QLS Classic: Jermaine Dupri

Questlove Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora.

This is Sugar Steven on this week's Quest Love Supreme.

Classic hip hop icon and R and B hit maker Jermaine.

Dupree tell us thirty years of industry tales from fresh best days to career reviving remixes. Originally released August twenty second, two thousand and eighteen.

Suprema Some Suprema roll call Supremo S Supremo. Ro called Suprema Sun Sun Supremo, roll call Suprema s Sun Supremo. Roll.

My name is Questlove.

Yeah, spitting hot tracks, Yeah, interviewing the man.

Yeah, the world's loudest high hand long time.

Primo Supremo, roll called Suprema something Supremo, roll called.

My name is Sugar.

Yeah.

Money ain't a thing, Yeah, because I don't have much.

Yeah, sucks for me. Supreme Supremo. You're going against Suprema something Supremo.

It shows up the hook, Yeah, like escape second LP. Yeah, Boss Bill is my name? Yeah, O quls with JD.

Supremo, So Supremo, Ro Supremo Supremo roll.

Yeah, what the legend a D. Yeah, I've been down with him, Yeah, because that was.

The roll Supremo Supremo roll call Suprema Son something Supremo roll.

Yeah, it's all about me.

Yeah, celebrating twenty five years in this crazy ass industry.

Yeah, h Suprema Subpremah Yeah sure, Son Sun Suppreva Subreeva Son Sun Supreme.

Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to another episode of Question on the Supreme.

All right, I gotta get this out once in the open. Why do you Why are your high hats so loud on your record? That is you do you be the only person that mentions, the.

Only person that ever asks why?

Right, and and I'm glad that you ask why because I feel like I don't get the credit for high hats being that loud on records. Now, and I'm glad that you're saying that because I did that deliberately. That's my thing to make you know, like when I first, I'm gonna tell you where I got it from, right, I got it from seven seven seven ninety three elevels.

You have to ask because your.

Okay, all right, right, wait are you? Are we about to break this art right now? I'll let the credit ahead.

Ahead, I mean the way that I hats sound on that record. That's the focus. When I was younger and I wanted I was playing drums, that's all. I used to try to play that beat, and my focus was that high hat. So then, you know, for some reason, when I started making beats on a drum machine, I just wanted my beats to sound like that. So once I started making one and people said something about the high head, I was like, oh, okay, this is my thing.

Time you've heard the.

Loud as his voice.

Yes, very loud, and that's how I wanted.

I wanted you to be a turn the record down as low as you can possibly turn it down and hear the vocals and.

The high hat though as well.

Now we have like techno, you know, technology that doesn't we don't have to spin on records anymore, you know, because we used tourvive and whatnot. But the thing is is that, uh usually shuffles and high hats leave an imprint on the wax.

Like if you look at Thriller.

The shuffle of Billy Jean leaves a sort of spiral design inside the actual groove of the wax.

So you're very technical.

All of your Wait a second, you're staring at the final of.

Come on, let me tell you something. This is something I noticed when I was like three years old.

It looks like, yeah, the grooves of all the other songs and thriller a look normal, but Billy Jean like, that's when I noticed, like, oh, high end, high end Fidelogy stuff. They leave an imprint on the wax, which leads to any time I've spun anything produced by you, especially money, ain't the thing. There's this whole what's what's the game we used to get as kids where you do like spy?

What was the spiral graph? It's not a game? But yeah, is that still a thing today? Or is that like did I just date myself? Sigh? Where you were?

I don't know what that is?

Come on, spiro graph, will you take us? They're like, okay, well, this is a classic quest of Supreme where I didn't even officially introduce our guests. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode. I had to get the high hair. I'm a drummer. I had to get the high hat question out of the way. All right, So another episode of Quest Love Supreme. Hello, Team Supreme. I assume that Fante is fixing his countertop or his pool or whatever. Yeah, exactly.

What an in?

I didn't use that intro my djama, I'm gonna use that's what ladies and gentlemen.

So how's it going? Man? It's going all right? So for our listeners, And I'm trying to pack every question I can.

Uh.

First of all, I was shocked you were born in Asherville, North Carolina.

Isn't that the hippie community?

I'm I'm not sure I was. I left there when I was two, Okay, because I'm not sure.

Usually for the roots, usually Asheville, North Carolina is like it's it's such a.

Hippie territory.

It's a mountain town.

So yes, like some of the things of like the boundaries, but times a billion, Like there's always jam bands performing there and you know we've done many a show there.

Because it sounds like jd ain't been back. You know, I was.

I was put in Atlanta when I.

Was two, Okay, So what what major family moved to Atlanta?

Because Atlanta's the big city to Ashville, and you know, North Carolina is like that's what they look to I guess back then it is the place to go to have like fun. Like it's almost like how people go from La to Vegas and you know what I mean, it's like that type of situation.

I think, I see, I think so.

Uh, as far as you got in the business early, But what described what life was like in Atlanta? Because usually I'll say that for me, my first my first education on Atlanta, especially being how old I was, or the the the unfortunate, uh, the Atlanta child murder situation with Wayne Williams.

Who looks.

Boss Bill looking at me like, don't say nothing out the line, but then he kind of looked like Walter Clyde. Orange mccommodore's oh my god, wow wow, now that you said he looked like Walter Clyde. Everyone's saying their head Walter, I love you your gruman. Anyway, that was my introduction to Atlanta. But what was your childhood like in Atlanta? Like did they always have culture?

And yeah, I think you know, you know, skating for kids was the culture of Atlanta. Like so when you see like at that movie was basically what child on my childhood was That was it for me to go to skate rink. You get away from your parents, you get to listen to music, you get to dance, you get to skate, you get to talk to girls. Everything happened at the skate rink. That was for young kids anyway coming up. Basically that was it for me. And

It was not really much.

It wasn't really much of a music scene in Atlanta, but it was a it was a scene for like dancers and the culture, like I'm saying, like skating and stuff like that. Musically, it wasn't really We had s O S Band and we had Brick and that was you know in Peebo Bryson and those were people was like, you know, he was like Rick Ross and Atlanta back then, like that was his that's Peobo's town. He had.

He had the penthouse downtown. You know, you used to drive by my days.

Like that's that's Ale's house and she'd be like, man, I'm gonna get me one of them shits one day like he's just.

You know like that. So okay, Yeah, So was your father always in the music industry or Yeah?

From from what I can remember, my dad was basically like a roadie that turned into like a road manager that turned into like a you know, a production manager more than anything. Because my dad played drums, so he was like more like a production guy for the drummers of Brick and you know, so Os band, and then he got into you know, morphed into more doing more production for you know, doing more production for all of

How old were you at that point when you were watching these bands?

Like nine.

That sounds about right? Yeah, like nine that sounds about right. Yeah.

Now, uh, we've discovered here on Quest Loves the pre met all the name brand super producers have some sort of DJ history before they went into production. So did you have any DJ history prior to your Yeah?

I mean.

Well, when I went on the Fresh Vest at twelve, Grandmaster D basically was showing me how to DJ. Like I didn't know what to scratch, like scratch. He showed me how to scratch. I used to just want to always scratch. I used to go BEHD the turntables while they was doing sound check and try to scratch and he's like, yo, you know, don't don't don't touch my touch my set. I'm gonna show you how to do it.

