For fans who were lucky enough to grab themselves a ticket to see TNGHT in New York on Friday night, they were in for a treat as the one-man-press-machine that is Kanye West made a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo, casually waltzing out on stage half way through a TNGHT remix to “Cold” aka “Theraflu.”
As TNGHT, comprised of producers Hudson Mohawke and Lunice,
got straight into things with their remix of Kanye’s “Cold” the crowd
were already loving it when the rapper surprisingly walked out onto the
small stage, sans microphone, sending them into a complete frenzy. Even
without a mic Kanye’s as entertaining as ever as his hands do all the
talking, acting out every word of his verse before casually walking off
stage again like nothing ever happened.
For anyone who’s listened to TNGHT’s Radio 1 Mixtape, you get the idea that they’re huge fans of Kanye and crew as their mixtape featured G.O.O.D Music‘s
“Don’t Like” as well “Mercy” so it must have been a huge honour for
Kanye to come out and endorse their remix to his song. Watch below.
Prince Ea, the man responsible for groundbreaking songs like “Smoking
Weed With the President” and “The Brain”, joined Straight Fresh
recently for an in depth conversation about his career, politics, the
state of hip-hop and more. To check out the interview, as well as the
exclusive a capella verse Prince Ea dropped for Straight Fresh, hit the
cut.
Straight Fresh: Thank you for taking the time to
interview, I know everyone at Straight Fresh really appreciates it. This
first question is for the people who are reading this interview that
don’t really know about you. Want to just tell us a little about
yourself – who is Prince Ea?
Prince Ea:
Sure, sure, sure…man, Prince Ea is a young rapper from St. Louis,
Missouri. Very lyrical, very introspective…very innovative. I kinda
built most of my fan base through digital media and digital marketing.
Um, you know, putting out viral videos, um, developing a really loyal
fan base with like a lot of political, a lot of socially conscious
songs, in the beginning. And then I kinda expanded to more relatable
type of music, still me, still introspective, but I expanded…I made an
expansion.
As far as my accolades go, last year I was named the best hip-hop
artist in St. Louis by one of our biggest, by the biggest newspaper down
here. I’ve been in Vibe Magazine; I was the first rapper to be in
Discover Magazine, Science Magazine. Um, man, the list kinda goes on and
on. I’ve performed with Ludacris, Busta Rhymes, DJ Khaled. Most of my
fans have been garner for my digital presence, so I have over 13 million
views online. So yeah man, that’s pretty much me in a nutshell. I’m a
guy, I’m a normal guy, that kinda wants to, I want to change the scope
of music, not even just hip hop, so I put out a lot of innovative
material. So that’s just me, man.
Straight Fresh: That’s dope. I’m sure you’ve been
asked this question now, probably, countless times, but the story behind
the Prince Ea name, want to go into that?
Prince Ea: Oh
man, the name, the name, the name…a lot of people don’t know. You know,
basically, a couple years ago, I was really, really into…one thing I
didn’t mention, I graduated Summa Cum Laude, I forgot about that. But I
got my degree in Anthropology, and one of the things I was studying was
the Sumerian culture. And Sumer is in modern day Iraq; other names for
it were Babylon, Mesopotamia, Assyria, etc. Sumer is basically the
cradle of civilization – this is where the fist civilization known to
man comes from, uh 6 thousand years ago in Sumer. And these people were
so intelligent, so technologically advanced, right out of the Stone Age.
They created the wheel, they had the first complex agricultural
systems, first political, educational systems, they put 360 degrees to a
circle, uh, they knew about all of the planets in our solar system
without a telescope. And if you would have asked one of these people,
how did you get so much knowledge, so much information, so quickly? And
what they would have said was that their living Gods gave it to them.
Oh, they also created the first written language, which is cuneiform,
script.
They wrote about these living Gods, these Gods called the Anunnaki.
And one of these Gods was called Enki, Prince Ea…Ea is actually an
abridged version of Earth…Prince Earth, basically who Prince Earth was,
he freed man. Man was in a state of bondage, um, in a state of,
knowledge was being kept from man. He kinda, uh, freed man. That’s kinda
what I want to do with my music – I want to enlighten people with the
topics I talk about. I don’t want people to believe me just because I’m a
rapper and I’m saying it. I want people to look into what I’m saying
and research it and find out. I felt like that story kinda touched me,
and I kinda took that name and kinda ran with it. And since I have that
name, I can never sell out, I can never go in a different direction,
because, you know, your name is your destiny. And that’s kinda what I
felt like my role in hip hop was, basically just enlighten man, tryin’
to free man out of, you know, the state that he’s in, that I feel like a
lot of us are in, as far as music. Which is a very constricted, very
limited form of music right now. So that’s the origin of the Prince Ea
name.
Straight Fresh: A lot of people probably believed,
or at least used to believe, you’d never make a name for yourself
through rap, because of the complex nature and substance of your tracks.
What was it like for you early in your career, before you started
getting noticed and even a little after you had some recognition?
Prince Ea: Um, you mean as far as the dynamic between fans or like people who came into contact with my music?
Straight Fresh: I guess that, but also people you knew before, like friends and family?
