Guce
Interview by Black Dog Bone
Continued from Murder Dog Vol 13 #1
Hyphy is getting defined right now, but this is the atmosphere in the Bay period.
Our music. We finally got something new that we can call our own. We had Mobb before. We always had our own. What was last is going to be first. Now it’s our time. To get back on this grind and let the team shine. We got to keep comin’ with the visuals as well as the good music. The Bay Area has came back to our own as in the beginning at one time when you had E-40, Too Short and Spice 1, and Richie Rich and the 415, and all them dudes. MC Ant. MC Pooh. When you had all them dudes back then, we really had our own sound, with the 808 that was knockin’. Too Short was the first person to say "biiii-atch!" worldwide. We was cussing on Rap before anyone was. Back then we had the 808 sound, the hard beats and gutter music. Somewhere in there we kind of lost ourselves trying to sound like this person or that person. And we felt like everybody that was on the radio we had to sound like that. But now we are back to our own shit. We’re with this Hyphy shit and we’re going to run with it. We’re still gutter though. We’re going to continue to run with it.
We had our Mobb sound but then Mobb sound got played out because everyone from the South to the West to the East everyone was doing the Mobb sound. It wasn’t new anymore. Then what happened in the Bay there was a radio or East Coast sound, and everyone was trying to be that. With the Hyphy thing, we got our own sound.
Another thing is, the producers in the Bay Area got lazy. Now you got a lot of hot young producers coming up. You always going to have the OG Rick Rock that been puttin’ it down. But now you’re going to have Sean T who been puttin’ it down who I feel is underrated but is now climbing. People are going to start recognizing that he is one of the most talented producers in the Bay. Then got young cats like Toy Shop. You got producers like Toray 101 Music. You got producers like Tatum One. These are new cats. We got producers that are really stepping our game up out here. The Bay Area is really trying to make some music. The production is going to set the standard for what we are trying to so. Our music is stepped up. Our lyrics is stepping up. It’s big right now.
Do the new producers you are working with have a different sound from the Mobb sound that we had?
They got a Mobb sound from a national perspective. The music that we got right now is sort of like Dipset. Like the Dipset got the East Coast, they got that sound out there. They deal a lot with a lot the slow hard driven tracks with the samples in it. We deal with the hard driven Mobb tracks with the samples in it and a different type of sounds, and things that we use for the tweak. The tweak we use for the music is what makes us have that sound that we looking for. It’s still Mobb, it’s still gutter, but it’s got that Hyphy feel. It’s from a different perspective.
We are coming to a whole different sound and it’s hard to define what it is.
Like for instance, we got Really Red on our album cover from Eye Candy. We had the East Coast girls come out here and take some pictures with us. When we put the music in they was like, "This could bump in a club in Brooklyn." They was representin’ Brooklyn. They came out here and was real gutter with it. They was on some Brooklyn, East Coast shit. I slapped on some of that Guce and Mess, they’ll let you know what it is. My man B Stucatto from Murder Inc. My man Oak Dog out there. Jersy, Philly. We got cats everywhere that’s really feeling this Guce and Messy Marv. They’re ready for us. Our music is there.
When were you in the studio with Keak and Messy?
This was in 2004.
Did you decide to work on the album right away?
We started immediately. Bam. Because I already had tracks. We started immediately off of the Sean T. Then we was taking our time. Mess said, "Guce let’s take our time with this. We’re going to make some really tight songs, some music!’ He ended going to jail. He had to fight that case. So I kicked back for a minute. I ended up releasing the album Controversial though SMC/Fontana. When Messy got out, we gave him a little while to rest up. Then we started right back at it again. We got some hot tracks. We ain’t candy coatin’ nothin’. Ain’t none of this shit watered down. It’s what everybody waiting on. There’s hype behind it. People asking questions. Everybody want to know about it. The shit is serious. If you don’t believe me ask E-A-Ski. E-A-Ski produced a track for us. It’s going to be one of our first singles called "Soul Hood" featuring Clyde Carson from The Team. It’s bananas. When E-A-Ski heard the song, he was loving it the way that we just sat back and took our time and just put it into the music. Producers like E-A-Ski, they been in the game a long time. They don’t want nobody playing on their tracks. If you step up to the plate and of you really trying to get one of those E-A-Ski tracks, make sure you ready to break it. Because if you not, go back to the drawing board and get it together. With Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3, we ain’t playing at all. There is not going to be no fast forwarding on this album. It’s straight what the people want. It ain’t just no regular shit that we poppin’ about. We poppin’ real shit. They can come to the hood and check us out. We poppin’ real shit. Big Boys pushing big things. We iced out. We do what we do. We come into the game by storm like Young Jeezy and T.I. came into the game. You had Lil John out there running wild with the Crunk music for a minute. Then you gutter gangster Mobb niggas come out of nowhere. One nigga talk about "I’m the king" and the next nigga talk about he the Snowman. Guce is Dope Boy and Messy Marv is Mescaline. Believe that. That’s how we going to set the standard for the Hyphy movement. We can get Hyphy in the club and you can get hit in the face with a snub too. However they want to take it or accept it. This Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 means exactly what it says. We hood, straight up.
