Latest / The Right Time with Bomani Jones / DJ Wally Sparks on When Rap Had Regional Identity, The Rise of Southern Singles, Bone Thugs Underrated? | 02.17

Transcript

DJ Wally Sparks on When Rap Had Regional Identity, The Rise of Southern Singles, Bone Thugs Underrated? | 02.17 · The Right Time with Bomani Jones

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time.
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: A wave original. My name is Beaumontie Jones. Thanks for
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: listening wherever you get your podcast. Thanks for watching us
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: on YouTube. Subscribe, like, rate us, review us, give us
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: five stars. You only give us four stars. I'm inclined
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: to believe you are a hater. It is Time Machine Tuesday.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: We have got our second installment on our series on
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: the year 1996 in hip hop. My man Jason England
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: joined us for episode one. He'll be back with two
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: more episodes. We got six on the books so far.
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: If we think of more, we may do more. But
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: join me for the other half of it. Check my
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: man out. Check him out on Twitch, twitch.tv slash DJ
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: Wally Sparks. He is, in fact, my favorite DJ, as
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: the shirt may indicate. Wally Sparks from Atlanta, well, from Chattanooga,
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: coming to us live from Atlanta.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: What's going on, brother?
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: What's happening? What's going on, bro?
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: So first of all, I want to make sure everybody
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: knows this. Wally's been a member of this community now, shit, man,
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: it's about 15 years. We go back to Morning Jones time.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: Wally was Big Crit's Turrent DJ. You can catch him
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: all over social, whatever it is. One of the most,
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: first of all, cold-ass DJ, but also one of the
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: most knowledgeable people that I know when it comes to music,
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: big picture and small, how it works in actual application,
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: big theory type stuff, all of that. So I'm glad
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: that we got this opportunity to jump on here.
• 1:23
  Speaker 3: Man, I'm happy to be here, bro.
• 1:24
  Speaker 4: I mean, you know, this is a The first time
• 1:27
  Speaker 4: we get to do this in this kind of setting.
• 1:29
  Speaker 3: But, you know, me and you, we talk about music
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: like this all the time, bro. Yeah, right, right.
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: Let's say, like, normally one big conclave once a year.
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying? Yeah.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Post up and go through it. So, no, this is
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: going to be good.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: And this episode I've been looking forward to because I
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: think there are three years in particular that when people
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: talk about, like, great years in the history of rap.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: The three that typically jump out are 88, 94, and 96.
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: There are others certainly, like in doing this, what I
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: realized was 95 and 97 really underrated because 96 is
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: in the middle and 94 is on the front end, right?
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: But when we do that, we typically think about it
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: in terms of albums and you can go through and
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: run through all the great albums that came out. 88,
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  Speaker 2: you talk about Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: Us Back, Straight Outta Compton, Great Adventures of Slick Rick,
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: you know, more than you can get to, but that's
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: the way that we typically do it there. 94, you
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: talk about Illmatic, you talk about Ready to Die, you
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: talk about The Diary, you talk about There's a Dark Side,
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: you got.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: All those to run through.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: 96, it's a zillion of them that we're going to
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: get to in later episodes, but what is often lost
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: when we do this is, 96 was a year for
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: bomb singles. And very often singles from people whose albums
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: we're not going to talk about that much in the series.
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: So there's going to be some overlap in that, certainly.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: But when I went through 96 and I started like
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: you typically would, I started going through the albums and
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: then I was going through the albums and being like, OK,
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: I didn't love this album, but this one got a
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: jam on it. Oh, this one got a jam on it.
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: And you still work in the trade. You still in
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: the trenches. You actually still know who the young people are. Um,
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: but you tell me if I'm wrong here, I feel like,
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: and this is not like, uh, it was better in
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: my day thing. This is really more of a kind
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: of structural assessment of the game that the role of
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: a single is completely different, right? Like we're going to
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: talk about people that only got one song that you've
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: ever heard of. And I don't think anybody could really
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: break through with just one song like that anymore.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: So singles back in, in those days and like the
• 3:28
  Speaker 4: mid nineties in particular, they were kind.
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  Speaker 3: Of utilized as a tool to sell an album. You
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: know what I'm saying?
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  Speaker 4: Like an album wasn't going to, I might not even
• 3:37
  Speaker 4: get made if the single wasn't, didn't perform the way
• 3:40
  Speaker 4: it needed to. So in effect, the way that singles were,
• 3:46
  Speaker 4: you know, utilized as sort of a tool back then
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  Speaker 4: is completely different from how it is now. Like now
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  Speaker 4: artists can throw 10 songs, just 10, just random songs
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  Speaker 4: on the internet.
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  Speaker 3: Until something sticks. You know what I'm saying? And that
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  Speaker 3: wasn't the case.
• 4:04
  Speaker 4: I mean, you know, and the way music is made, uh,
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: now versus then, uh, the, uh, the consumption, the time
• 4:12
  Speaker 4: and effort that it took to make records and actually
• 4:14
  Speaker 4: put them out back then versus the, the speed and, uh,
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  Speaker 4: ease of, of how it can be done now is
• 4:23
  Speaker 4: completely different. So yeah, I mean, singles don't even really
• 4:26
  Speaker 4: function in the way that they used to now, uh,
• 4:30
  Speaker 4: you know, a single was, was meant to be a
• 4:33
  Speaker 4: sort of a introduction and, and singles back then, bro,
• 4:39
  Speaker 4: you had, that had to be your best song. Your, your,
• 4:42
  Speaker 4: your best foot had to come forward. Nowadays, you can
• 4:44
  Speaker 4: just make you, you could make a song today, say,
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  Speaker 4: my name is Bo money and I like to rap
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  Speaker 4: and put it on the internet and somebody might like it.
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  Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
• 4:54
  Speaker 4: And you can, and you can, and in effect, you know,
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  Speaker 4: use that to become a recording artist. And that's just,
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  Speaker 4: you know, that wasn't the case back then. You know,
• 5:02
  Speaker 4: it was, it was a completely different ballgame back then.
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  Speaker 2: And it was a different presence and role of various
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: levels of gatekeeping. And in this case, I mean, gatekeeping
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: in a very positive way, right? The radio had not
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: yet be fallen under the control totally of the record
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: labels and the companies that rate, like it was not,
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: pay on has always been in effect in some level
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  Speaker 2: in radio, but it was, What it is now and
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: what it has been really for, I would argue, the
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: last 15 to 20 years, it was not there.
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: The DJ's role was.
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  Speaker 2: To reinforce the single and the role of radio as
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  Speaker 2: a platform also became a reinforcement of a single, which
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: then became something that people generally shared.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: And this is a very important point.
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: It wasn't required to jump off immediately and everywhere immediately.
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  Speaker 2: You had a slow bird of how things went. You
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: had things that some of them went national. Some of
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: them didn't, right? But it could be a big enough
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: hit in one place that it might turn up in
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: a DJ set at a club somewhere else.
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: And you're like, oh, snap, what's this?
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: Also, an entity that I don't think we talk about
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  Speaker 2: nearly enough, which is BET's Rap City. We talk a
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: lot about the history of Yo! MTV Raps, but BET
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  Speaker 2: Rap City is, was every day and became a radio
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  Speaker 2: station of sorts with all the stuff that quite honestly
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: you couldn't even necessarily hear on the radio but reinforced
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: the singles as they were coming.
• 6:25
  Speaker 4: Out yeah i mean the way the way rap city
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  Speaker 4: was moving back then it kind of even forced mtv
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  Speaker 4: to start doing a daily rap show because you know
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: you know we had you on tv raps the saturday
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  Speaker 4: uh you know uh you know, a show for lack
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: of a better term, but then all of a sudden
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  Speaker 4: we had UNTV raps today, you know what I mean?
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: And I think because a.
• 6:46
  Speaker 4: Rap city was, uh, they were sort of ahead of, uh,
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  Speaker 4: ahead of the curve and giving a national spotlight to
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  Speaker 4: things that were outside of the, the, uh, typical New York, LA, uh, based, uh,
• 7:00
  Speaker 4: hip hop music. So, uh, you know, that kind of
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  Speaker 4: in effect forced the rest of the country to wake
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  Speaker 4: up to what was going on.
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  Speaker 3: Like, and they, they, they being.
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  Speaker 4: BET were sort of acting like tastemakers and, you know, like, Hey,
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  Speaker 4: we've gone to these places. And, you know, BET, BET,
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  Speaker 4: especially back then when it was based in D.C., was
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  Speaker 4: like very, very heavily entrenched into like HBCU culture.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 4: And as you know, most HBCUs are concentrated in the
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  Speaker 4: southeastern part of the United States.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: Right.
