Dem Hoodstarz
Interview by Keita Jones
Photo by Black Dog Bone
You took some time off since the last album. Now you have a new album out. What’s been going on?
This album is called “Controversy”. We had to deal with controversy all last year. This album is about what we been through the past year and half. Everybody in the Bay knows what happened and the story was nationwide. Band Aide was indicted. We really can’t speak on the gang injunction because we had an incident where the prosecutor used
a previous article as evidence against us “Exhibit A”.
That was pretty big, because there were people who don’t listen to rap who now know your name.
Exactly. The media was quick to grasp onto that negativity, but they were never there to grasp onto to fact that we raised money for Katrina or raised money for Autism. None of that got credit. We raised over ten thousand dollars for Katrina and another ten thousand for Autism. We performed at the Ambassadors and instead of getting paid that night we donated our money to Katrina victims. We performed with Too $hort at the Playboy mansion to raise money for Autism. It’s irritating that the media is like that, but it come with the territory.
This street album right here is a real good look for me and Band Aide because this whole year there has been a lot of controversy surrounding me and Band Aide. We were going through a real tough legal situation. We put a lot into this project. It’s a street album, but it started off as a mixtape. We put so much into it, it turned out to be a street album. We didn’t have no mixtape shit on there. We went all the way on this as far as concepts and songs and production. We did our thing on this one.
The album features all original music, no recycled songs?
All original songs, no recycled singles or none of that shit. No re-used shit. It will be out on October 5th on iTunes. We made sure that what happened with The Tonight Show, as far as it not being on the shelves the expected date, doesn’t happen with this album. We distributed this album ourselves and Rasputin’s has the CD’s already.
What producers and features are on the album?
We got Zaytoveen, David Banner, Cinematik. A slew of different producers on the album to give each song a different sound. We didn’t want the whole album sounding the same. We believe that this album everyone, not just the Bay but statewide and nationwide, is going to feel. We were going for diverse sound. We’re not taking anything from the Hyphy movement—we support that movement 100% but we just don’t want everyone thinking that we are coming out sounding the exact same as we were few years ago when we were at the height of that movement, because that’s the last time we dropped a full-fledged album besides The Tonight Show.
A lot of people don’t know that Zaytoveen is from the Bay. How did you end up hooking up with him and bringing him back to his Bay Area roots?
We actually went to Atlanta to do the song with Zaytoveen and Gucci. There wasn’t no “email me the beat and send it back with your verse”. We flew out to Georgia and hooked up with them. Zaytoveen is from San Francisco and our manager is from San Francisco and they grew up in the same neighborhood. It was nothing but a phone call and a flight. That was real big for us.
So you got Gucci on there. What other features do you have on the album?
We got Red Café from the east coast. David Banner, the Huss from the Mob Figaz, Messy Marv, Big Rich. We got a lot of The Hoodstarz on the album. We reached out to a lot of people, but we also kept a lot of us on the album because this was a comeback album for us.
What made you all want to drop two street albums in one year so close together?
The Tonight Show is famous for putting out a gang of albums. We were already planning on dropping our street album, but we wanted to knock out The Tonight Show with DJ Fresh as a warm-up teaser to let people know what we were coming with for “Controversy”. We wanted to sock people in they mouth and not let them think that the misfortune that happened with me that we were out the game. Don’t think because we haven’t dropped in a couple of years that we have no material and that we are out the game. We real street dudes. We really be out here and got caught up on this street shit and had to overcome. A real street person is gonna have all types of interferences that you have to overcome. But that’s how we wanted to come, back to back with these two albums and hit people in they mouth. Don’t think that because we been missing in action that we not on. We got a lot of hot material that we can give y’all. We gearing up for the real album that’s droppin this April.
Y’all been dropping hot singles every year as teasers. 2007 with “Video Vixen”, 2008 with “Laughin”, and 2009 with “Thumper on My Laugh”. How come no album was ever released earlier?
A lot of people drop albums but nothing comes outta them financially. We wanted to get our business straight, so when we put out an album we can make money off it. Alot of people just look rich. We wanted to really make money off this shit but also stay relevant by putting out singles to let people know that we still here. A lot of people abandoned the Hyphy movement but we wanted to stay down. We not “Hyphy” rappers but we are part of that movement.