Is the Hyphy thing a new thing?
It’s new to people who don’t know about it. We been doing it.
Among rappers, how do you guys talk about this Hyphy thing? Do you say this is kind of wack or this is what we are about?
I ain’t going to say no names, but a lot artists be like as far as the Bay Area goes you had a certain period of time when everyone sound the same. We need to draw the lines. Make some hot shit. We going to get Hyphy to it. Everybody can’t make a song called "Go Dumb!" Keak and 40 did it. The Federation did it. They got to run with that. That’s classic shit. It’s untouchable. We can’t be trying to go back to the drawing board to try and make another "Go Dumb" song to touch those classic ass hits that come out of the Bay. That’s the kind of conversation that goes on between the rappers. Certain producers aren’t going to get your money because you try to sound like another producer. Make your own style of music so we can rap to it. And if that shit hot, everyone in the hood going to get hyphy to that shit. We can’t hall make a song saying "hyphy." Our music is hyphy. Our life is hyphy. The hood is hyphy. The bitches get hyphy. Everybody out here gets hyphy. Little kids get hyphy. They go dumb doing the thizzle dance and all this shit. That’s what the movement is about. It’s not about seeing everybody do the same thing. We all got to be distinctive. If we all the same, then how we all going to eat? Everybody got to be different. And if we don’t switch up and make it different, then as fast as everybody paying attention, muthafuckas are going to start to not paying attention. "Ah, they all sound the same. I don’t want to hear that shit!" We don’t want that to even happen. Bay Area rappers are trendsetters. We pop our own shit and do our own thing. When they copy cat, we went to something else. We was running with the Mobb, they copy cat. So we went to the scrapers and flipped them. We always going to keep setting trends. Everybody was running around with waves and now a lot cats is running around with dreads. I don’t got dreads but a lot of my young niggas have them. Niggas get hyphy without dreads. Everybody get hyphy. It is what it is.
Another thing a lot everybody is talking about is that everybody feel like they have to have this or that person on their song to get on the radio or to get people to play it. You don’t have to have nobody on shit. Keak the Sneak showed the world that. He made some of the hottest shit with no features that blew up. If niggas out here are really paying attention to the game, your shit just got to be hot! Don’t waste money on hella features. Spend your money on your production and make songs. If shit hot, and the streets feelin’ your shit and everybody bumping your shit, and the clubs and deejays bumping your shit, Big Von, Rick Lee, Mind Motion, Wild 94.9, Hoodrapper Gail, Jams Spinoza, Chuey Gomez ain’t gonna have no choice but to play your shit because it’s hot. It’s what the streets want and what the clubs playing. And that’s what these youngsters out here got to understand. You ain’t got to have a nigga on your song because he’s on the radio to get your shit played on the radio. You come with some hot shit and you’re going to get your spins just like the next man getting them.
What’s the new Bully’s Wit Fully’s album called?
The album is called The Infrastructure. For niggas that don’t understand, that’s reshape, rebuild, and reform. Ain’t no old Bay or new Bay. I’m new period. I’m from the Bay. I’m hungry. I’ve been hungry and we’re going to continue to eat just like any of those rappers out there in the South or the East that have been putting it down for years that we don’t know, and then finally they get a deal and everybody hear them and think the nigga new. Nah, man! This shit ain’t new out here what we’re doing. Ain’t none of these rappers new out here that’s goin’ on. I been dealin’ with Mr. FAB. I was running with FAB before people was even on him like. He know I was believing in him right off the top. I was one of the first niggas to have him come to Frisco and get on stage and win the whole freestyle battle shit. FAB been puttin’ it down. Keak been puttin’ it down. Messy, Quinn, Killa Tay, me, everybody. We all been puttin’ it down for a long time.
You kept doing good music, but you never took it to that level.
To the level that it’s getting to now. We got to stay consistent. And we’re keeping up with the times. We still in our prime. We ain’t no old ass, nigga has-beens out here. We’re still strong. It’s all about being focused. At one time when me and Mess was working on an album, we even was fasting and running for about a month when he got out of jail. When January kicked in we didn’t do nothin’ but salads and water. That was to stay focused. Everybody popped their pills, hit that weed and had their drink. It’s our prerogative, but at a certain point in time, a lot of dudes right now is trying to get focused and be in shape to get this money. Because you be in shape to be out here on the road like this and go day to day. You got to be eating right, living right, really surviving this shit because this shit is stressful it could wear you down. Especially with trying to open these doors and a lot of people be closing them on you. For us to go through that … I’m one of the first rappers to know what it’s like to actually not get played on KMEL. To actually go up there and not get played and being from San Francisco. I’m one of those rappers who went through that and I ended staying in the game. And a lot of the deejays who were younger with me back then, who grew up listening to me, is kind of proud to be like, "Man, you still making hot shit and I grew listen to your shit, you and Mess. As long as this shit is hot, we going to play it. I’m not just going to play this music because you’re my friend. I’m playing this shit because it’s hot and when it comes on in the club, everybody get Hyphy." This Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 is going to be some of the hottest shit to come out in the Bay this year.
