July 7, 2022 • 57 mins
Daily Show Correspondent Dulcé Sloan and writer Josh Johnson are best friends who rarely agree on anything.
In their new podcast called “Hold Up with Dulcé Sloan and Josh Johnson” they turn their hilarious, unpredictable, and legendary office banter into a war of words about topics big and small, but mostly small.
In this episode, Dulcé and Josh debate the merits of two pillars of hip hop: “Conscious Rap vs. Club Bangers." Kendrick Lamar or Drake? Movement music or ratchet beats? The debating duo leave no stone unturned.
Listen to new episodes of Hold Up every Thursday wherever you get your podcasts.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, it's Roy Wood Jr. We've got a little something
different for you today. Now you remember, before the pandemic,
you can stand around a water cooler and talk to
your co workers. Well, we used to call it water
cooler conversations, even though there was never really a water
cooler there anyway, two of my good friends, Daily Show
correspondent Dulce Sloan and Daily Show writer Josh Johnson are
known around the building for their water cooler conversations, and
(00:22):
they turned it into a podcast. This is your chance
to hear these two people go back and forth the way.
We get to hear it all the time in the hallway.
The podcast is called hold Up. Have a listen, everybody,
welcome to hold Up. I have now realized that that
a podcast hosted by two black people called hold Up.
(00:47):
It's a problem. It's a problem, but we already named it.
This is this is five but we can't do first Okay,
first of all, it might be better because it's like,
this is hold up, Like I hear what you're saying.
I hear I feel I feel like hold up works though,
I think it gives people's attention. Hey man, hold up. Yeah,
it's like or it can only be called like. Okay,
(01:08):
listen like, and there's no way to type out copy
for that, so we need to go and hold up,
Hold up, all right, hold up, all right. Well, if
you heard that last part, you already know what the
name of the show is. Welcome to hold up. It's
uh me Josh Johnson, writer for The Daily Show, with
my partner in conversations that go on way too long,
(01:28):
duel say sloan, and we're gonna be taking it to
to the true edge, the brim of issues that don't
matter at all to anybody but us, and we're gonna
have it out. So you need to know ahead of time.
This is what we do. This is how we talk
to each other anyway, all right. I don't want I
don't want anybody listening in thinking wow, while they're getting heated.
(01:50):
It's not heated. It's just the truth. It's what's happening.
Sometimes when you're right, you have to let people know.
And sometimes those people are some of your good friends. Okay,
because like Josh, how many times and we've been like
I think people would call it arguing, but for us,
it's just a regular conversation, discussion, situation. People from far away.
(02:14):
Definitely think it's arguing because I have a lot of
like we'll get will give me a second to like,
I have a lot of those stunted sentences, and those
always sound like they go in an argument. Really, I'm
just trying to think, right, So it's just like, okay,
so hold up, wait a minute, so like you have
that thought process, because it's like, there's so many times
we've been talking in the office and somebody was like,
(02:35):
y'a should do this as a podcast. I'm like, I'm
at are you doing this for free? I'm already getting
paid to be at work to talk to this man.
I ain't been to do it on there's a white
man's Internet, not getting no points for it. So we
out here being Josh talking about things that only really
well like we care about them, but I think like
(02:57):
people as a whole care about them. I would, I
would hope. So here's the thing. Today, We're gonna be
talking about conscious hip hop versus club hits. Which one
is better? And see, I think se we're already in
a place that's wow because you can't say which one
is better? Right, It's which one? Do you know? Listen,
(03:21):
it's which one you prefer. Okay, it's like, which one
do you prefer? Because I'm gonna say, because you have
one that you think is like better, and I have
one that I think is preferable to listen to. Okay,
all right, when we say better, what are the qualifications
(03:43):
for that kind? Okay, that's a good point, because my
thing is I'm gonna go with conscious hip hop because one,
I think I enjoy the journey more. You're wearing that hat. Okay, Wow,
personal attacks that have nothing to do with the argument
that I love this hat. It says a chief on
the side. It says a chief on the front. You
(04:05):
turn it too the side, it says a chief on
the side that I chose to be the side it's round.
Any side could be the side. You can have it
in the back, absolutely I could, and the people from
the back would be like, who is that a chief?
For walking past me? Here? Back to the topic you
(04:26):
had about. All I've said is that conscious hip hop
it takes you. It takes you to a place that
helps you digest society as it's happening in the moment
or the past, as as the people living in it
saw it and club hits. It's just Heathenism. You know,
it's just it's just sort of rubbing together. Listen as
a Christian woman, all right, I don't know what you believe,
(04:50):
and I don't know what God you serve, but we've
never really talked about what faith you have. Uh so
this is the thing. It's I listen to NPR. Okay,
listen to NPR. I get on seeing it. I am
very aware of all of the things that are happening right. Absolutely,
(05:15):
this is happening here, This is a problem here. Oh,
we got to go march again, right, So is that way?
Is that how you react? We gotta go march again.
I mean we've been marching my mother's we've been marching forever. Yeah,
we've been marching for I feel like that's obviously just
a prerequisite to black fitness. You know. It's just guys,
(05:38):
we gotta get out there and it is way over there,
so we're gonna be building these calves, could be fighting
the power. The best thing that ever happened to marching
was a sneaker, Yeah, because it would stop it. That's
when sneakers came out. They were like, who is going
to stop these blocks? Listen? Because before they was out
there marching in a straight church. Shoot. Just you try
(05:59):
to marching church shoes, you really have to think about
how much you care about the thing that you march
it for. Because about after eight steps you're like, a, hey, listen,
be could we stay? We can still sing? We can
sing and be still? Can everything be a sitting? Can
everything be just sit right now? Listen? The city came
(06:20):
from the marches, b like like, hey, hey listen, we
can't make all of us, can't make it all the
way over there. So let's just take over a lunch counter.
Because they don't less either there anyway. So let's we'll
kill two with one. Let's make it happen. I'll let
you hit me with the milkshake before I walk in
(06:42):
these church shoes for seven miles. Yeah, because you know
what a milkshake washes off. Bunians don't know. No. I
can get a new pressing curl, okay, I can wash
the stress. But my feet, on the other hand, my achilles,
it's going through it. So going real, man, I mean,
(07:02):
I understand why it's such an issue. So sucking up
my c l um. When I'm listening to music, I
don't want to think about all this ship that's wrong
in the world. Okay, I want to stop. I'm here
to listen. I don't want to hear about all the
hardships in your neighborhood and all another nonsense. Okay, I
(07:26):
want to hear about that ship. I don't want to
hear about your local struggle. No, I don't want to
hear about how hard it is in your corner of America. Bro, No,
are you robbing where everybody's robbing? Okay, first of all,
most ninth right, like, oh, let's go to the Bronx,
(07:47):
Like I don't want this play by play news story
of what the funk what's funked up in your area?
Like I'm not. I don't want I don't need that.
I don't want that because I already know. I already
know ship's bad over here, ship's bad over here. There's
already the misconception that people think, like, oh, well, like
(08:08):
the North's not as racist, which is a lie, and
it's like, oh, it's not as in your face. I'm
just like, Okay, so yes, this man not might not
have a Confederate flag T shirt on, but he's still
not gonna let you with this fucking apartment who gives
a ship, So like, oh, it's not in your face.
Racism all racism in your face. If you won't let
me live here, it's in my face some goofy bitches
(08:28):
in the lobby asking me to prove when I live here.
I'm like, bitch, I gotta keep file. If you touch me,
I'm gonna slap you back to like we already have
the ships. So when I'm listening to my musica, I
don't want to hear that ship. You know what I
want to hear about when I'm listening to my musica,
what is that guns? Holes, money? That's what the fun
(08:49):
I want to hear about. I want to hear what
you out here doing, Is you're getting these holes, Is
you're taking these drugs? How many bottles did you pop today? Like,
that's what I want to hear. I want to hear
repetitive be that will let me shake something that conscious
wrap you can't. I was like, I always think about this.
I was like, so do they have like conscientious wrap clubs?
Like you're just sitting in there thinking with a bunch
(09:09):
of other niggas. You're just sitting thinking, Yeah, just bobbing
back and forth. It's hard out here, No bro, I
want to shake something. I'm trying to forget. I'm trying
to see how many men want me to rub my
butt on their pelvis. I don't appreciate that. But what happens.
He could be a nice man. People are throwing books
(09:32):
and people putting their clothes on. Right, it was like
a sticking there, a jacket or all you were at check.
Everybody got to be the clothes on this club. So
I don't I want like for me. It's like I
don't want to say like escapism. But it's like I
already know about all of the ship that's bad. I
(09:53):
don't need you. I don't need you to put the
news to a beat. I don't need that. So I
will say this, okay, So you you have perfectly made
your point and team me up for mine. Because the guns,
the hose, the money, the butt rubbing, it's it's all.
It's since it's all the same. I can't. I can't
after a while you lose me, you know. But it's
(10:15):
like I wants you to rub a butt like this.
I want to rub all your butt like that. It's
just it's it's not only a bit repetitive, but It's
like I can guess the ending of the song, okay,
but in the social conscious rap, I can also guess
standing because y'all still out here being broke. The government still,
(10:36):
the cops are still killing us. Like fun the Police
is a song that could come out every single year. Sure,
like we're not like it's the same thing. We're not
learning new ship. Nothing new is happening, nothing is truly
you're still what the what with the new topic gentrification?
What are you talking about now? Dose coin? Are you
trying to fix the hood? Are they that's what? That's
(10:59):
not what happy ing in these songs. No one's giving
you like, hey, we're gonna strategize, like no one's the
comments not telling you how to win a local election,
Like that's not happening Like that that is? That is good?
Then that means that the only thing missing bridging this
gap between us would be a conscious rap that wasn't
(11:22):
about something that happened. It was it's about a plan.
So if you if you heard a song that was
about a plan that was like this is how we're
gonna take over half of Mississippi, you would be down
for it. You couldn't do bop to it, but you
could you could be like, Okay, this is a nice
flow and a good plan. I like this plan. I mean,
(11:43):
isn't the goal always to Bob though, you gotta get
if it's not about people gonna listen to it, so
you guys still get somebody about Here's the thing about
Bob's though. People are now, especially with club hits, people
are now forgetting to even check for the lyrics. You
don't know what your bop of your head too. You
could be you could be bopping your head to just
pure unadulterated gag violence argue. The song could be about
(12:05):
beating you, and you're like this thing slaps and then
all the sume people jump you and you have no
idea why my thing is. I truly understand that the
j Coles of the world, you can't you can't really
dance to it. You can't really like like like swing
your hips. But if he can't ride a flow, if
he if he if he can't put something out there
(12:26):
that not only I understand that you don't want to
think as much because this is kind of like how
I like, I think that we're this mirrors our personalities though,
because I have very much like documentaries, and you very
much like Korean dramas. You know, I love a documentary.
