#540 - Too $hort

Yo, what's up y'all?

Ship boy too short, make sure you check me out on the Bootleg keV Podcast Dope Show.

Hey, before we start the episode, we're gonna remind everybody, man, we got one of the biggest radio shows in the country syndicated in almost one hundred cities all over. Shout out to iHeartRadio. All right, some of the latest cities that we've been able to add. Man, We want to give a shout out to ninety three point nine and the Beat in Honolulu. That's right, Hawaii, we over there going crazy. I also want to give a shout out Hot ninety eight three and Tucson.

Shout out to Tucson going crazy.

Also want to give a shout out to Wild ninety four one in Tampa going crazy. We just got Richmond. We also just got the good folks in Bakersfield at Hot one O four to seven. So we're going crazy on the radio with my partner James Andre Jefferson Junior for the Bootleg keV Show. So make sure you tune in and you can listen anywhere on that iHeart Radio app. That's right, let's get into the interview, all right, bootlet

It's in the motherfucking building. What's up, God, how you doing, brother running Man? Just living living legendary for sure. Yeah.

Look, man, uh, you know you're one of them guys, man who just meant so much to my life and like my childhood. And you know, I remember the first time I heard cuss words and you were like the only rapper my dad fucked us.

I hear this so much. Yeah, my dad was like an old white dude. He fucking loved Too Short.

But you know, I just think it's it's the ship talking man, It's it's the comedy. It's like the it's at the time it was. It was in this little space where nobody was even doing it, like quite like I was.

So I had a little, a little laying to myself for quite a while.

Yeah, I think obviously, uh, there's a shot to the new movie that drop over our boy Simba plays you. Yeah, did he have to tap in with you? I mean he has to know your mannerisms. But obviously, like he killed it. He looked just like you too, Like it looks kind of crazy.

I just named it couple of music videos. He called me said, I just want to get a little insight. I just named him. I said, watch these two videos and then called mister Fab and whatever he tells you that she gets you there because Fab is a good mimicer. He kind of knows his good his story, and he can do people's style, rap, he can do your voice, he can do everything. I saw some footage of Fab when he was young and he was mimicking me, So I'm like, he'd be a.

Good reference for you. Yeah, Like, I can't tell you he's got the tics. Yeah, I can tell you how to impersonate me. Just watch.

Yeah, you were watching your whole life. It's crazy, yo. You uh so someone kind of broke it down. Some shit you're working on. You and Little John got a whole album coming.

Yeah.

So for people who are not aware, I kind of give you a lot of credit to obviously the Bay Area, but there was this Atlanta era that you were very instrumental in bringing to the forefront of like commercial music, and and Little John on the East Side boys. Remember that first song I ever heard you on with them, It's my Shit let my Nuts Go.

That's super underground by the way, too.

But it was, Oh my god, that song is a classic, and that was the first, like the end of it when Little John's like.

I heard you all on my nuts like a trick. I heard you was at jail house, bitch.

But you had like a lot to do with the crunk era kind of being pushed through on the mainstream front in terms of like you were like one of the first artists outside of the South that embraced that. I mean, obviously, you know you worked with three six month you back in the day two and all that, But what was that cause what what year did you end up moving to Atlanta ninety three?

Crazy ninety three.

Yeah, it wasn't a lot. It wasn't a lot of music going on out there. The Face Records was there out Cast, I mean Outcast was a year after I moved there, but it was when I first got there, it was like TLC and Tony Braxton. The Face was like in a real R and B space. They hadn't yet done Outcash yet, and there was some things moving around. Jermaine Dupree was was active, but he definitely he was just doing criss cross and it was you know, it

But my.

Whole thing is a lot of people don't know my connection with New Orleans. My mother's from New Orleans, and I spent a lot of my childhood in New Orleans. So that's a very different sound than anywhere else, with the jazz and the second line dancing and just you know, my cousins were in marching bands and they were just into whatever, you know, the hot dance whatever, And I just kind of always had that New Orleans culture embedded in me.

But I'm growing up in LA moved to the Bay.

I'm getting all these different flavors, and no one really knows this unless you really know.

The two short history.

I actually lived in Atlanta for about a year when I was a kid, a little over a year.

Wow.

I was in the seventh grade, part of the seventh grade and part of the eighth grade. We moved there, and I guess my mother wasn't feeling the vibe and we moved.

Back to California.

And you know, I just have all these things musically in me from a kid. So when I get to Atlanta, and I moved to Atlanta, I immediately I'm already on you know, probably my fourth platinum album. So I'm showing up to Atlanta and I'm on like some Michael Jackson status, you know.

And they were one of the biggest rappers in the world. Yeah, they're just like loving too Short.

So I'm I'm looking at Bobby Brown out there having fun. I'm bumping into Tupac. I'm like, oh shit, I'm about to have me some fun out here in Atlanta and had a lot of fun. But at the same time, the music scene was accelerating. It was I mean, it was just you know, the Tis and the outcasts were just coming, you know, left and right, just new artists, and Atlanta was getting hot.

So the reason why I'm embedded in the.

Crunk culture is because I was a fan of Little John as a DJ. He was also the pretty popular DJ before or anybody knew him in the world in Atlanta, and he was also producing records for So So Deaf. He produced some big records.

He was in the scene. But I was a real big fan.

Of the way he would dj because he DJed different than other DJs. His whole set was all about the crowd.

You know.

Mike just he was like doing it like a rapper, like he was rocking the crowd, but he was playing songs and his parties would just go up, and I was like, I like this dude.

Then he put out he put out a record.

He put out a record called who You w Yep, and nobody was rapping on there. It was a bunch of chants. So I just I had not really had a relationship.

With him at all.

We hadn't talked or we probably said what's up, and I just went to one day. I said, man, you should have let me do the remix on that song and put.

Some raps on there.

And he was like, nah, we should just do some new shit. And I'm like, all right, we'll come out of the studio. And he came by when I wasn't there, and he just left this song. It had vocals on it. It was the song was called Couldn't be a Better Player?

That's what I named it. But he was just uh doing those chants. He always did those chants, and he he left that record. I rapped on it.

I wrapped three four verses and we shot a video to it, and it just became like you know, in that region record that was was that, No, it was before that you started out.

I said, you couldn't be a better player to leave it.

Couldn't be a better player was the first song we did it and it just went big. So we just started making records together. Little John at the time had when he I guess when he put out who You Went?

He signed who You Wit? He signed to a small label and prior to tv T.

Yeah, yeah, and he was having this dispute. You know, they weren't seeing eye to eye. And I always tell people it's no gangster shit involved in nothing.

The guy who.

Had the contract with John was somebody that I had worked with, right, and you know, it was just he. I asked Little John was the problem?

You know? They was both saying f each other. And uh.

His version was, well, I spent money on Little John and I'm not budget. I get my money back back there. Little John's version was, well, man, I'm not happy, so I'm not making music with him. So I just figured out what the amount was, put whatever the sauce on it paid him.

It was like, man, I got business with Little Johnny, and.

You know it was you know, it wasn't like I was buying out some super hot artists or something. But Little John had offers on the table like the TVT and some other stuff, and it was stopping him from from getting there. So I basically just stepped in played the stepping stone, you know.

I said, look, I bought you out the contract you free.

You know, I could be like saying signed to me or something, but I would much rather cause he works for so so differ.

He's a DJ who's breaking records.

I realized his full potential. He I heard the beats, and I'm like, do what you gotta do. Just put me on.

The forever list of Little John beats. You know.

That was that was my pay and you know it paid off. I had people in my earback then going, man.

That's Little John White and the son you had him. I'm like, no, bro, And then you know.

Fast off because one of the biggest hip hop songs of all time ended up being blow the Whistle.

Yeah, and he did shake that monkey, so he kind of which is my ship. So I'm at a point in my career when he does those two songs. Two thousand and four five was when we recorded him, I'm like, potentially, like on the fence, you know, could I go, you know, fall over with the other OG's who are like retiring one after the other, not voluntarily.