Was it different working with Messy Marv from working with Killa Tay?
In beginning with Killa Tay, the energy was there Bully’s Wit Fully’s 1, with me and Killa Tay in ’99, that’s what it was. Tay had to eventually branch out and do his thing. Tay is always going to be Bully’s Wit Fully’s off the top. I’m just running with it. Mess had that energy. In Frisco, a lot of people couldn’t really understand my movement. I guess they felt like I was too hard or too Gangsta. They really couldn’t understand where I was coming from. Being fresh out of Y.A. out there hanging in Sac, running around with C Bo and all them. A lot of habits got picked up. And me being from the City, I represent Hunter’s Point, Filmo’. Those are two notorious hoods in San Francisco where Mess is from and where I’m from. Then you got hoods like Sunnydale, Valencia Gardens, Army Street, Lakeview, Portrero Hill, The Mission District. I represent what is really going on in the City. Nigga’s is out here getting’ wacked. Nigga’s got cases pendin’, catchin’ more cases, fightin’ time. Nigga’s out here snitchin’ and shit. A lot of these nigga’s think it’s cool to snitch and bang. It’s a lot of shit going on in the streets. And we gonna give it to them how it’s good and how it’s bad. Straight gutter. We represent this hood hit. We ain’t trying to candy coat none of this shit. That’s why I ended up fuckin’ with Mess because Mess represented what me and Killa Tay represented. He was one of the only Frisco rappers that I bumped into that was really on some real hood shit. Dude is a good dude. We folks. That’s what it is. He put me on his album. When people heard that song that me and Mess on his album, everybody was like, "Oh shit. I could just imagine what Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 is going to sound like." That shit was bananas. Everybody was like, "We can’t wait til Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 come out. That’s what we waiting for." Everybody know that I been gangsta. I didn’t just start poppin’ this shit. My first record was gangsta and I been sticking with it. It’s what I represent. I talk the talk, I walk the walk. I live it. It’s niggas in the game who came road through Frisco and seen me posted on the block doing what I do. They know how me and my niggaz move. They done seen us out day to day. They seen us on the Murder Show beating nigga’s asses in the club and throwing people off stage with this shit. This is what it is. This is what I represent. This is the shit that Mess came from and where Killa Tay came from. That just made us come together. Me working with Mess is just like working with Tay in the beginning. Mess’ chemistry is there. We don’t just write a song. We sit down and we talk together. We figure shit out. We figure out how we going to get on nigga’s lines and how we going to do choruses. We got a song on the album called "Breakfast." You’re going to see why it’s called "Breakfast" when you hear it. Niggas are going to be like, "Oh! They’re sick for that one!" We got some shit on that album.
This is the best time to come out with an album. People are buying Bay music. We are buying our own music.
They got to stop bootleggin’ so much shit.
That will never stop.
Yeah. I know. I wish it would though. I guess not though. I guess not everybody can afford to spend ten when you can get two for five. Please, if you are reading this magazine, please don’t bootleg me and Mess. We need to eat. We been selling units even without radio play. I know what it’s like to sell records since ’96. And to be able to continue to sell records and still have the star quality that I got is a good thing for me and Mess to be on the movement we’re on – Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 – The Infrastructure. That’s what we poppin.’ This is what we do. We make power moves and get paid. Either get paid or stay broke. That’s our slogan.
Right now we got some heavy hitters: you, Messy Marv, Keak Da Sneak, San Quinn, Mr. FAB, Mac Mall. It’s an exciting time in the Bay.
We’ve been here in the struggle. We gaining momentum.
But to the outside, you are new to them. Keak and Messy Marv are new to them.
To the world. Because we came in the game at a point in time when Bay music was real big, we were some of the artists that laid the foundation by jumping off them planes and traveling day to day and getting our name out there. That’s one of the things that me and FAB was talking about. We was at Sean T’s record release one night and we were sitting back talking. I was saying "Your name is getting there now. You got to get on that. You got the Bay and it’s time for you to take this movement everywhere else." Tour the Northwest, Portland, Seattle and all my folks out there. Hit Phoenix, Arizona. And niggas got to stop being scared of LA. LA feelin’ shit. If it’s real and authentic, they’re going to be with it. From then on keep it rockin’. Hit Denver. Hit Nebraska and Detroit and Flint. Hit Toledo and keep going. Hit Albuquerque, New Mexico. Hit Dego. We got to get out there and put this movement down. Even if we got to get together and create one big tour. And everybody put their money in. We should be able to pay for our own muthafuckin’ tour. We don’t need no sponsors. We can pay for our own tour and get the fuck on. We can take this Bay Area shit worldwide and get out there. That’s what we got to do. If your name is poppin’ in this small radius of a Bay Area all the from San Jose all through Santa Rose, Richmond, Vallejo, Fairfield, Sacramento, Pittsburgh, Modesto, Merced, Stockton, Oakland, Hayward. You can keep going and going and going all the way to Tracy. If your shit is poppin’ all through here, don’t feel like everyone in the world know you just because your stuff is on the radio out here. You can jump off the plane somewhere else and people will treat you like shit, like you small time because they don’t know who you is. Nigga got to got out there and pull out a map and put little red dots all over the map. Hit from here to the Midwest to the East Coast. Look how your sales are doing. If you are only selling a hundred in this city, go that city and do some shows. Get out there, meet niggas. Give away tee shirts, posters, flyers, whatever. Hang with the kids and watch yourselfs go up when you check sound scan the next two weeks. That’s how you going to get to the level we’re trying to get to in this game. We can’t be scared to go up against these majors because we got the best part of this game. We got independent money. And we can do the fuck we want to do, when we want to do it. Don’t nobody tell us what to do because we independent. We can get on the plane and go do a show in any muthafuckin’ time or day, whenever we want to it can go down. And that’s how we got to get money as Bay Area artists. It’s time for us to come together and cut out all this hate shit. Ain’t nobody hotter than nobody. Everybody got their own individual style. Let’s come together nigga and let’s show this is the Bay shit. All you muthafuckas have been robbin’ us for years and we coming to get what you took from us with interest.
