.

Speaker 8 (31:09):
You know what I'm saying, if they make enough money
to live in the projects or you know, subsidized rant
or whatever how that works.

Speaker 9 (31:14):
Everybody wanted to be her friend.

Speaker 8 (31:16):
Yeah, So she worked in Queensbridge when I was a
little kid, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (31:20):
And I used to go with her to work in
the summertime.

Speaker 8 (31:23):
This is before I met Halving all that, and I
went to reach day camp, like when my mom's at work,
she would drop me a day camp on the hill
called Reese. So I was already out there for a
few years when I was a little kid. I met
a bunch of people and it just so happened. In
years later, you know, once I moved to left right,
went to high school in the city.

Speaker 3 (31:42):
Man. Half now I'm back in Queensbridge.

Speaker 8 (31:44):
I'm older now, and I'm saying people I remember when
I was a kid from days from day camp and
all that, right, but it was just being back out
there and just seeing you know how Queensband was like
just a whole nother world, like the fashion, the slang,
like you know, just everything.

Speaker 3 (32:01):
It's just different.

Speaker 1 (32:02):
Okay, can you explain something to our listeners and by
our listeners listeners, I mean me, what is the dumb language?
And what is the genesis of the dumb language?

Speaker 8 (32:17):
Was that like done duney like done done, the done
language that's like saying we send no cats.

Speaker 1 (32:22):
In Sweden that talked with done like after my deep
s came up, Yo, what I've done?

Speaker 3 (32:26):
And I was like, what are y'all talking about?

Speaker 7 (32:28):
It's one of our homies from Queensbridge. His name is Bumpy.

Speaker 3 (32:34):
Uh.

Speaker 8 (32:34):
He got like a speech impetitive and he speaks with
like a list a little bit, you know what I'm saying.
So you know that's where we call each other's son.
Everybody like yo, what up son? What up son?

Speaker 7 (32:44):
And when Bumpy say it, he'd be like, what up thunk?

Speaker 3 (32:46):
What up thunk?

Speaker 10 (32:47):
So you know what I'm saying?

Speaker 8 (32:59):
So it's you, yeah, yeah, tears you in. But I
had short when I write my rhyms. I tried to,
like I write shorthand I try to write short as possible.

Speaker 3 (33:06):
So I used to write du in just to write.

Speaker 8 (33:08):
It real quick and get it out the way, you
know what I'm saying. So it's like two different spellings
when I do it. But whatever, that's where it started
with Bumpy, you know what I'm saying, and we just
started calling out. He created the dumb language. That's what
we you know what I mean, you, yeah, shout out
the bump man. But yeah, once I got out there
and I just seen how that world was in Queensbridge,

(33:28):
and I remember being out there as a kid. When
I was out there, it was like super early eighties,
like probably the Juice Crew.

Speaker 3 (33:36):
Was popping, like back of those guys.

Speaker 8 (33:41):
I was too young back in the days, you know
what I'm saying, when I was in day camp. But
I remember how they used to dress. They used to
have the shelter, they used to have the pumas with
the you know the tall one suits can't go. I
remember seeing people dressed like that when I was a kid,
So I know that was like probably that Juice Crew era.
And then when I came back out there later on.

(34:01):
You know, it was it was new things happening, you
know what I'm saying. It was like their era was
starting to change. You know what I'm saying, Things were
starting to change. And you know, I was like right
smack dab in the middle of it, man. And you know,
it was just interesting to see being from Hempstead and
going to school in Manhattan, you know where manha a.

(34:23):
We went to high school with everybody from you know,
different boroughs, Brooklyn, the Bronx, you know, Manhattan Queens. They
was from everywhere in high school, art and design, you
know what I mean. So we had friends with people
from all over eight East Borough. So we used to
hang out. You know, we used to party in the
Bronx up by Yankee Stadium and Sheridan. We used to
you know, hang out in Brooklyn and bed Style Marcy Tompkins, Sumner,

(34:48):
you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (34:48):
We used to.

Speaker 7 (34:49):
We was out there, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (34:51):
So was there ever any hesitation whatsoever?

Speaker 1 (34:54):
Because I know, if you go to a different part
of town that you're not necessarily from, it could be
a caution thing, like you know.

Speaker 7 (35:04):
Yeah, I mean you gotta be careful, man, I mean
look growing up. You know what I'm saying. This is
this is where things changed for me a little bit.

Speaker 3 (35:13):
All right.

Speaker 8 (35:13):
My first year of high school, there was this game
called The Decepticons, you know what I'm saying. And I
used to come to school in the morning, and uh,
I used to see people coming to school, my friends
coming to school with big ass cuts going across.

Speaker 7 (35:28):
They face their arms hands like.

Speaker 8 (35:31):
Buck fifty days, face is spliced open, like you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (35:35):
I'm like, what the fuck happened to you?

Speaker 3 (35:37):
Son?

Speaker 8 (35:37):
The're like, yo, the Deceptor car just caught us in
the train station, you know they I'm like, whoa.

Speaker 7 (35:42):
I'm like, Yo, the niggas ain't cutting me like that.

Speaker 3 (35:44):
Dog.

Speaker 8 (35:45):
I'm buying a gun right now because I damn nigga
try to cut me like that.

Speaker 7 (35:49):
These niggas was twisted, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (35:52):
So that kind of it kind of forced me into
position where I was like, i'ma protect myself, like you
know what I'm saying. So that's when I bought my
first gun because of that, you know what I'm saying,
Because I was gonna let the white cut me in
the face like that, you know what I'm saying, and
they was running around doing this on a daily like
this is what they was doing. Like they was from Brooklyn,
like you know what I mean. It was just a gang.

(36:12):
It was called Decepticons. They had a female version called
Deceptor Nets. They had another game called The Low Lives.
They had another game called I can't think of it
right now, but yeah, there was like this gang culture
from Brooklyn, you know what I'm saying. And we had
to deal with that, you know, because after school they

(36:32):
would come up to different schools and terrorize motherfuckers, Robin
motherfuckers like you know what I'm saying. So it forced
me and my little tight friends to be on some bullshit.

Speaker 7 (36:45):
It forced us to be on some bullshit, you know
what I'm saying. And that's that's where the bullshit started
a little bit, like you know what I'm saying, you
know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (36:54):
And then you know, also just growing up in Hampstead,
you know, that's like it's a hood, that's a hood
out there, like you know what I'm saying. It's a
residential area that got houses that looked nice. But that's
the hood out for Hempstead. Wasn't the the cozy part
of Long Island.

Speaker 7 (37:10):
That Nahmstead.

Speaker 1 (37:11):
When I think a Long Island, I think of like, oh,
that's a vacation spot or yeah, nah nah.

Speaker 3 (37:18):
Where'd you grow You grew up.

Speaker 1 (37:20):
In Hempstead, Bill, Now I grew up a few miles
north of Hempstead, but a little bit a little different.

Speaker 8 (37:25):
Yeah, there's a differant part where you crossed the track.
As soon as you cross the track called the track side,
right as soon as you cross.

Speaker 7 (37:30):
The track is over. Oh you're in the hood.

Speaker 3 (37:33):
Certain to explain that on his episode that Yeah, you know,
I had a lot of friends out there.

Speaker 8 (37:38):
We did a lot of things, and you know, it
put me on some ship mentally, you know what I'm saying.
Just and my my pops already had me on some
ship mentally. But then going to school Manhatan, you know
that really kind of changed me because I started hanging
out and on the different boroughs.

Speaker 3 (37:51):
I had friends from different boroughs and we.

Speaker 8 (37:54):
Used to deal with this type of ship Did you
go to art and designer man the Fame school?

Speaker 7 (38:00):
That's what that's what that's all right, No, that's that's
uh Guardia. Yeah, so there's another My mother went to
to that school she graduated.

Speaker 9 (38:10):
So what did you are having both go to the
school for?

Speaker 8 (38:12):
Because so Havelf was a grade ahead of me. He
was there for architecture. He was dope. He used to
build like scale models or like you know, apartment complexes
or whatever, building like.

Speaker 3 (38:22):
You know what I mean. He could do that.

Speaker 8 (38:23):
It's nice I went to school there because this is
all most of my friends was from left Rack.

Speaker 3 (38:29):
You know.

Speaker 7 (38:29):
We used to sit around the summertime, where are you
going to high school?

Speaker 3 (38:32):
Son?

Speaker 8 (38:32):
Well, we're going to Edison. Oh I'm going to this one.
And most of my friends like, we're going on design.
So I was like, fuck, I'm going there too. Then
I'm going wherever y'all niggas is going right. So that's
the only reason I wanted to go there. You know
what I'm saying, I didn't really have I didn't think
that I had any art skills, Like you know what
I'm saying. I had to take a test to get
into school. You had to bring a portfolio up. So

(38:56):
I was like, all right, what am I gonna do?
How'm I'm getting school?

Speaker 3 (38:58):
I'm a guy. I got work my way in school.

Speaker 8 (39:00):
Somehow, So I thought and I was like all right,
I'm a this is this is this group called the
shirt Kings, like clothing designers and.

Speaker 7 (39:07):
Oh the airbrush yeah, and a brushing in the coliseum
and queens.

Speaker 8 (39:10):
So you know, I grew up with them like I
grew up with a little kid on Jamaica Avenue, like
you know what I'm saying. So they know me all
my life, like you know what I mean. So I
was like, light bulb, I'm gonna just copy. I'm gonna
bite the shirt Kings. I'm sure these I'm sure these
motherfuckers art design.

Speaker 7 (39:25):
They never seen no ship like that before, you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (39:27):
Right, So I just got me some shirts, I got
me some marketers, uh, some paint whatever, and I just
drew some graffiti on the ship and I made a
portfolio brought up to school and they was like, oh
they liked it, and I got it.

Speaker 3 (39:39):
I got into school with that ship. I was shocked.
I was like, oh shit, that should work. You know
what I'm saying. This is crazy hearing this.

Speaker 9 (39:47):
This is that's your story.

Speaker 1 (39:48):
It's story, right because Tarik was was the art was
the art design students. So he used to make like
crazy medallions and those your baby, yo, Mickey mouse ship.

Speaker 7 (39:59):
Oh yeah, man, sit like creative man creative.

Speaker 8 (40:02):
But you know, I guess uh, you know, I got
a love for being creative by being at that school.

Speaker 3 (40:09):
Like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (40:10):
I got a love for photography because we had photography class.
There a love for you know, just design and ship
and seeing what have used to do with the architecture.
It's just, you know, open my mind something new.

Speaker 3 (40:23):
You know. So how did y'all how did you guys meet?
You met in high school?

Speaker 11 (40:28):
Yeah?

Speaker 8 (40:28):
We met my first year of high school and my
photography class was a kid named Black from the Bronx,
and we got real cool, kicking it every day in class.
And one day he was like, yo, man, he was like,
I used to wear mad jewelry like I used to
have I thought I was slick, ricked dog.

Speaker 3 (40:43):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (40:44):
I used to have hands full of rings, mad chains
and ship stop. I was retarded when I was in school,
Like you know what I'm saying. That's another reason why
I bought a gun too, because I'm like, I'm a
target with all.

Speaker 7 (40:54):
This ship on.

Speaker 3 (40:56):
You didn't feel like I was.

Speaker 8 (41:00):
I was bugged out as a kid, Yo, you know
what I'm saying. I didn't really care too much. So
you know when I'm at half it was because of
my man Black from the Bronx photography class. He was like, yo, man,
you know you should meet my one of my friends
the name Havoc. They're both rapped, you're both about the
same height. You know, I'm gonna introduce you to him

(41:20):
after school. So little did I know that these niggas
were setting me up to rob me. Oh wait what
Havoc boy? This had arranged marriage, that arrange.

Speaker 1 (41:39):
The greatest story, like the greatest life.

Speaker 8 (41:43):
They were setting me up that day. It was like
a whole setup. They was gonna rob me, you know
what I'm saying, and whatever. I ain't find this out
till later, you know what I'm.

Speaker 1 (41:51):
Saying, Like lady, when you're on the proposal.

Speaker 3 (41:56):
But like, oh, yo, you.

Speaker 8 (41:57):
Remember when we first met, Maybe like a year later
they came They was like, yo, remember that time. We
was like yo, we's gonna rob you that day, son,
But you know you was cool, so we was like, nah.

Speaker 3 (42:08):
I don't rob them. That's our story.

Speaker 7 (42:16):
That's real shit too, man.

Speaker 3 (42:17):
You know what I'm saying. Wait, a minute, you're listening
to the Quest Love Supreme.

Speaker 1 (42:20):
Our guests this week are Prodigy of Mob Deep and Kaffyandali,
journalists and co author of Prodigy's latest book, Commisary Kitchen,
My infamous prison cookbook. And we got some messages from
our sponsors. All right, So when you you're telling me

(42:41):
that initially your meeting was a setup, you came in
the name of oh, we should be in a group together.

Speaker 7 (42:48):
I was like, I'm cool, Black, we cool kicking. Seemed
like a cool dude.

Speaker 8 (42:51):
He said he want to introduce me to somebody that
wrapped to We about the same height.

Speaker 3 (42:55):
He was like, Yo, you should make a group.

Speaker 7 (42:57):
I'm gonna introduce you to him after school.

Speaker 3 (43:00):
I'm like, all right, bet.

Speaker 8 (43:01):
So after school we go outside and there's a fight
right in front of the school. So I'm like, we're
looking at the fight, and my man Black is like,
that's that's havoc right there fighting. He's fighting that kid.
So have I've seen that he was fighting some kid?
Kid actually tried to stab had missed missed him. He
was like leather jacket and like motherfuckers dropp niggas, like

(43:23):
got the knife out of his hand.

Speaker 3 (43:24):
Had beat him.

Speaker 8 (43:24):
Up and everybody lifted half up in the air like
he just like like he just hit.

Speaker 7 (43:31):
The winning game touchdown.

Speaker 8 (43:34):
There was dumping him in the air like this, I
swear all the way to the train station after the fight. Damn,
he's calling him Kiw because I was like his name, Like,
his name is Keiwan. So he's like nickname in schools
like Kiwi. The used to call the Kiwi and they
used to call me pee wee.

Speaker 3 (43:47):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (43:48):
Because I was mad small Like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (43:50):
That would have been a better group named.

Speaker 8 (43:55):
So you know, we following him to the train station
and I'm like this is crazy like all. So after
they put him down, we get on the train, we
meet each other. So I'm like, yo, where are we going?
Like we're going to Ravenswood. I'm like ravens Wood. I'm
like my grandmother from Ravenswood, my mother's mother, you know
what I mean. She had moved from South Jamaica projects
to Ravenswood like some time ago. He was like a word,

(44:19):
He's like my grandmother from Ravenswood. So both our grandmothers
lived in Ravenswood. So right there, that was like we
had a connection, like you know what I'm saying. Right,
so we went to his you know, his craving Ravenswood
and we chilled, and we went to Queensbridge walked around chilling, and.

Speaker 3 (44:35):
That was it.

Speaker 7 (44:36):
We just got cool that day, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (44:37):
And we started making songs immediately, and we just clicked immediately,
We just clicked, you know what I mean. We became
really close friends and getting in the mad trouble together
and just doing all this dope music and everything was
just like so he was moving know how to make
beats immediately or nah, nah, I actually taught Half how

(44:57):
to how to make beats, how to sample and.

Speaker 3 (45:00):
Wait, you were the initial the person. What were you using?

Speaker 8 (45:04):
Uh EPs sixteen planet task scam set, four track ship
recorder ship like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (45:12):
We let the little mixed board. Yeah.

Speaker 8 (45:16):
So after I met Half, you know what i mean,
and we started getting real cool and we started being
like all right, this is this is we got something,
you know what I'm saying. We kind of looked good together,
were the same height, we got the same style, like
you know what I mean, And it's like, uh, we're
making these dope. We made like fifty songs immediately. We

(45:36):
made like fifty songs when we first met, in a
week or in a month, a couple of weeks, you know.

Speaker 3 (45:40):
What I'm saying. OK.

Speaker 8 (45:43):
And uh, you know right after that, you know, we
just realized like you're damn we got something here, you
know what I'm saying. And uh, we just started pushing
forward with it, like, man, you know what, fuck school,
let's do this.

Speaker 3 (45:57):
For You did the two Young record on No this
is after I did that.

Speaker 8 (46:03):
So I did the Too Young Record when I was
in junior high school.

Speaker 3 (46:07):
Oh wow, the boys and sound him what this is
why I wrote a book.

Speaker 7 (46:15):
Man, There's so much shipped from different angles, Like.

Speaker 1 (46:21):
But the EPA won't listen to what I have said,
these two of the biggest biggest R and B heads
of all times.

Speaker 8 (46:32):
The fact that when I was living in Left Rack,
I had made a U, I had a solo career.
I was like trying to be a you know, a
solo artist. My name was the Golden Child. My name
was Lord T the Golden Child.

Speaker 3 (46:46):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (46:46):
Because my family they called me choker. You know what
I'm saying with the T, but the tea is silent,
you know what I mean. The tea come from choker.
You know what I'm saying. Lord T. The Golden Child,
I thought I was the Golden Chad. That was my like,
my favorite movie.

Speaker 3 (46:57):
I was.

Speaker 7 (46:58):
So Anyway, I had Little te the Golden Child, one
of my homies from Left Frack.

Speaker 3 (47:02):
You know.

Speaker 7 (47:02):
We used to make some music together or whatever whatever.

Speaker 8 (47:05):
But he used to send me some beats and I
used to go record him and I used to shop around.
My mom's was like, yo, shop your demo around. She
was like, write your lyrics out mailing to yourself. That's
the cheap man copy copyright, man, poor man copyright like
I was doing.

Speaker 3 (47:22):
My mom was teaching me what to do.

Speaker 8 (47:23):
She was like, do this, do that, take a shit around,
you know what I mean. So we got my music
to jive somehow. I don't even remember how, but job
gave me a demo deal and a demo dealer is
do you remember?

Speaker 3 (47:38):
Nah, I don't even remember how I answered that time.

Speaker 8 (47:41):
This is nineteen ninety, correct, Na, this is like eighty eight,
eighty nine. Okay, you know what I'm saying. So I'm
in job working in battery studio. You know, they got
their own studio, So they gave me a studio. They
was like, all right, let's see what you could do,
you by yourself. That's what a demo deal is, you
know what I'm saying. They put you in the studio.
All right, let's see what you If you could come

(48:03):
up with something dope within the next couple of months,
we'll sign you to you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (48:08):
So that's the kind of.

Speaker 3 (48:09):
Deal I had.

Speaker 1 (48:10):
So so you by yourself, Me by myself with the
German scene and you writing your rhymes, doing your own music.

Speaker 8 (48:15):
No, I wasn't making beats at that point. I was
getting beats from people, and you know what I mean,
just trying whatever I could do. So while I'm dead,
I used to I used to flirt with the girls
at the front desk, like you know what I mean.
A couple of girls worked at the front desk.

Speaker 7 (48:31):
You know, they was cool with me.

Speaker 8 (48:33):
So one day I'll go to job to go to
the studio and the girl at the front desk, her
name was Kim. I remember her name because she hooked
it up for me. She was like, yo, I want
to bring you to the back. You need to meet somebody.
They working on the soundtrack. I'm gonna get you on
his soundtrack.

Speaker 3 (48:47):
Come on.

Speaker 7 (48:48):
So she brought me in the back office. She was like, Yo,
this is this is little tea whatever da da da dah.

Speaker 3 (48:53):
He rapped.

Speaker 7 (48:54):
You should get him on this song.

Speaker 8 (48:56):
So they was like, all right, go ahead, you write,
write some balls. See what you could come up with.
And I wrote that too young, you know what I mean?
And they put me on the song.

Speaker 3 (49:04):
So crazy. I was just thinking about that. I was
really thinking about that song last week. All the stuff
about about Trump, you know, defunding the E p.

Speaker 4 (49:12):
A and all that, that lyric kept coming in my head.

Speaker 3 (49:16):
It's crazy crazy.