The problem is all the documentary is now about true crime,
and I don't want to see true crime. Also, it's
(12:51):
always true crime documentaries about white people getting murdered, like
niggas getting murdered. People are called the getting murdered, Like
y'all ain't trying to do no cold case of you
know a black man who was incarcerated and he was
an innocent person, like the Innocence Project. If the Innocence
Project became a production house, they win every oscar can
I can. I'm digressing for a second, but this is
(13:14):
that you just survived. To me of this as someone
who is seeing real crime, Yeah, this is messed up.
But like I wonder what's like when you see a
crime and then you see a document he about that crib.
But you're like, man, they should have interviewed me. They
got it all wrong. Listen something like what happened there.
(13:37):
I'm in the shot. I'm in the shot, and they
didn't get me. Listen. I had a neighbor on gangland
one time and my mother was like, this is nonsense.
This is absolute lies, lies, not this was happening, Like
she was so aggravated because she she was just like
they wasn't doing halving it ship. So when it came out,
we were like like me and my homeboy, like I
was talking to my homeboy and my like in his sister.
(13:59):
It were like lie yang like the whole time he
was watching it. And then there was some dude on
there who was supposed to be in the gang, and
then nobody knew who he was, so like they just
hired some actor, like they didn't have enough of the
story because this gang wasn't doing what they said it
was doing. Also, you were a gang in the suburbs,
like calm down, like they must have just like I
(14:20):
don't know. Gangland that week was just out of gangs.
And I was like, well we heard about this over
in Gwynette County and I'm just like, hey man, this
is wild, but um but my mother was like, this
is nonsense. My mother wit. They should have interview with me.
And I told him I was like, the last thing
you need be on Gangland. The thing that I love
(14:43):
about gang glad type stuff, though, is a perfect opportunity
to hype up your gags so you can be a
lot of people don't know we killed JFK. That was
Ba's aught. We weren't really out here like that, but
we've been out here, okay, and we we got that
mad all right. Could you imagine if like it was
like moo this, it was like, yeah, Holmes, we got JFK.
(15:07):
We got okay, all right. At the FBI was so
scared that they covered it up. What if the cryptal
what if the crypts just killed I imagine that they
could have done it, but by accident, they just saw
dropped top and they were just like, yeah, that's that fool.
(15:28):
You're like, oh, that was the president. Damn, Yeah, that
that's our bad because he was gonna side that voter
Rice bill too. He was definitely gonna sign a civil
rights sack. Fuck, we should ask more questions. So here's
the thing about club hits, all right. The other thing
(15:50):
is that this is this I'm gonna make this point,
and you don't even want to make it. I'm excited
to hear your account or though, because I understand I'm
stepping into to precarious waters. So basically, a lot of
the club hit game is so rigged that I honestly
(16:12):
have a hard time respecting it. There are some like
Atlanta is a great example. Atlanta club hits are authentic.
They're like they're like people run up on a DJ
or they have a friend that that can get their
stuff played, and then some people play it. Then they
play it in that club, people follow that person on Instagram,
DJ gives them a shout out, they build up a
real following and everything. But the rest of the game
(16:36):
at large, the broad like brushstrokes of music, it's still
the same like label Paola type thing that we pretend
we aren't still doing from the seventies or whatever. Like like,
it's still very much like, Okay, I have the back
end of this person to get me a feature by
this person and get pumped up by this person. So
now all of a sudden, my club hit is is
(16:56):
it's like on fire. But I'm like, if this was
if this had to exist in a vacuum, it would
have never got here. Whereas I feel like a lot
of conscious songs don't really have that problem. It's like
most of the most of the conscious rappers that I
enjoy are only semi famous. They're not like because the
ship is boring the make it's still working office depot
(17:18):
because nobody fucking cares. That's the thing. Like nobody is
like sitting up running them to a club is like, hey,
let me hear this. I don't even know those social
conscious rappers because that's how much I don't care. But
they give me a socially like a real socially conscious rapper,
like a conscious content give him in my name. Okay,
I've heard a no name. Yeah, but no name is not.
(17:41):
No name is not Cardi B. No name is not.
Like like she is at a place where I don't
think this should happen, but I think very well she
is gonna plateau where she's at because now the people
that know about her lover talk about her and everything.
But for whatever reason, it doesn't spread. Even war everything
(18:02):
everything hits, everything hits critical masks. At a certain point,
you're just famous, like there's not new people Like Brad
Pitt is famous, he's established, right like Angela Bassett established
like angel Bassett legit famous. But Loretta Divine is not
as famous as angel Bassett. But Loretta Divine Like it's crazy,
(18:24):
Like I feel like sometimes like certain people are like
black famous, Like a lot of times when I'm on
the shade room, they'll be talking about people like who
the funk is this? Who the fund is that? Like,
there's so many people that talk about in the shade.
I'm like, I don't know who any of these motherfucker's are,
but I should know so. But I think the other
thing that I think about, like when it comes to
like socially like conscious rap or like stuff like that
(18:47):
is like, like when I think about, like, first like
the number of when I look at, like the number
of white people that try to like talk to me
about like rap like music, if it's if it's a
white girl, she's asking me if I know who Lizzo is,
when I'm just like, well, first of all, I'm not Lizzo,
so leave me alone. Uh second, beat it, lady, Like
(19:11):
I get it, go away, stop talking. You're not going
to connect with me on this, Okay, talking to a
little way and you goofy, lady. But when I look at, like,
what do I I think the number white people that are like, well,
I'm really in an old school hip hop? But I'm like, really,
because we're done with it. That's why we call it
old school hip hop. Like it's not because like if
(19:32):
you think about like hip hop back like because the
style changes so much. Because at first it was all conscious, right, sure,
and then there was a break, like a whole you know,
like a Protestant Catholic situation where which is like we're
all doing the same thing, and then there was a
break where it was just like I just want to
have fun. I just want to I just want to
(19:55):
go out, I want to dance, and that is it.
Because I am very aware of like who consumes what,
So it's interesting that people are like, well because they
try to act like that. You know, black people don't
contribute to the American economy whatsoever, which is wild because
we are some of the biggest consumers. But when it
comes to like when I talk to my next like
(20:17):
it's conscious rap music, the people who are talking to
me about conscious rap musical at times are white people.
So it's like they're getting new information because, like, as
black people, because we're not the dominant culture, because we're
minorities in this country quote unquote, we have to know
(20:38):
all of the white things, but white people aren't required
to know the black things. So they're listening and he's like,
oh my god, I didn't know that this was such
a problem. I'm like, what do y'all do all day?
What do you do? Like? How do you not know
that there are issues and other commune Like It's that's
(21:01):
the thing that's always been wild to me, where it's
just like I just I just wasn't. I mean, are
y'all really short? Like when you're a are you sure?
Like when I like if I interacting with him, like
I've had a dude like be aggressive to me and
like rude to me on set and then I had
someone say to me, well, is that your perception of it?
(21:22):
And I just went, I don't know. I don't need that, Yeah,
not at all. I don't need you to second guess
what I'm doing. What I need you to do is
listen to what I'm saying and fucking fix it. That's
what I need you to do. So in those situations
where it's just like people just second guessing, like what
you're saying and what your experience is, I think a
(21:44):
lot of times when it comes to stuff like this,
it's just people going, well, I didn't know they were
going through so much. So they're like catching up on
news that happened twenty years ago. Because that's because it's
like now like as I was saying before, it's we're
gonna dance for everyone to shake forever. Like I feel
like that's why sometimes like on a bunch of black
(22:06):
people laughing bothers white people so much because no matter
they've done all of these things for all, Like we've
literally been in America for like four hundred and two years,
and it's gotten better than it was before because before
we were stolen and brought here answers were someone brought
here as property. So it's better than it was before,
(22:30):
but we're still dealing with things that we've been dealing
with since Jim Crows, Like Jim Crow ended on paper.
But now it's like we desegregated schools, and now they've
resegregated schools, but they've done it so slowly. You just
look up and you're like, damn you a white kids
in this school? What they got us again? So when
(22:52):
I look at stuff like that, it's like we are
what are we doing? Because there's still gonna be the
break happened for a reason, like the like the split
happened for a reason, Because it just gets to the
point where you're just like every time I turn on
a record. I can't hear about this ship because it's like,
is there conscious R and B or is that just
(23:15):
neo soul music? I mean if yeah, he might be
alone in that right or they just spoken word also
spoken work, it's just poetry. What do we talk It's
just poetry. It's low key rapping, Like what are we
talking about right now? But I do feel like spoken
word is for conscious rappers who have trouble staying on beat.
(23:42):
You know, they're like, I just gotta go with you know,
my guy giving gifts, let me be the beat. There's
like that that basis thrown me off. Let me just
do my thing, because it's I mean, I've never seen
a a gond word poem that I thought was like,
(24:03):
oh this sh like I felt before that some of
them should be songs. But then I was like, no,
there's no beat to like like his top end and
his back end or like completely. So I guess if
he had a beat switch, he could make it work
with both. But that's saying that seems too hard now.
But they're all doing But the thing is, they're all
doing the same. It's like like have ever been in
like a SASA club? Yeah, But so it's basically the
(24:26):
same song all night. It kind of is, but some
people like so, I don't know if you watch any
spoken word. I used to one of the slut not
and two things happened. There was a big schism in
spoken word where some of them stayed with like that
like bongo beat type and my brother like that that thing,
(24:51):
and then other ones really did start like almost rapping,
but they would just go so fast until they were
out of breath and you would actually hear the like
it was like you could hear them gas because they
were just like streamlining the whole poem. And my brother,
I'm trying to tell you, it's like you're not twisted,
just tell me the words. Yeah, and both of them
(25:13):
I couldn't go to a beat. They stopped doing the okay,
so this is they stopped doing the fast thing because
it made no sense. No, no, no, I wish. But
in Chicago, I went to an open mic night a
couple of times, like as I was getting it to stand.
It was a mixed open mic. It was like stand
up a little bit of everything. There was this guy
(25:33):
that would do spoken word and the first two times
he the first two times he brought bogos, but even
he could tell he couldn't keep up with what his
hands were doing. So then the next two times I
saw me didn't have any He just left him at home.