Right because you had retired and what.

But mine was you know, the rap game will retire you. Sure it will park you, and nobody will call you anymore. And you know, those songs gave me like the infinite extension of my career forever.

Yeah, no, that's a fact, dude. I think a lot of people don't unders stand or they're very surprised when they learned that, uh, blow the whistle is produced by someone from Atlanta.

So in essence, little John is you know forever, like you know, my guy because of what he's done for me and vice versa. So you know, And and then he becomes super instrumental in the emergence of crunk music.

He is the main player, he's the face of it.

And then he comes over to California and catches win of the Hyphee movement and he starts giving people Hyphee records, not just Barrier people either. He went and gave Yin Yang some Hyphee songs and Pete Pablo.

He also did tell me when they go right, Yes he did, so he I mean those are I mean, are those are the two biggest Bay Area raps.

I wouldn't say those were the best Hyphee songs.

I would just say, but they're the two biggest Bay arias. I mean, like Hammer and all that.

But then he forty had a phone call one day and we decided to stamp the Hyphee movement and we're like, I like what the youngsters are doing. Let's do something, because you guys are old g's at that point. Yeah, let's do something to help it move. He did tell me when to go. I did blow the whistle. We did some more little sprinkles of other songs with the vibe, and we support the movie. We never stepped up and said this is our movement. It was always the little Hole music was.

Always it was always the young generation.

Yeah, yeah, it was mac dre is kind of up there, but it was still Mac dra keeped the sneak and you know, the Federation and the Team and all these groups that you know, like the Pack and all these groups that were thriving.

At the time. So, you know, I think that helping little John get in the game just I didn't. He did it on his own. I just got the obstacle. Op. You're very instrumental in it for sure. And then this new album. It helped music a lot. We got a lot of songs for them, oh man, for that one thing, he gave us a lot of music. You know.

I go back and listen to Crunk Juice and Kings of Crunk so much. Yeah, so much. Those two albums are just I mean, man. And then some of the collaborations he was putting together, like putting the ice Cube and nas on Grand for Now, Oh yeah, just some of the shit, like Little John was just throwing so much gumbo into the pot that you would even expect to go crazy.

He'd be like, oh, this is crazy.

Like, yeah, he's got that song or turned down for what of course, and he it sounds like a little John beat, But he didn't produce that.

I think maybe DJ Snake produced it.

Snake did, yeah, yeah, But Little John says what maybe ten twelve words?

I think he might say like, yeah, ten maybe ten, And it's.

Like it's like the biggest shit ever. All I said was ten words. So crazy.

That's amazing. Man. Not a lot of us could make a ten words song.

Sonically, where is this album that you guys are working on? Is it more of the like newer era stuff because so.

You got to get the big picture. Man.

So uh, for a long time now, probably since COVID, I've probably recorded one hundred and two short songs, seventy five songs I don't know, right, but then I also recorded another fifty songs with Mount westmore Right and always doing shows. Always you've been You're very busy on this and that and just doing stuff, but not really announcing to people how much I really how much time I really spent in the studio really making dope ass records that I really haven't been putting out.

And it's a lot of them, and you're sparring NonStop.

Yeah, I said, people around and start playing two short songs. They're like, what the fuck is your problem? Is this shit not out? But there was always a plan, and I knew that the Freaky Tales movie was coming. This has been years in the making, like, uh, you know it. The deal of the process of making the movie has probably been a four year process, you know now.

I remember SEMBA hit me pretty early on and was like, don't tell anybody, I'm about to play too short in a movie.

And I'm like, so I was on when they were trying to get to the part where they even shoot the movie, you know, before the cast for sure, and I just figured, let's just time this out and wait till the movie comes out. And then I started my little movement. So I have a series of albums. It's called Sir Too Short. That was originally my name before too Short, when I first broke out, and I'm like, this is me. I was ser too Short. I used to write it, tag it everywhere all over the Bay.

And Banks's production is all over it.

A lot of music with a Banks recently so and it was he was I couldn't do it without.

Him, so they player short shit. Yeah.

So the first installment is the sort of Me and and Banks flavor. It's real Bay. I knew what the movie was gonna be about. I knew the movie was gonna be set in nineteen eighty seven. So instead of me trying to, you know, put out an album and like, you know, Kendrick's coming out next week, I'm coming out of the weekend. I'm like, I'm just gonna go in my zone and make some og as too short shit.

So that's what I did.

And then I was trying to do one song that me and Little John had recorded a about six seven years ago. It was laying around Ghazi from Empire. Shout to Gazi heard the song way back when. So every two years he goes, hey, man, let's put let's put out that Little John song. I'm like, all right, And then two years later.

Let's put that song out.

So once again, no one. I'm getting ready to try to put something out of the movie. He's like, you gotta put that Little John.

Song on there.

So I called a Little John, so let's make it new again, and he comes to the studio and we make We did something something.

I don't even know. We messed with that song a little bit, but we did something.

And he's like, I'm gonna leave some beats, and he just leaves me some beats. This is like on a Monday. I sent him. He probably gave me like twenty beats to listen to. A week later, I sent him like fourteen songs recorded and he said he.

Was like, oh, show you serious, son.

And he sent me like fifteen more beats and I'm like started recording on those. I'm like just doing them because they Little John beats some grabbing everything I've gotten, just you know, because I've been recording for years. I'm like, I got a lot of shit. And then he's like, all right, send me in another pack of beasts. I'm like, dude, I have more than enough for the album. He said, well, shit,

So Too Short?

Volume one is the Little Giant album, which is called Drinking Smoke, and it's a little more up tempo, it's a little more it's reminiscent of the songs that me and Little John made together.

And then it's so ignorant. The topics, the shit talking, all the.

OG's are like not all the OG's, but the og idea is like, you're in your fifties, you should be a mentor, and you should you should.

Say responsible things on songs now because you have matured. And not too Short. I'm like, right, where the fuck I was at nineteen eighty eight. I'm not.

I can't I can't see being a character called too Short. And then making the character grow the fuck up.

Yeah, and also like your fans who are like, I mean, I'm thirty eight. You know, I obviously was listening to you when I was a very small child, shot to my parents for you know, whether or not they were being good or bad parents for that is. But you know, people ten years older than me, people five years older than me, like they don't.

Want to hear too short, like we we love short for short.

Like It's like I just had that conversation with Cube when he was up here because I thanked him. I was like, hey man, thank you for this new shit sounding like ice Cube and not sounded myself trying to do some young head shit.

You know. Will Smith was asking Kendrick for advice. He's like, just talk shit, yeah, be true to yourself. Talk shit, bro.

So they're gonna talk about the mature the lack of maturity whatever in the subjects and the and the language and whatever.

But then volume three is actually gonna be that thing that they think a grown rapper should do.

And you know, sounds like the message in life is too short, and you know with the with the concerned lyrics.

I mean even getting it to like a motivational likes.

I always balanced my career for sure by talking the most extreme shiite and then talking the most intelligent ship. And the last album is just I have I make those kind of songs.

It's game.

So I just you know, I'm gonna get my grown man on on the way out. I want them to talk a lot of shit, somebody. I want somebody to talk shit. And like, that's just so childish. Are too short to drop that, you know in the environment in the world today is putting all these negative shits about.

Pimping and hoeing. Hey, it's too short.

If I was making movies, I wouldn't fucking you know, change Batman to fucking uh to do something that Batman wouldn't fucking DoD Damn.

You got a character, run the character. Yeah, no, that's I'm excited.

So when is the like, in terms of when you're gonna start rolling this stuff out?

The first volume one drops April eighteenth, so that's Friday. Yeah, next Friday, And I'm dropping a single this Friday. It's called still Mackin And then they each one would they all got to come out before the end of the year, so they'll be ninety two one hundred twenty days apart three to four months.

What is it man, at this point in time in your career, Like, what is the motivation? A lot of people get comfortable, a lot of people get lazy, they stop going to the studio. Why do you still have the drive? What is it that you attribute that to longevity?