There’s a lot of interest all over the country in the Hyphy movement. It’s good for the whole Bay.
I know how niggas get down. Hyphy could go any way. It could go good or bad. If you see a bunch of bitches and niggas shaking their muthafuckin’ heads crazy. It’s like Rock and Roll, how they be throwin’ some muthafucka off the stage into the crowd and everybody in the Rock club going crazy. But instead of us going crazy, we get Hyphy. It could be turned on some negative shit. Instead of some bitches in a scraper with the whistling pipes going hyphy on this shit. We don’t only get Hyphy on Bay shit. We get hyphy off other music too, especially a lot of South shit. We get hyphy off that shit. But then you could be standing in the hood and watch a nigga run up and pop a nigga and be like, "Ah, that nigga on some Hyphy shit!" Or you could see some bitches over here fighting and be like, "Oh, they’re on some Hyphy shit!" Whatever you are doing something that’s out of the ordinary and it may look strange to the next muthafucka but it’s normal to us, that’s some Hyphy shit. We even get Hyphy at funerals. When our partners die, we don’t let them die in vain. We go out with a bang. We get Hyphy. We do donuts in the middle of the streets. Real sideshows from funerals. And motorcycles get hyphy. Harley bikes. I’m with the Kings of Cali Bike Club. We get hyphy. We throw parties and do donuts and burn up the block. It’s so many different ways of labeling getting hyphy. We on some hyphy shit. That’s what we on.
Another positive thing is that more clubs are opening up to Rap. People are starting to go out.
They need us anyway! It’s cool that the clubs is fucking with us but they need to make money. People aren’t showing up for that regular basic shit no more. If you got some of these Hyphy cats from the Bay that show up to your club, you going to make some good money off the bar because we going to pull in a crowd that be in there drinking and partying. We draw the crowd. The clubs open up the doors because they need to make money off of us. And we need them to support our careers and sell our CD’s and to do whatever we need to do to bring our crowd in once place and show them what they want to see. They want to see nigga’s show up and look and perform what their music is about. But the clubs need us just as much as we need them, because if they don’t fuck with us, then their club is going to be dead, because whatever club is fuckin’ with us is going to be getting the most money and their club’s not going to get shit. We got the kind of music that will make a muthafucka get hyphy on a freeway. This Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 is going to make you get hyphy on the freeway and you might got through the muthafuckin’ fast track without paying no toll. They are doing a buck twenty off this shit because it’s gutter. You are going to feel it all in your chest because it’s gutter and what nigga’s is going through. It’s real shit. Me and Mess is bringing it.
Is this record coming through your label?
Git Paid Records, Distributed through SMC. The business is straight up. It’s all good. And another thing, we finally releasing that Thug Money motion Picture. Real movie, no documentary. Thug Money is coming. We got a whole new power with this Git Paid movement. It’s huge. I just signed Killer Keith on the label. He’s got albums and mix tapes coming out through Git Paid. Swoop AKA S Class is coming out with records on Git Paid. C. Luciano, Pette Jizzle. We got Jet, that’s putting it down from Oakland. We got Mr. One. I put my money on it. He’s one of the hottest niggas coming out of the Frisco, Hunter’s Point area. Then we got Tore On Gotti, a CEO and business partner with me. A lot of them artists is part of the Killer Squad. We taking shit to the next level. Thug Money, the movie and sound track is going to be big. Me and Messy Marv are going to shooting videos for this Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3. It’s going to be coming soon. We got the Get Paid sampler coming out, Year of the Money Bag. That’s with all the artists on there, the whole movement.
When is it hitting the streets?
Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 should be hitting the streets no later than the first two weeks of May. It will be in the hood. It’s going to be everywhere, in all the stores. It’s bananas. We giving it to ‘em raw and uncut. It ain’t watered down.
