In The Ring With Freddie Foxxx

 

Interview: March, 2005 @ Lobo Studios, Deer Park, NY

 

 

When your favorite rapper gets his jewels jacked in the streets, who does he call to get them shits back? Bumpy Knuckles, baby, that's who. He might not be the best known rapper in the world, but the 6"2 MC born James Campbell and better known as Freddie Foxxx remains one of hip-hop's respected and most intimidating figures more than 20 years after he dropped his first rhymes on wax (as a member of Nia Records artists Supreme Force). Despite his five borough thorough affiliations, the long-time Gang Starr Foundation member and BDP affiliate actually hails from the solidly middle class burb of North Babylon, Long Island. When I found out Freddie kept a studio inside the Lobo Studios compound in Deer Park, NY right down the street from my parents' old house, I got in touch and we spent a Saturday afternoon kicking it while he worked on his still unreleased fifth LP, American Black Man. In between breaking down how Eric B. really met Rakim, how Nas and Jay-Z really reconciled, Freddie explains he's just a funny guy who likes children and serene places. Lest you think he's gone soft, however, Freddie also pulled his steel out on me halfway through the interview just to prove a point. Listen and learn cause they definitely don't make 'em like Freddie Foxxx anymore

 

It's crazy how close you are. I grew up right around here. I've seen this building a million times and never had any idea it was a studio. Did you always live in North Babylon?

I was actually born in Rockville Centre and I grew up in Westbury (two other Long Island towns-Jesse). The summer after sixth grade my parents moved to North Babylon, near Wyandanch. That is where I joined my first crew, Supreme Force. I graduated from North Babylon High School, in 1985 and I did my first record, "You Gotta Come Out Fresh". It came out in 1986. And that's all I've done since.

 

Where did you first encounter hip-hop, here or the city?

I didn't start going into the city until after I moved out here. I started hearing about these battle tapes, Cold Crush and the Fantastical Magical Five. This was about 1979. I started hearing about Lovebug Starski and Kool Moe Dee and these cats having these tapes. There was this cat named Triple C who used to be down with a friend of mine named Ricky when I was in the Royal Nation. My association with the Bronx came from me kicking it with him when he came to Long Island, and me going to the Bronx because that's where I felt I could get the substance of hip-hop from. Long Island was just like Queens, Manhattan, Jersey-everybody was emulating this sound that came from the Bronx. So I figured the best thing for me to do was to go hang out in the Bronx. I went to The Fever, which was the hottest club for hip-hop, and started running into and associating these different personalities, like Bambaataa and Grandmaster Caz, who I was totally elated on. After that, I realized that is who I wanted to design my rap style after.  I picked who I thought was strong and dominant and I watched them do shows. I seen Doug E. Fresh and the Fantastical Magical Five. I was looking for these guys from those tapes. I tried to see them do performances and I started to get more excited about it as I did. But I was doing pause tapes before I even moved out to Suffolk County. When I moved out here, Cool C from Supreme Force (not the Philly rapper who currently on death row for the 1996 murder of a police officer-J) had two turntables. I was a backyard party favorite in the neighborhood. When I showed up to parties, I rocked all the time and that is what gives me the benefit now to perform songs that people don't even know. I can move an audience (because) I was trained on how to rock a party.  I learned it doesn't have to be a hit record for people to listen to what you're doing. There were parties all over and everybody was hiring us to do their backyard parties. So we were making money.  The DJ would rock the party and there would be a time to start the show and I would do what we did.

 

Were you rocking at parties in Wyandanch with Rakim?

The only reason I came in to Wyandanch is because I was trying to battle Rakim, he was calling himself Kid Wizard at the time. I wanted to battle Rakim but Rakim didn't want to battle. I was the favorite on my side of town and he had a crew called the Love Brothers on his side of town. My brother was big on pushing this battle between us. But Rakim wasn't a battle rapper. The Love Brothers were like the top crew in Wyandanch and the Supreme Force were the top crew in North Babylon and there was a cat named Superstar who was the top in Amityville.

 

Did you know Chill Mitchell (film and TV actor of Galaxy Quest and Ed fame and a member of Wyandanch-based group Groove B Chill) at the time?

I knew Daryl Mitchell very well. I actually defended him in a couple fights. There was a club called Legionnaire in a shopping center out here. They had a lot of artists like Slick Rick and Doug E. Fresh come out there and perform. We were all cool and I used to be there when Groove B Chill was coming out. The culture was growing. A lot of music came out this place. I watched Biz Markie come out, EPMD. I had a record deal before Redman. I remember Alvin Toney (EPMD manager) brought Redman to my house with K-Solo and asked me what I though of them. He said 'If Foxxx liked you that means you are going to blow.' I was looked at as an authority by him. He always brought rappers to me because I had a reputation for being dope lyrically. I liked Redman better than K-Solo and I told him I think he'll last longer because he's got more personality. K-Solo was dope but he wasn't as broadstroke as Redman was.