That's so weird because like coming up because run DMC uh, well, because Jay actually scratched or run DMC records. I always wonder why Larry Smith never let Grandmaster D physically scratch, not until like the third record, when the open Sesame record. Then I finally heard scratch and I was like, oh,

Okay, yeah, I mean he was, you know, all the tricks and they'll pick him up and he scratched, you know, he with his mouth on the cross fader and yeah, he was doing it.

He was going so.

Being as though the fresh Fest was the first major stadium tour for hip hop one, how did you get on the fresh Fest to what was that shit?

Like? Well, I got on the fresh Fest because the fresh Fest was created in Atlanta by a guy by the name of Ricky Walker. Ricky Walker now create has created Universe Soul Circus. Oh, the same guy. I created that and then he went and did the circus thing now, but he created the fresh Fest. And my father was the production manager on the fresh Fest. And they just needed to open act. You know, at that time, it used to be like they need an opening act to

And I ain't know what that was. My mother ain't know what it was. Nobody knew what it was. Won no money involved. It was just like, what was your routine?

I had a dance routine where I came out to its time and a couple of other records where I just was just on stage freestyle and just dancing. And I was little, so you know when you were a little kid dancing the crowd goes crazy. So it was like a it was kind of like the circus kind of like you know what I mean, you just you don't know what you're looking at. You it's watching and it looks like I'm doing more than what I probably was doing.

So how many acts work or well, I know it was fat boys who Denie and run DM Seed who like I'm sure there had to been.

GTFO was on the tour, Grandmaster Flash was on the tour. Everybody was hot at that Arrow.

Was on the tour.

How long would each act get Probably.

Like fifteen minutes. I mean they never had that many records, and and Run Run was really like, you know, this is my ship, so you gotta you know, oh, so ill better hurry out, you know. Run Reverend Run had a real you know, he had that real thing about him. And Curtis Blow was on the tour, so it was Curtis Blow, Run, DMC, the Fat Boys, who Denie, Grandmaster Flash, the Dynamic Breakers, and I think Old Zon and Turbo WHOA, yeah, yeah, See.

This is what I appreciate because I know as a youngster, as a person that was young then you were definitely in a fly on the wall situation.

Anyone else couldn't.

Like if I were whatever thirty plus years old at the first, they'd be like, hey, get the fuck out of it. But with you as a kid, I'm certain that you allowed in spaces that.

I wasn't supposed to be in. But at the same time they was trying to tell me to get the fuck out of there. But it was like I was just like, no, I you know, I'm here, I'm not paying attention to y'all doing this, and I'm not you know, I've seen everything.

Anyone from that era never has a recollection like DMC might you know. I'll ask him a few things and he, man, my memory is fivevey, I don't remember man like you know.

So I remember everything.

And I've been trying to do this movie about basically about my life kind of like that. And I've been having people tell me that it's hard to do a movie for a kid showing what I want y'all to see that I saw.

Go to Newtflix R rated and it's not.

And it's not like a series too, because that's a long life.

That's that's I mean, I don't know how far to get back, but I'm really more concerned about that because what he's saying is that people, this is I know the stuff. It's not even like history. It's like a kid seeing what you don't understand. The kids saw like I saw artists come to life, I saw artists doing drugs. I saw I just saw everything that at twelve, you don't really understand what you're seeing.

And at the time, since you're going you're touring and whatnot. Is your dad your only chaperone because he's.

Working, not really chaperon. I'm out there basically by myself. He's working, I'm running around all of these other guys on my chaperones.

That's why. That's why, like for.

Really, that's why Houdini actually became like my brothers, and you know, they became like the guys that was with me all the time. Not that my father wasn't paying attention, It was just that I saw that as a move for me to start getting away from him and just like hanging out more. And I wasn't like out late at night and nothing like that. None of them, none of the guys ever let me do anything like that.

This is this is how nerdy I am because it didn't even occur to me to ask about like, oh, the relationship you saw my nerd ass is trying to figure out, well, wait a minute, what's the back line situation?

So like what was sound check?

Like I know, monitors are ringing, like I'm trying to figure out, like how does from a reduction standpoint, how does the show run concurrently and smoothly without this DJ being like who broke my mixer?

And now they all had different sets, so it was like it was like.

Probably like five tables sitting in the back right, so every time somebody come off, there'll move that table and put that guy set up there, and nobody was nobody was using the same turntables.

That definitely wasn't happening on that tour.

See, that error was scaring me because I know that with dancers there's always skipping records.

And that's what made jam Master J to me one of the best live DJ ever because he knew, he knew how.

To you know, move in a land of where that would never happen.

He was like a drummer on He was like you on stage, like he could really just like do whatever he wanted with those turntables and make them, you know, play the way he wanted them to play.

So when they asked you, I'm sorry, I just want when they asked you to do the record years later, what was it down with the King Joint? Because that was the that was the only time y'all worked together again. The next Yeah, that must have been like a whole full circle moment, since you know, going from a kid and what you were saying, how you know, run with such a boss on tour or whatever.

I mean, it was all of us a full circle. I signed who didn't need so Like it was a complete full circle. Like I was a kid looking up to these guys and they was teaching me and telling me things, and then I felt so you know, connected to them that I wanted to sign them and give them what I felt like I was given to the rest of the world.

So when it was over, like the last day of the fresh Vest, I don't even remember that. Well, well, okay, were they all were? I know there were like two or three Fresh fest Did you do it every year? Just?

Yeah, eighty forty five and eighty six?

Okay, So when the fresh Fest is officially over, like, how do you return to normalcy? How do you go back to Atlanta or whatever wherever your home base was, assuming that you lived in Atlanta, Like, how do you explain this to your friends?

How do you explain what you saw?

Like, well, that's that's what actually really happened.

Is like when I was on I went on tour at twelve, right, and in Atlanta wasn't a city that was used to performing artists. We didn't we don't have a performing art school or nothing like that. When when I was twelve, so I was in a regular school and I had a tutor. But when I came back from tour and I took my grades back to the school, the school system told my tutor that they couldn't accept it, like they just like, we don't that's not We're not used to this. We're not going to accept all of

But was it weird for you?

Because you know, on tour, I don't know if you had anyone to relate to that was your age. And then you're not an environment in a school environment where you have stop hops or a prime or you know, just like regular.

You know, sock hops causton. That's worse than this. What sop? What's sop?

What is that?

That's the sophomore prime?

What's a sop?

Hop? Sp stop hops?

I think.

Were you going to leave me out here alone? I don't know because I heard you say sophomore shop shop hops are.

That's where John too, John, someone.

That went to school in the eighties like that.

It's a good reference.

Please explained it to me.

I thought you said so right? Where I get it? Jay?

You your I mean I was in two thousand, I was twelve in the eighties.

You're still twelve. Now, I get it what it was you're young? I get it right.

Are like the senior dance things? You're going to your junior prom, then you go on your senior prom.

But it happened in the fifties.

No, that's sock sock you're thinking of Greece. S o P. I have a cold. So someone all right, okay, I'm the oldest person in the room. Thank you, Steve. I don't know what it is, your firstbeeing, your Hulu hoops, your nerve fall. All. Right, here's here's my point.

My point is that you know not I mean, I don't know like what your relationships like with your cousins or your like your your family, but just to not to be isolated it from people your age, like, how was it? Was it a lonely isolated experience where it's just like hanging with these adults all the.

