The Game: Man Vs. Machine (June 18th, interview)

[Elano]

The game don't wait, at least that's what Warren G once said. However, The Game says that Hip Hop may have to wait on him to hear more after three largely-publicized, arguably classic albums. The third in the trilogy, L.A.X., is the topic at an early afternoon conversation in a Geffen Records corner office in New York City.
Surrounded by his homeboys from Compton and industry mastermind Jimmy "Henchman" Rosemond, The Game discusses Hip Hop in its purest form. Spouting off artists of yesteryear, recounting famous battles and quoting lyrics, The Game might seem like an unlikely lecturer for the university circuit. However, The Game is both a diligent student of Hip Hop and one of its biggest headline drivers. The 27 year-old needs no inquisition to speak about separation from Dr. Dre, a self-proclaimed victory over G-Unit and a sleeping giant perspective on Jay-Z.
Although it seems it's impossible to get The Game to not be controversial, the first Compton rapper since his mentor to further the city's legacy seems to be about bigger issues than feuds, bravado and half-stepping rumors of retirement. Whether his promises are to be believed or not, the rapper who has been one of the few platinum superstars to still serve time, demonstrates his love of Hip Hop history, and use his underdog status to do what EPMD, Too Short, Master P and Jay-Z did before him - threaten to hang it up if we don't wake up. HipHopDX shows you an artist, a dreamer and a victim of circumstance - Game, the man, versus the machine.

One of my favorite singles of the year is “Game's Pain" [click to view]. I think it might be the first time Kool Herc’s name, or maybe even Red Alert have been mentioned in a mainstream rap single, ever. You even have a line about that with Big Daddy Kane. I know early in your career, critics including myself joked around with your name-dropping. Do you feel at this point in your career that you’re actually educating these kids?
The Game: Yeah, I definitely think that. I think that I’m a big enough artist to be vocal enough for kids. What I did with “Game’s Pain” is, I want new school cats to know where it started, where Hip Hop comes from, who did it before us, and who we should pay homage to – and who we shouldn’t. On the second hand, I want to remind these old school cats and these cats existing in Hip Hop now, let’s not forget; let’s not get too far away from the essence of what true Hip Hop is supposed to be.
So every now and then, I’m gonna name-drop some of my favorite artists of my career. I write the lyrics, I can do whatever I want, and I sell millions of records every time, so it’s obviously not too painful to hear about it. And if you think about it, there’s a lot of people that say, “Game name-drops too much,” but then I listen to everybody else, like every other rapper, and they be doing the same thing, but nobody catches it when they do it. My whole career, man, people have always been trying to find shit to render me helpless, but it don’t work, ‘cause I don’t give a fuck, I just rap how I rap, and you can hate it or love it. You can buy my shit or you can leave it on the shelf. I don’t ever try to over-sell myself, my albums, my records; I don’t a give a fuck if you don’t buy my records, don’t buy my shit – buy the one next to it, like who cares? I make music for me and my fans and the people who appreciate me. All the people who judge, criticize and knit-pick like little bitches and shit, just buy somebody else’s shit, that’s it. You ain’t gonna buy Game; leave my shit on the shelf.

