ATL.A  (Junes 2007) | Interview By: Noncentz

      

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Interview was done by phone in May, 2007

Questions Asked By: Noncentz (Guest Contributor)

Malachi & J-Dub (ATL.A) Gave Dubcnn.com A Shoutout! Check That Here
 

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www.myspace.com/atlatv

www.myspace.com/thedangerouscrew
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Dubcnn: What’s the concept of ATL.A TV?

J-Dub: ATL.A is actually the project. The website is ATL.A TV because we’re coming from the aspect of we’re musicians and I do the video so we go the video, film, and everything on lock in alignment with the music. So we got video clips up, and we’re making a dvd of ATL.A that’s going to go along with the project. So just to clarify, ATL.A is the project and ATL.A TV is the site.


Dubcnn: What is it that you want to accomplish with ATL.A?

Malachai: To take each others solo careers to the next level by breaking the mold and reaching to two different ethnic groups. By hopefully reaching the Caucasian fan base and the so-called Afro-American fan base, we should be able to get a global fan base. And we really focus on making real, genuine, authentic, great hit records that’ll last for decades. We ain’t just going in the studio laying down some shit and saying that was hot and moving to the next one. We focus on each record to make it the very, very best it could be to make it last for ages.


Dubcnn: How did the two of you get connected?

J-Dub: Through a mutual partner of ours named Rob Love, who has a company called Guerilla Republic. And he’s based out of L.A. I knew him from L.A. but he and Malachi go way back and he linked us up when I was in Atlanta. Me and my company also did the video with the Outlawz, and Malachai did the hook on that record right there. They had did the record together, and we did the video for it so it was through Rob Love we got the direct connect, then by doing the video for them it was like it was meant to be. We was definitely bound to get together.


Dubcnn: You brought up the Outlawz, and I guess this may pertain more to Malachai, but I put that video up of Shorty B at the 2Pac video shoot that showed Shorty B, Pac’s sister, and then Malachai, Kane from the Ying Yang Twins and other down south rappers. The biggest question coming up is how does Pac’s legacy go from the Thug Life image, to now being linked with Ashanti, The Ying Yang Twins, and the down south cats. How does it correlate?

Malachai: Well, it has to correlate cuz even if Pac were alive he was going to have to do the same thing because all the power has shifted to the city of Atlanta. Like say we all from South Carolina, but they having a gold rush in Cali. We all gonna pack up and go to Cali cuz that’s where the gold’s at.


Dubcnn: I don’t want to say people are upset, but 2Pac fans saw him riding so hard for Death Row and the West Coast and then now it’s like…

Malachai: But that’s ancient history right now. It’s 2007. That was the ‘90’s. It’s 2000 right now. It’s a whole new movement and there’s a whole other music out now. Gangsta music is not at the forefront right now, bruh. Atlanta music is at the forefront and if you really gonna get in this game and get that bread, you better be getting in with that southeast/south region. From Texas to all over. Period. So you gonna have to be doing more collaborations with them artists. It’s like when we got love from Fat Joe. Fat Joe tried to show New York where it was. And ya boy MIMS, who’s from New York, got on that down south beat.

It’s like back in the days, when we wanted to get on we had to go to New York. Cuz that’s where the game was. Everybody was on that vibe doing collaborations with artists from up there. It’s about penetrating the market. If you want to eat, you gotta play the politics., and know how to get in there with certain artists. It’s not about degrading your image. It’s about linking up with artists in that realm that you feel you can sit with and get that bread. They gotta keep going and they gotta keep evolving.

That’s why I mentioned Fat Joe because when Pun was alive he wasn’t riding around with all them south cats, but that’s ancient history now. So now what does Fat Joe gotta do? Fat Joe done moved to Miami with Scott Storch and all that because the money is in the south. So the boys gotta come and get the vibe from down here so they can keep getting that big money and do it big.


Dubcnn: So you’re saying that the people who are crying about Pac’s legacy aren't understanding that in order to grow in music and/or business, you have to move with the times.

Malachai: Exactly! That’s why we need interviews like this so people can get properly educated, instead of misunderstanding. The general public don’t know about the game. Like a lot of people think I’m signed to Dungeon Family, but Dungeon Family is not a record label, it’s a clique. So it’s up to me and the DF to get out and fully inform the people what it really is, so people won’t be out here like ‘damn Malachai, I thought you was signed to them and they ain’t putting you all the way on!’.

They can’t put me all the way on because DF is not a record label. So if I get out here and do the work properly, and do interviews like this, and let people know, then that’ll kind of shut their mouths a little bit cuz it’ll start making sense. And they’ll understand why this is going that way, or why this hadn’t come out yet, or why all these things happen the way they do.