Speaker 7 (49:17):
I never knew that then.

Speaker 3 (49:19):
You know. My first year of high school, Mett Half.

Speaker 8 (49:25):
Still working at Battery at this time, so I used
to bring Half with me. I was like, yo, I
got a studio we could work at. So I used
to bring Half with me. The Battery, we used to
get beat. We used to like use recording polls on
the tape and make our own beats. And that's we
made a lot of beats like that.

Speaker 3 (49:41):
And where y'all going by the poetical prophets at this time.

Speaker 8 (49:45):
Yeah, we still didn't figure out the name out this time,
you know what I'm saying. But uh, you know, Job
gave me that studio then. Now I'm not supposed to
be having other people in there.

Speaker 1 (49:54):
So does the story sound familiar? Is the black version
of search, This is the third base got started.

Speaker 3 (50:01):
So take this out so now you know.

Speaker 8 (50:04):
Job was like, all right, we want to sign you
after the boys and the hood Ship and all that.
And I was like, look, I got a partner now.
I was like, if you want to sign me, you
gotta signed him. And they was like, na, we just
want you, you know what I mean, we don't want
your partner. And I was like, all right, well.

Speaker 3 (50:21):
See you later.

Speaker 8 (50:22):
You walked away from that, that's oil. I was like, man, listen,
because what we were doing, it was just it was
just a vibe.

Speaker 7 (50:32):
You could just feel it, you know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (50:34):
You could feel the power of what and we just
like met and just started and through our conversations and
just hanging out and the music we was doing, you
could just feel like, this is what it's supposed to be.
You know, I'm not supposed to be a solo artist,
you know, what I'm.

Speaker 9 (50:48):
Saying, knowed you walked away?

Speaker 7 (50:50):
Yeah, yeah, you know that because I was trying to
get both of us signed the job, you know what
I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (50:54):
But they was like nah, So like I mean, by
this time, there were other groups that were of your
age or I mean, y'all look mad young at least
on the Juvenile Health record, y'all look young and shit.
So I thought y'all were in the kids group realm right?
So were they trying to mold y'all into that ABC

(51:20):
criss cross kind of bandwagon?

Speaker 3 (51:23):
Like they trying to make y'all kids group?

Speaker 8 (51:25):
The ill part about it is we never had anybody
telling us to do anything nor ever, like I said,
they put me in that room like all right, let
me see what you can do.

Speaker 3 (51:35):
That's crazy. So nobody artist development, no do that. Nobody
ever told us what you able to teach yourself.

Speaker 7 (51:43):
All we just did it, Like you know what I'm saying.
We just did it.

Speaker 8 (51:46):
And you know, after job was like nah, I was like,
all right, we're out of here, and uh we just
continue to make songs and shop our demo around and
you know, try to get on you know I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (52:00):
And that's when we met you tip after a while.
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (52:04):
All Right, I'm sure you've told this story a good
jillion times, but can you please tell that death jam story?
So for our listeners, you've not heard this is the
illest story ever ever.

Speaker 8 (52:19):
Yeah, man, then let me say something real quick to Okay,
just something clear, real quick. A lot of motherfuckers they
read my book or they hear these stories.

Speaker 3 (52:28):
This nigga dry snitching.

Speaker 8 (52:29):
Now, let me tell you something, right, there's nobody being convicted,
arrested or anything. From what I'm saying. I'm saying, ship
with the I'm saying ship with a what do you
call it? The thattual limitations.

Speaker 7 (52:44):
Is done already.

Speaker 8 (52:46):
So it's like this is our life, Like this is
ship that happened in our life, and it's it's a
blessing that we're able to talk about.

Speaker 7 (52:53):
It right now and that we made it out of
certain ship.

Speaker 3 (52:56):
And you know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (52:57):
So when when when you hear people saying only they
don't know what the fuck they're talking about the dog
like that, that's that shit really pisses me off. But anyway,
I'm gonna tell you the story. Thank you, So after
the job, ship me and has started making mad songs,
and we took our new demo around and what we

(53:17):
used to do is look on the back of albums
to our favorite labels. So our favorite label, of course
was Death Jam at that time. So we used to
be like, all right, where's death Jam? All right, here's
the address. All right, come ons, cut out of schools,
take the train, go down to death Jam. So we
used to go down to death Jair with the headphones,
walk in, and we should to just stand outside the
door like this and wait for the rappers to come out,
you know what I mean, or whoever to come out.

(53:39):
And we've seen, you know, a bunch of different rappers
come out. We'd be like, yo, listen to our demo tape.
And he was like, man, I got time of this ship.

Speaker 1 (53:45):
See who in front of your who's the minor? Who's
the minor of the story on three guests last week?
And now I feel bad.

Speaker 3 (53:54):
I'm like, Yo, they're gonna be biggest sit like we
was outside of thirty Rock for you.

Speaker 7 (53:58):
I'm gonna tell you it was i'ma I remember clearly
who it was. I don't got no.

Speaker 8 (54:03):
Personal ship against him. I don't care about that ship.
This is like but it definitely was the Afros.

Speaker 11 (54:08):
Remember the damn hurricane Hurricane you could have had Hurricane
was like, what come on, watch out, shorty, you got
time for this shit.

Speaker 8 (54:20):
So I'm like, word whatever. So we wait outside. We
waited outside, We see people coming out. Nobody would give
us a listen. The Q Tip came out the building
and you know, they was on fire at that time.
That was the try call question ship. We're like, oh,
ship tip right here, Yo, could you listen to our demo?

Speaker 7 (54:38):
Son like check us out? Something from Queens dah da
dah dah.

Speaker 8 (54:40):
He's like, work, check your ship out. Put on listen,
playing him a couple of songs.

Speaker 7 (54:45):
He took it off. He was like, come on, come
inside the office with me.

Speaker 8 (54:49):
Dumn brought us in the office, introduced us to Chris Lighty,
introduced us to man. It was called RUSS associated label
at that time.

Speaker 3 (54:57):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (54:58):
It was like a management management thing and plus the
associated label thing, and you know, he introduced us to
people in the office and Sip was like, Yo, these
dudes are dope. Help them, you know what I'm saying.
He was like, help them get them, do something with them.
He was like, yeah, he's like your center.

Speaker 7 (55:16):
He's telling Chris, he's telling everybody office.

Speaker 8 (55:18):
YO, set up a meeting with Russell. Set up a
meeting with YO. Get them, you know what I mean,
get these kids music hurt they dope yea. So after that,
you know, we, uh we had a meeting with h
They set up a meeting for us with Russell Simmons.

Speaker 7 (55:33):
So we go to the office to have a meeting
with Russell and uh, it's supposed to be at Russell Cribb,
which was around the corner on Broadway, Rob McDonald's somewhere
down that area.

Speaker 3 (55:43):
So we get to Russell Creb.

Speaker 8 (55:47):
Matter of fact, I had the gun on me, you
know what I mean, the little one shot daarreage. I
had bought a school, you know what I mean. So
I wasn't trying to get cut. I had left it
in the deaf jam office because I didn't want to
bring a gun in Russell house, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (56:00):
I was like trying to beat respectful. Respectful.

Speaker 8 (56:03):
I was like, I don't bring no weapon in this
crib let meet. I was talking my man office. Hold
us in the drawer for me until we get back
from the mean. So he said, all right, put in
the drawer, walked around the corner with the Russell crib.
Russell was a no show. They're like, oh, Russell got
caught up. Y'all gonna meet with Leo instead in the office.

Speaker 3 (56:20):
Everyone has a Leo story.

Speaker 8 (56:22):
So we're like, all right, bet So we go back
to Death Jam. We meet with Leo. We play Leo
our music. He listening, then he stops the music. He's like,
I can't do nothing with y'all. We're like why. He's like,
how old are y'all? So we were about fifteen sixteen
at this time. He's like, y'all, First of all, y'all

(56:42):
look like y'all nine years old or something. Y'all cursing
like sailors, y'all talking about criminal crazy shit.

Speaker 7 (56:48):
He said, I'm gonna get sued. They're gonna sue Death.

Speaker 8 (56:50):
Jam for putting this on the radio and do all this,
that and the third like, there's no way I can
get this played on the radio. There's no way I
could get this. They're gonna ban y'all. Basically, he told
us like he's like, I can't do nothing with you.
I'm sorry, and We're like.

Speaker 3 (57:05):
That's crazy.

Speaker 8 (57:05):
We like what We was like, what the fuck is
wrong with this dude? Like he didn't understand the music.
He didn't I don't know. He didn't get it. He
didn't like it, that's his choice whatever. So we was like,
all right, fuck it. We wasn't mad at anything. We
was a little upset, like I fucked this nigger. He
don't know, but we didn't give a fuck. We was like,
all right, on to the next label. We're gonna go

(57:27):
to it. We're gonna we're gonna finally find someplace. So
we go downstairs and uh, before we leave, you know,
they had all these posters hanging up in the office and.

Speaker 7 (57:37):
They had like the Great Adventures of Slick Rick frame.

Speaker 8 (57:40):
They had like big Daddy cane ship everybody shit framed
in it, and uh, daylight just dropped, uh de los
Solo's dad. So I wanted one of those posters. They
had the ill dey Lo Soulo's dad post. I wanted
hanging up in my room. You know that was that
back in the day, shit hanging sh up in your
room or whatnot. So I told my man that helped
the gun for me.

Speaker 3 (58:00):
Drawer.

Speaker 8 (58:00):
I was like, Yo, get us some posters before we bounced.
You know what I'm saying. He said, ah, right, I'm
hook go up. So he went, got up some posters.
So me and Half is at his desk. So I'm like, oh, Ship,
the gun is in the drawer, son, So Half get
the gun out of the drawer. He points it at me.
I'm like, yo, chill, Son, that she got you know
what I mean, she got bullets. And he's like, I'm
just playing with you, my nigga. I ain't head, I'm

(58:20):
just playing. Calm down. I'm like, chill, don't point guns
at people, my nigga.

Speaker 3 (58:24):
Chill.

Speaker 7 (58:25):
So did my man come back with on the posters.

Speaker 8 (58:27):
He's like, yo, here he put the posters down to
half point the gun at him, like, YO, give me
them posters, nigga.

Speaker 9 (58:40):
By mistake, they got to go. They got to yo.

Speaker 7 (58:47):
You think, my nigga. Everything went in slow motion after.

Speaker 3 (58:52):
That, literally literally.

Speaker 7 (58:57):
Everything turned misty and went slow motion.

Speaker 8 (59:00):
I remember literally like I don't know why that happens,
but I guess in the heat of moments like that.
Just so Half drops the gun like he we both like,
oh Ship, what the fuck? Like being shocked? You know,
what I mean, have boats out? The boats out, the door,
runs downstairs like, oh ship, I'm out.

Speaker 7 (59:22):
So I'm like, oh, you're not leaving me in here.

Speaker 3 (59:24):
I start tasting.

Speaker 10 (59:25):
I start chasing behind.

Speaker 1 (59:26):
Him, like wait, my dumb man one, did you at
least take the poster because that day are so supposed to.

Speaker 10 (59:34):
I wasn't even thinking about no more at that point.

Speaker 3 (59:37):
Oh, you're not hard to sit on eBay right now.
I was like, not, you're trying to get low.

Speaker 7 (59:41):
He trying to get the fuck out of it at
that point.

Speaker 8 (59:43):
So half ran out the door, knocked d M C
damn m running was coming in the building, knocked the
One of the niggas fell on the floor. I don't
remember who because he busted. He like ran out and
busted through the door.

Speaker 3 (59:58):
So one of them fell down. We and we're running
up the block and crazy way to meet.

Speaker 8 (01:00:04):
By the way, I heard somebody screaming behind me. Stop
them kids, Yo, stop them kids.

Speaker 3 (01:00:10):
So I'm like, look, and it's sucking. At least he is.

Speaker 11 (01:00:13):
Chasing Oh god, so he's chasing us.

Speaker 3 (01:00:21):
Oh he cheaps chasing me.

Speaker 10 (01:00:24):
I'm like, yo, this is chasing us.

Speaker 7 (01:00:30):
So we get down to Houston, right we get down
to the house and have stop have his.

Speaker 8 (01:00:34):
Wild like, Yo, son, it was a mistake. I didn't
mean to do that. It was a mistake. I'm like,
you cal him down. Cal him down, my nigga, dona
al right, this chill relaxed. He's wounding though. He's like
ter because he didn't mean to do that. Ship like
you know what I'm saying. So he's woulding. I'm trying
to get him to calm down. And I see a D.
I see a detective call pull up a mall car.
You know, we know what the DS look like. So
I've seen the D. I said, oh, I said, you

(01:00:55):
have till the jeesus there because have it screaming like
I ain't mean to shoot him, I ain't chips on
the Z right here, chill, my nigga. So they see
him bugging, so they stopped the car. They get out,
they're like, Yo's what's going on. He's like, Yo, I
didn't mean to do it. I didn't mean to do it.
I'm like, oh my god, here come alist yo. Get

(01:01:16):
the They put the handcuffs on half because half is
sitting there basically confessing.

Speaker 3 (01:01:22):
He's like, I didn't mean to do it. It was
a mistake. They're like, oh no, it's gonna be all right.
Put your hand body back. Lord. I'm like, oh my god. Man.

Speaker 8 (01:01:30):
So they let me and my man Prince a d
that was our DJ at the time. They let us go,
took half. I go home, go to sleep right, wake
up the next morning, and go to school. My mom's
always got w b LS playing on the clock radio
in the morning. So I heard on the radio they like, uh,
yesterday there was a shooting in this jam office over

(01:01:53):
contracts the artist some artists. Uh they wouldn't sign the
artist or the artist shot somebody in the office. That's
what they said on the radio. So I'm sitting there
listen to it. I didn't even tell my mom putting
two and two together. I don't even know what's going on.
So when I heard that, I was like, I was like,
oh my god. So now like reality is hitting me
because I'm just waking up and I'm like, it's a

(01:02:15):
new day right now. I'm like, Reality's hit me. What
just happened yesterday? So now my brain kicks in the
how we're gonna get out of this mold?

Speaker 7 (01:02:24):
You know what I'm saying?

Speaker 8 (01:02:25):
And I'm like all right, and right away I just
came out with a story. All right, we thought it
was a lighter.

Speaker 10 (01:02:33):
In the village downtown.

Speaker 8 (01:02:34):
They got the little lighters at the smoke shops, little
gun lighters, Razelle used. So I'm like, yo, and my mom,
I'm like, all right, we got to think of something quick.
So right away, I'm like, yo, we thought we found
it outside. We thought it was a lighter. We was
playing with it and shit went off, you know what
I'm saying. So you know, I had to go to
the hospital kick it with the homie. They got hit

(01:02:55):
and you know, let him know, like, listen, man, you
know that was an accident. Man, you know what I'm saying.
You guys to this story. You know what I'm saying, Like,
otherwise it's gonna be bad for half. Like he was like,
all right, you know what I'm saying. He looked out,
you know what I'm saying, because you know it was
it was a terrible mistake.

Speaker 3 (01:03:10):
But where a bullet goull man.

Speaker 7 (01:03:12):
Stomach after So yeah, that that that craziness happened.

Speaker 3 (01:03:17):
Y'all did not get signed to death jam presum nah?

Speaker 8 (01:03:20):
Then uh like or I leave about this like later,
like now, But Nikki d remember.

Speaker 3 (01:03:29):
That everything because she was there at the office, right.

Speaker 8 (01:03:33):
Yeah, And after that she would always remind me. She
would always remind me about that day. She'd be like, Yo, y'all,
little niggas is bugged the fuck out. Ya, what's wrong
with y'all? The cat got shot? He survived, Like, yeah,
he was good man, you know. Fortunately, you know, everything

(01:03:55):
worked out. And that's a crazy story he'll tell for
the rest of his life. It's definitely a crazy story though. Man,
after that Death Jam had security. You couldn't even walk
in the building anymore.

Speaker 1 (01:04:03):
I was gonna say, because when I went to Jam,
it was like freaking yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:04:10):
So how long is it till Fourth and Broadway comes
in the picture?

Speaker 8 (01:04:15):
Fourth from Broadway is a company on the record company
on island Death Jam, you know. So right after that,
we uh, you know, after everything with that Death Jam ship,
we uh, you know, we continue to make demos and
just Q tip had brought us like into the industry,

(01:04:35):
so we started meeting different people and finding out. We
started finding out about industry parties, you know what I'm saying,
because they would tell us there was a party over here, Tonight,
Party of It Tonight. So we started being in the
loop of all the industry parties at that point, UH
talent shows. Kick Capri would do these talent shows or

(01:04:56):
whoever got the best verse a song, you get one
hundred dollars. We won one of those one night. We
were just going around different functions New York City, talent shows,
different party, industry parties, and a homie from a high school, Derek,
that put us together. That kid that was in my
photography class. His moms used to work for w ball

(01:05:16):
Les and she was like cool with Puff, so he
arranged the meeting with us in Puff. So we got
real cool with Puff right away, and Puff would invite
us to all his parties he was that's when he
was a club promoter at that time, heavy doing club promotion,
and we used to go to all of the Puff parties,
you know what I mean, at the building the Red Zone.

(01:05:40):
So we started really being at all the functions and
hanging out and people started knowing us, you know what
I mean.

Speaker 7 (01:05:48):
And Maddy c got a whold of our demo.

Speaker 3 (01:05:51):
Mattie see from the source. Yeah, he got a.

Speaker 8 (01:05:54):
Whold of our demo and he put us in the
Unsigned Hype column that he did. And because of the
Unsigned Hype column and Maddie See's other homeboy Bones alone, yep,
they was like they found interest.

Speaker 7 (01:06:09):
In us from that, and they was like, Yo, we
want to have a meeting with y'all.

Speaker 8 (01:06:13):
Bones brought us up there, Maddie and we met Cookie
Gonzales and uh we met uh Chris Blackwell, you know
what I mean. So they brought us in to meet Chris.
We sat down with Chris. Chris was an interesting dude.

Speaker 3 (01:06:28):
Yeah, what was that like?

Speaker 7 (01:06:28):
Because Chris is like that was very interesting.

Speaker 8 (01:06:31):
He was sitting there rolling up some hash and I
ain't I've never seen hash before.

Speaker 7 (01:06:36):
He had a big roll of black hash and I'm like, Yo,
what is that? It's hash? Smoke it. So I'm like
all right. He was like, want to try it.

Speaker 8 (01:06:44):
I'm like, hell yeah, were smoking hash with Chris Blackwell
in the office.

Speaker 7 (01:06:48):
He's like, y'all, I really like y'all, man, I want
to sign y'all up.

Speaker 3 (01:06:51):
You know what I mean? Do it deal with y'all?

Speaker 1 (01:06:53):
Did he ever interject I've never met Chris Blackwell without
at least him interjecting Bob Marley's story.

Speaker 7 (01:07:00):
I'm sure he did.

Speaker 8 (01:07:01):
I'm sure he did, especially when we were smoking, you
know what I mean, he probably said something like that.
But at this time, you know, they had rock him,
every being rock him before, not at this time, but
they had in the past every being rock Him and
the newer, more updated artists on fourth from Bro excellent
was mop you know what I mean. They had a

(01:07:22):
song called the Hill that's real. Uh And how about
some hollcore that was on fourth from Bro. At this
time when Chris is signing us, so he offered us
a deal. He was like, hell, yeah, we want that.
We're taking it, you know what I mean. So we
did the deal with Alan and basically it was the
same thing. He ain't tried to tell us what to do.

(01:07:44):
They basically just.

Speaker 7 (01:07:47):
I mean Cookie and Bones was like, you know the.

Speaker 3 (01:07:50):
Bones, that's dope. No Bones know us.

Speaker 7 (01:07:53):
Like he started hanging out with us and seeing how
we are.

Speaker 3 (01:07:55):
He like, just leave.

Speaker 7 (01:07:56):
Let them niggas do them. They know what they're doing
and they know what they want.

Speaker 9 (01:08:00):
Like, you know what I mean, how old are you doing?
At this point?