 

How come you never aligned yourself with the Hit Squad or Def Squad?

Well by that time, I had a deal already because I was with Eric B and Rakim on MCA.

 

Did you perform at your high school? I've heard about some crazy talent shows at Wyandanch High School with Rakim, Biz and Chill all performing together while they were all still in high school?

I was in charge of the North Babylon talent show. I went to the head of the music department, his name was Mr. Brown, and asked him if we could do some shows at North Babylon and he thought that would be a good idea. Our first performance, I had a live band kind of like The Roots do now. I'll never forget when LL did "I Need a Beat", he lived down the block from me on Deer Lake Drive and he went to a rehearsal with us and he said he thought it was the Treacherous 3 when he first came in. He fell asleep because we were doing underground beats with a lot of melodies. We would sing the choruses and rap the verses. And that is where L got " I Need Love" from, it was a song that we did with the Royal Nation. Well, we changed it around so much so I can't really say that. I would never blow him up like that to the media because not only do I don't think people would believe it but that's a sucka move to publicly say he stole that. He didn't take the song but he kind of got the idea from it -it was like some of the things we were doing in Royal Nation. He went from "I Need A Beat" to "I Need  Love". He came from Queens doing "I Need a Beat shit" and then he came out here fucking with us. He heard us singing hooks and melodies and he picked up his ideas. The whole LL story, he's a great artist and lyricist but it is what it is.

So I did talent shows. The first one was incredible but they made me use more rock bands for the second show. That first show we were the main act. And then a lot of the white cats who were into the rock shit at the time wanted to do their little Pink Floyd thing and they were like 'Can we be down on this show?'

 

I've heard from people like Chuck D, Biz, Parrish that coming out of LI and the suburbs during those early years they had to work extra hard to get any kind of respect at first. Did you find that?

 

I didn't have that problem. I went straight to Brooklyn, had some fights and beat motherfuckers up. I surrounded myself with quality dudes. My mic spoke for me. I didn't have any problem with people disrespecting me or thinking I was a prissy little rich kid-cause I wasn't rich. My mentality wasn't that. I came up with Eric B and Rakim and those cats-quality, street mentality dudes who recognized me for what I was. I never had a problem with anybody saying he was from there. If you listen to any of my records, I never said I'm from Long Island, I'm from Brooklyn or anything, because I knew that that isolated you. It was like putting a black light on you, knowing that people were going to prejudge you anyway. I never gave them that opportunity. It always worked for me to do what I do. I'm an MC. I never put a tag on myself saying I am from one place or another.

 

Overall, how'd you feel about coming up out here?

There were pluses and negatives of being an artist from out here in the era I came up in. The plus was I was around cats whose parents had the money to give them the things you needed like turntables and mixers. I also was able to learn balance and decision-making because it wasn't such a fast-moving place. I had time to learn and mix myself with cultures. I learned a lot musically from the white kids I grew up with because I wanted to hear what they thought was so much better than what I was doing. I had a couple friends who put me on to Led Zeppelin and The Doors. I listened to all that. And one of the first records that I sampled was Jim Morrison. I had a friend named Ben Sandoval who used to lend me this crazy Korg keyboard. My whole band was white. I just gave them the heartbeat of the music and we played and they gave me everything else. The only black guy in the band was this guy Eddie Lake, who was a bass player. So I learned from the people who played instruments.

 

The downside was that everything was happening in the city. I used to have to go to the radio stations in the city but we didn't have no transportation. I'd have to bullshit my mom and pop and borrow the car to go to 'work'. I'd sneak in before they'd go to work. Being in what I call the flatlands. Out here in the flatlands there wasn't really no hip-hop popping like that. You had to go where the shit was happening. I was winning all the rap battles out there. Any time I was in a rap battle, I won it. They had crew battles and rap battles and they would bring in established signed artists to judge. My first battle outside of Long Island was at the Latin Quarter and I battled Big Daddy Kane and I beat Kane, I think it was just before he got signed. Disco Rich was the judge. That was the first time I saw Public Enemy perform. It was a time when the wheels started rolling and I wanted to make my presence felt as an MC because I had been doing it, and this was what I wanted to do. So I went up and battled against anybody who was anybody. Nobody wanted to battle me here. I went to Boston, North Carolina, DC. If I heard about any battle through the street in this town or that town, I would jump on a train or a bus and get there. I won 95% of the time. If I didn't win it was because somebody else was a crowd favorite already. My name started getting in the arena as a battle MC. As I started doing more battles, I realized I had to sharpen my skills in making records because it is a totally different world. I wanted to have the balance. Once we had the "You Gotta Come Out Fresh" thing in 86... people liked it but it was a battle-style record. But through that I met up with some producers in Queens who taught me how to make a record. I had to sit down and really format things. I had books and books of just rhymes. I still got all my rhymes I ever wrote, from the beginning all the way to now.