You said “Hate It Or Love It.” That’s the “Juicy” of the new era, in terms of a rags-to-riches story. This is your third album in a very successful career, do you still feel like an underdog?
G: Yeah, I’m still an underdog. ‘Cause you know the whole…success, me bein’ a big rapper, none of that still ain’t hit me. I think for the last five or six years, I’ve just been coastin’. I never got a chance to go Hollywood or act different or be funny or none of that; I’m just enjoyin’ myself, man. That’s what a lot of people don’t understand. Cats come at me. Rappers want beef and say shit; I got the reckless tongue, and I don’t know you, really, I don’t give a fuck about you. I’ve got my homies, my friends, my family, people I care about, so to go rip somebody’s head off on a mixtape song…it’s underground, period. And it ain’t nothin’ to me; I do it all day. Ten out of 10 times, ain’t nobody ‘bout to pick up a gun, drive by my house and do a drive-by; 50 [Cent] ain’t comin’ by with no gun sprayin’ at my house; I ain’t goin’ by his house, ‘cause that’d be stupid. For the most part, it’s just a wax war. If you think about it, beef, these days, people just got it misconstrued.
They make a bigger deal out of it than it really is. ‘Cause beef been goin’ on since Busy Bee or MC Shan, since KRS-One and “The Bridge Is Over,” since Run-DMC, back in the days, Roxanne Shante, everybody had beef. N.W.A. had beef. Bone Thugs [N’ Harmony] had beef with [Tha] Dogg Pound . Uncle Luke [click to read] and Tim Dog [had beef] with Snoop [Dogg] and [Dr.] Dre. That shit’s been goin’ on. Nowadays, everybody just puts the magnifying glass on it in the wake of the untimely demises of Biggie and 2Pac. Since that happened, everybody just goes overboard with the beef shit in the media. People don’t understand, 10 out of 10 times, it’s the media, magazines and people that really fuel the fire in these shits.

You just ran through a grocery list of Hip Hop history. You’re this mainstream artist that studied his lessons. Do you think Hip Hop as an institution gives you enough credit for things like that information right there?
G: Nah. I don’t think nobody really understands what I’ve done in Hip Hop with my career. From the early stages till now, I’m anywhere from five to 10 years gone from Hip Hop. [They'll appreciate me when] my whole beard is gray, then people will look back, they’ll understand, they’ll respect what I did, but I don’t do it for the respect of people, man.

I think if you look at some of my accolades that I cherish in Hip Hop…I withstood, [I’m attached] to one of the biggest beefs in Hip Hop history. If you think about the biggest beefs in history, the only one that was bigger than mines, killed two of my favorite rap artists. Beef with me and 50 was just as big as Biggie and 2Pac’s in terms of that type of war. It was shootouts, and it was diss records, and I went to his house on some crazy, dumb shit, and I did what I did, and the only thing that didn’t come out of that beef was that neither one of us got killed. But that was a big beef, and I annihilated [G-Unit] as a group. Their record is coming out soon, and they ‘bout to catch a brick; their [single] ain’t even got 500 spins, and “Game’s Pain” is damn near 4,000 on paying homage. So that right there – “300 Bars,” the longest fuckin’ mixtape diss – the longest diss song ever recorded in Hip Hop history; you could play it like the shit’s three minutes. I got BDS spins on “300 Bars And Runnin’;” it was on the radio. People was takin’ out [the curses] – if you played “300 Bars” on your radio station, that means there was three artists, three songs that wasn’t getting played at all in that point in time. That shit was big, man.
I’m a product of Dr. Dre. I appreciate everything he did for me. I haven’t really been around him. I spoke to Dr. Dre recently, but I have really been around him to chill or record in years, but just being around him those first few years gave me enough to last me my whole career as far as creativity and how to make these classic albums become movies. People won’t respect me till after, but that’s fine with me, ‘cause that’s not what I do it for, I do it ‘cause love doin’ it, and once I get tired of doing it, then I won’t do it no more.

You’ve got Common on the album. His work with T.I. was groundbreaking, so I'm curious about this union. Tell me about this collaboration…
G: Common’s one of my favorite emcees of all-time. Like I said, this album, I figured it to be my last album, ‘cause I recorded with the people that I wanted to record with, that I always wanted to record with, and that I recorded with in the past that I really love. Like, got Nas on the album on a song called “Letter To The King.” We just both wrote 16 bar letters to Dr. Martin Luther King.
Me and Common – the song is called “Angel,” produced by Kanye West. Common just came off so crazy. I just let him go in. Kanye made a beat, and I had my boy J. West come in, this new R&B singer from Cali sing the hook. Common heard the hook [and said], “Oh, it’s about angels? I think about angels all the time.” We both just went in the studio and he just boppin’ his head like this, words started comin’ out, he was like “Shit!” He was in and out the booth in like five minutes. No doubles. No ad-libs. Just did his verse straight through.
Another person that I got on the album that I always wanted to call was Ice Cube [click to read], before he was done. I always wanted to make that happen, and I made that happen, and it’s like a classic, west coast, hood Ice Cube and Game, you know it should’ve been done a long time ago joint. It’s called “State of Emergency,” produced by J.R. [Rotem].