Speaker 7 (01:08:02):
We're like sixteen?

Speaker 9 (01:08:04):
Are you going to school still?

Speaker 3 (01:08:05):
And were in high school?

Speaker 8 (01:08:06):
But at this point it's like I'm about to drop
out because now I'm one day, I'm like sleeping in
the crib. My mom's wake me up, like I'm gonna
be late for school. I woke up, I said, Mom,
I'm not going to school.

Speaker 9 (01:08:16):
And how did she take that?

Speaker 3 (01:08:17):
She was like, oh, she was like okay, what she left.

Speaker 5 (01:08:20):
And then when she came back from work and she
thought about it, she said something, are you going to
pay some risks?

Speaker 8 (01:08:28):
She just she was just like okay, because she's I
guess she's seen what I was doing with my career,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (01:08:35):
She was helping me, like do it.

Speaker 9 (01:08:37):
You don't have any resistance in your family.

Speaker 3 (01:08:39):
Nah, not with like, you know, I come from an
entertainment family, so.

Speaker 5 (01:08:43):
They like they was encouraging the family trade, right, but
it's still hip hop, so you know, it's so different.

Speaker 8 (01:08:47):
It's definitely different. So they my mom was scared. She
was like apprehensive. When Chris wanted to sign us and
he actually did some kind of thing where we didn't
need our parents consent. Wow, that pissed my mom's off.
She was like, all that, he's a piece of ship.
He did say, went around our backs and signed y'all.

Speaker 3 (01:09:07):
Without uh.

Speaker 7 (01:09:09):
But we was like, ma, chill man, you know what
I'm saying.

Speaker 9 (01:09:11):
So the new edition story ain't happening to y'all.

Speaker 7 (01:09:13):
Y'all used to manage us, took.

Speaker 9 (01:09:16):
And then how do they go behind her?

Speaker 7 (01:09:17):
That's crazy at this time, she's managing us for a minute.

Speaker 3 (01:09:20):
And then we fired her because.

Speaker 8 (01:09:27):
Because she was like, we did the talent show right before,
right before we got signed the fourth row. We did
the talent show. It was like a New York City
some towns show New York you used to do all
the time. And we we had through like auditions, rehearsals
or whatever it is, and we're going through our song
and our song got curses in it.

Speaker 3 (01:09:43):
The chorus of the song go oh.

Speaker 8 (01:09:45):
Ship, here we go, Yo, oh Ship, here we go.

Speaker 7 (01:09:49):
That's the whole chorus, you know what I'm saying. So
we put it on.

Speaker 8 (01:09:53):
We like doing our ship and they're like, oh stopped
the music stopping. They was like, yo, you can't curse
in this talent show. We're like what they like, you
can't curse you you have to change the curses or
doing the song. We're like, we're not changing nothing, man,
We're not doing this man. Fuck your show and we
we walked up. My mom was like, what's wrong with y'all?
So she sat us down like right after that, she

(01:10:15):
was like, you can't do that. You can't you can't
disrespect people like that. You just can't take the curses out.
We was like, yo, listen, we're gonna stick to what
we do.

Speaker 3 (01:10:23):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:10:23):
We don't want nobody trying to change us. We was
hard headed, like you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
Have pridect. I gotta say.

Speaker 1 (01:10:32):
Three times I've heard you easily walk away from some
shit that could sort.

Speaker 3 (01:10:38):
Of maybe sort of change your life.

Speaker 1 (01:10:40):
What I've never heard nihilism to this level where it's
just like I'm out, I can walk away.

Speaker 8 (01:10:47):
What is it in you? Like, what's in your head
that just be like all right, I walk away. I
think we just we believed in what we were doing
so much, like like I said, it was like a
vibe that we had. We could just feel it. It
was gonna work and nothing was gonna stop it. It
was just a feeling, you know what I'm saying. Like
we was like, oh, we got some shit. He don't

(01:11:07):
know it, she don't know it. None of these people
don't know what they talking about.

Speaker 3 (01:11:10):
You know what I'm saying, we got some.

Speaker 8 (01:11:12):
Shit because usually people by this point, people will either
have a side meeting.

Speaker 1 (01:11:18):
Okay, maybe we can meet him at the fifty yard line.
Let's compromise a little bit, you know what they want.

Speaker 7 (01:11:22):
And then you know, now we were really we were
really hard headed.

Speaker 3 (01:11:25):
You were just like, oh.

Speaker 7 (01:11:26):
Really, we were really just stuck on what we were doing.
Tunnel vision. We wasn't trying to hear nobody.

Speaker 8 (01:11:34):
We had something that didn't really exist, like you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (01:11:39):
It was like the vibe that we had, you know, just.

Speaker 8 (01:11:42):
The the energy and the words and the style, the slang,
everything was just it wasn't nothing like that, you know
what I'm saying. And it was just like an changing
of the guard at that time almost because you know,
it was like you had the.

Speaker 7 (01:11:56):
Rock cams and the big daddy canes.

Speaker 8 (01:11:58):
And you know, the sent knees like when the Symphony
came out, like that was what was popping when we
was learning how to do rap. And then once we
started getting in the studio, we started catching on how
this ship works.

Speaker 7 (01:12:09):
And we was like, oh, we got this ship, Like
we know how to do this ship.

Speaker 8 (01:12:12):
Right, we thought we did, you know what I'm saying,
but it just it just made our minds like, oh,
this is we want some new ship. Were a new generation.
These motherfuckers don't know what they talking about. We got
some ship.

Speaker 7 (01:12:23):
We're not trying to hear nobody, so that wasson. It
was a fucked up attitude to have. But you know
what I'm saying. So my mom was like, yo, you
can't do that.

Speaker 8 (01:12:34):
So we was like, listen, if you if you're not
gonna follow what we're saying and believe in us to
the maximum and fuck everybody else, then we can't work with.

Speaker 3 (01:12:43):
You no more.

Speaker 8 (01:12:48):
Mom get sixteen and she was like she was like
all right, She was like all right, cool. See when
I get home, she was like, she was like, that's
a very bad attitude to have. You know what I mean,
that was a very bad attitude to have. You're not
going to get fun life with that attitude. She gave
me the whole spiel of that whole thing, but we
wasn't trying.

Speaker 3 (01:13:06):
To hear it.

Speaker 8 (01:13:06):
So it's like when you fire your moms, what happens
when you get home?

Speaker 3 (01:13:09):
Like is it just normal?

Speaker 6 (01:13:10):
Like? Right?

Speaker 8 (01:13:15):
I mean at that time, I wasn't I was kind
of I wasn't going home anymore.

Speaker 3 (01:13:20):
I was at the out the house already, you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:13:23):
I would stay at half crib, I would stay at
my grandmother crib. I would pop up my mom's crib sometimes.
Like we were just bouncing everywhere. I was staying in
the in the Bronx with my homie from school, staying
in Brooklyn with my homie Illog from school.

Speaker 7 (01:13:38):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (01:13:38):
We were just everywhere.

Speaker 8 (01:13:40):
Man were young, active, trying to get on like you
know what I mean. I wasn't thinking, but I adn't
want to be in the house with my mom's Like
you know what I'm saying, I'm out of here. We're
going to Coney Allen, we popping, we stay in the weekend.
We was just having fun and doing what we're doing
and creating ourselves.

Speaker 1 (01:14:00):
So even even though Juvenile didn't, Juvenile Hell didn't necessarily
do the numbers. I mean it did get you guys,
so notice amongst industry people.

Speaker 8 (01:14:09):
So check this out. Our arrogant asshole attitude. Right, That's
why that album came out like and underperformed, and it
was like not really, we didn't put our heart in soul.
We didn't put our We didn't understand that this ship
is not a joke, Like you can't just do whatever

(01:14:31):
and people supposed to kiss your ass and like it.
You got to make timeless, you got to make some
ship that's standing and test the time.

Speaker 7 (01:14:38):
And we didn't understand that.

Speaker 8 (01:14:39):
We was very arrogant. We was very you know, cocky
on some bullshit. And that's why that product came out.
And then a couple of months later, Naves dropped Illmatic
that brought us down to reality.

Speaker 3 (01:14:57):
Have you met Naves before?

Speaker 8 (01:14:58):
Like to on the block together. We're all trying to
get on at the same time, you know what I mean.
We're all trying to get on. Nas had Love at
the Barbecue. He had the song on the Zebra soundtrack
the halftime, So this is all at the same time.
While we're doing Juvenile Hell, Nas had the Zebra halftime
ship and you.

Speaker 3 (01:15:18):
Know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:15:19):
And we go off on a little promo run and
we up we're doing an in store one day in DC.
We're doing an instore for Juvenile Hell, and we walk
into the instore and Illmatic is playing. We never heard
it before. So we listen, we're sitting there like this.
We look at each other like you hit the ship.
We're like, oh ship, yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:15:41):
Packed this ship up. Were like, yo, pack this ship up.

Speaker 7 (01:15:47):
Man.

Speaker 8 (01:15:47):
We went about this all wrong, you know what I'm saying.
And that brought us down to reality. Basically, that gave
us that was a reality.

Speaker 3 (01:15:54):
Good thing because that was a reality.

Speaker 8 (01:16:00):
It was right point, you know what I mean. But
you know, right right then, we've seen it. We've seen
it before before we even got dropped. We already knew,
oh all right, we fucked up, you know what I'm saying,
because we can hear the difference.

Speaker 7 (01:16:14):
We can hear it. There was a big difference.

Speaker 8 (01:16:17):
Between the you know, the thought that was put into
making the music, you know what I'm saying, The thought
that was put into making writing the lyrics, making the beats.
He put some serious thought into that, and we didn't.
We were just fucking around being little dumb ass kids
like you know what I'm saying, like feeling ourselves.

Speaker 7 (01:16:33):
Yeah we got a wrap deal, Yeah I got gold tooth.

Speaker 3 (01:16:35):
Yeah, like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (01:16:38):
So how far like when did suddenly become like okay,
this serious business so we got a lot of people
still feel as though that's your first record.

Speaker 3 (01:16:47):
When we got dropped.

Speaker 8 (01:16:49):
That's when when we heard the ill Matic Alum and
then we got dropped maybe a couple of weeks later
or whatever whatever.

Speaker 3 (01:16:55):
We were just like in the sunken place.

Speaker 8 (01:17:01):
It was like, we gotta get the funk out of here, Yo,
we gotta. We was like, no, no, this can't happen.

Speaker 7 (01:17:07):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:17:08):
So you be making a second album and then.

Speaker 7 (01:17:11):
Yo, our hearts was broken. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:17:14):
Because we was like, Yo, this is what we want
to do with our life. We're not playing with this ship.
We just went about it the wrong way. We had
the wrong attitude, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (01:17:23):
So we was like hold hold no, It's like we
was like no, you know what I'm saying, Like, we
gotta we gotta show people who we are.

Speaker 8 (01:17:31):
We gotta tell our story the right way. We gotta
put like I said, put thought and put meaning and
put your soul, put your heart into the music, like
you know what I mean, tell your story, man, like
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:17:43):
So we was just.

Speaker 8 (01:17:45):
We went in and we had that attitude like yo, listen,
this is what we want to do for our rest
of our life.

Speaker 3 (01:17:51):
We just got dropped.

Speaker 8 (01:17:52):
We feel like the biggest losers ever were going to
the hood.

Speaker 7 (01:17:56):
Everybody laughing on us on the lower end.

Speaker 3 (01:17:58):
Na just drop.

Speaker 10 (01:17:59):
The man.

Speaker 8 (01:18:01):
Just now was looking at us like like you know
what I'm saying, Like they laughing at us on the low.
So we we like went in regroup and we had
the attitude like you know, we're not We're not gonna
this ain't gonna happen again.

Speaker 7 (01:18:15):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:18:16):
One for sure, this is never gonna happen again, you
know what I'm saying. And so did you have the
the well, I know that at that point, uh Matt
started working at loud correct Uh yeah, right or right
around that time, Matt got a job at loud Loud.
They was just like a cubicle inside the r c

(01:18:37):
A office, right, They had pm D I think his
first solo album. Yeah, they had the Alcoholics and they
had just signed Wu Tang you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (01:18:48):
So, uh yeah, we we regrouped after that with that mentality.

Speaker 8 (01:18:53):
We was like, oh hell no, that's when we really
started going in making our own beats. That's when I
was like, I was teaching half, you know what I mean,
during that time the juvenile hell and transitioning over to
making this new demo. I was teaching half how to
do the beasts and shit, and he was getting nice
with it. So at first it was like I would
make a baseline or some of some drums or something

(01:19:14):
and then have her come add some shit to it,
you know what i mean, and I'd.

Speaker 7 (01:19:18):
Be like, yo, yo, let me add, let me add something,
let me change something. They'd be like, oh yeah, right,
let me ask. So that that's how it was at first.

Speaker 3 (01:19:24):
After a while, I started.

Speaker 8 (01:19:26):
Listening and looking and have started looking possessed, Like you
could just see it. He was fucking possessed, you know
what I'm saying, And you could hear it. So I'm like,
after a while, I was like, I don't even want
to bother him, you know what I'm saying. Like I
didn't want to be like, yo, let me add because
he was in his groove, like you know what I'm saying.
So I was like, let me just let him work,

(01:19:47):
you know what I'm saying, and I'll just sitting he
him right to run, you know what I'm saying, so
it got like that. And plus he was hogging it
a little something too. He was definitely hogging you know
what I'm saying. He was like, holdo, hold up, said
hold on, hold up, Uh Yo, come on, let me
add you let hold on hold up.

Speaker 7 (01:20:02):
After a while, I'm like, all right, go ahead, man,
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:20:05):
I'm gonna just I'm gonna go to store get a
forty I'll be right back, come back to beat is done,
and then I just write around to it. But then
I also seen that. Have I seen Havoc become Havoc?
I seen it, you know what I mean. I've seen
it in his face. I heard it in the music.
I just seen it look in his face while he
was sitting there making the bees. I was like, wow,
he's really he's really tapped in right now, like you

(01:20:27):
know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:20:28):
So that's how that happened.

Speaker 8 (01:20:30):
And you know, Maddy brought us over to Steve.

Speaker 7 (01:20:33):
You heard our demos. He was like, Yo, yeah, motherfuckers,
I got some shit now, I got a new job
over here.

Speaker 8 (01:20:40):
I'm gonna bring I'm gonna bring you up to the office.
Meet Steve Rifkin Ba boom Steve. He played music for Steve.
Steve was like, y'all, I love it. He's like, I
want to sign y'all, you know what I'm saying. But
at the same time, we hanging out with Puff every day.
So Puff is telling us about this new company that
he wants to start called bad Boy, and he's like, yo,
I want to I want you to be the first artists.

Speaker 3 (01:21:00):
I want to sign y'all the bad Boy WHOA.

Speaker 8 (01:21:03):
So we like, we hanging with Puff every night, you
know what I'm saying at the clubs, he like, you
want to sign us?

Speaker 7 (01:21:09):
Steve want to sign us. So we now now we're
telling them, let's get some.

Speaker 8 (01:21:13):
Paperwork videos in those videos. Yeah, yeah, okay, I get
it in the video. So basically, the deal that Steve
offered us basically was more money.

Speaker 7 (01:21:28):
And that's the only reason why we took to Steve.

Speaker 5 (01:21:31):
What was the trade off, like, because usually with those
things more money but less control power and something.

Speaker 8 (01:21:37):
Nah, it was it was it wasn't. It wasn't actually
any trade off. I guess trade off was.

Speaker 3 (01:21:44):
The trade off was they probably got the key.

Speaker 8 (01:21:48):
They got to Maybe the trade off was also we
didn't have to do all the glossyat other ship. Like
you know what I'm saying, that was one good trade off,
Like you know what I mean. But Puff had a vision,
he had a vision for this company, and he wanted
us to be the first artist on bad Boy. But
Steve just so happened to offer us maybe like ten

(01:22:09):
thousand dollars more than where Puff was offering.

Speaker 3 (01:22:11):
So we we just went with the Steve deal.

Speaker 8 (01:22:14):
Sou Steve was talking like, yo, listen, I'll give you
all this deal to do what I want. It sounded
like you already got your game mastered. Just do what
I'll do, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:22:22):
What I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:22:24):
So we took the Loud deal, and you know, we
started working on the Infamous album, you know what I'm saying.
And you know, shout out to Mattie c. You know,
shout out to Bones Malone, you know, Cookie Gonzales and
you know Chris Blackwell and everybody that helped us out
in the beginning and got us to that point, you
know what I mean, where Steve Risker wanted to sign us.

Speaker 4 (01:22:46):
How did Q tip come back into the fold working
working with y'all on the Infamous So.

Speaker 8 (01:22:52):
After we had you know, it was like eighty percent
probably done, maybe sixty percent done maybe with the album,
we was like, yo, let's call Tip. We want some beats.
We want some beats fro Tip. So we reached out
the Tip.

Speaker 7 (01:23:05):
Uh.

Speaker 8 (01:23:05):
He came and picked us up and he brought us
his Crible Linden and uh, he was basically just played
us mad records. He was like, tell me when you
hear something you like, you know what I mean. So
he was playing Mad Patresse Russian and he was playing
all kind of ship that we so I think it
was the Patris Russian one.

Speaker 7 (01:23:21):
With that LL did the song Pink Cookies in the
plastic Bag.

Speaker 3 (01:23:27):
That's alright with me, yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:23:29):
So uh so, uh, he plays us that record and
right away I recognized it from LL song.

Speaker 3 (01:23:35):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 8 (01:23:36):
But in my mind I was like, Yo, let's make
a new Let's make a different version. Let's use that
beat and make a different version the.

Speaker 3 (01:23:42):
Right way, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:23:45):
So uh, we picked a bunch of beats from him
and we did some songs and basically we finished the
album up. And when the album was done, we brought
Qute to back in the studio to tweak.

Speaker 3 (01:23:57):
Up the mixes.

Speaker 8 (01:23:59):
Like you know what I'm saying, Like because he was
nice with Dad, Like you know what I'm saying, fix
the sounds here and there, do little things here and there,
touch the knobs and shit, you know what I'm saying.
And he basically like took what we did and like
made it sound good. Like you know what I'm saying.
Hooked us up with the good mix engineer is you
know what I'm saying. So that was that was really
good that we was able to work with him at

(01:24:20):
that point.

Speaker 3 (01:24:21):
You know what I'm saying. Where you're listening to the
quest of Supreme, we're here.

Speaker 1 (01:24:24):
We are a Prodigy of Mob Deep and Kathy Ianderley,
journalists and co author of Prodigy's latest book, Commion Sary Kitchen,
My infamous prison cookbook. Okay, I have to say that,
you know the glory of hip hop and being alive
doing the classic, doing the Renaissance and the classic period

(01:24:46):
and all the periods of hip hop is you know
when a song stops you in your tracks, yo, I
will say. And the thing is, I don't think anyone
is really properly put in context.

Speaker 3 (01:25:02):
Why shook ones? It's so culturally important? All right?

Speaker 1 (01:25:06):
Take it take it for someone shelter, someone sheltered like
me that like, just listen to hip hop to really
find out what's going out there, you know what I'm saying,
Like I'm one of the I'm one of the dudes
that the marketing people of def jam would have loved,
because like when Onyx came out, I was like, Yo, this.

Speaker 3 (01:25:26):
Is real hardcore. Or like when Niggas for.

Speaker 8 (01:25:28):
Life came out, that was like, Yo, you were n
w A saying this is so but I didn't realize
that it was so over the top hardcore.

Speaker 3 (01:25:36):
Its cartoonish. It was cartoonish.

Speaker 1 (01:25:41):
And when I heard shook ones they did, I feel
like if if Robert de Niro and al Pacino were
making hip hop.

Speaker 3 (01:25:53):
That's what it would be.

Speaker 1 (01:25:54):
Well, because the glory and Robert de Niro on al
Pacino's work is the fact that they're so dead seating.

Speaker 3 (01:26:00):
Yeah it's dead pan.