 

Royal Nation started out with three DJs and four rappers. It was like 8 guys and the first show we ever did was at a place called Studio 109, a rollerskating rink. The promoter's name was Woody and he sent us a limousine. We all dressed the same. We were emulating what the Cold Crush and all the guys in the Bronx were doing-we were just trying to establish that out here. When the crew started breaking up, Eric, the guy in Supreme Force that went by Easy E, was in a crew out here called Casanova Crew and got with me and Curt and we made it the Supreme Force.

 

So there's a legend that Eric B. came out from Queens to Long Island one day looking for you but weren't around and that's when he ends up finding Rakim. What is your version of that story?

 

My version is the truth. Alvin Toney brought Eric to me saying he was doing a record and that he was looking for a rapper. I can call Eric on the phone right now and he'll tell you the same story. He was looking for a rapper and Alvin said there are two guys you need to see. One is Freddie C, which is what they used to call me and the other is Kid Wizard, or Rakim. I was on Straight Path (road that cuts through Wyandanch, near North Babylon-J) and Eric flagged me down on the street. Alvin said 'Yo I want you to meet Eric'. He had this fur coat on and a leather hat. I said 'I'll be home in an hour' and he said 'I'll be by your house in an hour'. I thought he was just another dude coming out here and talking shit about 'I can put you on ' and this and that and I just didn't show up. Something else popped up, ha ha. In the meantime he went to meet Rakim. That's the same story I tell everybody. Rakim says it ain't that way but that's bullshit. That is the real deal. Everybody else don't know. I know, Alvin Toney know, Eric know. Rakim told my brother. My brother was a part of the Five Percent Nation of Islam and he used to be with Ra.

 

Were you ever a Five Percenter? I know in the mid 80s, a lot of people in the area were...

I actually was earlier, before it got popular. They used to see each other and say 'Peace, God'. I did this project called Freddie Kruger-I was hyped on Nightmare on Elm Street. Rakim heard it because my brother had the tape, he gave my brother his number and said 'Tell Freddie to meet me at the village at the barber shop'. I met Rakim up there and he said 'I want to put you out, help you get a record deal'. I had left Supreme Force and I was solo. I ended up going on the road with them as a bodyguard. I did everything, paying my dues. I cut hair, I was a bodyguard, I used to do security. When they were touring on Paid in Full , they had a time I could go out and rhyme to the audience before they'd get on stage.

 

Did you ever get your battle with Rakim?

At that point the battle shit was out of my system. As he became more popular, I respected his work because Rakim is a dope writer and a great artist. He's not no half-assed MC. I always wanted to go against the best. I just thought he was the best and that is what you go after-the best. I think Rakim had a lot of dudes around him that just wanted to capitalize off of what he had accomplished. They just wanted to be down because Ra was making moves. It was new for Wyandanch to have someone that large and popular to come out and make a record that big. No one was making moves here before. I got a lot of flak because a lot of people knew that I was a more diverse MC than him but I didn't make a bigger record than him. When EPMD came out I caught more flak. Like 'Yo, Erick Sermon can't even rhyme and he got a better record than you'. I was getting dissed, not disrespectfully but guys I was cool with were busting my chops. 'As good as you are how did Rakim make a better record than you?' And Erick Sermon and Parrish who both suck as MCs, literally suck. Everybody knew that I was a lyricist. Erick Sermon could never stand on the same stage as me and rhyme. Nobody would listen to him. His beat would have to be so incredible that he would get attention on that alone. But, as an MC, he's garbage. Everybody knew that. Rakim was a different story. He had a whole persona about him. Rakim was like a God out here. He was that high level that you had to reach. The only difference was I loved what hip-hop stood for in repping for the streets. I didn't care to make a commercial record and talk about shit radio wanted to hear. I wanted to make a record I wanted to hear. A lot of the people were afraid of the fact that I was from the street and I'd show up and make people nervous. My size-I was a big guy, they knew I was a fighter. I was different.

 

You ripped shop at that hip-hop boxing thing back in the day, the one where Tim Dog didn't show. Did you ever pursue boxing?

