#2250 - Raekwon

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That's it, the chef is in the building, ladies and gentlemen. What's up, what's up? Pleasure to meet you, man.
You are a part of the most iconic band in all of hip-hop. There is no question, there's one Wu-Tang, there's only one wu-tang nothing else is even close you guys are so different than every other band that ever existed it was a giant group of you yeah man and everybody was a killer fucking mob man it's a crazy band man like no one is if you think about it there's been a lot of hip-hop duos there's been a lot of producers and MCs.
There's been a lot of people that get together in small groups. But there's only one Wu-Tang.
There's only one group of nine assassins. I tell niggas that all the time.
It's kind of crazy. You ain't going to get another one of these.
It's crazy that it worked. Yeah.
Because it's so hard to keep all those alphas together.

It really is crazy.

To make it work, the most illest shit, some shit that I never would have thought would ever exist, it was able to exist because we tried it.

But it wasn't normal.

It wasn't normal.

It wasn't normal.

You tried it, but it almost seems like it was just instinct.

It's not like a business strategy that anybody would ever come up with. Nine dudes? No.
And nine of the realest dudes? Like, the rawest, realest dudes? Yeah. And it worked? Yeah, and it worked.
And it worked? I tell people all the time, it was like when RZA, you know, he came with this whole philosophy of wanting to do it. It was like hitting the lotto for him.
Like he didn't know what to expect. It was more a reputation thing for us.
It was like, yo, I want to do this. And, you know, he came to the block and he talked to some real dudes that was really had other shit planned in their life.
You know, but hip hop was always like that backpack that we wore every day. But everybody had everybody had different plans So he really literally came in and started to pick motherfuckers that he felt had potential So it's like the mob.
It's like, you know, you know Lucky Luciano prime example You know he knew that motherfuckers had potential right? He knew dudes have potential in any way. He's from a different part.
He's from a different part. He's from a different part.
But, yo, what we could do right here is we could make money. So put your fucking feelings down or whatever the case may be, and let's talk about some money.
And that right there, kind of like, yo, you start shaking hands across the table. Yo, I know you didn't really fuck with me like that Yo, I never had anything against you like that though But it just it was just something that he felt like at the end of the day Let me try this shit Well, Riz is a genius and it's it's amazing that he was able to coordinate that because that's often the case right with other killers like This episode is brought to you by Paramount+.
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When a dude's a bad motherfucker, they always assume that everybody else doesn't like them. They always assume that everybody else is the enemy or competition.
So to have nine of you guys together like that as one group, you know, we always, I told you when I was, when I sent you a message, I said that we play protect your neck. It's like whenever we have a police escort, that's what's the most hilarious thing.
So we do arena shows. We hire a police escort.
So it's like fucking sirens and shit. Protect your neck.
It's like the perfect song to play when you're getting a police escort. Oh, my God.
I know. I know.
Trust me. These young kids that I have at the club, like I was explaining Wu-Tang Clan to them the other night.
I go, you have to understand how wild this band was. I go, when Old Dirty Bastard was in Rikers, they went to Rikers and performed in rikers remember that yes i don't fucking remember i told everybody i was like do you know how crazy that is you're talking about like the biggest rap band in the fucking world and they're performing in a penitentiary to one of the members who's one of the biggest fucking hip-hop stars in the world who's in jail and then you guys go into the crowd.
God bless his soul first and foremost. Oh my god, old Dirty Bastard was a classic.
Yo Joe is the funniest shit because when we came in and when we seen him he was eating a cheeseburger laughing and shit. He reminds you he never was dirty.
I don i don't even think i never seen him eat meat like that or whatever the case may be but we came in he was eating a cheeseburger and shit laughing so we was dying laughing and they kept you know the people up in there they kept telling us like yo y'all can't y'all can't go into the to the to the to the um crowd with everybody you know we not gonna hold no responsibility if something happened. So, you know, be like, all right, nah, nah, nah, nah, hang on in.
Once we got on that stage, it was like, fuck the stage. We out there touching everybody.
Wow. It was love, man.
It was a lot of love. Man, it had to be what? I say what? 90, what? 90, 98, 97?

Wow.

98?

No internet.

Probably like, yeah, none of that shit.

None of that.

Is there even a recording of that anywhere?

Nah.

God.

I don't think so.

I don't think so.

You know how wild that video would be?

Yeah.

I never knew that people seen that.

I don't know how the fuck you knew that shit.

Oh, I heard about it.

Yeah, I heard about it.

But they love this, though. I mean, it was in the news back then that you guys performed in rikers yeah yeah man the 90s for hip-hop it was like people need you have to understand for young people you grew up with hip-hop you're only 20 years old i get it but you have to understand from my perspective in the 19 in 1980 there was no hip-hop in 1992 that was all anybody gave a fuck about that is crazy for a new art form it was to emerge right right i mean there was like sugar hill gang there was some hip-hop but it wasn't the thing until the 90s and 90s hip-hop it got big it got big yeah it got so big i remember i

remember it's so crazy you said that because i tell people all the time like disco to me was hip-hop before hip-hop was you know um disco um r&b everything was a mixture it was a mixture So really when hip-hop came, like you it came like maybe i'm gonna say 80s 85 it had to be 84 because i was in junior high school yeah yeah we was young boys right so i would definitely say you heard something and it was like oh shit motherfuckers is rhyming I ain't you know this shit sound cool though you know what I mean it sound cool but really it was like, oh shit, motherfuckers is rhyming. You know, this shit sound cool though.
You know what I mean? It sound cool. But really it was a way to bring people together, you know, that was going through different shit in their life.
You know what I mean? Yeah, and you know what? It was earlier than that because in 84 I was in high school. So it had to be 80.
80. 82.
I was a freshman in high school in 81. So i heard sugar hill gang when i lived in jamaica plain which was in 1980 so that was the first time i'd ever heard any kind of hip-hop yeah yeah so like yeah like we said yeah 80 yeah i was 10 years old so me probably really really gravitating to what i probably was like 12 like you said 12 what was the first hip-hop that really grabbed you do you remember do you remember like what was the shit that you were first into when you were a kid all right folks it's that time of year everyone is on a mission to improve their health and wellness habits and set the tone for 2025 by sticking to a routine and while sticking to a healthy routine isn't always easy it's so worth it and you all know that I've been using AG1 for years.
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The first shit that grabbed me was, like how you said, Sugar Hill Gang know um rap is the light yeah rap is the light that was the shit oh my god now look i had everywhere i had cousins i had wild cousins and shit they was you know they was wild they was selling drugs they was you know smoking weed and sniffing coke and you know what i mean doing whatever they was doing and um they used to live two they used to live two floors above me and um i used to sneak up there and shit and you know just be in a business be in a world and they would be playing music they had the record player you know you see coke on the table and wow weed and everything and my cousins they was cool cool. They was like, yo, come in, man.
We don't give a fuck. Like, just don't tell your mother that you was around and shit.
You know what I mean? Nah, nah, I ain't going to say nothing. I ain't going to say nothing.
And I would just be watching. And, you know, I would see weed on album covers.
And, you know what I mean? Just motherfuckers running back and forth in the room. And, you know, they in the shit.
But music and a lot of the music was r&b you know disco um you know and then next thing you know i heard this fucking record um sugar hill gang and i'm like the groove was dope i'm like holy shit like this is what i want to be you know what i mean i'm looking at the whole vibe i'm like this is who am right here, you know? It's so crazy how it emerged. I mean, it emerged.
Yeah. Nobody expected that, bro.
Well, it was a totally new thing. Yeah.
And there was a lot of resistance. I mean, for people that don't know, those little warning labels on your, when you used to have CDs, that all came from Al Gore's wife.
Get the fuck out of here's wife tipper gore she was a democrat she wanted to censor rap music because this is the first time anybody heard like ice tea you know like that six in the morning everyone's like what the fuck is this you know and that kind of explicit lyrics they wanted to put a stop to it and that's why they put and these dumbasses they didn't even understand it sold way more albums yeah because that's what kids are looking for where's the fucking this they don't even swear get this shit out of here once they got the label on it's like i want it exactly once the floodgates got open and kids got turned on to like real hardcore hip-hop you couldn't sell the the regular shit regular shit like get out of here with that yeah but that's a few guys who got through with regular shit but it just didn't last nah it definitely didn't last but like you said though everybody wanted the raw shit and you got to remember at that time it was a tough time man too much shit was going on i mean it was to the point where it's like, in our neighborhood, we had like crazy people. Like if they catch you at night, they'll kill you.
Like they'd be dressed up like a fucking drag or whatever, all this makeup on. And, you know, I remember one time going to the incinerator room.
My mom's made me go. She made me go to the, um, to the, um, take out the garbage and shit.
I forgot to take it out. And she came home later that day and i was laying down and she fucking smacked me in the head with a broom like yo didn't i tell you to take out the fucking garbage so now i'm going down to the incinerator room you know walking it's on the same floor and i remember when i cut the corner i seen a motherfucker sticking his head out and he had his hair all wild his shit was like like green and red and all this.
And he had lipstick on all crazy and his eyes was all fucking bugged out looking and he looked at me. And I got the garbage pail with me and it's like, yo, once I seen him I just dropped the shit and ran, mom, mom.
You know what I mean? Back then, you know, you yell your mother name and shit. You think that that was something cool back then.
You know, she's your hero at that time. Came back, the nigga was gone.
But I think if he would have caught me in that incinerator door when it was closed, he was going to probably try to run in there and probably try to fucking kill me or something. And that shit was going on back then because the drugs, the drugs was crazy back then.
Right, that's the big shift is crack. Yeah, crack.
That's also in the 80s. Yeah, but see, before crack, you had that dope, that dope, that dope.
So motherfuckers was mixing dope and coke together and getting high and shooting it. Yeah, everything.
You know what I mean? It was a serious time back then, man. But, you know, that's how far to me music went back, know listening to ladies night you know what i mean i had i had people on my store that had a candy store right on the same floor but it wasn't a candy store they had a bunch of penny candy just to make kids feel cool but really they were selling coke in the back coke and dope though so you know all this was going on in the community man wow it was a serious time scary times back then but if it's

not

funny back coke and dope though so you know all this was going on in the community man it was a serious time scary times back then but if it's not for those scary times you don't get the kind of band that wu-tang was like that has to emerge from an authentic experience absolutely it has to and that's part of the appeal of it is that everybody kind of knew that you know it, it was part of the appeal. There's never been, like, a genre of music like that that's so connected to, like, the grind and poverty and crime and ghettos.
Like, the whole genre of music, to be authentic, you had to come from that. You couldn't be, like, some rich kid from the suburbs that was talking about some shit you never

actually experienced nobody wants to hear it right which is kind of crazy right that's true i mean you know back then you know hip-hop was really an expression for the ghetto you know the way that out you know being that we was living in fucked up situations and nobody had shit nobody had no fucking jobs like that it was like yo we needed something to keep us cool keep us in the vibe mode you know back then gangs was still relevant you know um we never looked at ourselves as a gang we might have looked at ourselves as a tribe that yo when you from a neighborhood and you stick neighborhood, you know what I mean? And that's why even back then it was like a lot of times, you know, you would beef with people that wasn't from your neighborhood just because you wasn't from here. It's like, yo, what the fuck you doing over here? You don't live over here.
You know, then it creates this animosity thing. And I remember for us, you know, being in an area where it was like you go up the block up the block stayed up the block down the block stay down the block so for me I was in the middle so you know I lean more towards up the block you know but then we would go down the block just to start trouble and you know then they would come up the block and they would start trouble and next thing you know before you know it we all fucking with each other you know what I mean so that was our way of getting to know each other is to test each other's heart and um whatever may happen was happening back then though but the music believe it or not the music was keeping a peace now just you know the music was keeping a peace because they would do block parties, right? They would do block parties and, you know, everybody knew all these different DJs was coming from different places and going to play some music and shit.
So we knew every time they did that, we knew something was going to happen at the end of the night. It was just mandatory.
It was just because people from all over, different neighborhoods would come out, and everything would be nice. And next thing you know, you see a motherfucker riding down the street all crazy, you know, trying to hit motherfuckers and swinging a golf club out the fucking out the window and shit and you know

somebody mother might have got knocked out you know what i mean um you know um but the music is still playing you know so um yeah that's the type of shit that to me that made it fun but made it spooky but it still was fun because it was something to remember it was like well it's fun because you survived.