Speaker 1 (01:26:01):
You're more scared of someone that's silent and just deadpan
as opposed to like someone's cartooning over the top. Then
I don't take them serious. I'm like, oh, your your
bark's worst thing, your bite, You're just being a cartoon.
But the fact that they were saying the shit they
were saying and such so deadpan about it. And too
it was the visuals too, like the visual like that video, honest,

(01:26:22):
see the video until later so I heard the song.
It's just like yo, I saw we.

Speaker 3 (01:26:27):
Saw the video first. I saw the video first, and
so for us.

Speaker 4 (01:26:30):
It was it was seeing the video and literally probably
about a month after the video came out, I remember
kids in my school come my homies had the Hennessy jerseys.

Speaker 3 (01:26:44):
Straight up. But yeah, it was something.

Speaker 4 (01:26:45):
It was just something that came through in that video
that was like, I mean, being in the South, even
though y'all were in New York, guys, that was just
something I don't know, that was just.

Speaker 1 (01:26:56):
That was more New York to me, even any Wu
Tang product any like to me, even even even on
even on New York, New York, where like if you
listen to the very h the first twenty seconds, but
dark pounds New York, New York. I mean they're basically

(01:27:16):
mocking what.

Speaker 3 (01:27:20):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:27:20):
Like so for me, that's like lightning in a bottle
you can't even capture. Like I guess the theme of
Quest of Supreme is that whenever like these these monumentals
hip hop moments happened. It's always an afterthought, like, yeah,
we made this in like five minutes. What was the

(01:27:41):
process behind shook ones or at that part too?

Speaker 4 (01:27:44):
It was part yeah because it was part one first,
I had the master single with one on Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:27:49):
Like why wasn't that push And I don't know it
just it just happened the way it happened. I don't
even know.

Speaker 8 (01:27:55):
Man, we made Paul one and uh I think we
made we might have made they both of them around
the same time. And then we put the part one
out first, put the second one out and.

Speaker 7 (01:28:06):
Uh yeah, like we shock happened like that.

Speaker 1 (01:28:09):
We ain't shocked that at at it's the reception.

Speaker 8 (01:28:12):
And you know, every time we would make songs, this
is how we would test our music. We'd be outside
on the block with everybody. You know what I'm saying.
Queensbridge is like I said, ninety six buildings is big.
It's a big projects, a lot of people outside. Like
we had a lot of friends, like you know what
I mean, you know Brooklyn hanging out in Brooklyn and Bronx,

(01:28:33):
same thing. We would hang out with all our friends
and we would play our music and we want to
see how people react to it, like you know what
I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:28:40):
So you know what I'm saying. We and we got you.

Speaker 8 (01:28:43):
Know, our PIDs, people like Knaves spitting crazy, you know
what I mean, people like Cormega was spitting crazy like
it was.

Speaker 3 (01:28:50):
A lot of people that was dope.

Speaker 8 (01:28:51):
The whole Juice Crew thing, the Symphony like that, that
was like shit that we that was around us.

Speaker 3 (01:28:57):
So it was like, you know, we were.

Speaker 8 (01:29:00):
Trying to spit that level of shit. These are the
people that we had to deal with. These are people
that are gonna laugh with us if we make some bullshit,
like you know what I mean, if we talking some bullshit,
if we talking some shit that's not true, like you
know what I'm saying, if we like, we had to
deal with people like you know what I'm saying. And
so that's how we would test a lot of our music.
We would play it outside on the block, see how

(01:29:21):
people react to it, and we would see how friends,
our friends would be like, oh, shit's fire, you'll bring
that shit back, You'll bring that shit back. And we
would walk around different blocks in the hood and just
like I said, take it to Brooklyn, take your head,
take it dead. See how everybody feeling it, and that's
how we would know, oh, we got.

Speaker 3 (01:29:36):
Something, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:29:37):
If motherfuckers didn't react and we were like, we can't
fuck with that, But if they reacted, we knew we
had something.

Speaker 7 (01:29:43):
So we did the same thing. We shook ones.

Speaker 3 (01:29:46):
You know.

Speaker 7 (01:29:46):
Most of the songs was like that.

Speaker 3 (01:29:48):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:29:48):
We would test it out on the block and see
how people would react, and then we.

Speaker 7 (01:29:53):
Were like, all right, we got one. Put that out,
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (01:29:55):
I think another part of the formula that really made
that album work is the fact that the musical backdrop
it was like so it wasn't ass hardcore, like even
for like up North Trip, Like I remember my uncle
used to always that came from a Spinner's record, Spinners eight,
So you used to always play the spinners I'm tired

(01:30:16):
of living on his eight track, right, So that's how
I always remembered it. But now it's like I meant,
even though the subject matter that song was more like
a it's kind of like a fuck my friends, like
I can only trust me sort of things, Like I
always had happy memories of being in my uncle Junie's

(01:30:37):
card listening to that song, but then like y'all just
took it and just made it into like yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:30:41):
It was like a position of like smooth like soothing
sounds and then like the most murderous shit on top
of it, like lyrically even like drink record like drink
a Way to Pain, Like that's like a happy ass hit.

Speaker 3 (01:30:54):
On the song.

Speaker 4 (01:30:54):
But then right then y'all slow it down and like
spit that shit over it.

Speaker 3 (01:30:59):
It becomes something to you know, we caught our drift
we called a drift.

Speaker 8 (01:31:03):
We was on it, like you know what I mean,
and once we locked in, that was it.

Speaker 3 (01:31:07):
We wasn't. We was like, all right, we got it,
we got it.

Speaker 8 (01:31:09):
Let's go like you know what I'm saying, we get
in the reaction that we want from people.

Speaker 1 (01:31:14):
Now, So what is life like now that the album
is taken off? I mean, y'all got four and a
half mics in the source. I'm one of those people
that actually believe that four and a half mics is
better than a five because when you when you, I mean, yeah,
you can have a five, but then it becomes a burden.
Like I feel like for Nas that five is a
burden on him because it's like everybody's always going to say, well,

(01:31:35):
in the beginning of nineteen ninety four, this is when
you know they kind of I feel like four and
a half is like the highest accolade you can get
where you don't get that much jealousy or scrutiny from
your peers or whatever.

Speaker 3 (01:31:50):
I see.

Speaker 1 (01:31:51):
Definitely, did you feel some sort of way, do you
feel like, oh man, we should have got a five
like yell madic or at that time.

Speaker 7 (01:31:57):
We didn't really we didn't really care. Like the sauce was.
The source was definite, don't get me wrong.

Speaker 8 (01:32:01):
I was like the Bible, hip hop Bible, like you
know what I'm saying, Like that's how we got our
break was from the source like unsigned hype, but that
you know what we were making, you know, we knew
the power of what we were making, like we felt it,
we seen it, we heard it like we've seen people
were reacting to it. So we didn't really once we
got in that zone, it was just just go time.

(01:32:22):
We ain't really care, you know what I mean too
much about or they gave us four mice and whatever.

Speaker 3 (01:32:27):
Because we still had that attitude a little bit in us.

Speaker 7 (01:32:30):
Like they talk about like you know what I mean,
But it was a little bit more polished.

Speaker 3 (01:32:35):
The attitude was a little.

Speaker 7 (01:32:36):
Bit more polished, but it was still there, you know
what I'm saying. It was still there.

Speaker 8 (01:32:40):
So we didn't really we didn't really care too much
about anything. Once we got our ship off and running
and shook one Survival of the Fittest, there was like
we out of here. Fuck everybody, Now, let's just do
what we do, stick to what we do, stay in
the studio, stay working, just keep dropping these fucking albums,
keep dropping his music. And it was just like that,
that was it.

Speaker 3 (01:33:00):
It was over.

Speaker 1 (01:33:01):
So now that it's more active for you as far
as the reception and I'm sure the touring is ramped
up and just the overall activity, how are you able
to deal with your health issues and still maintain a
busy like itinerary promoting?

Speaker 3 (01:33:20):
And I was fucking up bad.

Speaker 8 (01:33:22):
I didn't even realize what I was doing to myself
because I didn't learn about health and dyeing until like
my mid twenties, Like you know what I'm saying, my
little mid to early mid twenties, Like you know what
I mean.

Speaker 7 (01:33:35):
So I was like I didn't even realize.

Speaker 1 (01:33:36):
So there wouldn't be times where like right before a
show you might have an attack or it's like.

Speaker 8 (01:33:41):
There was plenty of those times because I didn't I
didn't realize that I was making myself sick. Like we
would get up in the morning and have ian J
for breakfast, like you know, oh shit, like literally every day,
like you know what I'm saying, and Harolds for breakfast
Like that was I think, you know what I'm saying,
Like it's crazy as a sound, that's what we were doing.

Speaker 5 (01:34:01):
And why was that Because a lot of people don't
really understand sickle cell like that. So why was that
like so bad for you?

Speaker 3 (01:34:06):
Because I learned later.

Speaker 8 (01:34:08):
I didn't know at this time, but I learned later
that alcohol dehydrates you know what I mean, your blood.

Speaker 7 (01:34:14):
It takes all the oxygen out your blood.

Speaker 8 (01:34:17):
It drives up your blood cells, so that when oxygen
is missing out of my blood, that's what triggers a
sickle cell crisis, Like.

Speaker 9 (01:34:25):
You know what I'm saying, So you were having a
lot back then.

Speaker 8 (01:34:28):
I didn't even realize that I'm doing it to myself.
I'm thinking, because the doctor always told me all my life,
you got sickle cells.

Speaker 3 (01:34:33):
None you could do about it.

Speaker 8 (01:34:34):
You're not gonna live past forty, you know what I'm saying.
That's what they told me all my life. You know
what I'm saying. There's nothing you could do about it.
It's no cured.

Speaker 3 (01:34:41):
That's it. You got to deal with this shit.

Speaker 1 (01:34:43):
So do you think a part of the the Neilists
kind of I don't give a fuck attitude is just
the fact that inside you felt, maybe, well, sit, by
the time I'm forty, I'm not even gonna be here anyway.

Speaker 7 (01:34:54):
So but it's just it wasn't so much.

Speaker 8 (01:34:58):
I mean, maybe subconsciously that, but I I never I
never thought like.

Speaker 7 (01:35:02):
I'm going to die when forty because that's what they said.

Speaker 3 (01:35:05):
But I used to hear that all the time.

Speaker 8 (01:35:07):
So maybe subconsciously, yeah, you know what I mean. But
definitely the pain that I was going through made me
off a little bit, you know what I'm saying a
little bit.

Speaker 3 (01:35:18):
What is the stomach like the logic?

Speaker 8 (01:35:21):
Well, man, it's like pain in the blood. It starts.
It starts like, all right, you know, blood cells around
you know what I mean, look like a life sab
or whatever. And when my blood is missing oxygen, when
there's not enough oxygen with my blood. My blood cells
change shape and turned into like crushing moon shapes sickle shapes,
and they start interlocking with each other like this, and

(01:35:43):
it causes like chain reaction.

Speaker 3 (01:35:45):
And when when they start.

Speaker 8 (01:35:46):
Interlocking with each other, it just builds up and I
guess creates pressure.

Speaker 3 (01:35:50):
Or I don't really use like a headache or matter.

Speaker 8 (01:35:53):
It's like like somebody took a hammer or sledgehammer and
just like bo like you know what I mean, whatever
the pain is that That's what I said. It's like crippling,
like you know what I mean. I can't even walk,
I can't move. Sometimes my friends had to carry me
to the hospital like get crazy, like so you know.

Speaker 3 (01:36:11):
What I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:36:12):
I've been I remember that. I can remember being a
little baby laying in the hospital looking up at my
family looking down at me. I don't even I probably
was like three years old, you know what I'm saying.
And I can I remember those memories, just laying in
the hospital, looking up in my family, being sick in
the hospital. I ain't understand what was going on. I
just nominally pain. I don't know what the fuck is happening.

(01:36:33):
So this pain been with me all my life and
it definitely, you know, had an effect on you know,
my mentality and maybe angry.

Speaker 7 (01:36:41):
I ain't believe in God, you know what I mean,
because I asked the prey it.

Speaker 8 (01:36:45):
Suffer and make the pain go away, and it's not
going away. So I was like, oh, it ain't no God.
Then you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 5 (01:36:52):
This might be a dumb, non celebrity question, but did
you ever Were you ever in the same room with
like tea Boys, because I feel like y'all would have
some of the same issues y'all overre on tour Lie
and she seemed like she really went through.

Speaker 3 (01:37:03):
It a lot. Yeah, we had a conversation.

Speaker 8 (01:37:05):
We were gonna do a song on my H and
I c album, but she said her label would and
let her do a song whatever you can never feel
my pains on it. Yeah, she was supposed to get
on that with me. I had made that song for
me and her and I went down. I flew down
to Atlanta and for her to hear it. She came
to the studio and.

Speaker 3 (01:37:21):
She liked it.

Speaker 8 (01:37:22):
She was like, my label's not gonna let me do
it because they're not gonna let me get on a
hall core rap song. So I don't know, you know
what I mean, But yeah, the Sicker Cell was crazy.
It was a crazy thing to grow up with. And
you know it definitely he made me angry, you know
what I mean. I was an angry, pissed off kid.
And then my father, you know, he didn't help all
the shit he was teaching me. And you know what

(01:37:43):
I'm saying. So you know, by the time I got
to high school and they half I was, it was
I was insane. I was an insane kid, like you
know what I'm saying. I was very fucking insane man.
And uh, you know, going on tour, I didn't realize
I was chilling my myself, like I we would get
off the plane, I'm sick.

Speaker 7 (01:38:03):
I gotta go right to the hospital. You can't even
do gott to cancel the show. I have got to
perform by myself. This is when Infamous, you know what
I mean, Infamous came out. We was like touring overseas
immediately when shook ones and all that, and uh, you know,
I get sick. I got sick in Paris. I had
to go to the hospital in Paris. I had to
go you know, different places overseas.

Speaker 8 (01:38:22):
And you know, I just thought it was normal because
this is what I did all my life, you know
what I mean, Get sick, go to the hospital, get
better after a couple of weeks, come out. But when
it started affecting the shows and started affecting the money
and people booking us, and.

Speaker 1 (01:38:39):
You know what I mean, that affect your relationship with
with with habit, No, I really nah, Like would he
be on you like yo, man, like you know if
you do this da da da, he's going to mess
up the money?

Speaker 3 (01:38:52):
Or yeah, he didn't know. You know, we just thought,
you know, I got sick of sell I get sick.

Speaker 7 (01:38:57):
Okay, we didn't.

Speaker 8 (01:38:58):
I didn't realize, din't connect it's because of my diet
and all this drinking or just smoking all this. We
didn't know that, you know what I mean. So we
just think he gets sick all the time. I hope
he doesn't get sick tonight. I hope he doesn't get
you know.

Speaker 3 (01:39:11):
What I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:39:11):
So after a while, or the money getting fucked up
and promoter scared, the book us, that started making me
think different, Like all right, hold up, this is fucking
up the business. I keep getting sick. What's going on.
So you know, I started doing research and I started
finding out that, like you know, you could control the
sick of cell just you know, from having a proper diet.

(01:39:35):
It's all about diet and what you put into your body.
And and also also you're like your spirit, your mentality,
like because once you change your mind and your spirit,
it kind of has a domino effect. Everything has a
domino effect once you start making change in your life
little things, whether it's diet or whether it's spirituality. But
once you start making changes everything else you look, you

(01:39:58):
start looking at other things. All right, Well I eat clean,
I eat vegetables, all right, So what else do I
need to clean up in my life? Like you know
what I mean, Oh, I need to stop this or
I need to stop hanging out with these people, you know,
I mean get me in trouble. I need to stop
thinking like this. I need to start having negative thoughts.
So it's like a domino effects.

Speaker 3 (01:40:16):
Is it easy to do that?

Speaker 1 (01:40:17):
I mean, well, we didn't even get into how you
guys went from political profits to mob deep. But even
the first time I met y'all, I don't know if
you remember, like the you guys did an in store
or maybe ILL were just there.

Speaker 3 (01:40:32):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:40:33):
When do you want more? Our second album came out
in Philadelphia at Tower Records. We did an in store
like played inside of inside of that store, and you
guys were there, and I was kind of shocked.

Speaker 3 (01:40:46):
I was like, because you know, even then for us,
I guess people sort of.

Speaker 1 (01:40:52):
Looked at us like alternative rep outside kind of didn't
accept us into the fold until like way later.

Speaker 3 (01:40:57):
But I was shocked. I was like, damn mob D
saying like, damn, okay, maybe maybe we're doing good.

Speaker 1 (01:41:03):
Like I know that you guys were in town at
night to do Power ninety nine at night before, but
I also knew that y'all rolled humongous like big, Like
how how do you if you decide, okay, maybe I
need to break away, Like how do you separate yourself.

Speaker 3 (01:41:25):
From church and state if you will?

Speaker 8 (01:41:27):
I mean, I mean, you know, it's it's very tricky, man,
It's very tricky navigating through that whole lifestyle and do
that whole like you know what I mean, communities that
we grew up in, Like you know what I mean,
It's it's not easy, man, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:41:42):
Like on the average tour, how many people are rolling
with y'all now or back back then?

Speaker 8 (01:41:49):
Back then if we was in the States, maybe like
fifteen twenty May, it could be more. Sometimes if sometimes
we would drive to like Genetic Chi will drive to
Boston or something, and we had like fifteen calls with us,
they like.

Speaker 3 (01:42:03):
So I got people.

Speaker 8 (01:42:04):
So I got to ask because we're dropping, like you
know what I mean, it's nothing. So I got to
ask because any of us sleeping in a room, like
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (01:42:13):
So when when drop a gym, when them came out
and I first heard that on a mixtape, I mean
that was like at the not even at the hype,
but at the beginning of what would soon become a
very unnecessary you know, Fable talked about uh East West

(01:42:35):
rivalry thing, which you guys were like caught dead in
the middle. What was what was your reaction because I know,
I mean, in hindsight, I know that Tupac was just
basically like just calling out any and every name. I
mean even Daylight Soul and the Fuji's got.

Speaker 3 (01:42:54):
I was like, what are the right exactly?

Speaker 1 (01:42:57):
So I know they were just calling out he was
just calling out any and everyone. But when you first heard,
when you first heard hit him up, Like, what was
your reaction? You're feeling like, did y'all ever have a
relationship with Tupac before?

Speaker 3 (01:43:15):
Nah? We never. We never met Pac.

Speaker 8 (01:43:18):
We've been in the same room a few times, but
we didn't. We didn't have any connection. We didn't know
each other. Like you know what I'm saying. Yeah, so
when you know when to hit him up ship came out,
we was like, oh shit or word. So immediately, you know,
I'm already thinking like, oh, he's standing up for a

(01:43:38):
snoop because we just made a song going back at
snoop and Pocket is the brand new artist on on
death Row. I forgot about New York. Okay, you know
what I'm saying. Pocket is the brand new artist on
death Row.

Speaker 7 (01:43:49):
So he feels like he gotta show y'all what I'm
I'm death roll now watch'll snoop. You know what I'm saying, Like,
I'll hang through these niggas for you. I'm the new artist.

Speaker 3 (01:43:57):
Let me.

Speaker 8 (01:43:57):
It's my job to do this, you know what I'm saying.
So that's how park mentality was. I think, you know
what I mean? He was like, fuck that he got
to show him proof to death row He's gonna hold
it down, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:44:07):
So he went at us for snoop.

Speaker 8 (01:44:10):
That's what I think, you know what I mean. And
also a lot of people say that. On an album
on Survival when our homies have his cousin, he says
in the chorus, Doug life, we still live in it,
Doug Life, were still living it.

Speaker 7 (01:44:23):
Like on the chorus, we wasn't dissing Park. That was
just like a slang in the.

Speaker 8 (01:44:29):
Street, like the thug Life probably probably coined the phrase, right,
but it was.

Speaker 7 (01:44:37):
Yeah, yeah, so this is how we was talking, like,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:44:40):
So I heard that Park took offense to that, you
know what I mean, because we were saying thug life
is still living it, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:44:46):
What I mean. So not knowing you just adapting what
he It wasn't. No, we wasn't even taking those shots, right.