Dubcnn: Bringing up the Dungeon Family, I talked to T-Mo a few weeks back and he kind of hinted round that the Goodie Mob and Dungeon Family may be getting together again soon. Can you shed some light on that?

Malachai: There’s a couple distribution situations looking at Rico and Ray right now, the organized production aspect of the Dungeon Family. So as far as that aspect, they’re getting ready to drop some projects like me and Dungeon E’s project which is under Ray Murray which is a 3rd of Organized Noize production house. As far as Goodie Mob coming back, they’re able to come back to a degree right now because Cee-Lo has a label situation, he’s large in the world right now, and he’s actually talking about signing the group. So that’ll be that outlet for them. Cuz Cee-Lo ain’t gonna do the Goodie Mob unless he can sign the group. Cuz he’s really the one carrying the weight.


Dubcnn: Let’s get back to this ATL.A project. Getting connected through Rob Love and all, can you expand a little bit on what the idea behind this project was?

Malachai: ATL.A was never actually a thought. If it hadn’t come together the way it came together, it would have been a gimmick. But it was a natural progression that just came to be. J-Dub’s whole squad had came over from L.A. and I was already doing my thing real hard in the city of the A. I’m not from Atlanta, I’m from South Carolina, but the A embraced me because I had put so much work down here that they gonna embrace me like I grew up here. But us just working on the videos and things together, and us sitting around writing the beats, and at first we just writing, and it was decent chemistry. And then we just thought together that we should really put this L.A./Atlanta thing together and put a little project out on it. And actually there was two more members, but me and J was the ones who was going real hard, and everybody else just sorta dropped off. So ended up just being me and him.


Dubcnn: Tell us about the DVD that you got coming out..

J-Dub: The DVD just shows how it came together, with us in writing sessions, studio sessions, people being around that you might know, and just real generic like. Showing cats in L.A. the Atlanta thing behind the scenes, real VIP-style.


Dubcnn: Who can we expect to see on this DVD?

J-Dub: Already, you got cats like Shorty B, Ray Murray, T-Mo & Khujo Goodie, and The Outlawz. We about to go out west and there’s a number of people out there we’re gonna link up with as well. And once they get a taste of this they gonna really love it. I’m already getting a buzz from this over here, but once we really touch down I know it’s gonna be more.

Malachai: Mainly the focus is us. We ain’t trying to dickride. We our own great entity. We don’t NEED features, I mean it’s great, but we make great music. Like you know how you go get a new album and there’s like a million features on it? It’s like cats can’t respect that, man. Like when Nas first came out, he had AZ on his joint. Nas was so great that he didn’t have to go get everybody in the world to come out and say he was this and that. We not trying to come out here and ride cats’ names. We coming out here to bring our own contribution. We ready for that, and we’re real excited about the product that we putting together.

We don’t got a lot of profanity on it, it’s a family project, but It’s ghetto, it’s gutter. We say we ATL.A. but we make world music. We just use the southeast capital and the southwest capital as the main cities where we launching this thing from out of the states. The concept is not strictly Atlanta and Los Angeles. It’s a cat from L.A. and a cat from the A coming together and making WORLD music. Music you can play in Japan, Africa, South America, the Caribbean, etc.

I feel it’s evident if you go listen to the music and hear the different styles and combinations of music we putting together. You can hear the Caribbean. You can hear Africa. You can hear Blues. You Can hear Jazz. You can hear Rock & Roll. I feel we personify what we trying to project, and that’s world music. We not trying to limit ourselves. Like Akon, how he gonna give you some real trap music, or just music music. This dude is making world music, and that’s what ATL.A. come up with is world music. We not degrading women, or no bullshit. None of that!

J-Dub: It’s still raw, but we not degrading women, or cursing, but it’s still raw!


Dubcnn: Almost like you’re trying to transcend where music is at to where it’s going. Not bringing out the guns and what not, but just make real, good music.

Malachai: Right, but when you hear the dudes, you can tell they ain’t soft. You can hear it in the skills that they’re bringing. And you can tell the boys know music cuz you can tell by the arrangements. The arrangements is next level from what a lot of cats are doing right now. Cuz a lot of cats are stuck in 16 bars and a hook. We might have a joint that just has 8 bars. We just play with it. We got harmonies. We steeping it up, but it’s still very simplistic to where a child can get it. But it’s still musical enough to where musician cats can respect it.


Dubcnn: I like what you’re saying about not flooding the project with cluttered features. You’re keeping it simple, and that’s what I hear from fans of music, is that you can’t really connect with an artist and the albums cuz there’s no continuity or vibe in the albums anymore.

Malachai: Right, and folks look at that like you needed all of that to be somebody.