My father used to make me and my brother go in the garage and throw on the gloves. I was bigger and stronger than him but my brother had a lot of heart. My father said 'I don't want you guys to go out on the street and come home beat up'. My father was a big boxing fan. I was raised on Sugar Ray Leonard and Muhammad Ali and guys like that. I always wanted to have my hand skills up. It is something I did to stay in shape. I used to box in Newsday's tournaments or Grumman (airplane manufacturer) used to have tournaments but never professionally.

 

Did you do Golden Gloves?

No, I didn't get the chance to but I would love to have done it. I think what scared me is when I seen Muhammad Ali getting punch drunk. I didn't want to be old and fucked up from getting punched in the head too many times.

 

So you got your name from street fights then?

I punched somebody one time and my hand swelled up and this girl said you got a lot of lumps on your knuckles. I stepped back and said 'Nah he got lumps I got bumps.'

 

Do you feel you've gotten a negative reputation from people being scared of you?
I got a negative reputation once I started rolling with Eric B. and them. Not because I was with them but because they had a stigma about them that when they moved...the whole industry was afraid of them. All the acts, I seen Whodini, Kool Moe Dee's camp, everybody was afraid of them. On the real because they had real fellas with them, real dudes who was gangsters. Like the real 50 Cent. There was a dude named 50 Cent from Brooklyn with us. The 50 Cent that 50 named himself after. This dude was a real notorious gangster, they just did a documentary on him. This 50 that is out now is emulating the concept of this person. He's no real gangsta. The 50 Cent that died was a real gangster. Supreme Magnetic, Killer Ben, all those dudes was with us. These were all Brooklyn cats that were official. (Takes out a picture of the O.G. 50 Cent) That little nigga, if you had a ring on your finger that he wanted, he'd cut your finger off for it. He's not going to tell you to take it off. He bailed somebody out of jail one time to kill him. I knew him. He's on the back cover of the first Eric B. and Rakim album. He's the one kneeling down, next to Kool G Rap.

 

You've called out a lot of names on your records but I've never heard anyone diss you. If anyone, even, say 50 Cent, names somebody in a song they're going to come back at that person. But when you named people in songs they didn't come back at you.

People know the difference between small repercussions and big repercussions.

 

Did Ultramagnetic ever come back at you when you dissed them? 

No. Now I'm cool with them. I think that beef started with a statement he made about my records being wack. This dude is out there. He put on an Elvis wig. Coming from the battle era, my first instinct is to go at you, and I ain't never been subliminal about. That was how you got your reputation. You know they say the truth comes out in jokes. That is what you do. You make it be funny but let it be honest so that the research on it shows that you was valid when you made the statement. So I went at them like I'm going to throw some missiles at them. (Keith) Never said nothing back to me. I saw him in San Francisco, he looked at me a certain way and I was like 'Listen, if you want to take it there you and your little crew can get their asses beat right now' and he was like 'No, I don't want no problem'. No one ever did. Not from N.O.R.E., all these dudes I had problems with, nothing. Since I called him out (on "Inside Your Head", from 2000's Industry Shakedown), you never heard NORE say 'What What' in a song again. Executives in the music business, nothing. I seen Lyor Cohen, he wanted to shake my hand. What are they going to do? If they really want that kind of pressure, the beef don't start 'til I said it, the war ain't over 'til I win. Who wants problems with somebody like that? It ain't that I am using that as a crutch. If you want to come back on the mic and make it an everlasting, fine, 'cause its only going to get better. If I say something about you and you write something back at me, you know I'm going to come back at you. For me it is great. I would love for an MC to step up and do it, but can he stand the rain?  That's a problem. Even to this day, I still get busy. Pete Rock, DJ Premier, all those producers work for me on the strength of respect. I know right now that, of all the MCs from my era, there is not that many that still can get it hot and get that respect. I'm not tooting my own horn. The reason is I never oversaturated the market with myself. Sometimes if you ain't coming out, you're over. Dudes like Kane, who got me my first interview in a magazine, Word Up!... Kane called...I can't remember his name...and said 'Foxxx is my man I need you to shoot an interview with him. Eric B gave me his Rolls Royce and I drove it to the photo shoot. Everything that has been done for me has been about respect. I never had to break off no bread to pay for producers because the top dudes always say 'You workin' on something? I want to be on your album.'

 

Freddie Foxxx still has master tapes for every track he's ever recorded. In a bag.

