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July 25, 2025 • 12 mins
Willie talks with music artist and actor Ice Cube about the upcoming The Big Three basketball league, and his life and career.
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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
By Billy Cunningham. A special guest is in the studio.
Ice Cuba's with me and Ice Cube talk first of
all about what's happening tomorrow at Heritage Bank Arena. You're
an entrepreneur, you do music, you do television, you do movies.
You're kind of like every part of aspect of your life.
What's happening tomorrow about one o'clock at the Heritage Bank Center.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
We got the Big Three in Cincinnati doors at noon,
you know, starts at one o'clock, and uh, it's great.
Four games for the price of one. Get to see
the entire league. Our Hall of Fame coaches. You know,
we got coaches like Doctor J. We got Iceman.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
How did you get Julie? How'd that happen?

Speaker 1 (00:42):
I'm watching this the other day and I'm thinking, damn yeah,
doctor J Man, I can operate.

Speaker 4 (00:46):
Right, I'm on now.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
You know, big fan. We even named our championship trophy
after him. You know, it's the Julius Irvin Doctor J Trophy.
So Clyde Drexlers, our commissioner, you know, they golf buddies
and and you know, once I got Clyde, it was
it was pretty Uh it wasn't easy to convince Doc.
But Doc, you know, he he loved the league. You know,

(01:09):
he started with the ABA and then to the NBA.
So starting something new like this is he ain't afraid
of that. So it's gonna be a great event, man.
You know, like I said, four games, we got teams,
six teams battling with the same record, so they trying
to you know, loosen up that log jam.

Speaker 4 (01:29):
And great entertainment.

Speaker 2 (01:32):
We got dancers, dunkers, DJ's performers, you know. So it's
gonna be a fun event. And look, you'll be out
of there by four four point thirty and get to
go see some good music.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
Busai Collins, my buddy, and other people like that will
be there. Give me your all time starting five in
the NB. I've watched this all the time. I've watched
the great ones. You've been conducted to basketball since your
early days in LA. Give me the all time ice
the ice cube, starting five.

Speaker 2 (01:58):
Wow, all time. I got magic at point uh. I'll
put Kobe at the two. I'll put Jordan at the three,
give me Wilt at the four and Shock at the five.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
The Wilt's forgotten about an Oscar big O's forgotten about completely. Yeah,
but those guys, there's unbelievable. When did O'Shane Jackson become
Ice Cube? What I don't mean the name, I mean
the person because you came out of not bad, not
the best circumstances, Compton, etcetera.

Speaker 3 (02:32):
N Wa. So when did when did O'shae become ice Uh?

Speaker 2 (02:37):
Probably about twelve years old mentally, mentally really when I
started to do music, you know, I really got into
my own on that. But about twelve years old I
got the name and it stuck with me. And when
I started to rap at fourteen, we told nineteen eighty three, Yeah,
ice Cue was was what I.

Speaker 4 (02:57):
Was known as.

Speaker 3 (02:58):
So and the rest is history.

Speaker 4 (03:00):
Pretty much. We're still writing history.

Speaker 1 (03:02):
So right now it's going on as I speak. In
other words, Yes, you're not done yet, not done yet,
you know, mister Cube is not done.

Speaker 4 (03:09):
Come on.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
I got an album I'm about to drop called Man Up,
and I got a tour I'm about to do called
the Truth to Power Tour of forty decades of attitude,
I mean four decades of attitude.

Speaker 1 (03:20):
So it's great as far as somebody would say to you,
what are you? I look at your bio. You got,
you got kids, you got millions of dollars, billions of dollars.

Speaker 4 (03:30):
You're no no wait, whoa whoa whoa whoa wa.

Speaker 2 (03:32):
You gotta pay not billions, you gotta pay tax, a
lot of them in California.

Speaker 4 (03:36):
But what are you?

Speaker 1 (03:37):
Are you a rapper? Are you an entrepreneur? Because I
like the idea that you're spreading out, You're doing it.
You put the work, thousands of people. Explain what you
are today.

Speaker 2 (03:46):
You know, I'm a lot of different titles. You know,
I wear a lot of different hats.

Speaker 4 (03:49):
You know.

Speaker 2 (03:50):
Sometimes I'm the uh, the managers. Sometimes I'm the janitor,
you know, the you know, whatever it takes. You know,
it's really about being all around entertainer. And this is
show business, so you cannot do the show without knowing
the business.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
Then go in other words, a little bit of both.
And I had on earlier. I talked a little bit
about a whole coke and when I think a hull
coke and I think of I think a little bit
of an ice cube. Because Hogan went over different genres,
so different things. Yeah, he did everything and was he
not a role model, but somebody you want to emulate
a little bit.

Speaker 4 (04:24):
He was big.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
I mean, Hulk was big growing up, growing up, you know,
like he was the biggest wrestler I was when it
was the w W F you know, I was a
big you know, Hulk, Hogan, Superfly, Snooker.