Yeah,

oh yeah,

definitely,

the survival,

yeah,

you know,

but we were young

so we didn't,

we didn't,

we didn't care about whether we live or die at that time. We didn't give a fuck.
It was like whatever's going to happen is going to happen. That's wild.
But the music is what kept things in order for us because we always felt like that was a vessel to being calm. You know, when you come from somewhere that's fucked up, Joe, and there's nothing there, you can't get a job because of your community.
Your zip code don't allow you to be like, yo, he's hired. No, it's too infested over there.
So you kind of become relaxed with become relaxed with that mentality of saying well fuck it i'm gonna live off the land i'm gonna sell weed i'm gonna do whatever i think that is gonna make me survive you know so everything is just survival you know when um music always kept us calm and you always want to listen to what's next being played. Like, I grew up on R&B music, like disco and, you know, all that fun shit.
Roller skating. You know, I knew motherfuckers in the neighborhood that was roller skating.
You know, we would get off of Staten Island sometimes and go to these different parks and jams in the city.

That was fun, too, though. That was fun times for us.
So was it RZA that was initially all nine guys? Like, how did it get formed? Hmm. Well, number one, it was RZA, his cousin JZA, and his other cousin, Old Dirty Bastard, that they were super close.
Now, Old Dirty Bastard and JZA, they were from Brooklyn. RZA was from Staten Island.
you know we all Brooklyn babies too

majority of us in the Klan

we all resided in Staten Island

but majority of us grew up in Brooklyn. But anyway, it was those three that were close as shit.
So RZA, back then, RZA, he had knowledge of self, which was, you know, being involved with the Nation of Islam.

And also Jiz and Old Dirty, they were a part of the nation at that time.

So they would go to a lot of rallies.

This is a place where everybody go when they build.

They're talking about mathematics and all of this.

But it was Jiz and Old Dirty who instilled the hip-hop into RZA.

So RZA was a DJ back then, but he knew how to rhyme, too, and he knew how to rhyme because of his cousins. So they kind of had this gang called, not a gang, but they had this thing called the All In Together Now Crew, which was them three, and they would run around and they would battle, you know, different guys from different cities and move around.
So, you know, some of us kind of knew what they were about. You know, a lot of us, you know, found out later who they were.
But when Jizza and Old Dirty came to Staten Island, they came and they hang out with their cousin. So, you know, we started to see them a little bit more and know that, you know, yo, I heard about your rhymes.
And, you know, and Dirty, he was just a crazy motherfucker. He was was crazy but um yeah they they had their own little thing going on and then you know next thing you know jizzer caught a record deal he caught a record deal which was rare back then like if you had if you fucking caught a record deal that mean that you had to have relationships you had to know where to go you had to have some some type of connects so that's what gravitated RZA into wanting to to do it because he's seen that his cousin had was able to you know crack the code on making a record so when that happened it was almost like it magnet it magnetized RZA to be like yo I gotta make a record now too you know and the next thing you know, they had their movement going on.
So us from the outside looking, it was like, oh, shit, yo, we know them. We know they super passionate about, you know, being in the game and doing whatever they're going to do.
But we wasn't thinking that far. We just loved the music in general.
Wow. So RZA is essentially the mastermind to put all the pieces together and to bring all you killers absolutely to one under one roof absolutely absolutely amazing how he saw that because again that's not something that existed yeah it's like Eric being rock him you know there was you know there was a few PPMD there's a few people you know your shit yeah you know you sure you gang, there was a few people, EPMD, there was a few people.

You know your shit, dude.

You know your shit.

Gangstar.

There was a few people that were together, but it wasn't like you guys.

Nah, nah, because that was... It was kind of scary.

It was like, god damn, when you guys had a show, I mean, I heard stories that it was just like you guys would show up like 300 people.

Yeah, that was, you know, that was some neighborhood shit.

But, yeah, like you said, that was so rare to see a group that come out like that and it was really a mistake it wasn't really designed to be that way but when RZA had a record situation and they tried to make him be something that he wasn't and then you know always the case you know what I mean he was like yo fuck that I don't even care about the shit at this level no more. I want to create this now.
And I'm bringing in all my guys. And, you know, he just he just put that number together.
So believe it or not, I was one of the guys that he called first because we used to hang out. Like, like I tell people all the time, like, yo, I might have been RZA's first, you know, big fan.
So i kind of seen something then i'm already i seen something i'm like yo this guy really you know him and his cousins and i'm like yo these motherfuckers really got talent you know not only the ability to rhyme but they was clever like i'm talking about clever rhymes right right right you know and they was mixing it with the knowledge and you know smart rhymes, not these fucking regular Humpty Dumpty lines. I'm talking about serious rhymes.
Right. I'm like, damn, you know what I mean? Like, yo, so, you know, this is something that I felt like I would want to go chill with them just to be in the mix and be a fly on the wall.
Wasn't even thinking about being no fucking rapper. I didn't give a fuck.
I just love the music, but I'm watching these motherfuckers, yo, I'm like, something about these motherfuckers that I love. You know, and next thing you know, when RZA, you know, RZA went out there and he came back to the community, he was like, yo, I caught a record deal.
So, you know, I was there. I'm like, let me see this shit, looking at this shit looking at this shit what the fuck is oh yeah I'm looking down here like you said the the what's the name the fine print yeah the fine print and shit like yo this motherfucking man a record oh shit yo wow Staten Allen that's what's up we up you know but his situation ain't work out the way he wanted it to and that's when he came came back and he started to be like, yo, chef, this is what I'm trying to do.
Well, the dangerous thing for young artists in every industry is when you have potential and you're young, you sign a fucking contract and you don't know what's going on. And then you get locked into these people.
And then a lot of times you're getting fucked. And you don't even know you're getting fucked.
It's mandatory. Mandatory.

Mandatory.

You're getting fucked, which is how they make their money.

They make money by fucking young artists who don't know any better.

And by the time someone gets to like a prince's level, he's like, oh, you owe me?

I'm a fucking squiggly line.

Suck my dick.

And he performs as a symbol.

I mean, that's why he performed as a symbol.

Because they owned him.

It's crazy.

You take like the most talented people in the world and they get owned by people who provide no value, especially today. Today it's even crazier, right? Because there is no record sales anymore.
It's all gone. It's over, baby.
It's all gone. So for a young artist, it's so important that they stay independent as long as they can.
Just like you're hanging off a bridge. Hang on.
and keep grinding don't sell it don't sign if you sign you're gonna be fighting that shit 10 years from now yeah you're gonna be in court 10 years from now yeah you're right somebody's gonna be getting not just 50 percent but like some fucking insane like bill burr was explaining this about his his first comedy cd that he got a 60 40 deal he's like oh great 60 40 but it's not really 60 40 because he has to pay for all the distribution yeah all the all the printing of the cds everything came out of his money i'm gonna ask you a question let me ask you a question put yourself in the artist situation right you have right? You have talent. Here it is.
I got everything you want. Yeah.
You're going to have to make some sacrifices. For sure.
Because you know that, yeah, you may feel like, yo, I got talent, but I don't have the resources. Right.
So those resources come and tell you, yo, look, I'll give you a shot. I'm going to give you a shot.
But either you take the shot or you stay in the hood. What are you going to do? You're going to take the shot.
You're going to take the shot. You're going to take the shot.
And I agree with everybody who takes that shot. I'm just letting them know.
Right. I'm just letting them know.
You're getting fucked. You're getting fucked.
But see, it's the sacrifice that I'm trying to explain to you that every artist takes. They take that sacrifice because at the end of the day, you have to start from somewhere.
Right. So even when labels are being them, in my mind, I'm saying, yo, I get a chance to have a job, Joe.
Niggas ain't never had no fucking job in their life. And now we get a chance to do something that you could maybe think that you could change the world with and love.
It's like you're going to go for it. So for us back then being kids, we didn't give a fuck.
We didn't care about signing. Yo, I signed because what the fuck I got to lose? I done been through everything.
I done been over here. I done been kicked out of everywhere fuck it i just want to be heard so a lot of time that be the protocol is just to be heard yeah to be heard to be able to say yo something happened i don't give a fuck a lot of artists got robbed a lot a lot of artists and especially our our ogs that did it before us like you know what i mean sugar hell gangs all these different guys they all have been manipulated to do what they had to do but it almost gave them power too because they became this episode is brought to you by zip recruiter sometimes speed is a huge like in the ring or on the field, being quicker than your opponent could be the difference between winning and losing.
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They became big. They became legendary.
There's an argument for that, but I think it should be more fair. Oh, listen.
I'm with you. I'm with you on Of course you are.
But we just talking about the sacrifice you have to do it sacrifices everything if you're a young kid and that's step one and now you're on the runway okay you gotta take it you gotta take it but you gotta take it it just should be more fair oh and it shouldn't be i agree it shouldn't lock and i'm sure later on things worked out and you know now that you proved yourself once they become undeniable. It's like I tell a motherfucker this.
I'm like, yo, imagine you were a hustler, right? And you run into the connect and the connect say, yo, you talking like you know how to move shit. I'm going to give you 50 pounds of marijuana back then.
You know what I mean? Now, you may feel like at the end of the day you can handle it, but a motherfucker tell you, Joe, I'm giving you these fucking 50 pounds. I need my money back today at this time.
You can either take the 50 because you're so fucking confident or take one and say, yo, I'd rather take my time. You know what I mean? I don't want to be in debt with you.
What are you going to do? You got to take the 50. Oh, you? Oh, yeah.
He wants to fucking get his head fucking chopped off. You got to take the 50.
I don't know. You got to know people, and you got to bring everybody in, and you got to share the money.
See? You got to know people. You got to share the money.
You got to know people. There's a lot more money.
Now, if you ain't confident in knowing what the fuck you need to know, I advise you don't take them. You shouldn't be having that conversation if you don't know anybody.
but if you know some people and you're generous oh that's the thing you got to make it worth these people's while you got to bring you got to say listen we're all going to get something out of this and see now look that philosophy that you said yeah that's what we took on yes we took that on we said you know what at the end of the day we'll take this little bit of money, but we're going to go we're going to be willing to sell ourselves to get to this level because we know what we believe in. See, it all starts from what you believe.
If you don't have the belief in yourself to make it happen, you fucked. It's a rising tides lifts all boats thing too.
And with Wu-Tang Clan, that was for sure a big thing because anybody that was associated with wu-tang clan was automatically respected

automatically people wanted to listen automatically yeah automatically so like that that just lifts

everybody that lifts everybody it's hard for people to see that everybody thinks about themselves

especially when you're struggling when you're struggling then you're scared and you know and

scared money doesn't make money money that's what it is everybody gets paranoid and they think