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  Speaker 4: So BET would, you know, send people out to all these,
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  Speaker 4: you know, these schools and they would hear these records
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  Speaker 4: that are going crazy in, you know, Atlanta and Alabama
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  Speaker 4: and Mississippi. that no one's ever heard of, but all,
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  Speaker 4: all of these, all of these kids know, know these records.
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  Speaker 4: They know these songs word for word, and they clearly are,
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  Speaker 4: are effective in there.
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  Speaker 3: That something, something, there's something to it.
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  Speaker 4: So we're going to go back and we're going to
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  Speaker 4: tell the world, Hey, this is what's going on for
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  Speaker 4: the rest.
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  Speaker 3: Of the country.
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  Speaker 4: And, and that, that was a way for, to, to
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  Speaker 4: make singles, you know, be stronger, you know, and, uh
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  Speaker 4: yeah man it's just uh it was a a good
• 8:22
  Speaker 4: time to be you know a music fan and just
• 8:27
  Speaker 4: regional music is just was it was it was way
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  Speaker 4: different back then than it is now.
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah i was gonna say it was this is kind
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: of a sweet spot here because it's really right before
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: the idea of like going national, I feel like 97,
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: 98 is when this really starts, like what your potential
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: was for getting large. Not like, obviously, Hammer had sold
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: a gazillion records already, right? Dre and other, it's not
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: that people had not sold records, but it was still
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: a regional game by and large, right? Like now- Where
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: you're from doesn't mean anything at all, I don't think,
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: in terms of where.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: Your music is going or whatever else. It didn't require it.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: People were still products of scenes, right? Like, this is
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: what we're doing over here. This is what the stuff
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: sounds like. And you would know about stuff because your
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: cousin from wherever happened to come back with something, right?
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: Or BET, which kind of nationalized the platform in a
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: lot of ways.
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  Speaker 3: Like, I'm from Houston.
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: Why would I ever hear a Mobb Deep record?
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: Why?
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Where I was.
• 9:21
  Speaker 5: Right, right.
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: Who's doing this? Who's doing this? And then on the
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: other side, why do you know anything?
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: Like, the Ghetto Boys got nationally famous because they became controversial, right?
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: And then they became a thing that, you know, that
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: everybody knew. But otherwise, why would you know who these
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: people were, right?
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: There was no reason.
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: Like, Scarface was a really big deal among people who knew, but...
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: But still, he belonged to us still. And I think
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: that it was something dope about the fact that in
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: all these places, there were still very distinct, different sounds
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  Speaker 2: that existed, not just for regions, not just for states, cities,
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: even neighborhoods.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: Like Houston, by.
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: The time you get to the end of the decade,
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: the North Side and the South Side have their own
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: sounds and scenes, right? And they get national as it goes.
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: And so that's the environment that we're describing here.
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: And you know what's another thing about that?
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  Speaker 4: The artists themselves did not want to do anything outside
• 10:10
  Speaker 4: of the scene that they were in.
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: You know what I mean? That's the thing. Those artists
• 10:17
  Speaker 4: that were making all this music typically didn't have any
• 10:20
  Speaker 4: desires to be, I mean, sure, you know, everybody wants to,
• 10:24
  Speaker 4: you know, be famous.
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: Everybody wants to rule the world, as Tears for Fears
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: would say.
• 10:28
  Speaker 4: But, you know, a guy that's making bass music wants
• 10:33
  Speaker 4: to make music for the people that like bass music.
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: And if it goes national, great. But if it don't,
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: I'm fine. You know what I mean?
• 10:42
  Speaker 4: And that is a complete difference about the way things
• 10:45
  Speaker 4: were in back then in the mid-90s versus how they
• 10:49
  Speaker 4: are now.
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and so with that as the backdrop, it was
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: a lot.
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: Of cold ass songs that came out in 1996, right?
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: And it was interesting because when I did this, I
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: hadn't thought about this.
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: You started like actually DJing in 97, but like, you know,
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: just also... being a DJ was not quite what it
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: is right now. I'm just going to be a DJ
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: and see how it goes. It's not really the, you
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: had to, you had to make a significant, multiple significant
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: capital investments.
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah.
• 11:21
  Speaker 4: Heavy equipment investments. The real investment was time. That was
• 11:25
  Speaker 4: the real investment. Cause one, you gotta, you gotta save,
• 11:30
  Speaker 4: you gotta do something to save money, to get the gear.
• 11:33
  Speaker 4: You gotta get the gear. You gotta learn the gear.
• 11:36
  Speaker 4: And if the only thing you can do, the only
• 11:38
  Speaker 4: thing you can do, the only way you can use
• 11:40
  Speaker 4: the gear, pardon me, is to go buy a bunch
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: of vinyl. So you got to go shop for a
• 11:45
  Speaker 4: bunch of vinyl. And then you got to, you know,
• 11:48
  Speaker 4: you got to, you got to learn the music. And
• 11:50
  Speaker 4: it was, it was a, it was a, it was
• 11:52
  Speaker 4: a full on investment. Like back then, if you wanted to,
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: there was no, there was no like, you know, Hey,
• 11:57
  Speaker 4: you know what? I think I want to DJ. It
• 11:58
  Speaker 4: looks cool on TikTok. So I'm just going to go
• 12:00
  Speaker 4: buy me a $ 300 controller and find somebody to give
• 12:03
  Speaker 4: me a hard drive full of music.
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: And I'm a DJ. No, sir.
• 12:06
  Speaker 4: That was not the case in 1997. If that was
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: something that you really wanted to do, you had to
• 12:12
  Speaker 4: be like, I really, really, really want to do this
• 12:16
  Speaker 4: because this is going to take a serious, serious commitment,
• 12:21
  Speaker 4: especially back then, man. There were multiple steps that needed
• 12:25
  Speaker 4: to happen in order for you to even become a hobbyist,
• 12:29
  Speaker 4: not even just a professional.
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean? Right. You had to really
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: want to do it.
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: Now, I'm curious, because you were in Chattanooga, and I
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: am curious as to what sounds and scenes were getting
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: to you. Because I feel like in Houston, a lot
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: of Louisiana stuff would get to us.
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: A bit of, there's always been an interesting Houston-Memphis interplay
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: there in terms of stuff.
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: That got there.
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: But like, I guess I'm asking in the context of
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: beyond what was on big national radio that everybody would hear. Like,
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: Chattanooga seems like the sort of place that would get
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: a lot. Like, my boy makes a point about Memphis.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: Not Memphis, about Jackson. That Jackson is maybe like the
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: one place in the South that got a piece of everything.
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: Because it was so centrally located that they got a
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: bit of everything. Chattanooga feels like heavy Atlanta, heavy Memphis.
• 13:18
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's pretty much, those are the two main ones.
• 13:20
  Speaker 4: But we got a little piece of everything too. But
• 13:24
  Speaker 4: the direct influence just by via geography was Atlanta. We had,
• 13:29
  Speaker 4: because Atlanta's about 88 miles away from Chattanooga. Chattanooga's right
• 13:33
  Speaker 4: on the Georgia line, the Tennessee-Georgia line. But Memphis, because
• 13:39
  Speaker 4: was a really, really heavy influence on what music came
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: through Chattanooga because of.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: A few things there was a.
• 13:51
  Speaker 4: There was a a pipeline of of kids uh in
• 13:55
  Speaker 4: chattanooga that got sent to job core and job core
• 13:58
  Speaker 4: was in memphis and they would they would go to
• 14:00
  Speaker 4: job core and they would bring back the the dj
• 14:04
  Speaker 4: squeaky the the skinny pimp the the early early ball
• 14:07
  Speaker 4: and g you know the the scott face al capone
• 14:10
  Speaker 4: all that kind of stuff they bring all that stuff
• 14:11
  Speaker 4: back and then you know we had uh people in Atlanta,
• 14:15
  Speaker 4: the people that were actually making that music when they were,
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: you know, making their rounds, trying to go promote, they
• 14:19
  Speaker 4: would always come to, uh, Chattanooga to promote their, uh,
• 14:23
  Speaker 4: promote their music. And, uh, one that we had a
• 14:27
  Speaker 4: record store that I actually used to work in, uh,
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: a place called cats music. They were one of the, uh,
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: they were one of, uh, three, uh, independent music retailers
• 14:38
  Speaker 4: that had deals with these two distributors, Selecto Hits and SMD,
• 14:43
  Speaker 4: Southern Music Distribution. Almost every independent album from the South
• 14:47
  Speaker 4: that came out from the 90s up until maybe into
• 14:51
  Speaker 4: the early to mid-2000s was either distributed by Selecto Hits
• 14:55
  Speaker 4: or Southern Music Distribution.
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: I'm talking about all of them.
