ALL STAR 2011 - Ozone Magazine

25th Hour. I started up with my cousin. He’dmake the beats and we’d pay $25 an hour tothis guy in South Central, close to my house.He had a little studio set up in his back houseand I would pay him $25 an hour to record and$25 an hour to mix. It was a professional littlestudio. That year taught me a lot about how tomanipulate your sound; understanding thatyour vocals are like a [musical] instrument.When you first start, you think you sound a lotdifferent than you actually do. There are waysyou can say more, just with your voice. Youcan make yourself sound more convincing orbelievable or blend in more with the song.I was just having fun recording 25th Hour. Myfriends weren’t thinking it would be anything[that reached] outside our immediate circle. Ididn’t know about blogs. [My music] was onblogs before I even understood what theywere. I just made it strictly to have fun, play itfor my friends, and perform at little parties wehad. But it turned into something bigger.My cousin that produced “Watermelon Sundae”was a film student at Loyola Marymount.So the fact that we had access to good qualityvideos early on was really important to meand my movement. That remains a part ofeverything I do. We were able to shoot the“Watermelon Sundae” video and have it lookreally nice. When everybody saw it, it took off.You’re still an independent artist, but are youlooking for a major label deal?I’ve been working, first and foremost, that’sthe thing that doesn’t stop. I’ve turned [majorlabel] deals down. There have been offers butI’m happy where I’m at.Are you planning on dropping somethingwith your doppelgänger Don Cannon?Oh yeah, I always talk to Cannon and peoplealways ask me that. We haven’t really doneanything yet outside of being in the studiotogether. We went through a lot of beats. Wetalk a lot about music and what direction wewant to go. For my next project, I know he’ll beon there in some capacity.You’ve said you’re trying to work with evenbetter producers next go round. Besides Cannon,have you succeeded in finding that?Yeah, definitely. I think after From The West SideWith Love and the videos I did, there’s a mutualrespect, and that’s really all I’ve wanted. I’vehad opportunities to work with different producers,but a lot of times, I think people workwith producers ahead of schedule, you know?You might not be on Dr. Dre’s level yet. It mightnot be the right time. I always wanted to growand use my resources with the producers I’vehad access to. I want to take the time to findmyself and craft songs and find younger guyslike myself that have a lot of passion. Just likeI have passion in my work right now, there’sa lot of young producers that probably havemore passion than [somebody like] Polow DaDon, who’s a millionaire a couple times over.So it’s really not about the name, it’s moreabout: Are you really in this? Is your heart init? What are you trying to say? Can we do this?Can we reach our goals together?What’s the concept of “Choose Up”?(laughs) “Choose Up” just means “pick.” Decidewhat you’re trying to do. If you’re out at theclub and you see a girl that keeps lookingat you, y’all ain’t gon’ be there all night, youknow? Choose up. Hurry up. Do something.There’s a new movement coming: you, TiRon,Skeme, U-N-I, Fashawn - it seems like Californiarap has evolved into a newer, youngerenergy. What motivated this evolution?Man, a lot of people have been trying to figurethat out. I think we’re getting a chance againand people are open to it. It hasn’t reached apeak yet but I think there are a lot of peopleworking really hard that have something valuableto add, you know? We have somethingto say and we’re doing it a different way thanhow it was done before. You can look at rapmusic from all the different regions and seethe beginning. Now, it’s a new time. Rap musicmoves through different regions becausethere’s a new story to tell. People get enamorednot only with the music but how theylive, what they say, the whole culture. I feel likethe spotlight on L.A. right now is different fromwhat it was on before.How much of a hand do you have in the creativeprocess when building a project?A hundred thousand percent. Everything.When I come up with a project, like From TheWestside, I conceptualize everything. I knewhow I wanted the artwork to be, how I want itto sound, how many songs are gonna be there.I think the fact that I have so much control andfreedom is what separates the new generationof artists from the record labels. They’reso impersonal. If you have all this control andfreedom, you can say what you wanna say,to exactly who you wanna say it to. You don’thave to fight with somebody and explainsomething to them--people who don’t getit anyway--that have millions of other thingsthey really care about. Nobody’s gonna tell mehow my project is gonna be besides myself. //58 // OZONE MAG