I mean, you have to realize because it's like the
(25:55):
kind of beat Nick thing from the Fit. Like it's
funny because like the only people like certain people still
swing dance and then like this beat Nick like the
rockabilly kind of vibe that some people still funk with,
and then like the fifties was such an amazing time. Um,
it's kind of rough for everybody. Basically, uh, it's like
(26:16):
black people went, yeah, that beat Nick ship, We'll keep it.
And then just turning the spoken word because okay, so
where does Kendrick Lamar fall on this? He I think
he falls in conscious because of the The Damn Album
and the Pulitzer, Like he was already like Section eight
and to Pile Butterfly all that stuff like that. Those
(26:38):
weren't really he did kind of bridge a little bit
because he had songs like Um, he had songs like I.
He had he had songs like like d n A.
He had things that people like Bob two in a
in a way that was not like club dancing, but
it was like they were really rocking with it and everything.
So he's sort of like an outlier of a lot
(26:59):
of these are people because but like, if you played
be Humble in a club, it would bob like people
would dance to that. So he kind of found a
way to like bridget I am not what what blastshem me?
What do you? Go ahead and say what you're gonna say,
(27:22):
because I'm already upset. Go ahead, and I do enjoy
his music, But what I will say is that I'm
not a huge kids look lamar fan, because I think
he sounds like a muppet. So you could have stopped
at not a huge fact. See, this is this is
(27:50):
what you do. This is this is your whole vibe.
You like to put your foot on the line and
make sure your toe is over it ten toes down? Baby?
Why why would why would you even need to include that?
I can respect you're not being a huge fan. I'm
just saying I figured but when you say you're not
a big like when you say you're like people are
(28:10):
like people want quantifiers, Well why well what is it?
And my reason is his voice sounds like it's being
done by Jim Hinson. That's my It's like a Frank
Oz kind of like just Sesame Street Muppets take Manhattan
more like a muppet and Sesame Street way more muppet.
(28:31):
What you So, here's the thing. First of all, you
all those people don't think. Second, the qualifier doesn't make
it better. The quality, like the qualifier is only gonna
take what you're doing right now, which is taking a
Kindrick bar fan and coming to you actually had Cobba
ground and then you decided to jackhammer it. You had
like I was like, hey, you're not a huge I
(28:52):
could live with that. And then you were like, let
me throw in a couple of things. I like what
he's saying. I just don't. I can. I can say this.
I'm very into people's voices, right, okay, so that is
important for me, Like I I listened to like the quality,
(29:13):
the timber of someone's the musicality of someone's voice. Right.
So to me, if you sound like you should be
standing next to Gonzo, I'm not. I'm not really gonna
be so I will. I will ask you this question
about club hits in general. I understand what you're saying
(29:33):
about the consciousness sometimes being a bit too much. But
here's the thing. I there's two points that I basically
want to try to make simultaneously, So address whichever one
of them first that you that you feel he's addressing one.
I would make conscious socially conscious rap only a part
(29:55):
of the pie of what I feel like conscious rap is.
Sometimes I think conscious rap is all outright lyricism, like
like outright saying anything, because because I understand the socially
conscious stuff is is exhausting to a to a degree,
especially when you live in and you know, being at
the daily show, we have to read about it and
like work in it. So I understand needing a break
(30:16):
and not being like I want to reminder of what
I left when I go home. But I think that
when you take the time to put in incredible alliteration
and like all of these aspects of poetry into your lyrics,
I I personally, only me personally also put that in
a conscious vibe. Because I'm so you think there aren't
(30:39):
club rappers that are writing good lyrics. I think that
there are some, But I think that overall the same
way that you told me that like a at a
certain point we we get it. I think that That's
how I feel about a lot of club hits because
I'm like, here are all the things that I at
least because because of who I am, Because I'm like,
you know, you know me, but if if you're listening,
(31:02):
you might not. I'm like a nerd. I'm like, I'm
like a pretty Uh would you what would you call it?
I'm like, you got that book learning? You know, yeah,
you got the book learning? You real chill um. I mean,
I don't have this much with the club themes. So
that that's why I'm That's what knocks me out of it,
because I'm just like, well, I don't drink um. You know.
(31:25):
I'm more of a relationship person. I don't I can't
do the the the mushition together with strangers, you know,
I have to I have to know a person. So
a lot of that, a lot of that stuff is
out for me. I mean, I'm not saying the Harlot
out here just rubbing up against any man anytime, dicking
Jamal say that was that was it at all? I'm
(31:47):
saying that's what knocks me out. I'm not talking here you.
I mean it's like, you know, sometimes you know, some
man starts rubbing on you and you're like, okay, start
get off me. You feel broke? Neat it? Um? Wait
wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait
wait wait wait wait wait wait waite. Sorry to digress again,
but how does somebody dance broke? How does somebody dance
(32:13):
behind you broke? It's a feeling, It's it's a vibe,
it's a it's just a it's just a knowing. Like
I've only probably been in a relationship like one really
good man and he was a convicted felon, so, which
is neither here nor there. So just like the American
(32:37):
justice system hates us. Uh. But like, for instance, I
can spot a trash ass dude from fifty paces. I
could feel him right, just like I always know when
I see a theater kid. You always know, like within
five seconds of talking to somebody, Like when people are
like I'm a comic and I was like, no, you're
an open micro like stop. Um. It's kind of like
(32:57):
the same kind of thing. But there have been time
you just be out and some dude to just come
up behind you and you're just like, dude, no, because
like some days you go you're like I just want
to dance with my friends. I'm not here to give
some man a partial erection. Get off me right now.
This is my question. So I had a dude, so
we were out one night because like, i quit wearing
heels to the club because I'm just like, it's stid, right.
(33:20):
I don't want to be in this girl. I don't
want to be in the group of girls around a
pile of shoes like I'm okay, you keep dropping cups
in here because Flora's slippery, my busting my ass, this
is all a fire hazard. I'm not doing it. But
this dude came up behind me one time at a
club in Atlanta and I was dancing and then he
came up behind me and I stopped moving and he
(33:44):
was like hey, and I was like no, and he
started hitting me on my side and I'm like, star,
i am not Sea biscuit, stop hitting me on my side.
I'm not I'm not doing it. No, thank you. And
when he came up behind me, I was just like,
I feel unsavory individual. Uh, Like sometimes you're just known
(34:06):
as a criminal behind Like sometimes you just know they're
like this is not a good part. There's plans of
them and tricked just recently just fooled. But also sometimes
you just want to go out. You wanna be with
your friends, and I don't want some man behind me
like off me, get off being a nerd. So like
I understand, but there is those times from like listening
(34:27):
to like you know, club hits and stuff like that,
where I'm just like, all right, yeah, we're drinking again.
We're drinking again, we're taking all the drugs again. We're
getting these toes not as other ships. So it's just
you can get too full of one or the other. Right,
It's like when you go to like a Latin club
and they're just like, Okay, we're gonna play get a
(34:48):
little bit. We're gonna pay by Chat for a little bit,
we'ren play sausa for a little bit. Because like if
you're just hearing like a salt like salsa all night long,
or by Chopped or Anger or any of that, because
of the day ants that you do to those songs,
basically at the same melody just said a little bit different,
and then it's just someone else singing about being in love.
So after a certain point you're just like, I can't
(35:10):
hear this song again. But if you put on swave
mentate it's going down. Please know that about me. But
like I feel the way about suave and mentor like
I feel about knuck a few buck. Like that's where
I am with both of It's just like if it
comes on, I go all the words it's going down.
Used to singing in the hallway in my high school,
um so just somebody would just be in the halve
(35:33):
and somebody else save a man thing and everybody going
to classico bestman, and then we keep going to class
so also in the Joe to see who. Yeah, we
had fun. So but it does get to a point
where you're just like I can't hear about the club
shot anymore. I can't hear about the social shit anymore.
You just have to. That's why I can give us
(35:55):
Some people like don't listen to different genres of music,
like so this is all you listen to. I have
met people like that. It's wild. I'll throw on it
like it's lestenie I have Like the other day I
listened to Ariana Grande but chat to song and then
a gospel song and this was one two three yeah. Yeah.
(36:18):
So it's like people people who would agree with me
about conscious rap that only listened to it, and they're
too much for me. I'm like, hey, unless unless you're
gonna go do something, we can't just sit here like
I've been. I've been in those sessions where you just
chill with a fread and they're like, oh yeah, put
(36:39):
on put on that other album, put on that other album.
And I'm like, this clearly doesn't motivate you to do
anything because because they're sad, Josh, because they're sad. At
least when you're listening to a little John you least
want to get up and run around or just yell yeah,
like you want to do something. But those is the
(37:01):
sound tract to my friends getting arrested. That like, like
I'm telling you, that's I think that's the other reason
why I don't vide with club stuff as much, because
I just have a lot of bad memory. Okay, this
is that this may have to be cut. This is
five though, But I went to a club one time
where it was a local you talked about you don't
want to hear local conscious wrap. That's like, what's going
(37:25):
on over there? What I tell you? That a lot
of because you're from Atlanta, So I think I think
I can safely say you've been spoiled with good like
underground hip hop beats good. You know, a lot of
it's trash. A lot of the time you'll see some
dude and you're at a club or something or a bar.
You're at a club, and then they'll just have some
(37:46):
local act come up and just tell you what's happening on,
like Bouldercrest, and you're just like, yeah, that's one street dude,
or like whatever they're doing on the South Side, And
I'm like, hey, man, like you gotta also, I think
you're dry snitching first and foremost, Yeah, I understand. Foremost,
that's that's I think that's my other issue is that
(38:09):
a lot of these these club hits are not They're
not put together in the most creative way. So then
you just end up presenting exhibit A in court like
like you don't you don't have anything else does that
you don't have any sort of flowery language to hide
the fact that this is exactly what you did, Like yeah,
(38:29):
it's like okay, and I shot him and it was
like the you know, there's like a whole camp of
sketch about it where but it was Tuesday and yeah,
and you're like, guys, you're making me nervous because I'm
here to watch the show, like they might, I'm an
accessory to what's happening right now. But it's like, but
I think they're there's a place for both of them.
(38:49):
I just think for me, it's I mean, I do
understand that it's a way to let people know who
aren't on the up and up when it comes to
like getting our news or before there was like social
media and you really only knew you didn't have a
whole worldwide kind of like perception of what was really
(39:13):
happening in other places. So I think socially conscious rap
could tell you what was happening somewhere else because the
West Coast came out with some club boppers. The South
known for it, But like, I don't know, because like
you know, when I like, you know, one of our
friends just constantly likes to ship on like Southern hip
(39:34):
hop because he thinks that Northern hip hop is better.