• 14:58
  Speaker 4: All that music was always coming into Chattanooga because all
• 15:03
  Speaker 4: those people were trying to sell it outside of their, uh, their, uh,
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: whatever their locale was. So, and then, uh, the Florida stuff,
• 15:14
  Speaker 4: a lot of, a lot of that would creep into
• 15:16
  Speaker 4: Chattanooga too. Like, you know, um, especially when, uh, the
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: base scene, um, base, I mean like car base. So like, uh,
• 15:26
  Speaker 4: the DJ Magic mics and the MC80s and all that
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: kind of stuff, that stuff would find its way to
• 15:30
  Speaker 4: Shadow No. 2.
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: Gotcha.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: And Atlanta, they listen to everything.
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: I think that's a very difficult thing to explain to
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: people that it is, especially considering it's such like, it's
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: its own hub or whatever, but like, I think in
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: part because of the location of the colleges. Everything makes
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: a run through Atlanta. I got to Atlanta in 97,
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: and that had to be a hard place to DJ, man,
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: because you got to have a little of everything prepared.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: Where my people from Colorado at?
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: I mean, they weren't going that specific, but you needed
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: to make sure that you was hollering at everybody, and
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: all these cats were starting to move to Atlanta now,
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: like the actual factual rappers, right? That's where it's going,
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: and I want to start kind of talking about that
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: Atlanta area in this, and There were so many songs
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: I remember getting to Atlanta in like 97 and being like,
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: oh man. there's a lot of one-off just fun at
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: the party songs that I had never given a whole
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: lot of thought to, but I feel like 96 in
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: some ways is kind of the end of the era
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: where like various base scenes just kind of existed by themselves.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: There was no expectation that anybody had to be a
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: great rapper, but like, as you and I were going
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: through and listening songs from this time, like Freak Nasty
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: to dip, that was the jail, right? Like, like that
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: was the thing. That was the thing in Houston too.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: But like, You don't really have songs like that quite
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: pop up that much after this, but it's a significant
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: part of the fabric of the year 1996.
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, man. Records like that and records.
• 16:56
  Speaker 4: That was the year that the first So So Def
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: Bass All-Stars compilation came out. I know we'll talk about
• 17:01
  Speaker 4: albums later on, but one of the big records from
• 17:04
  Speaker 4: that compilation was a free kid by this dude named
• 17:07
  Speaker 4: Lathan who kind of got pigeonholed into a bass artist.
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: He kind of wanted to be... He was... really a
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: neo-soul artist. Oh, I did not know that.
• 17:19
  Speaker 4: For a long time, he kind of resisted the Freaky
• 17:23
  Speaker 4: record because the record got so big and people just
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: kind of typecast him as a bass artist and he
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: was not. His album's actually pretty good if you ever
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: get a chance. I mean, it's going to be hard
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: to find, but it wasn't that bad. Anyway, the bass
• 17:36
  Speaker 4: music of that time, it was a time period where
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: those records still meant something. but, and they, and, and,
• 17:45
  Speaker 4: and they serve, they serve the purpose, you know, they, they,
• 17:47
  Speaker 4: you know, that, that is party music and it's intended
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: to be party too.
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: And it still, it still serves its primary purpose like that.
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: But it was also, it was also kind of transitioning
• 18:00
  Speaker 4: out because, you know, by this time, Freaknik had kind
• 18:04
  Speaker 4: of changed.
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 18:07
  Speaker 4: And the, the music that was a Freaknik was that
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: type of the, you know, the, the bass booty shake
• 18:14
  Speaker 4: type joints, you know, the 130 BPM records or whatever.
• 18:20
  Speaker 4: And as Freak Nick was changing, that music started, started
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: to kind of fade out. And then there was like a,
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: there was a, I think, I graduated high school in
• 18:33
  Speaker 4: 96 and a big transition from that time from like the,
• 18:38
  Speaker 4: you know, the dip and, you know, uh, Daisy Dukes
• 18:41
  Speaker 4: and all those records from that era. There was, this
• 18:44
  Speaker 4: is when little John first kind of came into, uh,
• 18:47
  Speaker 4: you know, his first like record as a, as a
• 18:49
  Speaker 4: solo act. Well, I mean, it was, um, it was
• 18:54
  Speaker 4: who you with came out in 96 and that was
• 18:57
  Speaker 4: like a sort of like a disruptor. Cause it, it's, it,
• 19:01
  Speaker 4: it did what bass records already had done. It served
• 19:04
  Speaker 4: the purpose of cranking the party up. But it was
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: not a bass record by any means. It was way slower,
• 19:11
  Speaker 4: but it still was fast enough to be danceable.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: Memphis has entered the chat.
• 19:17
  Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying?
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: It kind of held the same energy.
• 19:24
  Speaker 4: It had the same energy as the dip, but it
• 19:27
  Speaker 4: also had the same energy as to the club up.
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 19:30
  Speaker 4: And it was like this whole, this like hodge, this hybrid,
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: this hodgepodge of these, you know, completely different types of music,
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: like conversion into this one thing. And the, the, the
• 19:42
  Speaker 4: little John version of Kronk music kind of started right there.
• 19:46
  Speaker 4: It was kind of like the foundation of it. I
• 19:49
  Speaker 4: actually got this, I got the cassette single.
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I just want to run through some of
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: the songs that fit this description, like just kind of
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: in this zone, right?
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: From 96. 96. Freak Nasty to Dip came out in 96.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: Latham Freakin' came out in 96.
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: Scarred by Luke comes out in 96. The introduction to
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: Trick Daddy, which honestly took me years to recognize that
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: that is what had happened there. Quad City DJs, Come On,
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: Ride the Train came out that year. Now look, They
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: not all my favorite songs, but I do know that
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: once I started going to parties where they was playing them,
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: I started to appreciate them in.
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: A slightly different way.
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: No, but like the song that exists strictly for the
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: party really phases out as we get to the end
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: of the 90s, right? You didn't even have to stay
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: in the South to talk about things that fit this description.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: DJ Kool, let me clear my throat. I feel like
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: I heard it every party that I have ever been to.
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: And by the way, I guess. Like, if that's what
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: we're doing, cool.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: Throw it up there. But it goes and it works
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: every time.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: I can only put it in your mouth, which I
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: don't think is necessarily in the same category, but.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: It kind of is.
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, because you rarely hear that record outside of a party.
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 21:04
  Speaker 4: Ain't nobody jamming that. You know what I'm saying? Like,
• 21:07
  Speaker 4: you're going to be riding around talking about, you know,
• 21:09
  Speaker 4: put it in my mouth. I don't know about that.
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 21:12
  Speaker 4: But if you hear it in a, you know, you
• 21:14
  Speaker 4: hear it through some loud ass speakers in a club
• 21:16
  Speaker 4: and see what the women doing, you'd be like, okay,
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: all right. I can accept it in this scenario.
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: Hold on now.
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: Not simply what they doing. The beauty of that song
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: is it smokes them out. there are songs that come
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: out every now and then that smoke them out, right? Like,
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: you don't really know what time it is. You don't
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: know what she about. And if you pay enough attention,
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: it's going to smoke them out. It is not simply
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: with that song about if they getting down with it, dancing.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: It's about, is that girl's part your part?
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: And if it is, she's been smoked out.
• 21:52
  Speaker 5: Yeah. Yeah.
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: We done learned something about you.
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: Yep. Yep. But I can't think of one time in
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: my life that I've heard that song anywhere other than
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: the club. And every time, it's wild because it's like,
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: he sound like he sound. It's not like this is
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: some super duper like danceable beat, whatever it is, but
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: it existed strictly for the club.
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 22:16
  Speaker 4: I low-key think that record, I think DJs just kind
• 22:18
  Speaker 4: of started playing it. I don't know this to be
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: a fact, but I just think DJs just started playing
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: that record because it was so outrageous.
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: And.
• 22:28
  Speaker 4: and then it kind of took a life of his own,
• 22:30
  Speaker 4: you know, because as you just, as you just, you know,
• 22:33
  Speaker 4: mentioned that record should not work in the club, but
• 22:38
  Speaker 4: it does, you know, but, but, but who knows, man, like,
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: you know, it's, it's, it's everything about that record and
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: what you would think a club record would be is
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: completely different. You know, it's a old soul sample. The
• 22:52
  Speaker 4: drums are a rim shots. You know what I'm saying?
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: It's this dude gargling on a song. You know what
• 23:01
  Speaker 4: I'm saying? And there's a woman singing for, you know,
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: a whole verse about, you know, what she's singing about.
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: And then, you know, it seems like that song should
• 23:13
  Speaker 4: not work, but man. Does it work like a charm?
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: Like a charm. Like a charm.
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: And I think when I ran through that list, I
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: may have skipped it, but the Ghost Town DJs by
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: Boo came out that year too. And that, the internet
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: gave that a resurgence. It feels like six or seven
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: years ago.
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: But I remember when that came.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: Out, I was like, ooh, this is perfect.