You all were really instrumental in popularizing the Hyphy movement but a lot of people speak on the Hyphy movement like it’s taboo or derogatory. Why do a lot of Bay Area rappers have that attitude to the Hyphy movement now when the Hyphy movement really pushed the Bay Area back into the national scene?
A lot of people like to get on the bandwagon, so when in an interview one rapper said, “I ain’t with the Hyphy movement” they took it as though, “Well if that nigga ain’t Hyphy, I ain’t Hyphy” instead of embracing hyphy. It really wasn’t a “movement”, the media made it a movement because the Bay Area always been Hyphy. from Tupac on down. You know what I’m saying? From spitting on camera on down. We always been Hyphy. But some people hear a rapper say, “Naw I ain’t Hyphy, I’m Mobb Musik,” and some rappers took it in a negative light. It really wasn’t negative, but the media was finally recognizing our style and our coast, and if everybody would have embraced it instead of abandoning it when the people started talking bad on it would have been bigger. The Hoodstarz ain’t really Hyphy rappers but we are down for that movement 100% because that’s what put us on and made us hot. There’s no way we can speak down on it because that was the pinnacle of our success.
How do you react when you hear Bay Area rappers speak on the Hyphy Movement negatively?
To each his own. What they eat won’t make me shit and what I shit, them niggas ain’t gonna swallow. To me, it’s like having an argument at home and then letting that shit spill out in the street. We all supposed to be family. If rappers weren’t feelin what other rappers were doing they should have brought that to them instead of putting it on blast out there in the streets and in the media for everybody else. When the Hyphy movement was up and going and we were getting all this media attention and the big labels were out here trying to sign everybody, everybody was on the bandwagon. But as soon as the people they were looking for didn’t sign and the big labels left up out of here, then people started talking bad on it. And what happened is that everyone else around the nation took off with that sound: You got niggas jerkin in LA, niggas swag surfing on the East Coast, niggas getting they Dougie on and all this other shit. Niggas took what we was already doing and called it their own. They got big on the shit and their cities are backing them up. But up here we all crabs in the bucket and that’s been the Bay Area’s problem for a long time.
That’s an interesting point because during the early 90’s the Bay Area was known for its unity. People from other regions would be jealous of our unity and independent hustle. What changed?
What happened is that we lost it and everyone else gained it. Everybody sees the Down South cats and their movement. People see the East Coast cats and their movement. I don’t know if their unity is strong or if it just looks like that, but I remember when the Bay Area was like that. Everybody in Frisco was doing they thing together. Messy Marv, San Quinn, Cold World Hustlers, Cougnut. And then you had Oakland and Luniz, and Vallejo with Mac Mall and E-40. Everybody was working together. Now it’s like everybody is in their own cubby hole and doing their own thing. If everybody was in a collective thought we could flood the radio with Bay Area hits and flood the television with Bay Area videos. But everybody is on their own page. I think we need more communication so we can make a big Bay Area presence.
I know you can’t speak too much on the controversy, but you did a promotion for the TV show “King of Queens” on CW. You all had this squeaky clean image until the media black-balled you with the coverage of the gang injunction. How has that affected your record sales and popularity? What do you think it will take to get that image back?
It is what it is. Image doesn’t mean shit to us. Even with the presidents. One president smokes weed another got his dick sucked. Everybody has a past, period. Everybody done shit they not proud of. If you look us up you gonna find some good and some bad and some ugly. At the end of the day we can learn from our mistakes and keep going or dwell on them and not move at all. But we choose to move forward. If a person chooses to dwell on our past, that’s up to them. You got to learn to forgive and forget as long as we don’t make the same mistakes and keep growing. The media coverage of the injunction did cast a negative light on us, especially with the endorsement with LRG and the “King of Queens” commercial. CW did pull the commercial off the air and a lot of things stopped happening. We don’t get as many calls to come talk to schools, so it did affect us like that.
Lastly, what are some Bay Area albums that you would consider influential and significant to the Bay Area Rap scene?
My most influential Bay Area album was Tupac’s “Me Against the World”. I have to say for me it was C-Bo’s Mob Figaz and the first C-Bo album “Gas Chamber”. The Mobb music was already out here, but those were the albums that sealed the deal for me. Also Spice-1’s first two albums and 415 with “Groupie Ass Bitch” and E-40 “Federal”. That was shit niggas was on.
