5th Ward Boys
Interview with Double O 7 by Black Dog Bone
From Murder Dog Vol. 6 #4
5th Ward Boys have been doing this for a long time, but I think you've been slept on.
Instead of a playful thing, we so for real with it. We're gonna keep on puttin out albums the way we feel. And it doesn't have to blow up. If it does we're winnin, but if it don't blow up we don't care, we're still winnin cause we're speakin our minds. We're doin what we want, the way we feel. It's not like we're just tryna do it for the fame, it's to teach.
You're not trying to make radio songs, you're making albums.
We're makin albums. Sometimes we do try to make radio songs, but if they don't hit we don't care. We're gonna just keep puttin it down the way we put it down.
You have a huge fan base.
The people that listen to 5th Ward Boyz albums, they know. They know how we feel, how we react to certain things. Certain things don't get us too excited, like sales and things like that. We just try to keep it real and keep it positive and go on with our lives.
Comparing this new album to the previous albums, is it similar?
It's nothing like our last album. It's like this, our first album was done where we said what was happening at that time. Second album we said what was happening at that time. This album here is like everything that was goin on between the last album and this album.
The lyrical content is different. What about the music?
The music is more grown up now. They're different from the other beats. We usually don't do our own beats, we use a variety of producers. But this time we got in the lab ourselves and did it ourselves.
The group made all the beats?
Right. We got our own studio and we just put it down ourselves. The sound is totally different. More Gangsta, more grown up.
What kind of response are you getting from people around you?
They're sayin they love the new album and the feel that it gives you. It gives you a more upbeat, up tempo feel. We used to appeal to a lotta kids, and we still do, but now a lotta grown ups feel where we're comin from and understand the lyrics more.
Does it still have a Rap-A-Lot sound?
Yeah, you can't never take that Rap-A-Lot sound away from us. We're gonna always have that sound, we're some of the pioneers of Rap-A-Lot. It's just a more mature feel, more real.
What year did you get with Rap-A-Lot?
'93. We were like 19.
It's still the same three original members?
Yeah. You got Lo Life, you got E-Rock, you got 007. Before you got with Rap-A-Lot were you rapping together?
We were friends, we were homeboys, we went to school together. We never did think about the Rap business until we got outta school, graduated from Wheatley High School. After we graduated I met Dewy, that's our manager. I introduced him to E-Rock and Lo Life and told him that they could rap. So we just formed the group, 5th Ward Boyz, and made it happen.
You took that name because you came from 5th Ward?
That too, and plus it represents the whole 5th Ward. Everywhere we go we're gonna represent where we from. It's a massive amount of love in 5th Ward, that's why we do it like that. We didn't wanna just be selfish and call it 007, E-Rock and Lo Life.
Since you were growin up in 5th Ward have things changed a lot?
It's changed a whole lot. A total 360. The time I was growin up in 5th Ward it was dreadful. Gun fights and all kinda killin stuff was happening. What turned it around a lot was a lot of pride that we had in our neighborhood. When our album dropped in '93, Ghetto Dope was our first album, we had t-shirts made "5th Ward" and everybody was talkin about 5th Ward. So much pride came back in 5th Ward to where it wasn't anymore killin and all that. We came together.
What was causing all the killing in the first place?
It was just bullshit reasons. Then we had to come to realize that it was bullshit. In our albums we kept on puttin out the positive lyrics about 5th Ward. We wasn't just regular rappers, we was representin the whole 5th Ward. In old times you would have this hood fightin against another hood, but now the different hoods is gettin together and having basketball games and things of that nature.
Rap has brought together a lot of hoods that were having conflicts before.
And rappers hook up with rappers that are from other places. We been kickin it with all different rappers, like Eightball & MJG, Tela, Three 6 Mafia. We kick it with them and we know how they hood goes, and they know how our hood goes. And we travel. When we was small we didn't never travel, but when we got into this Rap game we traveled a lot. We saw different things and different hoods and how they do stuff different. Chicago, Cleveland--it's the same everywhere, it's all about money and makin something happen.
Rap has become so powerful. When a Rap artist talks, they're like the spokesperson for the hood.
Like one person like me, I could fly to Hawaii and whatever I tell them about my hood they'll believe. And when they get here they'll know already about it.