• 23:32
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: That's one of the ones where you hear it, you
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: immediately know, like, this record is going to be around forever.
• 23:39
  Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying? As soon as you hear it, like,
• 23:42
  Speaker 4: this record is never going away. And that's just like
• 23:45
  Speaker 4: one of those perfect storms where, you know, it was,
• 23:48
  Speaker 4: it was an immediate feeling. I remember, I remember the
• 23:51
  Speaker 4: first time I heard that song, I was like, yep, this, this,
• 23:55
  Speaker 4: this record is going to be a gigantic smash. And it,
• 23:59
  Speaker 4: it was, and it wasn't like, cause it eventually became
• 24:02
  Speaker 4: like a big record and it got a lot of
• 24:03
  Speaker 4: love of nationally via radio. But that record was around.
• 24:07
  Speaker 4: It took, it took a while for it to break nationally, but,
• 24:10
  Speaker 4: but where, where it, came where.
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: You know, where it started, it was immediate.
• 24:16
  Speaker 4: You know, as soon as people heard it, they was like, oh,
• 24:19
  Speaker 4: I remember one of my cousins, first time she heard it,
• 24:23
  Speaker 4: she was like, oh, this is my new favorite song.
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: Like, immediately. You know what I'm saying?
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: And also, talking about the South stuff, separate from club
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: stuff also, this is when the South, like, people still
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: hadn't got wise.
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: They had gotten wise to a couple of camps, right?
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: Like people were obviously very aware of what Rap-A-Lot was
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: talking about. People had become aware of the Dungeon family.
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: But by and large, though, the South was still kind
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: of an untapped situation and still really did not have any, like,
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: grand ambitions for national stardom. That was not in the cards.
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: It was serve the audience that you have, right? We
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: make these songs for each other. They don't even respect
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: us like that.
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: No way.
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: 96 is the year. And like, look, like Elevators comes
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: out that year. And I think we'll talk more about
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: that when we get to Outkast, right? So like there
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: was a, it was a wide range of what the
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: South was bringing, but that's also the year that when
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: you get out here, you getting stuff like Mystical's Here
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: I Go, Tila's Shown Up. 8-Ball to MJG, Space Age pimping, right? UNLV,
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: drag them in the river. That's the cash money breakout
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: for us before it gets to everywhere else. We're going
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: to do an episode later about what the South was
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: becoming in an album standpoint. But it feels like as
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: not just little different dots on the map, like truly regionally,
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: the South was really, really starting to take shape and
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: form when we get to 96.
• 25:58
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, I agree. It was definitely like a
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: foundational time. And to your point where a lot of
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: these recording artists were super serving their audience and weren't
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: really particularly keen on trying to make things that were
• 26:16
  Speaker 4: going to break out nationally. I think that is a lesson,
• 26:22
  Speaker 4: like a foundational lesson in marketing.
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: Like, bro, find the people that fuck with you and
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: give them what they want.
• 26:30
  Speaker 4: And you will have long-time support. That's the key to longevity, man.
• 26:37
  Speaker 4: You find out what, you know, they buying what you're selling.
• 26:42
  Speaker 4: Keep selling it, Jack.
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: So this is a run, like 96, we'll talk later
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: about Riding Dirty when that comes out, but that's like
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: album three of UGK, super serving the audience they have.
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: That being the big example, obviously, that jumps out to people.
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: Master P, he turned a West Coast operation into a
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: down South operation.
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: Yes, he did.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: In terms of singles in 96 that I think are.
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: Important, break them off something that's so important, because look,
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: Bout It, Bout It, I don't know what it was
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: for everybody else in the world, but Bout It, Bout It,
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: the world was one way, and then Bout It, Bout
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: It came out, and then the.
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: World was a different way, right?
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: Like, we never heard anything that sounded like, that was the, yo,
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: have you heard this song?
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: Like, it was like people trying to- It was that beat.
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like, it wasn't as completely different as like Bombs
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: Over Baghdad was, where I spent days trying to figure
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: that out.
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: But that beat and it starts immediately like.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: There's no build up into it that synthesizer goes right
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: off the top and you're like yo what's going on
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: but I didn't give no thought to whether or not
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: those people were making any more music like that was
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: right right like that wasn't they didn't make me want
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: to hear more it was just like wow what an
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: amazing song they have Ice Cream Man album which I
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: don't fuck with but it has Break Em Off something
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: which I.
• 27:56
  Speaker 4: Do fuck with heavily that's a great record that's one
• 28:01
  Speaker 4: That's one of Pimp C and Bum B's best verses.
• 28:05
  Speaker 4: It's probably P's best verse too, actually. You know what
• 28:08
  Speaker 4: I'm saying? Just from P as a rapper. Think what
• 28:12
  Speaker 4: you will of him as a rapper and people have thoughts.
• 28:17
  Speaker 4: But as far as him actually rhyming on a song,
• 28:22
  Speaker 4: that's probably one of his best performances as a rapper.
• 28:25
  Speaker 4: That song is a damn near perfect song, bro.
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: It's a.
• 28:31
  Speaker 4: And again, that's one of those songs that when you
• 28:34
  Speaker 4: hear it, you understand it immediately.
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
• 28:38
  Speaker 4: So it was, it's, it's, it's great to, it's, it's,
• 28:41
  Speaker 4: it's one of those things that stands out even now, like, uh,
• 28:44
  Speaker 4: you know, 30 years later, uh, when I, when I'm
• 28:49
  Speaker 4: out and I'm, I'm in front of people, you know,
• 28:51
  Speaker 4: from my era or that are familiar with, uh, with,
• 28:54
  Speaker 4: you know, that time period, when I play that song,
• 28:58
  Speaker 4: the reaction is same.
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: As it was way back when.
• 29:03
  Speaker 4: As soon as you hear that bass line, everybody's.
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: Like, hell yeah.
• 29:10
  Speaker 4: And then when P come in, everybody knows Hustler, Baller, Gangsta, Catfiller,
• 29:16
  Speaker 4: who I be.
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: And everybody knows who he is.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: And also, it is important to note that Ice Cream
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: Man comes out three months before Riding Dirty comes out.
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: The reason I think break them off. So it might've
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: been a ride dirty throwaway.
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: It would shock me.
• 29:35
  Speaker 4: You know, you know, p i mean uh pmc produced
• 29:38
  Speaker 4: uh break them off something yeah.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: The reason i and it does not fit on ride
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: dirty nah it's true right like there's not there is
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: not yeah there's not a space on it but the
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: reason i bring that up is And again, we'll talk
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: more as this goes on, but we did our episode,
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: 96 is the year of Tupac. Tupac was the MVP
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: of 1996. But if we treated this like football, you
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: got the MVP, you got the offensive player of the year.
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: I feel like Black Thought and.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: Bum B were in a serious battle. At the very least,
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: Bum B came in. Bum B wasn't the most improved
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: player of that year. And that verse right there was
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: the first sign that, oh, this is going to be better.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: This is going to be something different. Because, you know,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: that's how these G's be. We three, me, C, and.
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: Master P sipping all genie kiwi. Which, by the way,
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: sounds disgusting.
• 30:31
  Speaker 3: Jenny Kiwi, that might not be what you want, brother.
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: He ripped that verse.
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: Everybody has an iconic verse for who they were in
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: the game and in the space. A.K.A.
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: Hit the wall, told the stuff out the fucking bed. Okay.
• 30:46
  Speaker 3: That man said, tomorrow I got caught, I ain't gonna go. Like,
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: what you talking about, brother?
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: Coming off the rim, let me sit this shit straight.
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: Let me lay down the rules.
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: If that bitch is talking shit, then that bitch gonna
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: have to snooze.
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: Boy, you can't beat that with a bat, man. I'm
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: telling you. That's what I'm saying.
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: So this is like, a song like that just drops.
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: And the thing about that is, nobody was really playing
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: the masterpiece stuff on the radio, right?
• 31:14
  Speaker 3: No, no.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: You see the videos, right? But it built and it
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: got around.
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: And I think that where you would hear something like
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: that on the radio is where some dude got a
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: show Saturday night from 10 to 11. And he'd be like, yo,
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: he'd be over there playing some jams. I check him
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: out when I'm on my way to work or whatever.
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: Like you had these different avenues of, you had fewer avenues,
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: but also more avenues for finding stuff because since it
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: was fewer, it was navigable and you didn't just get overwhelmed.
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: By what all the stuff was.
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: But like all these songs that we talked about here
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: popped in different places, but we all got them somehow.
• 31:51
  Speaker 4: That's the, that's the thing of the cool thing about
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: retail back then, because.
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: Even if you didn't know it, it was in the store.
• 31:59
  Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying? Everything was in the store.
