HipHop Talks Podcast
Introducing "Hip-Hop Talks Podcast/Media'' - a captivating experience that immerses hip-hop enthusiasts in the boundless world of the genre and its cultural impact. Join hosts Shawn, Coop, and Adriel as they pay homage to the foundations of hip hop, from its origins to the present day with a diverse take on Hip Hop. Shawn, takes you through the boroughs of New York, while Coop provides a provocative, yet daring take on the South’s stake in the Hip Hop game. Adriel brings the unique perspective of Hip Hop through the lens of those that cling onto the lifeline and purity of Hip Hop. Combining their thoughts and views, is liken to your favorite superhero team assembling to lean into each other’s strengths. Through insightful conversations, passionate debates, and meticulous breakdowns, they explore the intricate fabrics of hip hop, including its powerful lyrics, infectious beats, mesmerizing breakdancing, vibrant graffiti art, skillful DJing, and electrifying MCing. "Hip-Hop Talks" is the ultimate destination for fans seeking to deepen their understanding and appreciation of this influential art form. Tune in and become part of the unified community that celebrates the timeless legacy of hip hop.
HipHop Talks Podcast
Drake/PARTYNEXTDOOR, Westside Gunn Albums, IAMGAWD Interview, Pusha T, Jay, and MORE!
Outro Music. Good evening. Welcome to Hip Hop Talks. God Flow Podcast. Hey G, what's going on? What it doing? Click like, subscribe and share to the tribe. How's the week been, fellas? What's going on? Talk to me, Tell me something good.
Speaker 2:Man, I was in your neck of the woods this week, coop. I was in the Queen City, charlotte. Yeah, man, I was like yo y'all know, coop, I'm like who? Absolutely.
Speaker 1:It should be that way. I haven't lived in Charlotte regularly since 1999.
Speaker 2:He left us, he abandoned us. He ran to Atlanta for us.
Speaker 1:Abandon us. Such a strong person, it's such a strong word he ran to.
Speaker 2:Atlanta, atlanta, like a mace.
Speaker 1:I'm going to tell you what. I'm going to tell you what. Here's something I'm not going to play with you about. Did not leave Greensboro, north Carolina. On the best terms, it's not okay. One of the homies just pulled me to the side. He was like hey, so we just want you to go before something happens to you, so you should go. And I was like oh, he's like, yeah, he's like people are talking about you. He's like people we don't know we're talking about you. He's like it's time for you to go.
Speaker 4:Well, it's okay. One of my best friends lives in Greensboro, so I'll make sure that he makes it all right for you to pull back up in Greensboro again. I hope so. It's always going to be like a pass.
Speaker 2:You were talking to me earlier this week. Before you come to West Virginia, let me know, I give you a pass. No one needs a pass to get to West Virginia. You got to check in, you do not?
Speaker 4:I got the key to the city.
Speaker 1:No, no, you got to check in in Greensboro, you got to check in in Greensboro.
Speaker 1:Greensboro doesn't check in. Trust me, I found out the wrong way you got to check in. I found out the wrong way you got to check in in Greensboro. Okay, Not do what you want. All right, we got a great show lined up today. Fellas, I'm going to kind of just jump right in. I know Andrew had already kind of put this together before, so we're kind of going to work the anniversaries in order. You know, Tupac's Strictly, For my Niggas came out February 16th 1993.
Speaker 1:Ag, you and I had some dialogue in our personal thread this morning about the classic nature of the album.
Speaker 1:If I could start off, I kind of want to share with you that I think, more than anybody else that I've met since I've been in this space, you and I share similar musical sentiments and ethos, and so I can understand why you would question the classic nature of this album on a musical level.
Speaker 1:But the icon that he is like and the potential that comes to fruition, like all of it, exists on this project, and so while musically it may not be a classic from end to end, I think that's more of a production thing and if you want to knock him, formbol and even the Platinum Status. They all exist on this project, and so I did just find some. When I realized that that and Victory Lacks shared the same anniversary, it did make me think about the project and think. Well, if an album like this dropped today, a lot of people would call it a classic. In my opinion, because of the classic nature of the artist and because of the big records on there. You know what I'm saying, and so what do you say when I say all of that?
Speaker 4:I personally don't think it's a classic. Nor have I ever met anybody until now and you that called it a classic because you know it's a lot, of, a lot of different contingencies that you threw out there that would like make it a classic. But in real time, you know, don't get me wrong and I don't want people in the chat to take this the wrong way Tupac is an extraordinary rapper. He's in my top five. But in real time, when this album was out, we were more enamored with the big singles versus the album in and of itself. And I would even argue somebody that during this time he was more iconic as an actor than he was as a rapper. And even it was close. It was close, I'll just say that.
Speaker 4:And even post-death this album is not revered as much as All Eyes on Me, Me Against against the world, machiavelli. Nobody even really talks about this album like that. His first two, to be exact. You know, topocalypse now and then strictly so. I think it's more so like a retroactive thing because of who pock is where you would go back and say, oh, it's a classic. But I think the only thing that stands out is the major classic songs on the album as singles, but that doesn't necessarily make the whole body of work a classic.
Speaker 1:What do you feel about? Ok, so let me ask you something outside of the production. What keeps this album from being a classic in your opinion? Because it's easy to go to the production and say, well, it's the production. Because my thing is is, if you tell me that the production is the only thing about it, that's not a classic. It's like, well, there are a lot of albums that are missing, like certain things, like I could tell you, like there are certain albums that we hold like in classic nature and lyricism level, like isn't like high at all, like I can give you thug motivation one-on-one, which I think is a classic bar-wise, it's like there's no bars on there. It's going to make our bar seminar, necessarily, is there Right? Is there a bar seminar on 101? Maybe?
Speaker 4:TI, jv, jv, don't go crazy.
Speaker 1:I was thinking TI on Bang Bang. See, they're like right.
Speaker 4:What I will say I'll use in rebuttal. I'll use your own terms. This is not a great end-to-end player and, um, like we talked about uh, maybe it was a week we was talking about a week or so ago how to cal in real time. People really enjoyed and liked that album, but it was a victim of what came after it, right so for tupac to follow that up, you know. And one thing that's really slept on is the Thug Life compilation. I think I like that better than Strictly, if I'm being honest, the production's much better.
Speaker 4:The beats are better, yeah, but as far as, like you know, me Against the World, all Eyes on Me and Machiavelli to follow it, that just got, you know strictly, just kind of got pushed to the back. You know what I mean. So it's a victim to the heist that he was able to achieve after that, and in real time. You know when I lived it, you know everybody I was around, or even you know music publications and stuff like that. Nobody was saying it was a classic. The man himself was, you know, a big time artist, but I think the singles were more classic than the album itself.
Speaker 1:Sean, I want you to jump in. Can I just jump in for like, like, like, real, real quick. Ag, I understand what you're saying, so I think a lot of it is about context. So let me give you some context to what I was receiving. Strictly actually came out the year that I moved back from Atlanta to Charlotte, and so when I moved back, my cousin Six actually had a copy of Strictly.
Speaker 1:But what really struck a chord with me about the project and this is what I mean about him and the nature of the album no, I had homegirls that I had classes with in middle school that had the album too, and he was the first rapper that I ever saw women by the project, and that was different for me. Like he was like, like, no, I mean, see, that's what I mean about seeing it in real time, like when LL is doing that in 87, 88, I don't know, like I didn't. I seen that. But Pac was the first rapper that women also put me on to, that Like they were hip too, like they bought his album as well. And that's what I mean about the classic nature of that album, and that is saying something, because it is the first project that I could think of like that, where it's like oh no, the chick's at it too, because he had I get around and keep your head up and they liked both of those records and he was a good looking brother and he was young and in shape and had been in movies. He was a sex symbol and so there was a nature and a bravado to the album. And you make a very, very good point about the movie acting thing, ag, because you could argue, and I would actually tell you at the time, he's probably a bigger movie actor, he might be a better movie actor than rapper at that point.
Speaker 1:But I think what gets lost about this album is actually the three albums that followed it, because I think the three albums that followed it is one of the better three album runs in rap history. Like that's one of the top five to ten three album rap runs runs in rap history, correct? Yes, so it's easy to say that this album doesn't sound that great. He just went on one of the greatest runs of all time, like like tupac's three album run. That's like the celtics or the lakers or the bulls or the warriors or the heat, like it's. It's one of those like. Like that's what his three album run is. It's one of those all-time great runs, and so it's easy to look at a project like this and be like nah, but when you look at all the things that he became, oh, it all exists on this project, so it's just the production side is good I'll rebuttal your point, but I want sean to go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah those are all great points. Um, strictly, is this before the legend of pop began. This is when pop was ramping up. This was before you know the. This was before the death row stuff. This was before all of that. So this is like pre you know pop legend.
Speaker 2:So it's hard to really sometimes you have to compartmentalize Strictly versus that three album run versus where he was in his actual career as an artist Because pop was rapping, rapping on. Strictly, the energy was there. You start off a holler if you hear it. You know what I'm saying. It doesn't get and that's. That's more new york-esque than it is west coast. Don't holler if you hear me, because he's going with that right attack flow and you can hear the influence that he has from the jersey where he was hanging around jersey a lot during that time as well. You know, with the tretch and naughty, all of those guys and stretching all those guys. So you're getting getting the grimiest of grimy of pop. You're getting the echo of pop in that, the singles guys you're talking about Get Around. He's becoming a sex symbol right in front of our face when Get Around comes out, based on the video alone, coop. So I can understand where you're coming from with that, even when you think about Keep your.
Speaker 4:Head.
Speaker 2:Up. Now he's catering to a whole different audience. So now he's starting to bring in different audiences at the same exact time, before his legend even begins. So I hold this album very high. I don't hold it as a classic, I just hold it as one of those catapult moments that Pac needed to get him into the stratosphere. After the three albums that came after this one.
Speaker 1:Hold on real quick and I'm going to let AG finish so we can slide to the next album. To Cal or Strictly.
Speaker 2:For me, I'm going to Cal. I'm going to Cal just because of the I'm going Strictly.
Speaker 1:I'm going Strictly because Keep your Head Up is like it's hot. It's hot Because the Meth and Mary version of I'll Be there For you isn't on the real album.
Speaker 4:It's not on the album Bring.
Speaker 1:The Pain is tough, though, but to be fair, bring the Pain is tough. I'm going to take Strictly over to Cal, though I am.
Speaker 4:Pac has more range but the production gets Meth over. But what I will say, they're, both are four for my albums, for me, um, my cousin, my, you know. So I don't want to seem like I'm hating on it, but it's just not a classic. Uh, my cousin put me up on strictly and for me pocket as an mc, like I don't think tupacalypse now is like really that good at all.
Speaker 4:Um, I don't think it's a good album, I would give it maybe a 3, 3.5. But Pac's trajectory for me went straight like this From Tupacalypse to Strictly Thug Life. Then you got Me Against the World, all Eyes on Me, and I think with Machiavelli is his best form as an MC. If you say All Eyes on Me is a better album, okay. If you say all eyes on me is a better album, okay. If you see, if you say me against the world's a better album, okay. But I think pock as an emcee was his best and his sharpest on macaveli. So his trajectory as an emcee was like this for me, right and um. I do want to give credence to your point coop about the whole sex symbol thing and women buying into Pac, because when Pac got mad at Biggie quote unquote, like taking his formula, taking his style, that was derived from this album from Strictly.
Speaker 1:Yes, the making a song, yes, the back and forth, yes.
Speaker 4:So, yeah, I'll give credit to you on that point, but I still doesn't. I don't think that that makes it a classic. I think that he was on. You could tell that he was putting it together in real time. He was on the verge of figuring it out.
Speaker 1:It's got a lot of. It's got a lot of classic elements and it's got a lot of better songs than albums that we call classics, and that's why I was really forging the conversation. If you're telling me it's not a classic, I can agree, but there are a lot of projects and I'm not going to say any names like cause. I don't want to, like you know, try to defame those projects but there are a lot of projects that we call classics. It's really not as good as strictly. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:Because of the, because of one time region and cause I've had this argument on. You know because I joke about. You know on Stationhead how we had a conversation with Lowe like if Thug Motivation you brought it up, if it's not the regional major classic it was, it doesn't permeate and break through all the way through the mainstream. You know what I'm saying as an overall classic, you know what I mean. A lot of it's timing too, and you got to look at everything else that was coming out around strictly, what a lot of these guys was doing lyrically. It was a lot that pop wasn't. Oh yeah, okay so.
Speaker 1:So I think some of this too is is that? Well, if you look at the time of this, well, the east coast resurgence is also like starting to like happen. And so, even though he has the East Coast aesthetic on this album, he is not a big L or Nas on the mic with the metaphors and things of that nature in terms of like being that type of MC, and I will give you that. But we got to go to the next one real quick and I'm just going to ask a quick question and we could just kind of slide. Safe and sound by DJ quick Comes out February 21st 1995, classic or no. Safe and sound DJ quick Not for me, no, not for me. But I love it and Sam loves it. I love it. You don't love safe and sound, see, that's what I mean. Mean, that's one of the like. So how about this? There are a lot of guys to tell you like they'll swear by safe and sound on the west coast, like that's. That is a classic in my opinion. Do you know who exactly?
Speaker 4:over. Quick is the name.
Speaker 1:You got that over there I think the production is better. I think the production is better than quick, is the name actually that's, that's.
Speaker 4:That's the only classic that I consider for Quick.
Speaker 1:No, I feel you on. Quick is the name, but I can't front the production. You want to know what? It's one of those things I'm trying to think. Okay, it's one of those things. Do you prefer Ye's production on College Dropout or do you prefer his production on Late Registration? Because what I would tell you we lost Coop for a second.
Speaker 2:If Michael Brown is saying it's a classic, it's a classic. Shout out to Michael Brown. If Michael Brown says West Coast Driven, I'm rolling with it. If I don't know, I'm rolling with it. Yeah, there you go.
Speaker 3:Mute it.
Speaker 4:You might have to hop back in.
Speaker 2:Coop was referring to the production, but I think quick is rapping better on quick as the name personally yeah, yeah for me, he was for me, but again I'm not a west coast guy, so you know my ears on that is based on just kind of really down down the middle.
Speaker 2:So I still, I've always felt that quick, as the name was the one to me. It was because I felt it appealed to a universal crowd as opposed to just the one West Coast crowd. Because DJ Quick is true West Coast, his sound is definite West Coast, there is no tweaking.
Speaker 4:He shaped the coast and doesn't get enough credit for it. He helped shape that.
Speaker 1:Doesn't get enough credit, very underrated so just real quick, I was about to say so. People always talk about suge knight but people don't understand how influential he is. You know, suge knight executive produced safe and sound by dj. I didn't know that. Yeah, suge is the executive producer of safe and sound. So, like that, like he literally is behind a lot of the classic sounds that we consider to be the West Coast sound. Whether we like it or not, it's Dre, but she's got a lot to do with it too. He is the executive producer of Safe and Sound. Y'all gotten a victory lap yet by Nip.
Speaker 4:No, stop that time. Yeah, this is West Coast.
Speaker 1:West West. It's a West West anniversary On February 16th 2018, nipsey Hussle relics Victory Lap, which I do consider to be a classic rap album. Guys, we are all in agreement that Victory Lap is a classic. Okay, okay, just so we're clear. Victory Lap's better than Safe and Sound and Strictly for my Niggas apparently To you two niggas, oh, yeah, okay. So, guys, I actually did something and I want to ask you the same question.
Speaker 1:After I did this, I thought about the 10 best rap albums post-2017, because I call that the real Kendrick, drake and J Cole era. It's like from 2009 to 2017. I listed the best 10 albums I thought came out in that time. I have King's Disease 3 at number one. I have Pray for Paris by West Side Gun at number two. I have Magic by Nas at number three. Again, I have Daytona at number four. But when I look at it, I'm looking at Victory Lap and Alfredo, guys, and if I'm being objective, even though I listen to Alfredo more than I listen to Victory Lap, when I listen to Victory Lap today, I kind of got the impression that Victory Lap might be better, which means it's 2025, guys, it might be one of the best five rap albums of the last eight years, which definitely makes it a rap classic in my opinion. What do you think?
Speaker 4:Let me ask you this real quick Coop, Do you have it over damn?
Speaker 1:I said post-2017, but I can't front.
Speaker 4:Okay, so you're not counting 2017 itself? Okay.
Speaker 1:No, but I do. Okay. So if we're putting Damn in that mix somewhere, I would tell you that, objectively, I might put Damn ahead of Victory Lap and Alfredo. It's close, it's close, but I'm going to listen to Victory Lap more than I'm going to listen to Damn, and so I'm going to tell you Victory Lap is the better album, because everybody that knows me knows I love some Alfredo, but when I listen to Victory Lap again today, it's like no, I can't in clear conscience tell you that Alfredo is better than Victory Lap and that is saying a lot about how great Victory Lap is and so I cannot tell you that Damn is better than Victory Lap in clear conscience. And so I'm cool with it being at number five conscience, and so, like, I'm cool with it being at number five, even if we're throwing 2017 into the mix which is saying a lot.
Speaker 2:That means in the last 10 years.
Speaker 1:That means in the last 10 years he made one of the best five rap albums of the last 10 years, and even the fact that he's in that conversation says a lot about the classic nature of this album I agree.
Speaker 2:I agree. I think victory lap to me is that universal album. But you're from a coast, especially in AG. We talked about this before with Jeezy when he made 10-101. You don't have to be from the South to recognize how important and how special that album was. To me was like that. You don't have to be from the West Coast to appreciate and understand how important it was, because the way it sounded, the way it started off, the way he ended it, the way he flowed in everything that he was going to be you saw it in Victory Lap. It's a universal record. To me, it's a universal classic because you can vibe out to it, no matter where you're from.
Speaker 1:How about this daytona and victory lap came out the same year and I said that year if you told me that you picked victory lap over daytona, I wouldn't argue with you much because the length of it is so great for longer than daytona is like. Daytona is greater to me, but it is much shorter Degree of difficulty comes into play.
Speaker 4:It does.
Speaker 1:Stuff like endurance, degree of difficulty when you keep on making bangers, like when you on record 15 and you still making bangers. You know what I'm saying, yeah, this album.
Speaker 4:the production is so stellar on this album and Nip is doing his thing. He reached the peak of his form and it's just sad that he was taken away from us when he was. And that's what I don't like about this album, because if you do call this album classic, people are quick to say like, oh, it's retroactively because of his death.
Speaker 4:But I was calling this a classic in real time. I remember a barber not my personal barber, but a barber in the barbershop. I get my hair cut at. You know we was talking about like how classic this album was when it first dropped man, and you know I was first introduced to Nip in, you know, during the Marathon mixtape back in 2013.
Speaker 4:Like, I really messed with the Keys to the City track and then when Ocean views came out, that was like 20, I want to say 16 or 17. That was like that's probably my favorite song of his Right, but I still hadn't bought in to him totally. You know, at that point, you know I would check for his stuff here and there but then by the time you get around to victory lap, I was fully on board and then, just like that, he was taken from us and I was just like man. This is crazy because three of my top five songs that he's ever done come off this album like blue laces, two, um right hand to god and grind um the uh grinding on my life joint. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:So I think he reached the peak of it. You know he was actually getting better. You know, kind of like big. We got progressively better, yes, over time. Like I said, from when I was first introduced to him to the time he dropped this album, he was in a straight progression and, um, I think, I think he would have been even greater, you know, had he, uh, still been here with but this is undoubtedly a classic album.
Speaker 1:So listen to what I'm saying, then it might be time to check up on our man I Am God to see if he's like he's in the back right now.