What has been going on in the period between your last album and this album to make your lyrics different?
After The Usual Suspects album we did an album called Recognize The Mob, it'll be out next year. We did like two other albums while we were workin on this album. We was gonna pick which one would come first. So this was the first album out.
Why did you do two different albums?
We were tryin to see what the public would like instead of us. Sometimes we was just bent on 5th Ward Boyz and what we liked, but we couldn't do that knowin the agenda that's out there and that they like different things. So we did two albums, one for the public and one for ourselves.
The two albums are very different?
They are way different. What we did was we separated ourselves from each other for a while and we did production ourselves and did some things. Then we came back together to do some things and we saw what was different. We all did three solo albums. I did an album, Lo Life did an album and Rock did an album. Most of the songs that are on the new album P.W.A. are off our solo albums. It's like three songs offa E-Rock's solo and three songs offa mine and three songs offa Lo Life's. Then we did some songs together.
So basically they're solo cuts?
They're not solo cuts cause we were doin them together. Any solo stuff we do would still be like a 5th Ward Boyz album cause you'll hear the rest of us on it.
What's going to happen with your three solo albums?
The three solo albums, we still got them comin up. We wanted to establish 5th Ward Boyz first, keep it goin, keep it out there, let everybody know we ain't goin nowhere.
After being together for so long have you ever wanted to break up?
No, never! Cause we were already homeboys before the Rap game. Nothing can break us up. The Rap game surely can't break us up, we were already partners. The Rap game was just another thing to do together.
Who did the production on your first album, Ghetto Dope?
You got N.O. Joe, you got Bido, Mike Dean. That was the three Rap-A-Lot producers. We still kick it with those guys, those were the ones that showed us how to do beats and showed us how to do things. We watched them until we got to the point where we could do our own stuff. Record sales got us the money so we could go build our own studio, get our own equipment.
Those are the three producers who have done most of the Rap-A-Lot production?
Yeah they did. I'm tellin you, 5th Ward Boyz ain't never been like any other group. Even on Rap-A-Lot, we wasn't like another group on Rap-A-Lot. A lotta the artists still get beats from those guys, and we do too, but for other things. On this album it wasn't just like the beat that we needed from somebody, it was like the feel, the feel that we needed from ourselves. It's like, shit if we feel that way why don't we just do our own beats.
The beats came out the way you wanted?
Oh yeah. We got our engineer and producer, his name is Grizz. He's pretty dope. He's like a student of Mike Dean.
After Ghetto Dope you had Gangsta Funk. The same producers worked on that album?
Yeah, but that was our first time at doing a beat for ourselves. We had gone to Hawaii--me, Lo Life and Rock--we flew to Hawaii and did the album there.
Why did you go that far to do your album?
Lo Life, he didn't get to see the first album cause he was in jail, he was locked up. Then when he was released we flew to Columbus Ohio and kicked it with him the day after he got outta jail. Then three days later we all went to Hawaii. The record label was tellin us, Y'all need to do the album, you need to come back and do this. We just said, We'll do the album over here. That's what we did. Brought it back, and they were so surprised.
You recorded the album there?
No, we wrote the whole album there. When we came back to Houston we put it down, it was a done deal.
That album must have a whole different feel from the first album?
Yeah, the feel was just like how we're doin now. The things that we do is, I can't say spontaneous, but it's not planned. A lotta people plan songs and all this, but shit goes on so much in our life that we might be doin something that day and then we'll walk into the studio, Guess what just happened! Then we'll just go ahead and put it down just like that.
How did you feel when you were in the studio doing your very first album?
I felt like it was a dream come true. I really didn't never think we'd get paid from Rap. It was just something I did in the bathroom or while I was in my bed. But then it was like somebody really liked it. And they're doing our album. Lil' J's spendin like hundreds of thousands of dollars on my talent. I was really trippin offa it. Somebody actually believed in us. I was thankful at all times. Sometimes when I was quiet, some people thought we were bein nonchalant and funny, but we were really just proud. Man, we're proud to do the things we do, to have the things we have, to go to places we go. People in our hood, they just don't know all the shit that we see.
Some people probably never leave the hood ever.