• 32:03
  Speaker 4: Which I think, you know, back then, the music buying
• 32:06
  Speaker 4: public were better music fans because they had access to
• 32:11
  Speaker 4: all of this stuff. And there was one place where
• 32:15
  Speaker 4: you could go find it all. Whether your bag was,
• 32:19
  Speaker 4: you know, the roots of Das FX or Mobb Deep
• 32:22
  Speaker 4: or who have you, or if it was, you know,
• 32:24
  Speaker 4: Spice One, Richie Rich, or if it was Masterpin, UGK.
• 32:27
  Speaker 3: They were all in the same place.
• 32:29
  Speaker 4: And you could go, you were more willing to and
• 32:35
  Speaker 4: had more access to explore what was going on.
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: There's a dude behind the counter.
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: He'd be like, yo, how's this one?
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: He'd be like, yo, you should check it out.
• 32:42
  Speaker 3: Tastemakers, bro. They don't exist anymore.
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: Curators and gatekeepers were important.
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: And I get why people don't like the idea of
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: the gatekeeper because it's associated with somebody trying to keep
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: you out.
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: Right. But no, no, no.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: Somebody needs to. There's a reason why you got a gate.
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: No matter who you are.
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: There's a reason why we have it, Gates. There's a
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: reason why we have this curation. But look, we got
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: a lot more we're going to get to. More from
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: the best singles of 1996 with DJ Wiley Sparks coming
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: up next.
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: Want to know why.
• 33:11
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• 34:33
  Speaker 2: All right, we are back with DJ Wiley Sparks talking
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: about the singles in 1996. I realized that I skipped
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: over a very, very important single from the year 1996
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: from the South.
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: Forgive me, Houston.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: That is the year that Pimp the Pin, DJ Screw,
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: and Lil' Kiki comes out.
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: And that is.
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: Look, my mind's playing tricks on me is the best
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: song that ever came out of Houston.
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: Full stop.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: Like we don't there's no it's kind of like when
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: they when they have the Hall of Fame arguments that
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: I go Drew Brees. OK, we don't need to waste
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: our time talking about that one.
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: Like, OK, that was set. But I would argue that's
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: what's the name? Jermaine Dupri once argued that the that.
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: the most foundational of the Houston screw records was the
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: June 27 freestyle.
• 35:15
  Speaker 3: No, no, no. I disagree. It's this one.
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: It pimped the pin is to me. That's the one
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: everybody knows the words to. That's the one that immediately starts.
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: It goes.
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: And that's that guy, the first legitimate screw single to me.
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 35:29
  Speaker 4: That, that, you know, from, from that era, like the, the,
• 35:33
  Speaker 4: the actual screwed up click, you know, as a, as a,
• 35:37
  Speaker 4: you know, that was an actual song. I just, not
• 35:39
  Speaker 4: just the, you know, a bunch of guys freestyling and
• 35:41
  Speaker 4: screws basing me while he's playing whatever instrumental he was playing.
• 35:44
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 35:44
  Speaker 3: You know?
• 35:45
  Speaker 4: Um, and not to say that, that those were those,
• 35:47
  Speaker 4: those songs aren't great, but they are. Uh, but pimp
• 35:51
  Speaker 4: the pin was like, all right, we making records now.
• 35:56
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 35:56
  Speaker 3: I'm saying we make it, we make it legitimate songs.
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: Like, and this dude can rap.
• 36:01
  Speaker 3: Yep. Yeah, man. A lot of people, man.
• 36:04
  Speaker 4: Kiki is a very underrated of, you know, underrated. I mean,
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: he gets he gets the respect that he gets and
• 36:13
  Speaker 4: where he's from in Houston.
• 36:14
  Speaker 3: But I think.
• 36:16
  Speaker 4: I think in large part, Kiki is a lot more
• 36:18
  Speaker 4: influential than people may realize.
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that.
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: The I think the influence of Houston rap like pre-04,
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: 04 was the year that like everything got a little
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: bit different. But the influence of Houston rap kind of
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: goes in a radius of sorts. And if you did
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: not get in that geographical radius, you probably weren't going
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: to pick that up again. The Houston Memphis back and
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: forth is something that to be studied.
• 36:42
  Speaker 4: Man, you know who Kiki kind of reminds me of
• 36:44
  Speaker 4: in a analogous way to an athlete? Kind of like
• 36:49
  Speaker 4: Rod Strickland, where everybody knows that this dude is super nice.
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: But for some reason, the rest of the people don't know.
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: But it's kind of like if Rod Strickland just only
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: played playground ball.
• 37:01
  Speaker 3: There you go.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: Like, Houston is a world in and of itself.
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: Like, what is outside?
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: Look, it's the people that can't give you nothing outside
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: the loop. It's the people that can't give you nothing outside.
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: The beltway, right?
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: Like, it is an insular, self-contained world. And that whole world,
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: all those cats that blew up in 04 were all like, yeah,
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: but we coming back to Houston. Like, you want to
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: put this album out for me nationally, for real?
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: That's fine.
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: But I do this here.
• 37:30
  Speaker 4: Yeah, to your point of the Memphis similarities, man, you know,
• 37:36
  Speaker 4: you got a guy like Tommy Wright III, for example.
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 37:39
  Speaker 4: You know, where Tommy Wright III, he's had large-scale influence
• 37:45
  Speaker 4: on culture over time, but Tommy.
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: Wright III made music for people in Memphis.
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 37:54
  Speaker 3: That was it. You know what I mean? So, but yeah,
• 37:58
  Speaker 3: you know, and.
• 38:00
  Speaker 4: It's, it's just back to the back to what we
• 38:02
  Speaker 4: were speaking about earlier about, uh, the, the, the staunch
• 38:06
  Speaker 4: regionality of, about how things were back then, you know, everyone,
• 38:11
  Speaker 4: everyone had their identity and they were comfortable in the
• 38:15
  Speaker 4: identity that they, you know, were in, you know, we,
• 38:18
  Speaker 4: we do this, we do this, we do this for
• 38:21
  Speaker 4: these people. That's just the shame that, uh, you know,
• 38:26
  Speaker 4: music has, I don't want to say regressed because I
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: don't think it has regressed. I just, you know, it's
• 38:32
  Speaker 4: a music evolvement, a kind of, you know, push that
• 38:37
  Speaker 4: kind of originality to the side.
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: It's just, music is better when it's regional.
• 38:42
  Speaker 3: I 100% agree.
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: There's just like everybody chasing the same thing takes away.
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: There's less innovation when that happens, right? It's like, it's
• 38:50
  Speaker 2: like everybody know the answers to the test. And so
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: they try to write to the answers to the test.
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: And it's a little, when you play a regional game,
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: it goes a little different. Now, something else that happened
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: in 96 that is interesting is Chicago enters the chat.
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: Oh, yeah, Pope Pimp.
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: And we get two all-timers in 96 out of Chicago, right?
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: I'd say one is better than the other, but both
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: is a lot of fun.
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: The one that is better than the other is do
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: or die Pope Pimp because tongue twister had existed.
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: Prior to this and people were aware of him.
• 39:18
  Speaker 3: I like that move.
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: It's like, not like that. And like, we had heard Bone.
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: This was not that. Like, Bone is kind of singing,
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: kind of rapping. You know, it's like, it's a melodic.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: This dude was rapping.
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: I had never heard nobody rap like that before. Like, rapping, rapping.
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 39:37
  Speaker 4: So, but yeah, man, that song, that song, bro, when
• 39:41
  Speaker 4: it hit, man, and that was a song like others, that,
• 39:50
  Speaker 4: you know, came into where I was in Tennessee and
• 39:53
  Speaker 4: like literally was the biggest record of the time where
• 39:56
  Speaker 4: I was at, you know? And, and I think, I
• 39:59
  Speaker 4: think because of the, the sound, the, uh, you know,
• 40:03
  Speaker 4: we had by this time, you know, we had been
• 40:06
  Speaker 4: fully ingratiated into the, the UGK, uh, a ball, the MJG,
• 40:11
  Speaker 4: you know, syrupy, you know, pimped out type vibe or whatever.
• 40:15
  Speaker 4: So the way pole pimp sounded, was already a little
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: familiar to, you know, people like me.
• 40:23
  Speaker 3: Uh, but, and even, even, even, uh.
• 40:26
  Speaker 4: The dungeon family stuff to, to a certain extent, they
• 40:28
  Speaker 4: had like, you know, uh, all that live instrumentation, like real,
• 40:31
  Speaker 4: like somebody actually playing a bass, you know what I'm saying?
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: Uh, on, on this.
• 40:35
  Speaker 4: And it sounds like someone's actually, you know, sitting behind
• 40:38
  Speaker 4: a kid playing drums. But when Popeye came out and
• 40:42
  Speaker 4: it sounded the way it sounded and Twista is clearly
• 40:47
  Speaker 4: the highlight of that song with that incredible, incredible verse.
• 40:51
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: But the other two dudes weren't no slouches either, man.
