new Styles P interview(good interview)

[ABN]

Styles P. was first known in the Hip Hop game as part of the LOX. His early days performing with Jadakiss, and Sheek Louch brought the Yonkers emcee respect as a lyricist, as well as credibility in the streets. The LOX were originally signed to Bad Boy Records, which proved to be a bad fit for the group. After months of asking, they were finally granted their release and switched over to the Ruff Ryders camp, where the group was able to come into their own. As a result of the group’s success, each member of the LOX has been able to branch off into solo endeavors. In 2002 Styles P.’s own debut solo effort, A Gangster And A Gentleman, was released. The record sold surprisingly well, and showed that many people had underestimated his ability. Styles was a bit surprised himself, given that selling units was not his first priority at the time. He just wanted to make a good album, and prove that he could stand on his own. During the success of his debut Styles was dealt a set back as he had to complete an eight-month jail sentence. The music stopped, and Styles had a lot of time to think. It was during that time away from his family, his friends, and his music that Styles began to think about his life and his career. He thought about the success of A Gangster And A Gentleman, as well as his next moves.

As you will read in this SoundSlam exclusive interview with Styles, one of the results of his time spent in jail is a new approach to making music, as well as a new album, Time Is Money. The album was originally scheduled to drop in April but has been pushed back indefinitely. Styles hopes it will make its way to stores this October. In this interview he talks about the new album, his disappointment with how his first single was received, as well as his reputation as an emcee and lyricist. Read on for insight into the Time Is Money album, and why this emcee isn’t wasting either.

SoundSlam: You have a new album coming out called Time Is Money. I was wondering if going to jail during the success of your first album and sitting in jail influenced you to name the new record, Time Is Money?

Styles P: You f**king hit it on the head.

SoundSlam: Really.

Styles P: Definitely

SoundSlam: I read that the experience was a wake up call to you, what did you learn that you can take out and apply to music and just life in general?

Styles P: I could think different now. Instead of just reacting, now I got to think about what I do before I go ahead and do it. I can’t afford to be away from my family like that.

SoundSlam: I read that you switched up your approach to music when making this new album. What are some of those changes and how will fans notice them on the new album?

Styles P: On the new album I think I kind of broadened my horizons. Just from hearing the people I did records with and then just to hear how the records turned out. The records I did on this album, I wasn’t ready to do those kinds of records. I wasn’t feeling them kind of records. I felt I couldn’t do them records and maintain who I was. I felt there was some people I couldn’t collab with. I felt like I couldn’t do me on the track. Some people get with certain people and they got to soften it up. That wasn’t something I wanted to do. I like coming hard but while I was sitting in jail, before I put my first album out a lot of people just thought, ‘we don’t know what he could do. We don’t know if he could make a whole album. He’s good with the LOX, and on the mixtapes, but can he make an album?’ So on my first album, I was just trying to make a motherf**king album that’s banging all the way through. I didn’t have the ladies in mind, and the general world. I had the hood, the ghettoes, the people that listen to emcees, I had that in my mind when I was making the first album. While I was sitting in jail I was like, ‘you know a lot of people didn’t expect me to sell 800,000 records.’ That wasn’t expected of me. They expected me to sell one something. So I was like, ‘you know what, that’s f**king decent off of one single.’ I did one single, I almost went platinum. I sat in jail, I’m like, ‘I’m missing out on a lot of f**king money here.’ It makes no sense. A lot of people underestimated me. I know sitting in jail, this time around people would think that I would come out to make A Gangster and A Gentleman part 2. Before I went to jail, that’s the album I probably had in my mind, A Gangster and A Gentleman part 2. I wasn’t really thinking about going farther. When you sit in jail, you realize, I realized, this is the f**king wrong place for me to be. I worked too hard, I’m busy. Then I also thought about, you know what? We do f**king big songs. I’m the same hard street ass n***a that did Jenny from the block, and Mariah and all of that. So me sitting there thinking like, you know I got to broaden my f**king horizons. I don’t just want street n***as saying I’m good. Now I want everybody to say I’m great. Better than just the hood and street n***as, and mixtape n***as, Styles is f**king therew…A lot of people are like, ‘yo you’re underestimated,’ or ‘you don’t get enough credit.’ You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to step in everybody else’s f**king lane. I’m nice like that. I try to be usually modest about my s**t and humble, but I’m a superbly nice motherf**king lyricist. That’s what made Biggie the best. He was great at everything. He did “One More Chance” he did that. He did “Dreams of F**king A R&B Chick.” But he still did “Who Shot Ya?” and “Pray For My Downfall.” I said, ‘you gotta wake up kid, it’s time to switch it up.’ I ain’t never going to crossover and sing on these hooks and s**t like these bitch ass n***as. I’m going to be able to get on a song with Jagged Edge and be able to speak my piece and let them speak their piece, and blend it together. When you hear my album and the songs with these people, it’s a different song from everything with everybody else. To collab with people is great.

