Interview with St. Lunatics

By Dave Friedman

Your group is huge on a national level now with Nelly’s "Country Grammar" LP having sold seven million copies and St. Lunatics’ "Free City" LP going platinum. What does being from St. Louis mean to you?

Murphy Lee: That’s big, man. That’s the biggest thing that could be done. ’Cause we don’t have big entertainment in St. Louis, so for us to be holding it down for St. Louis is real big.

What part of St. Louis did you grow up in and what was that area like?

Murphy Lee: I grew up in U. City. It’s like half county, half city, where it’s a bad neighborhood but, at the same time, you’ve still got a chance ’cause your parents have good jobs or whatever. Most of it is bad choices that you make; it’s like if you don’t make it out of there, it’s because of the choices that you’re making. But you still have a chance in U. City. It’s a little different than from St. Louis city; it’s right outside St. Louis city. But it’s still St. Louis.

Nelly: I started growing up on the Northside of St. Louis and then I moved to University City. It’s like day and night. U. City is definitely a better area. It still has the same elements in it, but it has better living areas, so to speak. The Northside — not all of the Northside, but a lot of the Northside — is more urban, a lot of gang-infested areas, stuff like that.

Kyjuan: I grew up in U. City where it’s like the St. Louis city and the county, mixed all in one. U. City is in the middle of St. Louis, so you get both parts. You might go around the corner and you see a $300,000 house and then you go two streets over and you’ll see a $45,000 house. I was living in — now it’s worth more, but back then it was like $70,000. When they bought it, it was $40,000. But my grandmother has been living there for like 25 years. Before I was even born, they were at the house.

Slo Down: I grew up in Wellston. It’s like a block away from U. City. It’s grimy. It’s like Kingston, Jamaica. There’s a lot of crime, but there’s a lot of good in it. I got a lot of positives out of it.

Who were the local rap legends from St. Louis when you were growing up and getting into the rap game?

Nelly: When I was growing up, we had a guy by the name of Silk Smoov. He was doing his thing and, coming out of St. Louis, what he had achieved locally and even out of the state was big to us. We thought he was really doin’ it, which he really was to a certain extent.

Murphy Lee: There was a group called Bulletproof Records. They were the biggest thing that was going on when we first started back in ’93. We didn’t get a chance to work with them, but they were like an inspiration — just to know that we can make noise in St. Louis, that people can take to it and that we can sell CDs ourselves.

Were there other rappers that influenced you while you were coming up?

Kyjuan: Anywhere from N.W.A. to Ice Cube to Big Daddy Kane to LL to OutKast. I liked a lot of people. Whatever was bumpin’, I liked it. And if you didn’t like it, I still liked it. I just liked the groove.

What else are you into in St. Louis outside of the rap scene?

Murphy Lee: Sports. Everybody was into sports. We’re all into sports and movies. I’m a big Rams fan, a big Cardinals fan, for sure. I’m a big basketball fan, too.

Could you describe the St. Louis rap sound and tell me how it compares to the sound St. Lunatics bring to the table? Does your group sound anything like the rest of St. Louis rap?

Murphy Lee: With us, personally, the Lunatics are a swang, for sure. We come with a swang. But as far as the whole of St. Louis, we’ve got different sounds because we take in so much from the West Coast, East Coast and the South and North.

Nelly: I don’t think there’s any type of comparison right now. I mean, that was one of our big things when we were coming out of St. Louis — to be different, to make our sound different. I think that’s why we’ve achieved the success we’ve had so far. I think our sound is just that — it’s our sound. We invented the swang, the Midwest swang, the little vibe. I think there are a lot of people coming out now who are trying to imitate the sound or imitate the whole style of the St. Lunatics.

How do you feel about people imitating your style? Is that flattering or are you unhappy about it?

Nelly: I mean, it can be good. It’s good because we’re a big influence and when we’re seeing the impact that we’re having… But I think people definitely need to be reminding themselves that we got this way by being original. And I think that’s the key of success. You can imitate, but it’s only so far. I think it might only take you so far.

When you put out your first single, "Gimme What You Got," it sold 8,000 copies and was considered a success on a local level back in 1996. How did you promote that single?

Kyjuan: We really promoted that ourselves. We really didn’t get no help on that. There were no posters, no nothing. The radio helped out a lot, though. But we did a lot of that ourselves — 99 percent of it. We did a lot of (other) songs, but we never released them. We had the ‘Country Grammar’ on the streets for a second, but when we got signed to Universal they told us to hold off on selling that because we were gonna get signed. It really was a demo that we were giving out to the radio stations. And then everybody liked it, so we printed up like a thousand of them and just started selling them. But they stopped that quick because they were gonna put it out big time. So we were like, ‘OK. We ain’t gonna put it out no more.’

If a record label were to go to St. Louis right now to look to sign the next big act, who are some of the key acts label representatives would come across?