Time and not nah, because I looked at it like this was the only way I was going to get close to what I was in love with at the time, and these guys was dancing all day to turn you said, you want to know what soundcheck was like? Soundcheck was like because we had two stages. We had a middle stage and we had a big stage right the rappers was on the main stage, and then the stage in the middle was all the dancers. So in soundcheck, all the dancers would be out there dancing together at all

I first heard about you, like I before the internet, right on magazine was like every every black teen is like religion.

You know what that is?

J Yeah, yeah, okay, you better know.

I think that was his first article.

I was in there, shout out to Cynthia Horn and she put.

Me in there. Yeah. I was going to say, d do you remember being right?

Yeah?

So I think at the time was sometimes Leather your first project or how did you get into production?

Well, let me sell you.

Sometimes Leather were girlfriends of Hudini, right, Okay, So they was out on the tour doing with the girlfriends out on the tour do basically, and I was on the side of the stage when these girls came up and I was like, you know, checking them out. I'm young, so I'm checking the girls out and they was you know, they was a guy's performing. So then we just got to know each other because they was out there like I was out there and it was like, you know,

Time, because I don't even remember it sometimes like now, so they were older.

Yeah that's not cool, but you don't remember.

I remember.

It's not good. I wasn't born then, Yo, you were born when was on Yeah, that's when he was born. When it came, when Rap City.

Came home whatever, all right.

So so yeah, so you know they lived in Atlanta, and basically at this particular point time, I was so deep into hip hop and I was paying attention to everybody's movement. And Herbie Lovebug was moving. At this particular point time, he had Salt Pepper. I think he had just dropped Kid and Play and Kwame was you know, he had what I thought I was, you know, what I was looking at trying to figure out, yeah movement.

He was the drummer for Brick. I called him. He had a studio called twenty five sixteen in Atlanta. So I called him.

I'm like, yo, I want to make some records and he was like, okay, what you want to do and I'm and I'm and I'm bartering his services. Yeah, I'm bartering his services, like yo. And at this point, come fifteen, Okay, Yeah, that's the thing that's amazing me because there's for you soject either technically yeah, well nah, well yeah I did so so ultimately, like my first song, Shoddy wrote my

Who was who was? He came in second place to the Fat Boys in the Disco Fever dude.

Yeah, yeah, you remember crash Groove. Yeah, so he's real. Oh my god, Yeah, where is Chad Elliott? He's here, He's in New York.

Chad.

Chad actually is gonna induct me into the Songwriters Hall of Fame Thursday.

Yes, so wait he has a oh some give you. I'm gonna give you all this history.

So so you know Chad, Me and Chad because you said nobody I hung out with. So I met Chad later on in the Fresh Fest in like eighty five. So eighty eighty three, eighty four, eighty five, eighty forty five, and eighty six was the fresh Fest.

So in eighty five I met Chad.

We started. They put Charlie Stetler. You know Charles Stetler, you know child steps Man. Yeah, okay, Charles Stetler was the fat Boy, his manager, He managed Chad. He started managing Chad after the Disco Fever contest. He came to the tour and said, if the Fat Boys stay on this tour, y'all gotta put Chad Elliott on this tour because Jermaine's opening. So he made Chad the second opener

We weren't you know, we didn't really care about it. Yeah, well that didn't happen. It was just like kicking it.

And then it was like we should be a group. So this was like the first version of Chris Cross actually, if you think about it, one dark skinned, light skin kid. So fast forward to that, Me and Chad really start hanging out. So at the end of the tour, you want to know what happened at the At the end of the tour, I moved to Brooklyn with Chad Elliott,

Were you in Brooklyn eighty six, eighty seven, eighty eight.

Yeah, right when everything happened, Everything's got you know, jay Z's coming to life in Fort Green and Big Daddy Knees recording demos in Fresh Gordon's house in Fort Green projects, all of this stuff. I'm right down the street from this and knowing that this is happening, right, So I'm staying in in.

Brooklyn on No.

Stern, New York Street, Eastern Parkway just for anybody's listening to. Yeah, who's staying over there? And I don't actually know that?

Yeah, but yeah, that's right after there's a certain night club I whant they ask you about? But yeah, I was about to say, cueue that up? Do you have a Latin quarter story?

No, thank you Lord.

I couldn't get in there.

That was too young.

So so yeah, So Chad actually introduced me to break beats and the sound of New York at that particular time, and that's when my appetite for production and making records came to life.

So what happened was.

I would take break beats and I would play the breaks and I would start writing, and I knew.

That you had to, you know, catch the break and play another one.

So we was we you know, we had a box and we started pause taping and making these beats with break beats. So that's basically how I started. So when I got back to Atlanta, that's the part of the story. That's when I made the call and I'm like, yo, I want to.

Make some record culture to Atlanta.

Well, I don't think people heard it.

That's what made me become more of a producer because I told this guy sample these beats.

I told him, I want this beat to be the song.

What was your weapon of choice back then? Like? What machine did they?

I mean, I think they had.

He had a what was it, DM DMX That's what he had, right, So you couldn't really sample. So then I found these these white guys across on the other side of town. They had an emulator. Emulator could sample, so I'm like, shit, they could do it with this machine. They didn't want to do it either. They didn't understand what I was saying. It was like, you want us to take people's music and I'm like, yes, take moral culture.

I'm like, yo, take the beat.

I want to wrap over this beat. So then they try to recreate the breaks with drum sounds and I'm like, ew, like, this is not what I'm talking about, right, So the frustration of this made me become a producer. So then I just started like, I'm gonna figure this out.

See this is weird. So you're the first person of a note that I know that's not from New York.

That persisted until they found a satisfactory production technique that they knew in their heart they felt with hip hop because usually anyone else that I talked to from other territories, it's just like, okay, well I'll just do it on the drum machine, and you know, I hate it.

I hate it.

Like when I heard you, I was like, oh my god, this is is he real? Like this guy understands what I'm talking about. I'd be hating to hear drummers just play beats and it don't sound.

Like like that.

I wanted to sound like, like, tune the snail a little bit, make it do something right. So this was what I was going through.

So the frustration that I was going through and not hearing beats the way I wanted forced me to become a producer and start like hitting the drum machines and whatever whatever. So long story short, I got in there and I started getting Eddy to, you know, let me touch the drum machine and give him ideas about the

They got signed.

Okay, yeah, they was pretty girls.

And you know, I think that's what they was going for more than the music. They didn't really care about the music. They didn't really care about me. But I think they was into the girls and they thought they could sell them based on how they look.

So at what point are the training wheels taking off? And then you are like, okay, I can make these beats. Now supposed to sample this and sample that?

Well, Silktimes Love I think they sold fifteen thousand copies. So fifteen thousand copies to the writer of all the music is like, you know, fifteen thousand dollars maybe or something like. You know, So I took that money and I went and put my drum machine on Layoway and I got a five h five drum machine. I put on Layoway right because I didn't really have all my money, but I had enough to put the drum machine on Laiway. When I got the back end of my money, I

So I just stayed up night after night after night. I stayed. I ain't read nothing.

I just read.

I don't read nothing.

I just started messing with it because I because I already dreamed that. They told me at the store that it would do what I wanted. So if I'm thinking, if you tell me it's gonna do what I want, then I'm gonna start trying to do what I want. I seen the sample button. I'm trying to do what I want. And I learned immediately that it didn't do what I want. But you know that's the learning car thing.

Yeah, I caught on.

So with that, I just started making songs because the EPs was easier, And I started making songs and just doing my own little demos. And I met Left Eye and then she started living with me, and she was.