Speaker 1 (01:44:53):
So what drop drop a jim on him. It's like,
you know, for for most East Coast rappers, going to
LA is like, yo, that's some fun shit. I mean,
at least for now now that weird, you know what
I mean, But not back then, Yeah, like how I mean,
just to be caught up in that shit. Were you
guys like very cautious and coming to Los Angeles for

(01:45:16):
fear of like some shit might go down?

Speaker 3 (01:45:18):
Or was it just like.

Speaker 8 (01:45:21):
When the La La and New York New York came
out and then Pop dropped Hit Him Up. Our song
La La was number one on LA radio, you know
what I'm saying. For whatever reason, we had a big
fan base in Cali early, you know what I'm saying.
So we had fans out there and the song became

(01:45:44):
number one in LA radio and they was requesting for
us to fly out there and perform it. So we
were flying to LA. We would bring like all our
boys with us, you know what I'm saying, and we
would go perform this song. And we had the mentality
like you know, yeah, we wore already we're gonna bring
our niggas with us. Something pop off. We're gonna pop off,

(01:46:04):
like you know what I'm saying. That was our mentality,
like you know what I'm saying. And we was out
there performing that shit, you know what I mean. In
the middle of all that.

Speaker 3 (01:46:11):
Damn, I'm glad nothing escalated, yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:46:14):
Because you know it can get bad. Anyway, LA's bad.
New York is bad, like everybody bad, like you know
what I mean. So it could have gotten nasty, you
know what I mean, But you know it is what
it is, man like. That's I'm just saying how it
went down, Like you know what I mean. We were
performing out there the La La record and it felt weird,
but we did it. It felt like, yeah, we was

(01:46:34):
in danger, but we didn't give a fuck because we're
in danger back home too, you know what I mean.
When we hang out with the clubs, we hanging in
the hood, our friends are getting shot. So what's the difference, right,
And that's how that was our attitude, like you know
what I mean, what's the difference, Don't give a fuck,
Let's go perform.

Speaker 1 (01:46:50):
Like I happened to read the source article, uh for
your solo project when you were explaining that, you know,
the whole snoop crust, the buildings line or whatever, I mean,
I got the perspective you were coming from saying, like basically,
like we out here on the front lines, you know,
we're out here repping where we came from and that
sort of thing. So it's just the whole takeover situation,

(01:47:17):
like in hindsight. I mean, how do you feel like,
have you guys spoken sense or is it just like
is it water under the bridge now or.

Speaker 7 (01:47:28):
Yeah, it's basically you know, water under the bridge.

Speaker 8 (01:47:30):
Of course, we still we still got that little you know,
competition in us, like you still be looking at like,
you know, Jay don't really fuck with nobody.

Speaker 7 (01:47:38):
He don't do.

Speaker 3 (01:47:39):
Songs with nobody like badly. I'm surprised when Jay did
the joint with Fabulous.

Speaker 8 (01:47:43):
I was like, oh shit, he did the joint with
fab Yo, that's dope, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (01:47:48):
I was happy for fab when that happened. But you know,
Jay don't do songs with nobody.

Speaker 1 (01:47:51):
So it's like I know that him and Nas sort
of you know, people basically see taking over as as
a Nas.

Speaker 3 (01:47:58):
Jay Z situation.

Speaker 8 (01:48:01):
So let me let me let me let me start
from the top right right. I was already thinking when
I first heard Jay said that line. I was in
the club and Queen's and it was all my boys
and I heard the song money Cash Holes was playing
in the club. I was like, it's dope, that beat
his crazy but with the piano shit right. So I
heard the line, I was like, because you know we
listened to we like really be scrutinizing rat like you

(01:48:24):
know what I mean, we like what he just said,
you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:48:26):
Who we talk about like what?

Speaker 8 (01:48:27):
You know what I mean, we'd be overanalyzing shit. Like
So when I heard that s I was like, huh,
I caught that shit right away.

Speaker 7 (01:48:33):
I was like New York and Snoop. Ever since Snoop
came through, and I was like, what the fuck is
he talking about? So, you know, the thought just went
past my head.

Speaker 8 (01:48:41):
So I ain't think nothing of But really after that,
and I was in the office one day and Loud
and Pun was dead. Fat Joe's dead and I was
just kicking in the office chilling, and I overheard Fat
Joe said, Yo, you heard that line.

Speaker 7 (01:48:53):
He was talking to somebody.

Speaker 8 (01:48:54):
Yo, you heard that line? Jay said, New York be
And so I was like, words, son, I feel the
same way. I was like, Yo, that's crazy. You said that.

Speaker 3 (01:49:05):
So I feel the same way. He's like, word, that's
kind of crazy. He said that.

Speaker 8 (01:49:09):
So you know, when when doing the Sauce, I did
the Sauce interview and I was like, man, Jay z
a bitch ass. Nigga for saying that, Like how you're
gonna say that?

Speaker 7 (01:49:17):
Like you know what I mean? That was some bitch
ass nigga shit to say that, like come on, man,
cut it out man, like we was holding it down.

Speaker 8 (01:49:22):
We was out there performing, We've risking our life like
it was serious, like you know what I'm saying, And
that come years later saying some shit like shut the
fuck up, like you know what I'm saying, just rap nigga.
Why are you talking about that that has nothing to
do with you, Like you know what I'm saying, just
rap nigga. So I was pissed, and you know I
was on my bullshit. You know what I'm saying When
I was young, I was on my bullshit. I feel

(01:49:43):
I said I said something. I was like, here a
bitch ass nigga for saying that, you know what I mean?
And you know he he I got the wordy back
from Dame Dash. Dame was like, yo, Jay was you know?
Jay said, you know he wished you just would have
reached out and spoke to him instead of saying it
in the magazine.

Speaker 3 (01:49:59):
I'm like, man, whatever, man, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:50:02):
So then, uh, I actually had a conversation with Nas
right right before this article. I had a conversation with
Nas and uh because me meet what's his nigga name,
Memphis Bleak.

Speaker 7 (01:50:16):
Memphis Bleak was taking shots at Nas. You know what
I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:50:21):
He was, if you fall, I can help you out.
He was just saying little.

Speaker 7 (01:50:24):
Slick shit here.

Speaker 3 (01:50:26):
It was like your life was written? Who you kidding?
Some shit like that. Whatever.

Speaker 8 (01:50:29):
So you know, I took offence to that. Anybody talking
about NOAs, I'm taking offence to it. You know what
I'm saying, Like everybody you know Queensbridge.

Speaker 3 (01:50:37):
Is like, that's the crew, that's that's out cruel. So
I talked to Nas one day.

Speaker 8 (01:50:41):
I was like, yo, son, I was like, you heard
you heard you hear these niggas And he was like yeah, yeah,
He's like I ain't worry about that ship though.

Speaker 7 (01:50:49):
I was like, your son, man, fuck that, Let's go
out to these niggas.

Speaker 8 (01:50:52):
Son, what's up? He like nah, he like that, fuck
the niggas. Don't go out to the niggas, man, fuck them.
Niggas ain't nobody. I'm like, your son, fuck that, Let's
go at these niggas trying to pop ship.

Speaker 3 (01:51:02):
Son.

Speaker 8 (01:51:02):
You hear this ship they popping man ship. He's like, man,
I'm telling you man, fuck that ship man that it
ain't about nothing. So I'm like, I'm you were, and
I'm like, Yo, I'm gonna just do it by myself
then fuck it. He was like all right, you know
that's when I did the article ship said the ship
about him, blah blah blah. And then he do the
Summer jam ship. You know what I'm saying. Yeah, So

(01:51:24):
how that happened is uh earth gott He is cool
with uh, you know with Jay right and a Shati
used to go to my grandma's dance school.

Speaker 3 (01:51:36):
You know what I'm saying. Okay, and and Uh at
the time, we had did a song with Vita called Burn.
You know. We was like that was my Yeah, we
were like my favorite.

Speaker 8 (01:51:53):
We was going at it with Jay like we was
going at it like you know what I'm saying. I
was going at it with Jay like little ship a
mixed tapes. I wasn't taking it as serious. I wasn't
like being like a rapper, like being like I gotta
write some bonds like I was on some writing like Nigga,
when we see you, we're gonna beat you while we're

(01:52:13):
gonna I'm gonna shoot.

Speaker 3 (01:52:15):
You in your foot.

Speaker 7 (01:52:16):
Don't remember that ship?

Speaker 3 (01:52:17):
Like you know what I'm saying, Like that was my mentality.

Speaker 8 (01:52:20):
I'm not even thinking like I gotta write immaculate balls,
I gotta make a battle rap.

Speaker 3 (01:52:26):
Like I'm not even thinking like that at all.

Speaker 8 (01:52:28):
I'm just thinking like, yo, nigga, I'm just writing like nigga,
I'm angry, writing like we're gonna see this nigga, so
fucking you.

Speaker 3 (01:52:40):
Know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:52:41):
So we did the song with Vita called Burn, and
Vita signed it, you know, to IRV Gotti. So it's
trying to shoot the video for Burn, and you know,
Burn is getting a lot of play flexes playing the
ship out of his record. It becomes a hit, and

(01:53:02):
we try to shoot the video. We holler and we
forget a word from Vita that she can't do the video.
So I called her because I was like, you know,
Vida was kicking it. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:53:13):
I had a number. I'm called her.

Speaker 7 (01:53:14):
I'm like, yo, what's going on.

Speaker 8 (01:53:16):
She's like, yo, pee, let me tell you. She was like,
IRV told me I can't do the video. Because Jay,
you know, it was like, yo, don't let her do that.
I was like, word, he was like yeah, they hating
on you over there right now, and this, that, and
the third she was like I can't. I'm sorry, I
can't do the video. I'm like, word, they really did that.

Speaker 3 (01:53:33):
She was like yeah. She was like they over there
like you know.

Speaker 8 (01:53:36):
What I'm saying, They like, don't let her do it.
So I'm like, all right, it's cool, I understand, you
know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:53:40):
Whatever. So Vida never got in the video with us
because of that. Right, So, then the.

Speaker 8 (01:53:46):
Whole summer jam shit happened and he puts this picture
up me dressed like Michael Jackson.

Speaker 7 (01:53:53):
You know, I thought was Michael Jackson when I was
a little kid.

Speaker 3 (01:53:55):
Who didn't think we all thought we did.

Speaker 8 (01:53:57):
So right away I knew where it came from right away,
you know, right he put Immediately I was like, oh wow,
he did some real ill other shit, like he went
and got a picture. He lied on the picture said
it was Prodigy nineteen eighty nine and some shit like
you know what I mean, he lied about the year.

(01:54:18):
So whatever, I thought it was funny, you know what
I'm saying. That like my nigga was in the audience
a Summer jam My man elogy. He called me like, Yo, Pie,
you know, I told you that picture was gonna come
back to haunt you. She had seen the pictures years
ago and shit when he was like working on music,
he was looking through the books.

Speaker 3 (01:54:36):
He's like, oh shit, look at this shit.

Speaker 8 (01:54:38):
So whatever, He's like, Yo, I told you that picture
come back to haunt you. I was like, what you're
talking about? He said, Yo, son, Jay, just put your
picture up.

Speaker 3 (01:54:43):
In Summer jam. I'm like what.

Speaker 8 (01:54:45):
So now we dying laughing on the phone, right, So
now I'm like, Wow, that's crazy. So I'm like, all right,
that's what's up. He got jokes, He got jokes. All right, cool,
it's funny, you know what I'm saying. And that was that,
and then he made you know, he was going at
Nas and and me. He was like, as Nas, you
don't want it withhold, So basically talking to me, you
know what I'm saying, like, as Nas, you don't want

(01:55:06):
it withhold. This that I got money stacks bigger than
you and all this shit. He talked about me the
whole song.

Speaker 7 (01:55:11):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (01:55:12):
He took a little jabbed knaves, but he's talking about
me the whole song. So now I'm like, all right,
this is it fucked that it's warm? You got you
know what I'm saying, Fuck this shit, Fuck this nigga,
Fuck everybody.

Speaker 7 (01:55:27):
They down with da da dah. So you know, I
was on my ship and Nas dropped ether you.

Speaker 8 (01:55:33):
Know what I'm saying, and it just I was like, whoa,
he took it serious, he took the beef and you
know what I'm saying, making the Yeah, I was like, oh,
I wouldn't have wrote some ship like that. I was.

Speaker 3 (01:55:45):
I was too angry. I was just mad.

Speaker 7 (01:55:48):
I wanted to catch this nigga like and do something
to him, like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 5 (01:55:51):
Did you ever talk to Knas after he did either
about that? Because like he changed his mind and then
he changed his mind to a major extent.

Speaker 9 (01:55:57):
So what was he thinking? Was it that he got
mad for the attack on you or the mad for
the attack?

Speaker 3 (01:56:03):
I think no. I think Nas did the well all
said to defend his title.

Speaker 8 (01:56:07):
Yeah, yeah, I think Nas did eta and the song
called Building Destroy number one because Jay mentioned his name,
so he like, I not fucked that and plus we
was me and I was already talking about I was like, yo,
let's go at these niggas, like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:56:20):
But now I guess he heard that song and that
drew the line. He was like, man, fuck that.

Speaker 8 (01:56:23):
So he made a song called Building Destroyer also at
the same time, and he shipped on me talking about
your pology get robbed? You know what he was talking about.
Knives was saying some things that he doesn't have no
idea what really happened. He thinks he knows, but he
really doesn't know. So he was something I got robbed
this that a third and at the end of the
song he apologized to me, you needed the song, yo,

(01:56:44):
p I love you man, Just get away from them
fake ass niggas.

Speaker 3 (01:56:47):
That's what he's saying on the song, like you know
what I'm saying. After he just shot it on me
the whole I'm like, Yo, where did this come from? Oh?

Speaker 9 (01:56:55):
He hits you like, yo, I got this joint.

Speaker 8 (01:56:57):
Building Destroyer was just in a studio with him, Like
I was mad that they was rapping about nas.

Speaker 7 (01:57:02):
I'm like, yoyo, fuck that, Let's go out to these niggas.
They rapping about you, son, you know what I'm saying.
And now he had a song this on me. I'm like,
where did this come from? I don't have no beef
for nos.

Speaker 3 (01:57:12):
I hate to ask this. What album is that one?
No it was on? Was it still madic? I think
I think show was still mad? Really? I think I.

Speaker 8 (01:57:21):
Found out that Nas was mad at me because I
did the song with cor Mega right, and I didn't when.

Speaker 3 (01:57:28):
I did this, which is one of my favorite fucking
mob D songs on Murder Music.

Speaker 7 (01:57:32):
Right, no, no, no, no no, it was one of
the Mega songs.

Speaker 3 (01:57:34):
Okay.

Speaker 7 (01:57:35):
When I did the song with cor Mega, he didn't
have a verse on it. It was just a beat.
I went wrote my verse to it.

Speaker 3 (01:57:41):
I left. When he puts the song out, he writes
his whole verse this and notas Oh.

Speaker 8 (01:57:48):
So I didn't know that before three one situation, you
know what I'm saying. I didn't know that, So then
I found out later That's why Nas. I guess he
thought my verse was about him because he heard that's
fall from you.

Speaker 3 (01:58:00):
You know what I'm saying. I didn't.

Speaker 7 (01:58:01):
I never.

Speaker 3 (01:58:03):
Find out that.

Speaker 8 (01:58:04):
I guess making changes verse without you even knowing. I
guess years later after me being vocal about it and
talking about it.

Speaker 3 (01:58:11):
That's why I said, that's why I wrote.

Speaker 7 (01:58:13):
That's why I.

Speaker 8 (01:58:14):
Wrote the book because the story is so much complex,
pieces to everything. I want people to understand how everything
transpired and how it went down. I communicating that was
one of the main reasons I wrote that book. And
plus I looked at it like, this is my youth.

Speaker 7 (01:58:30):
I'm a grown man now.

Speaker 3 (01:58:31):
That book is my youth. That's my youth, that's.

Speaker 7 (01:58:35):
Me growing up.

Speaker 8 (01:58:37):
I'm a grown man now. I Don'm not like that
no more, you know what I mean. I was very
hard headed and ignorant and all my bullshit, and I
grew up. So I was like, you know what, I'm
gonna write a book and I'm gonna just like you know,
I'm gonna explain how I grew up, and I'm explaining
certain situations for people so they can understand why this happened,
How did that happen?

Speaker 3 (01:58:56):
How did you?

Speaker 7 (01:58:57):
You know what I'm saying? Like, there was so many questions,
and I'm sure that fans wanted to know, why is
y'all beefing?

Speaker 3 (01:59:02):
Why did this?

Speaker 8 (01:59:02):
How did this start with it? That was the main
reason I wrote this book because I want people to
have a clear picture of how it actually went down. Like,
oh yeah, I see Nas everyone again. I've just seen
him recently at New York Fashion Week. We kicked it
like you know what I'm saying, and we were talking
about doing some new music together.

Speaker 3 (01:59:19):
So we're cool.

Speaker 7 (01:59:20):
I don't got no problem with nots. We never really
had it.

Speaker 1 (01:59:22):
I was gonna say, how come like a Queen's Bridge,
like just Summit Meeting album never went down.

Speaker 7 (01:59:35):
There's too many Yeah, it's too many egos. There's too
many people like.

Speaker 1 (01:59:39):
Thinking like my deep Nas like like yeah, like eight
some of the most incredible as MC.

Speaker 3 (01:59:51):
One day.

Speaker 7 (01:59:53):
I was on the phone with Pharrell and Pharrell was
like our first conversation ever.

Speaker 8 (01:59:59):
At second conversation, who's on the phone And he was like, Yo,
you gotta ask you something. He was like, what's wrong
with y'all Queensbridge niggas? Why don't you to fucking stick
together and just do music? My nigga's wrong with your niggas?

Speaker 3 (02:00:13):
Ouh?

Speaker 7 (02:00:13):
Like I'm like, yo, son, it just is what it is.
My niggas just hood ship, Like that's what happens.

Speaker 9 (02:00:19):
Man.

Speaker 7 (02:00:19):
Everybody don't get along.

Speaker 8 (02:00:21):
I mean, I'm sure everybody wants to be lovey dovey
and picture perfect, but it's not like that, you know
what I'm saying, Like.

Speaker 4 (02:00:26):
What's the what's the deal now with I'm thinking about
other queenslandsh cats like Mega Nature, Littles, balls and hooks,
Like what's what's.

Speaker 7 (02:00:35):
They're all doing anything?

Speaker 3 (02:00:36):
You know what I mean?

Speaker 8 (02:00:36):
They doing aything and you know, we doing our thing,
and that's It's just is what it is. Everybody is
doing their own separate things like you know what I'm saying.
I mean, especially for me, I look at it. I
went through a lot of shit, you know what i mean,
just like being out there because I'm like an outside
out there, you know what I'm saying. So a lot
of people treated me like that. They was like he
ain't from the hood. I always had to deal with

(02:00:57):
that attitude a little bit. A lot of people might
have been scared to say it or they didn't want
to say it, but I could just feel it, you
know what I mean, And a lot of people did
say it, so it kind of turned me off a
little bit. It made me really want to just do
my own thing. Like I never said I was from Queensbridge.
Always say I'm from Hempstead, like you know what I'm saying,
and these a lot of a lot of different people

(02:01:17):
from Queensbridge would like to would like to have you
think that I'm a fake Queen like I like I
say I'm from Queensbridge, like p ain't rarely from the hood,
like I never said I was. You just want people
to think that, like you know what I'm saying. Stop
brutting that in people's minds, like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (02:01:33):
So I had to deal with that attitude all the
time with a lot of rappers, a lot of regular.

Speaker 3 (02:01:38):
People in the hood or whatever whatever.

Speaker 8 (02:01:39):
So it kind of turned me off and made me
just like you know what, I kind of I kind
of I just do my own shit cause I gotta
show it made me like I have to show you
now that I don't care about none of this. I'm
my own person, I'm my own entity. Y'all don't control
anything I do. Y'all don't scare me. I don't give
a fuck if from Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queensbridge, Bare, queens.