Speaker 4 (04:39):
You know, I loved a lot of the wrestling back then.
So you know, to.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
See him as Hot Thunderlips and Rocky was cool because
I knew him as Hulk. You know, now he in
a movie, so it was great to see him, you know,
become more than just a wrestler.

Speaker 4 (04:57):
You know.

Speaker 2 (04:57):
He took wrestling and made it really mainstream where you know,
everybody could accept it.

Speaker 4 (05:02):
And now look how big it is.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
And I said, who were the When you were a
young guy twelve thirteen, fourteen fifteen, you could not have
envisioned your life the next you couldn't have envisioned. Was
there a key person, a key moment that you saw
the life the door open you ran?

Speaker 3 (05:17):
That was there a moment? A teacher? Was somebody, the
and the and the hood? Who was it?

Speaker 4 (05:20):
Oh man?

Speaker 2 (05:21):
It was a lot of different people, you know, you
know from my father, you know, I think about when
you say teachers, I think about, uh, missus Prentice in
the fifth grade, she encouraged me to write and you know,
she put my little my little essay in the school paper.
Because of her, I ended up doing the speech for

(05:42):
my for my sixth grade class, which taught me that
I didn't have to be afraid of the microphone and
speaking in front of a lot of people. And so,
you know, Misprints is that teacher that really, uh, you
know kind of you know, made me a serious person
and not just kid running around.

Speaker 3 (06:02):
I don't see ice cube as being shy.

Speaker 1 (06:04):
Correct, So at some point when you were twelve, thirteen,
fourteen years old, you were microphone shy a little bit.

Speaker 2 (06:10):
Well, you know, you just don't know that you can
speak in front of all those people. And you know
I was able to do it. I wrote my own
speech and my classmates liked it, so you know I
felt like, okay, that gave me the experience to not
to not you know, before that day I was sweating bullets.
You know, I was like, man, I got to get

(06:31):
up here in front of everybody to say this, and so.

Speaker 4 (06:35):
It just gave me the confidence.

Speaker 3 (06:37):
When you speak.

Speaker 1 (06:38):
You know, Cincinnati's got problems right now, and you may
not be aware of this. We got a terrible crime difficulty.
There's no problems a Big three, there's no problems with
the with the music festival. It's been here Santangelo started
forty some years ago.

Speaker 3 (06:52):
No problems.

Speaker 1 (06:53):
Yeah, but there's an element, a small element, causing disproportion
and harm. What do you say to elements in the
community that says, you know what, you gotta quit acting
like this. You came up that way, you could have
gone the other route.

Speaker 2 (07:03):
Yeah, you know, it's it's personal decisions. You know, you
got to take personal responsibility for your action. You know,
I knew right from wrong when I was.

Speaker 4 (07:11):
A real little kid.

Speaker 2 (07:12):
So most real little kids know when they're doing right
and when they're doing wrong. So you guys, just choose
to do the right thing. You know, life is beautiful
and you don't want to waste it, and you don't
want to throw it away.

Speaker 4 (07:26):
It's a gift from from you know, the almighty.

Speaker 2 (07:28):
So we want to cherish this life and do the
right thing, and you'll live better and be better.

Speaker 4 (07:35):
You know.

Speaker 1 (07:35):
Ten or fifteen years ago, I did this television show
in New York, and there was a thought that I
could become a rapper.

Speaker 4 (07:43):
You can't.

Speaker 3 (07:43):
I can yeah, and Dave get.

Speaker 1 (07:45):
Ready, I laid down a couple of lines, so there's
nobody knows more about this business than Ice Queue because
you do it all.

Speaker 4 (07:52):
I know a lot about it, a lot about rapping,
yes for sure.

Speaker 1 (07:55):
And in fact, you're gonna go on You're gonna go
on tour. Yeah, are you gonna hit Cincinnati or not?
I believe you're gonna what. We'd love to have you
back here. When's it gonna be.

Speaker 2 (08:04):
We're starting in September, but you know, we're gonna always
extend it. If it's rolling good, we're gonna we're gonna
keep it extend.

Speaker 3 (08:10):
Because you're you know, it's a show, but it's a business.

Speaker 4 (08:13):
It's show business for sure, all right.

Speaker 1 (08:15):
Dave kind of hit that a little bit and let
ice Cube here some of the lines that I laid
down to this a few years ago. And this was
put together to maybe uh break in the rap a
little bit because the voice of my generation, you know
what I'm.

Speaker 4 (08:28):
You know, they need some good rappers.

Speaker 1 (08:30):
Let's go with season five about the rapper. There's no
better way to vent my crap. After office floods, blizzards
and mice, we moved to Harlem, which wasn't so nice.
Some nights in bed, all I could hear is put
the cheese and the cracker from ear to ear.

Speaker 3 (08:45):
They say, I'm so bulky, But how can that be?