I stayed in the game so long that I looked around, I see everything that's going on. I've seen all the people that came and went. I've heard all the chitter chatter about hip hop's limitations and how far I can go.

I remember when you couldn't.

You couldn't be a thirty something year old rapper because they're like, what your old dad's doing rapping? Right now, we have very successful represent their forties and fifties, And I just think that when you look at people out there just pushing it constantly on the road, trash, you know, people staying in the limelight.

Fat Joe, you know what I'm saying.

KRS one got twenty some albums and it's always you know, speaking hip hop and always relevant, you know. So it's like, you know, rock him, he just got red Man is dropping dope as freestyles and I'm like, I just think that we have to.

Make it.

You know, we have to own the narrative of like when does hip hop expire? When does the artist expire? And the only way to do that is to live it. We the generation who's poised right now to tell a story to the infinite version of it, Like who's going to be the first rapper who is rocking the crowd at seventy two years old? You know somebody's going to do it well?

Also too, like you're kind of I mean, I know we mentioned like rock him and those guys, but like in terms of like cultural relevance from your era of music, cubes in the mix obviously, but like wherever club you go to in the country, right, you're gonna hear blow the whistle. Oh yeah, it doesn't matter where you are. Could be a white club, it could be a hood club, it could be a bar mitzvah, it could be a basketball game, it could be anything. Blow the whistle is

And you don't. That's something that you don't work at. You just make good music. And you you remember that thing about you got to have the biggest ego and be hum humble at the same time.

Like a lot of people can't do both of those.

You get you got you got ego maniac and then you got people like, you know, zero humility, and they just come in and just shit on people, and it's just it's not a good energy. And I think that I always put that good energy out. I've always had never been too much in a hurry to a picture or listen to somebody's sixty second story about a too short experience.

Just like back in the day I ran into you at this.

Moll, I understand that from the start. I understand that it's gonna.

Come around full circle. I used to.

I used to do this thing where it was just an experiment. It was my first time going on tour and everybody's.

Like too short, too short, short dog, And I.

Said, I'm gonna do this thing where I'm going to tell all these beautiful women, Hi, my name is Todd.

Yeah, and just they're like, that's the dumbest shit ever.

Why are you doing it? I'm like, because at some point it's gonna be a bunch of beautiful women walking up to me going high Todd. And I did this shit for years. It just was like, oh, hi, my name's Todd. They're like, oh, you know that's your real name. Yeah, Todd, how you doing Yeah? And I just said this shit forever. And then all of a sudden I started going places and it just be some fine chick across the bar, Todd, Todd, I.

Ain't seen you in a while. And they're like, how the fuck you know her? And it became this thing and I.

Was just like, I just it was just part of the two short mystique, Like how do you do this shit?

Bro? And it's it's a little fucking this player ship. That's that's.

I studied some og players and I came up with my own version.

Yo.

You uh, you're an artist who has a unique connection with I look at like a group like Bone. Thugs like Bone got to work with Biggie, they got to work with Park, they got to work with Easy, of course, but you had such an incredible working relationship with Biggie. But then you also, I mean one of the most underrated chemistries. I think when we think back to albums and the amount of songs you guys, did you and jay Z had a run together where you guys.

Got three songs of jay three songs are big?

Yeah, I mean that's that's pretty crazy. Like, first, I'll start with the Biggie relationship because I know one of Biggy's last interviews, actually his last interview was in the Bay I believe it was that came out before you last.

Yeah, but what was you know?

And obviously you know you've got Diddy on your ship, obviously probably to the craziness, but you had such a connection with Biggie and puffing those guys, Like how did that relationship kind of start?

And I've really got to give one hundred credit now, I'll go fifty to fifty. Half of it was Biggie reaching out to me, and the other half would probably I would have to give it to Eric Sermon because he was my neighbor in Atlanta.

We made a lot of songs together.

He really the first song that New Yorker's ever liked me and by the Masses was a duet with me and Eric Sermon.

But the thing that really happened Biggie called me. Nope, he didn't call me.

He had puff called me and he said, big On to do a song with you, and I'm like cool, and we made the song.

The world the world filed it. So that actually just like makes all these New York workers go, oh, man, I fuck with you. I fuck with you.

You know what I'm saying, and it just it just became, you know, a fuck with you. And then I do this song with jay Z. Real niggas do real things, and then that opens up another door. I do a song with Little Kim call Me for the Booty Call soundtrack, and now I'm like sort of okay in New York. So me and Eric Sermon had a song called buy You Something. So now I got like four joints at all these years of New York ignoring the fuck out of me, got about four joints.

But these four joints are with the heavy head it is.

And then the phone starts ringing and they want me on the Foxy Brown album and I'm just.

Doing songs with New yorkers.

So it was it was Biggie because everybody he was the hottest motherfucker and then here I am with Big on a song.

They're like, well shit, I.

Got to get two short on the song because also the word was out that I had ten platinum albums, but it was like six platinums.

Four gold. And you know, folks are just like it with the feet, your thing was starting to pick up. We didn't used to do features back in the day.

Yeah, so because obviously nowadays, a lot of features get done over email. Back then, were you able to be in the studio.

Well, yeah, you pretty much all the features were done in person. What's the studio session? Like with Biggie?

The first one, the world is Filled? The song was recorded at a at Bad Boys studio Daddy's house in New York.

I got to the session. I had one of my homies with me.

And it's people. It's like a vibe, it's people in the studios. We smoked liquor, the usual session and Puff Daddy is on the first verse of the song. Carl Thomas is on the hook.

I was wondering who did that hook? Yeah, Carl Thomas.

And the hook is already done and Puffy's excited, you know, he's always like a high energy. When he's in the room, he's like playing this shit, loving it. Everybody in the room is agreeing this is one of the ones. And I'm sitting there my usual routine, grab a pan paper and just start vibing. The song is the hook is saying the world is Philip, Pips and Hose. We'll just talk about those I know, and it's just you know.

I didn't know about it. So he's just sitting around drinking and smoking.

He goes, I'm ready to get in the booth, and I'm like, what the fuck does he meaning?

Write?

Like I'm just And he goes in there and he says he announces because everybody's a little tipsy and having fun. He's like, I'm gonna do this shit in one take, and he goes in there, says a couple of lines and I guess messed up or didn't get the line right, and he said, run me back, and the next take he runs his shit front the back sixteen bars, and when he comes out the booth, it's like cheers.

And claps and everybody's like whash.

And I'm like sitting there with an empty piece of paper like this, and I'm like, the whole song is done.

Now.

The song has a blank sixteen bars. Everybody's in the mood, smoking the air. Ain't nobody pressuring me, but it's I'm pressure.

You're pressuring yourself. And I'm like, what the fuck.

So I go to my boy and I'm like, I should do if you kind of ripped that shit.

I was like, man, I ain't even wrote nothing. And my boy, he's from Oakland.

He said, he said, shit, listen to the hook. I'm like, okay, you said none of them. Ain't nobody own the song said anything about what the hook is saying. And I'm like like, bub okay, I'm just gonna write the story of the hook. So I told the story about some pimps and holes. I know, in the end, I start talking some shit about some pimps and holes I know, and then I come out the roof and they're like,

I'm like, I don't know.

He's like shit, He's like, I tell you a story. He's like, when I was in fifth grade, I used to steal cigarettes at the story and then go around selling cigarettes to adults. That's how I got money. And I'm like, okay, I wrote a rapper about it. Little nigga in the fifth grade selling cigarettes. That's one of my songs. But that's how we used to get down. So the World Is Filled became a classic, and you know,

Always sure it's funny because then you end up in the studio with jay Z, who does the same kind of thing.

Yep, you must be like, you know, it was these New York motherfuckers gonna be writing nothing down.

And then with jay Z song I actually sent him the Verse the World the Real Niggas was was a song that was written when I got the dem with the demo version that was.