SoundSlam: I want to talk about some of the collaborations on the new album. I know you have a song with Talib Kweli. What might you say to some fans that might be like, ‘man, Styles P doesn’t rap with Talib Kweli.’ Or when you were with Common, ‘Styles doesn’t rap with Common.’ They won’t expect that from you. What would you say to them?

Styles: My real-real fans do expect that from me. For me it’s a funny situation. A lot of people look at me differently. Some people just know the hard Styles. He just comes hard. He just makes this such and such. Some people expect the ‘I’m Black.’ Some people expect the ‘My Life’ with Pharoahe Monche. There’s some fans that know. They’ll be like, ‘you got that deep s**t. You got that s**t from the soul.’ A lot of people expect a lot of different things out of me. A lot of people expect all of it out of me, those that truly know me.

SoundSlam: On the ‘Why’ remix and other songs like ‘I’m Black’ where you’re critiquing the social system, offering solutions, and kicking some real knowledge, do you think those songs are getting overlooked when they come from you unfairly, while negative songs get pointed out?

Styles P: Definitely. If I go off on a f**king tape right now and say I’m going to shoot up these motherf***ers, I’m going to do this and that, you’d hear that s**t on the news immediately. You’ll hear about that s**t this evening. If I got out and say let’s help the hungry people and get some homeless n***as some food, let’s try to learn a little bit about our history, and let’s stop doing things to each other, you ain’t never going to hear no s**t about that s**t.

SoundSlam: Were you happy with the attention ‘I’m Black’ received? Or do you think people missed it?

Styles P: Hell no. Not at all. They say so much s**t about Hip Hop. Hip Hop’s this, Hip Hop’s that, negative this, negative that. Then you got me, a guy with the most credible street rep making a song like ‘I’m Black’ and they shove that s**t under the doormat. They swept that s**t under the doormat so hard it’s incredible. It damn near brought me to motherf**king tears. It’s sad because you can say all this s**t about a person but then all these f**king media people, all the people that got negative s**t to say about Hip Hop, all these critics, why ain’t you help support this thing? Make sure this s**t gets played. They say all this s**t then they pay no attention to the song or the people who do the songs. When was the f**king last time you heard a Talib Kweli single? When’s the f**king last time you heard a Dead Prez song on the radio? When’s the last time you heard a Mos Def song on the radio? But they say all this s**t about Hip Hop and all kinds of s**t. That’s the part that f**ks me up.

SoundSlam: I was talking to someone about how it would be crazy if someone that listend to G-Unit and D-Block started listening to Dead Prez and all them came together. That would be insane.

Styles P: That’s why I’m working with those kinds of dudes. I just did a song with M-1

SoundSlam: I was talking to someone from the Hip Hop Summit Action Network and he was saying that Hip Hop Culture and artists can pick up the torch from the Civil Rights Generation and start bringing change and doing more work. Do you think that’s possible?