Speaker 1 (08:47):
I run a crazy talk show, said, look at me,
liars and cheaters and pimps and hoes, DNA drama and
cheating woes. Don't forget the yelled ets and everyone's favorite
me on my knees. Some days I doubt it can
do it again, But then I see some good looking
woman and I can. Thoughts and cooch and raw dogging
and ratchet. Our vocabulary has truly become fantastic. My teams

(09:09):
work all day, work all night, just to convince some
guests they might be they might want to fight. The
guests are real, they never lie. Who else would sit
on set and pretend to cry. From housewives to hose,
porn stars and strippers, fake balloons, Barbie and Bieber, kid
Rock and Plooney stallone in to Nero. But let's not
forget Pyro my hero with beds on set, stripper poles

(09:30):
and doghouses. One thing's for sure, I'm never a bore.
Production is tough. That's not enough time to convince all
my guests. It's all in our dime. The expert needs intake.
We learned that this season and guests on the run,
they're a mess for a reason. They throw the chairs,
rip weaves from their hair. But don't forget there's always
after care. We try to help, We really do, but
sometimes the guests want to screw. The shoes they wear

(09:53):
have six inch heels. All they want to do is
get a free meal. The clothes are tight, the lipstick
better be bright because if Joyce proves you good to go,
but if she doesn't, well you know Lakeisha, Lacanda, Lawanda,
La Mama, Bottom Bitches, pregnant teams.

Speaker 3 (10:06):
Bad moms, and more. The best part of all.

Speaker 1 (10:09):
Is me and my team because without all you, I'd
have to scream.

Speaker 3 (10:12):
We often say we should.

Speaker 1 (10:13):
Write this stuff down, but if we don't, you all
be clowns. I heard the best daff and crew. That's
why I love all of you. I do the five,
one three, and I play golf at KCC. All right, now, yeah,
well do you see something? You see a little I
need a voice of my generation. You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (10:30):
Nothing wrong with being a voice your generation. We gotta
get you on beat though. You know, the rhymes were dope.
The rhymes was great, but uh, gotta get you on
that beat.

Speaker 4 (10:41):
What's the beat?

Speaker 3 (10:41):
What do you mean?

Speaker 4 (10:42):
We gotta get you on that. We gotta make it
wear flow that beat? The beat? Yeah yeah, but the
rhymes not bad, not bad. I was surprised and I
thought they were. You know, I didn't know what they expect.

Speaker 3 (10:55):
But now what do I have a future in rap?

Speaker 4 (10:58):
We gotta get you on that beat. Man, a few
months with me, You'll be, You'll you'll be.

Speaker 1 (11:02):
You know, I was going to tour the South. I
spent time at backstage of the Apollo.

Speaker 4 (11:07):
Okay, my show.

Speaker 1 (11:09):
Is in the Harlem for one season across and I
spent time there and that's where I hooked up with
some of jay Z's guys and they worked with me
some lines to become the voice of my generation.

Speaker 3 (11:18):
And then they want to put me on the road
to go into the South.

Speaker 4 (11:21):
Is that right? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (11:22):
Man, that's pretty incredible. Yeah, they need to work with
you on that beat though beat? Yeah, Yeah, we got
to rock that beat.

Speaker 3 (11:29):
Would you help me?

Speaker 4 (11:30):
I can help you, you can help me? Yeah, I
could definitely help you with that.

Speaker 1 (11:33):
All right, So lastly, tell me about tomorrow now, because
isn't about me and my rap career.

Speaker 3 (11:38):
It's about Ice. It's about Ice. Q. Tell me what's
happening tomorrow.

Speaker 2 (11:41):
Tomorrow, We're gonna be at a Heritage Bank Arena. Doors
open at noon, first game starts at one.

Speaker 3 (11:47):
Tickets available play take It's.

Speaker 2 (11:48):
Available Big three dot com slash tickets. If you can't
make it out there tomorrow, which we hope, you can
check us out on CBA's one o'clock and.

Speaker 3 (11:58):
You'll be at the music Festive. Well you're gonna perform tonight.

Speaker 2 (12:01):
I'm just come down there and say what's up to
the crowd, try to, you know, hopefully sell some more tickets.

Speaker 3 (12:07):
And boots He will be there, my buddy.

Speaker 4 (12:08):
That's my man. You know, Boosy Is. He's a special guy.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
You know, I did, uh just did a whole thing
at the the Grammy Hall of Fame with him.

Speaker 3 (12:19):
He's in twice.

Speaker 1 (12:19):
You know, he's in there twice. You know you know
who started him in music with James Brown.

Speaker 2 (12:24):
Yeah, yeah, you know him and his brother Catfish. So
it's good, pretty cool. Good to have you in town.
But don't come through without checking in. I got your
manager's card, got his number. ANTI touch with him about
laying down some beats anytime. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know
we are rocked that beat. Gotta rock to beat, got
a rock to beat. The words, the lyrics is right,
We got a rock to beat. The attitude is right.

Speaker 3 (12:46):
Got the attitude. Yeah, ice Cube, you're a great American.

Speaker 4 (12:48):
Yeah, yeah, you are too.

Speaker 3 (12:49):
Bill Cunningham seven hundred W O W
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