Halftimeonline: How did you guys hook up and how did you go about helping him create that project? It definitely seemed like meeting you was a turning point for him to where he went on and made Death Certificate and touched on topics that’d you’d be more likely to hear on a Public Enemy album.

Chuck D: Well people grow forward and upward but my thing is knowledge, wisdom and understanding don’t come in a microwave. People don’t generally get inherently dumber especially rappers because they are mental people and artistic people. In ‘87 or ‘88 Public Enemy were like ambassadors for rap music and we orchestrated the first tours putting on groups from other parts of the country instead of just relying on NY groups. We did the Bring the Noise tour in 1988. We put Hammer on the tour, Too Short – he used to keep his tour money in his sock and keep it moving. Matter of fact I brought Too Short to the Baltimore Arena and I said they might not understand you or like you but go through this one time and they will pick your vibe up later on and he bravely went and withstood the crowd. Same thing with N.W.A. to a certain degree. They opened up for us a couple times so we played together on some shows and I built a relationship with Ice Cube because I admired his work on Str8 Out of Compton. He reminded me of a lot of young cats that I was dealing with like Busta and LL. All of these guys were ten years younger than me so of course I was gonna be there to give them tips and they gravitated to my older brother wisdom so to speak. My thing was this is great. it’s like the sports league I never was in. So I tried to bring a sports mentality to the rhyme game.

Cube was having some problems in 1989-1990 where he was saying Eazy and Dre were getting money and Jerry Heller only gave Cube a plaque but that’s all he was getting. I would have a conversation with Cube like try to work it out with your guys. I didn’t want to get involved. I had just gone through the P.E. and Griff thing and the anti-Semitism thing that was going on so I knew the importance of trying to keep a group together. I advised Cube to work with the guys and try and mend that fence. Come to find out the guys weren’t trying to mend that fence because they didn’t have the power to do so with Jerry Heller in the middle of the mix. Jerry Heller had a relationship with Eazy and Dre alongside that so Cube, Ren and everybody else were the odd men out. Cube was their chief lyricist and increasingly he would come to me and say I’m kinda uncomfortable with this situation and I’m sizing up my solo career. He said he wanted to see if the Bomb Squad could do it. I looked at him like I kinda don’t want to get involved with you, Dre and Eazy. I’d rather we keep our distance and you figure it out. I tried to introduce Cube to other people like Sam Sever and other producers and he’d end up coming right back to us, him and his cousin Sir Jinx. One time he came to the Green Street sessions we were having when were putting together Fear of A Black Planet. Me and Kane had been talking over the years that we were going to do a record together. Finally Kane was in the vicinity and we were going to do Burn, Hollywood Burn. I planned it for myself and Big Daddy Kane to do it. So Cube happened to visit us because he was looking for a producer for his solo and I still didn’t want to get involved. So as Kane and I are going over the song Cube is sitting on the couch and says I want to be down with that. Me and Kane looked at him and were like ok come on. It was that simple. We gave Cube the middle part and after that session Cube said he wanted to get down. It was me, Hank Shocklee, Erik Sadler, Keith Shocklee and Sir Jinx. Cube was like Yo man I want to really get down and do this with ya’ll. He told us that he wanted to get Dre to do it but Dre told him he had to wait after Michele’ and like three other albums. Cube told them he’d have to get someone else to do it and Dre and Eazy told him that he ‘might’ go gold and rolled their eyes. That’s when he came out. So we were like ok we’ll do this record with you and we’ll knock it out in like 4 or 5 weeks.

Before we even started the project I wanted to give Cube some tips because he was a great lyricist. I said one thing you don’t want when you are doing a record, especially your first record, is to repeat yourself. Say things once as powerful as you can and move on to a different subject. Try to work with different textures, different speeds, try to make sure you can perform a good amount of these songs, don’t look back and try to be humble where you’re the good guy looking ahead. I told him not to direct any lyrics specifically at somebody [and] to try and be clever and indirect. I also told Cube before you write your lyrics take two dollars, go up into this CVS and buy yourself a notebook. He said a notebook? I said yep keep a notebook. He went in and got it and I told him this notebook is going to be the basis for you to come up with titles and work from your titles. Your titles will set the standard on what songs say what so you should say it all in your titles and your imagery. We did Amerikkas Most Wanted and Cube ain’t looked back. It all started from a $.89 notebook. Even to this day Cube still keeps his notebook whether he has movie ideas or whatever. He’s always been an interesting cat. He’s definitely one of the greatest emcees of all time if not the greatest representation from the west coast ever. I told Cube you have to go forward but not expect to change overnight. That’s why with Amerikka’s Most Wanted he might have wanted to go into a Public Enemy zone but I told him don’t try to go into that zone right away. Stay in your zone and grow into it. Kill at Will and Death Certificate were graduations. One thing that annoys me is when people say oh Ice Cube he’s the one who did the Are We There Yet? movies. I’m like yea well everybody has kids. You expect him to make a gangsta kids movie?

Halftimeonline: When you asked about our top five earlier Cube is definitely in my top 5 favorite emcees.

Chuck D: You know they say the same thing with Ice-T as far as he does this and that but he is the one guy I’ve seen who can put the audience in the palm of his hand. You can’t tell that by his records or videos. If he gets out there and performs you have no choice but to submit to his artistic talent. Some people have it and some people don’t. So when people judge rappers and leave out performance you don’t get the full dynamic of what that rapper can offer.

Halftimeonline: Have you seen his show on VH-1?

Chuck D: With the kids? Yea, we’re in the last episode. That was a wild night.

Halftimeonline: Oh yea that’s right. I know you co-signed it in the end but what did you think of that idea when he approached you with it? Your shows aren’t a joke so I’d think you’d take it a bit serious and not have inexperienced kids running around on stage.

Chuck D: Ice-T is my god brother man anything he wants. I’ll walk to California to do anything for Ice. You know another cat who gets disrespected that I always had a high regard for his intelligence and I don’t like the way he is being written out of history books is Eric B.

Halftimeonline: Really?

Chuck D: Yea man if there was a union leader in hip hop it would be Eric B. He always had a high level of integrity.

Halftimeonline: We did an interview with Rakim not too far back. In the history books it’s looked at like Eric B. didn’t really do anything and talking to Ra it kind of sounded like that.

Chuck D: Well, I don’t think Eric B. went out there and claimed that he made the beats or anything like that. He was just a strong presence that people respected for his ability to make Eric B. & Rakim work as a super group. I think Rakim was at such a young state and age that it couldn’t have worked without Eric B. Not at that time. It was a dynamic that happened to work. Eric B. never had to do anything complicated on the tables he just had to be there with his presence. Not to say that Rakim needed him because Rakim is the God. As far as phrasing is concerned Rakim and KRS are as important to hip hop as Luis Armstrong is to all music. When Luis Armstrong started making records he came with a vocal style and phrasing that is still used to this day. That’s why he is the greatest musician of all time because he introduced a vocal standard. Rakim is no different. Rakim did it with My Melody and KRS did it with South Bronx but we can’t remove Eric B. and Scott La Rock from that equation. Scott and Eric B. were homeboys and they thought alike. They were strong cats.

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Posted by Jbutters on Sunday, March 25th, 2007 and is filed under HIP HOP ICON SERIES.