Speaker 1:Oh, he is Okay cool, we can go ahead and start the pull-up. Listen, my brother's people knew Jeezy's people. Like I remember when my brothers were showing me the footage when I would come to the crib of Jeezy on stage. This is before the Deal, this is before Def Jam. This is all some Atlanta shit when people was literally recording Jeezy shows. You understand, niggas down here used to record Jeezy shows. It was like that when it's like you had to go record his shows with the little handheld shit back in the day and shit. When shows like with the little handheld shit, like back in the day and shit. And it's like when I look at Nip, to me he's everything that Jeezy was here out in Cali. Where in Cali, the following is so loyal and so big in all respect to Jeezy, and he was a better rapper too, and he got progressively better at rapping. The same way Jeezy got progressively better at rapping. The same way Jeezy got progressively better at rapping Victory lap.
Speaker 1:You know what Victory lap isn't a victory lap. It's almost like the opening ceremonies. It was supposed to be the coronation. He's the one that's supposed to be running the West right now. Yeah, that's what victory lap was. It's like, oh, he got next Because you got to understand that. It's like after Kendrick did drop, damn in 2017, and I keep on saying this, and I'm not saying this disrespectfully it's like, oh no, but Damn ain't no West Coast shit. Victory Lap is some classic West Coast shit.
Speaker 4:And Kendrick is on. I mean Kendrick's on the album. He was a part of this classic. You know what I mean. He was seeing the movement in real time as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, some classic West Coast. Yeah, that's different, that hit different. When you do that, we can go ahead and bring the man, let's bring him in Yo.
Speaker 2:Hello bro, how was y'all?
Speaker 3:I am what up homieie? I'm chilling, bro. Happy to be here. Appreciate y'all having me on the platform again no doubt, bro, no doubt peace, brother.
Speaker 1:So tell us, here we are again. City of gods I am. I am going to get into some things. You know that I want to ask you, but let's talk about your production of choice. Let's go around with Ill City, because I love your production choices, because I feel like that you choose producers that are reflecting where you're trying to go as an artist. Am I correct when I'm thinking that? So tell me you know about the production choice with ill city and who he is, what he brings to the table, what the relationship is like, why, and all of that.
Speaker 3:Absolutely Shout out the bro. He was city man. Um, I actually got put up on ill city, uh music from the homie Rufus Sims you know what I'm saying, rufus and Jay Hayes, the Lil Peoples. So he was you know what I'm saying working with them back when I first got put on Today Music a lot like Coke Raps 1, you know what I'm saying. So this was like 2022, I wanna say yeah, 2022. So I'm just like man, bro, who was that? You know what I'm saying, cause, like you know, I'm saying it's like you know I'm a boom bap. You know I'm saying like grimy. You know I'm saying hardcore rap, shit. You know I'm saying. So I'm like who was that, bro? He's like, oh, that's the homie ill city. You know I'm saying he wrote.
Speaker 3:You know I'm saying so we actually started uh city of god back in 2022. You know I'm saying like the first joint that I pinned for that project was a devil in his eyes. You know I what I'm saying. So we started this back in 2022. And you know shit you know what I'm saying happens. Things get put on the back burner, other things take priority, but you know what I'm saying. I made it a point of emphasis, the end of last year, like, nah, I'm ready to drop this, you know what I'm saying. So went ahead, and you know what I'm saying. Wrapped it up, going ahead and knocked it out and shit, we out of day. City of God, streaming the air.
Speaker 1:Well, so I'm assuming Ill City's from the Chi Chi, absolutely yep, yep. So you making sure you're keeping it Chi with all of your, your choices.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, we definitely trying to. You know it's a, it's a whole conglomerate, a whole citywide effort. I haven't said this many times, you know I'm saying like we definitely trying to, you know, uh, shine a new, a different light on the city. You know I'm saying we coming out of the drill era. You know I'm saying and we, I feel like chicago is wide open now.
Speaker 3:Chicago is one of them cities to where, like market-wide chicago chase was popular. You know I'm saying so, the trap or whatever you want to call it, that sound, it'll always be prevalent here. You know I'm saying there ain't nothing wrong with that, but we just trying to, you know, uh, reopen a door as far as the real mcs and the spitters is concerned, because we was always known for that. There ain't no new thing with chicago having spitters or nothing like that. That's in our history, that's in our DNA. But we just want to put that back to the forefront. Everything comes in cycles. What goes up comes down, everything comes in full circles. So we just trying to reestablish the city as far as real splitters is concerned, okay, ag.
Speaker 4:Yo, peace, bro. Bro, thanks for pulling up again and also a big thank you to sending us the project early so we could tap into it. Man, I was excited for everybody else to really get to tap into it. Finally, and here is something that we've been listening to for the past few weeks um, so we appreciate that. Um, let's stay right here.
Speaker 4:Since uh coop mentioned production, uh, by ill city and you mentioned uh devil in his eyes, that's actually my favorite track on the album and the beat for that is real unorthodox, right, and it's it's a crazy pocket. You know, to your flow, that you're in and we're in the current era where one mc taps in with one producer and you chose ill city for this project. But throughout this project, the eight tracks, he's giving you different looks as far as the beats, the tempos and, uh, different things. You know different, um, you know different kind of bags for you to go in, right. So, um, with that said, like, how did you select a lot of these beats, for instance devil in my eyes, that you said that's the first joint you did, it's a real unorthodox track, but then how'd you pick other vibes for the album to, you know, complete the project you know, whenever I go into a project I'm always first and foremost just picking whatever speak to.
Speaker 3:You know I'm saying like I literally just do what the beats say. I do what the music tell me to do and whatever the music evoke and bring out of me. You know I'm saying that's what y'all get as far as the finish, uh, the finished product. You know. So it's just. You know the things that something might be dope and I might not like it, but if it ain't grabbing my attention or holding my attention enough, you know it won't be as high as on the priority list of beats that I'm trying to write to.
Speaker 3:I like for beats that like speak to me right at that moment and make me want to pick up the phone and, you know, type it out or whatever the case may be. So it's like all the joints that you hear now is like it made me feel a way in a moment when I was listening to it, to the point to where it was like, oh no, I gotta write to this right now. The only thing that I probably knew I was gonna write to, that I sat on for a minute uh was probably, um, the intro way too easy, so I probably had that beat for like maybe, maybe a month before I actually wrote to it. But that's because I was already writing to other joints on a project, so that was about the only one that I had that I didn't do nothing to immediately Got it yeah.
Speaker 3:So, I am.
Speaker 2:I'm big on setting the tone for an album. When you set the tone out the gate with intro way too easy and the energy around that, just the way you was able to put your foot on the gas and never take your foot off the gas, to me it felt like you were trying to make a statement and you succeeded at making that statement about chicago hip-hop right, and not so much as the drill side but the lyrical side, was that your goal to kind of set that tone so it can permeate throughout the entire project absolutely.
Speaker 3:Um, even though y'all know me, I got a core base of listeners that have been following the music since I came back to rap in 2020. I'm still at such a lower level in the underground hip-hop space to where every project, every time I'm out with somebody first time, in Every impression, is a first impression for me, and I've said this many times before. So I'm always trying to first and foremost establish that thought in your mind. So, like you're going to hit a Chicago but you're not going to hear what I think 95, 99% of people is expecting to hear from Chicago unless you're kind of like from a different era you know what I'm saying than to hear from Chicago, unless you kind of like from a different era you know what I'm saying. Like, if you from a different era, then you know what we gave to the game.
Speaker 3:But if you only getting tapped in with Chicago from like 2010 or 2012, when the Internet really started booming and I mean social media really started booming and drill was taking off, then you would be surprised. But you know, I definitely always want to first and foremost establish that this ain't that you know what I'm saying. Like, this is a totally different side of Chicago music. You know what I'm saying. Content wise is similar. You know what I'm saying, but at the same time, it's it's, it's a much different style. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Taking it back to the essence, of what this shit is really built off of world. So so when I hear your music sometimes I feel like like that you are traditionally looking beat wise for producers that are in the Dilla, Primo and Kanye mode in terms of the boom bap with the drums, I think you like eerie samples, you like snares that make a lot of noise so that you can pick something different to catch your timing on Correct.
Speaker 3:Facts. No, that's facts.
Speaker 1:I'm correct about all of those things. And so when you talk about your comfort level and where you feel like in this space, well, let me ask you, what does your comfort level feel like? Do you feel like for where you are in this space? Do you feel like you're the best in this space and what are your expectations in this space? Because you spoke to some things and it made me think about a question that I actually had and I was going to ask it later now. Like, how do you feel about you? Like, a lot of people like me feel like you might be the best independent MC out here. Are you the best independent MC out here? Are those what your expectations are for yourself? Do you expect to go further? If it doesn't go further, are you okay with being just the best independent artist in this space? How long are you okay with that? What is, what does that look like for you? All of those things?
Speaker 3:so, as far as am I the best, I'll let the people tell it. When it comes to that, you know how I feel about it, based off the music, you know what I'm saying. Like my opinion is strong. Throughout the music I've damned every verse, every line. You know what I'm saying. So so I let the people tell it.
Speaker 3:You know I'm saying, but as far as comfortability, I'm not comfortable because I know I have so much more to do and so much further to go, and I know the expectations I have for myself. Like I do absolutely want to be the best. Like no questions asked, no debate about it. You know I'm saying no doubt, no, none of that shit. Like I want it to be a consensus, a popular consensus. Like Like, nah, right now, this nigga, I am God he got it, ain't nobody fucking with him. Those my expectations for myself. I want to crack your top five if possible, and I'm talking about top five all time. If I fall short of that, I'm comfortable with doing what I'm doing for this era. You know what I'm saying. But if I gotta have my, my way to be 100 honest, I want to crack your all-time top five. You know I'm saying, with that being said like I'm still growing as an artist every day, every verse, every line, every bar, every project. You know I'm saying like if you pay attention to the music, like you will hear that I'm always going back and forth and circling between things like I don't think I've ever put out since 2020, I don't think I put out a project or back-to-back projects. That was basically the same. I think the closest I got to that was 2021, when I put out the Eternal Reflection and Hell's Angels and Heaven's Demons. I think those projects was very similar mood-wise, content-wise, because the latter Hell's Angels and Heaven's Demons was kind of like residual leftover from the eternal reflection. So that's why they kind of kind of coincide and go together. But after that I don't feel like I gave you the same look twice and I'm watching everything and I'm watching everybody, and no disrespect intended. But I feel like a lot of dudes like give you the same song and dance over and over and over when they drop and that's not something that I want to get caught up in. I have more higher expectations for myself than that as an artist. You know, I'm not trying to go too far left, but I know my capabilities.
Speaker 3:My thing is like ain't nothing new under the sun. So I ain't necessarily saying I'm introducing anything new, but I'm blowing the dust off shit that ain't really prevalent in today's era and trying to bring that to the underground. Because who's to say this is underground hip hop? To me, that symbolizes freedom, and you know what I'm saying. Lack of constraint. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3:You're not a pigeonhole to do any one or two things. You know what I'm saying. So who's to say you can't talk to the ladies? You know what I'm saying. Through underground hip-hop, who's to say you can't get melodic? You know what I'm saying. Speaking of underground hip-hop, you know what I'm saying. Who's to say that everything got to be drumless or everything got to be a 40-bar verse? No hook. You know what I'm saying. Like, my thing is I'm a, I'm an artist. You know. I'm saying and I think I've proven that throughout the years like, if you listen to the catalog, so my thing is further expanding my, um, my artistry and the craft and, just like you know, being the best that I can be within the scope of where I'm trying to see myself that's dope man.
Speaker 4:Go ahead and claim it, like you do on the album v-o-t-e.
Speaker 3:Go to this era oh yeah, greatest of this era. Yeah, like, that's definitely where my sights is at. You know, I'm saying that, regardless if you agree, disagree or different. That's cool because I understand. Like, if you want, like if somebody wanted to say I'm delusional, you know, I'm saying that's fine because I feel like the ones who really hit that mark, you have to have some sort of disillusion. You know what I'm saying yes, continuous yes, take on this fucking. This journey, like this is a process, this is a journey to be yeah.
Speaker 3:Yes, it's really a marathon Like none of this is overnight. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:To be great, you got to have a rational confidence.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely. Ain't nobody tickle me that I ain't up there Like I don't care who you talking about, whether you talk about the Conways, the Ransoms, the Stove Guys, the Binnies. Like the Black Thoughts, the L's Eyes. Like I don't care who you talking about. If you asking me, I'm right there with all of it has nothing to do with being cocky. It has everything to do with knowing that I put in my 20,000 hours. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Like I've been doing this for more than 20 years. You took your shots. You took your shots.
Speaker 3:You can't tell me that I ain't putting in my reps, and you know what I'm saying. I ain't putting in the work. You can't tell me that. It's evident. You can hear it in the music.
Speaker 4:It might not be your cup of tea but you never finna tell me that, like I'm at a lower level, like I refuse to believe that, right, well, let's stay right there for my next question. Because if you remember, when you hit me up a few weeks ago to let me sample the album and you know we had a little back and forth conversation since the last project you were hitting you know different flow pockets with the sniping and you sound more polished. You know, on every track that you were on compared to um, bloodstained suede and more suede and things like that. You remember we had that conversation and um, so you mentioned, you know, typing the lyrics out on your phone and then Sean brought up the intro. So, uh, the way too easy.
Speaker 4:So out of the gate gate, I heard something different than on your previous projects. I'm like yo bro is in a pocket right now that he was sharp before, but his sword is definitely sharper now than it was back then. So take us into the booth with you and do you? Because? Because I know like when you memorize your lyrics after you write them, you're a little bit sharper with the flow versus reading off something when you're in the booth. So was your approach a little bit different from this project when you went in, or did you keep your same approach, because I can hear something different in the music.
Speaker 3:The approach is definitely the same. I don't really too much deviate away from my approach because that's kind of like that's the comfortability that I won't jeopardize and mess with trying to change.
Speaker 2:Now, I'm not saying that.
Speaker 3:I'm not willing to change it up if I find something.
Speaker 2:I feel like works better.
Speaker 3:But as of right now, I'm kind of on some if it ain't broke, don't fix it, type shit. As far as the approach, you know now, when it comes to, when it comes to the music and just delivering these projects, like y'all know, I'm as transparent as it gets. I'll be 39 this year. I know my time is very limited. You know what I'm saying, even though if you want to say oh, there's no age on this, you do it until you feel like you don't want to do it no more. You know that's cool, but I can't see myself chasing it forever. You know what I'm saying, without seeing some notable type of rise. And you know success, what I consider success, because success look different for everybody. So I know my time is limited. I'm not saying that this is my last go around or nothing like that, but I'm just saying like I know what I want for me. You know I got, I got kids to raise. You know what I'm saying. And if this is something as as good as I am at it, like this is like my trade, as good as I am at this, you've got to know when to walk away from everything. But that's for you to say, it's not for nobody else to say so. It's not necessarily anything outside coming in as influencing, influencing my train of thought. It's all about what I want for me, but I feel like I'm closer than I ever been. I feel like that right there is putting a battery in my back, so to speak. It's giving me that passion and that hunger back, because when I see, okay, it's new people tapping in all the time and they hit me up and let me know that what I'm doing is actually needed out here, then I'm starting to be recognized by people that I respect. That came before me, whether it be from my city or or otherwise. It's like I you know what I'm saying. That's kind of like letting me know that I'm on the right path. But you know it's scary hours right now. So I'm rapping like my life on the line and I'm rapping like the rent dude, but that could be a detriment.
Speaker 3:I know the era we in, I know the the masses don't want to hear that shit, but I'm of the mindset to where you would have to learn how to turn your deficiencies or detriments or whatever flaws you would say, into a positive. So if, if somebody is annoyed by rapping at a high level. I'm gonna annoy the shit out you because I'm gonna do that. You know I'm saying like you got a gun in my head every time. That's just, that's just the cloth I'm cut from. That's the school that I was raised in. When it come to this rap shit, like everybody wanted to be the best, it was the king of this, the king of that. That's what I'm cut from, like that's that's my own, that's my upbringing, that's in my dna. I've conditioned myself. You know I'm saying to be that way and I'm not uh, I'm not mad at it, like I'm not regretful or anything. You know what I'm saying. So I'm gonna rap like it's my last breath every fucking time you hit me.
Speaker 4:You know what I'm saying or yeah, what I will say real quick to that for sean uh, ask this question is you know? I just wanted to point that out you sound very comfortable on all these tracks, like somebody you're breaking through now, but you sounded like a seasoned vet on these tracks, real comfortable, you have a level of comfortability that I wasn't hearing on the other albums that I hear now. It's just, it's just different. Man, for real gratitude.
Speaker 3:I appreciate that. I appreciate y'all listening to detail and that's why y'all get the advanced listens and shit like that. Because I don't know if it was you or Coop. I was telling too like I look at y'all as what the source in XXL was. Those avenues and those platforms are no disrespect, but they obsolete now. They heavily void. Nobody pays attention to them, no more. They don't hold the weight they once held. That's where y'all come in at. Y'all are the new sources, the new XXLs. That's where y'all come in at. Y'all are the new double XLs. You know what I'm saying. So that's what the game was back then. You know the label will give these platforms the project.
Speaker 1:Right, you get the 30 day event. Yeah.
Speaker 3:And let you sit with it and live with it. So when it's time for the drop, like you've lived with it and you have a clear, concise opinion on this music and what y'all say matters to people. You know what I'm saying and I appreciate y'all, because before I was on y'all platform as an artist, I was watching as a fan. You know what I'm saying, even when Coop was on the other platform. You know what I'm saying, so it's only right. You know what I'm saying. That's what I mean by like just blowing the dust off shit. It's a lot like. I understand the industry did a lot of it. Fuck the game up. You know what I'm saying A lot, but at the same time, it's a lot of gold from that, that, that model and that platform that you can still utilize in today's game and still like get off and be successful.
Speaker 1:Well, you want to know. You want to know. What's crazy is that I actually found out about you really and that we kind of overlooked you on the previous podcast, when I was watching another podcast and other followers knew I was in the building and you were in the building and somebody called us out and was like yeah, they didn't even cover I am god's project. I'm like who is that? I was like what the fuck? I jumped look here, I jumped out the pod and started listening to your shit.
Speaker 1:That's how I found out about you, because I was like, did we miss him? I was like what did we miss? I'm like what's going on? I was watching another pod. You and me was in the same pod. So like when you mean you watch it no, I watch it the same way because I be watching other dudes and what they say. That's how I found out. Somebody stunted on me because I jumped in the chat Like, yeah, this nigga Coop up in here, he don't even know who I am God, I'm like what the fuck I'm like this nigga just tried me in here.
Speaker 1:I was like I'm out man, I need to go find out who I am, god is. And then I listened. I was like oh, I was like I still got the text message. I was like yo, we fucked up.
Speaker 3:Nah, that's love.
Speaker 1:I was like we ain't know who. No, because you popped up around the same time. Me and him popped up. You feel me Right? And so that's why I was like oh no, I was like we fucked up. He popped up when we popped up and somebody had to tell hold on, sean. You got a question. Sean, you want to get to your question?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I want to piggyback off what AG said because you brought some stuff down, man. I want to think about this Purple tape to the purple box, right, I played that repeatedly at the end of that joint, right. But I also thought about the evolution and AG actually touched on this about you ascending into a whole different pocket or different bag and most MCs. They get into an evolution and then they start regressing after they get into that evolution. But it also sounds like you're looking at getting to a different zenith at this point where you have already evolved. Can you kind of share with us, like, what is that looking like for you for future projects or just for future? You know songs or whatever you're going to work on in the future? Are you looking at still looking at evolving as an artist, as an MC, as an individual? Or are you looking at trying to get to that scene to see how far you can actually go?