One on Value one right, I can't remember, and volume two year on it was all good just a week ago.

That song was written for him to do a duet with Scarface. And you always say the stories about jay Z and UGK and these people. People didn't want to do songs with certain people because they thought they weren't friends of Tupacs, and it was always this this thing of I'm ride with Tupac.

At that time, it was so East West because that was like an actual thing that people were cognitive with. Some people like you Pimpsey was really on that, and I don't I don't know.

I think Scarface it was partially because he didn't like to fly on airplanes at the time. And then you know, I guess you gotta like some people was just like I got a ride for the side I fuck with right, and it just was like that. I can't tell you if that was Scarface's motivation, but he didn't do the song, but you kind of fucked with everybody at that time. And in that song, jay Z says something something about

Well, you're also like one of the greatest storytellers in hip hop history. I do that too. I give you a lesson by example by using a story.

And I know that when I'm on songs with other rappers and they doing all this great word play, I'm really just gonna I'm gonna give it to you, paint a picture or something, and just it's me, it's my your style. Yeah, So I like to whenever I get on the song with a super rapper, I like to dumb it down a little bit and twang the words a little bit. I'm doing that thing mine and I just I'm like, I'm not gonna battle you.

Broh. Yeah yo.

One of my favorite songs that you ever put out was one of the best stories ever told on record, blowjob Betty.

That should have been a movie.

It should have been a movie. For people who haven't heard the song, go please go listen to it. It's essentially about Too Short had a girl who he had to kick to the curve because she was tripping, and.

She ended up I'd like to fuck for free. Yeah, she because she was a real hoe, right and uh.

It all wraps up with Short running into a bathroom, running into her in a bathroom after she gets done serving a bunch of strangers, and Too Short says one more go and then busting under her mouth, she chokes on it.

Shot that fatal nut. Yes, she dies.

Too Short doesn't find out about it until later when he's was it the newspaper the news?

I forget And it was on the news. The young girl died just last night.

She choked on sperman or wind pipe. Sorry to say there's no suspect I busted down and killed the bitch anyway. You know what, when I wrote that song, please tell me yes.

When I wrote that song, the first thing I wrote on the paper was I busting that and killed the bitch. That's the first thing I wrote. I said, this is gonna be the last thing I say in that song. And I wrote the song to catch up to that one line.

That's so crazy, Yeah, because you found you know where the ending's going.

I mean, I was like, I thought of that, and I'm like, I gotta do something with this. Wrote it down, busting that and killed the bitch.

That's what we're gonna get to.

Did like fans take that and like there wasn't Google back then, But was there any like a lord that this was like a true story kind of or some semi truth.

I mean, truthfully, people really in the eighties and nineties, they really thought I pimped a lot of holes.

And I really thought that, oh, that shit was rude. I thought that it's just like that's because hip hop still had that mystique. I assumed you were.

I mean, man, but I used to hang with a lot of pimps. And it was very pimpish. But you know, I had a really good job. I used to like cops would have harassed me a little bit, and I'm like, bro, I got a really fucking good job. I'm like, why would I sell dope? Why would I pimp hose? I get a fucking, you know, million dollar check every fucking six months. What are you talking about?

Yeah, Plus, you grow up in the Bay, so it's like you're telling the story of like a culture from a place that's like very much pimps and hosea.

I was very fortunate enough to end up in Oakland, California, and a lot of too short is the story of Oakland.

It's not the story of me.

It's me looking at Oakland and interpreting what I'm seeing in songs, Like I literally could just think of some shit that happened and write a song. That's how exciting Oakland is when I'm coming up of age, and it's not you know, the streets.

It's always been a wild city, but you could go out and venture through the city. You're not gonna worry about getting killed or any kind of problem happening somewhere. I just had It's rough right now, for sure.

I just had free roam with the city and it was like a blank canvas, and I wrote hundreds of songs about Oakland.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's it's interesting too because you were kind of, you know, the first rapper, at least one of the first rappers to really I mean, uh, cuss and talk the way you talked for real, you know what I'm saying.

I mean, because you were like I mean, technically you were pre Nwa right before. I mean technically technically in the streets. Yeah, in the streets.

I was famous in Oakland at the same time run DMC and ll COOJ were famous, you know.

Essentially like the West Coast. It starts with too short and nice tea, right, is that fair?

What?

No?

You gotta remember you had l A was making a lot of dance music. It was I'm talking about just.

Like rappers like that, like we would. I got a you know, I got an Egyptian lover and l A dream team, you know, even when you know doctor Dre and then they were doing an up temple thing, the world Class Worcking Crewer. Yeah, I was buying those records. I was still in high school, but I was a rapper.

I was a pretty popular fucking rapper around the Bay at the same time. So I was one of the first rappers I met that was like on because he had did breaking and he was was doing like a six in the morning and all that ship, and he actually like chopped it up with me and gave me some game, and I was I was motivated after having a conversation with you know, young Ice t Young Too Short, and I always remember that he would do that with a lot of us, just give us a little game

I do, yeah, I mean you're you're like, what were the like the blowback being one of the first artists to have I mean you name it so on cusswords, right, Like that's something that you know, it's like, hey, we're cussing on songs.

This is this is this is not of the norm per se, Like, yeah, the legitimate journalists who had all the attention.

Because they were in the hip hop publications and you know it could be fucking I don't know, everybody said this ship there was like this guy too short he really can't rap, and he just curses.

And basically the album would.

Come out and they would go platinum, and then I put another one out and they go, yeah, he's you know, the music's mediocre. You don't think, don't think this style is gonna last too much longer, you know. And then I have this Big Records, another platinum. I'm talking about five six platinums in a row, and the review is still coming out pretty mediocre, can't really wrap that good.

And I'm like, stupid, motherfucker.

I'm rapping like this on purpose because people can hear what I'm saying and they feel it and they learned every word and I'm spitting game and the basses HeLa deep, and they like missing the whole point that we have all these different styles of rap YEP, and you have these lyricists who the wordplay is is is infectious and you fucking want.

To learn it and rap alone.

We don't even feel like though back then, like if we're talking like eighty seven, eighty eight, eighty nine, and it's like ll you got Kine, you got Rockim, you got rock Kim, but you were I just I always felt like your music was so it resonated so clearly, like you said, like you would say the fly shit.

In the simplest way, where'd be like, oh shit.

But there were a lot of hip hop heads who were like one to ten. I just saw the phumod report card. I never even knew about it. Yes, I got a C plus, And I'm looking at his categories and I'm like, of course I would give me a C plus, But he was missing categories like how the fuck you just rock that crowd or how the fuck you make a song that that you know, motherfucker's in the hood love they.

Don't need a radio station and shit.

And you know, if he could have seen the forest forest sight to the future, it should have been a category on there, Carl longevity, because I'd have got an A plus and that motherfucker.

And I just always knew, man, this is what I'm telling you.

I always knew that I didn't want to be a lyricist, that I could easily put the words together and spit the flow.

But it was that lane was taken.

And I'm sitting there like I chose to represent this Oakland style of like pimpshit street shit, and I'm like, that ain't the way people was talking, I'm gonna talk like the pimps talk on this song and fucking like I would just.

My get back was off.

Always live in concert, I'm like, just get on the show. Put I don't let I never would be the headliner. Mostly, I wouldn't be the headliner. We have these shows with like you know, ten seven ten groups, and I'm like somewhere in the middle, and I'm just like, watch, just watch the motherfucker to go on before me, and the motherfucker is going after me. It's gonna be a problem

Shut just walk out there. You don't even got to introduce me.

I just walked the fuck out there and start rapping, and the whole crowd is singing every word, and I'm like, I just rapped. I stopped rapping and just let the whole house sing it and just tell the crowd to say shit, and.

They're like, who the fuck are you? And then just I just you know, keep it real nonchal line. What's up man? Now? You know player and here from Oakland kept the lights on a jive man.

Yeah, I'm one of those aretists who saved the label one year they had for they had a bad year and I had a big record.