Interview by Keita Jones
Photo by Black Dog Bone
You took some time off since the last album. Now you have a new album out. What’s been going on?
This album is called “Controversy”. We had to deal with controversy all last year. This album is about what we been through the past year and half. Everybody in the Bay knows what happened and the story was nationwide. Band Aide was indicted. We really can’t speak on the gang injunction because we had an incident where the prosecutor used
a previous article as evidence against us “Exhibit A”. That was pretty big, because there were people who don’t listen to rap who now know your name.
Exactly. The media was quick to grasp onto that negativity, but they were never there to grasp onto to fact that we raised money for Katrina or raised money for Autism. None of that got credit. We raised over ten thousand dollars for Katrina and another ten thousand for Autism. We performed at the Ambassadors and instead of getting paid that night we donated our money to Katrina victims. We performed with Too $hort at the Playboy mansion to raise money for Autism. It’s irritating that the media is like that, but it come with the territory.
This street album right here is a real good look for me and Band Aide because this whole year there has been a lot of controversy surrounding me and Band Aide. We were going through a real tough legal situation. We put a lot into this project. It’s a street album, but it started off as a mixtape. We put so much into it, it turned out to be a street album. We didn’t have no mixtape shit on there. We went all the way on this as far as concepts and songs and production. We did our thing on this one.
The album features all original music, no recycled songs?
All original songs, no recycled singles or none of that shit. No re-used shit. It will be out on October 5th on iTunes. We made sure that what happened with The Tonight Show, as far as it not being on the shelves the expected date, doesn’t happen with this album. We distributed this album ourselves and Rasputin’s has the CD’s already.
What producers and features are on the album?
We got Zaytoveen, David Banner, Cinematik. A slew of different producers on the album to give each song a different sound. We didn’t want the whole album sounding the same. We believe that this album everyone, not just the Bay but statewide and nationwide, is going to feel. We were going for diverse sound. We’re not taking anything from the Hyphy movement—we support that movement 100% but we just don’t want everyone thinking that we are coming out sounding the exact same as we were few years ago when we were at the height of that movement, because that’s the last time we dropped a full-fledged album besides The Tonight Show.
A lot of people don’t know that Zaytoveen is from the Bay. How did you end up hooking up with him and bringing him back to his Bay Area roots?
We actually went to Atlanta to do the song with Zaytoveen and Gucci. There wasn’t no “email me the beat and send it back with your verse”. We flew out to Georgia and hooked up with them. Zaytoveen is from San Francisco and our manager is from San Francisco and they grew up in the same neighborhood. It was nothing but a phone call and a flight. That was real big for us.
So you got Gucci on there. What other features do you have on the album?
We got Red Café from the east coast. David Banner, the Huss from the Mob Figaz, Messy Marv, Big Rich. We got a lot of The Hoodstarz on the album. We reached out to a lot of people, but we also kept a lot of us on the album because this was a comeback album for us.
What made you all want to drop two street albums in one year so close together?
The Tonight Show is famous for putting out a gang of albums. We were already planning on dropping our street album, but we wanted to knock out The Tonight Show with DJ Fresh as a warm-up teaser to let people know what we were coming with for “Controversy”. We wanted to sock people in they mouth and not let them think that the misfortune that happened with me that we were out the game. Don’t think because we haven’t dropped in a couple of years that we have no material and that we are out the game. We real street dudes. We really be out here and got caught up on this street shit and had to overcome. A real street person is gonna have all types of interferences that you have to overcome. But that’s how we wanted to come, back to back with these two albums and hit people in they mouth. Don’t think that because we been missing in action that we not on. We got a lot of hot material that we can give y’all. We gearing up for the real album that’s droppin this April.
Y’all been dropping hot singles every year as teasers. 2007 with “Video Vixen”, 2008 with “Laughin”, and 2009 with “Thumper on My Laugh”. How come no album was ever released earlier?
A lot of people drop albums but nothing comes outta them financially. We wanted to get our business straight, so when we put out an album we can make money off it. Alot of people just look rich. We wanted to really make money off this shit but also stay relevant by putting out singles to let people know that we still here. A lot of people abandoned the Hyphy movement but we wanted to stay down. We not “Hyphy” rappers but we are part of that movement.