No, I'm tellin you. In my hood it's about 50 guys that sit on the corner every day. They don't even wanna go out to a club. They don't wanna leave 5th Ward. They go from their house to the block and that'll be it. That's their whole life. I tell some of them, Come out in the car with me. Some of my friends just went to Jacksonville, Mississippi with me, we had a show with the Hot Boys. We all kicked it and they were like, This is what be goin on? They're like, When's the next trip?! They never seen it and it's like funny to 'em.
Tell me about your third album. What was going on at that period in your life?
Rated G was an album that kinda changed us too. We had a little money, it was like a different life. We had to tell the world about it. Lotta people start braggin, I got this and I got this. We were tellin you that we were thankful for whatever we did have. A lotta people we lost in the battle, people went to jail, got 50 years, lotta people lost their lives. We had to tell the world about it. Talkin about these people and the lives that they lead. They're real, not just fake. We're not rappin just to be rappin. On the last album, Usual Suspects, we were tryin to tell you that we're usual suspects. A lot of us kept goin to jail. We was goin to jail cause the police kept messin with us cause of who we were. It wasn't because we was doin shit, they was just harassin. So we had to put out an album called Usual Suspects. When anything went wrong they had to look at us--at Rap-A-Lot or 5th Ward Boys or Geto Boys.
Why were they harassing you?
They had to have somebody to point at. If they don't get the answer quick they'd just use us as a scapegoat. I had legal trouble, Rock had legal trouble and Lo Life just got outta legal trouble. We had to put it out like that.
While you were doing Usual Suspects you got locked up a couple of times?
Yeah, I did just last year. I have a couple of criminal cases that I had to fight. Now everything's cleared up. We had to pay a lotta money.
Through all that you were still making music?
Makin music. The day before I went in I was makin music, the day I got out I'm makin music. I was just puttin down whatever I went through, whatever I feel.
Music is part of your life.
It is. It's like a beat that you live by. It's like everything I do is pertaining to my music. My whole life is my music. That's why I'm so serious with my music. Don't fuck with it. I'm a pioneer with the record company to where I wanna do something with the record company now. I wanna help blow somebody up. It's not about the money anymore.
Interview with Double O 7 by Black Dog Bone
From Murder Dog Vol. 6 #4
5th Ward Boys have been doing this for a long time, but I think you've been slept on.
Instead of a playful thing, we so for real with it. We're gonna keep on puttin out albums the way we feel. And it doesn't have to blow up. If it does we're winnin, but if it don't blow up we don't care, we're still winnin cause we're speakin our minds. We're doin what we want, the way we feel. It's not like we're just tryna do it for the fame, it's to teach.
You're not trying to make radio songs, you're making albums.
We're makin albums. Sometimes we do try to make radio songs, but if they don't hit we don't care. We're gonna just keep puttin it down the way we put it down.
You have a huge fan base.
The people that listen to 5th Ward Boyz albums, they know. They know how we feel, how we react to certain things. Certain things don't get us too excited, like sales and things like that. We just try to keep it real and keep it positive and go on with our lives.
Comparing this new album to the previous albums, is it similar?
It's nothing like our last album. It's like this, our first album was done where we said what was happening at that time. Second album we said what was happening at that time. This album here is like everything that was goin on between the last album and this album.
The lyrical content is different. What about the music?
The music is more grown up now. They're different from the other beats. We usually don't do our own beats, we use a variety of producers. But this time we got in the lab ourselves and did it ourselves.
The group made all the beats?
Right. We got our own studio and we just put it down ourselves. The sound is totally different. More Gangsta, more grown up.
What kind of response are you getting from people around you?
They're sayin they love the new album and the feel that it gives you. It gives you a more upbeat, up tempo feel. We used to appeal to a lotta kids, and we still do, but now a lotta grown ups feel where we're comin from and understand the lyrics more.
Does it still have a Rap-A-Lot sound?
Yeah, you can't never take that Rap-A-Lot sound away from us. We're gonna always have that sound, we're some of the pioneers of Rap-A-Lot. It's just a more mature feel, more real.
What year did you get with Rap-A-Lot?
'93. We were like 19.
It's still the same three original members?
Yeah. You got Lo Life, you got E-Rock, you got 007. Before you got with Rap-A-Lot were you rapping together?