 

 

To this day, I'm always wanting to be better MC than I was last year. I started becoming a businessman, a producer, doing all these different jobs at one time. I'm like a machine. I wake up in the morning, come right to the studio. Got to leave out of here with at least 2 or 3 songs done. I'm in here all day, all fuckin night doing what I do. I got an apartment in Queens and a house in North Babylon. What I love is my fanbase is now 90% white kids. I been all over the world, Italy, Japan, London, Australia, Germany, 90% backpacking white kids. It took me all the way back to high school when I did those shows. I watched the same similar looking faces. A kid called me from a band called Sweet Justice in California. They want to do a rock version of Industry Shakedown.

 

They want to cover the song?

Nah, the whole album. They want to metal it out. The guy said it was a classic and I said 'I'm with it, let's do it'. I never met him but we've been Mp3ing each other. It's not crazy screaming guitars all over the place. When you're an MC you need spaces in your music to stick into. It's like fitting a hand in a glove. You got five spaces, five fingers. In between those spaces you want to fill up what's there. Music consumes time and space. You have to know where to fill the spaces with your voice and where to fill the spaces with instruments. It has to be a marriage between you and the music.

 

Do you play instruments?

Anything you give me, if I want to get sound of it, I'll get sound of it. I can't read or write music but I know what I want to hear. I got violins, flutes, oboes. In third grade, I was the third top trumpet player in New York state for my age group.

 

People say 'Freddie Foxxx, why is he so angry?' The way that the vocals come across on your tracks sounds angry. Are you angry?

People don't understand the concept of energy. I rap hard. As a kid learning how to play the trumpet, I learned what they call circular breathing, and I rhyme from my stomach. That gives you the bass, so my voice is heavy. When you hear my voice now, talking, it's very soft, mellow and laid back. When I did "The Master", my first single in '89, I did in one take, no punches. Because I knew how to do circular breathing. If you breathe in and out through your nose, you can still talk at the same time. It's something you have to practice. I'm not as good at it as I used to be. People take my energy as anger but I'm not angry. I don't have nothing to be angry about.

 

Well, on certain songs like "Industry Shakedown", for instance, it comes across as anger.

"Industry Shakedown" was about me saying I've been in this business and these people actually believe that if I give them a song I made in my studio, they should make more money then I do. If somebody told you right now, bring me an article for your magazine and everybody buys that magazine because of your article, and they want to give you $10 bucks. And you value your work, put a price on it in your mind. But they diminish that and make it seem like it's not important. And what you did is the substance of their income. Something is wrong there. In the music business, there's savages and leeches and scumbags like Bob Perry and Peter whatever the fuck his name is from BBE. Motherfuckers like that who live off of what you do and have no input other than the fact that they're a label. 'I'll give you a way to put this stuff in the street'. "Industry Shakedown" needed to be made. I made that record so people that want to do what I do can say 'No'. I took a bullet for a lot of people by saying these are the people in the game that you gotta watch out for. Lyor Cohen, Sylvia Rhone.

 

I just had a meeting with Steve Rifkind. He said 'What did I ever do to you to make you diss me on record?' I said 'Steve, I made you famous. You don't realize I gave you your first $30,000. When you wanted to do street promotion your father went to Eric B and said 'Yo you got a new rapper coming out, let us do street promotion'. That artist was me.' He didn't do the work for the money. He probably won't remember that now because he's so rich but at the end of the day it is what it is. Now that he is an established record mogul I don't got no beef with him. I never had no beef with NORE. What I said in my own way is that he is a better MC than always saying what 'What what'. Some of these cats got to do job security. They got to take it to the next level because their fans want to see 'Is he really a gangster like he says he is on his record?' Why don't you respond with a hot rhyme and not a hot ass 9, and we'll see how really good you are as an MC. I'm not a rapper, I'm an MC. To be an MC you got to use words like instruments. I can rap in tune to the music. Some people just rhyme and you hear that same tone over every track. Some dudes don't know how to control their voice levels. If Premier gives me a beat, he won't do the track if I don't rhyme hard. But on other tracks, I rhyme like I'm talking right now. I do on my new ones. You need diversity in this game. I'm not mad. I wake up every morning, kiss a beautiful woman who will make me breakfast, lunch and dinner if I tell her to.

 

You should ask the people who say I'm angry, have you ever met him? People who have the option of doing something with Foxxx, and choose to work with me say 'You know what, I want to see who this guy is. He's probably going to be more helpful to me than harmful.' People who don't do it are usually people who say 'I know I'm a piece of shit, I know I'm going to do something to get my ass kicked so I better not fuck with him because I 'm a piece of shit and I know he's going to find that out.' Those are the kind of people that don't fuck with me. I don't remember the last time I sold equipment. I give it all away. I've built studios for so many people, off of my own shit.