Prince Ea: Oh,
got you, got you. Yeah, I mean, I was met with a lot of resistance. A
lot of people, even my parents, they didn’t get it, you know, they
didn’t understand rap music. When I was growing up I couldn’t listen to
rap music, they wouldn’t allow it. I was a big Biggie and Ma$e fan, so I
would sneak and listen to them. After I picked up rap music, and
started actually becoming a practitioner of it, and doing it myself,
they didn’t get it, they didn’t understand it. And back then, when I was
first, first, starting, I was the typical rapper. I mean, I always had
punch lines, I was always like a line guy, a wordplay guy, but the lines
that I was saying weren’t as socially conscious as what I developed
into. I was like, “I only wear yellow and blue ‘cause I make green” or
“I only see green like night vision goggles”. I had lines like that, I
mean, they were hot, I liked them, I still might throw out a line or two
like that, but they didn’t have the substance that I developed into,
um, so they didn’t get it.
You know, it’s no fault against them, they didn’t know that I was
gonna develop and grow and it was actually gonna be something I would
put my heart into. So fast forward a couple years when I actually found
my sound, it got a lot easier. People started understanding what I was
doing; they started to get behind me, started seeing the success I was
having. Friends and family, and, um, now it’s…I don’t want to say
they’re 100% behind me, like “when’s your next show” and stuff like
that, but they’re behind it I think, they understand it. That goes
friends and family. So yea, but at first it was bad, man, people would
talk about me. With the conscious music too, they were like, oh this
shit, this stuff will never sell, you’ll never make a name for yourself
doing this. You can’t be lyrical. And that’s people in general man,
that’s labels, that’s…when people have a concept in their mind, a way of
looking at the world, it’s tough to change it until it changes, ha, in
reality. So that’s just natural, you just gotta, you know…if anybody is
an up and coming rapper, you just gotta keep doing you man, cause
everything comes, is a full circle, it’s a 360, there’s gonna be cycles.
So, just keep doing you and one day, people will get it. You know, they
say a broken clock is right twice a day.
Straight Fresh: Now, moving to current times,
“Smoking Weed With The President”, which you released not too long ago,
was a song you hoped would reach the desk of President Barack Obama.
Beyond the intended goals of the song, what I really liked was that,
unlike most rap songs about cannabis, this wasn’t the average “get high,
smoke weed every day”. Instead, you presented a historical and factual
examination of the lies and hypocrisy that the laws are based around. It
was an educational look at the social and economic issue that is
marijuana. What I want to know is, what went into the making of that
song? How’s it going in terms of raising money, and do you know if Obama
has heard it yet? Read More Here...
Veteran HipHop duo Dead Prez, composed of Brooklyn native M1 and Floridian Stic.Man, sat down with Out Da Box TV to discuss a number of issues, including their recent album Information Age,
their artistic growth and the state of America. The group has always
been freethinking and outspoken, and they pulled no punches when asked
for their opinions on an array of topics.
Stic.Man describes Information Age, which was released
October 16th, as “a brand new sound and spirit with the same old
struggle,” noting that as a group they’ve “been growing a lot as human
beings, taking life lessons and using them to continue making an
impact.”
Information Age is a conceptual album and in reference to
that M1 noted, “it’s hard to translate something we learn every day into
music but in essence that’s what we try to do. We really tried to
encompass what the highest awakening can be, in hip-hop form.”
It should be no surprise that a group renowned for their social
commentary and criticism was asked about politics. In reference to
President Obama’s election, M1 was cautious and reserved; “a lot of
black people had a sense of satisfaction behind Barack Obama’s
selection, we have a long way to go at the end of the day.”
Continuing a string of social commentary, stic.man targeted “lack of
functional and progressive education” as a root cause of the continuous
trend of youth violence in urban centers. As musicians, Dead Prez seeks
to raise awareness; stic.man noted that “everything Dead Prez does is a
drop in the bucket to try and help change circumstance.”
Their successful Turn Off The Radio mixtape series, in which
both emcees rap over popular instrumentals, qualifies as one of those
aforementioned drops. Many critics classify the series as simply a
strategy to reach the masses, but stic.man asserts that “it’s just
another creative way to do what we do. We have a perspective that is
not the trend in capital America. Words are powerful, and we need to
really think about what we call the mainstream.”
Dead Prez might not qualify as mainstream, but they have certainly
amassed a loyal following over the years. The duo seems as focused as
ever and doesn’t appear ready to stop any time soon.
Information Age is available via iTunes or Amazon. Watch the full interview for yourself below.
50 Cent speaks on French Montana and shares exclusively with Big Boy what French Montana did for him when 50 was beefing with his now brothers, Rick Ross and DJ Khaled.
50 Cent tells Big Boy how French Montana Sold DJ Khaled Out
Redman has gone back to the Old Reggie...thank the Lawd....!! Don't get me wrong I do understand wanting to appeal to the mainstream because that's where the money is. Mainstream HipHop is not a good fit for every artist.. This is the Redman I grew up listening too that raw unadulterated HipHop s#@!. This new joint White People Are Rioting produced by Erick Sermon is his first release off of his new album THWD coming soon.