We were friends, we were homeboys, we went to school together. We never did think about the Rap business until we got outta school, graduated from Wheatley High School. After we graduated I met Dewy, that's our manager. I introduced him to E-Rock and Lo Life and told him that they could rap. So we just formed the group, 5th Ward Boyz, and made it happen.
You took that name because you came from 5th Ward?
That too, and plus it represents the whole 5th Ward. Everywhere we go we're gonna represent where we from. It's a massive amount of love in 5th Ward, that's why we do it like that. We didn't wanna just be selfish and call it 007, E-Rock and Lo Life.
Since you were growin up in 5th Ward have things changed a lot?
It's changed a whole lot. A total 360. The time I was growin up in 5th Ward it was dreadful. Gun fights and all kinda killin stuff was happening. What turned it around a lot was a lot of pride that we had in our neighborhood. When our album dropped in '93, Ghetto Dope was our first album, we had t-shirts made "5th Ward" and everybody was talkin about 5th Ward. So much pride came back in 5th Ward to where it wasn't anymore killin and all that. We came together.
What was causing all the killing in the first place?
It was just bullshit reasons. Then we had to come to realize that it was bullshit. In our albums we kept on puttin out the positive lyrics about 5th Ward. We wasn't just regular rappers, we was representin the whole 5th Ward. In old times you would have this hood fightin against another hood, but now the different hoods is gettin together and having basketball games and things of that nature.
Rap has brought together a lot of hoods that were having conflicts before.
And rappers hook up with rappers that are from other places. We been kickin it with all different rappers, like Eightball & MJG, Tela, Three 6 Mafia. We kick it with them and we know how they hood goes, and they know how our hood goes. And we travel. When we was small we didn't never travel, but when we got into this Rap game we traveled a lot. We saw different things and different hoods and how they do stuff different. Chicago, Cleveland--it's the same everywhere, it's all about money and makin something happen.
Rap has become so powerful. When a Rap artist talks, they're like the spokesperson for the hood.
Like one person like me, I could fly to Hawaii and whatever I tell them about my hood they'll believe. And when they get here they'll know already about it.
What has been going on in the period between your last album and this album to make your lyrics different?
After The Usual Suspects album we did an album called Recognize The Mob, it'll be out next year. We did like two other albums while we were workin on this album. We was gonna pick which one would come first. So this was the first album out.
Why did you do two different albums?
We were tryin to see what the public would like instead of us. Sometimes we was just bent on 5th Ward Boyz and what we liked, but we couldn't do that knowin the agenda that's out there and that they like different things. So we did two albums, one for the public and one for ourselves.
The two albums are very different?
They are way different. What we did was we separated ourselves from each other for a while and we did production ourselves and did some things. Then we came back together to do some things and we saw what was different. We all did three solo albums. I did an album, Lo Life did an album and Rock did an album. Most of the songs that are on the new album P.W.A. are off our solo albums. It's like three songs offa E-Rock's solo and three songs offa mine and three songs offa Lo Life's. Then we did some songs together.
So basically they're solo cuts?
They're not solo cuts cause we were doin them together. Any solo stuff we do would still be like a 5th Ward Boyz album cause you'll hear the rest of us on it.
What's going to happen with your three solo albums?
The three solo albums, we still got them comin up. We wanted to establish 5th Ward Boyz first, keep it goin, keep it out there, let everybody know we ain't goin nowhere.
After being together for so long have you ever wanted to break up?
No, never! Cause we were already homeboys before the Rap game. Nothing can break us up. The Rap game surely can't break us up, we were already partners. The Rap game was just another thing to do together.
Who did the production on your first album, Ghetto Dope?
You got N.O. Joe, you got Bido, Mike Dean. That was the three Rap-A-Lot producers. We still kick it with those guys, those were the ones that showed us how to do beats and showed us how to do things. We watched them until we got to the point where we could do our own stuff. Record sales got us the money so we could go build our own studio, get our own equipment.
Those are the three producers who have done most of the Rap-A-Lot production?