So she moved from Philly to Atlanta.

Yeah, okay, So she moved from Philly to Atlanta, and she hooked up with this guy named Ian Burke who brought her to my house. Now I didn't have nothing at this and I just had equipment that I had just bought, and I was working, and he was like, you should go over to Jad's house and y'all work. So she came up to my house. We started working

So that's a real story, Okay.

All this time I thought, I was like, Oh, that's marking a story like church.

One real story. I went to the mall.

I'm in the mall shopping and I'm looking in the corner and it's these kids that people are actually paying attention to. And I'm like, why are y'all paying so much attention to these kids? And I'm thinking, like, okay, maybe it's like one of these Nickelodeon groups. I don't know, something like that. So I walk over to him. I'm like, yo, what's up? They like, what's up? I'm saying, like, what do y'all do? They're like, we don't do nothing. We just kick it, Like y'all just kick it. I'm like,

I was just trying to be a producer.

These guys was in the mall flexing, talking to girls, spending money, all kinds of things and getting sneakers. So I was like, damn, where y'all get all this from? All y'all a group. They're like, Nah, we don't rap, we don't do none of that. We just come to the mall.

We cool.

Everybody like us because we cool, and I'm like, okay. Immediately I just stopped and my mom was like, s if I write them a song.

This shit is gonna go.

Did they know who Jermaine Dupre was?

No?

They thought I was like a pervert or something. I swear they thought they was like, why do you want my number? Because I asked them for their number. And then luckily one of the the mothers, one of their mothers, walked up and she read Jet magazine. So in the Jet magazine that had just come out, there was like a little issue about article about female rappers and it had Salt and Pepper and the girls grew girl groups that are coming behind them, and Silktimes Love It happened

It was or in Atlanta about the.

Missing, missing and murdered kids, and they was from that neighborhood, so you know, it was a stranger danger, you know of a situation. So I'm telling them like, y'all want you to come over to my house and kick it, and they were still like come over to your house and kick it?

What is what are we doing?

Like?

Cause they weren't into music, so they didn't even understand what I was trying to get them to do. So you know, that passed and I would like go get them from school and just try to hang out with them, and I become their friend more than just talk about music. So I did that and then I started noticing that they was in the back seat rapping to music that I was playing and they was rapping all the lyrics and really doing that shit in the car like that.

Wow, I heard pays some mother fuck.

They was going crazy in my car.

Let's word for me, Tomath.

The kids actually gravitating towards it that I actually like because usually, like the generation with the Divide, kids are always liking the ship that I don't like.

You know what I'm saying.

I was about the same age as as Chris Carson came out hold On and like America's Most Wanted, like ice Cube was my shit around and avoidable.

Yeah, that's that's what they was like ice Cube fanatics, but it's all they wanted to hear was ice Cube. So we play a whole ice Cube tape from their house to my house, and they was rapping all the lyrics. So I was thinking, like, okay, so if they like this like this and they rapping every word and they doing all the inflections, they sound just like he sound when he moves his voice. I said, if I figure I how to do that and write a song for them that they like, they possibly could do the same

Girl listen, listen never she's the girl.

So it was like my idea, like the girl is mine, he's Paul McCartney, he's Michael Jackson, and she's the girl.

This was my whole little scheme.

Okay, even though you won't let the public ever hear this. Do you know where that tape is?

I mean, it's a tape. Yeah, I know, it's a tape.

Okay, So you know that was the beginning. I'm starting to make these songs. And then I realized that they weren't Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson. They were little ice cubes like they want. They were from the south west side of Atlanta, which people call the Watots, that's where they're from. And they would come home from school and tell me stories about how Jamay, you don't even know. It's little kids in my school. It's eleven years old.

Y'all are little boys in the hood.

It's boys in the hood with y'all are little boys in the hood, and y'all see the crazy shit that everybody else sees, but don't nobody actually believe it. So that was my goal to write a song called Little Boys in the Hood. I wrote this song, and I sent the song to Jodah Butcher and Pilly. And when I sent the song to Jodah Butcher, he hit me right back like I love it, let's sign them. And I was like, what, oh shit, we got a deal.

Classics always written.

I wrote this song. I wrote this song in thirty minutes.

Yo, everything song?

Where did it start from?

What?

Jump start?

Like?

What was the first thought in your mind?

Kids?

Something something something kitty, something kitty. So I went after Michael Jackson like he was a kid. This was they was they was kids. So he was a kid artist, sample something Michael Jackson. So I started playing with the turntables and I heard this ABC and I was like, I shouldn't let it play all the way out of shitch it and just catch something. And I don't know what made me do that, and I just caught the first part boom boom boom, and I left it and

Rest of it play. I'm gonna just keep doing like that.

Wait mother trying to wait to do not say do not say it like we all know that's I want you back, And.

I mean I said the wrong song. My bad.

I got to say, come on, dog, you know that I do now.

I want you, I said a b C. I said ABC because I was she still.

Didn't know that I want you.

Here's the ship that's killing me. The ship that's killing me was the whole genius of that song is the fact that you managed to find a way to make funky worm oh sh match perfectly in key. I mean, look, I love the bomb Squad to death, but we know the calling card was just throw it on the wall and see what works. They were not atonal and you

Funky worm part. I played with it for a minute to get it to sound like that, or you bend it down to yeah, yeah, yeah, I was.

That was that was like, oh, let's go, because you know, like I said, you got to think about it. I just explained to you exactly who Chris Crust was. Chris Cruss was two kids from the Hood that I was in love with, the West Coast Rappers basically ice Cube at that point in time, right, So the Funky Worm was me grabbing what I thought was the West Coast for them so that they would like it. The sample was me trying to find something that was like Kitty

Can I just asked, this might be a crazy question, But now that the bail is up and Chris I know now that Chris Cross didn't write their lyrics leave me alone? Is that that was a surprise me A little bit just not a little bit of a surprise. I thought more of a collaboration. But does that mean the same thing for another bad creation in that way? Like I used to to assume that, like Michael Bimins did the same thing.

You were. I get it.

I get it.

The first like child rappers or bow Wow, the first kid rapper to really start writing.

Then you know.

JD wrote everything.

No, he didn't know bow Wow wrote some stuff? Right, come on?

Can I get to the science of him as a producer? I'm sorry, question, but listen, wait, act, but I'm just saying that in terms of of of who taught you, because this is the thing. You're the first producer that I've spoken to since the show that it is putting marketing savvy also in his production thoughts, because even me as a producer, I'm certain that there's some you know, like the equivalent of when you lose your glasses and

We need? A new earthworod and fire. Why don't you guys?

You know, I'm I've never heard a producer talk like a manager. So what I really want to know is where did you get your manager marketing savvy from?

Because that from the doors being closed? Right.

So, when I was here in New York and I had Silk Times Leather, I knew Red Alert and Chuck Chill Out from being on the Fresh Fest and I knew them as a kid. And then when I started making records, I'm thinking like, oh, I'm gonna just run up on here and they gonna play my records.

It's cool. I know these guys.

So I went up to you know, to radio shows, and Red was like, this shit is wack, like this ain't this, ain't no, this ain't a ork Jed.

And I'm like, and they told you at the time, you're like fifteen.

They told me.