Speaker 3:I'm actually looking to do, to do both. I don't think y'all got to worry about me trying to be no next Drake or no shit like that. I have no desire whatsoever to go that far left or be that appealing, so to speak. But yeah, my thing is, when I say underground, again I just mean free from constraint, meaning you don't have to make a specific type of music. To me that's the beauty of the underground. But my thing is why can't you bring a little of the other side into the underground but still do it in a dope, artistic, tasteful manner? You know I'm saying.
Speaker 3:When I say that, I'm just saying like every project don't have to be every song on. Every project don't have to be 50 bars, no hook, everything, everything don't have to not have drums. You can play with this shit Like us as people. We so sensual. You know what I'm saying. Like I'm trying to like. I'm trying to like fuck with your senses, like the audio sense, and like give you different looks when I create. Like I'm not trying to give you the same song and dance. So when you pick up or when you press play on the I Am God project, you know exactly what you're going to get. I feel like the only thing you should know that you're going to get from me every time out is my best Lyrically, my best. You know what I'm saying. Like you know I'm going to come. You know what I'm saying Lyrically, like like it ain't no tomorrow. That's the only thing that I want you to like be able to predict and you know and and kind of foresee.
Speaker 3:But as far as the vibe, the music, like I don't want to get caught in that box to where it's kind of like, oh, I know what he's gonna do. You know I'm saying he like to do this or he like to do that, like I'm always evolving, because I'm always evolving as a man. You know I'm saying like I I don't never want to stay too static in any regard. You know I'm saying, and I'm not super dynamic, but I'm, I feel like I got a nice pocket in between the two. You know I'm not so static to the point, so I'm never changing and I'm always the same, but I'm not so dynamic to where, like you wouldn't recognize me next week or some shit like that. You know I'm saying like I feel like I have a healthy balance.
Speaker 3:So as I evolve as a person. My music is a direct reflection of me. You know I'm saying so. That's the good thing about my artistry as I grow and evolve as a man, so are the music. So you can kind of listen to the music and kind of not know where I'm at in my life but kind of feel, you know I'm saying like, okay, he in this type of mood right now or he on this type of time, you know I will never want to get you know what I'm saying Stuck in a box, like I'm always trying to create and push myself.
Speaker 2:I love it you you.
Speaker 1:You know when, when you talk like that and I and I hear it in you you remind you don't sound like common and you don't cover the same content necessarily the common covers. But when I look at the arc of your music and I look at how you rap and I look at the themes and the content and like and how it's still like, rooted in the city, like a lot of your early stuff reminds me of his early stuff, like, like. Like. Your style to me is very resurrection, like, and I mean that in a complimentary way no, you know where I feel like when I'm listening to you, I'm listening to to common before everybody knew who common was, because people don't understand.
Speaker 1:Common made classic shit. It made hip-hop, classic albums before everybody heard him make the light like he was. Um, he was like seven, eight, nine years in the game before that moment happened for him. And so when I listen to you talk and I listen to your music I do see like maybe it's the Chicago of it too, because I hear like the street in it, but I hear the. I don't like the word conscious, you know I like when most said you know, I'm just a wait. I'm just a wait, dog, I'm doing great dog. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3:Right Facts, I'm aware, and that's synonymous with conscience, I understand the connotation that conscience has within rap and hip hop.
Speaker 1:But it just means to be aware and I am aware, Like I said, I'm not so static that I can't think and see from different perspectives well, this is what I mean when I say you remind me of Common, because this is what I wanted to get to, because I want you to explain this bar to me. I used to run with disciples, but now I am God.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, just the natural progression and evolution of growing from a boy to a man. You know, chicago is a real heavy gang affiliated city. You know, right, right, whether indirectly or directly, I feel like ninety nine point nine, nine nine percent of us call ourselves fucking around with something If we're not all the way fully in it. Some of us born in it, some of us are sworn in it, some of us just play with it. You know what I'm saying. Whatever your walk of life is, you're affiliated some type of way. And if you're not directly affiliated yourself, you got family. If it ain't your family, it's your guys. You know what I'm saying. Some of us is just out the womb, thrusted into that. That shit, that's just what it is.
Speaker 3:So when I say, uh, used to run with disciples, now I am god, you know gd gangsta disciple now growth and development, one of the biggest gains, to come out of chicago and make his way to other, you know states in a, in a country too. So that's basically just a play on words and like going from the gang banging shit. But like you know, now I am god, like I'm on a different level, a different way of thinking, a different wavelength. I'm a whole grown-ass man now like the things that I uh valued and and like to partake in back then ain't the same things I value and like to get into these days. So just the whole play on word shit. You know I'm saying with the disciples and with jesus. You know I I'm saying but I used to run with disciples.
Speaker 1:I'm like I'm.
Speaker 3:God, you know what I'm saying and also basically saying like I was a follower when I was a shorty, a lot of dumb shit I did came off me being a follower. You know what I'm saying? Because I didn't grow up with my pops. I didn't have no big brother, I didn't have three siblings and if I had any, if any of my guys was older than me, it was about a year or two. So mentally we still on the same level. They might have been more advanced than me in certain areas, but for the most part we on the same level. So that also speaks to me coming into my own as a grown man.
Speaker 3:I'm big on being a man because I feel like in this era, the prototypical man is very different than what I see as a man and not to disrespect nobody, but it's just different.
Speaker 3:And I get it. Times change, things change, but, like I said, I got two boys and I need to make sure that they're they're men, like in every sense of the word, and I don't know macho shit, but just being able to stand on your own two feet, being able to provide, being able to um, to endure you know what I'm saying being able to survive and also thrive, knowing how to put yourself in position to win and knowing that you are the man of your shit. You know what I'm saying. Ain't nobody coming to save you. You have to know how to carry yourself. You have to know how to earn and command respect and you also know how to give respect. So just the whole thing of like coming from that boyish thinking, you a man mentality, not really knowing what the fuck a man really is, and being able to look in the mirror one day and say, okay, yeah, I came a long way, like I'm a grown-ass man out here.
Speaker 4:Real stuff right there. For my question, I want to talk about Living Nightmares. That's where you that's actually my second favorite track on the project and where you get into your storytelling bag and, for me personally, my top 10 emcees list. That's like a prerequisite for you to even have a buy in, because I'm big on storytelling and you know you as a a rapper. I think you have a dope voice. You know what I mean. So that's part of storytelling is being able to convey, you know, through your voice, to keep us locked in and interested in the story that you're telling. But when you get into that storytelling bag, do you prefer to write from a perspective rooted in reality, like if you're telling the real story, or do you like to get creative and make up your own tales? You know street stories or whatever Like. Do you have a preference in that?
Speaker 3:I feel like it's always a little bit of both. I can't think of a story that I told that was a hundred percent real, like I took like uh, experience of mine or somebody experiences I know, and just put it out there like that. I feel like it's always a bit of both, because my thing is like, when it comes to storytelling, I like to channel the likes of Biggie Nas Scarface To me. Those are my favorite storytellers in rap. It's kind of like the vivid imagery that they narrated with, that they told a story with you could damn near close your eyes and you right there, in whatever situation that it is that they rapping about. That's what I'm saying. That they told a story with, like you could damn near close your eyes and you right there in whatever situation that it is that they rapping about. You know what I'm saying and that's what I try to do. Like the audio-visual aspect of rap. You know what I'm saying. Like I want to bring you into my mind. I want you to be able to close your eyes and be able to, you know, see and feel and smell. Smell the shit that I'm talking about. It's kind of like I don't want to limit myself by trying to be too rooted in reality, but I also don't want to be so far-fetched that I'm getting away from reality because I still want the stories to be relatable.
Speaker 3:I feel like I'm more of a Donald Goings-type storyteller. Everybody know motherfuckers get locked up. That's the first thing they do is pick up a Donald Goings book. I know motherfuckers get locked up. That's the first thing they do is pick up a donald hawk's book. Like I've been locked up. So that's how I got put on. You know I'm saying points and shit. So I appreciated his uh, his imagery. In a way he told stories. So I'm always trying to stay rooted in reality, but but not so much that I can't use my mind and use my creativity and, like you know, give extra life to a story. But I love storytelling like I think that's. I don't think it's a lost art, I just think it's done way less than what it should be, because I feel like if you know how to tell a story, right, that boosts your stock as an MC. You know what I'm saying Substantially.
Speaker 1:You know what I'm saying. Can I piggyback off of AG right quick, sean? Yeah, yeah. So I am God. You literally just took my notes from me when I have living nightmare circle and I was like extra credit for the MC for the storytelling ability. I literally have that song circle. It's not my favorite song on there, but the first thing that I noticed about it I was like and this is what I like about this project, I feel like you know what your bag is and you know that your core bag is good and you made it a point to try to express on this project that your other bags are good and this is the prime example of that on this album.
Speaker 1:To me it's like, oh no, I got a storytelling bag too. You didn't know I had a storytelling bag, got a storytelling bag for you. I was like, oh. I was like, oh, check. I was like go ahead and check that dope-ass MC, mc box. I got stories to check because when I listen to your previous projects, you really don't have a joint like this, and I think you knew that you didn't have a joint like this, which is why you made the joint and it's very compelling.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean. That's another thing.
Speaker 3:With the storytelling extra credit, it matters yeah, it's like reading a book or watching a movie, like like think about this like slick rick literally is in greatest to mc all-time conversations strictly off of storytelling.
Speaker 1:That is how important it is absolutely, absolutely rick.
Speaker 3:I'm tweaking like absolutely slick rick as well like it's like watching a movie or reading a good book If you can predict everything, I don't feel like the story was that good. If it's so predictable, I don't know. I just feel like it's rushed. I haven't even really hit my peak with my storytelling capabilities yet. I'll be listening to Blaze of 50 and Niggas Lead and I'll be like damn, what the fuck was them niggas on to where they was able to pin that type of shit. That's the level I'm trying to get to. I know I haven't reached that yet.
Speaker 3:The storytelling is still an aspect of mine that I'm working on trying to get there. I feel like I started telling less stories than what I used to in my music. So I'm not going to say I'm going to do a story every time. It's all about the feeling and what I'm trying to convey in the project. But I definitely want to get my storytelling really up there like high level. I would say if I had to grade myself on storytelling right now, I'd give myself like a, b, like a solid B, but I want that A++.
Speaker 3:You know what I'm saying and that's like the Biggie, the Cube, summer Vacation, the Blazer 50s. The motherfucking niggas bleed. I got a story to tell. Just countless storytelling joints like Star Wars. That's one of my favorite Nas songs. It's not like a story like Blazer 50, but it is Nas songs. It's not like a story like Blazer, but it is a story. It's like the progression of the violence getting into hip-hop and you know what I'm saying, how the shit was at that time. That was pre-drill, so it's like those type of stories right there. I love them shits. You know what I'm saying?
Speaker 2:No, doubt, city of God. Change in Chicago. Don't raise no holes. Perfect sequence. And to bring someone into Chicago at the gate, gratitude. So I listened to those in sequence like three or four times honestly today while I was at the gym and I'm like, I feel like I'm in Chicago right now.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:So I say that to ask this question for you. If so, I say that to ask this question for you, if you were to take three records, three albums from Chicago and put them in a capsule to capture Chicago, and I want you to include your catalog in there as well.
Speaker 3:What would three records be? Shit, three records, damn man. Then I got to include myself too, yikes, so I'm going to say you mean albums, sean, or you mean songs, albums.
Speaker 3:Oh, albums, okay, okay, okay. So first and foremost, I'm going to say Adrenaline Rush. Shout out to Twisted Adrenaline Rush. That was like the first time. I'm not going to say it was the first time it was done, but that was the first time my young ears heard chicago put down so precisely and so on point and in rap music for a whole project. You know, I was young at that time, that's 97, so I'm only what? 11 years old. You know what I'm saying. So I would definitely say Adrenaline Rush. For the second one, I'm gonna have to say what would that second one be?
Speaker 1:what's your favorite Kanye album? What's his best album to you and does that crack your top three? I feel like his best album to you. Does that crack your top?
Speaker 3:three. I feel like his best is my Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, but I don't know if that's my favorite. My favorite would probably be Late Registration Me, you and Coop just saying.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Late Registration is me and AG's shit too.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love late registration.
Speaker 1:I love late registration.
Speaker 3:I don't think Kanye got one in here. Ain't no disrespect.
Speaker 1:No, that's why I'm asking, because there's a difference between shy shit and rap shit.
Speaker 3:If I had to pick for the second one. I'm trying to think.
Speaker 1:Does Com have an album that makes your top three, because I feel like One Day It'll All Make Sense is very Chicago.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but I would have to put see it's not. It don't really sound, sound like Chicago, but for me I would have to put Food and Liquor in there, because Lupe came at a time to where it's like Chicago. Rap was lyrical but it was super street and he showed you just how far you can go with the imagination. But it was real Chicago.
Speaker 1:You think food and liquor is better than the cool.
Speaker 3:Mmm, I love the cool man Shit Superstar the cool is just the title track. Yeah, the cool man Shit Superstar the cool is just the title track Put you on the game.
Speaker 4:You want to talk about storytelling man.
Speaker 3:But see the thing, hurt Me Soul, hurt Me Soul is one of my favorite storytelling things and that's food and liquor. So I'm going to have to say food and liquor, like I have my moments to where I would prefer the cool over food and liquor, because those are my favorite two Lupe albums. I know everybody be talking about Tetsuo and Youth, but I kind of tapped out after a little after the cool.
Speaker 1:I don't love Tetsuo and Youth. You and me are the same. I tapped out after the cool I look at. I look at food and liquor in the cool. The same way I look at college dropout and late registration.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. That's a perfect parallel, absolutely. So that's my three right there. If I had to say three and I got to include myself, I'm going to say Adrenaline Rush. I'm going to say Lupe Fiasco's Food and Liquor and I'm going to say my second project from 2021, hell's Angels and Heaven's Demons. I think both of those are three different dynamics of Chicago, with my shit being closer to Twister's Adrenaline Rush, but not identical.
Speaker 3:Adrenaline Rush was from a street level Shout out to Legendary Traction, shout out Twister. It was from a street level to where it took you on a day in the life of Twister. It was from a street level to where it kind of took you on a day in the life of Twister. You know what I'm saying. Food and Liquor is kind of like the little kid who grew up off Twister but straight-A student and he has this wild-ass imagination, but you can still feel that he's from inner-city Chicago and when my shit come in, it's kind of like the socio-political talk mixed with the street, mixed with the lyricism, mixed with some creativity and imagination. So it's a little bit of both. So that would be my three.
Speaker 4:You know, yeah you tied them together. Well, that's interesting. Dope, dope question, sean. I'm surprised we didn't get B in there, though.
Speaker 3:I love B. I love B, but I just think, when I'm just trying to really think of shit, that really what's your favorite Common album.
Speaker 1:Hold on what's your, Is it B?
Speaker 4:Okay, that doesn't really scream the essence of Chicago to you, though. Right, Absolutely yeah, Because by that time Common was already who he is.
Speaker 3:You know, right, absolutely yeah. Yeah, because by that time common was already who he is, you know, and I'm not saying it didn't have no chicago. Feel like that project got the corner. I love the corner, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:So it's kind of like, but I just wanted to go like as three level as possible without being too grimy for all three selections so for those of us outside of chicago, when we're hearing B and we're hearing Common and Kanye, we're like that is what Chicago sounds like. So you're telling me that's not necessarily the case, or that was the case for the time? No, that's absolutely the case.
Speaker 3:That's absolutely the case. Like Chicago has a very backpacking type history. Like the backpack was for spray cans and guns Motherfuckers was backpacked, but it was still a street element there. It wasn't a backpack full of glitter and shit.
Speaker 1:Spray, you might blast you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know what I'm saying. We come from that backpack shit too. New York influenced everybody, chicago included, you know what I'm saying. So it was like we come from that backpack shit too. Like New York influenced everybody, chicago included, you know what I'm saying. So at a point in time, like before the industry kind of did away with the lyricist, that before the industry kind of inferred that you don't have to be a lyricist to be a star, when that was the formula and everybody wanted to be a lyricist, like that's when it started, chicago had some of the best lyricists.
Speaker 3:Back then, I mean, we got a brother named Juice, ju Ice. He'd be Eminem. And like in battles before M was like really aftermath M twice, you know what I'm saying. Like so we always had like them, them, them motherfuckers, them dogs, you know. But it's kind of like chicago is like one of the biggest, we the third largest city, so we a big market too, so we take in everything and we kind of follow the leaderish when it comes to certain shit. You know what I'm saying. But and that's why I said earlier, like we trying to re-establish the mc in chicago and put more respect back on that chicago never forgot how to rap.
Speaker 1:That's the slogan, right absolutely not tell us before you get out of here about, like you know, what's going on, what's up next for you. Tell me about your management team. Tell me how you keep finding all of these dope ass artists in Chicago. I'm going to tell you what else I got circling. We're going to have to cover this and I'm glad you brought this up.
Speaker 1:My favorite record on here has been about that, featuring the little people who you already bought up with little city hold on which one of which one of them got the last verse. That's my bro, rufus sams. Yo, rufus is nasty like it was you jillo on the last album that caught my attention. It was rufus on on this album. I'm like I Am God is a God MC, but he keep finding God MCs. To rap with Rufus is like Rufus verse the cadence and the delivery and how he's catching the meter and the bars oh no, I hear all of that. I'm like, oh no, he done found another one. Where are you finding these dudes from for real?
Speaker 3:Me and Rufus first got in tune with each other. I want to say, in 2022. You know what I'm saying he was going by another name, weasel Sims. You know, in 2023, I want to say he put out his first project under Rufus Sims. So I mean, like I say, we're a big-ass conglomerate, like the city, big, but it's really small know what I'm saying? And all of us is like around the same age and I don't. I think this shit is destiny, like the best way to put it. I think this shit is meant to be. Because I quit call myself trying to quit rap I came back late 2019, put out my first project since coming back in 2020, and every year since then I've been running into like a bunch of raw ass artists from the crib that I didn't know exist. I was always familiar with Vic Spencer. Vic been doing it for a minute.
Speaker 1:Feel More Green. I know about Vic.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know what I'm saying, but it's like it's, bro, we got so many and I'm talking about the women too. You know what I'm saying Like the women too. Like I said it before and I'm going to keep saying it, I feel Chicago got the best MCs in the game right now, male or female. A lot of people are not going to agree because we're not out there like that. You know what I'm saying. You don't see our faces and hear our names like how you hear and see these other people. But if you would do your due diligence and tap into the names that I'll be mentioning in these interviews, you will see why I say what I'm saying. Like I feel like Chicago to me right now.
Speaker 3:What we doing, we feel like what New York was in the 90s how everybody is different. Some similarities, but everybody different. But everybody was raw as hell, everybody nice as fuck. I'm pulling up. That's how I feel about Chicago. We got so many fucking artists. Like it's impossible for me to get working with everybody. I would have to literally do a compilation, a double disc of some shit. That's how deep we is. You know what I'm saying. There's so many artists.
Speaker 1:On some Scarface, my homie shit. You'd have to do some my homie shit like Scarface yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's why a lot of the features is Chicago artists, because I don't want to. I as much as I talk in the music. I really don't have an ego about this shit, Like I won't. If it ain't me Cool, At least let one of these motherfuckers pop and be the next one. I'm cool with it not being me, as long as somebody from here you know what I'm saying can make that shit happen. That's what a whole Chicago never forget how to rap thing came from.
Speaker 3:It ain't, I Am God, never forgot how to rap. It's Chicago never forgot how to rap. This shit is for the crib. Like it's those of us that's in love with this shit that came up in this shit, passionate about this shit, and we didn't like the fact that everybody was just like connecting Chicago with drill and that was it. Like, yeah, we knew.
