KNOC-TURN'AL  (November 2010) | Interviewer Justin Melo

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Interview was done in November 2010

Questions Asked By: Justin Melo

Dubcnn: We’re here with Knoc-turn’al! We’re breaking down his new January 11 2011 mixtape which will be released on December 8th hosted by DJ Nik Bean & DJ Clean. Knoc was nice enough to give us a track by track breakdown on the mixtape and we start off with track #1, “Just Like Us” alongside One-2 & Cashis.

This record first appeared on Mick’s Tape but I felt it didn’t get enough love so we threw it on here too. There’s a nice story behind this record. Of course everybody knows I was around Dr. Dre for 8 years. Around 2002, we were in the studio and he put on “the Knoc” beat. No other artists wanted it and he eventually had agreed to sell it to Nike for a Michael Jordan commercial. The song was gonna’ go like this – “don’t you wanna be just like mike, just like mike, just like mike” – and if you put on “the Knoc” today, you can hear that. I begged Dre for that beat and of course he gave it to me instead of Nike. I’m very grateful towards Dre for that. The man gave me a career.
But that has always stuck with me and you can hear me being influenced on the hook on this record. Of course One-2 & Cashis came in and laid down some fuckin’ fire verses. Komplex produced that record right there.


Dubcnn: Great story. Let’s move onto “Ain’t Seen You At All.”

Of course. My homie Blue linked me up with Young Hu$tle who is signed to Dipset West. Blue has been a long time associate of mine and Young Hu$tle is a good friend of his who’s a new artist. It was natural and we got in the booth and created this. Of course Jaguar is my brother and I’ve taken him under my wing. I’m helping him out and he was with me in the studio and we threw him on the third verse and he killed it. Me and Young Hustle created one of my favorite songs recently alongside Crooked I, “This is Long Beach” as well.


Dubcnn: The next record is very interesting and was the tape’s lead single. “Give me the Night.” This was originally supposed to be on “Knoc’s Ville”, right?

It sure was but we replaced it with “If U Wanna” featuring K. Young who is a great signer also signed to Treacherous. Because a lot of these mixtape songs had already been leaked by me, I didn’t wanna’ cheat my fans by not giving them new music on this mixtape. Once we put “If U Wanna” onto Knoc’s Ville, I felt comfortable taking this record off the album. This is a very personal record to me. Growing up this was my favorite song and my father’s favorite song; he used to play it all of the time.

Of course nobody can top what George Benson did with it so it ain’t even that serious. This is a song for Royal Harbor, not Knoc-turn’al. Knoc-turn’al is the street character I created. Royal Harbor is a real person and this song is for me. To be honest, I’m not sure how my fans would react to it. It’s different than what they’re used to. But then again, people have always told me they wanted to hear me sing an entire song like I’ve sung on hooks before and as you know, I don’t rap one time on this record.


Dubcnn: Very true. “Call Me.”

I used auto tune on this record. I experimented with it. I know a lot of west coast fans don’t like auto tune and they feel that I don’t need to add it to my voice, but I wanted to try it and I don’t think the outcome was half bad. Jaguar is on here as well. I’ve always thought this would make for a great ring tone.


Dubcnn: The next one is a throwback we were unable to hear from the Aftermath vaults. “Mad at the Aftermath.”

Me and my manager Justin collaborated on this one. We were on the phone one night talking about some things and he put on a snippet of this record for me to hear to see if I would remember it. It was funny because he played it for me because he thought it was me on the hook; of course it was Shorty but it was crazy that I was on the full version of this record. I told him what I remember about this song. It was tagged on some websites as Dr. Dre producing it and being for Detox, but my memory told me it was Focus who produced it. Luckily, my manager has a good relationship with Focus so we were able to call him up and play the snippet. Focus never even knew a snippet of this was out; he had the full record sitting right there with him.

He sent to us and gave us his blessing to go ahead and leak it to set the record straight. The record is by Shaunta featuring me and Shorty and is produced by Focus. I got this other record by Shaunta featuring myself called “Mushrooms” that’s crazy. We were tripping out when did that record (laughs). It’s something we did over at Aftermath and it never leaked. Mahogany who produced “Bad Intentions” produced “Mushrooms” as well and will be leaking that sometime soon as well.