And I'm just like, what do you niggas do when
you go to the club? Truly, truly, if you're in
here playing Wu Tang all that, what are you really?
Because the thing is they're talking about that much different ship.
It's it's just the beat is different, Like your issue
is like how they sound and what the beat sounds like.
(39:56):
But it's like no one's really I've never been because
even like those fucking like spoken with shows are condepressing.
The neo soul shows is just like, Okay, everyone in
here is currently I don't know how you burn in
sense in your own dreads, but whatever. So it's like
I get it, alright. White man's religion is trash, got it,
(40:18):
got it, got it, got it. These crystals will help
you cook. Coo coo coo cool, that's what you believe in. Fine,
funk with it. But you get in those shows, I'm
just like, Okay, everyone's in earth tones and they're still
talking about fucking. Like that's the thing at the end
of the day. Everybody's talking about fucking, and whatever way
you're doing it, you're talking about fucking. So like I
(40:42):
think like one of the best examples like a socially
conscious rap song that I could funk with it is like,
you know, the Tupac song Brenda is Having a Baby,
great example of a socially conscious song that you can
bop too, Right, It's like damn team. Pregnancy is a
problem in our community. Also, I also was like in
(41:09):
college when like a Little John was popping off, when
a whole krunk music ship was popping off, I was
in college. Yeah, well that's that's a huge thing with music, though,
is that I've been told and this is not it's
not science or anything, but I haven't been seen it
proved wrong yet that whatever you listened to in high
school and the early part of college is going to
(41:31):
be music to you forever. You're never gonna get broken
from that thing. Like if you liked a specific thing
when you were in high school, even if you veer
away from it, you're always gonna have a soft spot
for like that that little piece of the genre, right
Like I always like, you know, it's like I was
also in like middle school and like when Nirvana was
(41:51):
popping off, or like, um, the amount of hood at
the amount of I don't think that the Red Hot
Chill Peppers know how many black people fun with them.
I don't think they know. I don't think they wouldn't know.
They would. I think they think they might notice that
there are plenty of them at the concert, But I
(42:11):
don't think they they don't know enough to then be
like we would like to do the Source Awards. I
don't know if it's that deep. I'll say that it's
like all is subourbon black people I knew really funk
with them. I think about like there's so many times
(42:34):
where I was like trying to like listen to socially
conscious wrap and been like okay, and I feel like
I should be taking notes. Like every time I listened
to one of those songs, I'm just like, oh, we
have such we have such Like it's just like it's
holding a mirror up to America. It's holding up your
mirrors up here, like experience as a black person in America.
(42:57):
And I'm just like I don't want this. I don't
want this. Um. I mean, I understand what you're saying,
but like I think, like when it comes to like
the lyrics, because like we can all we can both
agree that like little Wayne is l Wayne is amazing,
(43:19):
like the use of a metaphor the use of a
similar like the imagery of ship, like it's you can
don't I so appreciate the concession that you're making at
the common ground that you're trying to build, But I
little Wayne is my one where I'm like, I don't
(43:39):
don't really care. Okay, I here's the thing. I respect
his you know, people talk about lyricism, people talk about
his um adaptability and how he's kept his music consistently
relevant over the years. I completely respect that. But overall,
if you want to talk about voices, you want to
talk about Kendrick's voice, Little Wayne sounds I don't under
(44:00):
six babies that got possessed by one big baby all
talking at the same time. I've never heard I've never
heard Little Wayne sound like a grown man. You did
his first album when he was fourteen. What it's confusing
to me about Little Wayne is that he had a
deeper voice at fourteen then he does right now. But
(44:23):
it's just the way he performed. It's just his performance voice,
I guess, because when I think when you hear him
talking like an interview, he does sound like an adult.
But then he sounds dangerous. Then I'm like, no, if
I don't know, if we could be friends, okay, we
book No, you'd never be friends. A little I could try.
I mean, listen, honestly, everybody has somebody to talk to,
(44:47):
you know, maybe I can. It's so funny because like
I have ever had been friends with somebody and when
of your other friends was like I wouldn't expect you
to be friends with them, and you just go, I
don't know what that means, but it sounds like disrespect. Yeah, like, oh,
your friends, I wouldn't have expected that. I'm like, I
don't know if we're gonna be I don't see that coming,
Like I don't know if we're gonna stay friends. We
kep having a conversation, but like, Okay, it's like I understand,
(45:12):
Like my concession would be, it's reporting the news, right,
It's telling what's happening in your hood, because sometimes like
you feel like what's happening to you where you live
sometimes feel like this is the only You're the only
one going through that. So like when it's like when
you have like more visibility of like when you just
(45:32):
incruisee visibility of different groups of people, so like you know,
minority groups, people with different like you know, plus size people,
people in the disabled community, people in the l G B,
t q I A community, you know, the b I,
P O C community, Like all of these groups like
we're not We're starting to see more, right, you're like, Okay,
(45:53):
it's like it's almost like a representation thing where just like, oh,
so you know how your hood is sucked up. Guess what,
my hood is also fucked up? What's happening over here?
I can understand. I can give you that concession where
and kind of just show people like you're not the
only ones going through this. Sure, but at the same time,
(46:14):
you can't play it at a party though. My concession
to you is that I definitely, definitely have enjoyed many
club hits over the years, and while I don't always
I don't always vibe with everything that comes out, there's
usually one about each topic that I'm like, Okay, I
(46:37):
arrived with this, this is this is like so, so
you know we talked about uh, money, sex, alcohol, all
the stuff I have. At least every year, I feel
like I have at least one money song, one alcohol song,
one sex song out of the out of the club
hits that I that's just to me undeniably good And
for that reason, I can understand why going down that
(46:58):
rabbit hole more, I might. I might be more into
club hits eventually. Okay, now listen, now, when I find
me a husband, right, maybe it'll bees we find one
when I start saying the word correctly. I don't know. Um,
of course you would be right. It's in my wedding
right now. On the program for the wedding, it will
(47:25):
have a designated time to swag surf. It is going
to happen. Okay, how do you feel about that song?
I can start preparing now and then and then I
think I'll be good to go. So you don't know
how to swag surf. I don't know how to swags serve. Well,
(47:46):
m m, that's not required the way that I swag serve,
though most of the dances I think I know how
to do. I've been told to stop. That seems that's right. Yeah.
Now to a club, and I try to dance towards
these club hits, I'm you, I usually end up having
to apologize to somebody because I don't know how it
(48:07):
is that that no one else is knocking drinkside people's hands.
It's just me. But I'm I'm trying to stay corey,
I'm trying to stay on beat. As someone who has
known you for a few years now, you do strike
me as someone who has a body that would not
match up well to music. This is exactly like the
(48:29):
Kendrick that because I already said what I did, I
didn't need you to add to the thing. Thank you
so much for listening to our podcast hold up or
what is it called hold up? Hold Up? There is
no way that we can get off a podcast talking
about club hits without talking about the song that has
caused us the most amount of contention. And what are
(48:51):
you talking about? You know exactly the song I'm talking about.
Don't you look at me. I tend to wipe things
that I think are absolutely trash from memory, I tink
to I tend to try to scrub that out of
my consciousness. Don't act like you don't know what I'm
talking about. That's right, the Amazing Crime Mob get Nuck
if You Buck. Don't act like I wasn't gonna bring
(49:12):
it up. Here's the thing, here's there's Nuck If You
Buck is probably one of the songs that I most
despise because it's not It's not only is it not
good flies, it just doesn't make any sense to me.
(49:34):
So we were having a thing at work one day.
We were talking about if there was a new Negro
spiritual I cannot believe we went this long without bringing
us up. If there was a new Negro spiritual, what
would it be? I of course said, nuck if you buck.
Josh came out of fucking not even left field the
parking lot of a baseball game and said Georgia, but
(50:00):
not the Ray Charles version of Georgia, the ludicrous version
with Jamie Fox singing the Ray Charles verse. I didn't know.
I thought it had to be a hip hop song.
If I had known, it was just completely I picked
a hip hop any any song in the realm of blackness.
(50:23):
I picked knuck if you buck. That has brought many
people together but also divided so many, and you rested
as many people as it has set free one. The
issue was you brought up a song that only I
knew and you knew anyone else in the conversation because
it was talking right. I did that, and I made
it just you and me thing. Because it was just you.
(50:45):
I didn't know you were gonna blast it out to
the rest of the office. It was a blast. It
wasn't blasted out like that. It wasn't blasted out like
that because there were other black people standing in their room.
We're having this conversation, and they all teached you, like,
what song is that? Even Alonso Boden, Uncle Alonso, who
was in the office one day, said knock a few buck,
of course, and he knew the song. Even someone who's
(51:08):
not even who's black, who wouldn't even grow up in America,
who is British, was like, of course, luck if you buck?
And I said why, And they're like, because of how
it makes you feel. Now I understand that you don't
like this song because what did you tell me? It
sounds like to you. I don't remember. I can tell
you because it hurt me. You said, but it hurt
(51:30):
because it was accurate. Okay, it didn't hurt me, hurt me.
But I was like, damn, he's right, you said that
knuck if you buck sounds like a G. E. D
getting thrown down the hallway of a juvenile detention center.
I do recall that. Now. Yeah, Now, anyone I've ever
said that too has been like, he's completely accurate. But
the song still slaps. That song still slaps, okay. And
(51:54):
the thing is this became a running thing in the office.
So me being the individual well that I am, got
Josh a trophy that said for knucking and bucking and
being ready to fight Josh Johnson. Now I was gonna
say first place, but I was telling Roy about it,
and Roy said, not put runner up, which makes it
(52:16):
so much funnier, It makes it so much meaner. And
you also it was it was it. I felt hazed
because I was I was new. I didn't like I
hadn't been at the show that long and I and
you mailed it to me. You did. You couldn't just
bring it to me like a regular Christian. You mailed
it to me. So then I got sent down to
(52:37):
to security to get my mail, and I was excited
because I had never got mail at the show before.
I was like, who knows that I'm here? And I
opened it up and it was that travesty. The way
you looked when you walked in my office holding it
down by your side. You know you've made it this far.
(53:00):
In listening to the podcast, you're absolutely Jim. You really
appreciate you. I just want to thank you all for
me for us listening. I didn't want to bring up
not a few buck at the beginning conversation because I
didn't want Josh to be mad at me. The entire time. Um,
but we had to bring up the Pinnacle. I mean,
we talked about Little John, We have talked about the
Pinnacle Club hit the Banger All Bangers, okay, Banger of
(53:27):
All Banks, really making me regret my concession. Um, thank
you so much for listening. I'm Josh Johnson and I'm
do Say Sloan and you've been listening to a hold
Up because we held up their lives. We'll be back
with more hold Up in the future. Bye. Thank you.