Speaker 3:That's what it was, and we knew that. That's what the, the, the popular sound was at the time. But we looking like we've been here too, fuck y'all talking about, like, I get it, you know what I'm saying. It's, it's, it's the new fad, it's the new trend, but I, we feel like in chicago, the artists and the lyricists got kind of like pushed to the, to the, to the background you know what I'm saying and we got a chip on our shoulder about that shit. You know what I'm saying. So, man, it's a lot of us. We be Brazil, out of hell. You can't tell me shit about Chicago right now.
Speaker 1:We pulling up, we pulling up this year, we pulling up. No, I'm pulling up, I'm pulling up. I'm telling you I'm pulling up this year. You have my word. I'm pulling up this year, I'm coming in.
Speaker 3:I'm telling you, we here, we out here.
Speaker 1:No, I'm pulling up. Yeah, I feel it. I'm pulling up. Yeah, yeah, fuck that other shit. Y'all got anything before? We get out of here. Yeah, just go to the music.
Speaker 3:More music, man, more music I'm trying to do, because every time I say that shit.
Speaker 4:It never comes to fruition.
Speaker 3:Just know that I'm out here for the 2025. Like I'm out here, like I know I normally hit y'all with like one project or two projects in a year. I'm trying to surpass that this year. You know what I'm saying. Like I'm really out here, like I'm making a conscious effort, you know, to get more work out. And I really want to show y'all that because, like a lot of artists that that have well, I ain't going to say a lot, but some artists that have put out a large volume of work within a year's span, I noticed people saying you can hear that they was doing a lot in a little amount of time. You can hear it in a quality. Like the quality may not be where it could be. I'm trying to show that you can put out a high volume of work within that time span and all that shit can be top tier. That's my mission for this year.
Speaker 4:I didn't have another question but you speaking to that right there I noticed he was kind of rolling with the format of the shorter projects, like present day 8, 9, ten tracks or whatever. So what's stopping you from maybe saying holding on to some songs and, instead of putting out two projects within the same year, put out one lengthier project and, you know, try to make that, you know, full in player. That's a classic. You know what I mean full-length player.
Speaker 3:That's a classic. You know what I mean. I think for that, when I get back to that, I do plan on at least dropping at least one super full-length project and that'll be probably like 14 joints. But my thing is, with the full-length projects I don't want to beat a dead horse. You know what I'm saying. After 14, I'm tapping out. Whether I'm tapping out what I'm listening, that's like the perfect number for me for albums 14 or 15. Yeah, Like for me it's 12 to 14.
Speaker 1:I feel like you talking 14 total records? Are you talking 14 actual songs?
Speaker 3:14 songs on a project, so 12 to 14 is the sweet spot for me. I feel like that's enough for me to say everything I need to say, for me to exhibit every type of style I want to show, for me to flex and check off every box as an emcee that I need to Anything more than that.
Speaker 1:Let me ask you something In that 12 to 14, how many guest appearances would you estimate for you to get your point across? For me, I tend to feel like a great artist can give you maybe nine solo records, but maybe another four or five records with contributions.
Speaker 3:Out of 14, I feel like five is maybe too many. If I'm doing 14 joints, three or four are going to have features, and that includes maybe a vocalist on a hook. You know what I'm saying?
Speaker 4:People have to pull up for you. People have to pull up for you versus you.
Speaker 1:Now when you say that it was written and only has 13 records. But let me try to run this down in my mind Foxy's on the hook on Watch them Niggas, so that would be one. It's a feature.
Speaker 3:But when I say feature, I mean like something prominent. Like somebody took up a whole verse.
Speaker 1:Somebody took up space oh no, there's not a lot of niggas taking up space when it was written.
Speaker 4:And it's 14 hit records if you count Solid Murder. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay.
Speaker 3:I can see what you're saying. I feel it. So 12, I'm looking to do maybe three. I feel like that number not gonna change whether it's 12 or 14, 12 or 14 songs. I'm looking for like three or four features because I want to also show that I'm a songwriter and that you know I'm saying like, I collaborate out of respect and out of just wanting, just respecting the artists and what they can do and, you know, wanting to push the envelope further as far as what I'm presenting.
Speaker 3:I don't collaborate out of necessity, and that's not to say I don't need any collaborators. You know what I'm saying. But I don't, I don't collaborate because I don't have what it takes to write a full song or to create a full song. I collaborate from a space of like. I respect this person and I think if we mesh our shit together, we can you know what I'm saying make something grow. I love to collaborate when I feel like you know the creative energy, match and even if like, if it's something different than what I do, it might be a challenge to me to try to match that and come into that person's world or bring them into mine. You know what I'm saying. So I love collaboration, but it's never done out of necessity.
Speaker 1:So I hate to bring this up because I do see the common similarity. Common felt like he had to leave Chicago to get his stardom and he wasn't wrong because it was when he moved to New York to get his stardom. And he wasn't wrong because it was when he moved to New York. Even though he got with a Detroit producer who was Dilla, it was in New York where it happened. Are you possibly afraid about not getting your fair shake by staying in the shot?
Speaker 1:Do you need to leave Chicago to become who you were supposed to be as an emcee in this game? Because the person even though I know Kanye had people ranked higher I think Common is still the greatest MC to come out of your city and when I look at his path, I do see some similarities to your path, but I'm also very clear in his path he had classic songs. He had all-time classic songs. He had classic albums, but it wasn't until he left Chicago that he actually became the all-time great that he became. Do you feel like you need to leave the shadow to become the all-time great?
Speaker 3:I definitely think I need to migrate just off, getting my name out there more. When I say migrate, I mean performing in different states, hitting other, bigger markets. As far as just like do I feel like I need to pick up and move? Maybe, but the way I look at it now it's a different era, like we're not picking up and moving for labels no more. You know what I'm saying. So it's kind of like we're doing what you would call underground hip hop, hip-hop like where, geographically, is underground hip-hop popping to where it's like it's all these opportunities and this is what you need to be. I don't think it's a place that exists like that for that specific genre of rap. I just think people move around based on opportunity and and what's popping in that specific uh uh, in that specific location. I'm not saying I don't need to move around, but I just don't think it's the same.
Speaker 3:I think back then the name of the game was getting a record deal, so you had to go where these labels was at. You know, nowadays, a record deal ain't really the thing you want to do. You know what I'm saying. So it's kind of like you migrating, but that's more so you trying to perform in different, in front of different demographics, in front of different audiences. You're trying to get your name out. You're trying to spread the messages as far and wide as you can.
Speaker 3:So, yes, I do need to migrate and, you know, get outside of Chicago, which I have, but I definitely need to do it more. You know more consistent. But as far as like picking up and moving, maybe I not gonna say no, I don't, but I'm not gonna say yeah, I have to. But I would definitely say yes, I do need to migrate and spread my wings absolutely, but that shit called that should take money. You can't just go nowhere.
Speaker 3:And you know I'm saying expect to be put on nobody's stage like I'm the one, like nah, like it's like I feel like I don't know the formula, but I feel like there is a formula. It's just about striking at the right time while the iron is hot and being consistent. My thing is my consistency always being able to maintain I feel like I can maintain a quality, but it's not having as many, uh, longer gaps within um projects. I ain't saying I gotta drop 10 times a year, but I also don't want to drop once a year or not even just twice a year, like I want to drop at least like three times a year and give you a little shit in between currency and bolding.
Speaker 1:You've made a great career out of doing that yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3:You got to man, you got to be a self starter, you got to basically live on the road. You know what I'm saying when you're doing this underground hip hop shit these days. That's what money coming from.
Speaker 1:Sean AG, y'all got anything before we wrap it up nah, bro, this is dope.
Speaker 2:This is dope. You got one at the park. I appreciate the fact that you allowed us to kind of pick your brain and get into your mind and your creativity. This is a blessing right here, bro, so we definitely appreciate that. For real, for real.
Speaker 3:I appreciate y'all anytime y'all extend a platform to me is always gratitude, because y'all don't have to do this.
Speaker 3:The way I look at it, like that's why I look at y'all and a few others as the real ones, because I don't have to be up here for y'all to acknowledge me and show love. I definitely appreciate that, because a lot of people say it's easier to make it today than it was back in the 90s or something. I kind of disagree, because this day and age you have to sift through so much shit to get to like the gym. You know, I'm saying and I don't think people want to condition themselves to do that, you get ear fatigue like that. So it's kind of like you, you settle with what you find that's to your liking. So I definitely appreciate y'all for continuously extending the platform, as I don't take it for granted. Like I said, I hold y'all in high regard, as I do a few others, and let's just keep putting on for the coaching, for the real rap shit and the real hip-hop together. I appreciate y'all. Much love and much gratitude.
Speaker 1:Appreciate you, bro. We appreciate you, man, congrats. I think I'm going to echo AG's sentiments. This is your most versatile and flexible project yet. All the great things that the MC does you do on this project and I'm impressed by it, so gratitude. We want you to get what you deserve too, you know that's what it's about for us. Yeah, we want you to get what you deserve too.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's love. I appreciate y'all man. I am God I am getting ahead without devolving. No mediocre. Chicago Never forgot a rap signing off. I appreciate y'all. Love y'all man. Peace bro.
Speaker 2:Peace.
Speaker 1:That was dope. That was dope. Next month will be five years that I've been doing podcasts. He's the best guy that I've come across since I've been doing this that doesn't have a cosign. And so listen to what I'm saying when I say this. I don't mean this to slight anybody. You have to understand somebody like AJ Snow, who we've interviewed. He has a Jansport. J Armin has a Scott Storch. I don't got nobody connected like that to him. You get what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:So when I'm supporting his stuff, people are like why is he behind him? It's like, oh no, I'm behind him because nobody has gotten behind him the way I feel. You feel what I'm saying, so I'm behind that shit right there. Because it's like, oh no and this is no disrespect to AJ or Armin but it's like, oh no, he's just as good as they are and they have official cosigns and so and not a lot of people know this, but the person that I built the last brand with knows oh, the main reason that I got into this was because I felt like, as an artist, I did not get a fair shake, like there wasn't proper support set up when the movement started changing, when the genre started changing, when the trend started changing.
Speaker 1:There wasn't proper support to let everybody exist in the space. The space used to exist as such that everybody could exist in the space, and so part of me existing in the podcast space was about wanting to promote anybody who I felt like have next, and I feel like he's one of those people that could have next, so I'm going to promote it, because that didn't exist when I was an actual rapper. Like that didn't exist. It was like you was either underground and you committed to being underground and you built your underground following and you lived off of it and you hoped, like a motherfucker, like pharrell or la reed or somebody will walk in the door one day and change your life. But if that shit didn't happen, it didn't happen. It didn't happen for 98 percent of people. You feel what I'm saying. Yeah, the way the game goes now, there's not even a hoop anymore. It's just like nah, you just out here. There ain't no more fellas. That's true. Yeah, there ain't even a hoop to jump through, no more we the hoop.
Speaker 1:yeah, no, I'm not joking and I'm not saying that to be arrogant and to bloviate in any sort of way, like when. I mean we the hoop, not like we, just us, like this hip-hop space that we exist in, we're the hoop that you got to jump through now. And so when I see him jumping through the hoops and being willing to jump through the hoops and I listen to the music and I'm like, oh no, that's the nicest motherfucker I heard jump through all these hoops in the last five years, in the last five years Without a.
Speaker 1:Coltside without a Scott Storch, without a James Fort Jay, without a Hit Boy. You get what I'm saying. Without all that shit, without even somebody like Crystal Glove, you know what I'm saying? He don't got none of that shit. He's actually the one that's putting me on the people's last few years. Every time I listen to one of his projects I find out about somebody else from Chicago I knew nothing about. And nigga, I'm not joking. I go on iTunes and they got a whole list of projects lined up and I'm like, oh, these motherfuckers outside, I gotta tap into those artists that he got featured. Yeah, jujilla on the last one, on the Lost Souls that started off, the last project. Jujilla got projects like on iTunes. Yeah, like he ain't just messing with people that got work. What do you mean these dudes is working? Oh no, they all getting independent, like in plugging it up into the system and like oh yeah, like they ready to go.
Speaker 1:They just need the proper cosine. In these days and times Like the cosine actually matters now more than it did even when we were coming up in this hip hop shit and learning about it, because now, if you don't have a cosine, you might just be resigned to existing in this space. Whenhop shit and learning about it, because now, if you don't have a cosign, you might just be resigned to existing in this space. When you're greater than that, yeah.
Speaker 2:Lil Wayne told me.
Speaker 1:I met Wayne before Drake and Nicki got signed Me and him. I had a conversation with him. He told me about Drake and Nicki one time.
Speaker 2:You get what I'm saying yeah, like before.
Speaker 1:He's like, no, no, he's like. I like what you're doing, but he's like but I'm going somewhere because the music is going here. And he was right, you feel what I'm saying. But they got plugged into his system when he was the man. That's part of why they became who they were. Didn't nobody know who Drake was? The music was great. The music was great. The shit that Drake was making before was great. The shit that 50 was making before M and Dre was great. Right, yeah, let's have a game get played now. We the co-sign now, because those motherfuckers don't pull up and co-sign nobody, no more. It's like Jermaine Dupri said it don't make sense for me, as a label executive, to sign an artist to an album deal anymore. These spams are coming crazy.
Speaker 2:My bad, I'm trying to get these spams out the way. Shit, they come out of nowhere. But no, that's a good point, because that's why it's so important that we do what we do. You know what I mean we in North Carolina with LT and his hood, reflecting on his life and his catalog, and shout out to LT in the chat tonight as well. You know what I mean Pulling up and showing love with I Am God.
Speaker 2:You know we got rappers over there in Vegas hitting us up, you know, wanting to get our opinion on their music. You know what I mean. Shout out to J-Sop from Vegas, you know, asking can we come out to Vegas to A&R's project? You know what I mean. Because they respect the fact that we are unbiased and we're giving out, we're giving specific points and opinions on things. I mean. Shout out to New Orleans Juve Tuesdays. You know we in there we got young artists out of New Orleans who want to spit and want to come out here and show that, show what they can do on our platform out here and show what they can do on our platform.
Speaker 1:Jack in Las Vegas want us to A&R his project. Not crazy, Jack.
Speaker 2:No, no, no. I said Jay Sa, Jay Sa. He's the guy that sent you guys his music about a month ago. Yes, yes, yes, he's asking us to come and do A&R's project when he get back into the studio in the summer. You know what I mean. We got stuff on tap in New summer. You know what I mean. We got stuff on Tapping New Orleans.
Speaker 1:I will fly out there and do that shit. Yes, I will.
Speaker 2:It's important that platforms like Hip Hop Talks we give the authentic riff we're not out here doing. Let me relax. We're doing it for the people. We're not doing it for nothing else but the people. I'm glad that the audience see that, big or small, or in between Pause, I'm glad they're seeing that.
Speaker 1:In between Wow, I said pause.
Speaker 2:before I said it, though you know what I mean. Can we get to the proceedings? I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:That's me being childish. I'm just saying no, no, no. That was me that Childish, no that was me, I was being childish.
Speaker 2:I want to apologize.
Speaker 1:Let's get the new music. Let's get the new music, new music. So Clips, mike Tyson, blow to the Face. Yes, a lot of people feel like I'm getting worried that this is not necessarily going on the new Clips album, that this is not necessarily going on the new clips album, that this is actually part of a Pharrell movie project and it's going to be on the soundtrack to the Pharrell movie project. Did I just crack everybody's face and fuck your day up with that? No, it's a bad. Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 4:I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know I. You really made me excited for the project bro.
Speaker 1:No, I think, not confirmed. But I have been told that Pharrell has a movie coming out and that this is actually might be more connected to the movie project than the actual Clips album. Hence only getting the push of T. And because I was wondering, I can't front guys. When I was listening to the content I was like how is no Malice not malice, how is no malice going to wrap over the Mike Tyson blow to the face. And when you mean blow to the face, he's not talking about a right hook or an uppercut, nigga, he's not talking about an uppercut. He's not talking about 88. Mike knocking out speaks. That's not the type of blow to the face that Pusha T talks about.
Speaker 4:But that's not the type of blow to the face that Pusha T talks about. But that's always what made them brilliant, was that juxtaposition? Even before he became no Malice, he always talked about the remorse of it all.
Speaker 1:The remorse exists on Hell. Have no Fury. The remorse is evident until the casket drops. Or, lord willing, these niggas are some dope peddling ass niggas. That was the introductionket drops. Or, lord willing, these niggas are some dope peddling ass niggas. That was the introduction man. No, these motherfuckers are dope boy, fresh on, lord willing. They are pushing keys of cocaine and they are fucking pimping hoes and talking shit in the process of pimping hoes and pushing cocaine. Alright, that's what they are doing. Lord willing has contrition to it. Until the casket drops is when you hear it. But blow to the face, nigga. It definitely feels like more like a Pharrell Pusha T thing than a Clipse thing. What say to you of the fact that it ends up on a Pharrell-produced movie? Ass, I don't know what the fuck is going on anymore. The album is taking too goddamn long. Been hearing about this shit since last summer, pissing me off.
Speaker 4:They're waiting on a feature. Nobody waiting on that feature no more.
Speaker 1:Like Rakim said, nobody's been this long waiting since Jesus.
Speaker 4:The rumor was the feature was Kendrick, but then it was a rumor swirling that the feature was done. So I don't know what the holdup is. But that just messed me up because when I heard the snippet I became really excited for the album. I said okay, jesus was gone three days, not for three years.
Speaker 1:This is taking forever, right. Three days, three days in the comeback. You got to turn back around. They should know these motherfuckers so dope, they should know what the comeback look like. It don't take this long for the comeback when you cook it shit. It's taking forever forever.
Speaker 2:Let's put it off. Let's get over with. Stop playing around with it alright.
Speaker 1:In other news nobody talked about the fact that West Side Gun just dropped 12 because mostly he said that he was retired and he wasn't dropping the album. But you know, whatever record actually turned out to be pretty good, just dropped 12 because mostly he said that he was retired and he wasn't dropping an album, but you know, whatever Record actually, turned out to be pretty good Guys.
Speaker 2:Thoughts on West Side Guns 12?. What's wrong with you, man? You want to go fresh on these? Niggas are so sick of all this shit, nigga.
Speaker 1:You want to know what I'm going to tell you the truth. This is why I fuck what I have got. I don't have to deal with none of this other shit. What I have got. He's like yo guess what? I got a project coming. Here's the preview to the project. Here's the project. Can I get an interview when you need me to pull up? Can you pull up? Man, I'll be there. All right, have a good time, good night. Here's why the fuck can't this shit be so simple?
Speaker 4:Crazy. Yeah, fnlb, need to like moderate the chat or something, but anyway the project. Oh man, like I really love this West Side Gun project, but for me you want to talk about an album, need to hurry up and drop. We need that Stove God. We need that Stove God. It's a run of three or four songs in the beginning of the album. They all got Stove God on it and it just made me want more Stove God content.
Speaker 4:That's 055, crazy yeah, he got a whole four track run on the album where Stove God is just going off man and I'm like man, when are we going to finally get that project? But you know, the man of the hour is Westside Gun. This is his project. What I want to ask y'all? I really enjoy this and it might even crack my top five Westside projects.
Speaker 2:Sean your turn. No man, you don't think. No, no, ag. Oh, no man. Sean your turn.
Speaker 4:No man, you know what I'm saying no AG oh no, man, this joint is pretty tough bro first of all, it's not better than B side of 10 right, yes, that's in my top 5 it's not better than pray for Paris pray for Paris is number 1.
Speaker 1:It's not better than pray for paris. Pray for paris is number one.
Speaker 4:It's not better than blinds hell yeah, no, no, I'm agreeing with you.
Speaker 2:So that's three so you're going to need to trouble bro like that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:This is going hard man pause, hold on.