• 40:54
  Speaker 3: They were fine. You know what I'm saying? And it
• 40:56
  Speaker 3: was like, bro, what is this?
• 41:00
  Speaker 4: You can actually rhyme this fast and still, you know,
• 41:06
  Speaker 4: have some kind of semblance of eloquence. It was amazing, man. And,
• 41:11
  Speaker 4: you know, the ultimate barometer is do a jam, and bro.
• 41:15
  Speaker 3: A jam. Like a motherfucker.
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: Hey, man, I went to Bub B's Night at the
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: Rodeo last year in Houston. They played that joint, and
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: it still went. I got a video of me rapping it, dog. Like,
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: it still went. The other Chicago song that came out,
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: Hey in the Middle of the Barn, came out that summer.
• 41:33
  Speaker 3: I got that cassette single, too. That's an all-time fun
• 41:38
  Speaker 3: reefer carol right there yeah man that what.
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: A what a slow down fucking down example they took
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: a fucking ballad slowed it down got this real interesting
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: drum pattern on it too that's just kind of like
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: hey in the middle of the board but it was
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: time to come back like we was losing in the
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: game it was time to get it cracking.
• 42:05
  Speaker 3: Yes did you know fab five freddie directed that video
• 42:08
  Speaker 3: I did not. I think they were signed to him.
• 42:10
  Speaker 3: I think they might have. That could be wrong. No, no.
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: I'm looking at it on the wiki right now. He's
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: the executive producer of that album.
• 42:18
  Speaker 3: I knew he was involved. You know what I'm saying?
• 42:20
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 42:20
  Speaker 3: I just didn't know at what capacity, which is crazy
• 42:23
  Speaker 3: to say. But, bro, that... How you feel today? Fine.
• 42:30
  Speaker 2: Blown and dandy. Yeah.
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: You know what, though? They were one of those groups.
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to think of another example that came to
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: me off the top of my head.
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: Where it's one dude that can really rap. And the
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: other dudes are just kind of like the Fugees.
• 42:45
  Speaker 3: The Fugee babies are like that too, kind of.
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: There's one person that can really, really rap. Jim Crow
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: got the one dude that can really, really rap. And
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: then the mother can't be on the beat.
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: And it's fine. You know, it'll work.
• 42:57
  Speaker 3: It'll do.
• 42:58
  Speaker 2: But the dude that did the last verse over here
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: in the middle of the bar was rapping his ass off.
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: He was going crazy. You know what I'm saying? He
• 43:04
  Speaker 3: was definitely going crazy.
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: And we had not heard Chicago not a rap city
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: like that.
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: I mean, eventually, obviously, it became one.
• 43:12
  Speaker 4: Yeah, because people might push back and say, oh, a
• 43:15
  Speaker 4: comment was there, but people didn't necessarily.
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: But he stood out exactly for that reason.
• 43:19
  Speaker 3: He was the one.
• 43:20
  Speaker 4: I mean, they didn't really associate him as a Chicago rapper.
• 43:23
  Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying? Especially in the 90s, I
• 43:27
  Speaker 4: think people viewed him as not a New York rapper,
• 43:31
  Speaker 4: but a hip-hop guy.
• 43:33
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 43:36
  Speaker 4: And the do or die and Crucial Conflict, I think
• 43:39
  Speaker 4: that might have been more in line with what, you know,
• 43:42
  Speaker 4: Chicago actually, you know, I don't want to say actually was, but.
• 43:45
  Speaker 3: No, no, no, no.
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: Sonically, like, I think it would be fair to raise
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: the question as to whether or not they were more
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: representative of what the scene was at the time. And look,
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: Common had no ID beat, so it's not like he
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: was getting a producer that was not from Chicago, right?
• 44:00
  Speaker 3: They were just making the music they was making, you
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: know what I mean?
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, but the music they were making was... It
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: was in line with a different sound than these other
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: cats who... Look, man, people tell you this. Everybody from Chicago,
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: from Mississippi was something that.
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: Didn't... It feels.
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: It doesn't feel the same now as it did then,
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: but they hadn't been gone from Mississippi for long. It's Chicago,
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: and the song is called Hey in the Middle of
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: the Barn.
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: They in a barn. It's Chicago.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: Like, that's what a lot of us really learned.
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: Like, oh, this is what Chicago is about.
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: Because at that time, when a new city would pop
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: on the scene for the rest of us, like, oh,
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: so that's what they do over there.
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: Why would we know, right?
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: Like, we were learning the map all at one time
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: when they came out. And so, yeah, when those dudes
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: came around, it was more like, my brother rode with
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: a bunch of dudes from Chicago in college because he
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: went to Southern in Baton Rouge. And a lot of
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: people moved to Chicago and then they send their kids
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: back to go to Southern, right? Common sounded like the
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: music that my brother listened to, but the other dudes
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: that dropped felt like the cats that he was introducing
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: me to. Yeah.
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: That were from Chicago. Yeah. I can see that. That
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: definitely tracks.
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: Now, East Coast Single World was really good.
• 45:17
  Speaker 3: Interesting, right? It was all.
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: So, one thing I think about it, and I think
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: that we focus it on jams right now.
• 45:25
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: Right? But 96, and it's something I'm going to talk
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: to Jason about a little more, is there was less
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: of an expectation in the construction of an album or
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: the decision to put an album out or sell it
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: or whatever it was that you had to have, like
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: you wanted a single, but it didn't have to be
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: like a club single, right? It didn't have to have,
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: it didn't have to be something that had some measure
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: that had like pop expectations, but there would always be
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: some dudes that was grimy as fuck, but also like,
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: understood this and had a hold of it, or it
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: would be something that jumped off and it was just
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: so jamming that you just had to be like, this
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: is what it is.
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: So like for me, I don't know.
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: If 96 had a better single than Lucchini by Kev Lowe.
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: I keep trying to.
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: It's hard for me to come up with songs that
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: are better than Lucchini. People be like, I don't understand
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: what they talking about. No, you don't know what they saying.
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: You know what they talking about.
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: You know what they talking about.
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: The vibes are through the roof.
• 46:26
  Speaker 4: Bro, I remember exactly where I was when I first
• 46:32
  Speaker 4: heard that song.
• 46:33
  Speaker 5: Uh.
• 46:34
  Speaker 4: So I told you I graduated in 96 and I
• 46:37
  Speaker 4: was in my first semester of college.
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: So the year was still 96.
• 46:43
  Speaker 4: But my freshman year of 97 at Lane College, we
• 46:46
  Speaker 4: had like a common area that had like a TV
• 46:49
  Speaker 4: on the cart.
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 46:50
  Speaker 4: Where, you know, they would play. We pretty much kept
• 46:54
  Speaker 4: it on BET all day. And I was coming back
• 46:58
  Speaker 4: from class or whatever, and the TV was just on.
• 47:02
  Speaker 4: And I was getting ready to walk back to my dorm.
• 47:07
  Speaker 4: And I walked past, and I heard that Dynasty sample,
• 47:11
  Speaker 4: them horns.
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: I said, what is that? Do you know what I'm saying?
• 47:21
  Speaker 4: And then I looked, and I was already familiar with
• 47:24
  Speaker 4: Camp Lowe because of Cooley High previously, the single prior
• 47:28
  Speaker 4: to Luchini. And I had already been blown away by that.
• 47:33
  Speaker 4: The same thing you said, no one understood what was
• 47:35
  Speaker 4: going on, but you kind of knew. The same thing
• 47:37
  Speaker 4: could apply to Cooley High. And that was another crazy beat.
• 47:41
  Speaker 4: It was a crazy beat. Shout out to Ski Beast, man. Yeah,
• 47:45
  Speaker 4: he did that. He did the whole album, actually. But
• 47:48
  Speaker 4: those two, man. But Luchini, bro.
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: Bro.
• 47:53
  Speaker 4: By the way, it's maybe only two rap songs in
• 47:59
  Speaker 4: my lifetime that I have been completely knocked over and
• 48:04
  Speaker 4: blown away by.
• 48:05
  Speaker 3: Luchini's one. Bombs Over Baghdad is dope.
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: Yep. By the way, the wiki says that this came
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: out January 21st, 1997, which sounds like 1996 to me.
• 48:14
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying?
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: Close enough.
• 48:17
  Speaker 4: The video was being played in 96.
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: That's all I needed right there. Like, that's what we got.
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: We got the vibes.
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: That is the, I could go on this forever, but
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: that is the coolest sounding album I feel like that
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: anybody's ever put out. Like, it is such a vibe.
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: And I don't even talk like that. It is all
• 48:34
  Speaker 2: of that. Like that is that it.
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: Was, by the way, a group that didn't put out
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: another record for like 10 years. Like this could just happen.
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: A group like this could have an album or have
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: a sound and it drops.