Murphy Lee: There’s a lot of people. You’ve got VIP Records, you’ve got United, you’ve got Bulletproof Records. There’s a group called Quor — they’re real hot. I think they’re gonna be the next thing coming out. My little brother’s rapping, he’s got a group called Star & Future. They’re hot. You’ve got two more guys that just came out, like my best friends from high school, they just got on that new ‘Training Day’ Denzel Washington movie. And they're signed to Nelly’s label, which is called Flush Entertainment. They don’t have a group name right now, but it’s like Professor and King Jacob. They’re straight from St. Louis. As a matter of fact, they’re from U. City.

Nelly: There’s a lot of good people, there’s a lot of good music in St. Louis. There’s always been; it’s just been a matter of people not getting a chance. And now we’ve been able to open the doors for a lot of things as far as publicity. People are coming down and checking out what’s going on. On the R&B tip, you’ve got your girl Toya. She’s out of St. Louis; she’s been doin’ her thing. As far as hip-hop, you’ve got P.D. Waxx Records, a group called Out Of Order. There's Bulletproof Records, VIP Records. There’s a lot of independent people down there too who are just looking for an opportunity to get their thing on, that are also making good music. Rag Doll Entertainment. In St. Louis, the intensity is definitely stepped up. It’s bangin’, man.

Earlier this year, Nelly performed with Aerosmith, Britney Spears, Mary J. Blige and ’N Sync at the Super Bowl halftime show. Given St. Lunatics’ success in general, do you feel like you’ve become too big to work with other acts from St. Louis?

Murphy Lee: No. Right now, we’ll be trying to do stuff. But a lot of stuff, Universal might not clear. Things like that. Since we’re under contract, we can’t just do stuff out of friendship no more. Everything’s business. So it’s like you don’t get a chance to do what you want to do, but, at the same time, we just show love and let everybody know they’re doing their thing. We give them good, real criticism about their stuff. They want to hear the real about that. So we’re just helping out. Most of the time, it’s a lot of people around the Lunatics that rap. So we’re helping them first. Like my little brother’s so hot. Our camp has six more people that just rap, that we’re trying to get on first. I feature a lot of local St. Louis artists, but everybody’s big to me; I don’t consider nothing local no more. Everybody’s doing their thing and there’s a chance for everybody.

St. Lunatics are a legitimate inspiration, not only to local acts in St. Louis who now see that they could make it big, but also to local and regional acts everywhere. What do you recommend to other rappers when they ask you what they need to do to get where you’ve got?

Kyjuan: Usually there’s not too many people asking that question. A lot of people ask how can they get right where you are right quick. And the ones that really do try to find out what they need to do without me physically helping them, those are the ones that I try to really talk to because they don’t want anything more than that. So I usually tell them to stay in school and that you’ve got to realize that this is a business. It’s not just rapping. A lot of people think, ‘I can rap, so I know I can be there.’ But it’s 90 percent business. So if you don’t know no part of the business, then you’re gonna lose anyway. You’ll lose or get your money taken or whatever. So I tell them to keep doing what they’re doing and that everybody needs to love your music — not just one street. Don’t make music for your one street.

Nelly: It’s hard. You get that a lot — ‘What do you recommend? What should I do? Should I do this?’ And the way we got on was kind of like, you could never imagine that. The way we did it, you can’t really plan that or make a blueprint for it. All you can do is keep doing what you’re doing. Don’t let nobody tell you that you can’t do it because a lot of people told us that we couldn’t do it. We’ve been doing it since ’93 and we didn’t get our deal until ’99, going into the 2000 season. And it was a long, drawn out process. There were plenty of years in there where we thought we were gonna quit, plenty of years where we didn’t think we were gonna make it. ‘It isn’t gonna happen. This is some bullshit.’ We went through a lot of that. But we stuck with it. I think that’s what allowed us to break through. ’Cause there were a lot of obstacles out there, a lot of people going to jail, your family and friends… We were hustlin’. We were doing all types of shit, man. You had to cut down on the hustlin’ because it’ll interfere, whether you like it or not. It will take away. I think you’ve really got to be focused on the music.

St. Lunatics toured with Nelly on this summer’s MTV TRL Tour, which also featured Destiny’s Child, Jessica Simpson and Eve. What was it like for you when the tour stopped in St. Louis?

Murphy Lee: Ooh, that was the biggest. We’re talking about, from front to back, people were packed up on the fences in the back. It was just crazy. It was outdoors. And we hadn’t done a show in St. Louis in a long time. Clubs aren’t able to be done because fire marshals would be coming out; it would be too packed. So now we have to do big events at home. For us getting a chance to do that, that was real big. A lot of people came out and supported. It was a sold out show, and they showed love from the beginning to the end. It was just nonstop screaming. It was love, man. St. Louis is the best.