Speaker 1:Can I submit something to you? So here's my problem with it, and I had to be honest with myself about it because people press me about it. What's they look like? What Mobb Deep would have looked like if Mobb Deep would have kept on doing what they're doing. But what Mobb Deep was doing wasn't working at the same clip that it was working at after Murder, please.
Speaker 4:Say that again because I didn't follow.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay. So the aesthetic, the hip-hop aesthetic that they follow, yes, yes, right, people like they brought East Coast you know rap back East Coast, you know rap back East Coast gangster rap back. But really they brought that Mobb Deep shit back more than anything else. Is that fair? I've always likened them to the locks more than Mobb Deep. But I see where you're going. I think style-wise they're more Mobb Deep. If you want to say lyrically they're more locks, I'll give you that because I get what you're saying, because it's prodigy when you're talking lyrically. And you got KISS styles and chic. That's fucking bar seminar shit every time they step to the mic. So I feel what you're saying on that AG. I mean the aesthetic, the feel, the way the music feel, not the bars. The way the music feel, music feel, not the bars. The way the music feel. It's hard to keep recreating that sound at a high clip is what I am finding out.
Speaker 4:You get what I'm saying. That's just.
Speaker 1:That's just what, uh, I and god just got through talking about is giving different looks every time out you know, yeah, well, okay, so because he's, he's in the same kind of well, he's younger than us but he's in the same roundabout bracket as us, so he has watched somebody like a mob deep Quite. Frankly, I mean, let's just call it what it is. Even though the first three albums after Juvenile Hill are great, they are progressively worse. It's hard to keep that aesthetic. We're clear that the Infamous is the best album, right?
Speaker 2:That's not clear to me, because I love Hell on Earth.
Speaker 1:No, even if you prefer Hell on Earth, we're clear that the Infamous is the best album because of the songs. Right, I'm?
Speaker 4:not Me and Sean had this conversation last night, I'm not clear.
Speaker 2:He's not clear. It's got a little.
Speaker 1:Okay, Sean.
Speaker 4:We just talked about this last night. No, no, no.
Speaker 1:God damn it. We're doing intervention live on air. Ag, respectfully speaking and I say this respectfully as somebody that loves the production on Hell on Earth and actually think that, prodigy, it might be Havoc's best beat tape, it might be Prodigy's best mic performance, but here's the reality of the matter. Ag Survival of the fittest Eye for an eye.
Speaker 4:The songs are too big Give up the goods Shook ones.
Speaker 1:You're just not fucking with the songs.
Speaker 3:Sam, the highs are too high, you can't win with the songs.
Speaker 1:You can't win with the songs, so it is the infamous. If you want to talk, if you want to break it down and get into, like, the intricacies of art and be like, oh well, beat for beat, havoc is better with the drums, because the drums actually are better on hell on earth than they are on the infamous.
Speaker 4:Well, here's how I look at hell on earth versus the infamous, and it's a tough argument. I look at the infamous like Jordan in his 88 season defensive player of the year scoring title dunk contest what? But no, he was MVP that year. They robbed him MVP. He was MVP in 88. He didn't win the chip, though, and I look at hell on earth like 91, mike, where everything came together you know what I'm saying and he didn't have as much individual accolades that year, but he won the chip.
Speaker 1:You know what I'm saying? How about this? The people, that shit. What people remember my beat for? Oh, that's, on the Infamous, what we as hip-hop heads remember them, for Might be a hell of a lot. But what hip-hop remember them for is on the infamous. It's their album. I'll say that to illustrate is that for the style of music that it's being done, it is hard to progressively get better.
Speaker 4:You usually progressively get worse they have three five month albums in a row yeah.
Speaker 1:So it's like are those three albums classic? Yeah, but them classics is built different. Hell on earth ain't classic the way that the infamous is classic. It's like are those three albums classic? Yeah, but them classics is built different. Hell on Earth ain't classic the way that the Infamous is classic and Murder Music ain't classic the way Hell on Earth is classic. There's no reason for it. And so the same thing is happening to Griselda. Okay, somebody is pulling up talking about Okay, thank you, we get spams. I just say that to say that there are levels to what they are doing. And so I say this to say my biggest problem with this album is that this album is really, really fucking dope, that they have actually done this better before, and so they are the victim of their own success in a lot of ways, because, quite frankly because quite frankly stove I'm so tired of stove sounding great that I almost don't want a stoveove album anymore. Ag.
Speaker 4:I'm not going to say that.
Speaker 1:No, no, no. Listen to what I'm saying. You've given so many albums worth of material away that I'm starting to wonder what it looks like as a solo artist, Because I used to look at it like a Method man thing. You looked at it like a Method man thing. That was three years ago when I looked at it like that. Ag Meth put out a few solo projects.
Speaker 4:Stove has too much flair to not put out anything else. Like dude's a star man, oh and speaking of Method man, which album. Does our bar seminar come from?
Speaker 1:His best verse. His best verse does a Jose Canseco His best verse. First of all, y'all picked that. Sean picked the extortion verse. Sean picked the extortion verse and it's not even a mob beat. No, no, no, I'm cool with extortion. I love Method man on extortion.
Speaker 2:It's great.
Speaker 1:It's no Shadowbox and or Woo Gambino's, but it's damn good.
Speaker 1:It's not even everything, but it's Method man. He might be the best 16-bar guest appearance guy ever, but what I'm saying is that even what Stove is suffering from is the fact that, no, guys, his best verse is still Jose Canseco. That's off the Fly God 2 album in 2020. That's still his best verse. Reasonable Drought is 2020. That was five years ago, guys. So, even when we're talking about the Stove album, are you sure the Sobe album's going to be great? Because, guys, we've been waiting for the Sobe album. Listen to this. We've been waiting for the Sobe album for over four years now. Are y'all sure the Sobe album's going to be great? Because he done gave him Vogue cover Ava Rex 99, Ava Rex. You get what I'm saying. He done gave Sobe Stove put a lot of shit out. He might have spent the wheel when he should have been keeping shit in the bag. I hope he kept shit in the bag. We got to say that.
Speaker 4:You was talking about the best album since 2017. Stove has arguably a top five to ten album since 2020. You know what I mean. So, and then plus his features.
Speaker 1:He has a top 20 album since 2020. Top 20?. I think it's top 10 hold on hold on back up in the last 5 years.
Speaker 4:You think it's you can name 19 albums better than Reasonable Drop in the last 5 years no, you can better name Cheat Codes is better than Cheat Codes.
Speaker 1:I don't have Cheat Codes Better than Reasonable Drop in the last five years. No, you can better name it Cheat Codes is better than Cheat Codes.
Speaker 4:I don't have Cheat Codes higher than Reasonable Drop.
Speaker 1:You don't think Cheat Codes is better than Reasonable Drop? I do not. I'm going to have this conversation with you.
Speaker 2:Production alone clears it. I don't want to talk to you.
Speaker 1:No, I don't want to talk to you.
Speaker 4:I don't want to talk.
Speaker 1:No gold teeth in Aquamarine is better than everything on Reasonable Drop.
Speaker 2:Production alone clears it. The production.
Speaker 1:Danger Mouse's production job on Cheat Codes is severely underrated. I do not think Reasonable Drop is better than Cheat Codes. It's dope. I would like to put that up for a poll.
Speaker 4:I just think that would be hard pressed to name 19 albums. Better Than Reasonable Drought In the past 5 years bro.
Speaker 1:I mean, no, what you're saying, that's not that unreasonable. When I'm saying it's top 20, I'm saying that it's like, well, if you're actually going by years, how about this? Do you think it's better than King's Disease 1?
Speaker 4:Probably I mean no, it's close, but I'll give the edge to KD1.
Speaker 1:Okay, so listen to what you're saying. If you're saying you're giving the edge to KD1, then Six and Nas' projects are already ahead.
Speaker 4:I want to put Magic 2 above it. I want to put Magic 2 above it.
Speaker 1:I want to put Magic 2 above it. He's already in sixth place, just off the Nas projects. Are you sure it's top 20 in the last five years? Based on what you said, he's starting off at sixth. If we're starting off the Nas projects, pray for Paris came out in 2020, so he's at seventh.
Speaker 4:So did Alfredo, sold separately. That's nine. I'm running out.
Speaker 1:That's it From a king to a god. No, you think reasonable growth is better than from a king to a god. I do, I'll stationhead you and I'll wax that ass.
Speaker 4:I've already done it Coop and.
Speaker 1:I lost Shout out to Trey. Shout out to Trey. You've already done it. Coop. And I lost Shout out to Tripe. You've already done it. You've already done it. I tried it against Sean and Tripe and I lost. Hold on. If y'all think reasonable drought is better than from a king to a god, y'all are overrating. Reasonable drought From a king to a god is one of the five best bar seminars of the last 10 years.
Speaker 4:Reasonable Drought has everything there's just so many quotables. The production, just like that. He gained so much equity with that album that's why I'm still anticipating the next one. I'm sorry I'm not there. I love Reasonable.
Speaker 1:Drought. I love Reasonable Drought. It is of in my time of doing this. It'll be five years next month that I've been doing this. It is the most impressive time of doing this. It'll be five years next month that I've been doing this. It is the most impressive album that I've heard from somebody that I knew nothing about before I did this. Of course, if we're talking about that, but it's not better from a king to a god Reasonable. Drought's not better from a king to a god?
Speaker 4:no way, no way not we have to agree to disagree not, I'm sorry, and listen to what I'm saying when I no way, not we have to agree to disagree.
Speaker 1:Not, I'm sorry, and listen to what I'm saying when I say this Conway is way too versatile on From a King to a God for y'all to be saying that about him. Because Reasonable Drought has one theme, has one content, has one style and has one flow and he's great in that flow. But Conway is all over the place from a king to a god in a brilliant way. Flow. But conway is all over the place from a king to a god in a brilliant way. Conway is trading bars with method man. He is doing doing mob deep shit with havoc. He is pulling beats from everywhere. He is doing shit with armani. He is pulling shit.
Speaker 4:Yeah, no, he no, he was speaking of method man and speaking of versatility. Me and uh sean already established early in the show tupac was more versatile than method man or torictly, but we still have Takao better than Strictly. So versatility isn't everything.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah. But just because y'all said that, don't mean y'all right. Y'all can be wrong, which you are? You just happen to be wrong. No, no, no, no, no, no, ag, I like no, no, no, y'all thought T'Kal is better than Strictly for my niggas. Y'all was just wrong about it. It's nothing wrong. It's nothing wrong with y'all being wrong.
Speaker 4:I'm used to y'all being wrong, we'll put these polls up.
Speaker 1:We'll put T'Kal up against Strictly. On the socials, we'll put the polls up. I didn't even think that was a conversation. I didn't think it was a conversation, but okay, I'll put them up right now.
Speaker 4:I'm here to enlighten Coop Apparently.
Speaker 1:Apparently, apparently, apparently, apparently, apparently. I am the problem, I'm the one that needs help.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:We're here, we got a super chat. No, no, you're not here, we got to go. Double barrel 12 is fire. Can't stop playing. Shout out to y'all. No, it is fire. It's just like. How many times have they made this piece of fire over this wood, on this log? When we talk about Mobb Deep's catalog not being top 10 all time for a group sometimes, okay, 007-499, queens, get the money. Slow down, coop. Murder music was a moment. There were bangers there. Don't forget to wear your heart out. Mobb Deep forever. Yes, no, I actually. How about this? The songs on murder music are actually more enjoyable to listen to than the songs on Murder Music are actually more enjoyable to listen to than the songs on Hell on Earth. That don't make them better.
Speaker 4:Okay, I feel you using, I feel that they you know the part that you're using it as an analogy or an example or whatever, but I don't think it's fair to Griselda to use Mobb Deep's shortcomings against them Because you know their approach to releasing music has been totally different than mobs well, I'm using.
Speaker 1:I'm using mob deep as actually a good marker, because using the locks isn't a high marker in terms of album making. That's why I'm using my.
Speaker 4:But gazelle releases projects at a way higher clip than what mob did. And if you, you know just the law, you know percentages and stuff if you put more shots up, the chances are you're going to miss more the more you take, so hold on.
Speaker 1:So when I said that you could put the Griselda catalog up against the Mob catalog for 50 songs and Griselda might win, people looked at me like I was crazy and I was like no, y'all thinking about Mobb Deep's 20 best songs. What about the next 30? About the volume? So I'm clear on the thing that you're talking about, but the reality of the matter is, in terms of their album making ability, they're closer to mob deep than they are the locks because, quite frankly, in my opinion, pray for paris. It's pretty much better than anything that the locks ever made.
Speaker 4:Yeah, because that has more classic material laying around. But in a versus I think they would still lose against the Mobs catalog because the Mobs are too beloved. You know what?
Speaker 1:I'm saying I think the Locks is losing to the Mob. That's what I'm saying, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:How about this? How about this? How about this? Jadakiss can't kick that. Who shot you? Freestyle against Mobb Beat. Mobb Beat, just come, drop shook ones.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's not going to work.
Speaker 2:Or give up the goods. That's not going to work in that area.
Speaker 1:They got fucking. They're like oh, you dropped that. Be like, that's cute, nigga. We got five of those, let's go.
Speaker 4:Listen, I love Jada, but that ain't going to work there.
Speaker 1:That ain't going to work against Mobb.
Speaker 4:That's what.
Speaker 2:I'm saying Not against Mobb, let's keep it a buck. Even Outkast would have a long day missing with Mobb.
Speaker 1:No hold on. I personally think that Outkast's catalog is better than Mobb Deep, but if we're picking 20 songs it's a long day. No, I'm ahead. So I already know what the shit sounds like when it drops. Like how about this Players Ball? Don't feel the way Survival of the the fittest feel when it drops. Like, most people's introduction to Mobb Deep is survival of the fittest. Most people's introduction to OutKast is players' ball. Oh, that ain't the type of introduction in terms of how the shit grip you. Well, I'll give your versatility point.
Speaker 4:Some credence there, because going up against OutKast, if they were to win which it would be close it would be based off the versatility alone and I think nothing else.
Speaker 1:How about this With Mobb Deep? This is the thing between Mobb Deep and OutKast. For Mobb Deep you can just play Mobb Deep's bangers. For OutKast you'd have to think about it to beat Mobb Deep, and that's the problem. You would have to think about it to beat Mobb Deep, and that's the problem. You would have to play certain records to offset certain shit. You'd have to think outside the box, because just playing Outkast quote-unquote bangers like the hits, the singles, oh then you're not. You would have to get heavy in an ATLians bag to lose Mobb Deep. If you just pick the records just standing straight up and down, that people know between Mob and OutKast, mob would probably win like 13 to like 8.
Speaker 2:You'd have to pick some shit, but it's too much for almost everybody, though it's too much for almost everybody, you understand.
Speaker 1:Mob people give NWA, public Enemy, epmd, de La Soul, tribe the Roots. Anybody Mob, give anybody a problem. You understand that right, it's a long day. Like to me they're a borderline top five group all the time. Like no, they a problem Because they high-level shit. Their high-level shit is what East Coast Gangsta Rap is based off of, quite frankly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4:So what we got next? Fellas.
Speaker 1:In news. We have reasonable doubt oh we got more new music First. Is there more new music? Why? I thought we covered Westside.
Speaker 4:The boy dropped a project no not there yet let's.
Speaker 2:We finished off with that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're almost there. Yeah, but reasonable doubt by Jay-Z did get inducted into Grammys Hall of Fame. Okay, sean, sean, you're the player hater extraordinaire of the bunch, not a hater? You're not a hater, you just crush a lot, right, Crush an ass. Go ahead and talk nigga, this is crazy.
Speaker 2:Anybody who think that this is cool.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, it's okay, it's perfectly okay, sean, wait what Sean?
Speaker 2:I'm okay with it being in there at some point, Paul, but not before Illmatic.
Speaker 2:There you go, okay, you don't defrog Illmatic and go to this. It's not right, it's not culturally right, it's not ethically right, it's not morally right. This is ridiculous. And if Coop thinks that this is cool, then shame on Coop, shame on our Cooper, because this is ridiculous. There is no damn way that Reasonable Doubt should be getting some kind of Hall of Fame, of Grammys or anything before Reasonable, I mean before Illmatic, or even it Was Written. I'll put it Was Written in a Hall of Fame.
Speaker 4:But let's not make it a Jay-Z Nas thing. Sean 36 Chambers is not in there, right? No?
Speaker 2:It's not right.
Speaker 3:I mean stuff like that, if it preceded it.
Speaker 4:If it's other classic albums that preceded it that's eligible, then I think, with what you're saying, those should get in first.
Speaker 2:Okay with it. Run it back. Start at the inception of the years. Don't just leapfrog all these other perfect projects to put this in that. It doesn't make sense.
Speaker 3:I'm sorry, it just doesn't make sense and I love Reasonable Doubt.
Speaker 2:I think Reasonable Doubt is his number one album.
Speaker 1:It's one of the best rap albums ever.
Speaker 2:He said one, or did he say one, or did he say D? You're right, it's one. He was about to get triggered. Oh my god, it's about to be bad. It's about to be bad.
Speaker 4:It's about to be bad. Sean was about to be like I'm changing my flight. Sean had a palpitation.
Speaker 1:Look here, sean.
Speaker 4:Sean. Sean clutched his pearls. Sean.
Speaker 1:AG. Sean was about to change his flight and come to Atlanta Like where is this thing? He's about to change his flight. The whole.
Speaker 4:Sean was about to change his flight and come to Atlanta, Like where is the scene? He's about to change his flight. He's about to change his flight. The whole flight was about to change.
Speaker 1:Did you know the flight was about to change? The whole flight was about to change. Okay, okay, okay, yo, that's crazy. Here's the reality of the matter. Ag, you want to go, or should I go?
Speaker 4:What's up? I'm gonna echo those sentiments. Who would it be in there? It definitely should be there, but I do think we should start earlier on in hip hop and go like don't leapfrog other legendary albums. So like, when did the Grammy start? Does anybody know? They started rewarding us in 1989, 1988, with Fresh Prince okay, then I think you should start there, and then you know 88, 89.
Speaker 1:That's my whole thing with. Go ahead, aj. I want you to finish.
Speaker 4:No, no, no. I was just saying like you should start. You know Payton Full was 87, but let's start with classic albums that came around in that era when the Grammys first started, and then keep down the line. I think that's more fair. I don't want to make it a like Illmatic or it was written kind of deal.
Speaker 1:But so what I was about to say, let's not make it an Illmatic thing, let's make it a hip hop thing. So I don't disagree with what Sean is saying. I'm more in line with what you were saying, hg. Let's make it. No, you missed it. Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back. There you go, I'm okay with it.
Speaker 1:You missed the Greatest Adventures of Slick Rick. You missed America's Most Wanted. You missed Death Certificate. You missed Doggy style. You missed the chronic. You missed enter the wu-tang. You missed illmatic. You missed ready to die. You missed only built for cuban links and like in the infamous like. So let's not. Let's understand who jay is and understand that. Let's put the pressure on jay to highlight the fact that those albums that his ass was raised on, that he talks about so glowingly, didn't make it before him. Because, not being funny, he got a bad habit of pulling up in this shit like he was the first motherfucker to do it, knowing good and damn well he wasn't the first. Cause he'll talk in a rap about how he rode other people's coattails, but then he'll pull up to the ceremony like first nigga to do it. It's like no, you weren't Cool. G Rap was the first nigga and he made a song about it and then he talked about it. It wasn't you.
Speaker 2:So that's what needed to happen.
Speaker 1:I got a controversial question for both of y'all. No, for real, jamie, just step to the mic and be like motherfucking painful. It takes a nation to millions. That's the hater in you talking. We going to pray about it.
