AVC: So it isn't just the socially aware thing.
RF: It's not just that… This is not a game, this is our life, this is what we're bringing. How can the home of the blues produce rappers? True rap that describes what's going on is blues revisited. So how could the home of the blues produce rappers who don't show that same sentiment? They can't, 'cause that's where we come from.
And that's part of the reason I named my album Blue Collar. This is a blue-collar region, this is a blue-collar country, this was the country that was built by blue-collar workers. My thing is, this album represents the struggle, the work it that takes to become a superstar, that it takes to change your community. Because I am not out here trying to hurt people, sell people drugs, pimp nobody. For those who say, "That backpack rap, that's not really the hood," let's talk about that. These are lines and divisions that were drawn up by labels in order to market and sell to certain audiences easier. So now we're caricatures of ourselves and what they made us? We're going to label ourselves? If you go to the black community—we can go where I'm from, 95th and Jeffery—you won't see one person on the corner selling drugs. But you may see seven people at the bus stop going to work.
So what's really hood? Who's telling their story? We talk about glorifying selling drugs, we talk about glorifying going to the club. Our whole life is based out of the club. We talk about that, but who's talking about the mothers that leave their kids at home, and the 5-year-old is the oldest one taking care of the 3-year-old and the 2-year-old? And the mother is on the drug binge, so the kids are eating the paint chips off the wall. Who is talking about that? There used to be a debate in hip-hop. There used to be like, "Don't do drugs, we know that they're in our community. We know there are drug dealers, but drug dealers are really wack." That's not even a fucking debate anymore about it. It's like, "You gotta eat, G. You gotta do what you gotta do." That's bullshit. We talk about strippers in the club—I got songs about it. Everything I am saying to you, I am guilty of, and I'm bringing around to the point.
We talk about strippers and how girls shake their shit, but who is talking about the fact that 75 to 80 percent of strippers were molested or sexually or physically abused? And sometimes when you go smack that girl's ass, and you think, "I'm having a good time," you are just another abuser in her life? Who is telling her story for real? I'm not saying that it's wrong to enjoy yourself or to go see strippers. I am not even saying that it's wrong to sell drugs. Some people feel like, "There is nothing else I can do, and I want to be a provider, and this is the only thing I think I know." I am saying that in music, we need balance—and if you're going to talk about this, [then] talk about this. On the Blue Collar album, whatever you choose to call me, whatever label you choose to put me on, I'm creating something that is fresh in hip-hop, which is balance. You know the humor, the cynicism, the seriousness, I know it's complex, and they say "Dumb it down."
AVC: Why is that?
RF: They say "Backpackers don't sell records. That ain't what the radio plays." Let's talk about the numbers. Let's look at the reality of it. You may have a song that's like "Booty booty booty booty rockin' everywhere." If you compare the first week's sales to that of Ghostface, who didn't really get that much radio play, Ghostface fared better than that. You may have a song like "Laffy Taffy"—everybody upset because it's on the radio all day, number-one ringtone download—but why are you upset? [D4L] can't even go gold. But then you take somebody like Kanye West. They didn't really play "Diamonds [From Sierra Leone]" on the radio for a long time—they only played it on the basis of his name. But had it been anybody else, they wouldn't have played it at all. They play "Gold Digger," but that because it's a negative connotation of a woman. He sold three million records based off substance, based off people were drawn and liked him. You could go on and on: OutKast. Who knew "Hey Ya!" would make it in urban radio? Ten million records. Where's J-Kwon at? Where are all these other guys? They got all this radio play.
What I'm saying is that we sell records, but somebody is scared somewhere of having these guys as a commercial force. I don't know why, and I don't know who, and I won't say "they." We in hip-hop, especially the purists, like to complain a lot. Before we complain, look at the fact that people with substance, they haven't had a record on the radio for five years, and they still tour and have a career and make lots of money. We're the ones that are the feet of the culture and the music. We are the one who people are buying the records. So I submit that there is a place for people with substance. The only problem is this: that we don't come back to the community, so the community doesn't relate to us in the same way. Artists have to jump out of the videos, off of the stage, out of the big screen, and back to the 95th and Jeffery, 87th and Stony, 63rd and whatever. We have to, so that the children can look at us and see us as an option of how they can be. If they only see us on TV, they're going to be like, "Oh, that ain't hood." That's what part of that comes from. Part of that is our problem, is all our fault. It ain't all radio, it ain't all TV, it ain't all media. You can see these guys in the community, and they may not be doing good things for the community, but we are where? We can do good things—why aren't we doing them? Sometimes we're just as bad under the self-righteous act.
AVC: That community focus leads to something else about you. A lot of the press for this record has been, "He's anti-bling. He's not singing about drugs." "Oh, here's a rapper who isn't singing about crack babies!" You've gotta pick up on the condescension in that.
RF: I think they try to make it like "Oh, he's a good guy, you should like him," but they don't realize that they're fucking flushing my credibility down the toilet. I love crack babies! [Laughs.] My Cadillac Escalade is parked downstairs. It's not that I'm not for it. People always think that either you're for it, or you're not for it. Either you're this or you're that. But we know, even from looking at what's going on with these Marines in Iraq. They're like, "Well they're good military," but sometimes slaughters happen.
We know that things are not black and white. But we want to make our artists like that, our music like that. Man, that's such a problem in America. Either you black or you white, either you Latino or you white. Either you're Irish or you're Jewish, or you're white. African, you black. I enjoy bling, I want it, I want chains. I can't afford it right now. I am not taking all my money and buying a chain—it is not the smart thing to do at this point. I bought a house, I got health insurance, I got car insurance. I got a car, I got a child that I provide for. While I do want chains—in the next album, you will see the chains, and I will move up from blue-collar—I have to work in order to get there. And that's part of what Rhymefest is about. Balance. You know, I like the ladies, I am not this asexual dude who is like "Black power!"
AVC: You're not dissing that lifestyle.
RF: The Rhymefest message may be a bit complicated, but it's just as complicated as the lives that we live.
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