Speaker 7 (02:02:01):
La, I don't give a fuck where are you from?
This is my life.

Speaker 8 (02:02:04):
Everybody live their life, and I don't live my life
in fear, you know what I'm saying. So it made
me back up over everybody. It made me back up
over everybody and just want to do my own thing.

Speaker 6 (02:02:14):
Man.

Speaker 8 (02:02:14):
That's why I started doing, you know, my own shit, man,
because I started dealing with a lot of that, a
lot of that, you know, just just weird shit people
like he's not from out here, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 5 (02:02:24):
Don't you think it's ironic that like amongst that, all
those mcs who look at you like that in that way,
It's like, now they're raising children and they're bringing them
up in a way that you were brought up in
your childhood, like culturally and all that stuff. And I
even thought that now would looking at the video you
doing bad landing like that, now that we have the
context of where that come from, it adds to the
dopeness of who you are, right And now I look
at even a blue ivy and I'm.

Speaker 9 (02:02:45):
Like, that's her. She's growing up in that environment. So
do you see that now as clearly?

Speaker 8 (02:02:52):
And I just think that, you know, it's not everybody.
Everybody's not a bad person, Like everybody didn't have that attitude.
It was only certain particular people and yeah, I mean,
it just is what it is.

Speaker 1 (02:03:06):
Man.

Speaker 8 (02:03:06):
I'm me, Man, you know what I'm saying, And I'm
the type of person. I was trying to get everybody together,
and you know I'm that type of person. I'm like, Yo,
all right, come on, you're gonna rap. We made Annoyed
and Twin and everybody rap, like you know what I'm saying.
We was like, nah, you're gonna rap Nigga and Nigga Annoyed,
Like I don't want to sell drugs.

Speaker 7 (02:03:23):
I don't want to rap, you know what I'm saying, Like, no,
come to the studio with us. Come on, you're gonna
rap son. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:03:29):
I used to help Anoid write his shit, you know
what I'm saying. And we used to all help each other,
you know what I'm saying. And then it was just like,
you know what I'm saying. I'm that type of person
to try to, you know, keep the team strong and
keep everybody together. I shot a movie for Queensbridge, you
know what I mean, called Murder Music. I put everybody's
in the movie. Nah's, everybody's in that motherfucker, Like you

(02:03:50):
know what I'm saying. That's the type of person I am.
You know what I'm saying, Like, I try to do
shit the right way, get it together, and then you
got niggas that's hate us. They don't want to see that.
Like he ain't even from out here.

Speaker 3 (02:04:01):
Why was he doing that? I should be doing it?
You know what I'm saying. All right, So you listened
to the quest of Supreme.

Speaker 1 (02:04:06):
We're into our last hour Prodigy of mob Deep and
Kaffe Yonderley, journalist and co author of Prodigy's latest book,
Commisary Kitchen, my infamous prison cookbook, And we'll be right
back after quick message from our sponsor. So, I feel
like your journey, it's probably you, of anyone has had

(02:04:29):
a kind of a parallel journey to that of like
Malcolm X, where like you, you had your Detroit Red experience.

Speaker 3 (02:04:38):
Literally Detroit, right, Oh damn, that's right.

Speaker 1 (02:04:44):
Yeah, like you you you you had your your Malcolm
little Detroit read experience. And then in two thousand and
eight when you had to do your bid you know,
you said and that that that really change that saved
my life. Explain that because what I want to know

(02:05:06):
and I'm trying to ask it away because I know
a lot of people have a tendency especially in the press,
they have a tendency to like fetishize jail. Yeah, like
or just like people had experience, so tell me what
was it like or whatever. But I'm I'm personally curious,
like to be a celebrity going into that environment, like

(02:05:28):
what is it what is your first day like when
you're when you're going there.

Speaker 8 (02:05:33):
All right, let me let me just back up a
little bit and say because I always think of it.
I always think about people comments when they you know
what I mean, hear the podcast or like people with
what they say, and a lot of people like to say,
why is he talking about all this is over? It's
in the past, Like why you keep saying It's like,
because this is the questions I'm being.

Speaker 3 (02:05:52):
Asked, So I have to answer the question.

Speaker 7 (02:05:55):
All right, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:05:56):
I just want to make that clear real quick for
the listeners to shuttle that call shit down, Like I'm
being asked questions.

Speaker 7 (02:06:02):
That's why I'm talking about this, Like you know what
I'm saying. And you know, I wrote a book about
my life and my youth.

Speaker 8 (02:06:08):
I wrote a book about my youth and my book
it talks about all these things, and you know what
I mean, that's my past. I'm a grown man now,
you know what I'm saying. So I put my I
put my youth out there for the people so they
could see all the fucked up shit. And now I
grew up in all the fucked up shit that I
did and been through, and you know what I mean,
all the good shit and what got me to this point.

Speaker 7 (02:06:30):
So that's why I did this book. That's why I
do these interviews.

Speaker 8 (02:06:32):
And talk about past things a lot, because these are
questions that people ask and they want to know the
answers to. So going when I got locked up, it
was the best thing that happened to me because at
this time I was dealing with a lot of hatred
coming from people from certain people from Queensbridge. You know

(02:06:53):
what I mean, certain people from uh, you know, wherever, wherever,
but mostly from Queensbridge. A couple of individuals that have
few problems with that. They just didn't like me.

Speaker 3 (02:07:02):
Can I ask a.

Speaker 1 (02:07:03):
Quick question, so after the infamous, are you still living
in the queens Bridge area or did you like we
We probably moved.

Speaker 8 (02:07:10):
We probably moved like around right after Infamous came out,
you know, I mean, I was living with having Queensland
for like two years when we was working on the
Infamous you know what I'm saying, Right, we would stay
at his crib or that we would take the equipment
back to Long Island Hempstead changed the scenery for a
little while, then we go back to queens Bridge, like
you know what I'm saying. So after the Infamous drop
and we was doing tours and shit, we kind of

(02:07:31):
like but we would still go back all the time
because that's our peoples is on the block, you know
what I mean. And we grew up with the mentalities.
You don't shit on your people, okay, you always take
care of your people, like you know what I mean.
You don't run away from problems. You don't run away
from anything. You deal with it, You face it, you
know what I mean, and you deal with the shit.
That's how we grew up. So that's why I was

(02:07:52):
still there in these communities dealing with my peoples that
I grew up with my pizs because I'm not the
type of person that's gonna run away from shit that
gotta deal with, Like you know what I'm saying. So
we were just learning how to navigate, uh, being celebrity
and all that shit, and so.

Speaker 1 (02:08:08):
It's never awkward going back there, even though you're obviously
established as a celebrity rapper and.

Speaker 7 (02:08:15):
Nah, because that was just like home base. That was
like the block. You know what I'm saying. We go
to the block, have fun, like drink all night.

Speaker 3 (02:08:21):
We used to.

Speaker 8 (02:08:21):
I just fall asleep on the bench, wake up in
the morning, little kids going to school, you know what
I'm saying, Like I'm waking up like, oh shit, Like
you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (02:08:29):
So it's just like that was the block. That's why.

Speaker 7 (02:08:31):
That's why our friends is at. We made something monumental
from this block. We created Infamous, Mob Deep, we created
all this shit. So this is our ship, this is
our people, like, this is our home team. So that's
how mentality was. But you know, after a while, you know,
we deal with a lot of jealousy people black pink

(02:08:54):
Pee coming around with a jewelry on.

Speaker 8 (02:08:55):
He ain't from out here, right, Oh nigga rapping about
my life while you rapping about my life, Like that's
what they like to say. Like you know what I'm saying,
Rapping about my life. Everybody likes to say that that's
so crazy. But anyway, I was dealing with people that
didn't grow up with me. Have it, grew up with
all these people, you know all I knowying twin, they
grew up with all these niggas.

Speaker 3 (02:09:17):
I didn't grow up with these people, you.

Speaker 8 (02:09:18):
Know what I'm saying. So they don't know me. I
don't really know them. We're figuring out each other. I'm
seeing who scared who not, who's putting pressure on people
who're doing this. I'm like, oh, word, that's how these
niggas get dawn Like word, that's how it's.

Speaker 3 (02:09:32):
Out here in the world.

Speaker 8 (02:09:33):
Like you know what I'm saying, I'm learning. I'm kids still,
like I'm learning as I go. And you know, we
got to the point where we were just dealing with
a lot of jealousy and we had to click up.
We had to strap up, like you know what I mean,
it's on Like we had to strap up, like we
got beef with niggas that shoot people. You know what
I'm saying, Like these niggas shoot people like and that's it.

(02:09:54):
So they cut people, shoot people like That's who we
was dealing with. So I'm protecting my myself, you know
what I mean, I would carry the hammer. I'm not
out doing no harm to nobody, you know what i mean.
At this point in my life, I'm just protecting myself.
So you know, it just got bad, man. It got
to the point where you know, I started just just

(02:10:15):
losing it, man, Like you know what I'm saying so
much negative, negative.

Speaker 7 (02:10:18):
Thoughts, so much all the time, Just ready to shoot somebody.

Speaker 8 (02:10:24):
Every time I get out my car and walk into
my crib or what whatever, I'm like, all right, it's
somebody gonna try to run up on my car or
be in the bushes or I'm on point, Like you
know what I'm saying, Like certain shit that we used
to do to people back in the days.

Speaker 3 (02:10:38):
We was bad kids, Like we was bad growing up
in high school. We was like Carma would come back there.

Speaker 7 (02:10:43):
We was foul niggas. We was doing foul shit to people,
were robbing people.

Speaker 8 (02:10:46):
Doing foul you know, young young shit, right, So I
got the mentality already, like that's how niggas get down,
and I'm not gonna let that happen to me. So
I'm like, you know, carrying guns, I'm dealing with this
mentality or time, and that shit rots your fucking brain
and your your spirit. That shit rots you keep thinking

(02:11:08):
like that and keep living like that and moving like that,
it just takes away from your spirit. Man, It just
makes you a foul person after a while, Like you
know what I mean, because you're dealing with all this
negativity and people saying they gonna do this to me
when they see me and making threats, and then I
gotta stand up for myself.

Speaker 7 (02:11:26):
Like, nigga, you ain't doing nothing when you see me,
Like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (02:11:29):
And that's just what it was.

Speaker 8 (02:11:30):
So unfortunately, this is the you know, the crazy life
that I was growing up living and the shit that
I had to deal with, and it got to the
point where you know, I was just out of control,
man smoking, man weig, just drinking heavily, like I was
already learned that shit fucks up my sicker cell when
I do that. But I was so angry and just

(02:11:53):
wanting to hurt somebody, just always like trickle finger, itchy,
like ready to show a nigga, like don't play with me,
like I'm just trying to. I'm going about my business,
doing my music I'm making my money. Don't come over
here playing with my life, you know what I'm saying,
because you're gonna find out what happens.

Speaker 3 (02:12:11):
So this is my mentality every day.

Speaker 8 (02:12:12):
And that's just started to like I said, it started
to ride away in my spirit, my brain. Everything was
just like h it felt disgusting. And I didn't realize
how disgusting it was until I got caught with the
gun in my car, got locked up, and I just
started thinking about everything, like damn, just just living that
life and just not thinking being young minded, and it

(02:12:33):
was just it was just bad.

Speaker 3 (02:12:35):
It wasn't good, man.

Speaker 8 (02:12:36):
It was I was I was gonna eventually get killed
or some or I was gonna kill somebody or hurt out,
and I would have went to jail.

Speaker 7 (02:12:44):
One of the other was definitely gonna happen.

Speaker 8 (02:12:46):
That was definitely, for sure, one thousand percent gonna happen
eventually if I didn't go to jail. You know what
I'm saying. It was like serious, and it's sad to
say it's like that, you know what I mean? And
I know a lot of people who listen to this interview,
Like I said on the album, like you know what
I mean.

Speaker 3 (02:13:01):
Pete think he tough? Pee talking tough? Nah, you real.
You know what I'm saying. I think it's tough.

Speaker 8 (02:13:06):
But I like to address the people that think that
so they can hear me say that. So save your
little pee think he tough comment, because I'm already ahead
of you. Though I know that's what you're thinking. I doubt.

Speaker 3 (02:13:20):
We have a bunch of nervous some people.

Speaker 8 (02:13:23):
They hear that and they be like, oh this. You know,
this guy think he's talking tough. He trying to make
his he trying to portray his life that something that
is not. I'm just being honest with you.

Speaker 3 (02:13:31):
You know what it was.

Speaker 1 (02:13:32):
I really thank you for this, because the thing is
that hip hop really doesn't allow for its figures to
come uh in a kind of a three dimensional, flesh
and blood tone like this is the first time I'm
really hearing your story. Like I've known of you for
twenty plus years as an artist, and I've read lots

(02:13:53):
of articles, but you know, I've never ever known about
your life or your experiences like this is the first
time I'm really, really really hearing you as a human being,
even speaking complete sentences. So no, no, no, I mean
I think the contrary. I think, if anything, you know,
it's more you really showing a human side to your

(02:14:19):
life journey and your experiences.

Speaker 8 (02:14:21):
You know, I was going down a a bad role
man because it was just like shit was escalating, The
drama was escalating, the threats people were making threats to
us was escalating. Like it was getting really crazy, especially
with at the gu and the deal and the money
got even bigger. A lot of people was like, all
these niggas are stupid. While they signed fifty, now they

(02:14:43):
looking as like we stupid. They don't even understand that
we got a relationship with fifty, Like you know what
I'm saying, Fifty from sulf Side, just like my family,
Like you know what I'm saying, Like we got friends
in common, you know what I mean that, Like me
and fifty got friends in Carmon, Like you know what
I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (02:14:58):
It was just meant to be.

Speaker 7 (02:15:00):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:15:00):
He got in a position where he was able to
put you on, reach back in to some of his
favorite all this or whatever, and he was like, mom, deep,
come on, you coming with me.

Speaker 3 (02:15:10):
You know what I'm saying. Come on?

Speaker 7 (02:15:11):
We was like hold up, you know what I'm saying,
Like what we're gonna get out of this?

Speaker 3 (02:15:16):
You know what I mean? He was like, You're gonna
get this. You're gonna get this.

Speaker 7 (02:15:18):
You're gonna get this. We was like, where do we
sign up?

Speaker 3 (02:15:20):
You know what I'm saying?

Speaker 7 (02:15:21):
Like, we was like, where do we sign up?

Speaker 3 (02:15:23):
I was queen. I was. I was one of the people.
It's funny. I was on the people like years ago,
uh that I wrote a review.

Speaker 4 (02:15:30):
It wasn't even review. I was just on our little
website and I was talking about the album.

Speaker 7 (02:15:37):
I know.

Speaker 5 (02:15:39):
What it was.

Speaker 3 (02:15:41):
Okay, I was on the lawn. It was like just
just right, but then the lawn. But then it went
to okay player and then no, I was just a dude.

Speaker 4 (02:15:53):
I'm all my message, but were just talking whatever. I'm like, man,
ain't nobody gonna read this ship. It's like thirty people
here whatever. Then this ship goes okay player. Then like
two three days later XXL, this is mom, what the
fuck are you serious? So then like a couple of
years later it was I guess it was right before
you went in and like he wrote, he wrote a blog.

Speaker 3 (02:16:12):
He was like, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 5 (02:16:14):
He was.

Speaker 3 (02:16:14):
He was like, this is me back. I was like, okay,
well else so so then like it's like for guests
in a row.

Speaker 4 (02:16:25):
So dude, so so and be and you this is
our first time like really talking talking like we met
like once I met you once an OL's crib like
years ago. But but yeah, but we was, uh this
first time we really talked. And so afterwards the joint

(02:16:49):
came out and then you did the blog and then
you went on your in your bid. So then Ol
was on tour with us for a minute.

Speaker 3 (02:16:55):
We was touring.

Speaker 4 (02:16:56):
Uh it was LB little brother and Evidence was with
us and he our with and so being out on
the bus like we just chopping up about everything, were
just talking whatever and he was he asked me, He's like, yo,
the the album, Like Yo, why you go? I was like, dog,
it wasn't that, I said, first off, I did you know,
listen back to it? Like at that point, I said,

(02:17:16):
it was better much like Phrenology. I think it aged
better than it was than it did.

Speaker 3 (02:17:23):
Critique the album myself.

Speaker 8 (02:17:25):
You know what I'm saying. When I when I read
what you had said, it made me think that shi
it hit me. I was like he said, he said,
we got rich and stopped trying.

Speaker 1 (02:17:40):
When I suggested yesterday, I suggested that gonna be on
the show your first start. I was like, I was like, okay,
but but it weren't gonna.

Speaker 9 (02:17:51):
Be nothing if it's real, beef.

Speaker 3 (02:17:56):
Was I was just like, it's not like. It ain't
like that.

Speaker 8 (02:18:00):
But when you said, Look, when you said that, it
made me think, like and being being locked up that
shit just made me think about everything. Made me think
about life and decisions that we would make in just everything,
because you know, I'm sitting there without nothing else to
do but think, so I'm not just thinking about my
own life and decisions.

Speaker 3 (02:18:15):
We made business decisions.

Speaker 7 (02:18:17):
And then I read I read that, and I would
listen to the album and hear other people talk about
it was mad.

Speaker 8 (02:18:23):
We signed a gu on it, but that but you
were coming from a different perspective. It was other people
that was like just mad we signed G and they like,
y'all mom yo, I was. I was on Ah Street
one day and this old black lady, she had to
be like seventy years old, she seen me.

Speaker 3 (02:18:38):
She was like prodig No. I was like yeah, she
was like, yo, why the fuck y'all signed I said
that shit shocked down.

Speaker 8 (02:18:51):
I was like, yo, she was like, y'all mob deep.
Y'all supposed to be just mob deep. You don't sign
nobody else. I'm like, yo, it's just a business move
like on me, like it's a queen's think, like nah nah.

Speaker 3 (02:19:01):
She was upset what it was. As a fan, it
made sense for me, like I thought he was from Queens.
They from Queens. He looking out.

Speaker 4 (02:19:08):
I got that, I guess just for me at that
time as a family grant, this is ten years ago,
you know what I mean. We all have grown whatever
it is then.

Speaker 3 (02:19:14):
But my thing was because y'all was coming off the
Free Agents Joint and that was my ship.

Speaker 7 (02:19:19):
I was like, yo, actually we was coming off America's.

Speaker 3 (02:19:26):
That's right. It was a job, That's right. It was
because we went from jobs.

Speaker 4 (02:19:33):
And so with that, I was just like, I mean,
the stuff that y'all was doing with alchemists, particularly like
you and Alchemi, is just the chemistry y'all had and
still have, like with Return of the Mac.

Speaker 3 (02:19:42):
And I was like, yo, they just do that. I'm like, man.

Speaker 4 (02:19:46):
So then so for me, just coming from that perspective
where I said that got riches I was just like,
man like, to me, it just felt like like I
understood on paper and business wise wise work, but just
to me, just as a true hardcore fan.

Speaker 8 (02:19:58):
I was just like, and they could have just did them.
When I thought about it, I was like, he was right.
Because I'm sitting there listening to Yo. I examined that
album that you Union album. We did so much, And
what I got out of it is when I when
I was in jail, when I was just like listening
to it and listening to it and trying to figure
out why people were saying things that they were saying,

(02:20:20):
and I was like, I was like, Okay, the first
thing I noticed that it was too much G on
it on the album.

Speaker 7 (02:20:26):
They was on almost every song.

Speaker 8 (02:20:29):
I didn't realize that whow with making it, we were
just having fun, like oh Ship, come on do this,
Oh Buck, come on, Buck, get on this song.

Speaker 3 (02:20:36):
You know, Banks get on this one. Like you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:20:38):
We're not even thinking, like we're just having fun moving
so but you know, being in jail, sitting there with
nothing to do, I'm just like listening analyzing the album,
I'm like, oh, okay, it's too they on too many songs.
Not only that, but it was it was too many,
like beats from like outsiders that wasn't really like mob
deep sound and beats, you know.

