You started rapping quite some time ago right?
First song I ever recorded and sold was ten years ago…
Did you started as a solo artist?
No, I started in a group with Eligh and Scarub, called the Three Melancholy Gypsies… I originally started rhymes by myself, but it was the first real thing I was in…
Then came the Living Legends…
Mystik Journeymen started Living legends early 1996, so it came seven years ago…
How do you manage to record so many things a such a little time?
I don’t sleep, and I do a lot of cocaine… No, I don’t know, I’m driven, I guess I can do more than I do, I don’t do enough, but if you think it’s a lot, then that’s good.
Yes, you do a lot of things, and I should add, a lot of quality things…
I don’t know… I appreciate my position more than others, I got a lot of time off, I don’t have a job, so all of my time and energy should be devoted to being a good rapper, that’s why I try to pull out quality stuff, and if you don’t like it, you can’t say that it’s poorly made, because it did take a lot of effort and thought…
What brought you to sign on Def Jux?
Me and El have been friends for a long time, and he was talking about starting his label, and I told him that he could have a record from me whenever he got started… So when he got things started he asked me to do a record, and now it’s finally coming out, February 25th 2003, it’s called The End of the Beginning.
And what are your other projects, with the 3MGs for example?
The new, the first 3MGs album, everything we did until now was EPs, will hopefully be out for fall or August, it’s called Grand Caravan To The Rim of the World and that will be the best album I ever did…
How did you come up to form the 3MGs?
Me, Eligh and Scarub met in High School, and I met the rest of the Living Legends on the Bay, the Berkeley / Oakland Area…
Did you know them before the LL, when you did Log Cabin for example?
Log Cabin was a different group that me, Eligh and Scarub were in in High School, that crew broke up, and then we met all the Living Legends later, at about all the same time…
Why did Log Cabin split?
You know, differences, we all wanted to do different things, I wasn’t feeling what some of the guys were doing, and they weren’t feeling what I was doing…
What about The Netherworlds then?
The Netherworlds met once and once only… That’s the other side, there’s Yin and there’s Yang, 3MGs is the Yin, the positive, and Netherworlds was the Yang, it’s still three people, but that was more my aggressive side, to balance the 3MGs, but there will only be one Netherworld album I think…
Did you need this balance, creatively?
Maybe in a way I did, but Netherworlds have together since the same time as 3MG, when I was fifteen, and we said, we’ll have an album, so I did it because I always said I would do it. And I thought it could sound different…
How can you account for the fact that you don’t have more worldwide exposure?
Because the French industry wants to oppress underground hip-hop, and I don’t know why Gnus, maybe you can tell me…
I’d like to…
No, but we just have poor distribution, Fat Beats doesn’t like us at all, we’re responsible for a lot of the distribution outside the US : Japan loves us, Australia loves us, but Europe is hard to crack because Europeans usually like East Coast artists, or your own artists, and not so much West Coast artists, unless they sound like East Coast…
That’s wrong!
Well yeah, not the people but the companies… Oh yeah, there’s that guy who does Quannum and Solesdides, he’s English, but I don’t know, European companies didn’t reach out to us, that’s why we don’t have a lot of entries there…
I guess it’s a question of fashion…
I don’t know really, I’ve never been to Europe, and I probably never will go there…
Why
Food is bad in Europe…
Is that it? Because we eat American Food…
But I don’t like the cold… but we’ll see, if we get more fans, I think we’ll go out there… The Legends are coming November 14th to Paris !
But, 3 people one day is not enough…
It will be everybody but Murs…
Deejay Bird: Murs is gonna come out there next year with us sometime, hopefully…
When the money is right, I will go.
Let’s go back to your current projects, what’s that Felt project about
Slug said he always wanted to do something with me, and I told him that he was down with too many gay rappers, so I wouldn’t anything with him, but then I found that he had a lot of fans in places where I didn’t, where I wouldn’t be able to tour, what I always wanted to do… So I decided that I would do something with him, so I said ‘that will fulfil your dreams, if I do this record with you, I want you to take me on tour, so I can perform in Iowa, and Montana…’ and he did, so now we’re even.
What do you think could bring you to an even higher step artistically now?
Better distribution, I guess that’s all I’m lacking, when I get better distribution in Europe and Australia and even in the States… I think that the Def Jux album is gonna solve a lot of the problems, so watch out for that…