And they also was like, Atlanta's not you know, it's a country y'all niggas country and blah blah blah blah. So I started building this mindset that it was gonna be hard for me to make music anyway or to put my music out because people weren't gonna listen to it. That's what I just started thinking. So I started thinking about everything that I could possibly do to get people to pay attention to my artists besides the music as

Right.

So then it was like, we need something else. We got the song I got jumped, We need something else. When I did a jump. When we did jump, they closed, weren't even on back was when we did jump, they didn't have braids. Let me say this, they didn't have braids on the first on the jump cover. They don't have braids. If you look up, they got fla they got flat tops, right, they didn't have braids. So then it was like, we gotta take this another level. We

Let's go to the mall.

He put his jump on backwards and we went to Linux Square and it looked like he had a sign on his chest that said come towards me. People was walking up to this kid, and I was like and I just sat back, like, oh, this is it. It's over It's over with.

This is over with.

Because once these people hear this song and they see that they dressed like this were gone And I don't know what was the attraction with the backward James.

It just happened like that.

You don't know what made you go turn it around or do something I do.

No, I mean, he's the only person I knew that spoke of a marketing angle and shit that I never even once bothered to think about.

Yeah, we was trying to do things.

We was in the house making tied our shirts and tied our jeans and just trying to you know, because you ain't got shit, you try.

To make something right. So that's what it was.

We didn't have nothing, so it was like, what can you do to make that sweatshirt look better than what it does?

Right now? Cut the sleeves off. You know, we just try anything right.

So it's just to try to get attention and put the word quest love over it.

And that.

This jumper was already one hundred sizes too big. It was like a Jibo jumper where you could get in there with him, right, So it's just like just flip it around, just flipping around. So he flipped it around and it you know, people were like bugging out, like where did you buy this at?

And I'm like, it's the same shit you got on.

But were they fearless enough to be like any crazy shit, I'll do it, because I would have.

Been like.

They they started doing talent shows.

I started taking them to do talent shows and performing songs before we had jumped. So they started getting the bug to be artists. And they started seeing how more people liked him than what was liking them in the mall. So once you get that going, then you start trying to make sure that people recognize you.

So how did you feel about when another bad creation was starting to garner steam and you know, in your head you're like, Okay, this is good for us, like we have someone to compare them to, And no.

Nah, I wasn't really paying too much attention to that. It's time because another bad creation is from College Park. We all from College Park, right, say all of my like me and Dallas Austin is like this, that's my dude, Like so we all they was all at my house, Like when.

He making ABC, I was at the studio with him. He was doing this, like we all cool.

They feel a certain way with inside out that.

I mean, you know, at one point it was like listen, JD got a little boy group. We got a little boy group. It's a competitiveness going on. So I started feeling that this competitiveness of people talking. So I was like, you know what, y'all gonna be real rappers. And if you're gonna be a real rapper, we're gonna We're gonna make sure that people know that they want to be an R and B group and y'all over real rappers.

So at this point, how are you splitting up your brain because you said that you and Left Eye or y'all are friends. She just got to the condom in the eye and where is the where's the TLC bus?

No, no listen.

So at the same time that I'm making Chriss cross, Ian introduces Left Eye to t Bos. So then they become a group in my house called second Nature and they become my group. And the way t Bos sings is did Jermaine do pre style of singing? Like the way she sounds? The way reason why she sounds that's me because you can hear me, that's me doing that. Now, that's how she sounds because I demoed the songs and I told her she should sing like me and for the rest of her life. I mean, it became the

But why didn't you.

Sign them?

Because the boys got signed first, right, So I was more connected to Chriss Cross and more into their project, right, and then left. I called me one day and she was like, Yo, we just had this meeting with Pebbles. If y'all watch the VH one movie, she makes this phone call and she calls somebody, but they don't say it's me. She's calling me, and she's calling me to see if I'm cool with them having the meeting, right, And I said, yeah.

Go ahead having me. I'm cool.

At that point, I wasn't thinking about having all of the artists under my unbrother. I was thinking about them getting signed so I could get some more money to make records. So I was like, shit, if they gonna sign, you just make sure I produce it when I get some money. So I encouraged them to get signed to the face and you know that was my group walking out the door.

But they all started at my house.

With UH. I believe.

I believe my internship at UH at Roughhouse was the first day that you guys went to Europe to open up for Michael Jackson. Because I know, I know that Chris Cross opened up for Michael Jackson on the Dangerous Tour. Then yes, so what was were you a part of their setup it?

What was that ship like?

And how could like where the audience is as familiar with you guys there as it was in the States.

Totally jump was crazy, Oh it did. Being on tour Michael Jackson was just like nothing that you could ever imagine, you know what I mean. It's like the way this guy came into his show. Just just the whole setup of the whole ship, like save f instance, this was like the cafeteria area when you're eating right, and you know how cafeterias are when you're in tour, it's the open or it's a place that you go into. Well, on his tour, it was always an open space. They

It was like like they would like, he's coming.

So you're sitting there knowing that he's going, and he's walking by, but you could see him on the way in because he had a police following him.

He would do this was real ship.

He would come in and then he'll cross and then he would and he would you know, he had He would tell the managers, you know, tell Chris, I'm in the you know, I'm in my dressing room, come hog, let me whatever before they whatever. So he never let me go because it was just like, you know, not too many people go in the dress room. So christ Nam there go back there kicking with them, and they'll come back and they be like, yo, he fucking with us, Like he really be like he know who we are?

Da da da da dah.

Because that's why I was always trying to figure out if Sony made the move, because everybody was on Sony to put crisscross on there, and he was really more like really focused on Crisscross being on his tour, and he liked the fact that they.

Was young and they had that energy to give before his show came on.

Was it was it easy to teach them, like, uh, things that you don't learn. Uh you know, I mean they're they're in stadiums, in soccer stadiums. I know he's playing like eighty five thousand people, Like, how do you teach them how to project to eighty five thousand.

People's That's what I tell people all the time.

You know, I got this TV show, The Rap Game, Well, I teach these kids and I try to tell these kids all the time, like everybody think they can rap, and everybody think they got the swag, but they ain't really got that shit like what I've seen Crisscross, Like I said, when I met them, they had a whack that I had never seen in eleven and.

Twelve year olds.

So they was instantly easy to grab on to what they were supposed to do to continue to have that swag that they thought they had before. So when their record blew up, they was doing shows every day. Chris Cross was like the first rap group to do K and O Summer Jam. Then catch a helicopter to do Power one oh six in the same day, and then get on a plane and come back to New York and do something the next day.

Like that's how they was. They were performing because of that song.

So they got the practice in and they got enough practicing to know that when we get out here, we're gonna go into a stadiums.

They their mentality was we gonna kill this, and they just was into it.

Was it overwhelming for them, Like it's to start at that level, Like how do you how do you come down from that level when you're you know, one of them. I'm certain that you didn't have any idea that this I just want to sound like seven eight million units.

Yeah, you don't know what to do. You're just going with the flow, you know.

It's like I said, it's like a it was a thing that wasn't even supposed to happen, and I've learned that these kids could rap and they did it and it just turned into that and you just like sitting back watching like this is crazy.

And it wasn't hard to keep them focused at all on nah.

I mean, because like I said, once again, once they realized that they was rappers, and people was looking at them like this. They were so into it.

I wouldn't. I didn't have any problem they was so their appetite was worse than mine.

So it was through them that you got to develop your label.

Yeah, so Chris crossed SOA eight million, and then Sony wanted to do more business with me, right, and they wanted me to have my own label, and they wanted to see what I could bring. They didn't know they I was nineteen years old, by the way. They didn't know what I could do.