Speaker 4:The speech that he gave for Beyonce at the Grammys last year. He's not going to do that for hip-hop as a culture. No, you know he's not going to do that. But I got a controversial question for both of y'all because I like where we're going with this. So if we do that, you know, for acknowledge the early years of hip-hop forward versus, you know, other albums. Leapfrogging is your buy-in to get inducted. Like what if that album was? You said they started honoring us in 1989. What if said album was never up for a Grammy Award that respective year? Should you still get consideration?
Speaker 1:Is now a good time to say fuck them Krakows.
Speaker 4:Yo, that's crazy.
Speaker 1:That is crazy, that's crazy.
Speaker 4:Cuban Pia da Cooper is of his own. But no, but for real, if Reasonable Doubt wasn't nominated for a Grammy in 96, should that be the buy-in or no? You see what I'm saying. Every year they go through the cycle of hip-hop albums that should make it. Do you think that the buy-in should be? Well, at least at one point had to be a Grammy nominee to be inducted.
Speaker 2:Yes and no. I see where you're going with that, because that's very difficult, because revision is history, right? It's like going back and say let me go back and re-rate this actual album. I didn't put it at five when it first came out. Let me go back and do a do-over. That's no different than a Grammy. If you didn't get a nom back, then, then how can you retroactive that nom to say he should be in that category? Who's what? Here's the thing. What criteria?
Speaker 1:are you using? I'm trying to think who are the Grammy nominees in 96.
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 4:It would have been for 95.
Speaker 1:No, no, that's 95. No no, no the 96 Grammy winner would have been from the awards in 95, so that's Naughty by Nature, with Poverty's Paradise, because that's 1995. That's the return to the 36 chambers. Got nominated, let me check real quick, I feel like that as far as 96, right In terms of the year the award got handed out?
Speaker 4:Yeah, because it's the next cycle year that it's the next cycle.
Speaker 1:So then, that's the Poverty Paradise year, which, by the way, is Naughty by Nature's worst album.
Speaker 4:I mean that raises the question should the winning albums be inducted to the Grammy Gangsta?
Speaker 2:Paradise 1996. Huh, gangsta Paradise 1996.
Speaker 1:Oh, Coolio, Coolio. Okay, that's still a 95 record, though Hold on for album.
Speaker 2:He won for best rap solo performance.
Speaker 1:Right, what one album. Yeah, the album should be.
Speaker 4:Poverty's Paradise Rap album. Was that even a category in 96, though?
Speaker 1:No, it is Poverty's Paradise by Naughty, by Nature, I think. Let me see.
Speaker 2:Where's the Jeopardy?
Speaker 4:music when you need it.
Speaker 2:No, I don't see it. It's not showing up. Gucci's won in 97, but I don't think 96 had one for hip-hop 96 didn't have one.
Speaker 1:No, no, no. 96 had a Naughty by Nature won in 96. I'm pretty certain Poverty's Paradise came out in 95. That was craziest and fill me flow.
Speaker 2:Somebody help me out with this. I don't, I just started pulling up. Somebody in the chat help me out with this.
Speaker 3:I don't see it anywhere.
Speaker 2:But be as it may, you dropped the ball, bro. Yeah, it started. Lp said it started in 96. So if it started in 96. If it started in 96, then that would be the Fugees.
Speaker 4:But Fugees would have been nominated in 97, would it not? Yes, no, because it was the 97 Grammys where Puff and Wu-Tang were up for the rap album. No, it's.
Speaker 1:Naughty by Nature, guys, it's.
Speaker 2:Naughty by Nature.
Speaker 1:Yeah, naughty by Nature won in 1996 for Poverty's Paradise. Yeah, I just remember because that's what really started the ODB shit, because ODB lost that year. So when he went up with the Wu-Tang for the children shit, it's because ODB lost. And then Wu-Tang lost Because, think about it, that was back to back, that was kind of like within two out of three years, where he was like hold on?
Speaker 4:That's kind of all I'm asking. Okay, naughty got an actual Grammy win and granted the Grammys are the Grammys, and we say they're out of touch, we don't care about it, whatever, but all.
Speaker 1:I'm asking is Until they do it, right, then we'd be like, oh, we care.
Speaker 4:All I'm asking is are the former hip-hop album winners? Do they get consideration, or are they going back and just acknowledging classic albums?
Speaker 1:Okay, so here's how I feel like I think that I'm not sure when the best album thing started happening. I feel like night naughty by nature might have been the first group to win best rap album, because when dj jazzy, jeff and fresh prince won, it was for best rap performance, not best rap album. So I don't, I do not know when best rap album became a thing, so Naughty by Nature might be the first ones to win best rap album, though.
Speaker 4:The other side of things. It behooves the Grammys to give Jay this award because he did his whole complaint speech last year. Beyonce finally won for the country album this year and they honored him this year. It's all lining up with, you know, everything that's transpired over the last year or so. It deserves to be there, but the optics are what they are. You know what.
Speaker 1:I mean AG is like it's a conspiracy.
Speaker 4:He's niggas C-O-N conspiracy he's trying to kill.
Speaker 1:J&B. He's like they're trying to take rid of J&B. Yeah.
Speaker 4:But nah, it should be there. But I'm with Sean, it shouldn't leapfrog other albums, but I don't want to make it just the Illmatic thing. It's a lot of albums that. I would put in ahead of Reasonable Doubt.
Speaker 1:Right, okay, so how about this? If you think Reasonable Doubt is a top 20 rap album and I can respect that understand that there's at least 10 to 12 albums that come out before at least Like bare minimum. No matter how high that you think about Reasonable Doubt, it probably will deserve this honor before Reasonable Doubt. And that's like bare minimum. No matter how high that you think about reasonable doubt, that probably will deserve this honor before reasonable doubt. And that's the problem with it.
Speaker 4:It's like oh no, they're 10 to 12 albums before reasonable doubt Better. We're all in agreement there.
Speaker 1:Better. It's not about the greatness of reasonable doubt, it's like oh no, those of us that know know that there are about 10 to 12 albums before reasonable doubt that are better. See look, look, look, look. Rewind one year. See the infamous by Mobb Deep, and Only Built for Cuban League.
Speaker 4:We just talked about Me Against the World.
Speaker 1:Yeah, see Illmatic ready to die.
Speaker 4:enter the Wu-Tang this is controversial but I think Reasonable Doubt is better than Ready to Die, but that's just me.
Speaker 1:I used to think that and I'm going to tell you where Ready to Die wins the production is so superior on Ready to Die. You can't say that the songs are bigger and the production is better, and you can't tell me that Jay is that much thicker than Big Nah.
Speaker 4:I actually disagree on all those accounts.
Speaker 1:You think the production is better? On Reasonable Doubt I don't. Oh no, oh no, oh no.
Speaker 4:You got three Primo beats, Like I mean.
Speaker 1:Oh them, three Primo beats. How about this? Not one of those three primo beats is better than the one primo beat he gave big Not one.
Speaker 4:I'd put the evils up there, but that's a whole other conversation for another day. That's a whole other.
Speaker 1:Let me ask you something Do you think the evils is a better song than Everyday Struggle? Yeah?
Speaker 2:Yes, okay, yes. Whoa better song than Everyday Struggle? Yeah, yes, okay, yes.
Speaker 4:Whoa, sean gave Jay some credit. Okay, that's great, I thought it was Jay like devil?
Speaker 2:Hold on hold on, hold on hold on.
Speaker 1:Watch this, hold on, watch this. Where's the Evils all time? In terms of Jay catalog, in terms of a song, it's a top five song.
Speaker 4:if he is right, it's definitely up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, where's.
Speaker 4:Everyday Struggle for me.
Speaker 1:It's not in this top five to me. All right, there we go. That's my whole point. But those songs are comparable and that's why Ready to Die is better than Reasonable Doubt, because Jay's best song. They are comparable, they are comparable.
Speaker 4:Who said they were comparable, other than you? I said they were comparable.
Speaker 1:They're comparable because you literally compared them. But I told you what. What's the best song on? Ready to Die to you, ag?
Speaker 4:I'm gonna go with. Actually, my favorite is Unbelievable, but I'm gonna go with shit. I love Warning man. I mean I really love Warning from storytelling the beat, just everything he does on there rapping the two different voices. He does everything that can be done on a song you think Warning is the best song on Radio Day? I mean, I would objectively say so.
Speaker 1:Sean things done, change y'all think both of those say so, sean, things don't change. Y'all think both of those records are better than Everyday Struggle, I think.
Speaker 4:Juicy's better than Everyday Struggle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, y'all are tripping.
Speaker 4:Juicy's one of the greatest songs of all time bro.
Speaker 1:I personally think Juicy is Okay. So I'm going to tell you what I think I Get Around by Tupac is overrated, and I think Juicy by Big is overrated.
Speaker 4:I did. I'm not mad at anybody saying anything is overrated. It is rated up there pretty high. So if you disagree, then I'm cool with that.
Speaker 2:You say Tupac, I Get Around is overrated.
Speaker 1:I do think it's overrated. I do think it's overrated. I never loved that beat and that's me, and you know how I feel about Pac.
Speaker 4:I never felt like. Why would you go on Wax Poetic about Strictly and then say that that song is overrated? Coop, make it make sense, because I'm objective.
Speaker 1:That's why it's not my first feelings at all. No, I'm not confused. See, you're asking me personally what I think personally.
Speaker 4:Personally what I think personally, how I feel about it. Okay. So objective versus personal, okay, right right right, right, right.
Speaker 1:My objective when I talk about Strictly for my Niggas, those are my objective thoughts about what I've seen, because I was influenced by it, because musically, ag, I'm more aligned with you, but I've learned not to lean on my own understanding.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, I'm very clear about how all the girls that were around me around that time felt about him and felt about that album. I'm very clear about how all the street niggas felt about that shit that I was around. So even though musically when I listen to it I'm like, nah, that ain't it. When everybody around you is like, nah, it's it that matters.
Speaker 4:See, I didn't have that. Everybody around me wasn't on. That's why.
Speaker 1:So when you explained it to me, I was like, oh no, my experience of it live in real time was different, and that's why our perspective is different and so no. So personally, when I listen to, I Get Around. It's like that beat.
Speaker 4:Round and round. We were texting in the group chat. I was like, well, I've never heard nobody else call this a classic and honestly God, I literally never heard nobody say that.
Speaker 1:Never heard nobody else call it it's a classic and, honestly God, I literally never heard nobody say that but it has more to do with the influences around me, because people around me was talking and walking and acting like that in real time. It wasn't me, because I feel more like you musically, musically, it's like I'll give it a four. But when that, try to explain that shit to some of the people I knew. Oh, you tripping, you gonna fuck with Pac nigga.
Speaker 4:And you know what. You know not to go off on a crazy tangent but I think that's the problem with hip-hop as a whole, because in our inner circles we rate stuff in a vacuum and we think, just because us and our crew think something is the greatest thing ever, that that spans nationwide or worldwide. And a lot of times it don't be like that.
Speaker 1:Like I'm going to tell you what part of why I love the purple tape so much. Oh no, I was the first one on my block to call the purple tape. When the purple tape came out, niggas was heavy on meth and old, dirty bastard. And so niggas was like oh no, it's good. I was like good. I said this is one of the best rap albums of all time, if it's not the best rap album I've ever heard. When I told niggas I thought it might be the best rap album I ever heard, niggas almost fucked me up. They almost beat my ass. I was in eighth grade. They were like this motherfucker, coop is tripping. Three months later, three months later, three months later, yo Coop. Months later, yo Coop. That incarcerated Scarface's, that criminology, that glaciers of ice, that ice cream, that Wu Gambino's ooh, that verbal intercourse verse, oh. But when it came out the first two weeks it came out, oh nigga. I almost got my ass whooped, and I'm not joking, I almost got my ass whooped.
Speaker 4:When I was in school, everybody loved that album.
Speaker 3:Not in.
Speaker 1:Charlotte.
Speaker 4:North.
Speaker 1:Carolina, sir, not in 1995. No, no, that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:No, it wasn't like that for everybody we used to just carry it around outside of the case so we could marvel at the like purple tape we used to just carry it around outside of the case, bro.
Speaker 1:It was not like that in Charlotte, north Carolina, in 1995. How about this Outkast? Soul Food was playing more than the Purple Tape was playing. That's what I'm saying. You feel what I'm saying? I knew Soul Food was a classic and everybody around me was calling Soul Food a classic. But when I'm calling a Purple Tape a classic in Charlotte, north Carolina, in 1995, oh no, no, niggas is not with that shit.
Speaker 4:Niggas ain't trying to hear that shit where I'm at, it's no regional bias, we just embrace everything that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:No, I'm in Charlotte, north Carolina, in 1995, the summer of 1995, when the purple tape and all that shit is happening, oh no, and that's what I mean about. It's like oh no, wu-tang was big, but wu-tang was big down here mostly about meth and dirty. So ray was actually when niggas down here stopped paying attention. It wasn't until when niggas really realized how dope the album was. The niggas came and picked it back up because niggas down here actually briefly thought that the purple tape was a drop off for what, what Meth and Dirty just did. How about that? Because they were the personality.
Speaker 2:They have no taste. That's why that's ridiculous, that's what I thought you said. I'm sorry they were listening to 95 South and 69 Boys, or whatever. They were listening to Tootsie Roll and you think I'm going to take the no, no, no, no, no, no boys, or whatever. They were listening to Tootsie Roll and you think I'm going to take the no, no, no, no, no, no, no no, no, this is Charlotte, not Atlanta. How about this?
Speaker 1:I'll tell you this. No, this is how funny it is. Mobb Deep was getting more played, the Infamous was getting more played than the Purple Tape and Charlotte, because Survival of the Fittest and Shook Ones and Give Up the the goods was more in line. You get what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:And they were doing a butterfly in Charlotte. You think I'm listening to somebody doing a butterfly in Charlotte by the perfect team.
Speaker 1:What do we got?
Speaker 2:next.
Speaker 1:First of all, who are you doing a butterfly? First of all, I know how to do the butterfly. Oh no, Second of all. First of all, I never got the one leg down. I never got the one leg down, even though I tried. Second of all, sean, where are you sitting and residing right now? No, no, no. I want Sean to tell everybody where he's sitting and residing right now. We got to get super chats real quick. No, no, no, sean, where are you? I want to know where you are. Sir, you're at home, right?
Speaker 2:I'm on Earth, man, you at home? Where are you, sean? Sean, are you at home in South Carolina? Sean, are you at home in South?
Speaker 1:Carolina Are you at home in South Carolina. No, I just want you when you're talking about these people that don't have taste. Are you talking about the people in South Carolina or the people in North Carolina? Because you're in.
Speaker 2:South.
Speaker 1:Carolina.
Speaker 2:Both, both.
Speaker 1:Respectfully.
Speaker 2:Respectfully. I just got to see myself doing the butterfly.
Speaker 1:Remember when. I just got to see myself doing the butterfly. Yo, remember, when you do the Like, do the right leg to the left leg Do you come back and do both of those? They wear the black Bart Simpson shirt. First of all, I've never had a black Bart Simpson shirt. I was definitely getting more girls than you In 8th grade because I knew how to do the butterfly. Alright, alright, pull up the super chats Because my iPad is dead.
Speaker 2:I didn't land on the second. On the second, I land on me.
Speaker 1:Your ass is still stuck there in low country nigga, all right, you wear that Yankees hat all you want your ass in South Carolina, right?
Speaker 2:now, oh my God, south Carolina, man Merc City, all right, so where we, at when we at.
Speaker 1:I can't see shit. All right, mobb Beat with Smoke, outcast East Coast Bias. No, mad Max, I said that. We said that yeah, Deuce Falco, Harry Fogg Currency coming soon. Well, they've done shit together before Rhea Love Currency Currency's consistent. When I Am God talked about what his plans are about releasing currency, Currency's consistent. When I Am God talked about what his plans are about releasing projects, currency's the first person that I thought of.
Speaker 4:You mentioned that during the interview.
Speaker 1:yeah, Currency and Boldy, because they'll give you three, four, five projects a year and you'll be like man, all these is bangers. This nigga's a shit.
Speaker 4:The only problem I have with that is people don't get with it's a microwave society. Have with that is people don't get with it's a microwave society now anyway, but people don't get to sit with the last project enough before they're on to your next.
Speaker 1:So my biggest fear for somebody like I am God is that he's not going to get the time to make it. It was written, or a reasonable doubt.
Speaker 4:It's a product of the era we're in.
Speaker 1:You're going to get two and a half years. We don't give product of the era we're in. You're going to give that nigga two and a half years. We're going to give IMGOT two and a half years to make Illmatic a reasonable doubt? Of course we're not. We won't be doing that. The nigga Big had three years to make Ready to Die. He had three years to make Ready to Die, nigga.
Speaker 4:Jimmy Life After Death.
Speaker 1:Shit better sound great. All that shit better sound great if you take three years. It took three whole years. Shit better sound great. Shit don't work like that. No more. 007, ready to die is better than reasonable doubt. What are we talking about? I don't know, 007. Tell these niggas, not me.
Speaker 1:In real time when something hits you you know what it is Cats had to split the block on reasonable doubt. Guys, this is a fact. 007 is talking about and I want you to acknowledge the fact. When Ready to Die came out, instant classic. When Reasonable came, doubt came out, spin the block because it was about. It was written Muddy Waters, atlians.
Speaker 4:I say Reasonable Doubt was a classic in real time, though me and Sean talked about this yesterday as well in real time. I thought it was a classic nobody.
Speaker 1:AG. Respectfully nobody. This shit dropped around the same time as it was a classic Nobody. Ag. Respectfully nobody. When this shit dropped around the same time as it was written, nobody was calling Reasonable Down a classic AG.
Speaker 4:I did. I'm so far ahead of my time. I'm about to start another life. Mind you, I'm about to pass you twice. Nah, but for real, I need you to die first.
Speaker 1:Die right now. Die right now and do it.
Speaker 4:Listen, I think we're ready to die. People focus on the singles and the remixes that weren't even on the album.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean.
Speaker 4:Because a lot of people focus on you know what I'm saying the One More Chance remix. People focus on who Shot Ya. They're on the remastered versions of the album years later, but we've already proved this on Stationhead. Like we put Ready to Die head to head where it was written, and it was written Smoke, ready to Die, bro.
Speaker 1:Like we talking about I'm not saying that Ready to Die we talking about Reasonable Doubt okay, or it was written in Reasonable Doubt, not comparable it was written better than Reasonable Doubt to me, and Ready to Die is better than Reasonable Doubt to me. But it was written as better than reasonable doubt to me, and ready to die is better than reasonable doubt to me, but it was written and reasonable doubt are more close in my opinion you think so?
Speaker 1:oh no, fuck that shit. I think both are better than ready to die. Really, I do not agree. I'm sorry. Where's the? Give me the loot on Reasonable Doubt? Where's the warning? Beat wise, beat wise. Where is the ready to die record like beat wise? I'm talking about the beat like no. The production on ready to die is better. Big Flow is better than Jay-Z's on ready to die we can talk about this all day but I just Jay is still doing that double time Jay is still doing that double time fast rhyme flow.
Speaker 1:y'all, Y'all are wild.
Speaker 2:Let's table this one.
Speaker 1:Put ready to die versus reasonable down up. No, put ready to die versus reasonable down up. Put ready to die versus reasonable down up.
Speaker 2:Let's table this one, because somebody's going to take this segment and make a show tomorrow and Saturday and Sunday.
Speaker 1:Look here they making fucking 27 shows with 18,000 followers and getting 300 views. Look here when you do 22 shows with 8,000 followers and you get 300 views.
Speaker 2:nigga you suck. Nobody cares about your fucking niggas. This is my fault, man man man, man.
Speaker 1:Cut the 300 view ass niggas off man. Cut the 300 view ass niggas off man.