I just remember, like the only I got that Jive logo and the way all the CDs kind of looked the same. I just remember it was you and Forty would always have the Jive logo on your ship. Like as a kid, I'm like, yeah, I didn't even know anybody else will sign.

The jib for a while, well a few people signed the jib because I was on jive. Yeah, I straight up like ugk ugk was on jives right because too Short was on jive.

Wow, that was the only reason. What are studio sessions in which it's too short and PIMPC? Like in life, PIMPC.

Is serious in the studio, He's very serious, doesn't really he's not He's not slow by any means.

It happens quick. Pimp C could make beats. He made a lot of sure, amazing producer.

Pimp C also sings and you hear the song like it's funky, but just listen, he's in the studio singing like he's still in the fucking high school quot on those songs, and he's really putting his all into it. So PIMC is the kind of motherfucker that come to the studio and first thing he wanted to do is smoke some weed. That's that's why we say that on the songs. He like smoke something like he really would smoke something.

That's not just a tag. He really would say that. When he walk in the room, she think we walked to walk in and smokes something. Man, what's that?

And and he's just immediately it's like, well we making If it's something on, he's getting involved.

If it's nothing coming through the speakers, he's like, man, this ship up.

Man.

Let's say he just immediately started kicking out a drum pattern, put a baseline on it, and he got a hook for it immediately, and we're making a song. Most I think most of the songs I haven't made with PIMC, he's doing the hook because that's wow. That's how it always went down. He would just he was just quick like that. And he's also one of those guys who he's like me in a sense that he's not feeling lyrically beat you down with this vocabulary and his cadence.

Listening to it, I was like, how is this? It's two of the best verses ever, but for different reasons, Like bun Bee.

Was more of the like intricately the lyricist. Yes, but Pimps ship just hit so two people.

A lot of people can do it, but it's two people that always distinctively make a record and make you bounce when you hear it, Like you want to bounce to the beat.

And the record. A lot of songs producers make.

The beat bounce, but if you like take like MJG from A B and MG, every time he raps the fucking beat, just start bouncing.

Same thing with Pimps. Like Little John told me a secret one day.

He said, I was in the booth rapping and I'm just rapping to the song, and he like, if you want the song to bounce, you gotta bounce while you wrapped the lyrics.

He's like, you ain't in there. Bouncing.

I gotta bounce and do the ship, and now the lyrics start bounce. He's like, yeah, like that love John taught me. Taught me some ship in the lab.

Yeah. I remember we made Shake that Monkey and he gave me the beat.

There was no hook on it, and I came to the studio when he wasn't there, and I recorded three verses with a hook, whole fucking song. Come back the next day and he and he is there and I play it for him and I didn't even think. He let the whole song play. He was like click.

He's like, that's not the idea I have for that beat, and just goes the hook.

Dumped my ship, and then he goes in. He goes in there and does the hook, which is him fucking he's doing. He does like fifty takes and consolidates him and makes it sound like one hundred people.

And he's like, that's the song. So I went back to the hotel we were in Miami. I wrote Shake that Monkey. I came back. He's like, that's the song. Okay, okay.

So that's how we record. Really like working with producers that produce. I work with a lot of beat makers who give you a beat, and then I end up producing it. But I like working with producers who you know, the jazzy phase and banks, and for producers who tell you words are cup but the flow is wrong, you know, or do your voice like this on that part right there, or switch that line and say that you know, just a little shit that makes the song better, and they

Father Dom wrote some songs for me Dangerous Dame wrote some songs for me.

You end up putting out this album that's on the desk, shout to getting it, which it might be my favorite album of yours. This was supposed to be your last album, right, was this? This was the retirement album? YEP, album number ten. Not a lot of rappers had ten albums at that time. I don't think anybody, dude.

Yeah, because this is ninety six, so that's fuck yeah. I don't think. I mean ten albums by nineteen ninety six is insane. Yeah, I don't think anyone artists had ten albums yet.

Plus you had the Dangerous Coup album, like, by the way, great album, but you take that that hiatus and then you come back we Can't Stay Away, which had some shit jay Z's on that album. I think Jermaine and Prieze on that album. What brought you to the point in ninety six to be like this is it, I'm out? And then take me through those three years where you get pull pulled back in and you make Can't Stay Away?

Well, it wasn't even about retiring. It was about.

Announcing the retirement. You're thinking you want to do something, you know, something that rappers don't do.

And I'm like, I know you're the first guy to fake retire. Yeah, so yeah, master P did it. A few people did it after, but it was just an idea.

I'm like, I say it on the beginning of the album, when the song Getting It comes on, I'm like, it's getting close to the end, y'alls the last album. It's just bait because I'm talking, I'm talking shit that the album was supposed to be named album number ten, but Getting It, Getting It came out so amazing with Parliament fucking delic They shot the video with and were just like, you gotta name this album this because it's gonna be

It's like your victory lap.

Kind of like all the industry, I'm just slapping the whole, all the haters in the face with actual numbers, like this is out number ten, This is fucking numbers. So the kickback was I did a lot of features after this. I was getting probably like this nineteen mid nineties. I'm getting you know, forty to fifty even up for a feature just to come on somebody's album sixteen bars.

And I was my hustle for a while. I was in New York. I'm doing deals about labels and.

Budgets and shitting fucking it, getting all kind of people paid and shit and just willing and Dylan.

But it was never any tension of like retiring. The whole was a marketing ploy.

So what we did with me and Jive Records and everybody whose mind was working on the campaign was we literally said too shorts retiring and instantly got the entire media all across the board to give us free advertising.

And that's exactly we had.

We held a fucking retirement party, heavy media invites. We held a press conference, heavy Meat, and it.

Just the story went everywhere.

The fucking album came out the box platinum, so that was that wasn't really a retirement, that.

Was just and then three years later you could do the opposite two shorts return album.

It gives you a whole other free advertising play like.

And you know, through these different phases of my career, which I think that was a very big turning point. Moving to Atlanta was a turning point. Yeah, coming back in two thousand and four and catching some heat with Shake that Monkey, and then.

A year later Blow the Whistle, and that just kicked in a whole new phase.

And you know, and even now, like I feel like whatever I did before twenty twenty, I dropped the album called the Fucking Pimp Tape, and the Pimp Tape did good for me, made me a lot of money. It was some good looks, you know, some nice little features

You know, got a little good little look did the duet album with E forty You also have some like other Gangsters and Strippers is a classic? Yeah, And I dropped some underground albums that they vibe.

I was.

I was really doing a lot of a lot of making a lot of money off off with Empire, off of just digital only releases, which you know, no matter where it got to, it got to these pockets, right, and then the pimp and then you and forty have this like obviously, yeah, you guys are like putting out joint albums together, and you guys are synonymous with each other.

Yeah, oh zones are still touring and like Jags Mick Jaggers seventy eight something like that.

Yeah, if you gave me the Temptations, Diana Ross and you're going the four Time Show, I'm pulling up. I'm pulling per So I think that that is my motivation right now to do this in the twenty twenties, to be a part of the movie. Drop three albums in one year, keep doing these big shows. I'm doing really big crowds every weekend every month.

Yeah you are, You are busy on the road.

And I'll be fifty nine years old this month, and I'm just like, you can't tell me. You cannot tell me. Stay home and sit in a rocking chair and tell old stories about being on tour.

Every time I talk with T. K. Kirkling the other day, Tk's like, you know he's older as well, he's older than me. Yeah, he's my homie. Yeah. Tk's like, you know, this is it's on your mind, you know what I mean? Like age, Like he's said the same thing.

He's like, no one's gonna tell you know, the rolling stones to stop touring like exactly.

You know, as long as I got this game, people will pull up.

So to the other guys that are ogs that are still pushing forward, I'm just I'm being a part of that movement. And I don't bash the young artists. I support them one. I like a lot of the new music. I think that a lot of stuff back in the day that we don't remember was garbage, for sure, and hip hop had a lot of garbage from day one until this day. And to sit there and be the kind of og who goes all that new shit is garbage is a lie because most of that old shit

School shit was dope, but you forgot all the whack people that.