Kyjuan: It’s love. And it’s so much love that it’s hectic. Because everybody gives you love and everybody wants the love back. And it’s all good, but you only have time for so much. Everybody’s like, ‘Come kick it with me, come kick it with me.’ And everybody deserves it, but your time does not (allow) it. You’ve got to go see your grandmother, you’ve got to go see your mother and everything else. And by that time, it’s time to get back on the flight.

Slo Down: The fans love it, if they see you on the streets or at a filling station anywhere, they love you. They don’t believe they’re seeing you. But at filling stations or Walgreens, that’s when you really get to see St. Louis fans.

What’s it like for you to realize that people look at St. Lunatics in the same light as celebrities such as Destiny’s Child, Eve and Jessica Simpson?

Kyjuan: Well, we don’t have time to even realize that. It’s big. We come out and hear everybody screaming and stuff and we’re like, ‘Oh, yeah. They’re screaming for us.’ But it’s kind of hard to believe that it’s reality, it’s right here in my face. We’re just working. We’re just doing what we do. It’s not really nothing extra. I always thought you would change and it would be something totally different. But really, you’ve got to keep doing what you do because that’s why people enjoy you anyway — because you’re doing what you do.

What I’d like to know is how Nelly and St. Lunatics have managed to appeal to so many different groups of fans. I mean, how have you been able to gain equal followings from hardcore rap fans and fans of the teen pop and R&B groups that came out and loved your show on the TRL Tour with Destiny’s Child?

Nelly: I think it’s just making good music. People just want to hear good music. I mean, you’ve still got your real down hardcore audience and you’ve still got your real broad audience. But I think now it’s just about making good music and people want to hear stuff that’s different.

Do you have a favorite type of audience to play for?

Nelly: A paying crowd. No. Like I say, man, everybody enjoys our music now. It ain’t a point that we’re trying to cater to one audience. We’re just doing what we do. Hip-hop is our love; this is what we do. People who are listening to our music for the first time that might not listen to hip-hop, we remind them that this is hip-hop. Whether you like it or not, it is hip-hop and we love what we do.

I’ve read articles where Nelly has been compared to Will Smith and Puff Daddy because your music even appeals to people who don’t regularly listen to rap music. How do you feel about that?

Nelly: That’s a positive thing. I think that’s opening it up; I think that’s making it easier for a lot more acts to come out. We’re upping the stakes as far as albums being sold now. A lot more people are buying hip-hop albums now. It’s not just one particular artist. There have been more hip-hop albums sold this year than ever in history — with the likes of ‘The Chronic,’ with Eminem, with us, with Ludacris. People are going double and triple platinum now, like Ja Rule. It’s crazy. I think the audience is just getting bigger. And when you do touch people who weren’t usually listening to hip-hop, I think that makes it easier for a lot of other people to get a chance to be heard.

How are you able to keep the right mindset to go along with the fame? What is the right mindset to go along with success?

Kyjuan: Really, that words don’t mean nothin’. I mean, you can say what you want to say and that’s your opinion. If everybody loved us, we’d be 64 billion times platinum. So everybody can’t love you. But I just don’t like the people who go out of their way to go to your event and they don’t like you. How can you go to somebody’s event and know it’s their event, and you don’t like them? What’s the point of spending your money to say ‘I don’t like you’? You can always see trouble, for real. If you stay calm with them being hyped, you’ll make them look stupid for real. If you give your energy to the badness, then it’s gonna be bad.

Slo Down: I take my mask off and I get away from it all. I’m a whole different person. People don’t recognize me without my mask.

Which projects are St. Lunatics working on in the studio? Your producer, Jay E, told me recently that Ali has a solo album in the works. Do other members of the group have solo albums coming out soon?

Murphy Lee: Ali’s got an album that was just finished — mixed and everything. We’re working on ‘Nellyville’ right now. That’s Nelly’s next album.

Nelly: It’s coming out right around Christmas time. ‘Nellyville’ — I’m definitely looking to get that out if you could add that to your Christmas list. I think it’ll be different, but I think it’ll be the same flavor. It’ll be Nelly. It’ll be different, definitely. Because, I mean, shit, look at the stuff I’ve been through in the last year or two. You get a lifetime to do your first album, but you get like a year to do your second one. I’m doing a lot of songs right now, and I’m gonna pick the ones that I feel suit the purpose for ‘Nellyville.’

Kyjuan: It’s a long line. Everybody’s just doing it, though, so when they’re ready, we’re already ready. We’re already starting on it. Everybody’s contributing to everybody’s projects.

Being on tour and making appearances all over the country, how much time do you actually spend in St. Louis?

Slo Down: Hardly none. I might see New York way more than I see St. Louis within the last two years. In 12 months, I probably see home a month and a half. I’ve got three days here, a layover here. I miss the hood. But if I’m not missing it, I’m not making no money. So, yeah, I definitely miss it. I like missing it, though.

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