Ice Cube doesn’t rap anymore, but he releases street albums for his longtime, core fans. You recently told Angie Martinez you prefer that movie money to record money, but can’t you do both, like Cube?
G: I can’t see that far right now, but I know what mind-state I’m in, I couldn’t say on what I would do in the rest of my life and career. I think that after three albums – and I’m pretty sure this one’s gonna go multi-platinum like the other ones; I think that three platinum albums are more than most of the Hip Hop artists [you and I] like, get. Nobody gives off three classics. Not to toot my own horn or sound cocky, but The Documentary [click to read] was a classic album. The Doctor’s Advocate [click to read] was a dope, classic album. This one, it’s gonna be a classic album.
My albums are what Dre’s albums would be if he gave them to you as frequently as I did. [If] you didn’t have to wait 10 years for a Dre album then it would be these albums. I think that when Dr. Dre hears this album, some or most of the songs, he’s gonna be like, “Damn, I could’ve used that on Detox, this is crazy,” but that’s because I’ve been there, I know what to do, I know how to make these movies - I know how to make these songs come to life and look like movies to your ears. That’s just what Dre taught me, and that’s one thing I always prided him and appreciated him for, if nothing else, was just teachin’ me the way to record music, and it’s just the way that I do it that nobody else can do it.
People don’t understand, or don’t care or don’t really get that my voice my changes sometimes, my style changes; I’m a man of many styles, man, and nobody ever notices, and if they do, they never said nothin’. Anybody – I could do your favorite rapper better than him. That’s why I’m The Game. That’s what I set out to do, and I think I’m damn near where I dreamed of being when I started.

I read the XXL story; I saw The Source cover. Everybody is portraying you to be really vulnerable, whether or not you are. However, I do know that All Eyez On Me came out of vulnerability, Stillmatic came out of vulnerability, maybe Tha Carter III came out of vulnerability. If you feel vulnerable, how has that translated into L.A.X.?
G: It doesn’t, ‘cause my feelings and my vulnerability hasn’t really effected my vulnerability process. I set my mind on recording this album a certain way. No matter how I felt, when I got to the studio, all of those thoughts, all of those feelings, whatever I was up against was out the window when I was back, staying [close] to my album. I didn’t go outside the lines, I stayed in. I knew what I wanted to do, and I accomplished that.
Interscope don’t want me to retire; they want me to come back in February with another album, which is so far off my radar it’s ridiculous. Now, if you give me like five, 10 million dollars or something to do it…I’m the biggest thing in that building now, with the recent demise of G-Unit, and that’s just it, man.
The album is…it’s a good album. I don’t have to say shit, I got albums to back it up, I got a school of mixtape shits, people know what I’m capable of. Will there be name-dropping on this album? Yes. Will it be the same fuckin’ controversial shit that I always spit about, just different toilet? Yes. Will the beats be crazy? Y’all know my ear for beats is fuckin’ retarded – yes. The next single is gonna be fuckin’ crazy.
I get albums done on no money. Everybody’s paid after me. My album is a month [from releasing]; nobody has been paid. People just work with me ‘cause they want to work with me. I work with people ‘cause I want to work with them. It’s not about money, it’s about Hip Hop, and people need to understand that. When they understand that, then they’ll understand how to be successful in this business, and how to appreciate Hip Hop and how to sell multi-…how to sell a lot of fuckin’ records, like Lil Wayne is about to do, like Kanye does, like I do, like 50 once did, like [Eminem] does everytime he comes in – sellin’ records is what we’re here for, man. We’re not here to bullshit our time away, we’re here to coexist in Hip Hop with the other legends and people that are gonna be iconic. And I feel like after six years of my career, I’m one of those people.