Oh God, if I could just go through my crates of records, I probably stopped buying records in the early nineties. I can go through my crates and you just be like, I never heard this garbage because I.

Bought everything that came out. So's it's never changed.

Is there anybody from let's say, like the newer class of mcs that kind of you have a little bit like kind of remind you of yourself a little in terms of just maybe subject matter swagger.

I mean, for a while there, I was seeing the movement in like YG like too short ish, like I see it, and he was just you know, he wasn't trying to be a super lyricist, right, always talking shit, pull up with all the homies and just be like y'all can't say shit, and you know it was the same kind of vibe. But you know, anybody that's spitting that game is I think that you have DNA hip hop DNA, and you see it in the rappers.

Sue evolved from jay Z, the ones who evolved from Lil Wayne, you know what I mean. You see sim I think Simba.

I mean it's weird to say, cause Simba plays you in a movie, but Simba, he's like a great MC.

But sometimes Symbol.

Will deliver the most player ill lines in the simplest way that make people like and he's freestyles.

He got like damn like.

So then you know, the DNA of two short e forty is like considered to be that bass shit. But if you take away the geography of it and just go that game that just I'm Gonna Save Me and.

Forty because it's a lot of people that do it.

But if you take just away like that's a base shit and just say these two rappers, it's a lot of hip hop DNA that came from the game that we spit. And it's a lot of rappers that spit that game because they grew up on that. Snoop Dogg is from that lineage, you know, all the way down to guys like ge Perico, Like it's it's a lot of them, and they when they sit there and say, I'm this type of lyricist, this is my look, but

Game because he comes from the game DNA. And it's a lot of them.

So you know, even the Russell's hot right now, but he's spitting game. Listen to the punch lines.

Is and it's real. It's easily consumable. The way he says shit, you'd be like, oh shit, like why nobody ever say it that way. But he ain't say nothing about pimper and hole and selling dope. For sure.

He's still spitting game and that game cloth is. It's very prevalent in hip hop.

You know.

T I comes from that, ball and G come from that.

It's a lot of motherfuckers that if you if you from the UGK DNA, then you from the too short DNA, because that's what UGK.

They wanted to spit game. Like when they seen Born in Mac.

PIMC said, when I saw that fucking album cover to Born to Mac, he said, before he even heard the music, he said, that's what I want to do.

That shit right there.

Yo. It's crazy too because you have your album covers were so ill like that's one thing about too short, Like, bro, you got them like first like I don't know, six seven eight album covers were so fire, like look at.

The first Outcast album, DRE three thousand is wearing a pimp had. That's some too short ship. Yeah that you know, they probably said what you want to do.

I just I just put out of I think at the game where you fit in with the pimp had And then I was I was putting it in the videos too. I was wearing the pimp hat driving in the Cadillac. Motherfuckers like I want that.

Short dogs in the house with the cartoon and illustration. That was before doggie style, right, Yeah.

Snoop Dogg's first album cover is very reminiscent of one of my album covers.

And you know, I mean you were the first dog to Snoop dog You know what I mean? You know it was that's my guy. Of you guys did a album to guy.

As we became friends, I was kind of thrown off early on, but then we became really good friends.

What was that a thing cognitive like cognitzant of that? I can't see the word, but were you like cognizant?

I mean they were saying beach Snoop Dog, Well, I'm short dog. It was you're from l A. You know y'all say bit like from the start, I took it as flattering. And I also the level of how it blew up is Doctor dre Is Death Road is blowing up. I'm like, this ship is helping me. There's no way I'm going to rock the boat and say, man, them dude's over there stole my ship. Whatever, Like they I immediately saw for what it was. But when he told

They was probably like middle school, bumping that ship and fucking he like they put me in the studio. I started rapping and just said bitch like I'm like, I get it. I mean, you know, Ice Cube said it at one point he was doing a I think it was a bitch as a bitch.

He gets it. End the song, he just yell out bitch.

I think he's the first person that said it outside of me, And people go, why didn't you trade market?

Why don't you make people have to actually permission to say it.

I'm like, it wouldn't be an iconic pop thing if I controlled it and said I'm the only one that could do it.

It's a gift to the world. When I heard.

Comedians do it, I seen I saw sitcoms doing it, it just became something that everybody knew. You got to give a lot of credit to Snoop Dogg for helping put that out there in the universe. And then I think when I say what's my favorite word and blow the whistle. That kind of solidifies my ownership. I really said that in the song because I overheard a conversation one day. You have an album called that, yeah, and I really was on that I'm not gonna let this

In a single. Just just give me my shit back a little bit.

You know.

I don't care it belongs to the world, right, No, but I mean in hip hop it like it's your thing.

But me and Freddie B came with that, and Lone before us, there was a guy named Rudy Raymore Dolomite who was in movies yelling.

Out the bitch lone before us Dolomite. So I remember Dolomite doing skits sound like some Snoop albums and shit.

Yeah.

So yeah, So I'm not the inventor. But you know I put my touch on it. He yelled at in a few movies, so you know, we give we give the credit to Dolomite.

What has been the craziest blow the Whistle moment for you? Where you were like, this is insane. I mean, obviously it gets played everywhere. Fucking Jay's He's got a classic.

For a lot of viral clips, a lot of viral clips that are funny as fuck. With Blow the Whistle, it's like, no matter if you got if you got a Grandma, you.

Got a I could do top ten viral. It's just moments with the song. But I mean the one that a clip that I can think of that stands out. I actually heard the story without singing the clip multiple times, and it's the one about babies. There's a clip I saw where a baby is watching Blow the Whistle video and the mom turns it off and the baby cries.

Just got new life to When the Eagles won the Super Bowl, they adopted it as their song, and.

Some people out there thought it was a new song.

Yeah, it was just so random because you see you see Gilly just turning up to blow the whistle.

Believe me, I thanked him personally appreciate it. Yeah, it's just it's good vibrations.

And it's who asked me this ship one day?

Oh, Jermaine dupre ASTs me. We were at a club this many years ago in Vegas and he knew Little John produced it because that's his boy. They're like really close, right, And he said, man, I just want to ask. She was like, what the fuck did you and Little John put in that song?

Like, like what was the ingredients? Like, I don't know, bro, listen to it.

As basic as fuck, Like as basic as fuck the production, it ain't a lot going on, Yeah.

But it's it's infectious.

Man, It's it's just me and dj A men talk about the ship all the time when we're like, what's like the West Coast national anthem and like that includes la that I'm just the entire West Coast and it's it's I just you know, he's got his Bay Area bias.

But I think it's blowla whistle. I was like, I think it's if you just think.

Of the national anthem for the West Coast, obviously there's like, you know, nothing but a g thing, and you know there's records, but blow the Whistle's done it.

And I feel like me and forty have a.

Lifelong friendly competition where it's okay to talk ship to each other, it's okay to critique and help each other.

And I wasn't keeping.

Tabs, but obviously he was, Oh he's yeah, I'm sure he's keeping tabs of.

Tell me when to go versus bull the whistles. A lot of fans figure trying to figure that out. Another debate, and I.

Forget what his logic was, but recently he said, all right, bro, you won, you won, you won something.

He got it.

If we talked to him, he'll tell us what his logic was. But that's funny, you know, they they both took a long time to go platinum. They've officially platinum, but something he has some mathematical.

Equation where it blow the whistle one.

I don't know. Yeah, it's interesting you are when I'm a kid. My picture of who you are is too short, scy one hundred bitches around him at all times, he's just fucking fighting bitches off of sticks. If you had to estimate not to get into your first what would you say, is your body count well, Chamberlain like, because you also have a song.

About nineteen nine bitches. Yes, that was s must be a funny song.

It was hilarious, by the way. It was great with the animated videos.