J-Dub: We just talking about the Wu-Tang Clan the other day about how all that power they had wasn’t enough to match what Pac had by himself.

Malachai: What I will say is that Pac got to the level he did by doing a record with EVERYBODY! Like if you really look back now, Pac did a record with everybody! You didn’t expect Pac to be on joint with Red & Meth! Smif-N-Weeson! He did records with everybody, and that’s why he could rise up to King status. He rolled with all the right troops, from different sections of the U.S. I mean he did records with Jodeci!! But look at when he did these records. After he was established and people knew he could do it on his own. Cuz them early records was mostly just him.


Dubcnn: I see what you’re saying. Who are we to say where he would be at now, and who he would work with now, when he was already doing shit with people that we wouldn’t have expected it.

J-Dub: And representing the west coast, and knowing how cats feel about him and how true to heart they take it, it really ain’t no secret if cats just did a little bit of homework. But Pac lived in Baltimore and in New York. On his first records he was giving it up to the old school. He’s not just a west coast dude. Even though that image from Death Row and all of that is strong, but it’s like cats get stuck in that. It’s ancient history. It was never just west coast, but cats get stuck in that mentality. If you really just opened your fucking mind and your eyes, you’d see that it wasn’t just all west for Pac.


Dubcnn: Him passing under that image is what everybody remembers him for, and it leads them to say that Pac would never work with so and so from the south, or this R&B singer or whatever.

Malachai: And when they say that, that’s a lie! They can never say that. Pac was an abstract dude. Pac was on some different shit. In the VIBE magazine photo where he’s in the bath tub with bubbles all over and shit, or a leather vest with no shirt on, or whatever. He was on some rock & roll type shit. Pac woulda been doing songs with white boys and whoever, man. But please educate these cats on where the 2Pac Education Center is, bruh! Please! It’s in Atlanta! The statue of Pac is in Atlanta! Is it in L.A.? The statue of Pac is in Atlanta. The 2Pac Center, his momma and the whole movement is here! Cats just don’t even know what it is, man.


Dubcnn: He fell under an image that he was doing at a point in time. But Pac was with dudes from all over his whole career.

J-Dub: Like you said, he fell under an image and got branded with that image. And that image was so powerful. Cats just need to be educated and listen, too. People want to listen to what they want to believe.

Malachai: It’s all about marketing. E-40 was man enough to get with Lil Jon and keep his name up and keep his paper up. When Jay-Z hooked up with UGK, he wasn’t thinking about being lyrical, he wanted paper from that region. Those people who get stuck doing the same things over and over are the ones who one day wake up and wonder why the checks stopped coming to their house. So in this industry, you gotta keep moving and you gotta evolve.

Pac would have done that, because he was doing that before he passed already. Jodeci. Jon B. Redman. Method Man. Scarface. Bone. Outlawz. C-Bo. Breed. $hort. Everybody from every region.. You gotta approach rapping like running for office. You gotta get the votes. Vote for me! You know what I’m saying? When you buy a record, you’re voting. Out of all these records in the store, this is who I’m picking up. Who I’m voting for.


Dubcnn: I feel you. Let’s step back a bit, and J-Dub, tell us a bit about Guerilla Epic.

J-Dub: Guerilla Epic is a film company That I began with my partner Cody Luciage. Me and Cody were both at LAFCO, doing our own thing, and I began doing music videos and other things, and Cody was doing documentaries in L.A. called the Acapella. So we just began a real strong bond to think about how we could start to get it on our own by putting what we had together and make some magic. And every time we’d go out and film guerrilla style and then edit it, everybody would say it looked real cinematic and epic, so we decided to name our company Guerrilla Epic. We do video work and have done work with Dead Prez, The Outlawz, Malachai, RZA, Wu-Tang, a gang of live concerts, and in the studio type filming. So we just building it up and getting a lot of interest.


Dubcnn: In addition to the album and DVD coming out, what other projects are you two getting involved in?

Malachai: Right now, we just trying to see what this does. Cuz this is a brand-new thing. We want to see how people gravitate towards us and what we’re doing, cuz that’s gonna say everything. That’s’ going to determine if J gonna stay in Atlanta, if I’m going to L.A., or if we going around the world, and all that.


Dubcnn: So this is the jump-off project?

J-Dub: And just to bounce off that word, the jump-off project, and to go back to the original mission of this project, this project will be our 36 Chambers, or The Score. It’s going to be the one that world knew about. The jump-off project is definitely the way to put it.


Dubcnn: Sounds good. Well, J-Dub and Malachai I appreciate your time and look forward to talking with you again and seeing your projects take-off.

J-Dub: We appreciate you, too Chad.

Malachai: Take care, man.