(53:58):
Listen to hold Up wherever you get your podcat pass
and watched the video version at Daily show dot com
backslash hold Up m HM
Hey, it's Roy Wood Jr. We've got a little something
different for you today. Now you remember, before the pandemic,
you can stand around a water cooler and talk to
your co workers. Well, we used to call it water
cooler conversations, even though there was never really a water
cooler there anyway, two of my good friends, Daily Show
correspondent Dulce Sloan and Daily Show writer Josh Johnson are
known around the building for their water cooler conversations, and
(00:22):
they turned it into a podcast. This is your chance
to hear these two people go back and forth the way.
We get to hear it all the time in the hallway.
The podcast is called hold Up. Have a listen, everybody,
welcome to hold Up. I have now realized that that
a podcast hosted by two black people called hold Up.
(00:47):
It's a problem. It's a problem, but we already named it.
This is this is five but we can't do first Okay,
first of all, it might be better because it's like,
this is hold up, Like I hear what you're saying.
I hear I feel I feel like hold up works though,
I think it gives people's attention. Hey man, hold up. Yeah,
it's like or it can only be called like. Okay,
(01:08):
listen like, and there's no way to type out copy
for that, so we need to go and hold up,
Hold up, all right, hold up, all right. Well, if
you heard that last part, you already know what the
name of the show is. Welcome to hold up. It's
uh me Josh Johnson, writer for The Daily Show, with
my partner in conversations that go on way too long,
(01:28):
duel say sloan, and we're gonna be taking it to
to the true edge, the brim of issues that don't
matter at all to anybody but us, and we're gonna
have it out. So you need to know ahead of time.
This is what we do. This is how we talk
to each other anyway, all right. I don't want I
don't want anybody listening in thinking wow, while they're getting heated.
(01:50):
It's not heated. It's just the truth. It's what's happening.
Sometimes when you're right, you have to let people know.
And sometimes those people are some of your good friends. Okay,
because like Josh, how many times and we've been like
I think people would call it arguing, but for us,
it's just a regular conversation, discussion, situation. People from far away.
(02:14):
Definitely think it's arguing because I have a lot of
like we'll get will give me a second to like,
I have a lot of those stunted sentences, and those
always sound like they go in an argument. Really, I'm
just trying to think, right, So it's just like, okay,
so hold up, wait a minute, so like you have
that thought process, because it's like, there's so many times
we've been talking in the office and somebody was like,
(02:35):
y'a should do this as a podcast. I'm like, I'm
at are you doing this for free? I'm already getting
paid to be at work to talk to this man.
I ain't been to do it on there's a white
man's Internet, not getting no points for it. So we
out here being Josh talking about things that only really
well like we care about them, but I think like
(02:57):
people as a whole care about them. I would, I
would hope. So here's the thing. Today, We're gonna be
talking about conscious hip hop versus club hits. Which one
is better? And see, I think se we're already in
a place that's wow because you can't say which one
is better? Right, It's which one? Do you know? Listen,
(03:21):
it's which one you prefer. Okay, it's like, which one
do you prefer? Because I'm gonna say, because you have
one that you think is like better, and I have
one that I think is preferable to listen to. Okay,
all right, when we say better, what are the qualifications
(03:43):
for that kind? Okay, that's a good point, because my
thing is I'm gonna go with conscious hip hop because one,
I think I enjoy the journey more. You're wearing that hat. Okay, Wow,
personal attacks that have nothing to do with the argument
that I love this hat. It says a chief on
the side. It says a chief on the front. You
(04:05):
turn it too the side, it says a chief on
the side that I chose to be the side it's round.
Any side could be the side. You can have it
in the back, absolutely I could, and the people from
the back would be like, who is that a chief?
For walking past me? Here? Back to the topic you
(04:26):
had about. All I've said is that conscious hip hop
it takes you. It takes you to a place that
helps you digest society as it's happening in the moment
or the past, as as the people living in it
saw it and club hits. It's just Heathenism. You know,
it's just it's just sort of rubbing together. Listen as
a Christian woman, all right, I don't know what you believe,
(04:50):
and I don't know what God you serve, but we've
never really talked about what faith you have. Uh so
this is the thing. It's I listen to NPR. Okay,
listen to NPR. I get on seeing it. I am
very aware of all of the things that are happening right. Absolutely,
(05:15):
this is happening here, This is a problem here. Oh,
we got to go march again, right, So is that way?
Is that how you react? We gotta go march again.
I mean we've been marching my mother's we've been marching forever. Yeah,
we've been marching for I feel like that's obviously just
a prerequisite to black fitness. You know. It's just guys,
(05:38):
we gotta get out there and it is way over there,
so we're gonna be building these calves, could be fighting
the power. The best thing that ever happened to marching
was a sneaker, Yeah, because it would stop it. That's
when sneakers came out. They were like, who is going
to stop these blocks? Listen? Because before they was out
there marching in a straight church. Shoot. Just you try
(05:59):
to marching church shoes, you really have to think about
how much you care about the thing that you march
it for. Because about after eight steps you're like, a, hey, listen,
be could we stay? We can still sing? We can
sing and be still? Can everything be a sitting? Can
everything be just sit right now? Listen? The city came
(06:20):
from the marches, b like like, hey, hey listen, we
can't make all of us, can't make it all the
way over there. So let's just take over a lunch counter.
Because they don't less either there anyway. So let's we'll
kill two with one. Let's make it happen. I'll let
you hit me with the milkshake before I walk in
(06:42):
these church shoes for seven miles. Yeah, because you know
what a milkshake washes off. Bunians don't know. No. I
can get a new pressing curl, okay, I can wash
the stress. But my feet, on the other hand, my achilles,
it's going through it. So going real, man, I mean,
(07:02):
I understand why it's such an issue. So sucking up
my c l um. When I'm listening to music, I
don't want to think about all this ship that's wrong
in the world. Okay, I want to stop. I'm here
to listen. I don't want to hear about all the
hardships in your neighborhood and all another nonsense. Okay, I
(07:26):
want to hear about that ship. I don't want to
hear about your local struggle. No, I don't want to
hear about how hard it is in your corner of America. Bro, No,
are you robbing where everybody's robbing? Okay, first of all,
most ninth right, like, oh, let's go to the Bronx,
(07:47):
Like I don't want this play by play news story
of what the funk what's funked up in your area?
Like I'm not. I don't want I don't need that.
I don't want that because I already know. I already
know ship's bad over here, ship's bad over here. There's
already the misconception that people think, like, oh, well, like
(08:08):
the North's not as racist, which is a lie, and
it's like, oh, it's not as in your face. I'm
just like, Okay, so yes, this man not might not
have a Confederate flag T shirt on, but he's still
not gonna let you with this fucking apartment who gives
a ship, So like, oh, it's not in your face.
Racism all racism in your face. If you won't let
me live here, it's in my face some goofy bitches
(08:28):
in the lobby asking me to prove when I live here.
I'm like, bitch, I gotta keep file. If you touch me,
I'm gonna slap you back to like we already have
the ships. So when I'm listening to my musica, I
don't want to hear that ship. You know what I
want to hear about when I'm listening to my musica,
what is that guns? Holes, money? That's what the fun
(08:49):
I want to hear about. I want to hear what
you out here doing, Is you're getting these holes, Is
you're taking these drugs? How many bottles did you pop today? Like,
that's what I want to hear. I want to hear
repetitive be that will let me shake something that conscious
wrap you can't. I was like, I always think about this.
I was like, so do they have like conscientious wrap clubs?
Like you're just sitting in there thinking with a bunch
(09:09):
of other niggas. You're just sitting thinking, Yeah, just bobbing
back and forth. It's hard out here, No bro, I
want to shake something. I'm trying to forget. I'm trying
to see how many men want me to rub my
butt on their pelvis. I don't appreciate that. But what happens.
He could be a nice man. People are throwing books
(09:32):
and people putting their clothes on. Right, it was like
a sticking there, a jacket or all you were at check.
Everybody got to be the clothes on this club. So
I don't I want like for me. It's like I
don't want to say like escapism. But it's like I
already know about all of the ship that's bad. I
(09:53):
don't need you. I don't need you to put the
news to a beat. I don't need that. So I
will say this, okay, So you you have perfectly made
your point and team me up for mine. Because the guns,
the hose, the money, the butt rubbing, it's it's all.
It's since it's all the same. I can't. I can't
after a while you lose me, you know. But it's
(10:15):
like I wants you to rub a butt like this.
I want to rub all your butt like that. It's
just it's it's not only a bit repetitive, but It's
like I can guess the ending of the song, okay,
but in the social conscious rap, I can also guess
standing because y'all still out here being broke. The government still,
(10:36):
the cops are still killing us. Like fun the Police
is a song that could come out every single year. Sure,
like we're not like it's the same thing. We're not
learning new ship. Nothing new is happening, nothing is truly
you're still what the what with the new topic gentrification?
What are you talking about now? Dose coin? Are you
trying to fix the hood? Are they that's what? That's
(10:59):
not what happy ing in these songs. No one's giving
you like, hey, we're gonna strategize, like no one's the
comments not telling you how to win a local election,
Like that's not happening Like that that is? That is good?
Then that means that the only thing missing bridging this
gap between us would be a conscious rap that wasn't
(11:22):
about something that happened. It was it's about a plan.
So if you if you heard a song that was
about a plan that was like this is how we're
gonna take over half of Mississippi, you would be down
for it. You couldn't do bop to it, but you
could you could be like, Okay, this is a nice
flow and a good plan. I like this plan. I mean,
(11:43):
isn't the goal always to Bob though, you gotta get
if it's not about people gonna listen to it, so
you guys still get somebody about Here's the thing about
Bob's though. People are now, especially with club hits, people
are now forgetting to even check for the lyrics. You
don't know what your bop of your head too. You
could be you could be bopping your head to just
pure unadulterated gag violence argue. The song could be about
(12:05):
beating you, and you're like this thing slaps and then
all the sume people jump you and you have no
idea why my thing is. I truly understand that the
j Coles of the world, you can't you can't really
dance to it. You can't really like like like swing
your hips. But if he can't ride a flow, if
he if he if he can't put something out there
(12:26):
that not only I understand that you don't want to
think as much because this is kind of like how
I like, I think that we're this mirrors our personalities though,
because I have very much like documentaries, and you very
much like Korean dramas. You know, I love a documentary.