Interview by Black Dog Bone
Continued from Murder Dog Vol 13 #1
Hyphy is getting defined right now, but this is the atmosphere in the Bay period.
Our music. We finally got something new that we can call our own. We had Mobb before. We always had our own. What was last is going to be first. Now it’s our time. To get back on this grind and let the team shine. We got to keep comin’ with the visuals as well as the good music. The Bay Area has came back to our own as in the beginning at one time when you had E-40, Too Short and Spice 1, and Richie Rich and the 415, and all them dudes. MC Ant. MC Pooh. When you had all them dudes back then, we really had our own sound, with the 808 that was knockin’. Too Short was the first person to say "biiii-atch!" worldwide. We was cussing on Rap before anyone was. Back then we had the 808 sound, the hard beats and gutter music. Somewhere in there we kind of lost ourselves trying to sound like this person or that person. And we felt like everybody that was on the radio we had to sound like that. But now we are back to our own shit. We’re with this Hyphy shit and we’re going to run with it. We’re still gutter though. We’re going to continue to run with it.
We had our Mobb sound but then Mobb sound got played out because everyone from the South to the West to the East everyone was doing the Mobb sound. It wasn’t new anymore. Then what happened in the Bay there was a radio or East Coast sound, and everyone was trying to be that. With the Hyphy thing, we got our own sound.
Another thing is, the producers in the Bay Area got lazy. Now you got a lot of hot young producers coming up. You always going to have the OG Rick Rock that been puttin’ it down. But now you’re going to have Sean T who been puttin’ it down who I feel is underrated but is now climbing. People are going to start recognizing that he is one of the most talented producers in the Bay. Then got young cats like Toy Shop. You got producers like Toray 101 Music. You got producers like Tatum One. These are new cats. We got producers that are really stepping our game up out here. The Bay Area is really trying to make some music. The production is going to set the standard for what we are trying to so. Our music is stepped up. Our lyrics is stepping up. It’s big right now.
Do the new producers you are working with have a different sound from the Mobb sound that we had?
They got a Mobb sound from a national perspective. The music that we got right now is sort of like Dipset. Like the Dipset got the East Coast, they got that sound out there. They deal a lot with a lot the slow hard driven tracks with the samples in it. We deal with the hard driven Mobb tracks with the samples in it and a different type of sounds, and things that we use for the tweak. The tweak we use for the music is what makes us have that sound that we looking for. It’s still Mobb, it’s still gutter, but it’s got that Hyphy feel. It’s from a different perspective.
We are coming to a whole different sound and it’s hard to define what it is.
Like for instance, we got Really Red on our album cover from Eye Candy. We had the East Coast girls come out here and take some pictures with us. When we put the music in they was like, "This could bump in a club in Brooklyn." They was representin’ Brooklyn. They came out here and was real gutter with it. They was on some Brooklyn, East Coast shit. I slapped on some of that Guce and Mess, they’ll let you know what it is. My man B Stucatto from Murder Inc. My man Oak Dog out there. Jersy, Philly. We got cats everywhere that’s really feeling this Guce and Messy Marv. They’re ready for us. Our music is there.
When were you in the studio with Keak and Messy?
This was in 2004.
Did you decide to work on the album right away?
We started immediately. Bam. Because I already had tracks. We started immediately off of the Sean T. Then we was taking our time. Mess said, "Guce let’s take our time with this. We’re going to make some really tight songs, some music!’ He ended going to jail. He had to fight that case. So I kicked back for a minute. I ended up releasing the album Controversial though SMC/Fontana. When Messy got out, we gave him a little while to rest up. Then we started right back at it again. We got some hot tracks. We ain’t candy coatin’ nothin’. Ain’t none of this shit watered down. It’s what everybody waiting on. There’s hype behind it. People asking questions. Everybody want to know about it. The shit is serious. If you don’t believe me ask E-A-Ski. E-A-Ski produced a track for us. It’s going to be one of our first singles called "Soul Hood" featuring Clyde Carson from The Team. It’s bananas. When E-A-Ski heard the song, he was loving it the way that we just sat back and took our time and just put it into the music. Producers like E-A-Ski, they been in the game a long time. They don’t want nobody playing on their tracks. If you step up to the plate and of you really trying to get one of those E-A-Ski tracks, make sure you ready to break it. Because if you not, go back to the drawing board and get it together. With Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3, we ain’t playing at all. There is not going to be no fast forwarding on this album. It’s straight what the people want. It ain’t just no regular shit that we poppin’ about. We poppin’ real shit. They can come to the hood and check us out. We poppin’ real shit. Big Boys pushing big things. We iced out. We do what we do. We come into the game by storm like Young Jeezy and T.I. came into the game. You had Lil John out there running wild with the Crunk music for a minute. Then you gutter gangster Mobb niggas come out of nowhere. One nigga talk about "I’m the king" and the next nigga talk about he the Snowman. Guce is Dope Boy and Messy Marv is Mescaline. Believe that. That’s how we going to set the standard for the Hyphy movement. We can get Hyphy in the club and you can get hit in the face with a snub too. However they want to take it or accept it. This Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 means exactly what it says. We hood, straight up.