No, you can't. especially when you're struggling when you're struggling then you're scared and you know and scared money doesn't make money that's what it is everybody gets paranoid and they think no you got that's when you got to bond together that's when everybody you have to find real people and stick together you said the key word you gotta sell that 50 you gotta know you we gotta sell that 50 yeah talk to carlos go down to the bodega got to make some deals.
We got 10 hours. I guess that's what RZA did is that he danced with the devil for the right reason.
And, you know, we took some scars. We got hit.
It was a different world back then, too, in terms of the industry. Because today, all you need is a social media account, Spotify, SoundCloud.
Yeah. You can blow up.
Yeah. You can blow up today.
Yeah, easily. Back then, you needed the radio.
Yeah. You needed, you know, you could sell mixtapes, but it's hard.
You had to be some undeniable talent. Yeah.
You know, like, we always played the video of Biggie when he was 17 on the street. Remember that video? Yeah, yeah, when he was in his neighborhood.
Yeah.iable talent. That's the kind of talent.
If he stays alive, you can't stop that train. Absolutely.
That train's running everything over. You know what I mean? There was guys like that back then.
But, man, to get out there and get your name out there, you had to dance. You had to dance with that with that devil you had to work and that business was so dirty back then it still is but real dirty back then in the record selling days yeah of course of course i mean but that's what made us learn is that we had to grow through we had to go through those growing pains we had to get jerked to learn how to say yo yo, that was a lesson.
So everything is a lesson at the end of the day. It's like if you're willing to sacrifice yourself and your time to learn something, I would always say go for it.
Yes. You know, go for it.
Definitely, go for it. It's so much better than not going for it.
Yeah, because then you're going to be sitting in the same situation, and you're going to realize at the end of the day, damn, I should have took that opportunity. Some people are scared of opportunities when they come, and it's like if a person offers you an opportunity, nine times out of ten it may not work for you the way you want it to work, but it may be an opportunity to help you.
Yes. You know, it's all about you trying to help yourself and get out there it's like watching Scarface and the nigga told him he said yo give you five grand better and if you fuck this up Chico Scarface looked at him and said man the fuck is you talking about we built? We built for this shit, man.
You know, when he lost his man in the mix, but he was able to prove to himself that I could do it. That's how I look at rap.
It's like, yo, I don't give a fuck. Yeah, we'll take this little bit of money, but we're going to prove to y'all later on that we know what the fuck we doing.
And for young people listening to this, every chance you take where you fail, that's a lesson learned. That's a lesson, baby.
And you just keep taking chances. That's right.
Keep going. Pick yourself back up.
Figure out where you fucked up and learn from that. Now you're better.
That's right. Now you have more experience coming into this next thing.
Just keep going. Just keep going.
Just keep going, especially as artists. It's just like so many artists, they don't hit until they do.
That's right. And then when they do, it's like, oh, and then people want to go back in their past stuff.
Like, oh, this guy had fucking three albums before this. Yeah.
Think about it. Think about all our favorite artists out there.
You know, Eminem, you know. Eminem been trying to fucking get on, you know, you know, Rakim, Slick Reg, all these guys, they went through a lot to get on, you know what I mean? Biz Markie, you know, nobody wanted to fuck with Biz at first, but, you know, he finally figured the code out and was like, yo, this is what I'm going to do.

You know, he start rocking shows in different communities and next thing you know, he finally figured the code out and was like, yo, this is what I'm going to do. You know, he started rocking shows in different communities, and next thing you know, people started hearing about him, and you're like, oh, shit, yo, this guy is dope.
But it's that sacrifice, man. I tell people all the time, got to sacrifice.
Yeah, it's time put in. Time put in, energy, effort, determination, and you got to have some talent.
Yeah, you got to have some talent and yeah talent is just god just give you something or doesn't you know some people just got it you know some people it's also like artistic families like nas you know he grew up in this like intellectual artistic family and that's why his rhymes are so good yeah his pops man pops man his pops is a musician. Yeah Good like rewind.
Yeah, that's like one of the greatest songs of any genre anybody's ever written It's a genius song so crazy. I was listening to that shit yesterday.
Genius goes back in the gun. Yeah Genius the whole song backwards fuck with lyrics and it's a me.
Oh, I love Nas, especially for lyrics. His lyrics are incredible.
They were so good. They were so good.
Dope. And unusual, like that.
Like, deciding. I'm going to be the first guy to make a rap backwards.
And make it work perfectly. Yeah, yeah.
You know? I mean, it's just. Hey, did you ever listen to any of the shit where the brand new heaviesies got together with a bunch of rappers? The Brand New Heavies.
I know the name, but I'm trying to do another music. The Brand New Heavies are like a jazz band.
They did a collaboration with Gangstar, Cool G Rap. Oh, yeah, yeah.
A bunch of guys. Of course, yeah, yeah.
Some of my favorite shit of all time. Yeah, they was more musical, though.
Yeah. They was more musical, more musical.
Have you ever heard Cool G Rap's Death Threat?

Oh my god.

Jamie, play that.

Play that. Find that.

We gotta put on the headphones for this.

This is in my, along with a bunch of Wu-Tang,

this is in my Spotify playlist.

This is Cool G Rap in like, I wanna say

92? Yeah, 92.

Listen to this. I've never heard this shit before.
How good is this? We had no heads on the tracks You rap on a wax coat Motherfuckers doing jumping jacks

You motherfuckers lost it

I bet your ass like a case

You know you flicks shit before. How good is this? Woo! Woo! One of my favorites right there.
Turn the chicks with small dicks. Woo! Nice.
So good. Nice.
So good. So this was on the Brand New Heavies album.
Yes. Never heard of it.
The Brand New Heavies did one with Gangstar. They did a bunch of different artists.
Nice. What year was this? 92.
Yeah. Phenomenal.
See, this is the beginning. Yeah.
Yeah. I was on a road trip.
I was doing a gig in Connecticut with a buddy of mine who's a comedian. Right.
And he turned me on to this. Like, you got to listen to this shit.
And I was like, oh, my God. And then I had a CD and I lost it.
And I couldn't find it forever. And then someone brought it up like a few years back, like six or seven years back.
And I was like, you got to be able to find it. And that's the beautiful thing about today with like YouTube and, you know, so many of these platforms.
People upload shit that you totally forgot about. Yeah, you forgot about it.
Like, Tim Dog. You know, people forgot about Tim.
Like, fuck Compton. Remember that? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He was a wildcat, but he was real. He was good, though.
He was good. Fuck Compton, yeah.
He was wilding back then, yeah. Great shit, man.
Yeah, he was wilding back then, though. But Coogee Rap, that, to me, was to me was like that defined like road gigs for me in the 1990s when we were drive that was when cock blocking came out oh my god that song is amazing yeah man damn so you you really you really pay attention to this fucking hip-hop shit like that yeah hip-hop was a big part of my my childhood or my my young adulthood

You know when I was driving around a lot doing comedy gigs like a lot of ghetto boys Oh ghetto boys fan. Yeah, me too.
You know boys I was playing the other day in the green room I was playing fuck a war for these young kids. I was like listen.
This is a song from the 1980s about the Iraq War.

This is about George Bush

in the late

1980s about the iraq war this is about george bush in like the 19 late 1980s and it applies today you remember fuck war nah you come on headphones are coming back on let's go school with me on shit like i talked to willie d willie d told me he wrote this song in 40 minutes wow yeah he was just angry wrote this song in 40 minutes. And this is ghetto boys in their prime.
Hello, can I speak with Bushwick? You know that album. Bushwick Bill.
Hello. That was my guy right there, man.
This is Bushwick, motherfucking Bill. I'm calling you for me that you've been drafted into the United States military.
United States wants me for a... 91.
91. Excuse me, sir.
Bushwick. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Bye. 91 91 Look at that big phone he's got

Yeah

I had one of those before too

Yeah

Fuck a war

Fuck a war Fuck a war Yeah

Yeah

Yeah Yeah.

Talking crazy. Oh, shit.

Oh, shit.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, God. Yeah.
He was in the NWA chamber. Dude.
He was in the NWA chamber right there. That shit was good.
And that applies today. And that applies today.
That applies today. We were all talking about what's going on right now with Gaza and Palestine.
I know. Iran.
I was like, listen to this. And see, this is why we love hip-hop so much is because it was educational, too.
Yes. It was giving us jewels.
It was talking about things that were going on in the world and that became the television for us. The music, the music, the music.
It became the news too. Like you need to know what was actually going on.
Like fuck a war tells you what's really going on. What's going on, yeah.
So when I think about those Compton boys, those N.W.A. cats and all of that, that was expressing themselves, it was like that's what we all were facing and living amongst.
And, you know, like I said, I never heard that song before. So I could tell that was made around the time when N.W.A.
was doing a thing. And, you know, you're hearing about all these riots and shit going on and things happening happening you know us living all the way on the other side of the world it's like yo we not yo what the fuck was that right you know but you heard it in a song and you knew it was real right you respected it and to me those perspectives and music were important for us because we were learning as we were getting older about society right you know you don't think about society when you poor and and living in and fucked up positions you just think about survival right you see what i'm saying survival is the only thing on your mind and you you you you're dealing with things that's in front of you that at the end of the day you're like damn the fuck was that that just happened or what was this shit but then when you heard it in rap and and motherfuckers like these was talking about it and all that right it's like now you was like oh okay i see what the fuck is going on yeah it's not just here it's it's all over it's in every everywhere every ghetto or whatever the case may be that's what was happening yes so i never heard that before though you just You just put me on some real shit.
And that's one of my favorite groups right there. I love the ghetto boys.
Ghetto boys is the real shit right there. The 1990s ghetto boy era.
Crazy. And that, like, I remember the day I found out about NWA.
I was teaching Taekwondo in Revere, Massachusetts. And I was at the gym, riding on the stair climber.
And I just picked up this cassette. And I was like, NWA, I keep hearing about this.
And Fuck the Police was the first song I listened to. And I remember I was on the stair climber going, this is wild.
You see what I'm saying? You're hearing people talk about the police, like they're getting harassed by the police in a way you never heard i'm saying yeah exactly the police coming straight from the underground it was like i was like wow straight from the fucking it was a totally different kind of music it was it was like they were rapping and no one was listening it was like they were rapping for themselves right yeah like they didn't give a fuck who was listening they were rapping like they were doing it for their friends but they were doing to the whole world and the whole world was like whoa 100 miles and running the whole world was like whoa this is crazy so look you had them you had public enemy oh yeah all of them type of guys were giving us information that was relatable in our community that they became a voice.

KRS-One?

KRS-One, the teacher, you know.

Boop, boop, that's the sound of the police.

All that shit right there to me was knowledgeable.

Knowledgeable rap, hip-hop.

I ain't gonna call it fucking rap.

Hip-hop.

Informational. Informational.
Right. Especially KRS-One and Public Enemy.
Yeah. rap hip-hop i ain't gonna call it fucking rap hip-hop informational information right they like especially krs1 and public enemy yeah they were they were saying something it was like very it was but it wasn't contrived right right exactly wasn't like you know you see people say shit today like ah you're just doing that for claps like they were saying shit to let people know about some information that you're not aware of, and this is why you're getting fucked.
This is why we're all getting fucked. Absolutely.
Come on. Come on.
Even when fucking Spike Lee made Do the Right Thing. Yes.
One of my favorite movies right there. That's a classic right there.
Classic. Classic.
Classic shit. Wow.
Classic. But like you said, we was getting information, and, you, you got to remember, you know, at the end of the day, you know, a lot of people that coming out of, you know, the hood and just being like, I know you, you come from the hood, you know.
Well, I was born in Newark. Yeah, he was born in Newark.
Shout out to Newark. So you, you seen it firsthand.
I wasn't exactly sad come from the hood, because I went to high school in the suburbs. Yeah, but you, yeah, yeah, that's true, bro's true i lived in uh newark i was telling you i lived in newark when i was 23 for about six or seven months and i told you my next door neighbor he was selling dope and the police raided his house while i was there they battering rammed his door and everything he had a nice audi right i looked at my house this dude has a nice car right selling dope he was sellelling dope.
He was selling dope. And they got him.
But he was around it, though. Yeah.
So he was able to, you know. Well, that was also the time that I was the most into hip-hop, too.
I mean, that was 1991, I guess. 90, 91.
That was a wild era, because that's when hip-hop was just exploding. Yeah, yeah.
Exploding. Yeah, I would say definitely 91.
You had Naughty by Nature. by nature oh yeah they had emerged on the scene like you said um rock him and big daddy king oh yeah easy ease and ice cubes to this day i go to work it's one of my favorite workout songs what big daddy king i'll go to work.
Oh, my God.