The problem is all the documentary is now about true crime,
and I don't want to see true crime. Also, it's
(12:51):
always true crime documentaries about white people getting murdered, like
niggas getting murdered. People are called the getting murdered, Like
y'all ain't trying to do no cold case of you
know a black man who was incarcerated and he was
an innocent person, like the Innocence Project. If the Innocence
Project became a production house, they win every oscar can
I can. I'm digressing for a second, but this is
(13:14):
that you just survived. To me of this as someone
who is seeing real crime, Yeah, this is messed up.
But like I wonder what's like when you see a
crime and then you see a document he about that crib.
But you're like, man, they should have interviewed me. They
got it all wrong. Listen something like what happened there.
(13:37):
I'm in the shot. I'm in the shot, and they
didn't get me. Listen. I had a neighbor on gangland
one time and my mother was like, this is nonsense.
This is absolute lies, lies, not this was happening, Like
she was so aggravated because she she was just like
they wasn't doing halving it ship. So when it came out,
we were like like me and my homeboy, like I
was talking to my homeboy and my like in his sister.
(13:59):
It were like lie yang like the whole time he
was watching it. And then there was some dude on
there who was supposed to be in the gang, and
then nobody knew who he was, so like they just
hired some actor, like they didn't have enough of the
story because this gang wasn't doing what they said it
was doing. Also, you were a gang in the suburbs,
like calm down, like they must have just like I
(14:20):
don't know. Gangland that week was just out of gangs.
And I was like, well we heard about this over
in Gwynette County and I'm just like, hey man, this
is wild, but um but my mother was like, this
is nonsense. My mother wit. They should have interview with me.
And I told him I was like, the last thing
you need be on Gangland. The thing that I love
(14:43):
about gang glad type stuff, though, is a perfect opportunity
to hype up your gags so you can be a
lot of people don't know we killed JFK. That was
Ba's aught. We weren't really out here like that, but
we've been out here, okay, and we we got that
mad all right. Could you imagine if like it was
like moo this, it was like, yeah, Holmes, we got JFK.
(15:07):
We got okay, all right. At the FBI was so
scared that they covered it up. What if the cryptal
what if the crypts just killed I imagine that they
could have done it, but by accident, they just saw
dropped top and they were just like, yeah, that's that fool.
(15:28):
You're like, oh, that was the president. Damn, Yeah, that
that's our bad because he was gonna side that voter
Rice bill too. He was definitely gonna sign a civil
rights sack. Fuck, we should ask more questions. So here's
the thing about club hits, all right. The other thing
(15:50):
is that this is this I'm gonna make this point,
and you don't even want to make it. I'm excited
to hear your account or though, because I understand I'm
stepping into to precarious waters. So basically, a lot of
the club hit game is so rigged that I honestly
(16:12):
have a hard time respecting it. There are some like
Atlanta is a great example. Atlanta club hits are authentic.
They're like they're like people run up on a DJ
or they have a friend that that can get their
stuff played, and then some people play it. Then they
play it in that club, people follow that person on Instagram,
DJ gives them a shout out, they build up a
real following and everything. But the rest of the game
(16:36):
at large, the broad like brushstrokes of music, it's still
the same like label Paola type thing that we pretend
we aren't still doing from the seventies or whatever. Like like,
it's still very much like, Okay, I have the back
end of this person to get me a feature by
this person and get pumped up by this person. So
now all of a sudden, my club hit is is
(16:56):
it's like on fire. But I'm like, if this was
if this had to exist in a vacuum, it would
have never got here. Whereas I feel like a lot
of conscious songs don't really have that problem. It's like
most of the most of the conscious rappers that I
enjoy are only semi famous. They're not like because the
ship is boring the make it's still working office depot
(17:18):
because nobody fucking cares. That's the thing. Like nobody is
like sitting up running them to a club is like, hey,
let me hear this. I don't even know those social
conscious rappers because that's how much I don't care. But
they give me a socially like a real socially conscious rapper,
like a conscious content give him in my name. Okay,
I've heard a no name. Yeah, but no name is not.
(17:41):
No name is not Cardi B. No name is not.
Like like she is at a place where I don't
think this should happen, but I think very well she
is gonna plateau where she's at because now the people
that know about her lover talk about her and everything.
But for whatever reason, it doesn't spread. Even war everything
(18:02):
everything hits, everything hits critical masks. At a certain point,
you're just famous, like there's not new people Like Brad
Pitt is famous, he's established, right like Angela Bassett established
like angel Bassett legit famous. But Loretta Divine is not
as famous as angel Bassett. But Loretta Divine Like it's crazy,
(18:24):
Like I feel like sometimes like certain people are like
black famous, Like a lot of times when I'm on
the shade room, they'll be talking about people like who
the funk is this? Who the fund is that? Like,
there's so many people that talk about in the shade.
I'm like, I don't know who any of these motherfucker's are,
but I should know so. But I think the other
thing that I think about, like when it comes to
like socially like conscious rap or like stuff like that
(18:47):
is like, like when I think about, like, first like
the number of when I look at, like the number
of white people that try to like talk to me
about like rap like music, if it's if it's a
white girl, she's asking me if I know who Lizzo is,
when I'm just like, well, first of all, I'm not Lizzo,
so leave me alone. Uh second, beat it, lady, Like
(19:11):
I get it, go away, stop talking. You're not going
to connect with me on this, Okay, talking to a
little way and you goofy, lady. But when I look at, like,
what do I I think the number white people that are like, well,
I'm really in an old school hip hop? But I'm like, really,
because we're done with it. That's why we call it
old school hip hop. Like it's not because like if
(19:32):
you think about like hip hop back like because the
style changes so much. Because at first it was all conscious, right, sure,
and then there was a break, like a whole you know,
like a Protestant Catholic situation where which is like we're
all doing the same thing, and then there was a
break where it was just like I just want to
have fun. I just want to I just want to
(19:55):
go out, I want to dance, and that is it.
Because I am very aware of like who consumes what,
So it's interesting that people are like, well because they
try to act like that. You know, black people don't
contribute to the American economy whatsoever, which is wild because
we are some of the biggest consumers. But when it
comes to like when I talk to my next like
(20:17):
it's conscious rap music, the people who are talking to
me about conscious rap musical at times are white people.
So it's like they're getting new information because, like, as
black people, because we're not the dominant culture, because we're
minorities in this country quote unquote, we have to know
(20:38):
all of the white things, but white people aren't required
to know the black things. So they're listening and he's like,
oh my god, I didn't know that this was such
a problem. I'm like, what do y'all do all day?
What do you do? Like? How do you not know
that there are issues and other commune Like It's that's
(21:01):
the thing that's always been wild to me, where it's
just like I just I just wasn't. I mean, are
y'all really short? Like when you're a are you sure?
Like when I like if I interacting with him, like
I've had a dude like be aggressive to me and
like rude to me on set and then I had
someone say to me, well, is that your perception of it?
(21:22):
And I just went, I don't know. I don't need that, Yeah,
not at all. I don't need you to second guess
what I'm doing. What I need you to do is
listen to what I'm saying and fucking fix it. That's
what I need you to do. So in those situations
where it's just like people just second guessing, like what
you're saying and what your experience is, I think a
(21:44):
lot of times when it comes to stuff like this,
it's just people going, well, I didn't know they were
going through so much. So they're like catching up on
news that happened twenty years ago. Because that's because it's
like now like as I was saying before, it's we're
gonna dance for everyone to shake forever. Like I feel
like that's why sometimes like on a bunch of black
(22:06):
people laughing bothers white people so much because no matter
they've done all of these things for all, Like we've
literally been in America for like four hundred and two years,
and it's gotten better than it was before because before
we were stolen and brought here answers were someone brought
here as property. So it's better than it was before,
(22:30):
but we're still dealing with things that we've been dealing
with since Jim Crows, Like Jim Crow ended on paper.
But now it's like we desegregated schools, and now they've
resegregated schools, but they've done it so slowly. You just
look up and you're like, damn you a white kids
in this school? What they got us again? So when
(22:52):
I look at stuff like that, it's like we are
what are we doing? Because there's still gonna be the
break happened for a reason, like the like the split
happened for a reason, Because it just gets to the
point where you're just like every time I turn on
a record. I can't hear about this ship because it's like,
is there conscious R and B or is that just
(23:15):
neo soul music? I mean if yeah, he might be
alone in that right or they just spoken word also
spoken work, it's just poetry. What do we talk It's
just poetry. It's low key rapping, Like what are we
talking about right now? But I do feel like spoken
word is for conscious rappers who have trouble staying on beat.
(23:42):
You know, they're like, I just gotta go with you know,
my guy giving gifts, let me be the beat. There's
like that that basis thrown me off. Let me just
do my thing, because it's I mean, I've never seen
a a gond word poem that I thought was like,
(24:03):
oh this sh like I felt before that some of
them should be songs. But then I was like, no,
there's no beat to like like his top end and
his back end or like completely. So I guess if
he had a beat switch, he could make it work
with both. But that's saying that seems too hard now.
But they're all doing But the thing is, they're all
doing the same. It's like like have ever been in
like a SASA club? Yeah, But so it's basically the
(24:26):
same song all night. It kind of is, but some
people like so, I don't know if you watch any
spoken word. I used to one of the slut not
and two things happened. There was a big schism in
spoken word where some of them stayed with like that
like bongo beat type and my brother like that that thing,
(24:51):
and then other ones really did start like almost rapping,
but they would just go so fast until they were
out of breath and you would actually hear the like
it was like you could hear them gas because they
were just like streamlining the whole poem. And my brother,
I'm trying to tell you, it's like you're not twisted,
just tell me the words. Yeah, and both of them
(25:13):
I couldn't go to a beat. They stopped doing the okay,
so this is they stopped doing the fast thing because
it made no sense. No, no, no, I wish. But
in Chicago, I went to an open mic night a
couple of times, like as I was getting it to stand.
It was a mixed open mic. It was like stand
up a little bit of everything. There was this guy
(25:33):
that would do spoken word and the first two times
he the first two times he brought bogos, but even
he could tell he couldn't keep up with what his
hands were doing. So then the next two times I
saw me didn't have any He just left him at home.
I mean, you have to realize because it's like the
(25:55):
kind of beat Nick thing from the Fit. Like it's
funny because like the only people like certain people still
swing dance and then like this beat Nick like the
rockabilly kind of vibe that some people still funk with,
and then like the fifties was such an amazing time. Um,
it's kind of rough for everybody. Basically, uh, it's like
(26:16):
black people went, yeah, that beat Nick ship, We'll keep it.