So what did you see an Escape that told you, Okay, you guys are next. I see how I can well.

Escape came to my house. The same guy I who brought Left out of my house. He brought Escape to my house to sing for my birthday. And there was this girl group from College Park that was out there doing things and they came and they sung Happy Birthday to me, and I was just like, y'all sound different than regular happy birthday than I'm usually here. I'm just I'm liking this happy birthday, right, So I'm like, when

This that and the third. And I had all of this other.

Musical talent inside my body that I hadn't let out on the Crisscrush record. And I signed Escape and I started writing their songs. And the first song I wrote for them was just kicking It and I, you know, and and I made Candy sing just like I made Tea Boss sing that's why She's low in that song, and you know, it was the same. I had already been setting myself up for this type of stuff, so I just was sending whoever came in through the same process that I had already started earlier.

Now, I mean around ninety three, ninety four, ninety five. I mean we're getting into what I feel like the true the business element of hip hop, where now bad boys developing, bad boys developing, Death Row's developing. But then there's also like kind of we're entering the danger zone, like it's not well. I mean, you've been around since you was twelve, so I'm sure you saw some dark shit that.

You know, yeah, twelve years shouldn't be seeing.

But I mean I've seen people get stabbed after midnight in Philly.

Jesus Christ the spaghetti Factory.

I wasn't born yet.

It was on Spring Garden Spring Gardens who anyway, but it's.

At least at that time in ninety four, I considered, okay, now the business mecca to be New York, which is Puffy La, which is sug and Atlanta which is you and Okay, I'll throw in uh Houston, which, of course because I fear for my life.

Jay. Friends.

So now that you're you're empire, how do you deal with the not the muscle aspect, but now you're playing with the big dogs, and you see what's going on rivalry wise and all that stuff. You've kind of been Switzerland with all this stuff. As far as Neutral been cool with New York Cats, he's.

Been cool with LA.

How hard was it to maneuver, you know, through what was developing and hip hop at the time in ninety three ninety four.

Well, it wasn't for me because I felt like, you know, I started out on the fresh face. So I started out with everybody being my friend. So that was my mentality. So like when Puff started doing parties here in New York, I heard about him. I come to New York and come to Puff parties and see what it was. I wanted to be around all my competition to see what they was doing. So I came to New York. I became Puff's friend. We called it hang it Out. I go to his party's party kick and see how he's

And then.

Once I would come back to Atlanta and throw my parties, I would say, like, Yo, I met these guys. I need to call them down to Atlanta and come, you know, come party with what I'm doing, right, And they and they I think my non interest in what they was doing was interesting to them. Like I wasn't interested in what whatever they was, Whatever they was doing, that was cool. I was still trying to do what I was doing,

I didn't have no pattern that everybody was going on. I was going through. Like when I did Escape, nobody else was making R and B. You know R and B groups.

Everybody wanted the rat right, So then when I would did the Brat, nobody wouldn't fucking with female rappers. They was all trying to do guys, and it was like so I just kept seeing this like, oh, I'm a maneuver like this, I'm gonna do something differ, I'm gonna do something different. So long story short, I just I

I remember, this is this is when it hit fans.

Wait a minute, that was your birthday in the movie, but they never said it was.

It was my birthday party when the ship hit the fan.

I didn't even know.

Yeah, and I didn't I didn't realize that that was what was happening. But they both were brought to Atlanta by me, and they came to Atlanta and you know, they were eyeing each other throughout the party and it was like a thing. But I'm thinking, you know, that's how hip hop is. And then it got to it after my after my party, went to an after party, and you know, words was said and somebody got killed.

Y'all. I didn't even know. Okay, that's course. Now I'm like trying to figure out where, like where does the B side fit into this okay, so so so there's so many stories.

But all right, So, when like I said, me and Puff was cool throughout this whole period of making music, and at this time, Functified came out, and it was three hot records that came out. One was super Hot, which was Flavoring in Your Ear, the second one was Functified with Me and the Brat, and then the third was Juicy Fall of Hip Hop. People that it wasn't a successful record like Functified and Plaving Year, so Big

How you get honey popping?

Like that?

Like why people don't like my record? Like he used to asked me all kind of crazy questions, like because he was under the impression that nobody like she was nobody, like because we was in the South, but what this is not New York, this is the South. We was in Florida, we was doing in Atlanta. Juicy wasn't nothing serious, nothing but the numbers.

So that was all New York. That's all Northeast, all Northeast.

That's crazy because even culturally, I would think that when the smoke clears mm hmm, Juicy sort of inched everybody freestyle over yeah, out of your ear.

But I feel like Juicy is more iconic.

It is, but it was like it took forever.

You had to die too.

No, No, it wasn't that. It was it just had to be worked. It was just, you know, it was the beginning of working your rap records.

Hard sell.

It was a hard sell work. The Juicy record was a hard sell for for for the other areas, like the South, you know what I mean. It's almost like yeah, so you know, Biggie was like, yo, you know, make me a record, do something for me, man, let me do something, do something. So he asked me so many times that once they released Big Papa, he wanted me to do the Big Papa. So he told Puff JD's doing the remix of Big Papa. Because he didn't believe in the success of Big Paper. He didn't think it

In Indiana where I grew up. That's the version. That's the version we heard on the radio all the time. Damn, goddamn. All right.

So when Biggie, when Biggie came to do well what So Biggie said, Yo, I want to do a real remix. I want you to redo the beat. I don't want to rap over this, I want you to take Let's do a real remix. So he wanted to actually make a new song. In his mind, he was like, Yo, I'm gonna go to Atlanta. I'm gonna make a new record and it's gonna relaunch my career. So he came to Atlanta. I said, we're gonna re vocal Big I mean Big Papa. I'm gonna give you a beat and

I wouldn't.

I wasn't trying to just make a beat. I was like, we're gonna sample something. You know, we're gonna figure it out. And I put up the outstanding beat the loop, and I was like, rap over this, and you know this guy's look incredible. He made that beat sound like it had a bass line on it before I even put the bassline on there. So then I was just like, he was like, brat, you're gonna come in after me. So he started making the song and I'm trying to make the beat at the same time while he's rapping,

Went fuck? That just rap and it was like that's how the song came about.

So man, all right, so I okay, I'm skipping a little bit because I know we got limited time. But even though I mean, you're you're associated with many artists, I always feel like your crowning achievement as a producer was working with Usher.

Yeah, And.

First of all, how does that happen? Because you you spearheading, like how do you take the little kid who did just call me a mac? And how did you how did you take him and fully develop him into the artist as far as like choosing his songs and like what was it that?

It's basically the same situation that I had already been through, right I started Usher, Usher came to me when Chris Crust was popping and he asked me to sign him. I told him no because I was tired of dealing with parents at this particular point point Whence Chris Cruss was getting big and they parents was like arguing and fighting. It was all a parents and I'm like, I'm not dealing with this shit no more. I don't want no

Right?

So they brought me think of You and they said, Jamae, please do a remix to think of You. So I did a remix to think of You. And in the midst of that, I felt like the song needed a bridge cause I was just trying to figure out some way to make my remix feel different than the record. So I added a bridge to the song and I told Usher he had to come in and sing the bridge over. So when he came in, he sung the bridge that I had written for him and he sung it just like I had him, like I did it.