Speaker 9 (02:20:59):
What I mean.

Speaker 7 (02:21:00):
But we didn't realize that while we sitting there making it.

Speaker 3 (02:21:02):
We was like so caught up on the G five
on going up to it, and we like, you know,
we were just living a high life, like you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:21:10):
Like we was already used to, you know, having fun,
living that life on the road, but now it was
just like living that life on stepoids, like you know
what I'm saying, with the inner school money now and
the big budget and the private jets and arenas every night,
like you know.

Speaker 11 (02:21:24):
What I mean.

Speaker 7 (02:21:24):
So we was just lost, man, Like we was lost
at that point, like you know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (02:21:30):
And I was officially lost because I'm already I already
got the attitude like I gotta defend myself like it's
mad threats going on. So the threats is even higher
that because they know we got bread. They know we
you know, fifty, I bought a bulletproof truck. I'm like
these niggas know what I'm saying. I'm like fifty moving
right I'm about to do the same thing because we

(02:21:50):
getting threats like that, and we kind of got beef
with like the same niggas almost like you know what
I mean.

Speaker 3 (02:21:55):
So it was like, you know, I just wasn't living right.

Speaker 8 (02:21:58):
So not living right plus access to all of that,
no money and high life, it was just like a
recipe for disaster.

Speaker 3 (02:22:09):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (02:22:10):
I was I was gone. I was gone, dog, you
know what I mean? Like, I was gone.

Speaker 3 (02:22:14):
So I had to get locked up that first that
first week or the first day, like.

Speaker 1 (02:22:20):
It is the goal just to be under the radar
and do your time or like for people that are
notable and and doing time. Is there a thing where
the judge is like, okay, I know, because I know
in Tupac's case he was they gladly threw him in
Jim Pop, Like all right, you go to Jim Pop,

(02:22:41):
no no.

Speaker 3 (02:22:42):
Protection, you know what I'm saying. So is it a
thing where.

Speaker 1 (02:22:46):
Like what is your goal or what is your thought
mentality that first week there, especially with your condition, which
leads to the book.

Speaker 7 (02:22:54):
Which when I when I got locked up, when I
realized I had to go to jail.

Speaker 8 (02:22:59):
And serve three and a half years and I got
locked up. I was like, all right, need to deal
with this, right, I gotta do this time, you know
what I'm saying. And I went in there with the
attitude like you know, I don't want to make friends
like you said, fly under the radar through my time,
get the forge out of there, get my shit. And
I went in there with the mentality to get my

(02:23:20):
shit together.

Speaker 3 (02:23:21):
Because I already knew what my problem was.

Speaker 8 (02:23:23):
I already knew what the downfall was as far as
like streak shit I was going through in my health
and just my spirituality.

Speaker 3 (02:23:31):
I was my spirit wasn't right, you know what I mean.

Speaker 8 (02:23:33):
So I went in there with the plans to get
my spirit together, get my body together, get my health
in order come and try to come out a better person.

Speaker 7 (02:23:43):
So I really went in there and went to school
with my I went to school to learn myself.

Speaker 8 (02:23:47):
How much time did you have to prepare from the
time that your sentence to the time that you're going
in because I know that you have a family take
cut care of and that sort of thing. So it
was like it was about maybe a few months, like
three four months maybe, okay, you know what I mean?
And Yeah, I went in there with the attitude like
I'm going in here to get my shit together.

Speaker 3 (02:24:09):
I'm gonna learn.

Speaker 8 (02:24:10):
I'm gonna discipline myself as far as diet, as far
as uh, you know, just spirituality, my thoughts, you know
what I mean. I started reading a lot of books
on you know, your thought patterns, and you know that
if you have negative thoughts to change it immediately into
something positive. And once you practice, when you practice that,

(02:24:31):
it becomes normal. You know what I'm saying. Once you
practice getting rid of negative thoughts as soon as you think,
it becomes normal. And just you know everything, man, just
getting better with myself and just trying to become a
better person. And like I said, I was listening to
the albums and seeing what we did wrong, what we
was doing right. I was just analyzing everything, like and

(02:24:52):
it took me some time to adjust because I was
writing blogs and you know what I mean, still popping
shit and talking crazy shit. But then after a while
started being like, Okay.

Speaker 3 (02:25:00):
I'm going about this all wrong. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:25:03):
I gotta I gotta be more, you know, I gotta
be more humble, humbling, like you know what I'm saying,
humble myself from calm down, and you know what I'm saying.
I was sitting in the date room one day with
my one of my young homies in there, his name
is Fresh, and were watching BT and somebody video came
on and I was, man, that shit is garbage.

Speaker 3 (02:25:21):
You like this shit?

Speaker 8 (02:25:22):
He was like, yo, Pee, why you say everything is
garbage when you're like, like, give people a chance. Son,
He's like, why you don't give nobody a chance? Like
when he said he said he was dead serious and
said it just like that.

Speaker 5 (02:25:34):
Now.

Speaker 8 (02:25:34):
He made me look at myself. I never thought about that.
I was like, I was like, damn you right, Like
I never like.

Speaker 3 (02:25:40):
I was like, you're right.

Speaker 8 (02:25:41):
He was like, Yo, the dude just trying to get
his money. My niggas like everybody, you know, not the same,
everybody got different tastes. Just let that man get his money,
like stop shitting on everybody.

Speaker 3 (02:25:51):
Like you know what I'm saying. And it made me.

Speaker 8 (02:25:53):
That shit made me. That shit changed me. I was like, oh,
I was like, I never thought of it like that.
Somebody nobody ever said that to me before. You know
what I'm saying. They were just letting me be me.
No one challenged you, right, didn't never say that was
wrong with you? Like why you shut the fuck up?
Like you know what I'm saying, Let that man get
his money, like you know what I'm saying. And I
was made me look at myself. I felt stupid when

(02:26:14):
he said that, you know what I mean. I was like, damn,
I had the wrong attitude this whole time.

Speaker 3 (02:26:19):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (02:26:20):
Now, how does how does someone survive in that system
with uh dietary restrictions? Like is it possible to be
a vegan in jail or a vegetarian? And does the
private prison complex even allow for those types of foods

(02:26:44):
to for you to even have access to that?

Speaker 3 (02:26:48):
Well?

Speaker 7 (02:26:49):
Everyoneor do they care? Every prison is different.

Speaker 8 (02:26:52):
Every prison allowed different things, and every prison you know,
won't allow certain things, and so every prison is different.

Speaker 7 (02:27:00):
One will let you know, a whole chicken, and the
other they won't let you let it in.

Speaker 3 (02:27:05):
You know what I mean. It's just so.

Speaker 8 (02:27:08):
You have and like the packaging, the way it's packaged,
the way it's sealed, the color on the packaging, Like every.

Speaker 3 (02:27:15):
Jail is different.

Speaker 8 (02:27:17):
It's real specific, you know what I mean, for each
individual jet some jails you can have CDs.

Speaker 7 (02:27:22):
Other jails you can't have CDs. You only have cassettes.
Some jails, you know what I mean, that's they still
got Yeah, they still got cossetts.

Speaker 3 (02:27:31):
In certain jails.

Speaker 7 (02:27:31):
You canna only have cassettes because they I was in mistake.

Speaker 8 (02:27:38):
As far as that from it's like four hours four
hours from here, okay, driving up, you know what I mean?

Speaker 7 (02:27:44):
And uh yeah, so every every prison is different.

Speaker 8 (02:27:47):
The food that they that they serve, you know what
I'm saying, and what they allow in the package from
your family, it's all different. So you know, they have
a special diet in prison for like kosha kosha or
halal diet, you know what I mean. You got to
prove that you know, that's your religion, and you got
to have a special diet sugar.

Speaker 5 (02:28:08):
Because one of my prisoner friends asked me, were you
going to do a book for the folks to mean
for the non sugar.

Speaker 7 (02:28:14):
Yeah, I mean I don't really know too much about that.

Speaker 1 (02:28:17):
But uh side uh for the very few people in
this room that know my day manager's era, she loves
the ship out this book because her diet is that
fucked up. She's like, I like this, like she saw

(02:28:39):
it as like college survival food.

Speaker 3 (02:28:41):
I'm like, not quite eat ship.

Speaker 9 (02:28:45):
Okay, it's like hipster that's cute there.

Speaker 1 (02:28:48):
No, I mean she's the type of person that actually yes,
she looked at him like but yeah, so and bringing
Kathy into this, how are you?

Speaker 3 (02:29:02):
Hey? I'm glad you here.

Speaker 9 (02:29:04):
Forgot she was here, so thanks?

Speaker 3 (02:29:07):
So what what is the research process in.

Speaker 1 (02:29:14):
Trying these uh, these recipes out that you you you
made in the in the book and and I guess
the trial and era of it all, like how do
you even I guess with very little instrument, instruments or tools,
you know, it becomes you know, creative, creativity is is

(02:29:36):
your is your best instrument?

Speaker 3 (02:29:37):
So how do you test these things out to see
what works and what doesn't work?

Speaker 6 (02:29:41):
Well, there's two like completely different parts of the cookbook.
There's the stuff that that p always cooked and then
there's the stuff that most people in prison cook.

Speaker 3 (02:29:52):
So you know, so were you allowed special No, he
just chose, Like see.

Speaker 6 (02:29:59):
The thing that's kind of the thing that's pretty interesting
about the Commissary Catching cookbook is everything that was cooked
was what you could purchase and commissary but you know,
p he had been through what was it, five different
prisons in three years because he always had to have
an infirmary like nearby, so you know he was moved,
but I think he spent the longest at Mid State, right.

(02:30:21):
So in doing that research, I went through the commissary
that was available at mid State to know what some
of those items were.

Speaker 3 (02:30:29):
And then so what's a typical meal. What's a typical breakfast?

Speaker 6 (02:30:33):
Well, typical breakfast at chow is different from see because
you know they would give the breakfast would be at six, right,
Lunch should be at ten, So.

Speaker 3 (02:30:44):
You got to wake up at five.

Speaker 6 (02:30:47):
What was it like like quarter to six, You're like
six thirty, six.

Speaker 7 (02:30:50):
Thirty breakfast and they go to yard are like seven.

Speaker 6 (02:30:53):
Yeah, lunch would be at ten. Four o'clock was dinner
and you were done.

Speaker 3 (02:30:57):
So when you had Jesus Christ.

Speaker 6 (02:31:00):
Yeah, So when it came to the commissary, that was
the thing that that people used to to fill to
fill them up for the rest of the day. So
if your family doesn't have a lot of money to
fill the commissary, that's where you get those traditional prison
meals like mashing up cheetahs and pouring chili on them
because those are the cheapest things in commissary and also
there's a pound limitation to what like family could mail

(02:31:22):
you as well. And he would make most of that
those deliveries of nothing but canned vegetables. But because they're
in a can, they weigh more. So it wasn't like
he was able to get like tons of spinach, you know,
because he would mostly get spinach delivered like that. But
it's by can, So.

Speaker 3 (02:31:40):
Yeah, can even though I mean the potential of that
being a weapon.

Speaker 6 (02:31:45):
Can you could use the race is a knife too,
you can get it taken away so stupid.

Speaker 3 (02:31:50):
They won't allow CDs, but you can have yeah.

Speaker 6 (02:31:56):
So you know, in going through and going through this book,
you know, and we were going through some of the
recipes that he actually made, there was just this whole
other part that, you know, I feel is like this
this voice to culture of people wanting to know about
those kinds of traditional prison meals. And in doing that
research and seeing some of those things, and the thing
that I thought was really important about putting it in

(02:32:17):
the book was, you know, on peace first day, he
had food poisoning because one of the inmates wanted to
make him a welcome meal, which was one of those
traditional prison dishes, but peace stomach obviously wasn't trained to that.
It's like going to Mexico and drinking the water.

Speaker 3 (02:32:31):
You know what.

Speaker 6 (02:32:33):
Prison surprise, which is Jack mac mashed up cheetos to
make a cheese sauce poured over like ramen. Right, it
was something like that, And by the end of the
night he had an ivy in his arm, so because
you know, he wasn't used to eating.

Speaker 7 (02:32:48):
And I mean the thing is why I woke up
sweating bullets throwing up.

Speaker 3 (02:32:52):
It fucked me up.

Speaker 6 (02:32:53):
Yeah, And you learn about certain things and doing this
research where like, for example, they only give you fruit
punch and iced tea, but if you want water, they
give you an empty jug and you have to go
get it. So it's like, if you want to lead
a healthy lifestyle, you have to actively pursue it in prison.
So there's there's also you know, there's this there's prison

(02:33:15):
tea that a lot of inmates drink, which is just
simply a Ramen packet in water, and the average Ramen
packet has like seventy five hundred milligrams, so you're.

Speaker 3 (02:33:24):
Drinking salt water.

Speaker 6 (02:33:25):
That's prison tea, it's called prison tea.

Speaker 3 (02:33:28):
And how are you able to how are you able
to cook the food on your own in your cell?
Like are you loud?

Speaker 6 (02:33:35):
No, there was a there's a common area where there's
a microwave and a toaster oven, which is that's why
so many of these meals are so simple, which is
why so many people in dorms will gravitate toward it
because of just the availability of those just two devices
and a couple of other things. So, you know, but
in doing the research, you really learn the way the

(02:33:56):
prison system kind of controls the situation. And and you know,
for me, the reason why I even you know, I
was part of this project was over over, Like you know,
the ten fifteen years that I've been a rap journalist,
I've had this kind of like unique privilege of speaking
to a lot of artists right when they get out
of prison. And I spoke with p like right when

(02:34:18):
you get got out. But I also spoke with Bousy
and come to find out it was diabetic, right yeah,
but he had also cancer. Oh shit, so I believe
it was kidney cancer. So and they blamed it on
the lean. But I started to like, you know, you
start putting two and two together, how people can enter

(02:34:40):
somewhat healthy and leave like completely a mess. And you know,
in talking with p about it, like literally when he
got out and he was just telling me these stories
and I'll never forget it was one of your guys
gave me one of the cassettes that were available in prison,
and it was a Jadakiss The Last Kiss and like
a prison catalog, and he's like, yeah, this is what's
a available. So you know, I was just like going

(02:35:02):
through the what was available, and I'm like, how can
anyone survive on this stuff? So, you know, we were
putting this together and you just look at the nutritional
information and then I started to dig even deeper and
you look at what was available in like the UK
in the fifties, a typical prison meal was like prime
rib and like mash potatoes and glazed carrots. That was

(02:35:25):
like a typical prison meal. Yeah, and you start you
see what happens over the years, and especially as it
made its way, you know, to this country, and and
like what was available, I mean even in the past,
what was available here was so fundamentally different than what's
available now. And you know, when we were touring this book,

(02:35:47):
the biggest prison strike in history was happening, so it
was kind of like this perfect storm. But it was
also pretty funny because some of the stuff that we
were discussing, like, we didn't make it too politically heavy,
but if you start to read about some of these
recipes and what's available and all this other stuff, you
can kind of put two and two together and be like, oh,
you know, trying to kill you in there.

Speaker 3 (02:36:07):
You know. Well, the book did get banned in some person.

Speaker 6 (02:36:09):
They got banned in California because yeah, but they said
it was because there was a hooch recipe, like who
doesn't know how to make hoots at this point? But
you know, and I think I think there's also parts,
you know, especially when it comes to pop culture, the
way people like glamorize prison, especially because of Orange is
the New Black and just make it seem like this
like cool place for camaraderie. And there is some of

(02:36:31):
that in the book, you know, because that some of
that is true, but there's also something real. I mean,
there's an episode of Orange Is the New Black where
they they use the prison packets for currents for like currency,
so that they could season their food. But it's like, yeah,
but the sodium, like you know, or there's a joke
that one of the inmates pretends to be Jewish, she

(02:36:52):
could so she can have a kosher meal. But like
because the kosher meal is the only meal that actually
has fresh vegetables in it. So you know, there's there's
things that they that they put in there that I
think are it's pretty cool. But if you don't do
your research on why those things are even incorporated into
those episodes or whatever, you know, you don't you don't
really understand what's going on. So uh yeah, I mean

(02:37:16):
the kosher meals are like amazing in prison and the
only fresh thing that that in in peace facility, you
were allowed to have as an apple.

Speaker 3 (02:37:24):
Damn.

Speaker 6 (02:37:26):
Yeah until the day that you you rated little Puns.

Speaker 7 (02:37:33):
You rated the CEO the correction office refrigerating little pun.

Speaker 6 (02:37:37):
Yeah, they call the little Pung because you look like.

Speaker 3 (02:37:40):
A little version.

Speaker 6 (02:37:42):
But he would eat the inmates food, Like he would
come in there and he would eat their meals.

Speaker 1 (02:37:46):
Like why he would eat is there is there someone
to be an advocate for better health? There's there's some
stefs that I know in California that are now leaving
their respective I mean these are like Michelan uh, Michelin
level chefs, James Beard chefs that you know, kind of

(02:38:09):
felt in a moral ways and moral for them to
you know, learn fine cuisine and then charge people two
thousand dollars to eat it.

Speaker 3 (02:38:18):
And so they're going to be opposite. They're they're going
to the hoods.

Speaker 1 (02:38:21):
They're going in like South Central, opening up healthy versions
of fast food spots. And even Magic Johnson said the
reason why he, you know, opened up for Fridays was because, uh,
you know, that's one of the few places where you
can get a garden salad or that sort of thing.

Speaker 3 (02:38:41):
Don't nobody, I'm going to Fridays for the solid.

Speaker 1 (02:38:50):
But a woman approached Magic and said, yo, I hope
this is like when he opened up his movie theater.
She's like, yo, I really hope you open up a
restaurant and bring it to the hoods so we can
have fresh sautlets, because you'll be shocked at the fact
that you cannot find I mean now that most hood
spots are being gentrified.

Speaker 3 (02:39:09):
I mean even with the locks.

Speaker 1 (02:39:11):
They opened up a juice bar in Young you know,
giving people their first taste of healthy options. So it's like,
you know, for for a lot of for a lot
of people, especially like I mean, even the idea of
soul food is inaccessible, inaccessible now, like you go to
find Southern cuisine spots at least in the northeast, not

(02:39:32):
not in North Carolina, no, but I mean soul food
right now, and most hoods are takeout Chinese food, like
what people had the experience of, like oh, Kylli greens
and chicken and grits for dinner, like in the sixties
and seventies. Now it's gravy white, yeah, rice and wings

(02:39:52):
front to five.

Speaker 3 (02:39:54):
So it's like, do you you in order specially so
after you experience.

Speaker 1 (02:40:06):
A right mother, I'm just I'm just asking, do you
feel that it's almost necessary that someone advocates, uh or
speaks on the behalf of of getting better conditions because
I often hear of the conditions in prison being horrible

(02:40:31):
and you know, substandard, and of course you know you'll
you'll hear these these you know, right wing Republicans just
being like, you know, it's prison, that's what it deserves.
But you know, it's still like you still got to
treat a person human, and so like, is there any
is it, Is there any step or do you realistically

(02:40:54):
see reality where that could be changed.

Speaker 6 (02:40:57):
I think it's getting I think it's getting every one
on board, but having you know, their own reasons for it,
like a lot of a lot of right wing Republicans
have you know, hit me in my d MS along
with craze mob deep fans, but you know, kind of

(02:41:19):
trying to challenge me in this discussion. And you know, well,
their prisoners, like you know, they can eat whatever, whatever.
And even if you take away like the humane aspect
of it, right, someone enters prison healthy, they leave with diabetes, hypertension,
you know, poor liver functions everything, right, when they get sick,

(02:41:42):
they go to the er.

Speaker 9 (02:41:44):
You pay for the er.