And then just turning the spoken word because okay, so
where does Kendrick Lamar fall on this? He I think
he falls in conscious because of the The Damn Album
and the Pulitzer, Like he was already like Section eight
and to Pile Butterfly all that stuff like that. Those
(26:38):
weren't really he did kind of bridge a little bit
because he had songs like Um, he had songs like I.
He had he had songs like like d n A.
He had things that people like Bob two in a
in a way that was not like club dancing, but
it was like they were really rocking with it and everything.
So he's sort of like an outlier of a lot
(26:59):
of these are people because but like, if you played
be Humble in a club, it would bob like people
would dance to that. So he kind of found a
way to like bridget I am not what what blastshem me?
What do you? Go ahead and say what you're gonna say,
(27:22):
because I'm already upset. Go ahead, and I do enjoy
his music, But what I will say is that I'm
not a huge kids look lamar fan, because I think
he sounds like a muppet. So you could have stopped
at not a huge fact. See, this is this is
(27:50):
what you do. This is this is your whole vibe.
You like to put your foot on the line and
make sure your toe is over it ten toes down? Baby?
Why why would why would you even need to include that?
I can respect you're not being a huge fan. I'm
just saying I figured but when you say you're not
a big like when you say you're like people are
(28:10):
like people want quantifiers, Well why well what is it?
And my reason is his voice sounds like it's being
done by Jim Hinson. That's my It's like a Frank
Oz kind of like just Sesame Street Muppets take Manhattan
more like a muppet and Sesame Street way more muppet.
(28:31):
What you So, here's the thing. First of all, you
all those people don't think. Second, the qualifier doesn't make
it better. The quality, like the qualifier is only gonna
take what you're doing right now, which is taking a
Kindrick bar fan and coming to you actually had Cobba
ground and then you decided to jackhammer it. You had
like I was like, hey, you're not a huge I
(28:52):
could live with that. And then you were like, let
me throw in a couple of things. I like what
he's saying. I just don't. I can. I can say this.
I'm very into people's voices, right, okay, so that is
important for me, Like I I listened to like the quality,
(29:13):
the timber of someone's the musicality of someone's voice. Right.
So to me, if you sound like you should be
standing next to Gonzo, I'm not. I'm not really gonna
be so I will. I will ask you this question
about club hits in general. I understand what you're saying
(29:33):
about the consciousness sometimes being a bit too much. But
here's the thing. I there's two points that I basically
want to try to make simultaneously, So address whichever one
of them first that you that you feel he's addressing one.
I would make conscious socially conscious rap only a part
(29:55):
of the pie of what I feel like conscious rap is.
Sometimes I think conscious rap is all outright lyricism, like
like outright saying anything, because because I understand the socially
conscious stuff is is exhausting to a to a degree,
especially when you live in and you know, being at
the daily show, we have to read about it and
like work in it. So I understand needing a break
(30:16):
and not being like I want to reminder of what
I left when I go home. But I think that
when you take the time to put in incredible alliteration
and like all of these aspects of poetry into your lyrics,
I I personally, only me personally also put that in
a conscious vibe. Because I'm so you think there aren't
(30:39):
club rappers that are writing good lyrics. I think that
there are some, But I think that overall the same
way that you told me that like a at a
certain point we we get it. I think that That's
how I feel about a lot of club hits because
I'm like, here are all the things that I at
least because because of who I am, Because I'm like,
you know, you know me, but if if you're listening,
(31:02):
you might not. I'm like a nerd. I'm like, I'm
like a pretty Uh would you what would you call it?
I'm like, you got that book learning? You know, yeah,
you got the book learning? You real chill um. I mean,
I don't have this much with the club themes. So
that that's why I'm That's what knocks me out of it,
because I'm just like, well, I don't drink um. You know.
(31:25):
I'm more of a relationship person. I don't I can't
do the the the mushition together with strangers, you know,
I have to I have to know a person. So
a lot of that, a lot of that stuff is
out for me. I mean, I'm not saying the Harlot
out here just rubbing up against any man anytime, dicking
Jamal say that was that was it at all? I'm
(31:47):
saying that's what knocks me out. I'm not talking here you.
I mean it's like, you know, sometimes you know, some
man starts rubbing on you and you're like, okay, start
get off me. You feel broke? Neat it? Um? Wait
wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait
wait wait wait wait wait wait waite. Sorry to digress again,
but how does somebody dance broke? How does somebody dance
(32:13):
behind you broke? It's a feeling, It's it's a vibe,
it's a it's just a it's just a knowing. Like
I've only probably been in a relationship like one really
good man and he was a convicted felon, so, which
is neither here nor there. So just like the American
(32:37):
justice system hates us. Uh. But like, for instance, I
can spot a trash ass dude from fifty paces. I
could feel him right, just like I always know when
I see a theater kid. You always know, like within
five seconds of talking to somebody, Like when people are
like I'm a comic and I was like, no, you're
an open micro like stop. Um. It's kind of like
(32:57):
the same kind of thing. But there have been time
you just be out and some dude to just come
up behind you and you're just like, dude, no, because
like some days you go you're like I just want
to dance with my friends. I'm not here to give
some man a partial erection. Get off me right now.
This is my question. So I had a dude, so
we were out one night because like, i quit wearing
heels to the club because I'm just like, it's stid, right.
(33:20):
I don't want to be in this girl. I don't
want to be in the group of girls around a
pile of shoes like I'm okay, you keep dropping cups
in here because Flora's slippery, my busting my ass, this
is all a fire hazard. I'm not doing it. But
this dude came up behind me one time at a
club in Atlanta and I was dancing and then he
came up behind me and I stopped moving and he
(33:44):
was like hey, and I was like no, and he
started hitting me on my side and I'm like, star,
i am not Sea biscuit, stop hitting me on my side.
I'm not I'm not doing it. No, thank you. And
when he came up behind me, I was just like,
I feel unsavory individual. Uh, Like sometimes you're just known
(34:06):
as a criminal behind Like sometimes you just know they're
like this is not a good part. There's plans of
them and tricked just recently just fooled. But also sometimes
you just want to go out. You wanna be with
your friends, and I don't want some man behind me
like off me, get off being a nerd. So like
I understand, but there is those times from like listening
(34:27):
to like you know, club hits and stuff like that,
where I'm just like, all right, yeah, we're drinking again.
We're drinking again, we're taking all the drugs again. We're
getting these toes not as other ships. So it's just
you can get too full of one or the other. Right,
It's like when you go to like a Latin club
and they're just like, Okay, we're gonna play get a
(34:48):
little bit. We're gonna pay by Chat for a little bit,
we'ren play sausa for a little bit. Because like if
you're just hearing like a salt like salsa all night long,
or by Chopped or Anger or any of that, because
of the day ants that you do to those songs,
basically at the same melody just said a little bit different,
and then it's just someone else singing about being in love.
So after a certain point you're just like, I can't
(35:10):
hear this song again. But if you put on swave
mentate it's going down. Please know that about me. But
like I feel the way about suave and mentor like
I feel about knuck a few buck. Like that's where
I am with both of It's just like if it
comes on, I go all the words it's going down.
Used to singing in the hallway in my high school,
um so just somebody would just be in the halve
(35:33):
and somebody else save a man thing and everybody going
to classico bestman, and then we keep going to class
so also in the Joe to see who. Yeah, we
had fun. So but it does get to a point
where you're just like I can't hear about the club
shot anymore. I can't hear about the social shit anymore.
You just have to. That's why I can give us
(35:55):
Some people like don't listen to different genres of music,
like so this is all you listen to. I have
met people like that. It's wild. I'll throw on it
like it's lestenie I have Like the other day I
listened to Ariana Grande but chat to song and then
a gospel song and this was one two three yeah. Yeah.
(36:18):
So it's like people people who would agree with me
about conscious rap that only listened to it, and they're
too much for me. I'm like, hey, unless unless you're
gonna go do something, we can't just sit here like
I've been. I've been in those sessions where you just
chill with a fread and they're like, oh yeah, put
(36:39):
on put on that other album, put on that other album.
And I'm like, this clearly doesn't motivate you to do
anything because because they're sad, Josh, because they're sad. At
least when you're listening to a little John you least
want to get up and run around or just yell yeah,
like you want to do something. But those is the
(37:01):
sound tract to my friends getting arrested. That like, like
I'm telling you, that's I think that's the other reason
why I don't vide with club stuff as much, because
I just have a lot of bad memory. Okay, this
is that this may have to be cut. This is
five though, But I went to a club one time
where it was a local you talked about you don't
want to hear local conscious wrap. That's like, what's going
(37:25):
on over there? What I tell you? That a lot
of because you're from Atlanta, So I think I think
I can safely say you've been spoiled with good like
underground hip hop beats good. You know, a lot of
it's trash. A lot of the time you'll see some
dude and you're at a club or something or a bar.
You're at a club, and then they'll just have some
(37:46):
local act come up and just tell you what's happening on,
like Bouldercrest, and you're just like, yeah, that's one street dude,
or like whatever they're doing on the South Side, And
I'm like, hey, man, like you gotta also, I think
you're dry snitching first and foremost, Yeah, I understand. Foremost,
that's that's I think that's my other issue is that
(38:09):
a lot of these these club hits are not They're
not put together in the most creative way. So then
you just end up presenting exhibit A in court like
like you don't you don't have anything else does that
you don't have any sort of flowery language to hide
the fact that this is exactly what you did, Like yeah,
(38:29):
it's like okay, and I shot him and it was
like the you know, there's like a whole camp of
sketch about it where but it was Tuesday and yeah,
and you're like, guys, you're making me nervous because I'm
here to watch the show, like they might, I'm an
accessory to what's happening right now. But it's like, but
I think they're there's a place for both of them.
(38:49):
I just think for me, it's I mean, I do
understand that it's a way to let people know who
aren't on the up and up when it comes to
like getting our news or before there was like social
media and you really only knew you didn't have a
whole worldwide kind of like perception of what was really
(39:13):
happening in other places. So I think socially conscious rap
could tell you what was happening somewhere else because the
West Coast came out with some club boppers. The South
known for it, But like, I don't know, because like
you know, when I like, you know, one of our
friends just constantly likes to ship on like Southern hip
(39:34):
hop because he thinks that Northern hip hop is better.
And I'm just like, what do you niggas do when
you go to the club? Truly, truly, if you're in
here playing Wu Tang all that, what are you really?
Because the thing is they're talking about that much different ship.
It's it's just the beat is different, Like your issue
is like how they sound and what the beat sounds like.
(39:56):
But it's like no one's really I've never been because
even like those fucking like spoken with shows are condepressing.