Yeah they did. I'm tellin you, 5th Ward Boyz ain't never been like any other group. Even on Rap-A-Lot, we wasn't like another group on Rap-A-Lot. A lotta the artists still get beats from those guys, and we do too, but for other things. On this album it wasn't just like the beat that we needed from somebody, it was like the feel, the feel that we needed from ourselves. It's like, shit if we feel that way why don't we just do our own beats.
The beats came out the way you wanted?
Oh yeah. We got our engineer and producer, his name is Grizz. He's pretty dope. He's like a student of Mike Dean.
After Ghetto Dope you had Gangsta Funk. The same producers worked on that album?
Yeah, but that was our first time at doing a beat for ourselves. We had gone to Hawaii--me, Lo Life and Rock--we flew to Hawaii and did the album there.
Why did you go that far to do your album?
Lo Life, he didn't get to see the first album cause he was in jail, he was locked up. Then when he was released we flew to Columbus Ohio and kicked it with him the day after he got outta jail. Then three days later we all went to Hawaii. The record label was tellin us, Y'all need to do the album, you need to come back and do this. We just said, We'll do the album over here. That's what we did. Brought it back, and they were so surprised.
You recorded the album there?
No, we wrote the whole album there. When we came back to Houston we put it down, it was a done deal.
That album must have a whole different feel from the first album?
Yeah, the feel was just like how we're doin now. The things that we do is, I can't say spontaneous, but it's not planned. A lotta people plan songs and all this, but shit goes on so much in our life that we might be doin something that day and then we'll walk into the studio, Guess what just happened! Then we'll just go ahead and put it down just like that.
How did you feel when you were in the studio doing your very first album?
I felt like it was a dream come true. I really didn't never think we'd get paid from Rap. It was just something I did in the bathroom or while I was in my bed. But then it was like somebody really liked it. And they're doing our album. Lil' J's spendin like hundreds of thousands of dollars on my talent. I was really trippin offa it. Somebody actually believed in us. I was thankful at all times. Sometimes when I was quiet, some people thought we were bein nonchalant and funny, but we were really just proud. Man, we're proud to do the things we do, to have the things we have, to go to places we go. People in our hood, they just don't know all the shit that we see.
Some people probably never leave the hood ever.
No, I'm tellin you. In my hood it's about 50 guys that sit on the corner every day. They don't even wanna go out to a club. They don't wanna leave 5th Ward. They go from their house to the block and that'll be it. That's their whole life. I tell some of them, Come out in the car with me. Some of my friends just went to Jacksonville, Mississippi with me, we had a show with the Hot Boys. We all kicked it and they were like, This is what be goin on? They're like, When's the next trip?! They never seen it and it's like funny to 'em.
Tell me about your third album. What was going on at that period in your life?
Rated G was an album that kinda changed us too. We had a little money, it was like a different life. We had to tell the world about it. Lotta people start braggin, I got this and I got this. We were tellin you that we were thankful for whatever we did have. A lotta people we lost in the battle, people went to jail, got 50 years, lotta people lost their lives. We had to tell the world about it. Talkin about these people and the lives that they lead. They're real, not just fake. We're not rappin just to be rappin. On the last album, Usual Suspects, we were tryin to tell you that we're usual suspects. A lot of us kept goin to jail. We was goin to jail cause the police kept messin with us cause of who we were. It wasn't because we was doin shit, they was just harassin. So we had to put out an album called Usual Suspects. When anything went wrong they had to look at us--at Rap-A-Lot or 5th Ward Boys or Geto Boys.
Why were they harassing you?
They had to have somebody to point at. If they don't get the answer quick they'd just use us as a scapegoat. I had legal trouble, Rock had legal trouble and Lo Life just got outta legal trouble. We had to put it out like that.
While you were doing Usual Suspects you got locked up a couple of times?
Yeah, I did just last year. I have a couple of criminal cases that I had to fight. Now everything's cleared up. We had to pay a lotta money.
Through all that you were still making music?
Makin music. The day before I went in I was makin music, the day I got out I'm makin music. I was just puttin down whatever I went through, whatever I feel.
Music is part of your life.
It is. It's like a beat that you live by. It's like everything I do is pertaining to my music. My whole life is my music. That's why I'm so serious with my music. Don't fuck with it. I'm a pioneer with the record company to where I wanna do something with the record company now. I wanna help blow somebody up. It's not about the money anymore.