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: And I don't feel like, like it wasn't like it
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: was dominating on the radio.
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: No, but we all knew it. In music beds.
• 48:51
  Speaker 4: Like when, you know, when the, the radio DJ needed to,
• 48:55
  Speaker 4: you know, to talk about the weather or whatever. I
• 48:58
  Speaker 4: used to hear, I used to hear that beat. and
• 49:01
  Speaker 4: be like, bro, man, y'all should play the song.
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: Oh, so good.
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: Also interesting of that year. I was talking about grimy
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: dudes with a knack for the singles.
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: The Lost Boys.
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: Two of them singles came out in 95, but Music
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: Makes Me High and Rene came out in 96. I
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: promise you, every Lost Boys song that I liked, Beats
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: for the East is the only one that did not
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: become a single. Otherwise, you'd turn on a Lost Boys
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: album and be like, nah, this ain't it. But it
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: got them four songs that was hitting on the radio.
• 49:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, man.
• 49:32
  Speaker 4: Shout out to Easy Mo B, because he got them right.
• 49:35
  Speaker 4: That's what I'm saying. He got them all the way right.
• 49:39
  Speaker 4: You know, Rene was super crazy.
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean? Yeah.
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: But that music makes me high with them crazy hard drums.
• 49:53
  Speaker 4: That record almost sounds like West Coast-ish a little. You know,
• 49:58
  Speaker 4: it gives me a West Coast vibe when I hear it.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 50:01
  Speaker 3: Just the way the movement of the drums are going.
• 50:04
  Speaker 3: I'm like, bro.
• 50:06
  Speaker 4: It, it, it definitely, it, it, it makes me feel something.
• 50:10
  Speaker 4: I don't know if the, you know, it definitely makes
• 50:12
  Speaker 4: me feel something when I hear it, but.
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: It is a preposterous story, by the way, it is a,
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: he is a, uh, it's the voice all star. Um, if, if,
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: if there has ever been one like Renee, you just need, don't,
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: don't think about it too much. Like you start following
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: along with the studio. You just be like, so why
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: did she get shot?
• 50:30
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: Like, like, like, like, was it a mass shoot? Did
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: somebody shoot up the whole, the whole law school?
• 50:36
  Speaker 4: Bro, you know what I appreciate about that song is Mr. Cheek's,
• 50:42
  Speaker 4: you know, commitment to making sure we understood what he said.
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 50:46
  Speaker 3: She went to law school. And she studied law.
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: She studied law.
• 50:51
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying? She studied law.
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: Hey, man, let me tell you this.
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: I know the homie Dottie listened to this joint when
• 50:59
  Speaker 2: he called up. Did you hear the show we had
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: when Sadat called up and talked about how he was
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: dating Regina.
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: Hall back in the day?
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: Oh, man. What an incredible story.
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but so, like, I think Regina Hall was at
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: NYU at the time, and I feel like Renee is
• 51:11
  Speaker 2: an archetype that these rappers knew, which is she's up
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: here living very professionally in New York City, and then
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: the real was pulled up, and now she kicking with us. Mm-hmm.
• 51:22
  Speaker 3: That story doesn't tell... Tell all the time. Man, who
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: you telling?
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: Also that year, you and I talked about this as
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: we were getting ready for the show, and we ain't gonna,
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: you know, we gonna miss a couple.
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: It happens.
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: But Shaquille O'Neal had a really dope single in 1996.
• 51:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, with the Notorious B.I.G.
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: Biggie on it. UK Stop the Raid was monster.
• 51:49
  Speaker 4: In the grand contest thing, how ridiculous does that sound?
• 51:53
  Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying? It happened, and it was awesome.
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: By the way, that's his third album. I know. The
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: first two went platinum.
• 52:01
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 52:02
  Speaker 3: Shaq has a.
• 52:05
  Speaker 4: Shaq had a better rap career than a lot of rappers.
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: And they were real albums.
• 52:11
  Speaker 4: He wasn't faking at all. You know what I'm saying?
• 52:14
  Speaker 4: He was completely serious.
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: They were real, actual, factual albums. I was also thinking
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: about this in terms of talking about singles. I meant
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: to bring this up in the middle of the barn.
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: My homeboy John, rest in peace. His argument was, Hey
• 52:30
  Speaker 2: in the Middle of a Barn became a hit because
• 52:32
  Speaker 2: we got tired of which the song that probably by
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: number was the biggest song of 1996.
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: The Bone Thugs Crossroads remix.
• 52:43
  Speaker 4: I'm going to say remix because a lot of people
• 52:46
  Speaker 4: don't realize that the version that we all know, a
• 52:49
  Speaker 4: lot of people don't realize that was a remix.
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: So there's Crossroads which is on East 1999 Eternal and
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: there's The Crossroads, which.
• 52:58
  Speaker 2: Is the bone, bone, bone, bone, bone. Yeah, I miss
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: my Uncle Charles. It's that joint. The original Crossroads, that
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: was dedicated to their friend named Wally.
• 53:11
  Speaker 3: Oh, damn right.
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: Even though you gone.
• 53:13
  Speaker 2: First of all, what a ridiculous way to pay tribute
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: to your man. Even though you, oh no, it's right.
• 53:17
  Speaker 2: Even though you gone, you still got love from bone.
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: I was thinking he was like, even though you gone,
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: you still got love for bone, which would be rather presumptuous.
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: Yes, it would be. You still love us though, don't you?
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: That shit was everywhere. Them funeral dirges, man, they did numbers.
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: That was a smash.
• 53:40
  Speaker 4: Speaking of records that started one way and ended up
• 53:46
  Speaker 4: another way, that's a glowing example of a record that
• 53:51
  Speaker 4: started out as just a remix to an album cut
• 53:55
  Speaker 4: because You know, they had their unfortunate passing of their
• 53:59
  Speaker 4: uncle and their mentor, Eazy-E.
• 54:01
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean? And that record just, it
• 54:05
  Speaker 3: just took off, bro. Just took off out of nowhere.
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: Did you see that video of Klay Thompson rapping with
• 54:11
  Speaker 2: Megan Thee Stallion? Oh, had Bone perform for him? Yeah,
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: booked Bone for his birthday because he loved Bone. Man,
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: what a life he's living.
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: Oh, dog.
• 54:20
  Speaker 3: What a life he's living, Jack.
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: And you see, he didn't go to the game on
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: the day after. Just like, I don't know why he
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: go to none of them games.
• 54:30
  Speaker 4: We got, what, four championships? You know, he got super
• 54:34
  Speaker 4: maxed out.
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: I remember the last time I was in love on
• 54:37
  Speaker 2: that level, and it was hard to go to work, boy.
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: Hard, hard to go to work.
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: What was so funny about that to me is Klay
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: Thompson from Newport Beach, wherever you're from in Orange County.
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: And I feel like if Bone was your favorite group
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: like that, you could have either turned into that or
• 54:52
  Speaker 2: you could have been hanging with the whiteboards and black
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: fingernail polish. Like that lane is the same. It's black goth,
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: highly dramatic music. Like that's where they were. And they
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: were really big deals.
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: And they were a.
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: Very controversial topic at the time. in terms of how
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: good they were, how hip-hop they were, so forth and
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: so on. I did not love them, but I think
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: historically speaking, it's unquestionable that they are underrated.
• 55:21
  Speaker 3: They might be the most underrated rap group of all time.
• 55:24
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 55:24
  Speaker 3: And it doesn't matter how.
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: You feel about the music. The influence was indisputable.
• 55:28
  Speaker 3: Yep. Indisputable.
• 55:31
  Speaker 4: And they put numbers on the board, bro. They got
• 55:34
  Speaker 4: the numbers to back it up.
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: They did. They put numbers on the board. Huge numbers.
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: I want to get to a couple more things before
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: we get out of here. One, as we were compiling
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: the list of this, we both put down a couple
• 55:47
  Speaker 2: of the Busta Rhymes singles. And Busta Rhymes, to me,
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: I argue Busta Rhymes is maybe the best rapper without
• 55:54
  Speaker 2: a classic album.
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: Like, you can have your favorite Busta Rhymes album. Like,
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: for me, it's Extinction Level Event. But if I'm being
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: honest with myself.
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: this close. Not quite, right? He's got it like, Big Bang,
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: this close. Not quite.
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: But what he did, though, in 96 was he became
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: a video superstar.
• 56:12
  Speaker 3: Yep. Right?
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: Like, those, the influence of Busta Rhymes was with the visuals. Like, woo-ha,
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: I got you all in check. It's a cool song.
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: It's a great video that just changed everything.
• 56:24
  Speaker 3: Amazing. Like, the visual component.