 

Didn't you build yourself a studio at home? You have a pretty serious setup here...

Every house I own has a studio. I come here because I like to feel like I'm coming to work sometimes. I don't like people coming in my house all the time, getting too comfortable. I got a family there. I work at home when I don't feel like coming in here. That's the luxury of being your own boss. I don't always do so great. It's always a struggle for me to continue making music in a pit full of snakes. I know how to fight that.

 

The BBE thing didn't work out...

I was his first experience putting a real hip-hop album out. BBE is not a hip-hop label. I did that because of Pete Rock. Pete Rock was the main producer that was down with Industry Shakedown. Premier, Alchemist, Diamond D were on it but he was...my brother had just died and that album was emotional. When I did Konexion, I wasn't really ready but I needed it to do what I titled it to do-keep me connected. Industry Shakedown was the head, Konexion is the body and American Black Man is the tail. I purposely didn't make Konexion the best album. I kind of downplayed it a little bit.  It's not a wack album but its not better than Shakedown. But it made Industry Shakedown a legendary album. Nobody said that until Konexion came out. So it was all a plan. This new album will be my last. I got a song with Juvenile on there. I connect with guys that I feel are good vibe dudes. I got Kev Brown, Premo, Pete Rock, Alchemist. The same staff from Shakedown but I got a couple of songs that will give people the answers to questions they've always had about me. If you think I'm mad I am going to explain that whole concept of what anger really is. I'm MCing all over this record. When you come up around cats like KRS-ONE and Rakim how could you not?

 

Did you ever record anything with Rakim?

When I was around Rakim he wouldn't do collaborations with nobody. Only R&B artists. He did one with Mobb Deep and Jay-Z later on. He was always protecting himself from people critiquing him against other rappers. If you listen to his verse on the record he did with Jay-Z or Nas' 'New York, New York', it's not better than everybody else. Listen to it. He's dope but he's not the kind of rapper that battles with people.  My view when I get on somebody's record is it's my record. "The Militia," is my record. (Gang Starr) toured for three years off that record because I got on it and made it happen. That record was not hitting like that until I got on it. Every record that I get on, like when I did Wyclef's "Masquerade", I have to take the record. I have to make a stand. I look at every collaboration as a battle. Rappers won't rock with me a lot of times because they know their skills will be questioned.

 

I've heard you've done some ghostwriting for some major cats. What can you say about that?

On the low, I wrote for some of the best. Male and female. I've got a couple of plaques but I signed confidentiality clauses. People want concepts. I try to attack a record with concepts. I've done commercials. At one time I started doing jingles.

 

Any recognizable ones?

I put Big Daddy Kane on a Snickers commercial. Red Lobster. Welch's Grape Jelly. Kentucky Fried Chicken. I taught these people at M&M/Mars to make a commercial sound like a record. People will turn the station when they hear a commercial is on, they don't want to hear it. Make it funky so they don't even know it's a commercial.

 

You call a lot of people out for being fakers, who are some of the fakest and realist people you've dealt with in this business?

There are so many people who in person will tell you I love your shit and then as soon as you walk away there like 'The shit is wack". Money doesn't change people, it just takes their mask off. A lot of these cats change once their financial status changes. They start acting like the people who shitted on them. I've looked people in the face and they say one thing and I already know the answer to the question and they're lying. Premier is one of the realest dudes I ever dealt with in this business. I've seen Premier do a beat so he can give somebody money to pay for a lawyer. Not just anybody but guys in the clique that don't have no money. Premier only messes. The little devil on my shoulder is telling me everybody has their real and fake points. Pete Rock is another one. If he's feeling you, he's feeling you. If he ain't feeling you, he knows how to get away from you. Even me, there's times when I want to kick it with dudes and there's times where I don't.  The only difference between me and them is I answer the phone and say 'Listen, dog, why do you keep calling me?' I think my downfall is I kept it real in a game where folks don't keep it real. When I came into the music business it wasn't about gangster, tough guy shit. I helped initiate that. If you listen to my first album, Freddie Foxxx is Here, I was talking about cutting people with razors in their faces. I also made records like "Ladies Jam". I came from a thing where I played with the band and I was rapping to the girls but I also stressed street shit. Everybody took to the hard stuff right away. I did a song about my sister who passed away from leukemia called "Ain't No Sunshine". Had that been my first single, my career would have went in a different direction. But "The Master" was my first single. But I can still make a record at 40 and people will want to get it because I have a method that I follow and I stay on my pen game.

 

Do you pay attention to all the little developments that go on in hip-hop?