The neo soul shows is just like, Okay, everyone in
here is currently I don't know how you burn in
sense in your own dreads, but whatever. So it's like
I get it, alright. White man's religion is trash, got it,
(40:18):
got it, got it, got it. These crystals will help
you cook. Coo coo coo cool, that's what you believe in. Fine,
funk with it. But you get in those shows, I'm
just like, Okay, everyone's in earth tones and they're still
talking about fucking. Like that's the thing at the end
of the day. Everybody's talking about fucking, and whatever way
you're doing it, you're talking about fucking. So like I
(40:42):
think like one of the best examples like a socially
conscious rap song that I could funk with it is like,
you know, the Tupac song Brenda is Having a Baby,
great example of a socially conscious song that you can
bop too, Right, It's like damn team. Pregnancy is a
problem in our community. Also, I also was like in
(41:09):
college when like a Little John was popping off, when
a whole krunk music ship was popping off, I was
in college. Yeah, well that's that's a huge thing with music, though,
is that I've been told and this is not it's
not science or anything, but I haven't been seen it
proved wrong yet that whatever you listened to in high
school and the early part of college is going to
(41:31):
be music to you forever. You're never gonna get broken
from that thing. Like if you liked a specific thing
when you were in high school, even if you veer
away from it, you're always gonna have a soft spot
for like that that little piece of the genre, right
Like I always like, you know, it's like I was
also in like middle school and like when Nirvana was
(41:51):
popping off, or like, um, the amount of hood at
the amount of I don't think that the Red Hot
Chill Peppers know how many black people fun with them.
I don't think they know. I don't think they wouldn't know.
They would. I think they think they might notice that
there are plenty of them at the concert, But I
(42:11):
don't think they they don't know enough to then be
like we would like to do the Source Awards. I
don't know if it's that deep. I'll say that it's
like all is subourbon black people I knew really funk
with them. I think about like there's so many times
(42:34):
where I was like trying to like listen to socially
conscious wrap and been like okay, and I feel like
I should be taking notes. Like every time I listened
to one of those songs, I'm just like, oh, we
have such we have such Like it's just like it's
holding a mirror up to America. It's holding up your
mirrors up here, like experience as a black person in America.
(42:57):
And I'm just like I don't want this. I don't
want this. Um. I mean, I understand what you're saying,
but like I think, like when it comes to like
the lyrics, because like we can all we can both
agree that like little Wayne is l Wayne is amazing,
(43:19):
like the use of a metaphor the use of a
similar like the imagery of ship, like it's you can
don't I so appreciate the concession that you're making at
the common ground that you're trying to build, But I
little Wayne is my one where I'm like, I don't
(43:39):
don't really care. Okay, I here's the thing. I respect
his you know, people talk about lyricism, people talk about
his um adaptability and how he's kept his music consistently
relevant over the years. I completely respect that. But overall,
if you want to talk about voices, you want to
talk about Kendrick's voice, Little Wayne sounds I don't under
(44:00):
six babies that got possessed by one big baby all
talking at the same time. I've never heard I've never
heard Little Wayne sound like a grown man. You did
his first album when he was fourteen. What it's confusing
to me about Little Wayne is that he had a
deeper voice at fourteen then he does right now. But
(44:23):
it's just the way he performed. It's just his performance voice,
I guess, because when I think when you hear him
talking like an interview, he does sound like an adult.
But then he sounds dangerous. Then I'm like, no, if
I don't know, if we could be friends, okay, we
book No, you'd never be friends. A little I could try.
I mean, listen, honestly, everybody has somebody to talk to,
(44:47):
you know, maybe I can. It's so funny because like
I have ever had been friends with somebody and when
of your other friends was like I wouldn't expect you
to be friends with them, and you just go, I
don't know what that means, but it sounds like disrespect. Yeah, like, oh,
your friends, I wouldn't have expected that. I'm like, I
don't know if we're gonna be I don't see that coming,
Like I don't know if we're gonna stay friends. We
kep having a conversation, but like, Okay, it's like I understand,
(45:12):
Like my concession would be, it's reporting the news, right,
It's telling what's happening in your hood, because sometimes like
you feel like what's happening to you where you live
sometimes feel like this is the only You're the only
one going through that. So like when it's like when
you have like more visibility of like when you just
(45:32):
incruisee visibility of different groups of people, so like you know,
minority groups, people with different like you know, plus size people,
people in the disabled community, people in the l G B,
t q I A community, you know, the b I,
P O C community, Like all of these groups like
we're not We're starting to see more, right, you're like, Okay,
(45:53):
it's like it's almost like a representation thing where just like, oh,
so you know how your hood is sucked up. Guess what,
my hood is also fucked up? What's happening over here?
I can understand. I can give you that concession where
and kind of just show people like you're not the
only ones going through this. Sure, but at the same time,
(46:14):
you can't play it at a party though. My concession
to you is that I definitely, definitely have enjoyed many
club hits over the years, and while I don't always
I don't always vibe with everything that comes out, there's
usually one about each topic that I'm like, Okay, I
(46:37):
arrived with this, this is this is like so, so
you know we talked about uh, money, sex, alcohol, all
the stuff I have. At least every year, I feel
like I have at least one money song, one alcohol song,
one sex song out of the out of the club
hits that I that's just to me undeniably good And
for that reason, I can understand why going down that
(46:58):
rabbit hole more, I might. I might be more into
club hits eventually. Okay, now listen, now, when I find
me a husband, right, maybe it'll bees we find one
when I start saying the word correctly. I don't know. Um,
of course you would be right. It's in my wedding
right now. On the program for the wedding, it will
(47:25):
have a designated time to swag surf. It is going
to happen. Okay, how do you feel about that song?
I can start preparing now and then and then I
think I'll be good to go. So you don't know
how to swag surf. I don't know how to swags serve. Well,
(47:46):
m m, that's not required the way that I swag serve,
though most of the dances I think I know how
to do. I've been told to stop. That seems that's right. Yeah.
Now to a club, and I try to dance towards
these club hits, I'm you, I usually end up having
to apologize to somebody because I don't know how it
(48:07):
is that that no one else is knocking drinkside people's hands.
It's just me. But I'm I'm trying to stay corey,
I'm trying to stay on beat. As someone who has
known you for a few years now, you do strike
me as someone who has a body that would not
match up well to music. This is exactly like the
(48:29):
Kendrick that because I already said what I did, I
didn't need you to add to the thing. Thank you
so much for listening to our podcast hold up or
what is it called hold up? Hold Up? There is
no way that we can get off a podcast talking
about club hits without talking about the song that has
caused us the most amount of contention. And what are
(48:51):
you talking about? You know exactly the song I'm talking about.
Don't you look at me. I tend to wipe things
that I think are absolutely trash from memory, I tink
to I tend to try to scrub that out of
my consciousness. Don't act like you don't know what I'm
talking about. That's right, the Amazing Crime Mob get Nuck
if You Buck. Don't act like I wasn't gonna bring
(49:12):
it up. Here's the thing, here's there's Nuck If You
Buck is probably one of the songs that I most
despise because it's not It's not only is it not
good flies, it just doesn't make any sense to me.
(49:34):
So we were having a thing at work one day.
We were talking about if there was a new Negro
spiritual I cannot believe we went this long without bringing
us up. If there was a new Negro spiritual, what
would it be? I of course said, nuck if you buck.
Josh came out of fucking not even left field the
parking lot of a baseball game and said Georgia, but
(50:00):
not the Ray Charles version of Georgia, the ludicrous version
with Jamie Fox singing the Ray Charles verse. I didn't know.
I thought it had to be a hip hop song.
If I had known, it was just completely I picked
a hip hop any any song in the realm of blackness.
(50:23):
I picked knuck if you buck. That has brought many
people together but also divided so many, and you rested
as many people as it has set free one. The
issue was you brought up a song that only I
knew and you knew anyone else in the conversation because
it was talking right. I did that, and I made
it just you and me thing. Because it was just you.
(50:45):
I didn't know you were gonna blast it out to
the rest of the office. It was a blast. It
wasn't blasted out like that. It wasn't blasted out like
that because there were other black people standing in their room.
We're having this conversation, and they all teached you, like,
what song is that? Even Alonso Boden, Uncle Alonso, who
was in the office one day, said knock a few buck,
of course, and he knew the song. Even someone who's
(51:08):
not even who's black, who wouldn't even grow up in America,
who is British, was like, of course, luck if you buck?
And I said why, And they're like, because of how
it makes you feel. Now I understand that you don't
like this song because what did you tell me? It
sounds like to you. I don't remember. I can tell
you because it hurt me. You said, but it hurt
(51:30):
because it was accurate. Okay, it didn't hurt me, hurt me.
But I was like, damn, he's right, you said that
knuck if you buck sounds like a G. E. D
getting thrown down the hallway of a juvenile detention center.
I do recall that. Now. Yeah, Now, anyone I've ever
said that too has been like, he's completely accurate. But
the song still slaps. That song still slaps, okay. And
(51:54):
the thing is this became a running thing in the office.
So me being the individual well that I am, got
Josh a trophy that said for knucking and bucking and
being ready to fight Josh Johnson. Now I was gonna
say first place, but I was telling Roy about it,
and Roy said, not put runner up, which makes it
(52:16):
so much funnier, It makes it so much meaner. And
you also it was it was it. I felt hazed
because I was I was new. I didn't like I
hadn't been at the show that long and I and
you mailed it to me. You did. You couldn't just
bring it to me like a regular Christian. You mailed
it to me. So then I got sent down to
(52:37):
to security to get my mail, and I was excited
because I had never got mail at the show before.
I was like, who knows that I'm here? And I
opened it up and it was that travesty. The way
you looked when you walked in my office holding it
down by your side. You know you've made it this far.
(53:00):
In listening to the podcast, you're absolutely Jim. You really
appreciate you. I just want to thank you all for
me for us listening. I didn't want to bring up
not a few buck at the beginning conversation because I
didn't want Josh to be mad at me. The entire time. Um,
but we had to bring up the Pinnacle. I mean,
we talked about Little John, We have talked about the
Pinnacle Club hit the Banger All Bangers, okay, Banger of
(53:27):
All Banks, really making me regret my concession. Um, thank
you so much for listening. I'm Josh Johnson and I'm
do Say Sloan and you've been listening to a hold
Up because we held up their lives. We'll be back
with more hold Up in the future. Bye. Thank you.
(53:58):
Listen to hold Up wherever you get your podcat pass
and watched the video version at Daily show dot com
backslash hold Up m HM
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