Well, what's the process of you getting these songs album? Because I mean, these aren't like average songs, these are like staples you make me wonder and all that stuff like.

How did you.

What's your process of getting to know the artists and what type of songs the right song?

And hoot it?

I mean, well, I went through a bunch of record I've started making songs that I thought were like I don't even know what you could call the first songs, but I know that he said, y'all, I don't want to be like that. I want to be like Bobby Brown. I want Bobby Brown to fear me. So then I started looking at my prerogative.

Check.

So I started looking at my prerogative and I'm like, okay, well, I'm thinking like, I can't.

Make no harder record than my prerogative.

This shit is crazy, and Teddy Rowley's my idol, so I'm not. I'm like, he, I can't make a better record than my prerogative. So I was just trying to make records that I felt like would go to bat with these songs at least, right. So I made Nice and Slow and I played it for La and he didn't like that song, and I'm like, how do you don't like this song? And I'm like, nobody's doing this, nobody's doing you hear how Usher's singing seven on the top top dudes in the streets.

I'm saying, who you know talking like this?

As an R and B artist, they wonn't getting none of that shit, so that song was like put to the side. So then Usher was like, man, this I need something like prerogative. This is my I want this ship my way and I was like, oh, my way, okay, let's do that. Let's do it your way, and we started making my way and then we got to my way. My way was probably gonna be the first single. I didn't have You Make Me Want him, and my Way's probably gonna be the first single. And I wrote him a rap.

He was rapping it. It just felt like it was like the new sounds for Usher, but I still wasn't convinced.

I wasn't sold yet. I was like, uh, d ain't like nice and slow and I was on the nice and slow shit. I was trying to get that off like the singing rap type singing right, and they weren't really soul on it. So LA was like, we're gonna put out My Way as the first single. And when he told me that, I left the office and I went home and I started making you make Me Want him? And I was like, I just felt like he didn't

That's it.

So I went back to the studio and I finished you know you make me want to and I got Usher on the song and he sung the song like he loved it, and the rest is history.

How often do you have to browbeat your artist when it comes to vocals?

Bribe?

No, browbeat. I'm sorry.

I've made it known on the show that the one process of production I hate the most is vocal takes. I hate that shit. So usually I have someone else because I don't have a good chemistry. Yeah, I don't have the patience.

So how do you.

Especially at the time, I mean, I mean, pro tools was the thing here and there, but you weren't mid nineties, early mid nineties.

You work, yeah, literally working this well.

See, my thing is this.

You know, if you can really sing and you understand music and you listen to my demo, then automatically it's gonna sound better than what I'm listening to anyway, or what I'm thinking anyway.

Right, So that's how I make my records.

I'm like, listen to me first, and do exactly what I'm doing, but do it the way you would do it in your real singing voice. So most of the time when they do that, that shit starts starting to sound way better than what I'm thinking.

So for every for every hit that you have that I wrote.

So I mean, I did this last like two weeks ago, three weeks ago at the ASCAP convention in LA and it was like going start play go under the Hood of Confessions, and I gave them basically a snap look at how I wrote that song and how the song came about and let them, you know, listen to me actually sing a song like that.

That's interesting. I would know. I would love to hear that.

No, not just because it's interesting, Like I was the type of kid that took all my toys apart because I wanted to see how they worked. So like to be able to hear a demo, your demo of a song like nice and Slow or something like that, but just is fascinating to me. It's bad, but you know, but it's still but if I heard it, I could still hear how from that to the version that we do.

And that's why when you introduce when you sound get the credit. I feel like people don't really understand that those Usher records is why Trey songs sound the way he sounded and the way Chris Brown started singing the way he sings.

This is these records created that sund Yeah, it was.

Definitely the template for it. I know that. Also, Mariah came to you at a crucial point in her career. Not a crucial point.

I did always be my baby, That's what I'm talking about. That wasn't crucial.

She was the thing was you gotta understand though, always be my baby in Fantasy Remix. That was a very radical term for her, at least from the tutelage that she was under with Tommy Mintolan with making sure that I mean okay, like dude, dream Lover had the break

They're letting her work with us. Yeah, and that's what it.

So first of all, in working with her, was it a thing of like you getting extrustions like don't go to hardcore, don't you know we already have one moot tak, so only just try to give her no.

We had this conversation last night. I'm I'm the musical person when it comes to Mariah Carey, she's the rapper. It completely a flip when we go in the studio. We had the same conversation last night.

Oh, so you're the conservative one and she's the one that's.

Yeah, because I'm like, I'm trying to protect who she is at all times because I feel like I feel like, you know, she has an image that you can you know, if you can keep it in this space, just don't. You ain't got to go overboard. You could just keep it in this space and put like you just said, she had a loop, but it wouldn't get people killed. It was still what we liked, but it was not crazy. And I'm always like, let's make records like that, like

And when she was.

And I said, so, how were you like back a little bit?

And I'm like what And I and Tomy Mattle was standing there when she did this, and I'm thinking, like you said, I'm like, I'm not fucking with this cream ship.

That's not going to happen. I'm not doing this. Was it the fear of you didn't want to be the guy that the career? Yeah, I.

Knew because that would have been a great idea.

At the time when she asked me to do.

It would have made amazing, but you didn't want to be a guy holding the.

And I and like, like I said, I'm I have a super super musical side of me. Right when I start doing R and B records, I turned into a very musical person that wants to hear a lot of different chords and different things and the way the song is supposed to go.

So and I had just did you know usher? So it was it was R and B time for me, right, So I was like, I need.

Something that fits into what I just did with so I'm having success here, Let's do something that has this field. So then Manuel started playing the boom and I'm like, see if we put some eight o weight on that ship, it's oh we that's all. I believe in eight o weight on anything.

And that's it.

It's about this period. Okay, Now I'm using a fantine term. What's the division of labor as far as uh, who is in your team, your production team? As far as Okay, it's nineteen ninety seven and I'm riah carry I want to get it. Make sure that you know I'm rya carry Okay, I work with my car. I'm like, yo, produce a record? What is team dupre like, what's going on?

Songwriting? So what's the songwriting session? Like?

He's like, do you have something or is it like you work?

Yeah, he's you just work right off the you know, right off the cop he's he's an extra keyboard player, guitar player, you know, he plays instruments. And I play what I play, and then I make the beats and I have the ideas basically, and I write, I write the lyrics. Basically it will have it, you know if with Usher, that's how it was. It was me and him and we basically did the song that whole album like that, and we went Tim Mariah was me and Emay when we made always be my baby.

The engineer or or mix your own records as well.

Nah, yeah, I mean I do it, you know, I do my rough before it goes. But I don't yeah, don't touch that.

Amir mentioned nineteen ninety seven, and I always I feel like with Atlanta something happened between like ninety six and I don't know ninety nine where of course, starting with you, the music industry just built faster than any other industry in most major cities.

Can you kind of or Jack the Rapper, Well, all.

I mean you got to consider all those things, like conferences were coming.

You did have Freaknick, but like it just was a crazy like five years in Atlanta, and I don't know if everybody understands and how it broke down and whatnot.

I mean, well, like you said, it was Freaknick. It was things weren't happening in other major cities that that people were like looking like in post Olympics.

So what point?

What point was Atlanta seeing as you know, because I know that Northeast Northeastern people are very cocky and whatever, like you country five, Suddenly Atlanta's the ship.

Like when do you feel that Atlanta like.