Is the Hyphy thing a new thing?
It’s new to people who don’t know about it. We been doing it.
Among rappers, how do you guys talk about this Hyphy thing? Do you say this is kind of wack or this is what we are about?
I ain’t going to say no names, but a lot artists be like as far as the Bay Area goes you had a certain period of time when everyone sound the same. We need to draw the lines. Make some hot shit. We going to get Hyphy to it. Everybody can’t make a song called "Go Dumb!" Keak and 40 did it. The Federation did it. They got to run with that. That’s classic shit. It’s untouchable. We can’t be trying to go back to the drawing board to try and make another "Go Dumb" song to touch those classic ass hits that come out of the Bay. That’s the kind of conversation that goes on between the rappers. Certain producers aren’t going to get your money because you try to sound like another producer. Make your own style of music so we can rap to it. And if that shit hot, everyone in the hood going to get hyphy to that shit. We can’t hall make a song saying "hyphy." Our music is hyphy. Our life is hyphy. The hood is hyphy. The bitches get hyphy. Everybody out here gets hyphy. Little kids get hyphy. They go dumb doing the thizzle dance and all this shit. That’s what the movement is about. It’s not about seeing everybody do the same thing. We all got to be distinctive. If we all the same, then how we all going to eat? Everybody got to be different. And if we don’t switch up and make it different, then as fast as everybody paying attention, muthafuckas are going to start to not paying attention. "Ah, they all sound the same. I don’t want to hear that shit!" We don’t want that to even happen. Bay Area rappers are trendsetters. We pop our own shit and do our own thing. When they copy cat, we went to something else. We was running with the Mobb, they copy cat. So we went to the scrapers and flipped them. We always going to keep setting trends. Everybody was running around with waves and now a lot cats is running around with dreads. I don’t got dreads but a lot of my young niggas have them. Niggas get hyphy without dreads. Everybody get hyphy. It is what it is.
Another thing a lot everybody is talking about is that everybody feel like they have to have this or that person on their song to get on the radio or to get people to play it. You don’t have to have nobody on shit. Keak the Sneak showed the world that. He made some of the hottest shit with no features that blew up. If niggas out here are really paying attention to the game, your shit just got to be hot! Don’t waste money on hella features. Spend your money on your production and make songs. If shit hot, and the streets feelin’ your shit and everybody bumping your shit, and the clubs and deejays bumping your shit, Big Von, Rick Lee, Mind Motion, Wild 94.9, Hoodrapper Gail, Jams Spinoza, Chuey Gomez ain’t gonna have no choice but to play your shit because it’s hot. It’s what the streets want and what the clubs playing. And that’s what these youngsters out here got to understand. You ain’t got to have a nigga on your song because he’s on the radio to get your shit played on the radio. You come with some hot shit and you’re going to get your spins just like the next man getting them.
What’s the new Bully’s Wit Fully’s album called?
The album is called The Infrastructure. For niggas that don’t understand, that’s reshape, rebuild, and reform. Ain’t no old Bay or new Bay. I’m new period. I’m from the Bay. I’m hungry. I’ve been hungry and we’re going to continue to eat just like any of those rappers out there in the South or the East that have been putting it down for years that we don’t know, and then finally they get a deal and everybody hear them and think the nigga new. Nah, man! This shit ain’t new out here what we’re doing. Ain’t none of these rappers new out here that’s goin’ on. I been dealin’ with Mr. FAB. I was running with FAB before people was even on him like. He know I was believing in him right off the top. I was one of the first niggas to have him come to Frisco and get on stage and win the whole freestyle battle shit. FAB been puttin’ it down. Keak been puttin’ it down. Messy, Quinn, Killa Tay, me, everybody. We all been puttin’ it down for a long time.
You kept doing good music, but you never took it to that level.
To the level that it’s getting to now. We got to stay consistent. And we’re keeping up with the times. We still in our prime. We ain’t no old ass, nigga has-beens out here. We’re still strong. It’s all about being focused. At one time when me and Mess was working on an album, we even was fasting and running for about a month when he got out of jail. When January kicked in we didn’t do nothin’ but salads and water. That was to stay focused. Everybody popped their pills, hit that weed and had their drink. It’s our prerogative, but at a certain point in time, a lot of dudes right now is trying to get focused and be in shape to get this money. Because you be in shape to be out here on the road like this and go day to day. You got to be eating right, living right, really surviving this shit because this shit is stressful it could wear you down. Especially with trying to open these doors and a lot of people be closing them on you. For us to go through that … I’m one of the first rappers to know what it’s like to actually not get played on KMEL. To actually go up there and not get played and being from San Francisco. I’m one of those rappers who went through that and I ended staying in the game. And a lot of the deejays who were younger with me back then, who grew up listening to me, is kind of proud to be like, "Man, you still making hot shit and I grew listen to your shit, you and Mess. As long as this shit is hot, we going to play it. I’m not just going to play this music because you’re my friend. I’m playing this shit because it’s hot and when it comes on in the club, everybody get Hyphy." This Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 is going to be some of the hottest shit to come out in the Bay this year.
