Latest / Tha Smoking Section Podcast / Out of the Darkness: Dawreck of Triple Darkness

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Out of the Darkness: Dawreck of Triple Darkness · Tha Smoking Section Podcast

• Smokey Da Bandit: Whee! Yo, welcome back, welcome back. Welcome back to the Smoking Section podcast where the real conversations live and the culture gets the respect it deserves. Today's guest is not just an artist, he's a pillar in Chicago's hip hop history, a true lyricist, a pioneer of that raw, conscious, street-rooted sound that helped shape a whole movement. If you know anything about underground legends, then you already know the name. Representing the legendary group Triple Darkness, this man has been putting in work speaking truth and standing on authenticity long before it was trendy. We're talking about somebody who helped the foundation for generations of artists coming out the city. So whether you're here for the bars, the history or the game, he's about to drop. So everybody put your hands together for my homeboy, Westside Zone, the wreck of Triple Darkness. What up, direct? Did you holla at that bitch? DaWreck: Yep. Smokey Da Bandit: So it's song. Bring the crown, nigga be kickin' it that. DaWreck: Yep. That nigga be kicking it there at the cuffers though. That's my part right there. Smokey Da Bandit: What up, Rick? How you feeling, man? Thank you for being the guest on my podcast. DaWreck: What up, Smoke? You already know, Appreciate it. Thanks for having me. Smokey Da Bandit: We've been fucking with each other for some years. You my brother from another mother, even though you be treating me like a bald headed stepchild sometimes. I got my buttons and everything. What's good, what's good? So I got a lot of questions for you, man. How you feeling though? DaWreck: Hey man. That's it, that's it. Man, I'm good, man, I'm chillin'. Smokey Da Bandit: I bet. So, ⁓ how did you get the name Derec? DaWreck: Okay. Smokey Da Bandit: Was it given to you or did you make it up? DaWreck: It was one of those things that it came to me a couple times. You know what saying? ⁓ I was calling myself the wreck. then, but kind of like. kind of like came up with another for me. You know what I'm saying? Like, man, you should call yourself Dawreck ⁓ another direct. ⁓ then I just put those two together and that's direct. ⁓ ⁓ direct, not none of that. ⁓ means I'm straight to the point with everything I do. try to be... ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: another direction. So what does that mean? DaWreck: 100 % real with a lot of things, you know in the industry where it's a bunch of phony people around, you know, that's that's a rare thing, you know Smokey Da Bandit: Mm. Woo! Say that shit again. I done misplaced my motherfucking lighter. So anyway, for the people that don't know, where you from? DaWreck: from the West Side of Chicago, ⁓ a block called Warren, you know what saying, right by Henry Horner Projects that's in between Rockwell, know, Rockwell, Horner's, O's, all that area right there. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay, and to my knowledge from our, you know, conversations throughout the years, I heard you grew up with a lot of these Chicago legends. DaWreck: Pretty much, you know, ⁓ never from crucial conflict. ⁓ We kinda like got together as Shorty's and stuff and started on music and stuff, you know what saying? ⁓ ⁓ know, he'll tell people I taught him how to rap, ⁓ he already came in knowing how to rap. I just taught him how to make his song formatted and then we did song stuff together. ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: You help them, you help them how to teach them how to mold it. DaWreck: Yeah, know, when to stop, you know. Back then people would rap forever, Yeah, yep, yep. Smokey Da Bandit: Count them bars, basically. Okay, so you grew up with never, what about do or die? DaWreck: So I didn't grow up with Do or Die, but me and Neva grew up in the same neighborhood and we had like a group and we did a lot of shows where we was all around the city and we met with a lot of people through that, you know what saying? We got signed at, I think I was 12, he was about, no I was 13 and he was 11. We got signed at Toma Productions with a dude in the city everybody know, Rap and Tate the Great. and Ice Cold by the name of Black Ice, let me see, Sax Preacher, you know what saying? They signed us. We went around the cities doing talent shows and stuff. We won a lot. Smokey Da Bandit: So you got signed at a young age? How old was you when you first got signed? DaWreck: Yeah, yeah, we got signed to that. Yeah, I was 12. No, I was 13. He was 11. I was 13. He was 11. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, our group, the Ultimate Posse, we had a little deal with Toma Production, which is like a production company. And at the time, they was helping us, getting us in shows and stuff like that. Smokey Da Bandit: Damn, you were never? ⁓ so y'all got signed together back in the day first. Okay. So what was it like, what was Chicago like ⁓ when you was coming up, when y'all was coming up? How was it like for y'all growing up in that era? DaWreck: Ew. It was a lot of house music and dance groups and stuff like that. yeah, back then if you ain't danced, how you gonna get in? You know what I'm You had to dance to get in the shows and stuff. They didn't care about no rapping or nothing like that. Smokey Da Bandit: You was in a dance group? Okay. DaWreck: Yep, dance groups was like the main event. They was like the main attraction. Matter of fact, that's the name of a couple dance groups in Chicago, but that's what it was. That was the last thing that they did at the shows. Smokey Da Bandit: So we'll cut. What kind of dance was it? Footworking? Or just? DaWreck: There was footwork and all kinds of choreographed movements with a lot of people on the stage. know what I'm saying? It be like 20 of them up there and stuff. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay, so that was when you was like 12, you said? DaWreck: Yeah, but you know, from the age of 12 on to like 16 or 17, that was like an ongoing thing. know, people in Chicago did footwork, they was battling and all type of stuff like that. Like if you were in the projects, the dancing went along right along with the game making and all that too. It was just like, it was part of it. You will see that, and then you will see that. You know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: gonna like the Michael Jackson video, DaWreck: The Michael Jackson video? Hell nah, boy. Hell nah. Smokey Da Bandit: bad when he brought all them crips. DaWreck: Nah, man. Smokey Da Bandit: the point. So, no, but I did hear like, you know, I'm cool with B-Lo and shit. And I heard them say they was dancing. Did you battle them niggas? DaWreck: They was, they was cold. Hell nah, they was like, they was older than me. So you know what I'm saying, if I'm a kid, they teenagers. And ⁓ when I went to Crane, that's where I met Buck. And... ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: Okay, okay. ⁓ okay. from Psycho Drama. Shout out to Buck from Psycho Drama. much for the industry to handle. DaWreck: Yeah. At the time, yeah, that was, I met Neva first and we was together for years. But you know, when high school hit for Neva, it was like he moved to a different neighborhood. And that's how we kind of like, ⁓ you know, got to know the flick and all that stuff like that. And I used to, know, go over his crib and kick it with him and stuff. But still, you know, was like he had his own thing. I had my own thing. And, ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: That's when you ran into Buck. So you met Never first, then you met Buck. Okay, okay. Right. DaWreck: That's when I met Buck. I was actually going by the name Psycho when I met Buck. Smokey Da Bandit: I should have asked you what was your name when you was with Neva when y'all was in the group. DaWreck: Well, shit, when I met Neva, my name was Sam. It was just like my regular name, I had no... Which is funny, which is funny, because my name was Sam Eel, which is my real name, Sam Eel, S-A-M-I-L-L. But a rap name, it sounded good back then, I guess. Smokey Da Bandit: What was never meant? It never was his regular? ⁓ wow. ⁓ wow. Hell no. All right, so then when you got with Buck, your name was Psycho. DaWreck: Yup, my name was Psycho, but... Smokey Da Bandit: And how old was you back about that time? DaWreck: Ummm, when I got the name Psycho? Smokey Da Bandit: Nah, what you link with Buck? DaWreck: When I what? When I linked with Buck? About 16, 17. Because Buck was, he was younger than me. So he came when I was getting ready to leave almost. You know what I'm saying? I had messed up a couple grades so I had to pick up this class and they was in the class that I had to pick up. You know what I'm saying? Him inside and I met them in there. And we became cool in class. Go ahead. Smokey Da Bandit: When you linked up, yeah. out. Okay. Assault. No, so, so, so Cy was with Buck when you met him? DaWreck: Yeah. Nah. Yeah, it was different. Nah, that ain't how that happened. Smokey Da Bandit: And but they wasn't psychodrama and your name was psycho. So they took your name and created a group. No, I'm playing. DaWreck: That ain't how that happened. I just kinda like, I just kinda like didn't like the name no more. Cause it was something me and Neva was doing. you know, towards the end of me Neva rapping together, we had started a three man group with me, him and this dude named Tek. And ⁓ I think the group was called Sick. And it was, yeah. And it was Tek. And I think that's when Neva came up with Neva. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Sick. DaWreck: Yeah, it was Tech, Neva, and Psycho. And then ⁓ we just went different ways. Tech Cole is here. A lot of people don't really know Tech, but I think Tech was doing something with the Renegades, Neva Group. Smokey Da Bandit: And we're not talking about Tech 9. This is Tech from Chicago. DaWreck: Nah, nah, we not talking about tech. Yep, yep. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay, so when you got with Buck, did y'all start a group or did y'all even, you know, y'all DaWreck: Yeah, me and Buck tried to start a little group, me, him, and one of my friends, ⁓ a girl by the name of Kiki. And we was calling ourselves Brothers of the Hoodie, even though she a girl, you know, we were just trying to come up with something. Smokey Da Bandit: Brothers of the hoodie DaWreck: I know right, we was rocking hoodies and stuff. Hey man, be laughing at me man. Smokey Da Bandit: All right, so take this out. So this is a lot of hip hop history already. DaWreck: Yeah, it's crazy. Smokey Da Bandit: through the door you was linked up with Never from Crucial Conflict. Then when he moved, you ended up linking up or meeting Buck of Psycho Drunk. Buck and Psych. Psych. Okay. DaWreck: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but I got a funny story though. When Mia Never was a group, was me, him, and three of our other homies. So we was like a five man group. You know what saying? We used to be dancing and all that shit, but then we was the rappers, Mia Never. You know what I'm saying? But they were so little. Yeah, they were so little that all the people liked in us, because it was like, oh, they so cute. You know what I'm saying? That shit. So we had a show and we won, right? Smokey Da Bandit: Like Wu Tang. Okay, so y'all have some backup dancers. DaWreck: But yeah, but I knew the dude that we beat supposed to won, cause he went crazy. But he did this song and in the song he said, I think the last line he was like, black people ain't prejudice, they just mad. And when he said that, they was looking like, oh man. And I think they disqualified him or something and we won, but I knew he supposed to won. You know what I'm saying? And to this day, Smokey Da Bandit: Thales out. Dude. DaWreck: Every time I see him, well not every time I see him, but I had to tell him and remind him about that. And he was like, man. And it was at the Robert's 500. I mean, he's like, man, I know what was going on. Cause he was talking his stuff, you know what I'm saying? A real righteous brother, you know what I'm saying? That was D.A. Smart though, you know. Smokey Da Bandit: You tell him, man, you should've won. How he feel? How he feel? Yeah. ⁓ okay. That was D.A. Smart. The nigga that you talk about? ⁓ you sneaky nigga. Nice story. That was dope. That was dope. You snuck that in there. So it D.A. Smart that y'all beat. Cause y'all had backup dancers. DaWreck: Yeah. Yeah, that we be. Yeah, man. Yeah. Well, we had matching uniforms on and we was, you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Y'all came with a whole, you're right, a whole show. Y'all had a show show. And it was just him by himself basically with speaking knowledge. DaWreck: Yeah. He was in that going crazy on them people. I was like, yeah, yeah. I looked around over there and it cool. Smokey Da Bandit: He still is. Shout out to DA Smart, Damn, look at how all the branches intertwine. We ain't even got to triple darkness yet, which is what I was about to So you met Buck. Never. Buck's. DA Smart. DaWreck: Right, now that took a minute. And this was funny because Buck said a rap for me. Because we actually met in the class. And then we had went to like youth guidance, this thing in school where people go when they don't want to go to class or some shit like that. So we in there, and they're like, man, he can rap, he can rap. I don't think they talking about me. They talking about him. I'm like, ⁓ he can rap? They talking about Buck. I'm like, man, let me hear you rap. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: He let me hear a song, I didn't like it. I was like, that ain't... He was like, what? Oh man, get out of I'm like, man, that ain't, I don't know. And then he came to the school with another song. That's what let me know. I said, oh, this boy cold. I don't know what's up with that other soul, but you cold, boy. Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Damn. He's like, oh, got something else for you. So how did you form Triple Darkness then? DaWreck: That was years later. Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Years later. Damn. DaWreck: We should think high school was, you we was in school in the 90s, early 90s. 90, what the hell am talking about? 90, shit, 90, 91, 92. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: When Buck used to always tell me about this group, Do or Die, that's how I first heard Do or Die from him. You know what saying? He was like, man, I got a song with them. You know what I'm saying? I'm finna do a song with them. you gotta think about it. They already out of school and rapping and he in high school. You know what saying? He was like a... He was like a sophomore or something? Smokey Da Bandit: Was it? Is it true that Buck was originally a part of Do or Die? Yeah, right, right, right. So you said, no, the only reason I asked that, because you said, got a song with Do or Die, but wasn't he with them? DaWreck: Yeah. Yeah. No, he was like, he was like, no, he was with them, but it wasn't serious. He was like a kid. You know what saying? So they grown, not grown, but they out of school, living street life, doing shit. You know what I'm And Buck just this kid from the neighborhood that could rap. So they like, you know, yeah, you down with us. You know, it wasn't really like he ain't the main members like AK and B-Lo was, but. Smokey Da Bandit: This is after. Okay, okay Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. DaWreck: Every now and then they let him on some songs and stuff like that and he made the most of it because he was on No Love. A lot of people knew that and knew him from that. You know what I'm Smokey Da Bandit: No love, no love. Yeah, that's that shit. No love, no love, no love. That's what's up. So how did, then how did Triple Darkness, you said even though it was years later, how did y'all form? And what does Triple Darkness mean? You know, it's a lot of people that ain't from the city that don't know the history. What do Triple Darkness mean? And where, and how did y'all come together? And who's the members of Triple Darkness? DaWreck: Triple Darkness is... Triple darkness. Okay, Triple Darkness is me, Trick, he go by DeMarco, and Hanious, Mack. So, the group Triple Darkness started because, it's crazy how it started because I didn't have no group no more. So first, me and Neville was in a group, then he ended up joining with the flick. You know saying? They used to be another group, but they ended up replacing them with him and Coldheart, the other two people. So when that happened, I'm like, cool. Because I had a friend of mine, and she introduced me to her best friend who rap. And she ended up getting the deal and was like, man. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: If something happened, I could take you with me. You know what saying? I'm like, fuck it, we'll just sign to her label and shit. So this what I'm thinking. I'm like, okay, I'll take me and Neva over there and introduce Neva to her. When I took Neva over there, she loved Neva. You know what saying? You know what I'm talking about, Smokey Da Bandit: I was about to ask you who you talking about. feel like I know who you talking about. You talking about the Brat tat tat tat tat. Shout out to the Brat. Shout out to the Brat tat tat tat. I was like, is this, you talking about Brat? So. DaWreck: The break. Yeah, right. So. So I took him over there, kicked him, you know, basically let him audition for us so she could kind of see, you know, that she liked him. Like, man, y'all cold. But he ended up joining the flick. So I had another homie, Buck. I'm like, fuck it, I'll take Buck over here and maybe we could do something with that. You know what I'm saying? I went in, I called Buck and that boy said, man, I want you to hear this. I went over there and he had a... Smokey Da Bandit: Eugh. DaWreck: Magic, he let me hear magic. I'm like, Joe, that's cold, what this is? Smokey Da Bandit: Hey! This like magic. Yeah, I think I'm ready to get my pimp on. Yeah. DaWreck: I started a group. We called Psycho Drama. I'm like, man. So first I was like, damn, that's kind of like how me, you and Kiki was. You got him and the girl. That was the same thing we was doing, but it wasn't for real like that was. You feel me? That was like for real. They went to the studio, recorded this shit and everything. So I'm like, okay, what the fuck? I'm finna do that. So for a minute I was just down with him. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: hahahaha ⁓ I got a group over here. DaWreck: and me and Buck could just be kicking it but they still got they group so whatever they doing I'm going with them I'm not in the group but I'm basically like the fourth member cause I'm another nigga that rap and I had a song called reckless Smokey Da Bandit: Okay, great. Cause you still doing right, right. DaWreck: You feel me? So I was always able to slide in a song whenever I'm doing something with Cycle Drama. They'd be like, okay, we gonna let Durek go first do Reckless or let him go last do whatever because they only had three songs and we tried to make the show stretch. You know what I'm Smokey Da Bandit: Motherfucker who dat? Okay. Okay, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so these the underground soul scene. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. DaWreck: Yeah, but you getting paid though now, you know what saying? So it was like, it's little different. Everybody was playing the songs everywhere, so people kind of started to know who they was. And I was just like, man, I need some more people. I need a group or something like that. ⁓ We started being at the flea market a lot. On Madison Polanski, and that's where ⁓ color. Smokey Da Bandit: Dun dun dun dun. DaWreck: and Rick used to be at Abbrusher T-shirts and stuff like that. And we'll be down there rapping and kicking and shit. And that's where Haneus came in. He was down there. So he, you know, started hanging with us. And I was like, yo, we should do a song or something. You know what saying? So we can have some shit to perform too. So we did, we did a, up that paper. So. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. Dude. Top up that paper hoe, top up that paper hoe. This is the timeline, okay? All right. DaWreck: So just look, this how slow it was going. I had one song, I had reckless, and then I had chop up that paper. So now it's two songs we can perform, you feel me? Smokey Da Bandit: Where was you recording at? was y'all? ⁓ DaWreck: ⁓ No, we actually recorded in crime crib at first. I recorded, I recorded ⁓ Reckless in Waukegan at Studio ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: Cram. See? What? What? Yeah. Yeah. I was going. DaWreck: Yeah, you mean Maurice? Yep, that was about, man, that was about, I want to say that was 90. Smokey Da Bandit: Wait, you recorded Reckless and Walkie? DaWreck: Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: and with the legendary Studio RP, RP Maurice. DaWreck: When I was 16, my father moved to Walkheaton. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. DaWreck: So I started coming out there, you know what saying? And then when the music started happening, I was the person. Because I could just go into play-by-play of Gardner's and be like, hey, I got these dudes in Chicago with this music, man. And they're like, bring it out here then. Let me see what it is. I brought them, the first thing I brought them was D-Fly out. Because he was like the first one to hear the album. Then when I got a hold to the psychodrama, I was bringing that out there. Smokey Da Bandit: Mmm. Yeah FU- Yeah. DaWreck: you know, and then, you know, continued after that, you know what saying? But, Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. putting that music in the stores in Walktown. That's what's up, that's dope. And then you linked up with Maurice. DaWreck: Yeah. Yup, I actually linked up, I'm trying to think who told me about it. Somebody told me about it. ⁓ And the funny thing is I remember 1990s. Five or six? I think 1995, one in the six or something like that, I went to. gardeners and I was in there and I was ⁓ talking to the people and stuff like that and then was this one dude he was a little shorty with some braids black as hell and he came to me like man you know such-and-such now you know this and I was just telling them everybody I knew and then the nigga rap for me it was cold as hell Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ huh. Yeah. Let me guess, that was Ace. Shout out to Ace Ito Banks. DaWreck: Ace from Fade the 4, yep. And when I met Ace, they became, the whole Fade the 4 became my little homies, you know what I'm saying? They come ride over me and shit, you know what saying? But they was straight kids, you know what I'm saying? In high school and shit. And they knew, they knew my baby mama little sister, you know I'm saying? And then I think we just started. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ The fatal foe. Eugh. Eugh. There's so many tree branches entangled so you knew all the legends of Chicago before they was legends and then came out here and walked town. DaWreck: Because when the stuff was bubbling in Chicago, it was kind of bubbling out there too, you know what I'm saying? So me bringing the stuff out there, people taking notice like, hold on, you bringing that out here? Who was that? You know them? Like, yeah, I'm the record triple dog. They're like, what the fuck? You know what saying? That meant criminal law and everybody. I just meant everybody. Young Action, Speed, and... Smokey Da Bandit: and Yeah. He naming all the town legends. out to the town. DaWreck: armed rebels, you know. ⁓ wait, I can't forget my man Fred Freeman, you know what saying? That was my homie. That was like my biggest promoter out there. He just kept. Smokey Da Bandit: Man, RIP. DaWreck: throwing motherfuckers at me, hey, this is quarter key right here, holla at him, this is E.W. right here, you know what saying? So I just kept meeting people and building those relationships, because the person I am, you know what I'm saying? I'm straight to the point, I ain't really got, I ain't trying to get nothing out of nobody, you know what saying? So was like, it was just one of those things where, oh, but Triple Darkness, now Triple Darkness was, was right before that, or right, Smokey Da Bandit: You like a magnet. to everybody. DaWreck: It was kind of like all happened at the same time. I met people when I was like 16, 17, 18, 19, you know what saying, getting older. Then when I got to like 19, that's when Triple Dogging started. So me and Mac around that time, it was like straight out of high school. Soon as we graduated. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: It was just like my crib was a spy. know what I'm Everybody come by my crib and we would throw the beat on or sample whatever. We used to sample stuff and slow it down. And so we just sample, yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. And you a producer, right? A lot of people don't know that. You will produce a lot of people. Right, we finna, hey, this going worldwide, ⁓ baby. DaWreck: I produce for triple darkness, produce for direct, I produce reckless. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, the A. That shit come on so motherfucking hard. Niggas just don't know. Payback is a motherfucking, fucking witch. DaWreck: I did reckless, did niggas just don't know. Chop up that paper. On the mission, shot in the dark. Smokey Da Bandit: See, we gonna get into all of that. I know you direct videos, you direct the director. DaWreck: Yeah. Yeah. You did. Smokey Da Bandit: You plug with, let's finish Triple Darkness, because that's, you know, finish what you were saying. DaWreck: Okay, so I had chopped up that paper with Mac Hanis already, so he basically was already starting Triple Darkness. Now, Mac Hanis wanted us to call the group Triple Darkness even with two people in there. And that's because Triple Darkness don't really got nothing to do with three, no. Triple Darkness is a state of emptiness that the world was in before God created everything. God created the world in Triple Darkness, so. Smokey Da Bandit: the number of DaWreck: Triple Dark is basically the form of creation. You know what saying? yeah, and as far as us as a group, Triple Dark, it's like growing up in Chicago, it's like you are going through that. You know what saying? You going through whatever you gonna end up being. You know what I'm saying? By the time you done with all that. So that's what happened with us and that was a good name. So I'm like, cool. It just made it better when we met Trick, cause now we got three people. You know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Inalids! Eww. Eugh. Yeah, I like that. Dude. DaWreck: And I met Trick the day he got out of jail. So it's kind of like the song, Niggas Just Don't Know. If you ever heard the whole beginning, we got the whole skit with him in jail, getting out of jail, and you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Mm-hmm. What up, man? ⁓ DaWreck: Yeah. Yep, when we did, niggas just don't know. Smokey Da Bandit: So y'all basically told the story, because it is a story. One of the dopest stories in hip hop history to me. That's it, call. DaWreck: It's a story that's changed a little bit, you know, protect, it's changed, you know what I'm It ain't 100 % how it went, but it's a story. yeah, once we did that, we was just like, you know what? We might as well be a group, Triple Darkness. Okay, cool. Smokey Da Bandit: You You met her at 2215 sitting on the bench? DaWreck: Then I said, the hornets, the projects right there. You know what I'm saying? And then I said, dancing and gang banging. Smokey Da Bandit: Hahaha DaWreck: It's like, wasn't no rappers. What am I thinking about that shit? Like, you either know how to do some footwork or, because you gotta think, if all the girls doing that and you a dude and you wanna be around the girls, what you finna do? You finna be right there. You know what I'm saying? And the dancers was, them bending over, shaking their ass, you back pumping and doing other stuff. So it's like, it was cool. It wasn't like you dancing by yourself or, you know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Yeah. All right, so. Shout out to Drama Award real quick. DaWreck: Yep, South to Drum Award. Smokey Da Bandit: How did Drama World come about and what's the foundation of that? DaWreck: Okay, so Drum Award was... Smokey Da Bandit: And what do it mean? Because I like how you broke down Triple Darkness. That was dope. What do Drama Award mean? DaWreck: Okay. The drum award is something that SAD came up with and it's just, it kind of goes with the whole thing of psycho and psycho patients and stuff like that. Smokey Da Bandit: Shout out to Sy. Mm-hmm. DaWreck: You know what saying? So basically it's saying we a bunch of crazy dudes in the psych ward. But it's not the psych ward, it's the drama ward. Cause we on some old, other stuff. You know what I'm saying? And it happened out of us, actually side and color arguing. You know what I'm saying? Cause we was all Max Crew. Max Crew was, yeah, Max Crew was a psycho drama. Smokey Da Bandit: You Yeah, let's go. Masker. DaWreck: Triple Darkness, Twister, Do or Die, Color One, Big Keem, Quelo Hame, ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: Hey, shut out the Quelo-Hing, I ain't heard them in a minute, DaWreck: ⁓ man, it was the whole Speed Knot Mobsters. I mean, not the Speed Knot Mobsters. What was it called? The Speed Knot. So first it was Speed Knot before they changed the Speed Knot Mobsters. And Quelo was Speed Knot, Twister, B-Hype, ⁓ Malific, Lif, Malific is Lif. And who was it? Smokey Da Bandit: Damn. DaWreck: Mark Boogie, Jot Down, a whole bunch of people. It was a whole bunch of people in Speedknots. So imagine Twister had like a whole crew of like 20-something people and brought them over there with us. And we all was just in there, deepest hell. And Color and Rick had a crib. And it's just like a big ass room with black carpet on the floor. And we start be in there doing cyphers. like in a circle, smoking and rapping and shit. yeah, and it was like Twista was one of the coldest motherfuckers I ever heard rap in my life. I'm like, I don't know what the fuck, where he come from? Cause he like a real professional rapper. And here with everybody, you know what I'm But it was something about the way we rap too. So. Smokey Da Bandit: all these people you just named. Dude. DaWreck: And it was like more me, Buck, sad nuisance, Buck wife. It was like a few of us that did that style. But the rest of them was all like hip hop. You know what mean? Like twisting all them, they was more like hip hop. Smokey Da Bandit: Where did that style come from? DaWreck: with style. Smokey Da Bandit: It's like Chicago style, that rapid fast, spitting fast. DaWreck: Okay, so if you talking about flipping, flipping is a style that me and Buck do. Smokey Da Bandit: Do you know where they originated? Yeah, that's what. Okay. DaWreck: and it's kinda like it went to different places and it kinda came from different places too. So me and Buck got our type of flippin', which is like, it was more like a ragged style thing. You know what I'm sayin'? So when Buck say itty bitty bang bang, that's like some ragged shit to him. You know what I'm sayin'? Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: Like how they all go bidi-bidi-bye-bye, you know what saying? He was just doing his own itty bitty bang bang. It was like something, you know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, bitty bye bye. BLEH DaWreck: I had a song called, they called me psycho. Check out the Lyrical Masterpiece, stop me just asking. So it's like, we was just doing that shit. Then you had me and Neva. We was kind of doing something like that. You know what saying? Before that. Then you had ⁓ D-Fly. You know what saying? He was doing his way of doing it. You know what saying? You had the snipers. You had JD Walker. You know what saying? It was like so many people doing their own Smokey Da Bandit: Shout out to Teddy Walker. DaWreck: type of thing that was one of reasons why i did the song reckless because i was like i need to do something i said i need to do something different than nobody else ain't doing so i'm like i'm gonna do the flipping but i'm gonna speed it up so i'm going faster i thought i was supposed to be the fastest one doing that time i heard twister do this shit i'm like god damn it's what it went crazy you know what saying he Smokey Da Bandit: That's one of my favorite songs about you, man, reckless. Pfft. DaWreck: topped out the speed on the motherfucker, so I'm like, damn. But it was also a three-fold count too on that song, so that was different too. You know what I'm saying, but. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. So I've come to know a lot of members of Drama Award. Can you say who? DaWreck: Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Is all a part of Drama Award? DaWreck: There's a lot of Drama Award members right now. But I will say, but I will say there's some new members out there. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, that's why I want you. Like, okay, who, who the founding fathers? Can you say that? Can you say that? DaWreck: Well, would say, well I would say, you know, Sad came up with the name, but I think I'm kind of like the longest standing member that's you know, doing stuff. Representing and still, you know, messing with the newer members, because we got new members of the drum ward. Not new, but the most recent members, like Don Relic, Bo Beasley, Lil' Smokey Da Bandit: Right. DaWreck: I know they're gonna be mad, but I can't think of everybody's name, but yeah, it's newer members now, you know what saying? Even though the original members still there, you know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Shout out to them. Drama Award. We just gonna shout out the whole Drama Award. Sweet Juices. Shout out to Sweet Juices. ⁓ DaWreck: So that, that was another story right there. That was a different thing though. Yeah, see, when you say shout out Sweet Juices, that's a different branch. Yeah, cause it wasn't, it was, I'm Drumawood, but I started something called FMP. And it was like me trying to do a newer thing with some younger people around 2009. So I had Sweet Juices and Splurge. Smokey Da Bandit: What, the drama war? Element branch. Yeah, right. There's DaWreck: ⁓ Neff, ⁓ Samuel, Wood G. And I had Hardstop and Rob with me on that. So it was all, and Yak. It was all us together. And... I was producing everything and I had everybody coming in. We did albums together. We did like two albums. like every show we had, Sweet Juices used to be like the secret, you know what I'm The secret highlight, you know what I'm saying? So we'd do our thing and then Sweet Juices just come in going crazy and shit. Like, man, old girls, now. Smokey Da Bandit: Sniper. She come through that motherfucking and shut shit down. DaWreck: So we had a good little run with that, you know what saying? If you look online, we got a couple shows out there. You can see us, we was doing that. But yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Sweet juices be snappin'. ⁓ Shout out to Drama World real quick. You do a lot of classic legendary shit that Chicago really loves and appreciates. Me being a fan, when I was doing my thing, when I started rapping, a lot of people would tell me that, man, you sound like D-Wrek. And I'm like, I ain't even know who you was. I knew who Triple Darkness was, but just the name of the group. I didn't know D-Wrek. So when people was like, you sound like D-Wrek. DaWreck: Pat yourself on the back, that's a compliment. You like, nigga I don't sound like no nigga. Smokey Da Bandit: but I didn't take it as one back then, cause I'm like, who? Who is that? ⁓ yeah, I sound like that. And then I looked it up, you know, ⁓ looked you up and you had that album out. ⁓ that came out. DaWreck: The reckoning. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, with the orange in the ⁓ the orange, dark city. Yeah. Yeah. That shit hard from front to back. From front to back. So yeah, I check it out. I'm like, ⁓ okay, I can see it. And then, you know, but then back then that's when people that when you like, when you first start rapping, people start comparing you sound like they used to say, I sound like bone. They used to say, I sound like Twister. I used to like, you know. DaWreck: Are you talking about Dark City? Yeah. 2002. Smokey Da Bandit: And when they would say those niggas names, I was like, ⁓ yeah, for real. You sound like The Wreck. Who's that nigga? don't know. Triple Darkness. ⁓ shit. Okay, okay, okay. For sure. But yeah, man. Back then, what I was saying was ⁓ you do a lot of classic hits like I'm Cold, Nigga Because I'm Cold. ⁓ But you also was into some acting. DaWreck: Wait, what? Yep. I did a couple little things. Smokey Da Bandit: Did you, you did a couple, you got a classic movie that's out there. Cause you, I see that Wicked Entertainment hat on your head. Yeah, shout out to Wicked Entertainment. Shout out to Wicked Entertainment. Don't y'all got a movie out called, Trust None? DaWreck: ⁓ yeah, the movie's the movie on that? In the hood we trust. In the hood we trust. You dig. Yep. Actually, ⁓ the movie is starring EC Ella. And I play ⁓ Pancake, who is the connect with the lane. Pancake got the cert, you know what saying? So I got a ⁓ couple of little lines or whatever, you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, I was like... Can you tell us about that movie, man? I could tell you about it. It's a classic to me. It got a whole lot of legends in that month. Y'all came together. The city is like the city came together for that movie. It had. DaWreck: Yeah. So Trust None is the first official gangster movie in Chicago and it had a lot of the hip hop community in it, you know what saying, DJs, you know basically Chicago industry in the movie, you know what I'm saying. The movie is about, you know, matter of fact, it's out there so they can go check it out. So I ain't gonna tell them what it's all about, but it's, the movie is about, uh, Smokey Da Bandit: Hustlin'. We could, you could give him a brief, you know. ⁓ DaWreck: EC's character connected with my character. At the time I'm in Houston on the run for something, but I done got down there and came up, you know what I'm saying? And I'm just throwing the stuff to him and he come back and then everything started happening crazy, you know, so. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. and your name pancake. Yeah, that movie dope and the ending is dope as well. It's a lot of Chicago legends in that motherfucking video, I mean that movie, like Cap One, Crucial Conflict. DaWreck: See, can't say that. Yeah, Crucial Conflict, Cap One, Traxta, Dundee, ⁓ what's in that movie? There's a lot of people in that movie. Smokey Da Bandit: Traxta. Yeah, one DA smart now. Thanks, though. DaWreck: Remember? I know buck and psyde in ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: definitely. That character is crazy. ⁓ a must see movie. I'm telling y'all before it was a tubi or anything. Niggas had DVDs of trust none. That's a classic Chicago movie that y'all, it's a must see. I guarantee you. And they got a lot. Yeah. Yeah. Shout out to them, man. Shout out to Wicked, man. DaWreck: You Yeah. Yep, yep. Set out the wicked entertainment, sleepy. You know what I'm saying? Shout out to EC and Lil E too Smokey Da Bandit: All right, so you got a lot of albums, man. You got a favorite album or a favorite collaboration that you've done. DaWreck: think my favorite albums are... Damn! That's a hard one. I was gonna say one, then I thought about another. I'm like, Okay, so my first solo album... Well, the reckoning is probably my... No. Project X is my favorite album. Project X is the one where I got the song Crooked Eye. Smokey Da Bandit: I was about to see, I'm glad I asked that question. DaWreck: Yeah, and then, don't play, you got We Don't Play on now, and there's a lot of songs on that album. Yep. Smokey Da Bandit: Nigga, we don't play nigga. We don't play. Yeah. Yeah, I was gonna ask about that. How did you I know I was gonna ask about all the Familiar names that people across the world are with you know, like Twister how you got a song with Twister? How did you link with Twister? But before we get to that, I do know you did a song with King Crooked And that shit is hard as hell if y'all haven't heard it I suggest y'all go check it out DaWreck: Yeah, yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: How did that come about? DaWreck: Well, you know, I got some connections and he was here doing a show and one of my connects hit me up and he was like, yo, Cricket out here. He got a show and he leave out tomorrow. You want to do a joint with him or something? I'm like, not really. I don't even know who that is. I'm telling the truth. I didn't even know who it was. And they was like, you don't know who Cricket out here is? I'm like, nah. And I think they... ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. DaWreck: told me to listen to his stuff or check him out and shit. And when I heard him, I'm like, man, he cold as fuck. He ain't just a little cold. He probably one of the best rappers I ever heard. You know what saying? So I'm like, fuck it, let's do it, you know? Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ yes. I wish I could play the song, man, but they flagged my shit. DaWreck: called I Murder or Murder, Direct King Crooked, Direct Crooked Out. I got two versions. I produced the first version. But when I worked on Project X, XL produced the whole album. So I didn't want to mess that up by using my beat that I had earlier used. So I said, you know what, we're going to redo it for this one. And that's what we did. Smokey Da Bandit: You got a couple of versions of them, don't you? DaWreck: and XL produced that whole album, you know what saying? Multiple platinum Grammy nominated XL, you know what I'm saying? Oh, Grammy winner, my bad. Grammy nominated and winner. Right. I think he won the one with Yeh, yeah. He won the one, well, one of the ones with Yeh. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, shout out to XL. I went to, yeah, Grammy winner. Don't he got a couple of them? He got one with Yang, right? Yeah, shout out to XL. Shout out to. DaWreck: Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: You know, Kanye? DaWreck: I've been around him a couple times. I don't know him like right now. You know what mean? I can't just call him up and shit, Smokey Da Bandit: Oh, okay. Y'all ain't got a song together in the end of that. DaWreck: I don't think so. I ain't do no song. I know you got a song with Psycho Drum, but that's them. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ okay. But you got a song. but you got a song, two, three, or four, how many you got with Twister? DaWreck: ⁓ I got a couple with him. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. That darkness. How did that come about? How did you meet Twister? ⁓ no, you said about him. Yeah, go ahead. How did you meet Twister? Right, right, right. That's what I... DaWreck: Met Twista, yeah, with the Mass Crew. Back in the 90s, like 94, 95, something like that, Mass Crew, everybody was coming around, know, and Twista came with his crew, and Buck came with all us, you know what saying? And when we have our sessions, was like certain people took notes to certain people. And I think me, Buck, and Twista kinda clicked. Smokey Da Bandit: Mm-hmm. DaWreck: And then like, you know, people would be talking, kicking or whatever. We would branch off, us three. And then it was like something there, like we was gonna do something, but we didn't never do nothing together. Like I don't got no me, Buck and Twister song, but we was always talking about that. And he was always like, man, you got these patterns, man. Your patterns is cold. I'm like, all right. I don't know what the fuck that mean at the time. I'm like, patterns? Nigga, I got bars, nigga. He like them patterns cold, so. That was how I met him, you know what I'm saying? And we actually kicked it a couple times, like ⁓ me, him, chicks or something, you know what I'm saying? Stuff like that. Smokey Da Bandit: That's our group. DaWreck: Yeah, I mean, it was like one of those things where it was like, man, what you want? Shit, man, I got something I'm gonna go, man, let's go. You know what I'm Go kick it and shit. You know, he became a friend like that. I had to be like 19, 20. Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: I always do when you mad at him. Okay. Yeah, y'all got some classic joints together. And you also have directed some of his videos. DaWreck: Yeah, I was actually ⁓ his videographer. So I filmed a lot of his stuff that he did. Not just his music videos, but the stuff he's doing with the gun camp and the gun events he do. I actually travel with them. Vegas, Miami, Atlanta, all over. Just filming them shooting this stuff. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Okay, so y'all relationship thickest, you know what I'm saying? Still going after all these years, that's dope. DaWreck: Yeah, I got a lot of respect for Twista. He's one of the coldest rappers I ever heard. And he the king of Chicago. You regardless of what people want him to feel like, he the one. You know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Cheers. Yeah, so who on your top 10 list of artists? DaWreck: Chicago. Smokey Da Bandit: Matter of fact. Is it, it's been rumored that you created that top Chicago list thing that's been going viral, stirring up ruckus, is that true, So, so I heard. DaWreck: They say I created that? Smokey Da Bandit: What do you think about that? DaWreck: I don't got no top 10 Chicago. I'm not in it, Emma. I couldn't have created it if I ain't in there. I would have definitely... Smokey Da Bandit: It's actually, it was a lot of them that started getting thrown out there. People been fucking with the little AI shit and creating lists. DaWreck: Yeah, I wasn't in none of those. I wasn't in the top 10, the top five, the top 25, the top 50, the top 100. They ain't put me on none of shit. So whoever it is, they don't fuck with me. Smokey Da Bandit: Hey, hey, I know that feeling. I ain't gonna lie. So I ain't trippin'. Do you feel like you the underdog of Chicago? The Chicago scene? DaWreck: I feel like I'm the king of the underground. Like I always say, you know what saying? I ain't with them niggas. I'm here, I'm in the underground. And I ain't saying I'm the king because I feel like I'm the best in the underground. like I'm holding down everybody in the underground. Like I still promote this shit and I don't give a fuck. And I'll never be a nigga that feel like they too much or too high. You know what I'm saying? So. That's how I feel. I'm always gonna be here for anybody that asks me a question or wanna do something or whatever. Smokey Da Bandit: So you don't, as you was saying, you do shit for other people. Like you do videography for Twister. You shot a couple of my videos. Well, I think one or two. shot, yeah, we got a video together and you shot on the block, nigga. You shot on the block. We on the block. Nigga, you shot on the block. We was out there on the block, hot as hell. It was scorching. DaWreck: Yeah. ⁓ yeah. Right, I'm like, ain't shoot your video. on the block. Hot as hell, man. I would ask you a question. How you feel about that day? What was the, what was going through your mind shooting that video that day without the hot in Chicago and all them people? Smokey Da Bandit: Thank you though, appreciate you coming out there. Man, I was like, we gotta get this done. That was what was going through my head. We gotta get this done. This is something for the city. This is for Chicago. This gotta get put together like this. We gotta have the Bud Billiken Parade. I was lucky enough to be a part of that. Walk the parade, shoot the video while doing the parade. You shooting the video. So I got a legendary Chicago artist shooting my video in the city at the Bud Billiken Parade. DaWreck: It was distracting to me. It was very distracting to me. Smokey Da Bandit: with a song with DJ Sluggo. And then to hear you and Sluggo ⁓ talk about Chicago history. It was dope everywhere we went, but it was, but. DaWreck: Yeah, it was real distracting to me because there was lot going on and then people kept trying to be bogus or trying to, you know, throw shade. Smokey Da Bandit: It was a lot going on. It was. DaWreck: And I told you, I hate the Bud Billiken Parade because we used to have to walk in that when me and Nevin them was shorties in that group. They used to make us walk the parade. You walk, you saw how they had to do walk and then they'll stop. Now you're supposed to do your routine and shit. And start walking again, running and shit. I'm like. Smokey Da Bandit: you Yeah, yeah, yeah. You gotta catch, yeah, then you gotta catch up. DaWreck: Yeah, that's why I was like, damn Joe, how long we doing this for? You finna walk the whole thing? Shit, we old now, I can't be walking. Smokey Da Bandit: you No, I was like, no, I couldn't walk the whole thing, man. Man, hell no. Plus we had to go to the other location and meet Sluggo. So, nah. Yeah, that was dope. Thank you, I appreciate you for that. For dealing with all that chaos. DaWreck: 45th of a minute. Yeah. man. I appreciate you for having me do the video. Smokey Da Bandit: We got a couple songs together, people don't, before that get put too far in the interview, shout out, you I appreciate you. I'll have to reach out to you. Like I said, when I was growing up, doing, starting my thing in this music industry, people would say, I sound like you. So I'm like, I have to look you up, look up. You know, I was already listening to Twista and all that. Push the conflict. So. DaWreck: I was like, they sound like me. He that cold? Okay, let me check him out. Smokey Da Bandit: So I'm like, boom, then once I got in the industry and I got to finally meet everybody and I got to meet with you and we bonded and clicked, we got to do a couple songs. You jumped on one of my songs. I forgot, see I'm high as hell. This some high nigga shit. ⁓ DaWreck: Right, see, I bet you'll forget the one I threw you on the mine. Smokey Da Bandit: I didn't forget that one. Shout out. Hey, speaking of that. ⁓ Look, I can't remember my song that I got you featured on. ⁓ Sucker Free. Shout out Sucker Free. Sucker Free. Bitch, I'm Sucker Free. You just a clown. Yeah. We did the video. That shit was dope. And then, then we did. DaWreck: I you, I told you that's gonna be a classic. It's circle free. Yeah. Yep. Smokey Da Bandit: I get high, I get high. Thank you for letting me get on that shit, because that's a song I gotta perform at every show. DaWreck: Thank you for listening to me. Cause I have, I'm one of the people that got ideas all the time. And the idea might not be for me. So when I came to you and said, Smokey, you got smoke songs? All boy, you better do a lot of smoke songs. You know what mean, Smokey. The smoke song people last forever. ⁓ smoke song. Cause that's a, that's a, you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Dude. Damn. Yeah, I said, I got a couple of them. He's like, no, you need to make all Smoke's songs. DaWreck: You could do that forever. And there's so many weed festivals and 420 this and that. And look at you now. Got your own show called The Smoke Session. Smokey Da Bandit: The smoking section. But ⁓ speaking of that, you know, you directly you partially directed that video, but we we got lucky to have another legendary person direct that video. DaWreck: I know man, I'm come take over the video like that man. I'm like, hey, you lucky you a famous, that's being, you lucky you a famous that's being. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ of super famous. We had we had the privilege of having wood Harris. Direct in our video. And I didn't know the nigga was coming over. I'm sick. We shoot the video. A red crib. And this nigga would have come through. And we just chill. DaWreck: Yeah. I didn't tell you he was coming through. He just walked through the door. Hey, that's hilarious. No, I think I might've didn't tell you. I might've just, you know, stuff was going so fast. No, I might, I think I didn't know. I think I didn't know. Smokey Da Bandit: No! I might have forgot. You might have told me. I don't recall you. I just was like, nah, yeah, you didn't tell me, because I was like. life. DaWreck: Yeah, I didn't know. Cause when he called me, was just like, what up, boy, what you doing? You know what saying? I'm like, shit, I was trying to shoot this video right quick. He like, cool, I'm on my way. I'm like, all right. I'm thinking, damn, he finna get in the video? Then when he got there, he was like, I'm just gonna sit over here. You know what saying? Hey, watch out. Man, you know I'm doing? should. Matter of give me the camera. I'm like. Smokey Da Bandit: Ha ha! Mmm. Yeah, that was dope. Yeah, hell yeah! DaWreck: I'm like, damn, he's just taking over my video, but he him, so. Smokey Da Bandit: That was, yeah, he was directing me. He was directing me. hey, I need you to stay right there. Don't move. I kept moving. He like, no, stay in that one spot. Right there, hold on. That was dope. Shout out to Wood Harris, man. Yeah, man, Chicago legend. DaWreck: Man, shout out to Will Harris. That brother's a wealth of knowledge. If you ever have a conversation with him, just know you gained something, you know what saying? Cause he got it up there, you know what I'm saying? And he always was telling me a lot of stuff. And I just didn't, I didn't think it was that easy. You know, for him to just be like, let me get the camera, let me do this. You know, I never would have asked him to do that shit, you know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: He was like, be over there all the time and just was like, nigga, hey, you ain't shooting the video right, right? Let me do this. DaWreck: That was like, he was over there all the time though. That's what I'm saying, he was over there all the time and it just was a, what you doing? Nothing, I'm finna slide through. You know what saying? But not all the time, let me take that back. Smokey Da Bandit: That was dope, man. I ⁓ had the privilege of meeting him, man. That was dope, man. And he be kicking it with. Allah. DaWreck: It's kind of like movies, go home. Hang out with motherfuckers, go back to the movies. You know what I'm saying? So that was one of his off times. So he could come over every day or whatever. And it was like, we just chilling, listening to music, you know what saying? Let me hear his music. I'm letting him hear all our music and stuff. And just telling me about life and Hollywood and how things is and people. Smokey Da Bandit: Mm-hmm. DaWreck: As I say, that dude is real smart, brother. I don't know if people know how smart he is, but he like, genius level smart with it. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: How long you been on him? Y'all grew up together or y'all? DaWreck: for a few years. No, we didn't grow up together at all. I met him through T-. ⁓ know, T-Hyphen have a podcast. I'm trying to think of the name. I'm bogus. My bad, T-Hyphen, my bad. Smokey Da Bandit: You ain't even smoking, you ain't even smoking. I'm over here getting high in the smoking sex. DaWreck: It got, it's called dope lines, the dope lines. That's what it is. yeah, shout out to T-hyphen dope lines, you know what I'm saying? And he had actually had Wood interviewing me and Buck. Smokey Da Bandit: Mmm. DaWreck: And that was my first time actually meeting Wood and talking to him and stuff. You know, he actually, when we met him and did that interview, he actually made a video for... Trumpets. Smokey Da Bandit: Props? DaWreck: Yeah, he made a video for Trumpets in his phone and sent it to us and we posted it, you know what saying? Online. And he posted it on his page. You know what I'm saying? So he had like an admiration for what we was doing and everything and he felt like, let me be a part of this by making y'all a little video, a little promo, you know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: What? ⁓ wow. Yeah. So he did a little promo for this album right here. DaWreck: Yep. And that's crazy because that was before, before Dion Cole did his video to it. Smokey Da Bandit: This is dope as- N***a got... cards and shit. DaWreck: Yeah, hey we was the first, well I'm gonna say we was the first ones to do that. I ain't gonna say that. But we had it that year, you know, so. Smokey Da Bandit: I don't know where the CD at. The CD must be in the CD book, because I was bumping it. CD gotta be in the CD book. I ain't had time to look for it. But yeah, you got a dope collaboration with Buck, huh? DaWreck: That's it. Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: called Scatterbodies. I was blessed to be a part of that tour. Y'all was touring, huh? DaWreck: scattered body. Yeah, yeah, he was, he was. Oh, snap, you got the poster and everything. Who all on that poster? Let me see who all on that poster. We got Dolly Stax, Sherman Demand, Smokey the Bandit, Sweet Juices, Fatal 4, Shakey Shawn, Tina B, Al Coleon, damn. That's what's up. Shout out to everybody who went wherever they went with us, because I think that was all different places. Everybody wasn't in the same place though, right? Right. Like you and Fatal 4 was in one. I Sweet Juice was there too. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Yeah, it was a nice little rhyme, Nah, not every single one, nope. Yeah. Yeah, we was at a couple of them. We was at a couple of them. Yeah, yeah, Fader 4 was snappin'. ⁓ DaWreck: Okay, yeah, yeah. Man, shout out to everybody who came, everybody who on that flyer right there. Smokey Da Bandit: This album got promotions from another Chicago living legend as well, didn't it? DaWreck: and someone Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ Deon? DaWreck: Yeah, Dion Cole. Right, that's what I was saying. He made his video. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. You know a lot of Chicago legends, right? DaWreck: I live in Chicago and I'm not leaving, so you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Mm. That's what's up, man. So how did that happen? How did you get Deion Cole? Like, what's up with that? He did it Wasn't he in the video? He in the video too, right? You got Deion Cole in the video. You got wood hair shooting videos. DaWreck: I know, I'm gonna tell you how it Yes, so this is what happened. Bro, I woke up and my Instagram was off the chain. I'm like, what's going on? I ain't know what was happening. You got a thousand messages. I looked and I saw the video. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: And I'm like, Joe, that's crazy. And I texted him, not texted him, I inboxed him and stuff like that. And he was just like, man, he fucking with the song. He fuck with us, you know what I'm saying? Anything we need. I'm like, Joe, we want to shoot the video for it. We want you to be in the video. Not realizing that what he did was really the video already. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: you know what Him sitting there listening to it and stopping and saying you know what I'm saying? he was saying. That was the video. But I ended up catching him in town. I wasn't able to be there. So what I did was I hit up my mentor in the film industry, Chris Adams. And I was like, Chris, do you know Deion Cole? Cause Chris know a lot of people. You he do stuff for Lupe and all that. He, I think he did Kick Push video. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Shout out to Chris Adams. DaWreck: And he was like, ⁓ I wanna meet him, but I don't know him. I said, well, this is perfect. If you can get some footage of him for the video, he gonna be in our video. I just need you to shoot the video. And Chris was up with it. He met with Deon Cole and they shot his part by theyself. I had to Buck. Yeah, so I had to get Buck down here. Me and Buck went back and shot our part. And it was all green screen. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. but he did it for you, that was dope. DaWreck: Dion part, our part, all that. I just hate that we didn't get to be there with him. But I ended up going to his comedy show and waited till he came out and told the people, I wanna go backstage and holler at him. You know what I'm saying? They let me back there and shit. And that's when we took those pictures and shit. yeah, man, Dion, he was fucking with us a long time ago when he was doing comedy in Chicago before he actually blew up and all that stuff, so. Smokey Da Bandit: Buddy. Yeah. DaWreck: He knew buck already. He knew a buck. Smokey Da Bandit: He knew of Buck or he knew Buck. DaWreck: He knew us, but he didn't really know, know, but he knew of Buck. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. So man, you just plug, you a plug thug, everybody. I got a question from one of your fans, One of your fans asked, why we ain't never heard of the REC and NUSIS collab? What's the beef? Because yeah, that should have happened mid 90s with a bunch of eyeballs behind it. REC and NUSIS. DaWreck: Yeah. I I mean, hey. Okay. and nuisance. Nuisance? I got so many songs with nuisance. What are you talking about? He talking about a whole project or something? I know he ain't talking about those songs. I can start naming off all the songs. Smokey Da Bandit: Why we ain't never heard. Man, don't, that's the question from a fan. DaWreck: Nuisance is on Triple Darkness' first album, Nuisance is on my first album, Nuisance is on a lot of stuff, so I don't know. Smokey Da Bandit: Well, there's our answer. DaWreck: Nuisance is on a mission. Nuisance is on. You know what mean? Smokey Da Bandit: All right, I got a couple questions for you. What's the biggest mistake you see independent artists making right now? DaWreck: biggest mistake an independent artist. That's a hard one. There's a lot of mistakes out there. I was about to say sign into a major label, but that could be a mistake sometimes, but that also could be a good thing sometimes. But that's one of the biggest mistakes I've seen, artists that don't need to sign, sign. You know what mean? If you already got the buzz, you got your own music out there, your own way of paying your own self, and then you gonna sign with a label and they gonna take all that away from you. Smokey Da Bandit: Damn. Okay. DaWreck: basically signed the 360 so they get paid some of everything. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: if you got a 360. DaWreck: I don't think it's nothing but 360 now. Smokey Da Bandit: Nah. DaWreck: It's mostly all 360s now. Well, I ain't talking about you. Smokey Da Bandit: I ain't got no 360. DaWreck: I don't know what kind of deal you got. That's the weather stuff. You got a deal where you still control stuff. So, you're one of the lucky ones. You know what saying? And I think that's like, most people that's already a vet or been doing it for a minute, most of their deal is not gonna be no 360. They might try to do some quick marketing, some quick production deal with you or something like that. Or a single deal or something like that. But, you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Yup. Yeah. ⁓ Do you feel like Chicago gives its legends their flowers while they're here? DaWreck: I don't think they give them to them while they're here or while they're gone. Smokey Da Bandit: No. DaWreck: I'm still waiting on somebody to do something for Black AG and Quicksilver Cooley. I I don't, you know. I seen Plast giving flowers to Reese G from Three Piece in a big show. I ain't seen no other Chicago people do that. Like the city people, you know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Well, I've seen you throw some events together, giving recognition to Chicago legends. DaWreck: I mean, yeah, I do that. I do that. Well, I was just talking about like the city as a whole. Like when you talking about the city, we talking about like City Hall and the mayor and all that type of stuff. You know what saying? We don't get that same kind of recognition like New York or Atlanta. You know what I'm saying? Them people, they mess with them people real hard. So with us, they might do something for, I think I seen, I just saw a crucial conflict on the news. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ okay, okay. Like. DaWreck: Probably like yesterday. Smokey Da Bandit: think that was up on WGCI, right? DaWreck: Yeah, ⁓ yeah, WGC, that's what it was, not the news. My bad. That was, I wanna say that was Twista on the news. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. But that was. Somebody was on the news? Somebody always on the news. DaWreck: Yeah, man. They always got people on the news, but it's the legends, the Chicago legends, that they don't really have on them. They normally have like a lot of newer people or people from different genres of music, not rap, you know what I'm saying? Up there singing or doing whatever they do. Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Mm-hmm. So, real talk, let me get your decision. Industry or independence? Which is the better route right now? Because you was just speaking on people making. DaWreck: I believe independent is but if you can't hack it, you can't get out there or you don't know how to make no moves independently you gonna have to try to get a deal because not everybody know how to market they self or promote they self or get out there and meet people, fans, know what saying? Put out some music, they don't know how to do a lot of stuff so but if you a person Smokey Da Bandit: If you ain't networking, you ain't working. DaWreck: Exactly. But if you're a person that already got everything, you know what you're doing, you out here, your stuff is moving, I don't see why you would sign to a label. You don't need... Smokey Da Bandit: Do you think Chicago rap is underrated or properly rated? DaWreck: Chicago rap is very underrated, but it's also overrated. So you got some real good people and then you got some real bad people and they put them together, which is messed up. You need to separate that. Put the real good people where they're supposed to be at. And then the bad people make another lane for that. not just, you know, kick them out all together, but. Smokey Da Bandit: What? WHAAAT DaWreck: That gotta be something else. That can't be like the same thing as this. You know what I'm saying? You can't have a dope ass lyricist that got bars and all this shit and then you got a motherfucker over here who really don't sound good at all but they like his hair or they like his, how you say it, one word or something. You know what I'm saying? It's like, you know, that ain't the same thing. Smokey Da Bandit: you So that leads into my next question. Is lyricism dead in today's game? DaWreck: No, lyricism is dead to the average person. The average person not really trying to hear that. know, a rapper or somebody who really got a real good mind for thinking or a person who like puzzles and quizzes and stuff like that. They want to hear somebody who got stuff, lyrics that you got to rewind. Man, what'd say? Like, I just got that, that shit cold as fuck. Damn, he said, you know what saying? Shit, you gotta explain it to a person. Man, he said, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know what saying? That's what I came up on. I came up listening to people that was like, damn, that shit cold as fuck. You know I'm saying? Twista cold as fuck. Buck, cold as fuck. Yeah? Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Gotta rewind it and break it down. writing, listening to what they saying, writing it down, listening, writing it down, rewinding it, writing it down. What this niggas just say? Learning it, learning it, yeah. I used to do that. I used to do that. What did the underground scene teach you that the mainstream never could? DaWreck: Learning that shit. Yup. Yep. See you again now. Smokey Da Bandit: What did the underground scene teach you that the mainstream never could? DaWreck: I don't know. I never was mainstream. I had a couple of brushes, but I've been underground the whole time. So the song I did with Twista, that's mainstream. But that's his song. You know what I'm saying? I could step in and out and see what they doing, but I'm always underground. that makes sense. Even when was with Swabhouse Signs, Psycho Drum, and I was down there working with them, I was working. I wasn't the mainstream person. I only had like a glimpse of that, but it was like, you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. So. So is that by choice or you just decided you was like, I like being an underground artist or did you just, you just do music or is that something that you strive for or ever wanted or, you know. DaWreck: Don't think it's a choice. I think it's just how things played out. I Wanted to be mainstream. I think I want to be mainstream until I really saw what it was and I was like, okay I'm not really upset that I didn't go over there. You know I'm saying Because it's like you hear all the stories of the bogus shit. You hear all the stuff about the Yeah, you hear all the stuff you hear bogus deals. You hear people doing dirty shit. You know I'm saying you all kind of Smokey Da Bandit: of the deals and shit. So you kind of like. DaWreck: Cannibalism and kids, you know what saying? You hear crazy stuff and then, yeah, I wanna be that. No, I don't, you know what saying? I don't wanna be over there doing all that stuff, I don't wanna be a part of that. Smokey Da Bandit: But you didn't have some deals, right? Why don't you sign a Traxtor? DaWreck: Yep, I signed a trackstuff, I went to Hollywood. I basically, I technically made it to Hollywood and I recorded my album then. It was a whole lot of people around, different things going on. Smokey Da Bandit: What tracks was in Hollywood? The actual Hollywood? It was out there? ⁓ shit. That's where, that's, what I'm saying. That's where the labels just started or some shit. DaWreck: Yeah. Hollywood, California, yeah. I got pictures and shit. ⁓ Well, no. That's where his studio at. So you know, a lot of people move to California or New York because that's where all the stuff at. Like in Hollywood, you could be walking down the street and look and Capitol Records is right there. You know what saying? So it's a lot easier than Chicago. We don't got nothing like that. But ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: How did you link with Traxta? That's another legend right there. DaWreck: I've been linked with Traxta since 96 or something like that when he started doing Triple Darkness music a little bit. He did Cold Blooded and he did, what else did he He did Cold Blooded and I also was, yep. And I also did Crook County song with him. Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Nigga because I'm cold? Nigga because I'm cold? Traxta did that? DaWreck: You know that? Yes. So Traxta did Magic, Uh-huh You Right, all that stuff. Yeah. You know that? Traxta is the Chicago sound producer, I would say. But I'm also one of those people too. I'm also one of the originals, cause I did Niggas Just Don't Know. Smokey Da Bandit: I didn't know that. No! No! Man, shout out to Trax. Trax the May Magic. ⁓ shi- Ehhhh DaWreck: You know what Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, that's dope. Some Chicago history for that ass. DaWreck: Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: So. ⁓ I ain't gonna keep you on too much longer. What do you want your legacy to be when it's all said and done? DaWreck: It's all said and done. Smokey Da Bandit: Mm-hmm. DaWreck: Rec, AKA Big Rec, king of the underground. I want people to look at me as an institution and not just a rapper. I'm not gonna be the person that just, he was a rapper. You know what saying? It's gonna be more bigger things than that. Chicago rap legacy. Chicago Rap History Foundation these organizations I'm building to uplift Chicago artists and make them feel like okay we got something here we ain't gotta scramble and try to be on this show and this show and out there doing this and doing that cuz we got a lot of stuff here you know I'm saying like your show you know I'm saying so I want to highlight Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: Everything in Chicago. I want to basically make a database or some you know where people can go and look at the artists and the people that's doing podcasts and the producers and the Video directors and you know I'm saying all that stuff any kind of Distribution we got here or record labels. We got here all them. You know I'm Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: It make it lot easier when you realize we got some stuff and you can just talk to these people instead of trying to figure out, man, how could I send my demo to New York or LA or something like that? You know what I mean? And I think it's going to benefit the younger generation, the next generation, not this young generation, probably the next one after that. You know what mean? Like the kids that's like 10. So. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Coming up. DaWreck: So I guess it's like a 10 year plan or something like that. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ You've done a lot of things for the city of Chicago that I've been a part of, that I've seen for myself. You put on for the city to me in a major way. You put on a lot of shows. You didn't let me be a part of a lot of those shows. I know you shoot a lot of videos for people. You do a lot of features for people. You produce a lot of songs for people. So, like... You wanted them ones, right? You know what I'm saying? You be doing your motherfucking thing and I want to show you love and let you know it's always love and respect. It's a lot of things that you do that I don't know that you do, because you do so much. So like, what you got going on right now? Like you're involved in a lot of things. let me hear a little bit. DaWreck: Appreciate it. ⁓ Okay. But right now, I'm... But right now I'm working on a written and directed by me. I'm also starring in the movie with ⁓ Rob Flynn, if you know that's Rob from Snipers, Nebraska Franklin III. Smokey Da Bandit: Mm-hmm. Okay, so that's a ride. Sniper ride. Who? DaWreck: Nebraska Franklin the third that's big nasty. No, that's big nasty Smokey Da Bandit: That's the name of the movie? ⁓ okay, okay, okay. Okay. ⁓ DaWreck: We also got Jermaine Ware written in, that's T Smooth, Mike Samp, you know what I'm There's a bunch of people with that, you know what saying? The movie is called Audio Matrix. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ What audio matrix? DaWreck: Yeah, Audio Matrix. Yep. It's about ⁓ the music business, but it's a comedy. Yep. Yep. Well, I'm working on the soundtrack for that. And ⁓ yep. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. Okay. So that's what you're working on right now. Any new music? You working on a soundtrack for that? Didn't you just come out with a new song, nigga? Didn't you just, was featured on a song, cause some kind of, rapping kind of fast. Don't you got a song with ⁓ Busy Bones? Don't you got DaWreck: Did I? ⁓ tell me what you talking about. Okay. Yeah, I just got it. So I just had a song. Yeah, I was featured on a song with busy bone, twisted insane, VBL and me. And it's called, ⁓ Alter Beast. It's Alter Beast. Alter Beast. Remember the video game Alter Beast where you be a man, then you walking, then you start fighting the goblins and ghouls and you turn into like a werewolf or something like that. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Okay. DaWreck: So if you would, if you look at the video they got us in the video like we the video game people. Yeah, it's like a video game. But you just watch it and then you know. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ you got a video? ⁓ shit. I just heard the song. Y'all was spazzing on that, That was spazzing. DaWreck: Appreciate it. Appreciate it. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ Nah, I ain't gonna do that. ain't gonna do that. Was you around? DaWreck: What, what, what, what? Go ahead. Let's do it. Smokey Da Bandit: Was you around when the beef was going on with bone and shit? DaWreck: Yes I was. Was I dissing them too? Yes I was. Smokey Da Bandit: You DaWreck: But am I a fan of bone? Yes, I am. So it was just like. Smokey Da Bandit: How did you, how do you feel about that? How do you feel about that? DaWreck: This is how feel about that. When I first heard Bone, I thought this was psychodrama or something on the radio. ain't know what it was, but I knew it was similar. You know what saying? As I listened more, I realized the difference. I said, ⁓ these dudes kind of like got a singy thing going on. I said, that shit is cold as hell. They got it. They got a style. Like having a style. And then everybody in the group was basically doing the style. You know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Mm-hmm. Okay. Yeah. DaWreck: That's kind of like how a lot of people did at that time. You know what saying? Cause a lot of people wasn't like, the snipers was kind of like each other. ⁓ Psychodrama, their verses was damn near like the same verse, but from different people. You know, they all started, think I'm ready to get my pen bone. then, but it really don't matter. I kill the motherfucker and brought they line. Put the head on the flatter. Kill the motherfuckers make my day right. And look. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Yeah. And they were harmonized, they verses too, like Bucket Side. You can hear Bucket Side in the background of Noose's verse. DaWreck: Think about this. And really don't matter. I kill a motherfucker and brought a lie. Put his head on the platter. Cause killing motherfuckers make my day right. Itty bang bang. And I hear, for the love of money, gotta get that money man. I'm like, that's kind of cow like that little. But I'm just keeping, I'm just being a hundred percent honest. You know what I'm saying? And I know a lot of people be like scared to say the real, but that was the real joke. Smokey Da Bandit: Friday light. Yeah The money man is Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's that's a DaWreck: And I really liked that shit. I'm like, these motherfuckers cold. I told Buck, I'm like, yo, these motherfuckers cold, yo. I don't know where they came from, but these motherfuckers got the style. They flipping. And that's what, I kind of like went on a mission to listen for all the flipping motherfuckers out there to see who all was doing it and try to figure out how not to be like that or how to be different or whatever. Cause I was like, bone was cold. Smokey Da Bandit: Buh. Dude. DaWreck: But I liked it all to them niggas. I liked it everybody that did that a little bit. All the Memphis people and all that. You know what saying? That was the same time where I was hearing Brother Lich Hung and all this stuff. And it was like the same time. You know what I'm saying? Same time we doing it. They doing it. They doing it. And I thought we was going to be all cool. Today start this. Smokey Da Bandit: What do you? Yeah Yeah. So that's what I was going to say. do you think? Who do you think shot the first shot? Because I was a fan listening to that shit. And I was. DaWreck: Boom! Bone shot the first shot and I was shocked. I was like, why they do that? We supposed to be cool. But I didn't understand that they didn't know about what we was doing. Smokey Da Bandit: What, what do you think, what was the first shot to you? DaWreck: It was looking into my eyes and tell me what... To what? Smokey Da Bandit: That was a reply. to some shit I believe Twister did. Then he say fuck the whole thugs and the purple taters who die for speed. DaWreck: Okay. Smokey Da Bandit: No, I believe it was ⁓ like. ⁓ I can't remember the exact song. I don't want to misrepresent, but that was my understanding. DaWreck: thought, this is I thought, I thought they crazy. They this in Chicago, they gotta come here. I was like, it's finna be violence because Chicago is gangsta as hell. And I'm thinking these niggas from Ohio or somewhere. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. DaWreck: If it becomes Chicago, man, then GD's, BD's, everybody's finna be at their necks, cause they had some Chicago's, you know? I think they was chasing a Chicago, a nigga with a Chicago jersey, so. They was chasing a nigga with a Chicago jersey in the video. Smokey Da Bandit: What? See, this is different angles. I'm, okay. that is so, so the, so out here in Chicago, niggas are looking at this like these niggas dissing us in videos. Ooh. DaWreck: So that's what kicked it off. Yeah, so that made it like, ⁓ it's all that war. Everybody against bone. Snipers do or die, Twister. Crucial conflict, everybody. Smokey Da Bandit: I, nigga, everybody on one song, nigga. That shit was crazy. And it just didn't stop. DaWreck: Nah, it was a bunch of songs. was Dua Dian and Snipers head busting back and then Crook County with Twister head all of us on that motherfucker then they re-did it and just had Newtons on there. Smokey Da Bandit: I know, that's why I said it didn't stop. Dude. Yeah, yep. DaWreck: And then I think it was a whole lot of people, man. The Christian conflict that y'all motherfuckers don't wanna do nothin'. Boom club, boom. Smokey Da Bandit: do or die, some shit. It was the whole city of Chicago versus Bones, but I'm glad that shit over with. ⁓ DaWreck: glass over with and I just hate that we didn't have enough unity at the time to realize that we supposed to been together because bone got played bogus and we got played bogus in the industry bone is like one of the best groups ever but they don't get looked at when people say best group seven they go straight to Wu Tang and other people mob deep like how y'all gonna leave bone now because the you know Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Yeah. DaWreck: The way we rap wasn't conventional. We wasn't backpacking, we wasn't going to this beat. Boom, do or die, twister, Christian conflict, snipers, triple thugs. None of us was doing that. So they kinda kicked us all to the side and said, you know what? We're gonna just have hip hop without y'all. Smokey Da Bandit: Dude. Damn, so you fuck with Bond, alright? DaWreck: Yeah. You already know my favorite bone member. Not the one everybody think. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. Who? Who your favorite bone member? DaWreck: Layzie nigga L-Burner. Smokey Da Bandit: Eee, shout out to L-Burner, Why is that? DaWreck: That was, he got the, is he, I don't know if he the first one all the time, but he seemed like he always had the coldest kickoffs. You feelin' the strip in the rump? Who say that? You feel me? And he just seemed the realest to me. I don't know if that's true, but he just seemed the realest to me. The couple of times I met him, I didn't really get to like, really one-on-one. You know what saying? It was just like a group of people around and know, shit like that. But um... Smokey Da Bandit: Dude. DaWreck: I've been around him a lot of times. I've seen Layzie a lot of times. Like right here, this close. Okay, Smokey Da Bandit: So yeah, you ain't really been around him like that. DaWreck: I mean, like I said, I've been around him, but I never had a one-on-one conversation with him. We only said, ⁓ what's up? And shit like that. Smokey Da Bandit: Now you got a song with Bizzy Bowne, So that's dope. DaWreck: Yep. Now, Bizzy Bone, I actually got to talk to, talk to. You know what I'm saying? And when I met him, he was cool as hell. So I'm like, damn, I thought I didn't like this nigga, because he seemed like he was like the most mad one. Like he was mad as I ass, like mad as Chicago. Like, I don't know. He just seemed like he always was snapping all the time to me. I was like, you know what? I don't know if I like that one right there. Smokey Da Bandit: Dude. ⁓ Yeah. ⁓ DaWreck: The crazy always seem laid back and cool, so you know. and wish too. Smokey Da Bandit: He lay back, man. He be in the cut. DaWreck: And Flesh, that's the other one that's cool as hell to me. That was my... Man, that's like... Flesh was like, when they first came out, I'm like, okay, that one cold. Then he just was gone. Like, man, where you going? He got locked up for some years, didn't he? Smokey Da Bandit: That's big bro. Yeah, hell yeah. But he back and he, man, doing a lot of major shit right now. So shout out to Big Bro, man. Stack be doing this motherfucker thing. All right, so besides the movie, you got anything else you want to promote that you got going on? DaWreck: Man, right now we only talking about Audio Matrix. That's the only thing I got going on. I'm actually finna start telling people they can submit songs for the soundtrack. Smokey Da Bandit: What about ⁓ my role and my spot in my scene in the movie? What about that? DaWreck: Man, man, we almost done. You're have to come out here and hurry up and get in this boy. Smokey Da Bandit: Nigga, I've been trying, nigga. I've been telling yo' ass I'm ready. DaWreck: You know what your already gave the scene what you gotta do. You just gotta come do it. Smokey Da Bandit: Man, I done lost my notes. DaWreck: This weekend, this weekend come do it. Smokey Da Bandit: This weekend I got a video shoot. You need to pull up. This weekend I got a video shoot. We shooting a video to my first single that's gonna be released called Self Made featuring Teddy Bear the Prince on Bone Thugs of Harmony Records. Same as plug. Nope. Nope. It's a motivational song. It's a motivational song. DaWreck: Okay. I might with it. that Okay. Is that a weed song? ⁓ you gotta do a weed song man. We wanna hear all weed songs. I want every 420 Smokey got 10 songs playing back to back. Smokey Da Bandit: Hey, for real. ⁓ you talking about new ones. You talking about new ones. DaWreck: Yeah, yeah. Shit, they could be new, it could be old, whatever. But every time 420 come, all those songs new again. You feel me? Smokey Da Bandit: So you don't smoke no more? I ain't saying you hit a blunt, a bowl, a bong. When you did smoke, what was your preference, backwoods or swisses? DaWreck: Nah, I stopped. Hey man. ⁓ Dutch Java Dutchess ⁓ backwards, but I'm a, I ain't know why I so I, you know. Smokey Da Bandit: Backwoods. dispensary or street. DaWreck: It's messy. Smokey Da Bandit: What? DaWreck: I mean, you know what you're getting. You know what you're getting. The streets, don't know what's going on now. They don't even know what they got. They I think this called, yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Okay. What's your favorite weed movie? DaWreck: half baked. ⁓ you know, I, let me take that back. I said half baked, but how high? No, is Friday considered a stoner movie? Yeah. Friday. Smokey Da Bandit: Stoner, your favorite step Stoner movie. Friday, that's your favorite? Give me your, yeah, I was gonna say, Your top five for a movie. DaWreck: Damn, let me think of something else. Let me think of something else. You said give me my what? Okay, Friday. How, huh? Smokey Da Bandit: too. DaWreck: Half baked. Smokey Da Bandit: 30. DaWreck: Bye, bub. I don't even know if I got fire. Smokey Da Bandit: You only got three? Fuck it. Three. DaWreck: That's it. That's the top three. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ You got a top five artist, top 10. DaWreck: in Chicago. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, let's do Chicago. All right, boom. 5. Twister 2. DaWreck: Okay. Chicago. Okay. I'm number one. ⁓ Twisted book. Smokey Da Bandit: Are these in order? Okay, except for number one. DaWreck: Nah. Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: All right, so okay, Rick, you, Twista, who else? DaWreck: this player. But. who else? This is hot. This is hot. This is hot. Smokey Da Bandit: Chicago, Chicago, your top 10 Chicago. This is for the city, y'all, coming from the legend. His top 10. Everybody got their own list. This is his. DaWreck: Okay. Meatball Twister, never. Smokey Da Bandit: That's three. Never fold. DaWreck: Chill out. Smokey Da Bandit: Sheila from the snipers. DaWreck: That's So that's five old school. Let me think of who five new school or who five YNs. You know what? I was just about say I ain't finna put none of them in my top. Because my top is my top. Smokey Da Bandit: It ain't gotta be 5Y is it? It could be whoever in your right, nigga. This your right. This your top. DaWreck: My top is my top. This shit kinda hard though. Smokey Da Bandit: ⁓ well, we got time. You got five, you need five more. DaWreck: So, okay, I got five. I need five more. Shit, Lil Rock. Let me see. ⁓ Noosis. That's a hard one here. Look, I got three more. Okay. Smokey Da Bandit: That's seven. You got three more spots. All the Chicago rappers. DaWreck: I'm trying to think who I think is Nicole. You say I got three months? Smokey Da Bandit: One, two, three. You got Nevin already. DaWreck: I got never. ⁓ I got bucking Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, they all in the top five. That's in the top five. We need three. DaWreck: I gotta put Trick and Mack in there. That's the other two members of Triple Darkness. One last spot. ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: Okay, one last bite. DaWreck: Did that get me? Smoky the Bandit, Smoky the Bandit, God damn it, Smoky the Bandit. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah nigga you number nine. ⁓ DaWreck: Hey, hey, hey, hey, you right here, son. Smokey Da Bandit: No, no, what about, what about Carmen, Lupe, what about Kanye, the Brats? DaWreck: Let me tell you something, let me tell you something. I'm not phony. The world is phony, I'm not phony. Smokey Da Bandit: This is your list. This is your list though. This is your list, but you was struggling. That's why I was like, you you was struggling. That's why I'm sitting here like. DaWreck: But let me tell you what I feel and say though. Let me tell you what I feel and say. Okay, you gave me some options right there, but I want to keep it 1,000. That's what the world say and that's what people who say, that's what people say to follow what the popular thing is. In Chicago, it was never a thing of Kanye one of the coldest rappers to people. It was just always, you know, Kanye make dope beats. Kanye had a group called the Go-Gitters with him, GLC, Timmy G, and somebody else. I thought Timmy G was the coldest one. You know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: People will say stuff like, man, I like your shit. I don't like that Kanye shit. They'll tell me that. So to them, I'm better than Kanye. You feel me? But when you do things in the world and you get big and people look at you for your money and your hits and all that, it's not about if you cold. It's not even about if you wrote it, because he don't write a lot of this stuff. You know what I'm saying? Common, totally hip hop. That's almost like the opposite of what we do. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. DaWreck: You know saying? They don't like our shit, and we don't really like their shit. We give them their props, you know what saying? We be like, okay, that's that, but that's hip hop. If you not listening to hip hop-y stuff all the time, and you like some street shit or whatever we doing, then that ain't that good to you. You know what I'm saying? And that's how it's looked at. ⁓ Smokey Da Bandit: You ⁓ Eugh. DaWreck: coming from the city. People scared to say shit because they don't want to be blackballed. Man, you said that they ain't gonna fuck with him. I don't give a fuck. Ain't nobody fuck with me no way. You know what saying? So, but you scared to lose. Ain't nothing to lose, shit. No, not Kanye, not Kami. Now Lupe, I will say he is cold as hell. That's the difference, you know what I'm saying? Kanye is kind of like, he rap kind of slow. Smokey Da Bandit: Pfft. Yeah. DaWreck: He kinda rap easy. He make jokey lyrics. You know what saying? Common is to me is better than Kanye, but he don't get that because he Kanye bigger, got more money. you know, but yeah, I like mostly the gangster type rapper, the Chicago flipping style rapper, stuff like that. Smokey Da Bandit: The 10 that's your name. Okay, so what's your top 10 all artists hip hop favorite favorite period ain't even gotta be just John to give me your top 10. DaWreck: Now that's what I did. I did put a top 10 of my favorite artists out there from the whole world. And I really ain't putting no Chicago people on there, because I kind of like hold us separately. But I think I had, let me see if I can go down the list. think I had Rundy, Tupac was first. And I had like Run from Rundy MC. had LL Cool J, I Slick Rick, I Rock Him. then it kind of get like... It got tricky. I didn't put the normal people everybody put in their list. I didn't put Biggie. I didn't put Nas. You know what I'm I don't know, I gotta find my list. Let me see if I can find it so I can see it. Who else I had in there that just... So I had Crooked Eye as number 10. And Nine, had... Let me see if I can find this shit. I had... Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah, who you got? Who you got? That was like three, four. Okay. DaWreck: I had a tie at nine and the tie was... Techno and Eminem. I'm still looking for my list so can try to see all the way through. Smokey Da Bandit: All right, what's something people think they know about you but got completely wrong? DaWreck: ⁓ I know. I have to find out what they think. What they think about me but got completely wrong? That I'm mean as hell? People say, you look mean as hell all the time. My face stuck like this. don't be mean. I just be looking like this. Smokey Da Bandit: Damn, nigga. Yeah. you DaWreck: As my wife says, she's like, man, they think you mean to him. Smokey Da Bandit: You got any new music coming out? No new projects, nothing. DaWreck: Audio Matrix Soundtrack. Smokey Da Bandit: Where can people find you, What's your social media? DaWreck: Now. D-A-W-R-E-C-K, just my name. Look on my Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, Twitter, and whatever. It's D-REC. Smokey Da Bandit: Alright. Last question. When you gonna put that motherfucking song out man that we got? That you been hoarding that song man. Man, I killed that shit man and I know I did. Like why you holding on? Why you holding on? Man. DaWreck: Hey, man, I probably got a thousand songs that I probably got a thousand unreleased songs. We did this song in 2016 That's 10 years ago. That was 10 years ago, really. You know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Why? Why did you do that? Why did you do that? DaWreck: Hey man, I probably felt like it's alright, we can do something better. Smokey Da Bandit: You ⁓ man. Hey, which was the best verses to you? DaWreck: ⁓ the best verses to me was the Lox and the Three-Six Mafia Bone. was like, both of them was... The locks is like what broke the mold. That was the best one. And then Bonehead, the other end of the book end. That was like the, I guess the second best one. I don't know. Cause they kicked it off. It was the best one of you? That's cause you was there. That's cause you was there. But I watched it on TV or whatever. Smokey Da Bandit: See you. Hell yeah, nigga, that shit was... Nigga, that's cause that shit was hard. Hey, that shit was... That shit was... That shit was... That shit was... Wow, nigga! DaWreck: YouTube, whatever, and I watched the, I watched the Locks and Dip set. Now the Locks and Dip set, bro, that was one of the best battles ever. That was the best thing for hip hop in a long time. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah it was, cause Jada, real Jada. DaWreck: Thanks to Jadakiss. Thanks to Jadakiss. He made that shit. Dip set, you know, people who's big fans of dip set, but I don't think they was up to par. They wasn't ready. They didn't practice. They didn't have their stuff together. That nigga Cam came on stage with a motherfucking lawn chair or some shit. Just laying out. Smokey Da Bandit: They didn't take it serious. was like, nigga, we just finna go in there and kill this shit. Yeah DaWreck: But it's like this, he probably like, shit, let me go up here and flex on these niggas, because I got millions of dollars. I'm the richest person on the stage, so I'm bringing me a lawn chair and laying out. Smokey Da Bandit: would you like to see in the Verzuz DaWreck: ⁓ I would like to I would like to see do or die & crucial conflict Smokey Da Bandit: Eeeee! That's hard! That's hard! DaWreck: I think that'd be very entertaining, man. Cause Crucial got so many bangers and Do or Die too, you know what mean? I think it'd be like the energy would be switching cause Do or Die got like player pimp songs and the flic got like charged up anthems and shit so it'd be cool. It'd be like the no limit, it'd be like the no limit and cash money thing. They from the same area, basically the same sound, basically the same fan base, you know what I'm saying? Smokey Da Bandit: Hell yeah! Yeah, that's dope. That's a dope. First cash money shit. Yeah. DaWreck: But Chicago got a lot of figuring out to be involved with a lot of stuff. You know what saying? A lot of stuff that we try to be involved with, we need to do our own because we not invited. We not invited. It's like they say, you know what? He can come. Him. Tell him to come on. The rest of y'all thousand, mufuckas friends, stay back there. Smokey Da Bandit: but this gonna be the last question for real. What do you want fans to take from your music when they press play? DaWreck: Okay. When they first play, I want them to... Listen and learn. because any music I make from now, I'm have a message to help in life. You know what mean? I'm not just doing... I'm not finna just be doing songs about shit that I was doing when I was a kid no more. It's like now I gotta give them that shit. You know what saying? Yup. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. What's up, Well, thank you for being the guest. Thank you for staying on with me this late, man. I know you got shit to do. It's been a day. I appreciate you. I love you, bro. Thank you for everything, all the help you've done for me. And, ⁓ DaWreck: Yep, yep. I'm ready, I'm ready. Man, thank you man and much more success with your venture man. I see this being a big thing and helping a lot of people in Chicago get heard, you know what saying? And the whole Illinois, you know what I'm saying? The Midwest or whoever you interview or whatever. But I do see it help us, our city, our area have some platforms like this, you know what saying? The crib, you feel me? Yeah. Smokey Da Bandit: Yeah. ⁓ yeah, we gonna do that. Yeah, we gonna do that. We gonna represent the crib. You feel me? We gonna wrap the crib. Shout out to the crib. DaWreck: Shout out to everybody. Shout out to everybody that's doing something for Chicago. Whether it's a podcast, a venue, a radio station. We need that and we appreciate it. And keep the good work up. You know what saying? Smokey Da Bandit: you got any shout outs you wanna end this off with. DaWreck: Man, shout out to the whole Audio Matrix cast. The movie is coming. We trying to hide y'all dying laughing in that theater. And Smokey gonna be filming his scene real soon. It's gonna be funny as hell. Smokey Da Bandit: We got it. Hey, we got proof. If it don't happen, y'all, just look. DaWreck: If it don't happen, Smokey got too much going on. He gonna be gone on tour with Bone or something. Smokey Da Bandit: Hell nah, I'm coming. I we got shit to do, man. We got shit to do, man. But thank you, man. I appreciate you. ⁓ DaWreck: already I was having to go but I'm in the house so y'all finna go I'm staying here Smokey Da Bandit: Everybody love everybody. Make sure y'all like, subscribe, comment, share this video. If y'all got some more questions y'all wanna ask for the next guest, make sure y'all put it in the comments. Show some love to Dereck. Make sure y'all follow Dereck on all streaming platforms. Check out all his movies. He got some legendary movies in. He got some that's coming soon. music videos and all that shit. And we out this bitch. Inhale the good shit, exhale the bullshit. You better blow that shit out. We out. DaWreck: Dig, from what? Yep yep. Mm-hmm. Smokey Da Bandit: you