Arrived, Like when when I was when I was having parties and everybody started coming. When when when if JERMAINI pre have a party, everybody was going to Atlanta for the party. Freak Nick was the start of this, But then I started, you know, I did this. How can I live weekend where.

Your version of the n W a pool party? No?

No, no, no, no, no, matter of fact, it wasn't.

It was My thing was called can I live right, because I had just did I had just did the Money Anything record. And what what was interesting, what I was getting back was that people felt like in the South, I introduced them to jay Z right because people in the South weren't listening to Reasonable Hell, you know, that wasn't their album. They weren't into that, none of those

Yeah, people come to you to besides.

Yeah, So that's what happened, so people, I think people started paying attention to this, like this momentum. You know, Mace came to Atlanta for my birthday party to get signed. Nelly came to Atlanta to try to get me to sign him. At my birthday party, I had this crazy birthday party at the High Museum on P Street, and I had all of.

Those guys there.

I had new Audition there, I had Maya, Elton John, everybody was you know, whoever was somebody was trying to be at Jamaine the pre party and people were like, I remember like yesterday that even the paper. It said, what does Jamaine Dupree have just making everybody wanted like Elton John, what do you have a reason to be around BBD and Maya and Jermaine Deprie.

What's the purpose? What's what's internection?

I'm trying to imagine that conversation.

Now, Well, you know Elton John like for real, like he loves black.

Music, but still it's just an odd parent.

Yeah. Well, I mean he wanted me to know he was cool and he came to party. But I think that's what it was, what you're talking about. It was just like people saw that happening, and it was it was just like like I said, I wasn't paying attention to everybody else. Whatever people was doing in New York, that's what they was doing in New York. I. I was determined to make Atlanta stand out just like New York in LA Like.

See, then there was a point when Atlanta started taking in this and pushing his chest out with pride to the point where like it wasn't so much the Northeast record would get played first. Now Atlanta is supporting each other on the radio, and it's records that you would

When she was seeing Yeah, I mean it was you know, it was a it was a it.

It was a tug of war type of mentality because people weren't really receptive of things that was coming from Atlanta like that, almost to the point where Jermaine Duprex was getting the success. So a lot of people in Atlanta was mad at me because I was getting success that a lot of them weren't getting at the same time. So it was like they didn't understand why my records

I wasn't. I didn't grow up in Atlanta. I grew up on tour.

So can you explain can you explain the science of what would be now known as trap culture because initially I thought that you guys were more of a refined what was supposed to be Miami's identification of bass music. I always felt that you guys were a more refined bass music, Like you guys did better work with those type of planet rock beats and stuff, you know, and then trap culture.

Develops. How how do you feel, like, are you in your heart the old.

I know, you're technically not supposed to agree with this, like are you the old schooler that's sort of looking like okay whatever, or like are you still about like if kids are about it, then that's the future and I support it and that sort of well, I.

Mean, it's it's hard to it's hard for me to even have talk about this because if you listen to Jermain du Pre records that are like some non social death artist records, the records are trap. Like if you listen to Grills by Nelly. Okay, this was before people start saying trap records, this is, but but it's by Nelly and it became a number one that top one hundred records and it's not connected to the trap.

It don't come off like that's.

What that is.

But the sound of the record. The sound of the record is one.

Boom.

It's all the same elements.

You know.

The eight eight is overbearing, the small little kick, the Franchise Boys, Bone Crusher, young Bloods, all of this shit is what you're basically listening to now. So to me, i'm i'm I think people disconnect me from being with that sound. But that's that's been the sound like you make me wanted to me, sounds like a trap record.

Guitars on it, right.

Music.

Yeah, So I just I don't look.

At it as I look at it as like people were listening to that sound and they just decided what to do. I also feel like trap music ultimately, I don't like that title because I think people use that title to let us in as opposed to just saying it's the Atlanta sound. I wish people would stop calling it trap and say Atlanta music like they say everybody else. That's that La sound, that's that New York sound, That's that Atlanta sound. Stop saying trap because trap makes it.

So what do you feel now? Is the future like are you done with Atlanta or is it just starting? Like for you? Is there more to reveal to the world as far as what your next move is going to be? I don't know.

As executive or nah, I mean I you know, you have to continue to keep finding ways to open the doors for Atlanta. So I got the TV show, and you know, with the TV show, I bring five kids to Atlanta and expose them to what kids in Atlanta are exposed to. Kids in Atlanta have it better than mostly every other city kids out here period.

Like in Brooklyn.

I don't think they have talent shows for kids with kids can do do things. I don't think they have skating rinks where they allow you to perform. I don't think they have it just when you want to be an entertainer. In Atlanta, we have more elements than you know. I find out because these kids coming, they're like, yo, we don't have nothing. Like one of the kids came from Chicago and she was talking about how they close the skating rinks and kids don't really have anything to do.

Right in Atlanta, the kids got they can go.

To things and perform and people see them and do just so many different outlets that people are opening that we already had Wednesday, every Wednesday, every Monday, every Sunday.

This is going on.

So with all of this stuff going on, I'm still pushing Atlanta culture. I think that that's that's the most you know, that's the most important thing. And I still feel like Atlanta's yet to have their Kendrick Lamar or their j Cole or.

Their jay Z. Yet in this era.

We had it prior to No No, No, No No, I'm saying we had it prior. I'm just saying I'm saying in this era. In this era, it feels like, you know, it's a new artist every week, right, feel like it's a new hot artist every week. So I'm just saying, I still feel like the city is so hot that one of these rappers that people look at as a problem rapper, because like I said, they label everything in Atlanta so much as trapped that they don't fear anything, right, you know what I mean? If you say, oh,

Who do you feel that's unbeknowns to us?

But who do you feel that's bubbling under that's gonna make an impact right now?

Like what artists do you feel that are?

I mean, it's a lot of underground artists in Atlanta that really raped that that could possibly do this. I feel like I felt like Saha was gonna be that guy for a second. You know, he's with the right crew and he understands what I'm talking about. Like a lot of people might not even know that this is from Atlanta, Chicago. No, he's from He's from He's from the East side.

Of Atlanta, and he I know that Kanye was from Atlanta, Atlanta.

Too, So I mean, you know, like I said, it's it's it's we still got room because of how people put it in the box. If people open up the box and do what I'm doing, and it might be a little different. But I'm saying I wish people would stop that because I think trap the word trap music.

Came from E D E.

M d j's wanting the ability to play rap music, and they said, and call it and not call it rap music.

Let me as we're talking about wait, can I can? I?

It's what I pushed open the trap.

No, it's never a battle, boss, it's never a battle.

I'm about to about the reign on parade.

How happy are you to do an interview in which no one has to ask you any Jana Jackson questions, Yes, it is, that's why.

No, Actually I didn't. I have little John questions that one.

I want to be the first.

I mean, listen me, let me say this. I don't.

I don't look at any of that as a problem because my life is not regular, right, And if you if you don't understand that your life is not regular, then you won't be celebrating your life the way you're supposed to write. I had a girl tell me, like, Nigga, do you even know that I don't know another person that's dated James Jackson. This is what the girl told me, right, And I'm like, I'm thinking, I'm listening to her. I'm like, and I'm listening to her in a in a not

But I'm saying.

And it overshadows, but I'm saying, she's such a cultural staple in our culture that it's hard for people to ignore it.

Right, so I understand it. It's not something that you know.

It is what it is. Okay, well, ask one question.