So two short is a character that I made up, and I don't think a lot of women would really appreciate too Short per se. I've never tried to be that way with women in real life. Yeah, all that bit shit and some my dick bits, and I don't do that. I played kind of the opposite a lot.

Of times, like really like Todd is a different guy.

Really like gentlemen. But now when you get over to Todd Shaw, I've always even before I was famous, I always had like girlfriends and just like cute girlfriends, and they was like, you ugly motherfucking fuck up teeth, how you get all these cute girls?

And it was just always the game. I learned it at a young age. And people come and say, well, what's the count, what's the count? I'm just like, it ain't no count.

You know what it is like literally, Like you talked to some of the people that roll with me over the years, I'm super low key with everything these days, but for fucking about a.

Thirty year run, I had a bit of two or three or four with me.

At all times, like falsely wake up, everywhere we go, going to lunch, go to the barbershop, it's bitch in the car, Like I just I just love to be around beautiful women. So whether I would be fucking her or not, I'm like, let's go run around for a day, let's hang out for the next three days, just whatever. And I had a lot of female friends who fucking dine pieces, who would stay with me, pack up shit and just stay with me, and we would never even

Some bringer hold me through, just like, what was the most amount of women you've been with it? Once? I guess I can answer that. One man never like talking about this kind of ship. But I figured, like.

I figured, like in one night I had over and over and over again all night with like four chicks, and just it was just me, not having a fivesome, but just all night, all morning, however long, just anytime I wanted to just hit any one of the four. And you know, it's not really like anything to brag, not anything to brag on, because at some point it becomes a burden on the individual who's supposedly, you know, trying to pull this feet off. It's not it's your

I would be like, oh, you see her over there, I hit that one time, two times or whatever, and.

Some some a group of like super bad bitches walked into a club or wherever we were one night and I told my homie, I said, I fucked all four of them. Not at the same time, Like over years, I fucked all four of them, And he said, you ever thought that maybe they fucked you?

And I'm like, like what, they passed me around. He's like maybe maybe.

I'm like, damn, hey, because that's that's how you would look at it. If one girl fucked your whole crew, you'd be like, yeah, we passed her around, like you're the whole grow I'm like, dang, the look at They might have looked at you the same way.

One of them told him it was cool, and then the other one tried and they spread me around over.

They passed me around.

So you know, when you think about that and you wake up after a night of like letting four women have their way with you, and then you see another group of four women that you had over a period of time and they're all friends.

It's not a good feeling, bro. It's not a good feeling.

Like if I was a pimp and those are my ex holes, so I'd be like, yeah, a bit, just got money for me. But that wasn't the case. So you know, after a while, I started being a little more. I was a rock star at a young age. I did that shit.

I probably went on three tours and just was a fucking horror. But yeah, I mean that's that was kind of the game back.

But I've also been in love and had long stretches of not being a whole right, So I love life.

Man.

I enjoyed it, and I think I remember I was like hitting thirty and I was like, I just want to be a fun motherfucker for a while.

I don't want to, man, you gotta settle down. You ain't you get thirty nine. I just kind of want to be fun for a little while. Over this is fun, So I just have fun.

Which you have really three chapters of your career, but I would say like two definitive chapters. And it's really it's really like, you know, the eighties up until it's called it like oh one two or whatever. But then you have this other era where the hyphie movement comes in. You start working with different, different sounding production. You get you know, there she goes slide down the pole and gangsters and strippers and.

I'm the log I'm forty years old, yeah, forty something.

And all these records that like don't sound like old, too short, but there they make you like they like you said it earlier, like blow the Whistle gave you career relevance forever, but like it. You have this whole library of songs from the last twenty years that don't sound anything like getting It.

Don't you know that song don't act like a bitch? Yeah?

I gave that song to E forty. That song came from the Trunk Boys. The Trunk Boys had the song, same hook, everything.

And the shit fifty seven got on right. Yeah.

The Trunk Boys is local group from the Bay and they wanted to get me on a verse for a remix. So the producer who made the song was like, when we first made it, it was made for too short to get on it. So I did the remix with them, and some time went by, everybout a year or so, and I just kept really feeling like that song was something, and I got E forty to get on it, and Forty was like, I want to put this on my album.

So I called the Trunk Boys.

I'm like, hey, forty wants to put a version out with just me and him, but because it's your song, both of us are going to give you guys a free verse on whatever you want. And there was a lot of little little drama with the song, but we did it. It comes out it instantly, it hit now, mind you, this was this was a song from there mixtape two years before we dropped it.

And then fifty gets on it. They probably feel even more like, what the fuck fifties, even though we both gave them verses? They had nine members in the group, probably like it's a real barrier wang right there.

Yeah, like five was cool and four was like, fuck that, that's our song, you know what. The forty brought them out on stage. We did a lot of I really appreciate that the young homies, you know, let me do that. But they had mixed emotions about it, and I understand the whole way. But that is a big record for E forty.

Yeah, and I just literally go, here's a song, and that's how we get down. Though. What is like your favorite era?

Though? But if you had to say the two when if you divide your career kind of in half, I mean, you're kind of doing it with this new series a bit.

Okay, so early on we're just like kids, you know, twenty twenty one. I even had an early career too, Like I was pretty fucking famous in the Bay before I coore jump out, and I was doing shows and having a ball and living the rap life. But when I go on tour, I was on the straight out of the Compton tour with NWA. Easy hit me up, you want to go, I'm going on tour.

You want to go? Hell yeah, I want to go.

So I go on tour with them, and DC's on tour above the Laws on the tour. JJ FADDs on the tour and I'm a fucking instant rock star.

Is that the tour hosted?

Yeah, he's the comedian coming out in between all the acts. Nineteen eighty nine and I'm a fucking rock star day and night, every day. Even when the tour ends, you know, I'm still doing my two shirt show. I'm a fucking rock star.

Next year, ice Cube is no longer in n WA. He drops then album. He wants to go on tour.

Me and him became really good friends on the Struggle after tour, so we go out co headline of tour, fucking rock star.

I The next year, Spice.

One gets hot. Spice One, man, you know, I'm on like third platinum Altum, Like, let's go out.

Me and Spice One go.

Out fucking rock star also on drive right, Yeah, yeah, because of me by way of you know, this is just the affiliation.

But that was a lot of fun, fucking fun. They're talking about like five years of just fuck it man, also having fun without having to worry about the social media. Yeah at a page, I've called you back if I feel like you know. And I think that stands out, just that run of just being young, not having it and not knowing better almoment, not having to call nobody. You know, I didn't have a girlfriend. I was just like floating and that was a fun run.

But then later on, I'm well established, I know how to move around. I got the right people around me. I always had good people around me. But I'm seasoned, and now I.

Get this run with blow the whistle and shake that monkey. I literally.

Started doing a hustle or I was like, if it's Monday through Thursday, you can give me five six seven grand, I'll come to.

Your club and rap, blow the whistle and shake that monkey and leave.

And I would do two three clubs in the night, like I would. I would make a lot of money on the weekends, but I would make a lot of money during the week just walking in the clubs and we're having fun, like set me up at a table bottles, and it just looked like I'm out there just balling everywhere I get on.

The mic, rock and shit.

So I did that ship for probably fucking ten years, and that got me through the recession. The recession hit I'm partying and shit ain't really like on my a game on, like you know, my multiple hustles clicking. Shit caught it caught the motherfucker off guard. I'm talking like eight oh no concert, shit slowed down, motherfucker start penny pinsion. But these two songs allowed me to go make fucking twenty grand a week, you know, fucking around if I go, you know, or.

More just doing walk through. They called them to walk through, like the cheap ass promoter.

Sure that didn't really want to you know, you want to put out the flyer too short live, but I'm really only going to sing two songs and they call it to walk through.

The walk through was cool. I don't really do them shits no more, but that was a fun erra though, I like not really I was doing.