I go to work.

Oh, he was so smooth and so fast, too.

Yeah.

You know, Big Daddy Kane had like a very particular style.

It was energetic.

You know, you heard his style.

Like, God, you like your blood started pumping.

Yeah.

You started getting moving.

And see, those are the type of guys that paid the way for us to be so, you know,

I'll see you next time. started pumping, you know? You started getting moving.
And see, those are the type of guys that paid the way for us to be so, you know, outspoken on the mic. You know, when I sit here and when I think about the Klan, you know, the Wu on how we, you know, formed Voltron, each one of us had a superpower that related back to those guys.
You know, all these guys that we talking about today um they was the they was the light bulb right in in in the house you screw that shit on

you this is what i see right now i see slick wreck i see rock cam i see cube i see fucking

you know um all these guys that paid the way for us. So the Klan at that time, we were so, you know, inclined on knowing about all these guys, knowing the majority of them, we kept a piece of them in us that helped us become who we are.
Like I tell motherfuckers all the time, I say, yo, let me tell you something. When by nature was the shit they was they was fucking shit up on the east coast side of things you know and at that time you had them you had epmd you had queen latifah roxanne shante all these you know artists back then were blowing up ll can't front on ll ll oh yeah um LL was huge Coogee rap one of my favorites I know that's one of your favorites um you know the fat boys all these guys were just that's right fat boys you know these guys was giving us so much food for thought that we knew that if we didn't come on that level we wasn't built to to be in a game at that time.
Well, there was so much high quality. Yeah.
High quality. That's the word.
The level was very high. Absolutely.
The lyrics were so good. Like you would hear lyrics and just go, oh.
Oh, shit. Yeah.
Oh. That was the thing.
That was the thing about hip hop. Listening to the lyrics, I love that.
I love lyrics. You lyricists.
That's right. Lyrics is everything.
That's right. You know, it's like that was the thing.
That was the thing about hip-hop. Listening to the lyrics, I love that.
I love lyrics. That's right.
Lyrics is everything. That's right.
Lyrics is everything. That's what I wanted in.
That was the style back then. It was like the most clever guy, the most clever lyrics.
It was so important. There's so many guys that just had, everybody was battling.
So it was like more and more cleverness and more and more intricacies and more and more twists what they were saying yeah and it was just a vibrant art form man like it like how many people cheated on their significant other because of opp right how many it was like a license to people were were cheering. Exactly.
I mean, hip-hop had so much influence on the culture, and it emerged out of nowhere. Out of nowhere.
That's what's so crazy. Like, 10 years ago, it doesn't exist.
Boom. I mean, even rock and roll.
I mean, rock and roll, you had the 50s, it starts to emerge, and then the 60s really takes off, and, you know, it had been around for a while. Right, a while to have something like hip-hop just explode

and make a lot of other things look lame you know especially for young kids because when you hear guys like you and you know ghost face and you know method man and like you're dealing with real dudes who are talking about real shit and everybody else just look kind of lame you It was like, they didn't even swear. You know? It was like, you guys were wild.
It was fun, and it was clever, and I think RZA did a genius thing by naming it Wu-Tang Clan because it connected it to this kung fu mindset. And I know that you're big on kung fu shit cause I'm coming through your shrine and shit you got all kind of fucking shogun warriors but nah but you know what's so crazy I tell people it's like when RZA when they was on their Wu-Tang shit we wasn't on that I grew up watching more like Scarface and Mafia movies, Once Upon a Time in America.
Oh, yeah. One of my favorite movies.
Oh, that's a great one. People forget about Once Upon a Time in America.
That's my fucking movie right there. That's my movie.
So we were like, we were living in this, we were living around a lot of hustlers. A lot of drugs of drugs was being sold in my community at that time right so when rizak came with the whole wu-tang philosophy it was almost like yeah we love karate flicks we were watching you know about the karate flicks three o'clock three o'clock yeah we come over and school them shits is on channel five all of shit.
But if you notice and you look at those karate movies, it was about a place that, you know, was filled with a lot of crime and aggressive people that were doing things that bothered other people. And you either had to protect your people or you had to make a name for yourself.
Now when think about Wu-Tang I'm gonna just give you a quick lesson on what Wu-Tang was Wu-Tang was a school that was in Shaolin this particular school these niggas was crazy they was fucked up they got kicked the fuck out of Shaolin really they got kicked out yo y' Yo, y'all bugged out. Y'all wildin', y'all.
But these guys were very good, but they just couldn't sit in Shaolin because they had a different way of looking at shit and doing shit. So when RZA came with the whole philosophy of it, it's this movie that's called Shaolin vs.
Wu-Tang, right? Check it out whenever whenever you get a chance so whatever was going on in that movie he made a reality of it because really at the end of the day that's how we were living back in Staten Island you know so we wound up changing the name and calling it Shaolin because we would have forgotten Barrow you know when you think about Brooklyn Bronx Queens, we don't really talk too much about fucking Staten Island. That bothered us.
So we didn't, we felt rebellious. Like, yo, you come out here, you ain't from here, you better know somebody.
You're not fucking coming into projects thinking you're going to fucking act like you're going over to your friends. I remember we used to see UFOs come through.
We call them UFOs. Unidentified flying objects.
The fuck he doing? Yo, follow him. We came to see.
You know what I mean? Because we had so much to prove, but it was the same thing that was going on in the karate flicks. Like, yo, you go to a new neighbor.
Who is this guy? Either he's coming to play you, he's coming to play you, or you going to play him. This is all the shit that's going on in the karate movies.
You know, the brotherhood. Yo, oh shit, my brother got hurt.
What happened? Oh, hold up. Let's go.
We got to go get back to that. We got to go figure that out.
All this shit that RZA was thinking about at that time was a reality check for us in Staten Island. So even when he came with the name, it was almost like wow that shit is interesting you know wu-tang clan yo you know and back then he was hanging in ghosts community which was stapleton so stapleton was a place that was maybe like 10 15 miles away from park hill where i'm from i'm from the hill i'm from up there they were selling drugs and getting crazy with it and Jamaicans and Westerners and Guyanese and you know, it was a melting pot.
You know, it was a melting pot of different nationalities of motherfuckers. You had the Spanish motherfuckers over here selling dope.
You know what I mean? You had the white boys over here fucking doing what they doing. You know, um, all these going on.
But in Stapleton, it was nothing but criminals and motherfuckers that want to fight and rob and steal. And, you know, RZA was hanging out there a lot.
You know, so they came up with this whole, you know, Wu-Tang mentality thing that they brought up the block to us. So when RZA came with it, it was like, oh, shit, we like that.
That's kind of dope. We see the vision of that.
But it was never for us to look at it at any given time like, yo, you trying to portray us as some fucking ninjas or some shit. A lot of times people thought, yo, your niggas know karate? You know what I mean? You know no fucking karate, motherfucker.
We don't do that. But we grew up, our older brothers and sisters, they grew up on that.
That was some early 70s shit right there. Yeah.
So, you know, back then you might have had a cousin that was a martial art. He knew the arts and shit.
You know, you looked up to him like, yo, this motherfucker's L right here. He know the arts and shit.
He know how to fight. You know, your motherfucker would be in back of the building with two Doberman pinches and shit.
You know what I mean? Beating him with fucking laundromat hoses and shit and, you know, grabbing him and hanging him on shit. And, you know, back then that was, you know, that was dope to see your cousins and all of them do it.
But RZA, when he came with this philosophy, it kind of like fucked us all up. But we agreed with it right away.
Because Wu-Tang was, to them, was always something like an expression. So if you drinking, this is Wu-Tang.
I'm drinking, yo. You over here, yo, this is some Wu-Tang shit or whatever.
Because he was trying to say that we were just like them in the flicks.

It's crazy.

Want to hear something crazy?

Whenever I kill an elk, you know, I go bow hunting every year.

Whenever I kill an elk, when I text my friend Cam, I text Wu-Tang.

Like whenever I kill something, I'll show you.

Oh, my God.

I'll show you that that's true.

I've seen some of the pictures in there.

I know, but I want to show you that that's true.

I'm not making this up. It goes back years.
It goes back years. This is like our tradition.
Whenever I kill an elk, well, I'm going to find this. I'm going to find one the last time I said Wu-Tang.
I text him every day, so it's going to take a second to get back into some pictures. But whenever I get one, I say Wu-Tang, and then I send him a picture.
Oh, shit. Crazy.

This is going to take a while because I do scroll, but this is important to show you. This is

real. Come on, motherfucker.

Go back and search Wu-Tang and it'll show you.

Oh, it'll show you? Oh, okay.

Look at Jamie. Under Cam Haynes

or just Wu-Tang? Then when you

find Cam Haynes, it'll show you. Oh, look at

Jamie telling me how to do it.

Here we go.

Here it is. Right there.
Wu-Tang. Holy shit.
Holy shit. And then the elk is down.
Wow. That was from October.
But I go back like five years of doing that. Like every time I shoot an elk, I text Wu-Tang.
Wow, crazy. When you started hunting,

since you came out here?

No, I started hunting in 2012.

Oh, shit.

I shot that deer,

that deer,

that head that's right there.

That was the first animal I hunted.

And then I was like,

okay, that's what I'm doing.

Wow.