Was it different working with Messy Marv from working with Killa Tay?
In beginning with Killa Tay, the energy was there Bully’s Wit Fully’s 1, with me and Killa Tay in ’99, that’s what it was. Tay had to eventually branch out and do his thing. Tay is always going to be Bully’s Wit Fully’s off the top. I’m just running with it. Mess had that energy. In Frisco, a lot of people couldn’t really understand my movement. I guess they felt like I was too hard or too Gangsta. They really couldn’t understand where I was coming from. Being fresh out of Y.A. out there hanging in Sac, running around with C Bo and all them. A lot of habits got picked up. And me being from the City, I represent Hunter’s Point, Filmo’. Those are two notorious hoods in San Francisco where Mess is from and where I’m from. Then you got hoods like Sunnydale, Valencia Gardens, Army Street, Lakeview, Portrero Hill, The Mission District. I represent what is really going on in the City. Nigga’s is out here getting’ wacked. Nigga’s got cases pendin’, catchin’ more cases, fightin’ time. Nigga’s out here snitchin’ and shit. A lot of these nigga’s think it’s cool to snitch and bang. It’s a lot of shit going on in the streets. And we gonna give it to them how it’s good and how it’s bad. Straight gutter. We represent this hood hit. We ain’t trying to candy coat none of this shit. That’s why I ended up fuckin’ with Mess because Mess represented what me and Killa Tay represented. He was one of the only Frisco rappers that I bumped into that was really on some real hood shit. Dude is a good dude. We folks. That’s what it is. He put me on his album. When people heard that song that me and Mess on his album, everybody was like, "Oh shit. I could just imagine what Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 is going to sound like." That shit was bananas. Everybody was like, "We can’t wait til Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 come out. That’s what we waiting for." Everybody know that I been gangsta. I didn’t just start poppin’ this shit. My first record was gangsta and I been sticking with it. It’s what I represent. I talk the talk, I walk the walk. I live it. It’s niggas in the game who came road through Frisco and seen me posted on the block doing what I do. They know how me and my niggaz move. They done seen us out day to day. They seen us on the Murder Show beating nigga’s asses in the club and throwing people off stage with this shit. This is what it is. This is what I represent. This is the shit that Mess came from and where Killa Tay came from. That just made us come together. Me working with Mess is just like working with Tay in the beginning. Mess’ chemistry is there. We don’t just write a song. We sit down and we talk together. We figure shit out. We figure out how we going to get on nigga’s lines and how we going to do choruses. We got a song on the album called "Breakfast." You’re going to see why it’s called "Breakfast" when you hear it. Niggas are going to be like, "Oh! They’re sick for that one!" We got some shit on that album.
This is the best time to come out with an album. People are buying Bay music. We are buying our own music.
They got to stop bootleggin’ so much shit.
That will never stop.
Yeah. I know. I wish it would though. I guess not though. I guess not everybody can afford to spend ten when you can get two for five. Please, if you are reading this magazine, please don’t bootleg me and Mess. We need to eat. We been selling units even without radio play. I know what it’s like to sell records since ’96. And to be able to continue to sell records and still have the star quality that I got is a good thing for me and Mess to be on the movement we’re on – Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 – The Infrastructure. That’s what we poppin.’ This is what we do. We make power moves and get paid. Either get paid or stay broke. That’s our slogan.
Right now we got some heavy hitters: you, Messy Marv, Keak Da Sneak, San Quinn, Mr. FAB, Mac Mall. It’s an exciting time in the Bay.
We’ve been here in the struggle. We gaining momentum.
But to the outside, you are new to them. Keak and Messy Marv are new to them.
To the world. Because we came in the game at a point in time when Bay music was real big, we were some of the artists that laid the foundation by jumping off them planes and traveling day to day and getting our name out there. That’s one of the things that me and FAB was talking about. We was at Sean T’s record release one night and we were sitting back talking. I was saying "Your name is getting there now. You got to get on that. You got the Bay and it’s time for you to take this movement everywhere else." Tour the Northwest, Portland, Seattle and all my folks out there. Hit Phoenix, Arizona. And niggas got to stop being scared of LA. LA feelin’ shit. If it’s real and authentic, they’re going to be with it. From then on keep it rockin’. Hit Denver. Hit Nebraska and Detroit and Flint. Hit Toledo and keep going. Hit Albuquerque, New Mexico. Hit Dego. We got to get out there and put this movement down. Even if we got to get together and create one big tour. And everybody put their money in. We should be able to pay for our own muthafuckin’ tour. We don’t need no sponsors. We can pay for our own tour and get the fuck on. We can take this Bay Area shit worldwide and get out there. That’s what we got to do. If your name is poppin’ in this small radius of a Bay Area all the from San Jose all through Santa Rose, Richmond, Vallejo, Fairfield, Sacramento, Pittsburgh, Modesto, Merced, Stockton, Oakland, Hayward. You can keep going and going and going all the way to Tracy. If your shit is poppin’ all through here, don’t feel like everyone in the world know you just because your stuff is on the radio out here. You can jump off the plane somewhere else and people will treat you like shit, like you small time because they don’t know who you is. Nigga got to got out there and pull out a map and put little red dots all over the map. Hit from here to the Midwest to the East Coast. Look how your sales are doing. If you are only selling a hundred in this city, go that city and do some shows. Get out there, meet niggas. Give away tee shirts, posters, flyers, whatever. Hang with the kids and watch yourselfs go up when you check sound scan the next two weeks. That’s how you going to get to the level we’re trying to get to in this game. We can’t be scared to go up against these majors because we got the best part of this game. We got independent money. And we can do the fuck we want to do, when we want to do it. Don’t nobody tell us what to do because we independent. We can get on the plane and go do a show in any muthafuckin’ time or day, whenever we want to it can go down. And that’s how we got to get money as Bay Area artists. It’s time for us to come together and cut out all this hate shit. Ain’t nobody hotter than nobody. Everybody got their own individual style. Let’s come together nigga and let’s show this is the Bay shit. All you muthafuckas have been robbin’ us for years and we coming to get what you took from us with interest.