Speaker 6 (02:41:46):
So if you want to, you don't want to even
look at it for anything other than selfish financial like reasons.
Look at that, look at that at the heart of
it that it's still it's ultimately costing you money for
these for people to to get better essentially, so you know,

(02:42:08):
which it's a horrible reason to have to it's a
horrible argument to even present. But there are some people
that's yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:42:16):
Well people don't also realize, you know, when when you
hear people arguing against the idea of private prison industry complex.
People don't know that if you're one of the commissary owners.
There was a webs there was an article I was
reading about I guess one of the CEOs of of
I don't know if Bonton is a thing here. It's

(02:42:40):
in Pennsylvania.

Speaker 3 (02:42:40):
It's real big.

Speaker 1 (02:42:41):
It's like little Debies Bonton. It's like these local snack companies,
but they are.

Speaker 8 (02:42:46):
Making a killing being the exclusive provider of all these
high end snacks.

Speaker 1 (02:42:55):
And it's almost like I feel, I mean not even
I feel, I almost know that it's like the cheapest
high sodium, high sugar amount which keeps you almost.

Speaker 5 (02:43:08):
And what's funny is even when you go visit, y'all
just made me think about something because I've been the
way too many prisons in Jersey. Even when you go
to visit, they don't even provide, Like the snacks are
the same as for the visit. Like, say you're there
and his families as kids and they want to eat
something while they're there, you better go to the vender
machine and get you as of chocolate or something.

Speaker 9 (02:43:26):
Not even like the trail makes nothing in that area.
Is it, Kathy? Is there not one person that's worth
working on their dietary situation?

Speaker 6 (02:43:33):
You know?

Speaker 3 (02:43:34):
I think I know that Martha's sorry, Martha Stewart changed.

Speaker 9 (02:43:38):
Her spot in West Virginia and she's still.

Speaker 3 (02:43:41):
Yeah, she's still. But hers is like a minimum security.

Speaker 6 (02:43:46):
A federal women's prison. I think it's Morgan. That's not Morgan.

Speaker 5 (02:43:50):
I know that.

Speaker 1 (02:43:51):
Yeah, she still actively sends them fresh vegetables and fruit, and.

Speaker 6 (02:43:58):
You know what, what what's going to ultimately happen in
my opinion, I mean, I'm seeing some of it that
they're they're talking about doing it in New York. It's
going to take someone trying to do it in such
a kitchy way, because that's what's gonna end up. It's
going to become trendy to do it because I was
reading some articles and they're like, check out the farm
to table prison whatever, and it becomes it's gonna have

(02:44:19):
to take that brand like rebranding. Yeah, it's gonna have
to be that unfortunately, and the same way that you
got to like change the argument for Republicans on the
whole prison system in general. But it's gonna have to
be something cute see for them to.

Speaker 3 (02:44:36):
Their kids are doing is like wait a minute, right, right?
So kind of like the way Heroin got rebranded.

Speaker 6 (02:44:43):
I mean, but you know the the jump from OZ
to orange is the new black, how one? You know
what took off by making it like hey, what happens
when you put you know like that kind of Yeah,
So I think I think that's going to be the
thing that well, we'll have to do it. You know,
it's it's not not similar, but you know when people

(02:45:04):
started to advocate for better snacks and offices and schools
and all these other all these other things where those
things had to change, but it had to be a
slow build. It's a harder argument in prisons.

Speaker 9 (02:45:17):
Oh, Kathy, are you saying Michelle Obama missed out on
that one? Because I just ooh, like she was supposed
to cover that.

Speaker 3 (02:45:24):
No, I love that.

Speaker 9 (02:45:26):
All praise due to the Queen, but the clue just
went off in my head. Right, she did schools, she
didn't what a bow?

Speaker 6 (02:45:32):
Well, you know the thing that Michelle Obama did that
I think was wonderful too was you know, there's a
school in particular, I forget the name. You know, my
mom had consulted for them in nork. They had a
garden at the top on the roof, and the kids
would grow the vegetables. They would pull down the vegetables,
and they would cook with the vegetables for their lunches.
So she did some amazing things, But that kind of
stuff doesn't translate into prison, you know. I mean, I

(02:45:55):
think that the initiative that she did was it was
making nutrition fun, because that was the problem. Kids weren't
having fun with nutrition. Your brustles sprouts are gross, like
you know, dipp them in chocolate like whatever like that
you're making you're making you're making nutrition fun. But convincing,
convincing inmates whose families are maybe putting five dollars into

(02:46:17):
their commissary and they finish eating at four pm, and
they're starving by eight o'clock and they're hanging out in
the common area and all they have is like enough
in their commissary for ramen noodles. Convince them that nutrition
is fun, because what happens is it's not the it's
not the commissary necessarily, that's the problem. It's the quality
of the food that they're eating in chow too. I mean,

(02:46:40):
the sodium levels of some of those things, but also
it's expired food sometimes, you know, they'll leave cans for
however long. I mean, there's rat poisoning in certain prisons,
and some of the food they found glass pubic hair.
I mean, these are things like these are real issues
that just the quality of the food alone, and what
will end up happening is a lot of the inmates
just don't want to eat the food. You know, who's

(02:47:01):
gonna want to eat that? So it becomes a matter
of all right, well I'll just eat some chips. There's
a lot of artists that I've spoken to who when
they got out of prison, and even before meeting Pee
and hearing that story, I would say, what did you eat?

Speaker 3 (02:47:15):
I got?

Speaker 6 (02:47:15):
You know, most of the time it's some chips, like
living off like freedoms, you know. And then I remember,
I forget the artists. Was it thirst and hell? The
third who did the prison cooking shows and he would
do this like show where he would like, you know,
mash up all like the food and he would like
make these prison dishes, and I was just so fascinated.
I'm just like, yeah, I get it, because if like

(02:47:37):
if someone said to you, okay, every day, all you
can eat the bag of Cheetos, bag of Doritos, one
of those packets of chili, and a pack of Ramen noodles.
Of course by week three, yeah, you're you're trying to
deep fry your ramen noodles in the toaster and you're
trying to make a burger out of the chili patty,

(02:47:57):
like you're gonna try to get creative. So and that
that chapter that we put in the book.

Speaker 3 (02:48:04):
I remember.

Speaker 6 (02:48:05):
I remember talking to Pea about it and he's like,
you know, some of the things were going over and
he's like, oh, fucking disgusting, because like, you know, he
he was one like he just made a concerted effort
to not touch any of that stuff because for him
it was like it could it's life, you know. There
he caun't eat that stuff, right, So, I mean, I

(02:48:26):
remember when you know, there was like a lot of
the guys would go and they would cook together, and
I remember, you know, asking Pee like what was the
main thing, and he's like, no, I would just have spinach.
Like if I didn't if there was if I didn't
want to cook, I would just keep eating canned spinach.

Speaker 9 (02:48:40):
But you didn't even have to.

Speaker 6 (02:48:41):
Wash that off it's like packed with sodium. So there's
like really no way out if you don't sit and
think about it, which is why we put this book
together because it's like, listen, I get it. You know,
maybe your commissary is lower than the next guy, but
there's ways around what you're choosing to buy and how
you're choosing to prepare it.

Speaker 3 (02:48:58):
You know, can I ask what was the first then
you ate? When you got out?

Speaker 8 (02:49:02):
I went to this Korean barbecue spot Corwoulo, Okay downtown
and Soho Korean Barbecue. It was really good, and I
thought about it the whole big ship. Every time I
sat down to h child, I was like, yo, man,
if I was home right now, I'll be eating Korean barbecue.
Everybody was like, what the fuck is that?

Speaker 3 (02:49:21):
You make it yourself? Was me? Rust me?

Speaker 7 (02:49:23):
So as soon as I got out, we drove straight
to the restaurant and I couldn't wait to eat some
more of that good food.

Speaker 3 (02:49:29):
What's your diet and stuff like on the day to
day now? You know, I just try to my favorite
thing to eat it.

Speaker 8 (02:49:35):
I try to like grilled chicken, like Kathy said, a
lot of green vegetables, a lot of water.

Speaker 3 (02:49:44):
Brown rice.

Speaker 8 (02:49:45):
You know, I try to just eliminate fried foods and
red meats. You know, it takes time to get to
that point, a lot of time and discipline. Some people
don't like water, you know what I mean. It took
I mean about a year or two to really get
used to, like I could just guzzle water and I

(02:50:06):
love how it tastes.

Speaker 7 (02:50:07):
Before that, I was always craving for a juice or you.

Speaker 3 (02:50:10):
Know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:50:11):
Soa it takes time to develop and discipline your body
and your mind and your taste buzz to, you know,
to do the right thing. So you know, after a while,
you know, even before I went to jail, I was
I was already learning that stuff in my twenties, like
you know what I'm saying, And you know, just being
locked up it made me like, all right, I want

(02:50:32):
to see what happens if I'm on some military discipline.

Speaker 3 (02:50:36):
Shit.

Speaker 8 (02:50:37):
I want to see what happens, how my body is
going to react, how my mind, how things are going
to be different if I, like, on some military discipline.

Speaker 7 (02:50:47):
Straight water every day, green vestable. I wanted to see
the outcome of that.

Speaker 8 (02:50:51):
So I did it, you know what I mean, Because
of doing that, I was able to work out, Like
you know they tell doctors told me all my life,
I can't work out, I can't do any physical contact
or streng you with exercise because the triggered is sicker cell.
And it's true, like certain things I do, like if
I'm running around too much, my heart rates start going

(02:51:12):
too fast, I get to hype my adrenaline and start pumping.

Speaker 7 (02:51:14):
It triggered my cikeret cell. It can trigger my cigret sells.

Speaker 8 (02:51:18):
So you know, once I cleaned out, changed my diet
and was very very very strict with it and with
the water, very strict with the with the vegetables and everything.
I noticed that I wasn't getting sick. I didn't feel
sick at all. I was able to work out, not
feel sick like you know what I mean. I was
able to get strong and it felt great. It felt great.

Speaker 7 (02:51:40):
I was like, Wow, this is l like you know
what I'm saying, Because I was already doing it in
the streets.

Speaker 8 (02:51:44):
Like I said, I learned. I learned how to do that.
In my twenties, I kind of fell off, you know
what I mean. Right before I went to jail, I
started going a little down with Spirals going through some
bullshit in my life. But you know I was already
with that discipline. I had already changed my life five
six years straight no smoking. This is from two thousand,

(02:52:06):
I mean, excuse me, from ninety eight, ninety seven, ninety eight,
like two thousand and two, something like that, you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (02:52:15):
On two thousand, maybe two thousand and three. You know,
I was on some strict diet shit.

Speaker 8 (02:52:21):
I was like learning how to heal myself through diet
and spirituality. So I did that already and I felt
the effects of it. And then I kind of, like
I said, I kind of went on Darren spir right
before I got locked up. So when I got locked up,
I was like, you know what, I want to try
what I did, I want to do it to the maximum.

Speaker 3 (02:52:38):
Now.

Speaker 7 (02:52:39):
I want to really do this shit now, like I said,
straight military discipline with it.

Speaker 1 (02:52:43):
So what spirituality do you mean? Like meditating, deep breathings.
I mean, like just the powers in your thoughts, affirmations. Yeah,
like just the power of your thoughts.

Speaker 8 (02:52:52):
You know what I'm saying, Negative thoughts, like if somebody, like,
especially being in jail, everybody got bad attitude. Nobody wants
to be everybody's upset. They in jail, like everybody wakes
up in the morning pissed off. Nobody even to see.
Even the correction officers are pissed off. They gotta work
out to be there, you know what I'm saying. So
everybody got an attitude in that motherfucker, and especially correction officers.

(02:53:15):
They talk to you like the go do this, go do, go,
go wash the toilets, go do like. They boss you around,
like they fuck with you, especially when they first meeting
you and you didn't know who you are.

Speaker 3 (02:53:25):
They fuck with you. They try to press your buttons
and see how you react. So I use that as
this is.

Speaker 7 (02:53:33):
Gonna be my training. I'm gonna control my thoughts as soon.

Speaker 8 (02:53:36):
As he or anybody gives me a bad attitude instead
of me saying fuck in my mind. My first thought
in my mind used to be going to fuck this nigga,
like you know what I'm saying, piece of shit. But
then now I started practicing. As soon as that thought
pops in my head, change it. But like you know what,
I pray for him, you know what I'm saying, Hopefully

(02:53:57):
he'll get his thing together. You know what I mean,
he don't know what he doing, you know what I'm saying.
He's just angry. He got work here. So I pray
for this person, that's what. And I've changed my thoughts
to that. So I started practicing that in there, and
that was like the perfect place to practice that, you
know what I'm saying, because you're.

Speaker 7 (02:54:11):
Dealing with all his tension and foul shit every day.

Speaker 8 (02:54:14):
So I would practice that every day every day, practice
changing my thoughts immediately as soon as the thought popping mind,
I changed it to something else. And then when I
kept doing it, it just it happened naturally, you know
what I mean. I don't have to think about it
no more. And through eating right and you know, thinking different,
it changed like spirituality, that changes your spirit. Once you

(02:54:35):
start thinking different, you know, you more at peace. You're
more at peace with everybody else and yourself. You know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (02:54:42):
You you walk peacefully, like you carry yourself peacefully, you
know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:54:48):
At the same time, you know, I'm who I am.
I grew up how I grew up, So it's not
like I turned into some soft sucker motherfucker. I just
know how to control my thoughts.

Speaker 7 (02:55:01):
Now, you know what I'm saying. Fine, I was gonna.

Speaker 4 (02:55:03):
Say too, man. I hear that in the new record too.
I listened to it on the plane on the way
over here.

Speaker 3 (02:55:08):
Thanks.

Speaker 4 (02:55:08):
And shit is dope, man, I can hear like just
the the I don't want to misquote the liquid. It
was one joint in particular you were talking about. You know,
it ain't about black and they don't care if you're white.
You know, it ain't about your religion. You were just
you know, just kind of speaking to tyranny joint tyranny. Yeah,
and you're saying, I just tyranny. You tuk about none
of that.

Speaker 8 (02:55:27):
You know, race don't matter, Yeah, that was it. Your
faith don't matter. The enemy is government, tyranny, all that
other shit don't matter.

Speaker 3 (02:55:35):
Like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:55:35):
You rich, don't matter, you broke, don't matter. The enemy,
they threaten our liberties, all that other shit don't matter.

Speaker 3 (02:55:42):
Like you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:55:43):
That's what I'm trying to get because they try to
like divert our attention with like a lot of racial issues. Now,
don't get me wrong, there's a lot of racial issues
with this country. Like for a long time, but they
magnify that ship on the news, and they magnify so
much to.

Speaker 7 (02:56:01):
The point where we think it's more than what it
really is. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 8 (02:56:06):
And if people only knew we all have a common
enemy that's really trying to destroy our spirit and our
soul and control our life. We actually have a common enemy,
you know what I'm saying. That's what I was trying
to get it cross the point. I was trying to
get close on that song. So yeah, you know, I
would practice that in jail, and it just it changed me. Man,

(02:56:27):
that's it felt great. I was like, oh shit, this
is ill. I was like, this is a great way
to think. Like I'm glad I was doing this. I
was like, man, this is great man meditation. Well, I
was like, I told you this, you know what I mean.
It just made me feel better. I felt better every
day as a person, like you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (02:56:48):
Well, Priory, we are going to have to close the show. Unfortunately,
we could talk to you forever. I do have one
last question, what up though? Are we going to get
one more reunion an album out of you and have it?

Speaker 8 (02:57:03):
We definitely, man have like crack things when it comes
to hip hop, like it's like we that's good ship
to know, like rock him like my fiend.

Speaker 1 (02:57:12):
So you're about to do something your I know that
you're gonna do. Uh, you're doing a few projects with
live musicians. You're doing your residency at Blue Note. Yeah
that's every month. Yeah, we do it once a month.

Speaker 3 (02:57:24):
Did So how can people find out like news about
upcoming dates with you and that sort of thing?

Speaker 8 (02:57:29):
I always tell people, like, you know, you can always Google,
you know what I mean? Hit hit up Google, like, Yo,
are you on Twitter?

Speaker 7 (02:57:36):
Or yeah, yeah, I'm on.

Speaker 8 (02:57:38):
Twitter, Mob Deep, Instagram, Prodigy, mob Deep. But I forget
sometime myself. If you want to know what any of
your favorite artists is performing, or when a new album
is dropping, you could go right on Google and just
be like yo, all Deep new album or Prodigy new
concert or you know what I'm saying, like and it'll
all pop up like you know what I'm.

Speaker 3 (02:57:57):
Saying or you you I guess.

Speaker 2 (02:58:02):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (02:58:02):
Cleverly released the Hegelian Dialog Dialectic on January twenty inauguration,
which was yeah I.

Speaker 7 (02:58:12):
Was gonna say and I was planned out. We did
that on I figgured as much.

Speaker 3 (02:58:18):
Oh his birthday and your birthday.

Speaker 1 (02:58:20):
Well, yeah, it's all about you, right, Okay, Well, Kaffy
and Prigy, I thank you very much for uh yeah,
thank you. I don't even think I'll go through the
customary what we learned thing because I think we learned
everything at the same time.

Speaker 3 (02:58:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (02:58:37):
Man, shout to everybody too. Man, I always got to
do this.

Speaker 6 (02:58:40):
Man.

Speaker 3 (02:58:40):
Shout to jay Z, shout to NAS, shout. Oh my niggas.

Speaker 8 (02:58:44):
Man.

Speaker 7 (02:58:44):
You know what I'm saying, so love you know I
funk with your niggas.

Speaker 10 (02:58:47):
Man.

Speaker 7 (02:58:48):
He is like, Man, I'm a fan of jay Z.

Speaker 3 (02:58:51):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 7 (02:58:51):
We went through our ship. I'm a fan. I love son.
He's one of the illis.

Speaker 8 (02:58:54):
I learned so much from him watching him do business,
carry yourself saying with NASM so much by how he
writes his songs and make his music. Like, you know
what I'm saying. It ain't no, ain't no beef, ain't
no none of that ship. Man, were grown.

Speaker 7 (02:59:08):
We're nowolved.

Speaker 5 (02:59:09):
You know what I'm saying, Yo, But you gotta get
out the comments. Don't read them comments no more.

Speaker 3 (02:59:12):
The comments be better than the articles.

Speaker 5 (02:59:20):
When they're taking him down too much. I remember none
of the positive. You don't remember the negative.

Speaker 8 (02:59:25):
Joe the listeners out there, man, you know what I mean.
Anybody can go to jail. I was locked up with
a lot of characters from different walks of life. Bill,
anybody could getting locked YouTube can go to jail.

Speaker 3 (02:59:38):
I was in there with judges, das, detectives.

Speaker 5 (02:59:43):
My prisoner friend just said that the other day he
and there with engineers, barmbers.

Speaker 8 (02:59:46):
I was in the millionaires engineers. Anybody could get locked up.
Mistakes happy, You know what I mean. You can make
a mistake, a fatal mistake, and end up going to jail.
And from any walk of life. Look at Martha Stewart.
So when I'm saying that is just you know, stay
out of jail, man. You ain't got to eat that
crap man.

Speaker 9 (03:00:04):
Out the corner store. Stay out the corner store.

Speaker 7 (03:00:06):
Man, stay as in the street man.

Speaker 3 (03:00:07):
Do the right thing. And on that note, on b
A for Prodigy Kathy Yndly, I got it.

Speaker 1 (03:00:14):
Finally, Sugar Sugar Steve, Damned Sugar Steve.

Speaker 3 (03:00:18):
We didn't even bring up your Sugar Sugars book exactly.
And get diabetes.

Speaker 1 (03:00:28):
But you can just hang out with you and get
that no, no, whatever whatever, Fay Bill Bossonville, Fan Ticolo,
and Margaret.

Speaker 3 (03:00:36):
Are you Margaret? How many prisons you've been to in Jersey?
Like five? Mar everywhere? You know prison tool.

Speaker 1 (03:00:44):
This is Quest Love, Quest Love Supreme. We will see
you on the next around. Thank you very much.

Speaker 3 (03:00:49):
Ye see it.

Speaker 1 (03:00:54):
Quest Love Supreme is a production i Heeart Radio. This
classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For
more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.