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Oh, crazy. It was either for me it was that or become a vegetarian.
I watched too many of those PETA films. Oh, yeah.
You know, those animal factory farming films and torture films. I was like, fuck this.
Like, either I'm going to be a vegan or I'm going to learn how to hunt. And my friend Steve Ranella took me hunting.
I shot that deer. I'm like, all right, that's what I shit i've been doing it ever since so i've been hunting for 12 years 12 years yeah so you consider yourself a marksman then uh well it's like i'm not really good like compared to real marksman you know that's like saying you're a black belt when you're not really a black belt you know like like i go through the courses yeah like how good are you mean, I'm good for regular people.
Yeah, if you didn't know, you'd think I'm really good. Except for regular people.
Yeah, but like for people that are really good? No. I'm not nearly at their level.
Gotcha. But you know, there's like professional archers that are like super accurate out to 100 yards.
They can shoot like a softball-sized group at 100 yards consistently. I got a couple of homeboys who can shoot like that, though.
It's a lot of discipline. Yeah.
A lot of discipline. Yeah, but they come from, they live on this side of town, too, though.
Yeah. Well, there's a lot of bow hunting in Texas.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. A lot of bow hunting in Texas.
Yeah. It's fun.
Yeah, yeah. I like it.
I got to get out there one day, man. I got to, you know.
I told you, like we were talking before the show, like, you want to learn. I could put you on some people that will 100% teach you how to do it.
Because you're fairly close. That's an easy thing to do.
We could hook it up. Yeah, definitely.
You would enjoy it. It's also a nice discipline to clear your mind.
You set a target up in the backyard and just shoot the target. It just clears your mind.
Because you have to really concentrate on it. And while you're doing it, you don't think about nothing else For a guy like you busy so much shit going on like it's good to have a thing like that To just it's like a sport to me.
Yeah, I'm learning and kind of master Yeah, that's important, but it's one of those things like like a shooting a free throw like at that moment You can't think of anything else other than what you're doing if other shit shit gets in your head, it's like you don't have any room for it. You're not going to be focused.
You got to push it all out. Right.
And just think. And that kind of stuff like cleans your mind.
Exactly. It's like it flushes your mind out.
That's what it's all about at the end of the day, man. Just kind of like get a peace of mind and vibe to something different though.
Yeah. I always say that for artists too too.
You should find some other thing you like to do just to give you a little break mentally from whatever you're trying to do. Exactly.
You could get too close to something and lose sight of the big picture if you're all wrapped up in it. Because you're so stuck into one.
Sometimes you need something else that you also enjoy outside of it, and then you can look at what you're doing. Oh, okay, what am I doing different? different exactly maybe I should put a new wrinkle in this maybe I should take a new turn you know mix it up man that's important yeah you know what was another cool thing about today is that it used to be thought at one point in time I think it was like the early 2000s that rap had that hip-hop had a shelf life and that there wouldn't be classics You know what I mean? Like the Rolling Stones were still touring, you know, they were 58 years old back then like this is crazy the Rolling Stones are back on the road, but that was like a new thing It was like old rock and roll guys out touring was a new thing But with hip-hop artists artists, if you weren't in now, if you weren't new now, people weren't in to go and see you.
Right, yeah. Well, when I see guys like L.L.
and Kane and them perform and Slick Rick and Ice Cube, it gives me more leverage and more strength to want to do it because I see some of my legends still doing it today. But, yeah, man, like you said, just to see a lot of guys like the Rolling Stones and Mick Jagger and them still performing, it's like, why not? Why not? Why not? Why give up on it? But with hip-hop, it wasn't really a thing for a long time.
Like older hip-hop. You didn't think that it would last.
Right. You know what I mean? So you felt like you would get a five-year run.
They say any artist that was coming out back in the 90s, they was already putting a cap on how long or how far they felt you was going to go. So even for us, we was like, yo, hey, we do this shit for like three or four years.
We good. Yo, we'll be cool with that.
Wow. So they always put us in a, what's the word I want to say? What's that? A box? Put us in a box.
Yeah. To make us feel like at the end of the day, yo, this shit is going to be here for a minute, then it over you know but seeing guys still doing it you know i don't give a fuck like i listen to billy joe i'm a billy joe fan that's my fucking guy right there that's hilarious people i know people would be like get the fuck out of here that's hilarious i love his old shit until he he's until he had that supermodel wife oh then everything got real soft.
He fell in love. Too much good pussy.
He got supermodel pussy. And it's like, uptown girl, she's been living in her uptown world.
Before that, you go back to his other shit, you know, Owen the Good Die Young. Oh, that's a great jam.
He's got some great stuff, man. Scenes from an Italian restaurant.
That's a great song, man. Captain Jack.
Ooh, Captain Jack's a great song. Billy Joe, man.
But when he got older, it just became, you know, he was changing as a human. He in New York too, right? Yeah.
New Yorker to the heart right there, right? I mean, that guy sold out Madison Square Garden like 300 times. See what I'm saying? Kind of crazy.
Still going. Yeah, still going still going those are heroes those are guys that we we look up to that you know they still doing anything man yeah it's just beautiful that uh hip-hop is like that now because uh i feel like in the 2000s only it was more overseas was showing you guys love yeah like a lot of europe like a lot of my friends that were like maybe bigger in the 90s they had to go over to europe to come check out yeah and i tell people all the time like being being from the states being where we from i think they appreciate it more because they they never really got a chance to grasp it as much as we did.
Right. So they come out more.
Right. Right now today.
They're more enthusiastic. They more.
They love it more. Right.
They can't believe you're there. Yeah, they can't believe it.
Yeah. But for me, I think I love performing a lot more when I go out there because they come out and they never, ever make you feel like they don't appreciate you.
You know what I mean? And even to this day, it's like the Klan still goes out there and makes a ton of cash. We see a lot of people.
And we see young generations of kids now, too. It's like, yo, you look in the crowd.
You're like, yo, how the fuck old is that fucking kid that we just put him on stage and he knew the fucking words. Like, yo, he might have been like 17, 16 years old.
Like, yo, he wasn't even fucking born. Well, there's classic hip-hop now.
You know what I'm saying? Like, when I was a kid, there was classic rock. You listen to Led Zeppelin.
It was classic rock. Now there's classic hip-hop, which is amazing.
Yeah, you're right.

Well, it just shows that the culture has completely accepted it as an art form.

And so now young kids that get into hip-hop, maybe one of their friends will be like,

hey, you ever heard of this?

And then they turn them on to new stuff.

Exactly.

And they're like, wow, yeah, yeah, this is 1992, you know?

That shit, you know, and I think that that's how we were. We always were infatuated with the music before our time, you know? I'm like how you just said, like, yo, you know, listening to Sugar Hill Gang, you know? I actually had them in one of my videos before.
Really? Word, you know how that, and I brought them to my hood, too. So you know how that felt for me? Oh, wow.
To have fucking Sugar Hill Gang come out to that's amazing that was dope though right there man but yeah man it you know that's why i always feel like yo i tell people all the time you have to respect the people that did it before you man because they gave you something to to dream about yes be able to instill in yourself Like, if you don't have that, then you're not moving the way you're supposed to be moving. You know, I remember old man would tell us, if you don't know where you came from, you'll never know where you're going.
So having that history, that history is an experience that sticks with you forever. You have to have that.
Don't try to front on that you know and i think a lot of times people you know they look at hip-hop and they think certain things is hip-hop it's like history of hip-hop is something that you gotta know man you gotta know it you gotta know it you gotta know it you should know it like the history of the united states exactly it's it's something, if you're an artist, that's what lit the fire. Somebody had to light the fire.
And if these young guys don't know, like, hey, this shit didn't even exist in 1979. Yeah.
Didn't even exist. That's not that long ago.
And then all of a sudden, now it's everywhere? Exactly. Like, what happened? Somebody lit the fire, and if they didn't light that fire, you wouldn't have it.
Exactly. You wouldn't have the embers you wouldn't you wouldn't have this desire to try this thing exactly and now look what it's doing look what it did it's like yo one of the biggest genres of music is like you know and there's a lot of times people take shots at it like you know y'all ain't talking negative y'all ain't talking this they talking that's like, my thing to that is always like, yo,

it's no different from going to see a scary movie.

Exactly.

Jason.

Exactly.

Motherfuckers killing motherfuckers in the woods.

I hated camp.

You know what I mean?

Based on that, Heat is one of my favorite movies.

Great fucking movie.

I love Heat.

You know, De Niro, De Niro and Al.

But why is it okay to do that in a movie,

but it's not okay to do that in a song?

Right.

I don't understand it. I don't, you know.
It's hypocritical. You know, it's hypocritical.
It is. It's hypocritical because they say it encourages violence.
And that's the same thing they'll say about video games. Like, you know, doesn't hit everybody.
Yeah. So what's going on really? What's going on really is you have a bunch of disenfranchised people that don't have any hope.
And if they are around a lot of violence, maybe something will get them excited about violence. If they're not disenfranchised and they have hope, they're not inclined towards violence.
It's a societal problem. It has nothing to do with the art itself.
The art itself is representative of real experiences. So if you're telling people that they can't express themselves about real experiences, you're just going like this.
La, la, la, la, la. I'm not listening.
That's all you you're doing that's how you feel at the end of the day this is these people's lived expression this is that which is why wu-tang was so good the reason why it was so good is because it was real like no one was questioning the authenticity of anybody that was in the wu-tang clan so it's like that the message that you guys were putting out the way you were putting out, like Wu-Tang Clan ain't nothing to fuck with,

like that is, it was like from you to the world, you know?

And if someone doesn't like that, you don't have to listen.

Exactly.

You don't have to listen.

Right, right.

But if you slap a warning sticker on it,

you're just going to sell more albums.

You're going to listen to it anyway, right?

You're going to get caught up in it anyway.

Yeah, it's like, look, prime example, when we made the it anyway, right? You're gonna get caught up in it anyway. Yeah, it's like, look, prime example.

When we made the record Cream, right?

Cream was a record that didn't have nothing to do with anything

but the realness of what we were looking at.

It wasn't really a song to rap to or have fun with.

It was a reality. It was a picture we was trying to paint cash rules everything around me cash rules like around me not me should never fucking rule you but around me you know and a friend from the neighborhood he actually came up with that acronym but i tell people all the time my cousin i had a cousin from brooklyn that he used to come to staten allen and he used to sell drugs for us and he came up with that word cream because he was like yo yo as long as i can make my cream i'm good i'm like what the fuck is cream like you know what i mean he's like yo cream yo you ever see tom and jerry the movie and you know he make those big fucking sandwiches and all of that and he splash all that cream on it and you know I'm like oh the Tom and Jerry the sandwiches right yeah when he made the big sandwiches and stuff them in your mouth and all.
Nah real shit real shit. So the cream that the cream that was splashing all over the place he was looking at that as that's his money like I just want my cream I just want my cream.
You know what I mean, yeah, you're going to get your cream. You sit up in the fucking spot all day, you're going to make your cream.
You're going to get it. So who came up with the acronym? A good friend of ours from the neighborhood.
His name is Raid, right? And him and Method, man, they was like real close, like brothers. So when we was in the studio, right into it, he was there and um he just sat back and he just came up with cash rules everything around me and him and meth they put it together and next thing you know that that was a hook you know at that time for me i was still writing a lot of stories you know so i wrote believe it or not i wrote two verses for cream i

didn't write my rhyme never started off as i grew up on the crime side i was writing about drug dealers in the neighborhood like yo i know this kid by the name of giganti giganti a teflon don with a diamante you know the diamantes back in the days was like the you know the five series He bends his fuzz back then.

And a good friend of mine was like oh that rhyme is cool i think it's all right like why you don't like the rhyme everybody else like it he was like it's cool i like it so he made me go back and change it and when i changed it i started to think before i wrote it i'm'm like, damn, he said, yo, we need to rhyme about shit.

That's something that we could relate to that we're dealing with around what the fuck we wake up to every day.

And that's when I came with I grew up on the crime side, you know, the New York Times side.

So he he just told you harder.

Yeah, he just told me to think harder.

Harder. Yeah.

He said, yo, chef, you could you could you could be a little bit more creative.

Well, Kare Cream is crazy because it became viral. Saying dollar-dollar bills, y'all, became viral.
But you know where that come from, the dollar-dollar bill, y'all. Dollar bill, y'all.
Dollar-dollar-dollar Tee La Rock. Oh, wow.
You remember that record? Yeah. Money.