Styles P: I don’t what to say because the media ain’t going to help. They’re trying. People are trying. It ain’t like nobody’s f**king trying. A lot of people are trying. You don’t hear about it. You hear about f**king corporate America and the people that doing things in corporate America. You don’t never hear about the brothers on the corner trying to school somebody and trying to preach to somebody. You don’t never hear about that s**t. You don’t hear about the motherf***ers on the corner in Harlem, the Bronx, Brooklyn, with books and pamphlets, because the media ain’t going to cover them. It ain’t that they can’t carry the torch. People keep dosing the torch out. They keep throwing a pale of water on it. It ain’t like nobody’s going to try, they can’t say that. They definitely can’t say that because a lot of people try. There’s a long list of motherf***ers that try. Even if you take it out of rap, f**k rap, go to R&B. I don’t hear Anthony Hamilton all day. I don’t hear Jill Scott all day. I don’t hear Erykah Badu all day, I don’t hear that s**t. That’s not what you hear on the radio. All the people that say that need to go to f**king radio and stop f**king with artists, get the f**k off our back.

SoundSlam: Speaking of the new album, do you have a favorite track or one that’s most personal to you?

Styles P: I can’t really say I do. I love the whole album actually. I put a lot into every single song. I put the same effort and drive into every song. I could say on certain days I got favorite songs. I’m a ride with the times kind of guy. I might wake up on a certain day and certain events might be happening and one song might be the song that suits the day.

SoundSlam: When is the album going to drop?

Styles P: Hopefully October my brother, hopefully.

SoundSlam: It got pushed back from April.

Styles P: Tell me about it.

SoundSlam: Is that one of the more difficult parts of being a Hip Hop artist that people might not see?

Styles P: Yeah because I could put out an album a month, easily. For a person like me, it kills me. It hurts. That’s why you hear us on so many mixtapes. It’s for the love of the art. I’m not a half-assed emcee. I’m the real thing. This is what I do. This is what I breathe. This is what my days, my nights, my darkest, my lightest moments go to. For me personally, s**t, 12 songs a month would be nothing to me. Maybe I’d be too jumpy, but I could at least put out three albums a year. I would love to.

SoundSlam: I read that you didn’t graduate from high school but did get a degree later…Based on your own experiences with school, what changes or improvements can be made to the way school is set up to keep more kids not just in school, but interested and graduating?

Styles P: I think people got to start learning s**t that matters….You ask the average person what they learned in school and they can’t f**king tell you. Most of the s**t I learned I can’t even[remember]. It was a lot of s**t you didn’t want to learn but you felt coming from the hood and where you’re from, ‘how does this s**t apply to me?’ If they’re going to teach all that s**t, at least teach people something about themselves that will make it interesting. Who the f**k wants to go to social studies? Why do I want to go to social studies class? It makes no f**king sense. Math, you know, people are going to do math because they want to know how to count money and divide and multiply. You have to do that anyway. If you’re going to teach science, teach about some black scientists too. There’s a lot of them. We built this damn f**king country. That s**t kind of makes school difficult sometimes. But these little n***as and children, and everybody needs to stay in school so they can get ahead. With me, I got my s**t in jail because in school I was bored by school. I used to always pass tests, I never really did the work, I just passed the test. I didn’t graduate because I never went to [one class]. I passed the test, I did everything, but I never went to class so I couldn’t pass the class. So they failed me. So I went to jail. In jail they gave me a practice GED, I got one or two wrong. Then I took the real thing, I passed that thing. After that I just told the teacher, ‘I want to get my high school diploma because I only failed one class, see if you could get them to send all the class work, I’ll just knock out the class work.’ So he got me through it and I knocked that s**t out.

[Denial! Is Actively Joinin The Revolution]

propz for this

[Meho]

propz for this

[UKnowWhatItIs: welcome to my traps....game over]

thx