I get calls from rappers when they got beefs. Nas is my man. When Nas and Jay-Z had their beef, he was with me all the time. We had linked back up. I have nothing against Jay-Z. I think he is a cool ass dude. I can tell you that me and my buddy who is cool with Jay-Z are two of the major reasons that they never went to blows. If Nas was going to do something, I was going to do it for him. If Jay-Z was going to do something, my dog Chuck was going to do it for him. Me and Chuck ain't going against each other, so it wasn't going down. People call me up and say 'Dude stuck me up and took my jewelry' and if I'm cool with them. I'll say 'I want to meet with you' and get shit back.

 

You've had to go and transport goods that were jacked from rappers?

If I had enough hands for every time I rapper called me for help when he's got a beef, I'd be a fucking octopus. I've literally had to go to street guys and get very well-known rappers' jewelry back from them and squash it when they're being extorted. I've had to be like 'Yo dude, you're not taking money from this guy.'  And these street dudes respected me and left them alone. There is a way you deal with it where people know you mean business. You don't have to insult their shit. All of this is what hip-hop has become. You have to have a real reputation. I've used my influence to help people get out of trouble that don't really have the heart to do it on their own.

 

I always figured that one day some young motherfucker is going to try to make a name and pop me. Ain't going to be no real nigga that do it. It's going to be some faggot ass dude trying to make a name. Cause he's thinking like me. If you are going to go after somebody, go after somebody you can get your name off of. But he won't live to talk about it. Cause if something happens to me, I got so many soldiers that whoever do it is a wrap. I got that much respect from guys that are my brothers, we talk brother talk. Knowing that I lost a brother, I take that word very serious. It is funny how shallow and weak-minded the new hip-hop audience is. People say 'I killed this nigga', and nobody analyzes it. This shit is not real. You've interviewed a lot of rappers and met with them at their spot, right?

 

Sure.

How many people showed you their gun? (pulls a gun out of a drawer)

 

I've seen a few. No one's pulled it out to show it to me like you're doing right now!

Why wouldn't the rapper say 'I'm a real dude, I keep a gun on me'. If a rapper ain't scared to keep it real, why wouldn't he sit in on the counter and say this is my gun? What, as a journalist, are you going to call the police saying 'Ohmygod, I just saw a gun?' Did 50 Cent show you his gun?

 

He didn't have a gun, he had two security guards with him.

On 50's new album he says 'I never leave to go anywhere without my toast'. That is what he says. It is not the same as saying I'm like Clark Kent, I can fly like Superman. He says I never go anywhere without my gun. And when you interview him, he's got two bodyguards standing there with a fucking reporter. Do you understand what I am saying about this new age?

 

It is not that that's so bad, it's just probably better for corporate America than it is for that artist. People always paint a picture of me as mad, angry, hard, however you want to say it but people who meet say I'm a funny guy. I'm always cracking jokes. Dave Chappelle wanted to have me on his show. I am always working with the WWE on concepts. I do a lot of consulting work when it comes to street stuff. Corporate people want to pick my brain about what's real and what's not. People want my input on how to make this guy sound more realistic. My real friends recognize that. Jerry Butler is a friend of mine, I know Ben E. King, Gene Chandler, "the Duke of Earl". I been on tour with Aretha. I got my education through them. When I meet people like that, I try to pick their brains and talk to them about things that make me more fluent as an artist because I grew up on that shit. I did a show called "The Four Kings of Rhythm and Blues" where I was DJing on stage with people like that, it was a soul revue but I added a hip-hop flavor to it.

You know, Rakim was a saxophone player-he could play his ass off. His aunt was the singer Ruth Brown. His whole family was talented-he had two brothers that played keyboards and sisters that sang.

So, back to your question, who knows what is real and what is fake. My reputation on the street is not made up. But people are more interested in the bad stuff than...they don't care that on Thanksgiving I buy a truckload of turkey and give 'em out to the homeless. Suge Knight did it, they didn't put it on the cover of the newspaper. In hip-hop, we need to learn not only how to gather info but how to regurgitate it. That is why I shy away from interviews. Once you give them the information they turn it around. My downfall is keeping it real. It's something people do for themselves, not anybody else. I got a song called "Sexy Noises" talking about how when you're having sex with a woman, all that screaming she's doing is not really for her, it is to stroke your ego. She can be quiet and feel the same thing. Everybody's got their own rendition of real. I love kids. I love quiet, serene places. I don't like being in the mix of all the BS. I'm not a grimy ass motherfucker taking from people. I am always giving people things. You see this gun. This right here is part of who I am. I want you to understand, I'm a real motherfucker. But I keep it on me everywhere I go. Not because of me but because of the type of people among us. I'm not 50 Cent, I'm not Ja Rule. They do what they do, I do what I do. I was that before I was an MC, and I just kept it where it belongs. When I'm in here, this is my world and I want you to respect my world. I'm sure you do but if you want to know something about Foxxx you get it from the source. You can say Foxxx had a beautiful place, he was a gentleman, he was honest with me about everything. And, oh yeah, he ain't somebody to be fucked with.