Shows, the real show, but this this little floating around the West coast or wherever popping up. I'm gonna go to Scottsdale as a forty something, you're a rapper, and shit was fun and it's like I'm every time I'm doing this to this very day. The census is you're supposed to be expired. Bro, Like, you're not supposed to be in Seattle last night rocking twenty thousand people like, what the fuck are you doing?

I'm like, can't stop me.

So you guys dropped Mount Wesmore, which you guys did a dope run on the road with that.

I think it.

I would would you say that a lot like the fans might have been a little little disappointed with the album.

I think that people don't know for bosses, four egos, for different sound, four busy schedules, it was a very small window of everybody on the same page.

And literally what I think happened was we did a lot of shit, a lot of songs, a lot of putting together the project, and then it started getting a little too close to the Snoop Dogg super Bowl.

Appearance and stoops on his crypto wave try to do the NFT. He just shit started happening, And I think that the schedules, the schedules started clashing to where it would have been a tour, it would have been all this other ship, and time just ran out where that window of everybody on the same page, it just kind of ran out.

That's that's my personal opinion. I'm sure you will get four different answers if all four of us.

I think I talked to Cube about it. He caun't pretty much share the same sentiment.

But we have.

Another album and a half worth of music that sounds really fucking good, and everybody's I send a little sarcastic text messages in the group text every now and then because I'm like, I'm like, I know, you guys are all rich and busy and shit, but we got this dope ass album laying around, Like, let's come up with a scheme, any kind of scheme. You don't have to put the album out. We could just start putting singles out. Let's just do what the fuck this goodass music laying around.

Cube just got his ship out right, Yeah, God the Missionary came out, so maybe you know, but it's like you said, everybody's too fucking rich, to.

Busy too they give a fuck. So I think.

I think that at some point the fans are gonna hear it. I think that the album that came out would have been worked if it came out a little sooner.

Yeah, and then you guys also did like an NFT release on it first, which is kind of weird.

But then you gotta flip to the positive side because I did an album with Snoop Dogg E forty and Ice.

Can you did a tour?

And I promise you, I would promise you that Mount Westmore made millions of dollars.

No matter where you think of landed. They they they have so many deals intact that it was.

It was a very good It was very good for everybody. It was great, and it would have been we actually, and I've never been involved with anything like this in my life. We turned down like fucking like a twenty million dollar tour or some shit that was only probably like fucking it was only it wasn't twenty shows.

It was you were You were probably like about, who the fuck does this are we voting on this? Because if so?

So, yeah, it's that kind of And I know I'm like I'm in is super group, and I'm like, it's not the kind of situation where you try to boss up because everybody's a fucking boss.

So it's like, we just got to work together, find the compromise. Find I took the role in the group.

I'm like, I will go through all kind of links of making sure the music is organized and all the files are in the right place, and all the songs get ready for whoever's gonna mix them in. Every everybody's verse gets turned in and put in the same session and all this shit. But I'm not gonna fucking come up with the marketing plan. I'm not telling you motherfuckers when the tour. I'm not picking the merch company. I ain't doing none of that shit because all you boss motherfuckers know everything.

I'm like, y'all know everything. Just just my job is the music, So let me organize everything. Yeah, so that's what I did, get the sessions together. All that forty was our number one beat picker. It sounds like it. He calls this of a beat picker.

That actually makes a lot of sense hearing it. Yeah, you know the thing you're talking about Oakland. A little bit earlier, you know, obviously the Bays crazy place right now, the Bipping is out of control. You know, it's a pretty wild place. You recently lost your brother earlier this year. I currently imagine you're still mourning that loss.

How you feeling man like? I mean that that was in January, you know where, Yeah, when you.

Lived the life that we lived, Me, my brothers, some of the homies. You know, we we've survived a lot of shit. And not not like I was wilding in the streets selling dope and drugs, but I've been in the streets a lot of my life. And when you in that environment, that chance is always there. I've been around.

Dozens of shootings.

I caldn't even count how many times I've been around when somebody started shooting very close to where we're at. I've been in situations where close friends of mine were sworn that they were going to murder each other and we were all good friends, and they're like, kill that motherfucker when I see him. And I've been around, you know a lot of situations where we had to bury the homies. You know, we grew up and we started

It was.

It was some ship that you know. It's just it's the town bro like it's and.

Uh, you just gotta deal with it. You gotta deal with it, and however the way, however which way you want to deal with it.

I think.

I have received so many blessings from Oakland, California, that I can't blame.

The city for what happened. It's not it's not Oakland's fault.

The environment whatever created the problem that caused that. But I don't blame Oakland, not the Oakland that I love. And somebody worded it to me in a way that that sticks with me. And they just said to me they said, this town we love can really be mean sometimes, and it really can, and it can really be fun and really educational, and you know, it's revolutionary, and there's a lot of shit. So I just think that sixty one years gun down, that's that's an anomaly. It's not

Most of us would have the same gun that he had.

Somebody would ram that garage door, and we might probably probably try to be sort of strategic and like, well, if this motherfucker comes in, I'm gonna be behind here. And you know, but my brother he runs out shooting. That's that's that was him. And we all, all of us that know and love him, was like, what else was.

He gonna do? That's him?

You know I could have told him a million times, Bro, you got all these angles in the building, probably when they come in the door.

But he ain't think like that, So you know, I don't I don't mourn him in a way that this was a sad thing that happened. It was some township. It could have happened that anybody, you know, And it's just like I just I just I wrestled with the part about the age. I'm like Dad, we made it past it.

We talked so much about all the homies, about surviving, about doing it right, about not doing stupid shit, and then this happened. So you know, I got a lot of a lot of love. I don't know how you would feel about it, but a lot of people reached out just to you know, just to acknowledge what happened, and a lot of people that knew him, and a lot of people that knew me, and you know, shit, it was very impactful.

In the industry, Like it just yeah, a lot of people to your brother, because remember talking a few folks from the Bay and not you know, he had a lot of friends that were my friends. He had a lot of high regard people that he knew that I didn't even know.

So I'm just getting shipped from everywhere. He also lived in Atlanta with me, So we had a lot of friends out there. Uh, you know, then my whole life, a lot of people in LA family.

Right, so yeah, you know L R. P. Wayne Lowe for sure. All right, So this album is coming out next Friday, the first of four three three part serious three. Okay, that's well.

You know why I said that, because you told me you were doing the double album Little John, or you did two albums.

Well, the Little John will come out and there will be sorry, a bunch of reserve songs.

Yeah.

In my head, I'm putting the Little.

John extra songs in the same folder as the unreleased Mount Wes Moore song. Got it And I just listened to him, love him, keep them to myself, playing with people, riding in my car.

They like, put this ship out. I hear that so much. You don't put this ship out.

Listen, man, you were one of the greatest rappers of all time. I appreciate you sitting down and uh, I can't wait to hear the new ship because yeah.

We're stretching the the age limit. We're swimming, floating off into the uncharted waters of hip hop.

How far can this go? How far can you extend? How long can you extend it? Do you do you still keep in contact with Hove at all? Or is that somebody who like because he seems like such an unreachable Well, we never were telephone buddies. Okay, so you guys, you guys, just it was just a work relationship. Yeah, you get to the sixty second was a yeah, what's up, hey, I got something for you. I'm gonna say it your way. It's always a you know, a you know, a salute when you see him. A lot a lot of us

It's you know, we don't choose the prior into each other's personal lives, but when I see you, what's up, hommy?

Yeah?

Well look listening to the album on the eighteenth pre order it new single coming this week, still macking, still macking, man. I'm happy to hear aunt bass on.

I brought the Cadillac back to I re whipped the Cadillac.

I called the homies in Alabama, spokes and vogues, and they built me a white on white on white Cadillac.

First I had the black so like similar to the Born to Mac car. Yeah, same car, oh, same car, same car, not the exact same same model, same year or whatever.

Yeah, then I took that one, made it three times burgundy, and now we're all white.

I love triple white. There it is, man short, dog too short. I appreciate you, bro, for sure. There it is