It takes money. Yeah.
Whatever he was saying back then. I haven't heard that for ever.
Yeah, that was a serious record right there. Yeah, that's an old school record right there.
Wow. Fly shit, though.
But, yeah, Meth and my man Ray, they sat down and they came up with Cash Rule, everything around me. And it was a it was a perfect, you know, symbol of what we were trying to express that we were always trying to get money.
But we was dealing with certain things in our community that, you know, that we were trying to get past first to try to make some money. And it was a sacrifice.
It was like, yo, you do this shit, you might be able to get out of it alive, or you might not. So that record wind up blowing up so big, it wind up being one of our biggest records.
And it didn't have nothing to do with... To me, it didn't feel hip-hop.
It just felt like real realization. Real shit is we need to start listening.
Like how you just played the Gettos Boys shit. You know what I mean? We're trying to give off a message.
A message. And that's what I think that people love about Wu-Tang is that we give out messages.
We give out. We like an emotional rollercoaster group.
We can give you the Wu-Tang Clan ain't nothing to fuck with. And then we can give you the tears where it's like, oh, shit.
Yeah. The fuck? He's right.
You know what I mean? Yo, we got to be careful. We got to look at things for real.
So all that had a lot to do with being around smart guys. You know what I mean? The smartness allowed us to write the way we wanted to write.
Right. It's contagious.
It was contagious back then. Yeah.
Well, that's what I'm saying about really good lyrics and high-quality rap. It's contagious.
Yeah, yeah. Because then everybody else's shit has to be tight, too.
Yeah. And you know when you come in with a group of guys that, yo, he kill it, you better come in.
Right. You have to come in and say some shit that makes sense.
Like, I give a lot of credit to our first record, right, Protect Your Neck, and I know that's one of your favorite shits. When Inspector Deck said, I smoke on a mic like smoking Joe Frazier, the Hellraiser, raising hell with the flavor? Yeah.
That right there that right there opened up something with all of us. I always tell Deck, I'm like, yo, Deck, you are like a Scotty Pippen.
You're always going to hit if you get the ball in your hand. And he did that.
He created that first verse that, you notice me, I jumped right in behind him. Yeah.
Rhymes, rung it, it built like Schwarzenegger. Yeah.
Then meth came, and you know what I mean? Everybody kind of like... That's what's so amazing about all these killers, all these different voices, all these amazing lyrics all on one song.
Yeah, yeah. But we wanted to show the world that each one of us had a style that was unreckoned.
Each one of us can paint a picture within our own way that you will love all of us. So it's better to get us all now.
You know, we'll sacrifice the little look for the bigger look later. Right.
You know, and that was one of the situations where we had to dance a certain way to be like, okay, yeah, we'll take a little bit of money. But we know we're going to be able to sell, like you said.
Yeah, give us those 50. We'll sell them.
Now, we know you're telling me you don't got the money, but you got the relationships. Okay, cool.
As long as you got the relationships okay cool long as you got the relationship long as you got the money yeah we're gonna go out there and we're gonna work to make it happen but this is what's gotta happen and you know i'll give all the credit to steve rifkin you know um steve was the guy that owned loud records back then. He was a part of RCA back then.
And he believed in us. He's like, yo, I'll give y'all that deal.
I'll give y'all that deal. And next thing you know, when everybody started taking off, now you got Method Man over here.
You got Jizz over here. You got O'Reilly Bastard over here.
So we did something that was so new to the world that it's like, oh shit. From the outside, it felt different because it felt like a movement.
Right. It's like Wu-Tang was like a movement.
Exactly. It was different.
Everybody tried to box it. Everybody tried to box it as a group.
So even though we knew we were a group, in our minds, we looked at it like you you said as a movement being created that would eventually spread out and and and hit all corners of everything and that was the plan all the time that was a premeditated plan because they wanted us to still be a group it's like nah we look we sacrificing this and that but we not going to box ourselves right you know so by us doing that it kind of like really paid the way for other groups and other artists and everybody to kind of you know follow this blueprint so now you have you know these other other guys coming out and creating their own labels and bringing in artists that they wanted to do. So to me, this kind of made hip hop a little bit more interesting because it showed that artists were starting to get more smarter, which is important.
You know, we didn't want to be just like you said, yo, just coming in and you sell your soul and you just stay there. Nah, we can stay there is one of the hardest parts getting the right beat oh the beat is everything bro because it seems like all you guys are very prolific everybody can write but if you don't have a great beat and how many great beats can you make right if you got an album then another album's coming out next year like whoa you gotta have 16 20 great beats yeah and then you gotta pick from those beats what what you know what goes what song and try different ways out and you gotta make sure

everybody shows up at the studio how hard was that the shit was real bro i mean i tell people

all the time like number one for us like you know being around so many different lyricists

Look at this. I mean, I tell people all the time, like, number one for us, like, you know, being around so many different lyricists, lyricist guys, beats are important.
You know, I remember one time a fan asked me, he said, yo, what's the most important thing to you, the rhyme or the beat? He fucked me up the whole day with that. I was fucked up.
And I answered him. I gave him an answer probably like three or four minutes later.

And I was like, you know what? Nobody never

asked me that. I said, the beat.

I said, you know why the beat?

Because the beat

makes you think about what

you want to say and what you want to

get across.

Anybody could make rhymes.

I could have you sit with me for fucking a month and you could be an ill fucking rapper you i can take you there but to be able to have that combination factor of making a body of work or or that sound that you want you need to have the right production so a lot of times wu-tang wrote to whatever they felt. It's like how you can listen to Protect Your Neck and you get that energy from us.
Yes. You know, you get a certain energy because of that production.
Then you get this energy. When you get a cream, you get that.
So for me, I always tell people that beat is everything, you know, and us just sitting down and waiting for RZA to come up with something. Like one thing about RZA, he was so clever.
You know, he had a team of guys that was around him that was assisting him to helping him come with different sounds. And, you know, he played with different things.
And of course, you know, just having his ear for music and listening to other people's stuff he was able to isolate himself away from everything and start brainstorming for us so it's like um he was like um he was like the Steelers back in the fucking 80s you know what I mean when they won four Super Bowls in a row he was like that when Terry Bradshaw and I was playing. Lin Swan.
He was in a zone. He was really in a zone.
Especially because it became successful. Yeah.
And there was a lot of motivation behind it, a lot of energy behind it. Yeah.
I hear what you're saying, but without the lyrics, the beat is not the same. I see from your perspective as a lyricist and as an MC that that you would think that the beat is more important because it's important to you to get started to get started but damn for as a fan you have to have those lyrics just the beats by themselves that's not enough look no no no no you know how many times me and rizzi would argue about that and i would tell him like yo listen bro it took it took all of us it's a had that.
Yeah. You had this, we had that.
That's what, you know. It's a 50-50 proposition.
It's always like that. I think it's more 60-40.
I think it's more 60 lyrics because the thing is the lyrics are the thing that make you go, oh. Oh, shit.
Like, a great beat makes you move your head and gets you going, but lyrics make you go, oh, shit.

Rewind that.

Well, you know, me is 50-50 all the time because if I have nothing to give me that energy to write,

how can I give it to you if I don't have nothing?

It's a collaboration for sure.

It's a collaboration for sure.

But it's interesting that people would think, what's more important?

What's more important, breathing or having a heartbeat heartbeat shut the fuck up like you need both you need both yeah you have to have both but that's where the collaboration comes in yeah i had scott storch in here the other day oh word oh yeah i love that dude he's so talented so out there you know his glasses on just like see him feeling the music it's like a rare savant there's dudes like that that are like beat machines you know like he just feels it it comes into his head and he feels it and just coming out of his fingers you know yeah he's a super talented oh so talented i love him but like that kind. And, you know, to team the kind of guy like that up with Dre or, you know, with 50 or any of these people that he collaborated with.
It's like, that's special. And that's why, like I said, you know what I mean? You can't never front on the maestro.
You know what I mean? You got to remember that, you know, DJing started it all. Let's be honest.
You know what I mean? The DJ game. Scratching records.
That was so important. Scratching, you know, they created a synergy to the artist to be like, yo, let me try this.
Even if you go back to, like I said, look at Quincy Jones, man. Look what the fuck he did, man.
Right, right. right you know look at look at frank sinatra like who the fuck was handling his fucking music man right he was so clever he needed a vibe though he needed something who was that guy you ever hear frank sinatra when he's young oh he was before he was smoking all those cigarettes it's a super high-pitched voice it's crazy it's crazy it's crazy you listen to the difference like wow it had so much range the production though i don't know i don't know you know somebody he never really got he never really got famous well i think the whole thing back then was elvis or whoever it was you know whoever was the person that was in front everybody behind the scenes didn't really get that much respect right yeah but he was a.
But he was a talent. Yeah.
Good boy. Who was that crazy dude that wore the wigs that shot that lady in L.A.? He produced all the Beatles shit.
He got tried for murder, and every day in the courtroom he'd wear a different wild wig. He created the wall of sound.
Fuck, what's his name? He was really insane. Phil Spector.
Phil Spector.er phil specter back in the day he was known for pulling guns on people he'd pull guns on people stick them in their mouths and shit he was a complete psychopath white guy yeah and he's a jewish guy i think and he shot this lady in the mouth oh was he jewish i don't want any jewish people mad at me jewish people get mad when you say someone's not Jewish and they did something terrible.

Hey, look, guys, we not here to fuck with nobody.

Talented, successful Jewish people in the entertainment business. Be clear, man, yeah.

But that dude, he was responsible for the wall of sound, the Beatles.

That was a big thing with him.

He was known for being a guy that would change people's music Russian Jewish Yeah, what's and he was one of the Bronx on the Bronx. Yeah, holy shit wild wild boy Shot some lady picked up some lady at a bar took her back to his place and shot her in the mouth Holy shit.
Yeah, he would put guns in people's mouths. He was known for threatening people.
Like, you want to get out of this fucking contract and just shove a gun in your mouth. Wow.
What's that? Pulled a gun on Cher. He pulled a gun on Cher.
He pulled a gun out on Cher? Cher recalls stopping Phil Spector in his tracks when he pulled a gun on her. He pulled that shit with me.
Right. Right.
Right. Right.
We had this really strange relationship. You don't don't say you don't say Well, it's like the music business at one point in time was run entirely by gangsters of course That's the story about Hendrix.
You know the story about Hendrix is that his manager killed him That's the conspiracy was that his manager killed him because it's more valuable for Hendrix to be dead his music He's a Maestro, like a one in a billion year talent. Yeah.

And that... because it's more valuable for Hendrix to be dead.
His music, he's a maestro, like a one-in-a-billion-year talent. And they knew that they had all these recordings of him and they could kill him.
And so that's why his girlfriend jumped off the top of a building. Yeah, to own his shit.
Because he was going to leave his management. His bodyguard wrote a book about it years later, and it just came out like, I want to say like.
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That's R-O-K-A.com. 10 years ago? Wasn't that long ago, whereas the bodyguard said, yeah, the manager killed him.
Killed Hendrix and threw the girlfriend off a roof.

Didn't they do a movie of him too?

Oh, yeah, they did a bunch of movies on Hendrix.

They need to do a real Wu-Tang movie.

I know Hulu had a series, but they need a real, like,

Quentin Tarantino needs to do a Wu-Tang.

That's me, man.

I know Quentin Tarantino.

That's what I think.

I think we talk Quentin Tarantino, because he wants to do one more movie.

How about he does a fucking Wu-Tang movie?

The real Wu-Tang movie. Tell Quentin all that.
Because, like Hulu is great, but it has to be on Hulu. You can only get that so wild on Hulu.
You know, like for it to be real real, it has to be a movie. Let me tell you something.
I wrote a book, right? And inside my book, I talked about how Q-Tip, a good friend of mine, Q-Tip, he had me and Leonardo sit down. Leonardo DiCaprio? Huh? Leonardo DiCaprio? Leonardo DiCaprio, right? And I remember Q-Tip was like, yo, set up a meeting for you and Leonardo to meet in Brooklyn at this small pizza shop, one of Leonardo's favorite spots.
And he wanted to talk to you.

I said, yeah, that's what's up.

So me and Leonardo, we started talking.

And he was like, yo, Q-Tip was telling me that you was thinking about trying to, you know, get guys together to create a movie.

I was like, yeah, this is what I was thinking.

So make a long story short, I set up a meeting with rizza myself leonardo's peoples in la and i told riz i said listen before we do this hulu thing which at the end of the day it was a riz's a riz's production thing or whatever he was doing i said i think we need to make a realistic, real life movie of us. Said it shouldn't be nothing that we should play with because people need to know our real story.
So RZA entertained the conversation, but I don't know, for some reason, I guess he felt like he was committed to doing whatever he wanted to do with Hulu. He might have already had a deal.

Yeah, yeah.

And you know, like I said, at the end of the day, the Klan, you know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah.

Jamie, fast with him.

Jamie's the best.

It was that night, and I remember that. Wow.