Dubcnn: Cool. The next record was originally the street single off Knoc’s Ville – Sorry I Left You.

This is one my favorite records I ever did. Of course it’s very personal and honest. I’m sorry to my fans that I went away for so long but I had to keep my family straight. I moved to Texas to live my life and keep my family together. I couldn’t handle being on the road for ten months out of the year. I’m married to my high school sweetheart and we have two beautiful children together. I had to step away from music to keep all of that in tact. But now we’re back on the west coast and I’m ready to come back to the rap game. This record has been leaked for a long time so we took it off the album and put it on here. But luckily, I do have a banging west coast remix to it on the album featuring three of my favorite west coast emcees – Jayo Felony, Yukmouth & Sly Boogy. If it wasn’t for the remix, the original would still be on the album.


Dubcnn: Ok. Next up we have a Hall & Oates sample; Oh Here She Comes.

Another record Jayo Felony is on. That’s Sabrina on the hook by the way. She’s worked with Focus and all kinds of good people. Me and my brother Jaguar have verses to this. DJ Bless from New York produced it. It’s a real hip-hop record. Hoopla Media Group put this together and it’s a good record.


Dubcnn: “Huntin” is next.

This was for Knoc’s Ville but I felt comfortable taking it off to give my fans some exclusive music on the tape. It’s more like a skit. I was pissed off one day and went to Treacherous to produce this beat. That’s why you hear a gun snare on it (laughs). I did one verse on it and left it alone. I still wanted to release it though.


Dubcnn: Another exclusive – Can We Do Our Thing.

Another track I felt comfortable taking off of Knoc’s Ville. It’s more of a party, club record but its still Knoc-turn’al and it’s still west coast. I didn’t step too out of my element on this one. People might be concerned we took four joints off Knoc’s Ville but I want to let them know Knoc’s Ville is still 15 or 16 straight tracks, no intro’s, outro’s or skits.


Dubcnn: That’s good to hear. We have an interesting collaboration up next – “I’m on the Hunt” featuring Airamis.

When I moved to Las Vegas, Airamis was one of the first artists I met and I liked how he acted around me. I was new in town and he took me to a banging studio where I could record my music in an appropriate manner. That’s one thing about me; My whole career I’ve had the pleasure of recording in some of the best studios. From the days to when I was with Dr. Dre to Treacherous, I always had the best studios at my disposal. So even though I haven’t put out an album in six years and I moved to Vegas, I wasn’t about to downgrade the sound quality of my music. Airamis took me to a good studio and I fuck wit him. I thanked him by jumping on this record. Ajami produced it and I’ll tell you one thing, they love this record in Europe. It’s getting constant radio play in Sweden from what I’ve been told. Maynea Records is full of good people. We might be doing a video for this shortly.


Dubcnn: Next up is track 11, the final track – U Don’t Know.

The Raskal is a good person and artist from Tucson, Arizona. This is his record featuring me and Lifted. Of course I called him up to ask for his permission to use this record. The song appears on his last album he’s selling right now. You can find his music on iTunes and shit. This is a great record and he was happy to let me use it. We always felt it was a good radio record; very catchy. He thought by using it on my mixtape we can give it more notoriety and I think we will.


Dubcnn: Well that does it for the mixtape. It’s out December 8th and Knoc’s Ville will be out January 11th 2011. Any last words for our readers?

Thanks to Dubcnn first off. Y’all have always supported me throughout my entire career. From 1999 to 2011, I’ve always known I can come to Dubcnn first and they will show me love. So thank you for that. To the fans, I’m sorry. I know we’ve had to push back Knoc’s Ville a few times but understand this - I haven’t been out in six years and nowadays, there are a lot more politics to putting out a record. We’ve been working hard all this time; we’re not just sitting on our hands doing nothing. On January 11, Knoc’s Ville will finally be out and I’m talking physically in stores, not just online. I have a good distribution record and I look forward to putting out lots of records.
I’m back world!

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