There’s a lot of interest all over the country in the Hyphy movement. It’s good for the whole Bay.
I know how niggas get down. Hyphy could go any way. It could go good or bad. If you see a bunch of bitches and niggas shaking their muthafuckin’ heads crazy. It’s like Rock and Roll, how they be throwin’ some muthafucka off the stage into the crowd and everybody in the Rock club going crazy. But instead of us going crazy, we get Hyphy. It could be turned on some negative shit. Instead of some bitches in a scraper with the whistling pipes going hyphy on this shit. We don’t only get Hyphy on Bay shit. We get hyphy off other music too, especially a lot of South shit. We get hyphy off that shit. But then you could be standing in the hood and watch a nigga run up and pop a nigga and be like, "Ah, that nigga on some Hyphy shit!" Or you could see some bitches over here fighting and be like, "Oh, they’re on some Hyphy shit!" Whatever you are doing something that’s out of the ordinary and it may look strange to the next muthafucka but it’s normal to us, that’s some Hyphy shit. We even get Hyphy at funerals. When our partners die, we don’t let them die in vain. We go out with a bang. We get Hyphy. We do donuts in the middle of the streets. Real sideshows from funerals. And motorcycles get hyphy. Harley bikes. I’m with the Kings of Cali Bike Club. We get hyphy. We throw parties and do donuts and burn up the block. It’s so many different ways of labeling getting hyphy. We on some hyphy shit. That’s what we on.
Another positive thing is that more clubs are opening up to Rap. People are starting to go out.
They need us anyway! It’s cool that the clubs is fucking with us but they need to make money. People aren’t showing up for that regular basic shit no more. If you got some of these Hyphy cats from the Bay that show up to your club, you going to make some good money off the bar because we going to pull in a crowd that be in there drinking and partying. We draw the crowd. The clubs open up the doors because they need to make money off of us. And we need them to support our careers and sell our CD’s and to do whatever we need to do to bring our crowd in once place and show them what they want to see. They want to see nigga’s show up and look and perform what their music is about. But the clubs need us just as much as we need them, because if they don’t fuck with us, then their club is going to be dead, because whatever club is fuckin’ with us is going to be getting the most money and their club’s not going to get shit. We got the kind of music that will make a muthafucka get hyphy on a freeway. This Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 is going to make you get hyphy on the freeway and you might got through the muthafuckin’ fast track without paying no toll. They are doing a buck twenty off this shit because it’s gutter. You are going to feel it all in your chest because it’s gutter and what nigga’s is going through. It’s real shit. Me and Mess is bringing it.
Is this record coming through your label?
Git Paid Records, Distributed through SMC. The business is straight up. It’s all good. And another thing, we finally releasing that Thug Money motion Picture. Real movie, no documentary. Thug Money is coming. We got a whole new power with this Git Paid movement. It’s huge. I just signed Killer Keith on the label. He’s got albums and mix tapes coming out through Git Paid. Swoop AKA S Class is coming out with records on Git Paid. C. Luciano, Pette Jizzle. We got Jet, that’s putting it down from Oakland. We got Mr. One. I put my money on it. He’s one of the hottest niggas coming out of the Frisco, Hunter’s Point area. Then we got Tore On Gotti, a CEO and business partner with me. A lot of them artists is part of the Killer Squad. We taking shit to the next level. Thug Money, the movie and sound track is going to be big. Me and Messy Marv are going to shooting videos for this Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3. It’s going to be coming soon. We got the Get Paid sampler coming out, Year of the Money Bag. That’s with all the artists on there, the whole movement.
When is it hitting the streets?
Bully’s Wit Fully’s 3 should be hitting the streets no later than the first two weeks of May. It will be in the hood. It’s going to be everywhere, in all the stores. It’s bananas. We giving it to ‘em raw and uncut. It ain’t watered down.