I wish we could have been able to sit down with him,

because the way I had him looking at it, it was almost like I told him,

I said, this would be like a slash of Goodfellas and Menace to Society. Yeah.
Mixed in one. Yeah.
You know, to kind of talk about our story and whatever. And he was super open.
He was like, yo, chef, what we got to do? Yo, who do we need to talk to? But at that time, RZA was already in pocket on what he wanted to do. So I said, you know what, one day, you know, maybe I might get a chance to show my version of it.
Because, come on, how many Pablo Escobar movies we looked at? Right, right, right. You know what I mean? You got these guys telling it.
You got the people from the community. It can still be made, for sure.
So it can still be made. A hundred percent.
Just because there's a Hulu suit, that doesn't mean shit. Right.
But I think that at the end of the day, you know, God willing, we would really give you guys another taste of really how we really see it. Well, I think it would be hugely successful.
I think for music, from a movie, rather, perspective. Would you rather see it as a movie? A movie.
Or would you? A movie. A movie.
There you go. That's how I felt.
Or you do it, like, on Netflix, where you can get wild. Yeah.
You know? Do it, like, you know, like, Netflix has shit like Ozark. They get wild on Netflix.
Oh, yeah. I love that shit.
You can get wild. Yeah.
That's how it has to be. It has to be grimy.
It has to be. That's how you want it, right? It can't be in any way ABC After School specialified.
You know what I'm saying? It can't be cleaned up through a filter. It has to be good, too.
It has to be good narrative. It has to be set up.
The scenes have to be set up. Because it's very hard to take an insane career of nine of the best MCs to get together under one mastermind with all these genius talents and they form this movement.

And you're going to condense that to two hours?

Yeah.

See, that was one of his beats right there.

He was like, yo, Ray, yo, yo, blah, blah, blah, yo.

But I think he could be done.

That's what I said.

I said, yo, look, come on now.

I said, people do it all the time.

I said, yo, look at prime example.

Look at NWA.

I'll tell you. blah blah blah yo you know but i think it could be done i think that's what i said i said yo look come on now i said people do it all the time i said yo look at prime example look at nwa i thought nwa movie was dope you know what i mean straight out of compton i thought they did a good job but that was dre and cube and you know i'm sure i'm sure you always gonna have somebody around that be like yo now that ain't that ain't it, that ain't.
But it was so realistic that when I seen ours, it was like, all right, I get it. You know, Riz even said to y'all, you know, this is more for the younger generation to kind of gravitate to.
And once everybody loved it, they loved it. So it was like, okay, y'all love it.
We love y'all for loving it. It's great.
It's great. But hear me out.
Opening of the movie, Rikers. Opening of the movie, you guys show up at Rikers to do the concert.
We're all daddy bastards inside. That's the opening of the movie.
That's the opening of the movie. You want all the real gritty.
You want the gritty. But that just get everybody on the hook right away.
And then you bring them back to the beginning right after that you you know you put the year when that's how you make movies you pick all the greatest moments yeah and then you start showing and threading right yeah that's a no brainer for a wu-tang movie you start with rikers with Rikers, which is what year was that? 95? What year was that? When did... What year was the Old Dirty Bastard and Rikers concert with Wu-Tang? Yeah, I was about to say, look up that.
And what year did you guys start? What was the very first year? We started in late 92. So you start the movie with Rikers, and then you bring it back to 92 92 back to 92.
That's what it is That's what it is. I mean you just think about the incredible Amount of talent not just not just rap bully jizz is like a world champion caliber chess player 99 2000 Yeah, I got an interview, RZA talking about it.
And and doesn't just have some degree in physics Smart doesn't he have some crazy degree? Smart he's like look that up, please. Yeah, so you just that alone in the movies like come on.
This is real Yeah, this is that people was looking forward to looking at yeah think of a movie like that think of a movie that starts up with the gates opening and you guys going in put your put all your belongings in the basket the whole shit getting frisked checking everybody down the guy reading you the rules the warden telling you do not go into the crowd do not do that yeah yeah yeah okay cool yeah we got you yeah yeah wow think about it yeah that's the beginning of the movie yeah that's an incredible opening for a movie and it really happened this isn't bullshit this is a bunch of dorks sitting around a table coming up with some nonsense this is some shit that you lived through that would be an incredible opening for a movie and it's. And it's just so even credible even more on how we connected because, like I said, everybody come from almost the same poverty bullshit,

but everybody had different philosophies on how they felt their lives was going into.

I tell people all the time, you know, my neighborhood was about making money. You know, Ghost Neighborhood was about taking money.
You know what I mean? Taking shit from you, you know? JZA, you know, being one of the MCs that could have been down with the Juice Crew. You know what I mean? You know who the fuck the Juice Crew is.
He turned it down. Really? It's like they was the hottest shit back then.
Master Ace, Biz, Kane, Kooji, Rat. All these dope MCs, they asked him, yo, we want you to come and get down with us.
He's like, nah, you know what, nah. All these things I remember yesterday, like, you turned down the Juice Crew? He was like, I love the Juice Crew, but I just was in this chamber right here.
You know, us with Ol' Dirty, like, yo, you know, Ol' Dirty always wanted to be like Biz, Biz Markie. He had that personality, that charisma, that energy.
So like you said, these are the things that I wanted to see, Each individual, like, you know, and like I said, you know, shout out Hulu, man, for doing a great job. But I do agree, like you, we need another movie where it really defines who we are.
Yeah. You know, RZA, you know, that was his side of how he wanted to tell it.
You know, it's a great story. It's fine.
Great story. It's fine.
The Hulu thing's fine. But I think there's something missing.
And I think there's something missing is a movie. It's got to be a movie.
It's got to be a big screen, big thing. And it could be done, man.
You heard it first, man. You heard it first.
I ain't have to argue with my brothers about it. I mean, just imagine when ODB does Baby I Got Your Money.
Oh my god. Come on.
Imagine that. And that becomes this massive hit.
Massive hit. You know he had the most hits out of all of us, right? He was so fucking talented, man.
And so real. You remember when he was on MTV and they started talking about what are you going to give? Who are you going to give your money? He's like, I gave my money to nobody.
He was like, yo, you going to give back? He was like, yo. Yo, yeah, I remember that shit.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And everybody was crying.
Everybody loved him, man. Because it was so real.
Because it was so Yeah. It wasn't like, well, I think it's really important that we establish some sort of a community fund.
Shut the fuck up. He was just having fun.
You make nothing. You know what I mean? But, you know, we always gave back in our own ways.
Of course. Well, by existing, you give back.
There you go. By existing, you inspire others.
Yeah. By existing, how many rap careers, how many hiphop careers were inspired by wu-tang clan and all the members countless countless yeah so many i say that we definitely had a a piece of watching the the new generation grow and you know kind of you know build their build their arc the way we built ours.
That's important to reflect on that. Back then, like you said, nobody wasn't giving motherfuckers this kind of money.
We was the first group that ever had a million-dollar video. Wow.
I remember that day me and RZA was coming up with the storyboard. What video was that? Triumph.
Wow. We did the Triumph shit.
We came up with all this shit and we was like, yo, this shit's going to cost a million dollars. We were like, what the fuck is...
What's a million dollars? Like, do it. You know, and at that time, you know...
Is this it? Oh, let me hear this. Yeah, yeah.
This is with my guy Brett Ratner. By swarms of killer bees.

I'm gonna look for his joints.

They've been seen approaching from Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queens, and Staten Island.

See the bees coming through and shit.

As we will be bringing you up-to-the-minute information.

This just ends.

Police are reporting that there's a man on top of a skyscraper ready to jump.

I'm told that he is possibly old dirty. a member of the Wu-Tang Clan.

The police suspect that there could be some connection between this old dirty man and the killer beast.

Old dirty man. Ooh.
Ooh. Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo!

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Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! He jumped, he jumped.

He jumped, he jumped.

We'll see you next time. Woo! Woo!

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Woo! Woo! Go to old days of the Klan. Is it weird looking back now? Does it feel almost surreal that you guys did it? A little bit to me, yeah.
It has to. Yeah, to me for sure.
I mean, you know, I always believed in my group, man. I mean, these guys is, like you said, very talented, very talented.
Sometimes we don't know our power when we come together, but we might be the only group that stuck together so long, you know, because we all feed off each other every time. So to be able to reflect back when we was in our prime, it was like we still didn't even give our best.
It was almost like, okay, yeah, we're going to do it because we have to. Not do it because we're all in a happy vibe, a happy moment.
A lot of times we made great things happen out of nothing, you know, under pressure. Might have been turbulence in the room.
Might have been an argument that happened that day. But we still managed to come out with something great out of that whole time of that moment.
That's what's incredible, is that through all the disputes, you guys still stay together. There's no way you're going to have nine dudes and not have disputes.
Especially nine alphas, nine killers. It's hard, man.
It's hard because, you know, everybody has an opinion.

And you want to respect everybody's opinion, you know. But it made me think about sports and it made me think about how coaches and people, you know, outside of the group are so important.
And see, how we were designed, we huddled up,

but we never really had people around us kind of like push the narrative more to show us our true power. So we made a lot of mistakes, you know, of being great, but still handling the business a little bit different from if we had some coaches.
Some guidance. Some guidance.
The problem was back then no one knew what was going on nobody knew because it was so fresh it was so new the whole genre had only existed for six or seven years right so it was it was it was emerging and it was chaotic and was so exciting but there wasn't a lot of experts and how to manage it Yeah, you know, it's like today, you know, you could you could you know a young artist to come to a guy like you and say Hey, what should I do? Help me out? Like what what is what's the path that you think that I should take and you could give them real advice Where back then like who knew who know who knew who time was gonna work? They would have told you that's not gonna work. They would say you can't get nine dudes in a that's crazy How you doing that? Yeah, but it worked But it didn't just work it like accelerated everybody like amplified all the voices That's what was so crazy about it is it just it didn't just work.
It worked better than being by yourself Yeah, yeah, I tell people all the time I don't. The Klan, I think we all got better based on us as a collective.
A hundred percent. You know, nobody couldn't have did it by themselves and be great.
Iron sharpens iron. That's right.
And that's what it is. Steel sharpens steel.
Yeah. You guys had so many killers together.
There's no way it couldn't be great. That's what's incredible.
It's like, it's so hard for people to do that. That's why it's never been done before, which is amazing.
If you think about the history of hip hop, how many artists have come up and not one group has come together and made like a, oh, they're just like Wu-Tang. Not one.
Not one. Yeah, even when it comes to, you know, sales and, you know, each one of us was blessed to be able to go platinum and gold.
But we talk about that. You know, sometimes when we all are together, we laugh and we say, damn, you know, no other groups did what we did, like come with guys that everybody in the group went gold and platinum and this and that.
And I couldn't name one person. person they was like yo name one person name one group that did what we did at that level back then I couldn't name it you know what I mean because well the Ghetto Boys branched out you know Scarface obviously went on to have a massive career yeah did you see his little tiny desk performance oh yeah fucking incredible fucking incredible yeah incredible that That's one of my greatest friends to man So different than anything else like the way he did it like he adapted the lyrics to the environment Yeah, oh, it was incredible incredible Scott faces a real guy to man One of the all-timers one of all-time greats Yeah, all time greats Adam show yet? I haven't yet.
No, I'd love to have him on. I love that dude.
I've had Willie on. I think that there's so many amazing talents that came out of that 90s hip-hop era that for a young guy coming up, someone who's interested in a career and it now, it's imperative that you go back go back you have to you've got

to explore the classics you got to see what started this whole thing because and you got to put yourself in this mindset like it's hard to imagine my experience of it because you're not going to be able to have it it's always been around but for me it was like when it came around It was this totally new thing.

It was a totally new sound.