Speaker 4:Yo Coop didn't take his riddle in before the show, or he took it with alcohol one or the other Might worry about these niggas.
Speaker 1:18k with motherfucking 800 views.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:What the fuck are we doing out here? Lord of the Cows, get Around, is a club banger. Y'all West Coast haters, try to tell you.
Speaker 2:Coop is a West Coast hater.
Speaker 1:I'm the one that said it's a classic on the West Coast.
Speaker 2:But you just also said it wasn't. No, I said I don't love the beat.
Speaker 1:I said I don't love the beat. I didn't say it wasn't a classic to the West Coast. I said how I feel. See the feelings that Coop feel is not fucking perpetrated by fucking hip-hop talks, you see what I'm saying and they said y'all Right, I don't know what he's talking about.
Speaker 1:I said it's a West Coast classic. Come on, guys, the Chronic three feet high, low end theory are in the Grammy Hall of Fame before Nas. But you were complaining only because reasonable doubt is going to be there before Illmatic. I mean he's fair. You know what I mean.
Speaker 4:If you want, to call it that those came before Illmatic, though. No, that's what he's saying. Those albums came before Illmatic though. No, that's what he's saying. Those albums came before Illmatic though. So that that's a mute point, because Reasonable Doubt came after Illmatic.
Speaker 1:I mean truthfully, is Doggystyle in the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Speaker 4:No, even if it was, doggystyle was still before Illmatic.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, Damn all that Illmatic stuff.
Speaker 1:doggy style right alright cause look here you can have your east coast boom, bap, ass, ilmatic, reasonable doubt conversation no, doggy style fucking better than reasonable doubt. So fuck that other shit. How about that? Next? Do say falco what I like. Now we have jskis, I God even artists out here like Dolce. No, no, no, I love this space right now. Highly talented artists, very, very gifted. We just want I Am God to get where Dolce and yeah, that's what I'm saying, I Am God is the guy in this space without the people behind him, like the other people that exist in this space that we know about. We just want to get the people behind him because he's just nicer to these other motherfuckers, if not nicer. Next, we got more Super Chats.
Speaker 4:Alright, fuck y'all. Good night, I'm out.
Speaker 1:No, no, we got shit to talk about, no.
Speaker 2:He's finishing off with the boy oh.
Speaker 1:Punk-ass nigga ain't sending me my jacket. That's what the fuck happened Anyway. Punk-ass nigga ain't sending me my jacket. That's what the fuck happened Anyway. So Drake and Party Next Door are going to do what?
Speaker 2:What is it?
Speaker 1:Sean. Quarter million units. Quarter million units 250.
Speaker 2:Yes, sir, 250 for the new album.
Speaker 1:I mean, let's talk about it, guys. People are talking about the numbers being fake. People are talking about the numbers being low for a Drake album. People are talking about this being Drake overkill and he keeps trying to get the Kendrick effect rub off. Where are we at with all this bullshit, guys? I'm so tired of these niggas. I hate these niggas, Niggas are ruining my life.
Speaker 1:Sean, you go first. I'll piggyback off what you said Taking all the fun out of this shit for me. Yeah, sean, we all going taking all the fun out of this shit for me. Yeah, sean, we all gonna piggyback off you no fun.
Speaker 2:Hate these niggas, because it's like the weirdest climate of hip hop when it comes to an album release, because we wanted to see what this album do when it comes to streams and when it comes to the numbers and all of those things. Right, and I told AJ yesterday and Coop I think you and I talked about this a long time ago about numbers and how numbers can be. You know they can be masked a little bit.
Speaker 1:Tinker, tinker, tinker, tinker motherfucker.
Speaker 2:They can be tinkered all over the place and I'm not a P&D fan. I don't know much about P&D. I'll be completely honest. I can't tell you three songs that I can say is in my playlist from P&D. So let me start there. This kind of music is not really for me. I'm going to be honest with you. I can appreciate it for who it's for. I guess you got to be in a club scene. You got to be living the lifestyle that Coop lives to appreciate what Drake is saying Respectfully.
Speaker 2:That's what I to appreciate what Drake is saying respectfully. It's respectful. You got to be able to live that kind of lifestyle.
Speaker 1:I don't trust these hoes.
Speaker 2:You got to live that kind of lifestyle to understand what he's talking about on here. Is the album good? Is it great? Is it solid? I think it's none of the above. I think it's an album. It's a thing. I think it's none of the above. I think it's the album. It's the thing, right? I mean, I think it's the thing. The one that stands out to me most is when he actually rapped and when he made the comments about Joe and all of that. You kind of saw glimpses of the boiler being there. But everything else it just to me is the run of the mill. I do feel that the numbers are indicative of Drake more than they are P&D. I told AJ yesterday P&D never went platinum. I think they went platinum once or twice.
Speaker 1:Never, never been platinum, that's wild.
Speaker 2:Hug me as fire, definitely hug me as fire. But P&D doesn't really move the needle for numbers per se. They're more of a gold type. He's more of a gold type artist. So that 250 is a good deal of Drake regardless. But it also brings down, because you're talking about the average of what P&D actually does himself as an artist and you're thinking about Drake's average, which is around 400,000, I think close to right AG. You know this more than I do, but P&D is more around that gold market. So you're talking about maybe 60,000, 40,000. And this is P&D's first number one as well. So now the law of average is coming into that.
Speaker 2:I say this this is something that Drake had to do from a safe space. He had to make a safe album on the heels of the beat. This was very safe. This is likened to Jay and Jay Electronica doing that joint. That they did Very safe. If it fails, it doesn't fall on one side or the other. The other person doesn't get the hit. If it succeeds, that person gets the hit. If it succeeds, drake gets the hit. If it doesn't, he's still going to get a hit, but he can always say well, that's a, that's a collab or project between myself and pnd, so I'm gonna just leave it at that. I know, uh, ag really wanted to say something on this one, so I'm gonna just leave it at that.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you cooked that, sean, Before I even get started.
Speaker 1:Did he cook that? That's what you said. You said he cooked that?
Speaker 4:Yeah, because he brought up excellent points and I got some numbers to go along with those points. And before the chat goes crazy and say we're caping for Drake or whatever, no, we're not, we're just calling it right down the middle. And I hate where hip-hop is at now because if you call something down the middle, one fan base is going to say you know, you're hating on their favorite artist and you're caping for the one that they're against. So that's where we're at right now, but this is straight down the middle. So to Sean's point, with P&D being the artist that moves less units and Drake moving a higher amount of units Drake's last album, for All the Dogs, did 402K the first week. Party's Next Door 4 album did 37K the first week, which that comes out to an average of just under 220K. Right, if you combine those two are just under $220K, right, if you combine those two. And if they're saying that they're doing $250K, then that's right in the wheelhouse of where they should be right.
Speaker 4:Because people are trying to do this comparison of in which we said that this will happen of Drake's numbers to Kendrick's numbers on GNX, which was $319K the first week. That's not an apples-to to apples comparison, it's more apples to oranges. You know it's not a one to one comparison. And if you look at the buzz that granted, that was a surprise album, if you look at the buzz that Kendrick has in context, if he's only doing you know what I'm saying like 69 grand more than Drake is at this point, when Drake is supposed to be dead in the water off a collab album, then I don't really think that that's something to really champion for the Kendrick fans. It's really not, if I'm being honest. So y'all can say I'm caping for Drake if you want to, but I'm just calling it down the middle.
Speaker 4:But here's the thing Collab albums are very tricky because you're trying to merge two fan bases together, which both fan bases have to tap in. Because this is a situation where if you're a big time P&D fan like you know me and my son, we both rock with P&D heavy you know you'll still tap into this album, or Drake, or vice versa. But if you don't rock with P& D, you might say you know what, I'll catch Drake when he drop a solo. I'm not even tapping in. I know plenty of Nas fans that don't want to listen to distant relatives, which I think is a stellar album, because they don't want to hear Damian Marley. You know what I'm saying. They don't want to hear the reggae stuff. I know plenty of people who have Jay-Z as the GOAT that said yo, you can keep that Jay Electronica album, I'll hear Jay if he come out with something else.
Speaker 4:It's hard to merge those two fan bases but just for some comparison sake I got some numbers. Her loss did 404K the first week, which their fan base is 21, and Drake cross-pollinate a little bit more than Drake and P and D and they're trying to do an R and B album, which are R and B album is. You know, r and B is a dying genre at this present day, if you ask me honestly, nevermind. That did two oh four K the first week for Drake and that was a house music album and this was before the beef. You know what I'm saying. So it's like if people want to say because of this 250K that Drake is dead in the water, he did less than this even before the beef. You know what I mean. So it's just like it depends on what they want to hear from you or not.
Speaker 4:And, comparatively speaking, what I mean about fan bases merging everything is love Jay-Z and Beyonce. By name recognition alone, all the fans that Jay got on the hip-hop side and all the fans that she got on the R&B side you would think that would be a great selling album. It did 123k the first week Because the people who want to listen to Jay and what he delivers Are not tapping into that album because of Beyonce and vice versa, people who love Beyonce for her music are not tapping to that album because they don't want to hear Jay rapping. It just is what it is. This is what collab albums do Vultures $148K the first week. I know Kanye fans that don't mess with Ty Dolla $ign. Vultures 2, $107k the first week. So collab albums are kind of tricky. So for everybody comparing it, even if drake would have outsold kendrick on this one, it's still not a one-to-one comparison. It's not an apples to apples comparison. It's really apples to oranges at the end of the day.
Speaker 4:But as far as the project itself, I rock with it. I think it's dope. You know I'm set a mood like valentine's day. You out moving and shaking. You know I'm saying with your girl whatever it out moving and shaking. You know what I'm saying with your girl. Whatever it's a dope little mood. You know what I'm saying. I'm glad that the album switched, because it's very much like a P&D album at the beginning and then it switches moods towards the end and gives some different looks. I do like that about it. But what I will say, and this is what I'm going to stand on, I don't think this album was made organically, and what I mean by that is, like Sean said, and this is my last point, it's very safe.
Speaker 4:You remember when Drake tweeted out or put on his Instagram or whatever, summer Vibes? Next, you know what I'm saying, he's making some tunes. He tried that 100 gigs or whatever. I think he really started to do his own solo project and was throwing out temperature checks and it wasn't coming back how he liked it. So I think he pivoted and turned this into a collab album with P&D, which is ironic because it's like, ok, people ain't messing with me rapping so I can fall back into this R&B bag, but I still need somebody to stand beside me to make it a safe bet, a safe play. And because P&D he's never released. P&d has signed the OVO. He's never released two projects back-to-back years by P&D before, but now, all of a sudden, you want to do yeah until now.
Speaker 4:So now he wants to stand beside him and put him to the forefront, like yo, because he needs somebody to stand beside him and put him to the forefront like yo, because he needs somebody to stand beside him at this juncture, right, and I find it. The reason why I say I think he started a solo album and pivoted to the uh collab joint was because it's six drake solo records on here. Out of 20 some songs, one pnd solo record. That's very lopsided for a collab album. So what those six solo records tell me is Drake was cooking in the lab with a solo album and had to pivot and pull P&D and say yo, let's make this collab album so I can fall into this safe space of R&B.
Speaker 1:Respectfully, I'm going to say something to you that is a checker's opinion, not a chess opinion, and I'm going to tell you why Everything that you're saying can be looked at totally differently from a different perspective. And here's why Drake is testing the waters right now. Right now, that's why he did an artist with somebody who has been on his label for pretty much a decade, that has never dropped material consistently. He's testing the waters with this. This is the first time Party Next Door has literally dropped back-to-back projects. The motherfucker been around since 2014. It 2025.
Speaker 1:So party next door, and like some new artists that just popped up, it's been a decade in the game, but the brevity of music exists because in the ovo space has existed as some sort of like um outliers, some sort of like, you know, like sunken, like secret peace, like to the battleship, like, like like to win the war. And so this is drake actually using party next door, very much like kanye used ty dollar sign, in my opinion, only with better results, because the results that they are getting is actually the results of vultures one and two combined in the first week. And so I think drake was working on a project, but I think the intention of the project was to attach somebody to it, about just seeing how the numbers would move, to see where he's at in a space where he's currently apparently at an all-time low. If kendrick is at an all-time high and drake is at an all-time low and 100,000 units don't separate them, not even 100,000. No, that's what I'm saying. I said under 100,000 units, separate them. Oh, that would give credence to everything I'm saying about Kendrick not being like that.
Speaker 1:Like I'm saying, guys, you understand that all this hoopla, all this Super Bowl like whoop, whoop, whoop, and Drake can just pull up with an album on Valentine's Day with a motherfucker that don't drop material regularly and pretty much sell what you're selling at your highest moment. And let's respect the fact that Drake does have a section of fans. It is a large section. Oh no, they fuck with Drake, guys. They don't fuck with Nicki.
Speaker 1:They don't fuck with Nikki. They don't fuck with Wayne. They damn sure don't fuck with Party Next Door. They're like who is this motherfucker? They fuck with Drake and they pull up with Drake when they know Drake is dropping a full-length project Not a surprise, padraic, a week after your biggest rival is literally having the biggest moment of his career. This is a win for Drake to me, and I am saying that objectively, because if Kendrick just had the biggest moment of his career and he had it on your back and all he got out of it was 70,000 more sales than you, oh he ain't winning shit in the battle, and that is what this is really telling me.
Speaker 4:Let's be clear. Clear the numbers battle, not the battle is. So he won the battle very decidedly but, but, but.
Speaker 1:But what I'm saying is this is how drake looks at. He looks at it very much the way jay looked at it when he liked looked at nas. So even in defeat there's a valuable lesson learned. So it evens out for me, because jay already knew that numbers wise, it wasn't a conversation. And he's like no, no, even if you beat me on some rap shit, I'm still jay, numbers wise. Hence the reasonable doubt going into the hall of fame before ilmatic, a full two and a half years after ilmatic. You get what I'm saying and that's's what Jay was speaking to. It's like oh no, even if I lose to you, I still win because I'm Jay and all I've tried to explain to people. It's like, oh no, he may have lost the battle, but he's still Drake. This 250? That's proof positive, he is Drake. If G and X did 319, because to be honest with you, g and X, for the way motherfuckers play, not like us, am I. Am I wrong for saying that it should have sold double that the first week?
Speaker 4:guys, in context, it was a surprise album, so surprise albums are tricky too.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean Because you had a chance to double up. They could have doubled back and made 200. You're sitting missing.
Speaker 4:Everything you're saying is no different than what I was saying. The only difference in what I said was is, I think that the a hundred gigs was more so him testing the waters and he didn't like the response to that while he was making these other tracks, and then that caused the pivot into the collab. And you're very correct, he is using P and D. You know what I mean and that's exactly what I said. This is not. I don't feel like, although it's a good project, I don't feel like it's an organic project. So you're not saying anything fundamentally different than what I said. You know what I mean, Because I say he, you know he's using them like, hey, come stand beside me so we can make this project and I can be in a safe space and we'll see what it does. You know what I mean. So I think that's what it is.
Speaker 1:And it's a safe genre because he's not. He's rapping on songs on here, but it's a r&b. So when I'm saying, when I'm saying it's a win, that's what I'm saying. All things considered, yeah, yeah, that's what I mean. This is kendrick's moment and all kendrick got to show for it is doing the super bowl performance in 70 000 more units first week than a project. Listen to what I'm saying, guys. A project Drake is not even really thinking about. Like this was strategic by him.
Speaker 4:He wasn't thinking about making this a solo project, guys, he's competing, but that's smart to not do an apples-to-apples comparison, because if he drops a solo album where there's rapping like typical Drake stuff rapping with R&B sprinkled in there or whatever then that is a one-to-one comparison with GNX and if he loses that battle, then it's something that would really be a problem. That happened before with Damn and More Life. Damn outsold More Life during that in real time.
Speaker 1:Drake only really loses for what he does if those numbers come out in less three 20 on his next solo project. That's when the hit happens. That won't happen. That won't happen. I mean, he's been hovering around 400 for a minute, so it's like Kendrick has crept up on him.
Speaker 4:So but that's my whole point with the collab album and Sean alluded to that with the law of averages P and D is not pulling a big fan base into the project, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:This is all drink. This is just just organic drink shit. That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:But it's a lot of P and D fans that are not tapping in because they don't want to hear a drink. Yeah, but but, like I said, it's a tricky thing to measure because, if I told you just in a vacuum, JNBR say doing how Does anybody know what the numbers for GNX were after the Super Bowl?
Speaker 1:Did the GNX number spike?
Speaker 4:His whole catalog spiked Like a little 50, 60, 70 piece.
Speaker 1:You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:His whole catalog spiked. I think his back catalog spiked more than anything, though.
Speaker 2:Everything went up.
Speaker 4:Everything went up. It did so. He got a spike, yeah, but that's natural. It's the Super Bowl, that happens to everybody.
Speaker 2:It's that stimuli from the Super Bowl that's going to go up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, where are we placing the album then, sean? Where do you rank that actual album? What do you think of the Drake and P&D album?
Speaker 4:He said it was a thing, he didn't even say it was solid.
Speaker 2:I'll be honest with you. It's off in the corner.
Speaker 4:For me for context purposes, in the same wheelhouse genre. I think, this is a lot better than the Weeknd's album. The Weeknd's album got high praise. It's so similar to the Weeknd album. I forget what Weeknd sold the first week, but it's similar to that.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I think it did. What did Weeknd sell, you know he?
Speaker 4:sold the first one, not off the top of my head, but it was close to around the same ballpark LP said it was off the top of his head, I think Weeknd's beating these niggas.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Weekend's beating these niggas.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he sold 500K, hold on.
Speaker 4:Weekend sold 500K, 500k. That's the Weekend. I thought, it was like 300.
Speaker 1:I don't know if it was 500. I don't think he did a five-piece.
Speaker 2:I don't know if he did a five piece.
Speaker 1:He did more than Drake and Kendrick did. I know that shit. Yeah, let me check. The Weeknd is actually one of the few guys out here that's actually supposed to be moving more than Drake and Kendrick, though.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he has a whole different demo. There go LP 490. It's like yeah. I ain't remember hearing no fucking 500k, 490. It's like, yeah, I ain't remember hearing no fucking 500k.
Speaker 2:Yeah, 490?
Speaker 1:490. Jack's saying 475. Motherfucker's saying 400k with bundles. This, that bullshit. This is what I'm talking about.
Speaker 4:It's the bundles. Regardless of what, I think this is a better album than the Weekend album, though, because I think that's a more accurate comparison compared to G and X, though you know that's a more accurate comparison compared to G and X, though that's a rap album.
Speaker 1:Okay. So let me ask you this, AG what did you think of the actual album, the Drake and P&D album? We've been doing all this numbers talk and all this logistic talks and all this maneuvering, all this bullshit.
Speaker 4:No, you missed that part. You missed that part because you wasn't listening. I said me and my son are both like big P&D fans and we love the album because it's a vibe for, like, if you're out with your lady, if you're trying to catch a vibe, I think it's a good album for what it's intended to do.
Speaker 1:No, no, no. What I'm saying is okay, so let's look at your demographic.
Speaker 4:You are in your 40s. My son said 490.5 for the first week on weekend Okay, 490.5.
Speaker 1:So almost 500. Close to 500.
Speaker 4:We'll give him the five. That's a hell of a good week. You know that's a hell of a good week.
Speaker 1:We ain't going to be petty, we're going to give him the five.
Speaker 2:Different demo.
Speaker 1:Different demo True, true what would you listen to more at this stage in the game? You listening to that Kendrick more. You listen to this Drake and P&B more uh, gnx, gnx definitely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, gnx definitely.
Speaker 1:I'm not listening to GNX anymore.
Speaker 4:I still got it in heavy rotation.