 

You use the word cracker a lot in your songs, probably more than any other rapper I'm aware of. What's the difference between a cracker and a white person?

I say the word nigga a lot, too. I am a hip-hop culture guy. I don't see colors, nationalities. But everybody outside that circle, I can label. If you pulled 15 people off the street, I can tell you which of these people is hip-hop and who's not without talking to them. If I say cracker, it's more or less talking to those corporate suit-and-tie motherfuckers with that crack-a-whip mentality. That word comes from when the slaves used to get beat, the whip cracked the back of those slaves. Whip cracker turned into white cracker.  It doesn't necessarily mean a white person. You feel me?  It refers to that slave mentality that a lot of older white people have. It is instilled in some of their children but I think the biggest medicine for that has been hip-hop music because you and I could discuss your background and my background because hip-hop opened that door. You could tell me your nationality and say, 'Yo, in my country, this is what happened.' All because me and you like the same beat. When I use that word in front of a 90% white audience, they understand. It's not them that I am talking to, it's the mentality of corporate America that I am talking to. White crackers with that mentality that everyone is beneath them. I'll give you $200,000 and you make me $2 million. It's still slavery. It ain't only me, it's you too. You know why? Because you mingle with the lower class. Hip-hop is the lower class to corporate America. They use it but they don't have no love for it-it's just a moneymaking opportunity for crackers. All these niggas talking about how nasty they are, they got millions of dollars, but they're buying houses from crackers in crackers neighborhoods.

 

I don't really care for him too much but one of the smartest guys is Russell Simmons. He knows how to play their game. The only thing that Russell did is he kind of dropped his kids off at the babysitter and never picked them up, meaning hip-hop music. He sold it to corporate America and left it to fend for themselves. Now he's coming back in after he did his whole thing with the modeling woman and that whole bullshit but I think he owes hip-hop culture. It made Russell Simmons. Not that he didn't work for it but it has been disappointing. Where is he? Lyor's still around grimy as a motherfucker. Would I consider Lyor a cracker? Nah. Would I consider Ahmet Ertegun a cracker? Yes. I went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame dinner and met him once. The only people there that represented hip-hop was Russell, Busta, Puffy, Wyclef, Chris Lighty and Freddie Foxxx. I was sitting at a table with academy gangsters. Russell came over to me and said, 'What are you doing here?' I was 'Motherfucker, what are you doing here?' Everybody around me was like you don't know Foxxx. But he don't know who you know. It is always a 'big them, little us' relationship with crackers. We have hip-hop culture and knowing about each other that keeps us grounded. And they had rock and roll, rhythm and blues. We know they wasn't bonding cultures because they were sending soul tours out and rock tours out going this way. You got Lawrence Welk, then you got Chuck Berry, Little Richard. But hip-hop ain't like that. Hip-hop is this (crosses fingers together). White, black, Hispanic. Through the fact that we love beats, rhymes, baggy pants, Nikes. When you ever known white boys who wear their pants loose like this before? It happened with hip-hop. Before that it was Lee jeans, with the wallet with the chains hanging down, "Disco sucks" on the shirt. The Pagans, Alphas-I was fighting all of them dudes, man. Racial riots in North Babylon High School were running amok when I was there. You know how you get best-dressed awards and all that in school? I won an award for "Most Soul" in a school with more white kids than black and they gave me a calendar of Michael Jackson for a present. North Babylon High was one of the most racist places. The teachers were racist, the kids who went there were racist. The black kids were in one lunchroom, the white kids were in another. This guy Mr. Cunio went from a shop teacher one year to a principal the next year. He used to organize those riots against us. He used to pull the fire alarm and all the white kids gallop out across the streets with bats and when the black kids come out they attack. White t-shirts, red bandanas, blue jeans, boots and if there was a fight, it was on. We all got on shelltoe Adidas, Kangols, we trying to dress to impress and still we under attack.

 

When I seen "King of Rock" came out, meshing rock with hip-hop is when I started seeing it (white kids acting black). There is something about that rock guitar that locks you white kids in. It is like the flute to the mouse.

 

 

For an abbreviated version of this interview, visit: www.spitkickers.com/spitmag/vol4-issue454/