Totally new avenue of music. But for me, it was like when it came around it was this totally new thing.
It's totally new sound totally new like

Avenue of music that existed and everybody was like wow and all the young people were excited

Everybody was excited like this is crazy. Yeah, this is so different than everything else

You know and so for the people that are like making a career in it now like oh

You know, I know there's like a tendency to think you're the fucking man and everything else sucks

I'm going to go to the next one. else you know and so for the people that are like making a career in it now like oh you know i know there's like a tendency to think you're the fucking man and everything else sucks i'm telling you gotta abandon that abandon that thinking yeah go back and educate yourself you know because it's free just get on go get on youtube get on spotify educate yourself there's so much classic shit from the 90s that you're missing.
And all we were doing really was just, like you said, just expression. Yeah.
Being in the studio, smoking a lot of weed, you know, and a lot of times when we were smoking and just vibing, it's like we were mentioning things that, you know, like today, like prime example, you know, I own a cannabis business in Newark called Hash Story. You know what I mean? See you representing us.
You know, we said in rhymes like can it be also simple? Yo, I want to have me a fat y'all in enough land to go and plant my own sex crops. But for now, it's just a big dream.
You know, so we kind of like spoke things into existence that at the end of the day, like, you know, now as I sit here and I'm an owner of a cannabis business, I'm like, wow, he was talking about things. Yo, my first joint and it went gold.
I put it on my mother's, you know, my mother's living room wall.

You know, we did that.

So we were kind of like saying things that meant so much to us back then, but still dreaming of it being a reality. And the next thing you know, it happens.
You know, like how you said, you know, JZA being so intelligent and talking about science and, you know, meth, you know, talking about certain things. And, you know, now today he's in the movie world and Riz is a director.
And, you know, these are the things that were going through our minds as we were just smoking and listening to production and just saying, yo, what the right next? Where do we want to go, you know? And I think that that is important as an artist is to dream and be creative don't sit in one box like that's the shit that just be driving me crazy a lot with hip hop today it's like yo it's just sounding too fucking repetitious like let's make it bigger let's let's take it over here over here over here yeah but it just sometimes it's just sitting in one fucking box where it's like, yo, come on.

It's not just that.

It's about opening up the doors for everybody

to be able to see so many sides.

Now it just seems like the hip-hop shit

is just being controlled by one person that's saying,

yo, we want y'all to stay right there.

We want you to talk ignorant.

We want you to talk ignorant. We want you to not grow.
We want you to just— Whatever they think is going to sell. Why is that the case? I don't get it.
Because the same reason why they were trying to take the RZA and change him and turn him into something he's not, people always do that. They do that in comedy.
They do that in podcasting. They do that in music.
There's always some executive that thinks they know better, and they're going to mold you and shape you and change you, and this is what we're going to do. We're going to hire an image team.
It's all just bullshit. It's non-artists interfering with art.
That's what it is. It's when you have middlemen.
You have these people that profit profit off of your talent and they think they're going to steer it in a way that's going to be the most profitable they don't give a fuck if you're like earnestly and honestly expressing yourself that doesn't mean anything to them they just want you to stay in that box because that's the box they're selling and once it sells once they don't want you to change it up remember when ice t started a fucking a fucking heavy metal band Oh my god, yeah Ice-T who played a cop on TV for like fucking 30 years. He had a song called cop killer Body count and everybody wanted him to be the rapper and Ice-T was like, yeah, I'm gonna do a hardcore album It's like what? It's like what is this? What is this? This is crazy.
Yeah, but it's like he just didn't listen. He's like I don't give a fuck what you say I'm gonna do what I want to do.
This is what I want to do now Exactly, and you have to give an artist that ability to do that They have to be able to change it up anytime they want Whatever because whatever got them to the dance is gonna keep them dancing And they might dance to the beat of a different song, but it's going to be the same person, that same creative force that created whatever you liked in the beginning. Well, you probably like this new direction they're going to go into because it's going to be just as good.
It's just like we all like different. Like you were saying, you like Billy Joel.
We both like Cool G Rap. It's very different.
You wouldn't want to see the two of them at a concert together you know but the but that's what you have to give room for an artist and these executives and these people that are profiting off of art without being creative their input's always terrible it's always terrible because they don't have a vision they don't really unless you're like a rick rubin like one of those cats it's just like super eccentric weirdo genius dude who just knows what he likes. You go, hold on, hold on.
Do that again. Stop that.
Stop, stop, stop. Do it again.
Do it again. Do it that way.
Okay, can you make it echo? Do it. Do it.
Give me an echo. But he's working with you because he sees something.
Right, right, right. Right.
He's barefoot and shit and fucking doing yoga. One of the geniuses.
Super weirdo. A Scott Storch type character.
Yeah, those guys. These guys be great in their own way though you know they're artists though it's like that's different but when you get these suits and the suits get involved and they know that oh we made you know Raekwon sold a million and seven hundred thousand CDs doing it like this so this is what we want from this one too we want it to be the exact same way.
We want to do it like that. Do it like that again.
Like, what's this new thing you're doing? What's this new thing where you're talking about discipline? Uh-uh, uh-uh, uh-uh. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
You know? But that's one of the most important things about hip-hop, too, is, like, songs inspire people to change their lives. Right, right.
Like Gangstar's song Discipline. Like, that song inspires you to have discipline serious song it's a great fucking song with great lyrics like i said like yo this shit became knowledge to us man yes you know that's what i miss about hip-hop is the the knowledge factor the you know raising our kids to be smarter and you know not hiding anything from them like like you said once you put that warning stick on there don't look at it they're gonna look at it anyway so why not let them see what for what it is and then say yo look you can make these choices but you go that way you know what you're getting you go this way you know what you're getting i think all it takes is someone today to do what you guys were doing and blow up.
And then everybody would want to do it that way. If someone today became like this genius lyricist who was like pointing out things in society and became a huge artist.
But you think that music is still, you think the radio will play it? I don't think the radio means jack shit anymore. I think what means something now is people sharing it That's what means so how do they get it out there? Someone like put it on Spotify put it on SoundCloud put it on YouTube Someone sees it someone hears it you send it to somebody they send it to ten people and then it goes viral That's what it's all about now.
I think it's just be undeniable be undeniable have some shit where you listen to it You it, you go, ooh. Be confident, yeah.
And you have your friends like, you got to listen to this. Listen to this.
Listen to this. Listen to the first lines.
First lines. Yeah.
Yeah, listen to that shit. Oh, my God.
That's how we always sold it anyway. Oh, my God.
Yeah, come out of the gate with a fucking haymaker. Nah.
Boom. This is what we do, though.
Yeah. See, damn, you talking like I feel about my album I'm about to drop.
When is it coming just i just been working on this documentary right for the purple team let me just be honest with you take you back um i've been working on you know only built for cuban links is my my what's going on album my thrill album that i made 30 years ago this year 2025 will be 30 years so what we done was we went back and decided to do a documentary about it a real life film so it's called the purple tape files because remind you only built for cuban links was the name of the album but being that i came with it as a cassette everybody started to call call this album the Purple Tape. So now, you know, we came back and we decided to do, you know, me and my team from my camp.
You know, the clan, of course, the clan. But this is something that was my intellectual property that I said, yo, you know what? Me and my guy sat down.
My team sat down and said, yo, you need to do a documentary about this album. Because you can make 50 albums.
People are still going to talk about Only Built for Cuban Link. So I said, damn, you know what? You're right.
So what I did was I said, you know what? Let me invest in it and kind of tell a story of what helped us inspire that album. What helped us be a part of the culture, and how it still allows me to still exist today.
Like, if you see a lot of these guys today in the game, they still wear Cuban Link chains. Yeah.
You know what I mean? So who would have ever thought that I'm calling my album only built for Cuban Link niggas? Now everybody and their mother is wearing Cuban Link chains today, 30 years later. So you know that's been something that I've been working on and believe it or not we've been working on it for 10 years.
Wow. So I got over 50 influential people that was in my life that was affected by that album to be a part of this documentary.
So now this is all in the making. We didn't actually go out there and start pitching it yet.
We're finally getting ready to do it right now as we speak. As we speak, once the new year kick in and all that, we will be ready to go out there and position ourselves to go do a deal with a network with this project.
It's going to be ill. It's a great idea.
You know what I mean? So my thing is to talk about it in a way to where the way we made the album, all the experiences, all the things that we went through, and eventually that would wind up becoming a movie later on because the storyboard of how I talk about it is going to blow people's minds because it's like, damn, this is what you was going through? This is how your mindset was? Because I just want people to know that that album was made because I love hip-hop, man. And, you know, we were in a position to make something golden that, at that time, I was already thinking cinematic.
I was already in my Scorsese mindset because when I came in the clan, I was like, I don't do all the karate shit. I don't know how to rhyme like that.
I don't even know about drugs and hustlers and trying to get from here to there and turn my life around for the positive. You know, so we talk about this in a documentary and we go through some of the songs and like I said you know I got some of my guys that you know we had we had um you know we had um conflictions with some artists out there like big biggie back then everybody thought we had a beef and you know just it becomes interesting but the bottom line is that's what i've been working on alongside with working on some other music so i just said that yo let me get this done the right way first and then i'm gonna you know drop some new music so i got i got a definitely new album getting ready to come out and where's that gonna come out you think the new album um i say probably probably between second quarter right now.
Yeah. And I never even mentioned the name of the album, but I'll mention it on your show.
The name of the album is going to be called The Emperor's New Clothes. You ever heard that Dutch folk tale? Yeah.
The Emperor wears no clothes. Yeah.
So that's going to be the name of it, because I feel like the status quo today, everybody follows bullshit. Nobody wants to be genuine no more.
Nobody wants to call out shit that makes sense. It's like, oh, if you believe it, oh, I'm supposed to believe it.
I'm supposed to believe nothing that don't feel like what it's supposed to be to me. Goes back to like you said, and I'm listening to everything you're saying about you have to do it from this way.

Fuck that.

Fuck radio. Whatever is going to stop you from being you.
You know what I mean? So this is the same mindset that I'm thinking with my hip-hop, my new album that's coming. Like, yo, I'm not going to let you tell me that this is not what people still love.
You know what I mean? I don't care. I know what I know from coming up as a kid who loved hip-hop and what inspired me.
So I'm going to have a ball this year, man. I got a lot of great things that I want to give the world.
But, yeah, that's going to be the name of my new album. People still love it.
And I'm telling you, these young kids that I have at the Comedy Mothership, when I play them 1990s hip-hop, they go, oh. They just don't know yet.
Yeah, yeah. They just don't know.
And we can't fool them because they wasn't alive probably at that time. Also, they got so much shit coming their way.
Exactly. They're getting inundated by all these new artists and all these new TikToks.
There's so much shit going on. There's so much shit going on.
There's so much going on, but I always say that it's always a lane for people that love music. You know what I mean? I don't care.
It's like you could be 50, you know i always say that it's always a lane for people that love music you know i mean i don't care it's like you could be 50 you know today i'm sitting here as a 55 year old man that still have that kid in him to love what i what what what helped me be who i am today so i'm still at my best when it comes to making music you you know. Like today, The Chef is more of an architect artist now.
I don't consider myself a gangster rapper or a funny rapper. I'm an architect rapper, you know, because I like to reflect on things about growth and development.
You know, and when people hear this album, they're going to be like, damn, like, yo, he still fucking got it. I tell people all the time, don't ever think we're going to lose that shit.
That's like sitting here and saying Mike Tyson can't fight. When you know at the end of the day, he ain't lose a fucking bit when it comes to how he feels that passion for boxing or whatever.
I feel the same way with my music. So get ready.
But like I said, the name of the album is called The Emperor's New Clothes. Check for that shit.
I'm ready. I'm ready.
Listen, brother, thank you very much for being here. It was a real honor.
Of course. A real pleasure.
You my guy, man. And thank you for everything you guys have done over the years.
I've been endlessly entertained by Wu-Tang Clan for a long fucking time. There you go.
And I hope somebody listens to this and makes that fucking movie. Make that movie.
Well, we're going to make it happen. Do it the right way.
We're going to figure it out. I wish I made movies.
I wish I was a movie maker because I would make it that way. I would open up with that fucking Riker scene.
Listen, Joe, it's never too late for us to do what the fuck we want to do. Never too late.

Never too late.

Never too late.

Thank you, sir.

Love you.

Love you too.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate it.

Bye.

Bye.