Speaker 1:It's off to rotation it's not guys, it's I mean I. Okay. So be, I'm gonna be honest with you, both of these projects. To me it's not guys, I mean okay. So I'm going to be honest with you, both of these projects to me, if the guys that are attached to them weren't attached to them, I don't even think I would have even played them as much as I've played them so far.
Speaker 4:I rock with GNX, but what I will say, I don't go back to it as a whole project and let it run front to back, but it's a lot of songs. I still go back to man. Yeah, I still go back to Whacked Out Murals man at the Garden. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I still go back to Luther, Gloria Squabble Up is my shit. I ain't even on front on Squabble Up.
Speaker 4:Squabble Up is my shit and them is the popular joints, them the joints I go back to Whacked Out Murals is dope Whacked Out Murals.
Speaker 1:I fuck with. I'm sorry, guys, I don't feel GNX like everybody else does. I hear it. I'd rather listen to Pimplebutter.
Speaker 4:I wouldn't say it's a classic, but it's a really dope album.
Speaker 2:I did a short on it and I said it's a solid four.
Speaker 1:I think it depends on who you're.
Speaker 2:I think it depends on your environment guys like Cooper. Last time you've been to a club I know, aj, you don't really go to clubs like that when last you been to a club, cooper, it's been a while December, so you haven't really heard anything like G and X or P and D and Drake in a club. I think in that environment luther was spinning.
Speaker 1:When I was in the club, luther was spinning and I mean, okay, so you have to understand. I work in atlanta and so I work in an environment where there are djs in my spot, so it's like all right, I hear I hear all the shit. I hear lotto and glow and sexy shit that y'all ain't even heard, not being funny because it's Atlanta. I'm plugged to shit. I live in the world where I'm on that scene, but I don't go to the club, no more.
Speaker 4:I ain't been to the club in a handful of years. I can't even front when I went to the club, no more.
Speaker 1:It's like I ain't been to the club in like a handful of years.
Speaker 1:I can't even front, like when I went to the club. The club I went to is right next to my job and the niggas know me and so, like security is like, oh, it's cool. Like we ain't about to charge this nigga at the door, nigga, work next door. We about to walk downstairs, we like what? You Better fucking give me this shit for free when I fucking pull up, take care of all you niggas Like yeah, so it's like I don't really go to the club no more.
Speaker 1:But I'm around in that scene where I hear and see that stuff and that's what I mean about it being different Guys. Ain't nobody playing that Kendrick or that Drake like that down here Atlanta. Ain't that type of scene where the type of shit they just did really flow down here like that, not like us hit like that. But I'm going to be honest with you Between Drake and Kendrick. If you want to talk about a record that they made hitting in this city, oh no, outside of Not Like Us, these niggas ain't made nothing hitting this city like that since the pandemic happened.
Speaker 4:Between the two of them. You talking about what's ringing off in Atlanta, both P and D and Drake.
Speaker 1:I only talk about them niggas when I pull up to do this shit. Ain't nobody talking about them niggas in Atlanta like that?
Speaker 4:Well I'm asking the question is that 250 just domestic? Because, being that both, of them are from Canada. What's that doing in Canada is what I would like to know.
Speaker 1:No, how about this? I feel the same way about that 319 for GNX. No, nigga, I lived in Cali. It's like, oh no, you can do 200 off Cali. On Cali, you can do 200. You feel me. So that's what I mean. It's like, oh, when you talk about drinking, oh no, I feel the same way about Kendrick out there and Cali. It's like, oh, I don't even know how real these niggas is, these niggas. Ain't nobody in here worried about Kendrick or Drake in?
Speaker 4:Atlanta. As popular as this album, as GNX is, it doesn't have the reach of damn, Like you know, even Kendrick at his height of beating Drake. The album in and of itself, GNX, doesn't have the reach that damn had. How?
Speaker 1:about this? How about this? No, when Kendrick dropped down, oh no. Humble getting played down here, loyalty played down here, love played down here. That's what I mean. Multiple records on them getting played down here. Ain't nobody heard no shit from G and X getting played down here like that.
Speaker 4:But let's be fair, let's be real, it's a very West Coast hour. No, the Drake and P&B shit the same way but we gotta be fair, coop, cause you was the one saying that like he needs to make a west coast sounding banging album, and he did that, but you can't fault him for not reaching to the south if he made something that's a regional sound for where he's at, though we can't play both sides of the fence like it gotta be one way or the other.
Speaker 1:No, I'm not knocking him for what he did. He did what he needed to do because he hadn't done that in a while.
Speaker 1:That's why I'm like, oh no, that 319, wouldn't be surprised if 200 came from cali yeah, so if they don't reach Atlanta, then so be it you know, oh no, I'm, I'm when I when I am saying that I am speaking factually what is going on, as somebody who actually lives and is on the scene in atlanta still live. I'm not saying that to detract away from the quality of the product that he made. I think gnx is a high quality product. What I am saying is the demographic that I exist in. Oh no, that shit ain't slapping down here like that and that's cool. If it don't slap down here like that, it's some West Coast shit. Let me tell you what Crash Talk slapped down here. It sound like some Atlanta shit when schoolboy Q did Crash Talk. That's part of why it slapped down here. No, kendrick made some shit for the West, finally. But what I'm saying is that if you actually look at his numbers, he even might have made some shit for the West too late.
Speaker 4:Nah, they galvanized behind that shit.
Speaker 2:Everywhere.
Speaker 1:Hold on when you're saying they galvanized behind that. How many records has it done? Is it Platinum already? G and X Platinum.
Speaker 4:I don't know, but just the movement in and of itself. I haven't seen the West this active, with this much energy behind something since, like you know know, game was out, or before that, when death row was popping. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:It's like the energy feel real, but usually in cali, when the energy feel real, the the numbers.
Speaker 4:That's why I don't like putting too much credence in the sales, because sales don't tell the whole story. A lot of times, even though I broke down a bunch of sales, I'm always a big advocate of numbers can make them do whatever you want to do. You know what I'm saying they can tap, dance and do whatever you know what I'm saying you can manipulate numbers, they do lie sometimes.
Speaker 1:What I'm saying is when the West's behind you, you ain't going to go platinum, you're going to go triple, quadruple, quintuple. You understand that right? Yes, large markets. History has shown us like dog food by the dog pounds like double platinum off Rip Fam.
Speaker 4:That was a different time.
Speaker 1:That's not streaming there, oh no, oh, no, no, no, hold on. If kendrick is who we are saying, that we he is, I can compare him to somebody like the dog pound from that era and it'd be a comparable. Like I'm not comparing, I'm not asking him to do doggy style I see what you're saying. I'm not asking him to do tupac ice cube. Right, I was fair about the correlation. It's like like, oh no, dog pound numbers is reasonable in this day and time. I'm not asking him to do all eyes on me.
Speaker 4:But they got a lot of that Snoop and Dre carryover, though they got a stimulus package as well.
Speaker 2:That's how it is. It's everywhere.
Speaker 4:It's a bleed over effect, you know listen to the nba games halftime.
Speaker 2:You hear kindred. Listen to when you go. You heard everything from last week from the all-star game. Every cut it was kindred.
Speaker 4:Every time you watch a game, which confused me because, granted, he got the super bowl, but, being that the um, that the all-star game was in san francisco, I'm like yo, that might have been a perfect, more of a perfect, situation for Kendrick to perform there. Granted, they had, you know, tushor E40, the Legends, sweden.
Speaker 2:That's overkill. I'm not going to do that. That stage, you don't go to that stage after the Super Bowl. You got to, especially with that group. You got to that's a downgrade.
Speaker 4:Right, it's not like a downgrade.
Speaker 2:Especially the way the All-Star game was projected this year. They had to stay with the locals. They got to stay with those who rocked really hard with the Golden State Warriors.
Speaker 4:That's their. I got you. I got you and the game was whack. Anyway, the game was terrible.
Speaker 2:He has a Anyway, so the game was terrible.
Speaker 1:The game was awful. Yep, double barrel. Gnx is plat. Coop. The owl dropped the dud. It's okay. First of all, if GNX is platinum and we're in February, that's been three months. Drake's already a fourth of the way there after one week, so that's just me.
Speaker 4:I don't know if this album is going to go platinum though Coop.
Speaker 1:I really don't know if this album is going to go platinum, though, coop, I really don't. You don't think the P&D album is going?
Speaker 2:to go platinum? I do not. It's going to take a while.
Speaker 1:What's the second week?
Speaker 4:Honestly, never mind go platinum, because I think that's an easier track.
Speaker 1:Hold on. Actually, I think a good track is to say when did GNX actually go platinum, though, while we're doing this, Because GNX has been out for like three months now right, Two months.
Speaker 4:Almost three. It came out in December, right Beginning of December right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I believe so. So we're getting close to like it's been over two months of GNX. So what's the numbers Like? If it's platinum, where? Where the number is that?
Speaker 2:somebody gonna show. I think lp did say it went platinum on gns already, but I don't know when it went platinum. But it went platinum okay. Oh, it had to be no, no, no.
Speaker 1:The information sounds so precise and very well founded, we're just gonna just going to go. I'm pretty sure it went platinum. Okay, 007, the boy's still rapping, shout out, shout out to the ghost writer, drake. I'm just saying you understand how this shit sounds out loud. I want you all to listen to what I just said. It's like well, it's Kendrick, so I'm pretty certain that it's platinum. It's like oh, it's like well, it's Kendrick, so I'm pretty certain that it's platinum. It's like, oh, it's like is that what we doing?
Speaker 2:Because we would never do that shit with Drake. All right, appreciate you. Just send it to me.
Speaker 1:Appreciate you it went platinum. It went platinum on Drake.
Speaker 2:When February 19th it's over, that's yesterday, sean, that's my daughter's birthday.
Speaker 1:My daughter turned 18 yesterday. Shout out, sean, that's my daughter's birthday.
Speaker 2:my daughter turned 18 yesterday shout out to my daughter, sade.
Speaker 1:Sean, let me know yeah, yeah, appreciate you, man baby girl is not baby girl anymore.
Speaker 4:Baby girl is a grown ass my son just came and told me he chimed in live. When I phoned a friend, he told me that, honestly, nevermind did go platinum, in fact in August of 2023. So if that went platinum the house album by Drake that nobody wanted to hear then maybe the P&D album does go platinum. I didn't think, honestly, nevermind was platinum.
Speaker 1:I really did. You're telling me that Kendrick's album just went platinum yesterday, so it took pretty much. What 10 weeks is what you're telling me? So let's see. So, let's see in 10 weeks is what you're telling me. Yeah, so let's see in 10 weeks from now where this Drake and P&D project is, before we go.
Speaker 4:I think that's fair and for Kendrick's height and all the buzz that he has, that is a slow burn.
Speaker 1:I will say that but is that not fair, though? So we can pull up and say, 10 weeks from now, drake and pnd's album is platinum, that kendrick didn't step all over? This guy, like we think if he's doing the same numbers for a throwaway album with pnd, like when people are talking about drake is over. No, because people are running around talking about drake is over, and all I'm saying is that, well, if he can just do an album with PnB and just drop it randomly on Valentine's Day and do the same numbers as Kendrick, how over is the motherfucker if this is Kendrick?
Speaker 4:they don't tell the whole story. You can still lose and still be that guy. What? What Jay? I mean Jay lost, you know, decidedly to Nas but what he said, niggas thought hobo was over such dummies, even if I follow Lando and a bunch of money Y'all ain't got nothing for me.
Speaker 1:He lost. This is not about Drake losing. People are acting like it's over. Show me that it's over.
Speaker 4:Nah, his career is not over. But see, here's the problem. People like it's over, even if it's over as a rapper. That's what I keep saying If people say I'm not going to tap into Drake, no more the rapper. He has all these other different bags he can fall back into. But the rapping is what I want to talk about, because we didn't even touch on that. On, give Me A Hug, what did y'all think about the bars? That was aimed at Joe Budden. That was aimed at Kendrick, when he said Kendrick going to have the girl twerking with the dictionaries like do you think too little, too late?
Speaker 1:I thought it was funny, it's funny.
Speaker 4:I don't. I don't respect the joe budden bar because he wouldn't respond to joe when joe was active, rapping at him, and then now joe's not active, so now some of the kendrick snuffed them out and instead of barking up that tree again, you go and you know double back and say some stuff to Joe. So that's why I don't respect that bar and Joe was barring him up and, if I'm being honest, it's almost like if a tree falls in the forest, there's nobody there. Does anybody hear it right? I would take Joe's four or five diss tracks against Drake over Kendrick's just as far as barring him up, because Wake and Makin' the Murderer are insane. He was going crazy. It matters the messenger, because Kendrick is who he is and that's why his diss is more effective.
Speaker 1:You're making my point. For me, ag, it's like oh well, if Bud's bars were better, why didn't they hit this community as hard? Because this community is the messenger. This community values Kendrick in a way they don't value Budden, even though Budden actually did the better job of dissecting and breaking him down.
Speaker 4:Let's be real.
Speaker 1:Pusha T and Budden have both done a better job on Drake than actually Kendrick did. It is just Kendrick wants to do the job. That is the part of it where it does feel like it is industry planted.
Speaker 4:That's the part. If Pusher don't have that salacious info, I don't think that Adidon has the impact that it does if he don't have the this is what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:What Kendrick is doing on Not Like Us is right out the page of Exodus and Infrared. It is just Kendrick doing it.
Speaker 4:It's just Kendrick doing it. It's the messenger, it's the messenger.
Speaker 1:He's not doing anything, he's not saying anything. Button and Pusha T haven't said you do understand that right.
Speaker 4:We all know those button tracks. If y'all ain't heard them like button. That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:So people are like, oh no, kendrick is an industry plant. It's like, well, if somebody like push a T and button have been saying this about the guy all this time time and they have been landing these topics over dope beats and dope production and dope hooks for years and it hasn't caught fire, why did kendrick caught catch fire? There is something about that that does make it seem like it is industry motivated and planted to take drake out, quite frankly. And so when people gravitate towards kendrick like this, it feeds that part of the conspiracy, because people like you who know about Joe Budden's disses, people like me who know about Pusha T's disses like, well, about 95% of this shit has been said.
Speaker 4:Well, taking the conspiracy theories out of it. And then, Sean, you was going to say something, but we couldn't hear you. Real quick Joe, oh okay Joe, real quick Joe. And Pusha. When they did that, they went at Drake at his height. When Kendrick went at Drake, people were already tired of him anyway, like he was already Drake. Fatigue was a real thing.
Speaker 1:Kendrick chose the perfect time to strike he took a page out of Floyd Mayweather's book. What a shock. You said super chat, sean. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Floyd Das strike. He took a page out of Floyd Mayweather's book. What a shock, okay.
Speaker 1:Right, you said Super Chat, sean. Pack it on what Floyd's ass if you would have called him younger. Pack it on what Floyd's ass if you would have called him younger. Ag made me spill my drink, lol, because the Weeknd new album is Smokin' Drake and P&D album. Is it now?
Speaker 4:The Weeknd album's good People say good things about that album, but I like the Drake album better.
Speaker 1:I fuck with the Weeknd. Mad Max. Oh Lord, Dear Lord, let us pray. Ag Joe got 50 problems now. Drake, the least of his worries Joe been having the owl name in his mouth more than a scorned BM.
Speaker 2:Agreed, I agree with Mad Max, no one cares about Joe.
Speaker 1:First of all, I'll never admit in public anymore to agreeing with Mad Max. I won't be doing that, Thank you.
Speaker 4:Mad Max. I agree with that. But that still doesn't negate the fact that those Joe Button tracks were fire a handful of years ago they were hitmakers Yoga Fire.
Speaker 1:Flame, yoga, fire, flame, mad Max. See here, mad, don't, mad Max, don't start this Floyd shit with me. You know he ran his punk ass Floyd, two year olders than Pac. Stop it, coop, and he still ran. That's why he ran, because he's two years older. With him in his brittle ass hands and little arthritic hands that he had, he did not want to fight Pac when he got all soft and brittle. I do not want to punch anymore, I just want to play defense. Okay, anyway, I Pacquiao when he ain't got all soft and burly, I do not want to punch anymore, I just want to play defense.
Speaker 2:Okay, Anyway.
Speaker 1:I just want to play defense. That is boxing to me. It's like nigga that ain't boxing to nobody.
Speaker 2:It's art, cool Yep.
Speaker 3:And just like that.
Speaker 2:Just like that Fade to black. Oh man, yo anything for us fellas.
Speaker 1:No, I don't have. I think we got everything, man alright. So I want to say more.
Speaker 2:The story is GNX is still everywhere. You hear it in every venue, every major platform, even though it's not selling.
Speaker 4:Even though it's not selling once the tour starts, you'll see another bump in sales. Once the tour starts, you will see it.
Speaker 1:Put a cape and a cap on both of you niggas, whatever.
Speaker 4:Just calling it down the middle. I'm not caping for either one of them. That's just a fact. It's a stimulus package. When you tour an album, that album gets a bump in revenue sales. It's just what it is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so what if Drake does the same thing?
Speaker 4:he's doing it now. He's in Australia now it's international, but he's not necessarily. I don't think he's touring. I don't think he's performing anything from this album yet. At least I haven't seen that but that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Who's to say he's not gonna just be petty and start circulating when Kendrick starts popping up at the tour as he should, as he should? That's what I'm saying. Who's to say he's not going to just be petty and start circulating when Kendrick starts popping up at the tour as he should, as he should? Well, tune in next week for more Petty Wars from old-ass niggas approaching 40. While you're hearing about some niggas already in their 40s, this has been Hip Hop Talks. Yo, some quick shout-outs, shout-out to the chat.
Speaker 2:Shout-out to the chat. Shout-out definitely to the chat LP everybody, miss LB, jack, you know everybody who actually contributed to nice chat. The chat is always live and we appreciate that. A lot of Discord family in there. Double, we saw some new faces out there. Reason Hearts from the OVO, jadarian. Shout out to Jadarian. Shout out to Ernest, who's actually looked like he's new in the chat as well. If you haven't subscribed, please subscribe to the show. Please make sure that you hit like and share. Get the word out. Join our Discord. Join our Twitter. Join our Facebook. All of that stuff is on the taglines to the bottom of the ticker. We appreciate y'all. Jack, we'll be bringing back the press play next week. We want to dedicate this show to. I Am God for him showing up for us tonight. We may spend a block on y'all in the next 48 to 72 hours.
Speaker 1:Jack, you sit your ass down. Don't be asking us about our press. Play, jack, you sit your ass down. We got you next week. Don't ask about what we're doing on Hip Hop Talks, Jack. Don't be asking questions, nigga. How?
Speaker 2:about that.
Speaker 1:That's what Sean really wanted to say.
Speaker 2:I'm going to say what Sean really wanted to say. Don't be asking questions. I don't want no beef with Jack.
Speaker 4:Jack is a staple man.
Speaker 1:Jack is wild. Stop cosigning Jack.
Speaker 2:Jack's a wild boy, every team need needed, dennis Rodman, every team, every team. So again like share, subscribe, get the word out, join the Discord, join all of our socials, follow us for content, follow our YouTube page really well, as well.
Speaker 1:When did I become the voice of reason for social media behavior? You see the shit Jack be doing, right? Jack be getting shit cracked. Jack is.
Speaker 2:You be with him, he's one of one. He's one of one. You need Jack. You don't go against Jack. You partner with Jack.
Speaker 4:He's necessary, he's necessary, he's necessary evil.
Speaker 2:Stop encouraging this nigga. Yes, the Jack ring. So yo, this nigga Jackering Yo. Shout out to West Virginia, shout out to Atlanta, charlotte, shout out to everybody in South Canada, north Canada, worldwide. Appreciate y'all, we out Peace.
Speaker 1:Jack, I will smoke you like a pack of loud from California. Yeah, I will Jack.