You all were really instrumental in popularizing the Hyphy movement but a lot of people speak on the Hyphy movement like it’s taboo or derogatory. Why do a lot of Bay Area rappers have that attitude to the Hyphy movement now when the Hyphy movement really pushed the Bay Area back into the national scene?
A lot of people like to get on the bandwagon, so when in an interview one rapper said, “I ain’t with the Hyphy movement” they took it as though, “Well if that nigga ain’t Hyphy, I ain’t Hyphy” instead of embracing hyphy. It really wasn’t a “movement”, the media made it a movement because the Bay Area always been Hyphy. from Tupac on down. You know what I’m saying? From spitting on camera on down. We always been Hyphy. But some people hear a rapper say, “Naw I ain’t Hyphy, I’m Mobb Musik,” and some rappers took it in a negative light. It really wasn’t negative, but the media was finally recognizing our style and our coast, and if everybody would have embraced it instead of abandoning it when the people started talking bad on it would have been bigger. The Hoodstarz ain’t really Hyphy rappers but we are down for that movement 100% because that’s what put us on and made us hot. There’s no way we can speak down on it because that was the pinnacle of our success.
How do you react when you hear Bay Area rappers speak on the Hyphy Movement negatively?
To each his own. What they eat won’t make me shit and what I shit, them niggas ain’t gonna swallow. To me, it’s like having an argument at home and then letting that shit spill out in the street. We all supposed to be family. If rappers weren’t feelin what other rappers were doing they should have brought that to them instead of putting it on blast out there in the streets and in the media for everybody else. When the Hyphy movement was up and going and we were getting all this media attention and the big labels were out here trying to sign everybody, everybody was on the bandwagon. But as soon as the people they were looking for didn’t sign and the big labels left up out of here, then people started talking bad on it. And what happened is that everyone else around the nation took off with that sound: You got niggas jerkin in LA, niggas swag surfing on the East Coast, niggas getting they Dougie on and all this other shit. Niggas took what we was already doing and called it their own. They got big on the shit and their cities are backing them up. But up here we all crabs in the bucket and that’s been the Bay Area’s problem for a long time.
That’s an interesting point because during the early 90’s the Bay Area was known for its unity. People from other regions would be jealous of our unity and independent hustle. What changed?
What happened is that we lost it and everyone else gained it. Everybody sees the Down South cats and their movement. People see the East Coast cats and their movement. I don’t know if their unity is strong or if it just looks like that, but I remember when the Bay Area was like that. Everybody in Frisco was doing they thing together. Messy Marv, San Quinn, Cold World Hustlers, Cougnut. And then you had Oakland and Luniz, and Vallejo with Mac Mall and E-40. Everybody was working together. Now it’s like everybody is in their own cubby hole and doing their own thing. If everybody was in a collective thought we could flood the radio with Bay Area hits and flood the television with Bay Area videos. But everybody is on their own page. I think we need more communication so we can make a big Bay Area presence.
I know you can’t speak too much on the controversy, but you did a promotion for the TV show “King of Queens” on CW. You all had this squeaky clean image until the media black-balled you with the coverage of the gang injunction. How has that affected your record sales and popularity? What do you think it will take to get that image back?
It is what it is. Image doesn’t mean shit to us. Even with the presidents. One president smokes weed another got his dick sucked. Everybody has a past, period. Everybody done shit they not proud of. If you look us up you gonna find some good and some bad and some ugly. At the end of the day we can learn from our mistakes and keep going or dwell on them and not move at all. But we choose to move forward. If a person chooses to dwell on our past, that’s up to them. You got to learn to forgive and forget as long as we don’t make the same mistakes and keep growing. The media coverage of the injunction did cast a negative light on us, especially with the endorsement with LRG and the “King of Queens” commercial. CW did pull the commercial off the air and a lot of things stopped happening. We don’t get as many calls to come talk to schools, so it did affect us like that.
Lastly, what are some Bay Area albums that you would consider influential and significant to the Bay Area Rap scene?
My most influential Bay Area album was Tupac’s “Me Against the World”. I have to say for me it was C-Bo’s Mob Figaz and the first C-Bo album “Gas Chamber”. The Mobb music was already out here, but those were the albums that sealed the deal for me. Also Spice-1’s first two albums and 415 with “Groupie Ass Bitch” and E-40 “Federal”. That was shit niggas was on.