You mentioned controversy. You released a track that surfaced, “My Bitch.” You were around when Kurupt released “Calling Out Names” as a hidden track or 2Pac had “Hit ‘Em Up” as a b-side on the “How Do You Want It?” maxi-single. With that said, those records erupted. “My Bitch” is crazy, why didn’t it stir up more controversy?
G: I just threw it out. One day I felt like, “Let me just throw this shit out.” I didn’t do a "Game, make a lot of noise, here it comes"…

You didn’t push the button.
G: I didn’t push the button. I just threw it out. People got it, they heard it, appreciated it, but it never hit. I could fuckin’ re-release that on a mixtape today, make some noise, and it would fuckin’ go, ‘cause “My Bitch” was incredible. The way that I formatted the song, the things that I talk about, the people that I talk about…I never got responses from nobody; I’m just that reckless, man. It is what it is, man. I respect all rappers until they disrespect me, and then after that, they will be disrespected, and that’s how it is, man. I got the reckless tongue, man. Busta Rhymes called me yesterday on Rap City the “Troublemaker Man.” “Aw, here comes Troublemaker Man.”

Whether it’s it with this album, in 10 years, how do you think you’ve taken something legendary in rap like Compton and furthered it?
G: I don’t think I did anything. I think that N.W.A., DJ Quik, MC Eiht and Comptons Most Wanted, they put in all the work for me. They left it wide open for me. All I had to do was come, put on the hat and make sure I wore it right – make sure I didn’t disrespect the letters on it, and that I stayed true to my city and my people. I think that I’ve done that. I think that Eazy-E would be proud, I’m pretty sure that Dr. Dre knows who I am, what I’m about, how strong my voice is. I know Cube respects it. King Tee, [MC] Ren – I never met Ren; I met King Tee, I met D.O.C., who thinks highly of me. That’s all the praise that I need, in my whole career – stamped by niggas who did it before me, did it the right way, did it for me…it always feels better when Michael Jordan tells Kobe [Bryant] “You’re doing a good job.” That’s how I feel by being stamped by all those cats.
Even other cats – on the east coast. Havin’ Nas say that I’m the only cat in Hip Hop that he fucks with; the rest of these niggas is pussies. That, coming from Illmatic is like – it’s huge, man. Even though me and [Jay-Z] don’t talk or do songs, he knows. He listens. He heard the “You’re 38, and you’re still rappin’, ugh” [from “It’s Okay (One Blood)”] [click to read]. He came back on “Kingdom Come” and I was like, “Yeah! Jay listens to my shit!” [quoting] “I used to think that rapping at 38 was ill / Till last year I grossed about 38 mill.” I was like, “I know who he is talkin’ to. I know he listens. I know his antenna’s up." Maybe one day he’ll do a song with me, and then I’ll stop shootin’ subliminals.
I’ll let you know this - and only you: if I do come back with another album, it’ll be called The D.O.C. It’ll have 10 songs on it. It won’t have titles, it’ll just be Chapter One through Ten, and [it stands for] The Diary of Compton. The only way that I’ll do The D.O.C. or comeback to do that album is if I can get Ren, King Tee, Dre, Cube, because I don’t want any features except people who’ve been through Compton and really made their mark. I’m gonna get some DJ Quik tracks on there. If I can make The Diary of Compton happen, and can get Dre to executive produce that, then you’ll see a fourth album. If not, you’ll see me drivin’ by the park in California, you’ll see me throwing balls with my kids, that’s it. That’s my reality.

[Lord Funk]

Nice interview. I'm really looking forward to the album.

[Lazar]

Damn, I can´t wait hearing this "Angel" track

[RingMan]

video from interview, 4 parts

[1234]

Props. Good read.

[187_gangsta_crip]

I wish he puts out Diary of Compton.. that would be dope

[Matty]

i don't understand why he don't collab with dj quik atleast once for the lp...

[marcin1712]

wowwwwwwww! I want D.O.C. Album 

[1234]

Yeah. That D.O.C. album would be a classic! LAX in stores soon!

[AnybodyKilla]

Nice interview. I'm really looking forward to the album.

[Elano]

Ice Cube doesn’t rap anymore