• 56:30
  Speaker 4: Is another thing of that was sort of driving singles, uh,
• 56:35
  Speaker 4: that you don't, you don't do, you don't get, uh,
• 56:38
  Speaker 4: with music and today's thing, you know, like today's music,
• 56:42
  Speaker 4: you rarely see, uh, if it's a video of somebody
• 56:44
  Speaker 4: that shot it with a handheld, you know, whatever camera
• 56:47
  Speaker 4: they got, or maybe shot it on iPhone, you know,
• 56:50
  Speaker 4: but back then, like visually, the way you presented a single, was,
• 56:56
  Speaker 4: especially if you were going to be operating on the
• 56:57
  Speaker 4: level that, say, Busta Rhymes was, where they kind of
• 57:00
  Speaker 4: knew what they had with him immediately, because Busta Rhymes
• 57:03
  Speaker 4: was a star from the minute he showed.
• 57:04
  Speaker 3: Up, right?
• 57:05
  Speaker 4: He was, you know, regardless, I have my own personal
• 57:08
  Speaker 4: feelings about Mr. Smith, but be that as it may,
• 57:14
  Speaker 4: Busta Rhymes has always been someone that once he shows up, yes,
• 57:21
  Speaker 4: the attention naturally gravitates right to him yes and the
• 57:28
  Speaker 4: the you you know being a being a visual star
• 57:32
  Speaker 4: uh in the era of singles was uh was uh
• 57:36
  Speaker 4: was a big thing for people like him you know
• 57:38
  Speaker 4: what i'm saying he was he was he was he
• 57:40
  Speaker 4: was definitely like the you know the standout uh rap
• 57:44
  Speaker 4: artist that you know i want.
• 57:48
  Speaker 3: To see him on television you know what i mean.
• 57:51
  Speaker 2: It's kind of a precursor to what missy elliott yes
• 57:54
  Speaker 2: he was became Right. You know, very simply working with, say,
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: people making production and stuff like that. But I guess
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: a multimedia star, I think, is the way that we
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: could describe it.
• 58:06
  Speaker 3: Speaking of Mr.
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: Smith, by the way, you know, we weren't really fucking
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: with him when he was doing this kind of stuff.
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: LL Cool J, he gave the world.
• 58:14
  Speaker 3: He gave the he. And it was comeback number two. Yeah,
• 58:23
  Speaker 3: because this is after 14 shots to the dome.
• 58:25
  Speaker 2: This is after 14 shots to the dome. And you
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: and I were also talking about this. We're like old
• 58:30
  Speaker 2: school Mr.
• 58:31
  Speaker 3: Smith.
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: I mean, old head LL Cool J.
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: He was 26, 27, or maybe 26, he's 28.
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: He was the old head. He's the old head. He
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: had already put up a whole career. Yeah, man. Like
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: nothing LL Cool J did.
• 58:48
  Speaker 3: A Hall of Fame career.
• 58:49
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: He does not have a classic record after 1990, right?
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: Mama said, knock you out.
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: He's got three of them.
• 58:54
  Speaker 2: He did nothing he did after 1990 matters, but he
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: actually consistently did things.
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: After 1990. But the Mr.
• 59:02
  Speaker 2: Smith album, you know, he's got I Shot You, right?
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: He would always pop back up and let you know
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: that he could still do the thing.
• 59:09
  Speaker 3: But he... I got it in the chamber, homie. Don't
• 59:12
  Speaker 3: play it.
• 59:13
  Speaker 4: Just because I've been working out all day thinking about her.
• 59:16
  Speaker 3: Don't think I got it back in the chamber, dog.
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: But he gave up on us.
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: He decided that we were not going to buy no records.
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: I figured we'd just want it.
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: He just did it all for them.
• 59:29
  Speaker 3: I've been working out all day thinking about you. That
• 59:34
  Speaker 3: is absurd.
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: Licking his lips with that one pant leg up.
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: You know what he is?
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: He's low-key what Drake was trying to pull off. Except
• 59:46
  Speaker 2: when it came time to do I Shot You, Drake
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: couldn't really give you that.
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: And also, he just wasn't LL Cool J.
• 59:54
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying? Uh-oh.
• 59:57
  Speaker 4: Man, speaking of visuals from that time, that man was
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 4: in these videos pouring chocolate syrup on people's knees.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: It was ridiculous.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: It was always so frustrating because it was like, partner.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: You don't have to do this. Go look at Method Man.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: He's the proof that you don't have to act like this.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: All you got to do is pull up.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah, be LL Cool J.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: They are not... Like, right, you've already done the hard part.
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: Right, the hard part, just be LL Cool J.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: You've already managed to pull that off, right? Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 3: That's too much, bro. Here he go. Here he go.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: Nips all out and shit and just.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 3: That's too much, dog.
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 2: Oh, man, like, it got to a place where you
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: couldn't even tell people you liked his music.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, because they look at you crazy. They like... Did
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 3: you jam LL Cool J?
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: You might as well just play actual slow jams.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 3: How about that?
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 2: There was far more dignity in that sort of behavior
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: if that's where you wanted to go. But man, that's 96.
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 2: We got so much more than we could have gotten to.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: We talked about Tee LaRae fans. When we get to
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 2: the albums, that's when we'll get deeper in some of these.
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 2: But Show Nuff, man, that was the one.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 4: Man, shout out to Ricky Smiley for forever immortalizing that,
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 4: the intro, the baseline intro to that song and his
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 4: stand-up special. Because, man, that's one of them things. I
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 4: like a lot of these songs that we've spoken about today.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 4: The reaction to when it starts is immediate.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 3: Everybody going to be like.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 4: It takes you to a place, man. It takes you
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 4: to a place. Shout out to Jazzy Faye on that beat.
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, also, shout out to ghetto mafia straight from the deck,
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: which was a really big deal, but boy, that was
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: a what do you Atlanta people do? Like, that was
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: one of those like, what are you guys up to
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: down here?
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 4: Bro, you know, I can't recall who it was, but
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 4: it was somebody that you would associate with, well, like,
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 4: the whole Backpacker hip-hop. It was an artist from that.
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 4: It may have been, it was like a Pharaoh Munch type.
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 4: I can't recall who exactly it was. But they were
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 4: on an episode of Your Own TV Raps Today during
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 4: the interview portion.
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 3: They were being asked what they were listening to. And
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 3: they both said, bro, there's.
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 4: This record called Straight From The Deck by these cats
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 4: called Ghetto Bop.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 3: It's the greatest thing I ever heard.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 4: And that was like a signifier to me that, oh,
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 4: you know, what I think of them, they might not
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 4: be thinking the same of me.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: They might actually like the stuff that we're doing down here.
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: I didn't think that... I was always the type of
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 3: fan that.
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 4: I'm a hip-hop fan, so I loved a bunch of
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 4: New York music, and especially the Backpack Tiger. I'm a
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 4: low-key backpacker nerd, to be honest with you. I like
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 4: all that stuff, but I used to think that they would...
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 4: no way they would like something like ghetto mafia. And
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 4: when I heard that person say that, I was like, oh,
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 4: it's okay to like everything. You know what I mean?
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 4: Because I was, you know, I was a young man
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 4: back then. I was, you know, fresh out of high
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 4: school or whatever. And I had my own preconceived notions.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: About- Let me tell you, your preconceived notion was correct.
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 3: Came up, came down, stayed down, played around, amen, amen.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 3: That's a good flow, though, man. You know what I'm saying?
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but I tell you, maybe I need to go back.
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 2: I heard that like three times when it came out.
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 3: It's super churchy.
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, man, look, I heard that like three times when
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: it came out, and I was like, look, I don't
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: know what they're doing over there on the east side
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 2: of this city. These rappers I hear from the south
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: and the west, they're doing things. I don't know what's
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: going on over there in Decatur.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 4: That's all just a blessed assurance in gangster form.
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: I tell you this, boy.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: Them boys love beer from Decatur because the joint in
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: Decatur was the jail.
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, 100%. Shout out to the east side.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, man.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 3: Look, man.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: It's DJ Wiley Sparks. Check him out.
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: Twitch.tv slash DJ Wiley Sparks.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: Just look him up.
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: DJ Wiley Sparks. You can find his stuff. Whenever he
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: goes on Twitch, he's jamming. He do parties in Atlanta.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 3: Whole nine.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: Check it out.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: And he'll be back with us as we continue this series.
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: My brother, I appreciate you.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 4: Thank you for having me, bro. It's fun. I mean,
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 4: you know, like I said, we do this all the time.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 4: But it's always fun for me.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 3: Hey, man.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: All good. Ladies and gentlemen, thanks so much for joining
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: us here on The Right Time. We do this four
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: times a week. Ryan Brumley handling everything behind the scenes.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: Thank you, sir.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 2: Hit the voicemail line, 323-596-7767. Remember, follow the right time. Subscribe, like,
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 2: a hater. We'll talk to you guys in a couple
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: of days.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: Take it easy.