Lloyd Banks: Batter up part 2 (interview)

[PLANT]

Lloyd Banks: Batter Up Part 2
By Jigsaw



HipHop: Ya'll have a strong force around ya'll, can ya'll enjoy life in that state?

Lloyd Banks: It's crazy because my success came kind of faster than an average artist. I can't go no where in New York right now. Like when 50 walks through the mall they won't care if he's with his baby mother, grandmother, whoever they are still going to run up on him. They not thinking about if they're disrespecting him all they see is 50 Cent. I'm to the point where I can go certain places but even now it kind of grew, like I don't have a record out, I don't have an album out, so therefore what I was killing the streets with were the mixtapes and I was still getting that type of popularity off the mixtapes. So I'm feeling like, sometimes you over grow other peoples expectations before your own because I'm feeling like I'm not a star until I sell records, they're feeling like you're a star already so while you still feel like you can go to Jamaica Avenue or you can go to the mall, you already grew out through the expectations. It's kind of like a hard new process, you have to know when to be certain places and when not to be certain there.

HipHop: Were you there when 50 was in Philly for this Iverson stuff?

Lloyd Banks: Yeah it was hard, they had locked the whole street down. In Philly the Reebok store wasn't the biggest store. So it was crammed up there, 50 he jumped on cars and everything.

HipHop: Is it true you are originally from Baltimore?

Lloyd Banks: I was born in Baltimore. I was born on the run, I grew up in Queens. The only reason why I was born in Baltimore was because my pops was on the run at the time. He took my moms with him to Baltimore, I stayed there for about a year or two then came back to Queens.

HipHop: Ya'll shut down the mixtape game and the problem now is that everybody is trying to do the same thing that ya'll did and everyone can't do that. I'm kind of tired of seeing that every artist has to have a full fledged mixtape

Lloyd Banks: Especially artists who already have an album out. I'm doing that now for a reference for what is going to come on my album every now and then. I'll give them a hook. When my album comes out there will be no more Lloyd Banks: mixtapes, I'll still be hitting mixtapes, I'm not going to put out just me because if you are hustling back, you can't be a platinum artist and then go and put out a mixtape. You have to hit individually, give a few freestyles to this DJ, give a few freestyles to that DJ because they own the market. I better get that award this year too or we fighting.

HipHop: What award?

Lloyd Banks: Best New Artist on a Mixtape.

ipHop: Oh for the Mixtape Awards, are ya'll going to be there?

Lloyd Banks: Oh I'm going to be there if I win, I might be there if I lose too, but I'm not feeling that one. I mean who else. I gotta get that. It's funny because I stretch that point because I take more pride in that shit right now than any other award just because that's what built me. There's a lot of people who know me only from mixtapes. That's more important to me than any Grammy or anything at this point. Until I start selling albums, then I'll want a Grammy. For now I want the Mixtape Award.

HipHop: Do you get sick of artists sweating you?

Lloyd Banks: It's cool as long as you know what relationships are what, at the end of the day it's all good. I got two records with Joe, a record with Eve, a record with Missy, Mya, with Alicia Keys, I got a record with the kid Novel, got the Rah Digga record. It's so many features that I have, I got two Brandy records one that's going to be on the Barbershop 2 Soundrack that's with me, Fabolous, and Brandy it got to be a freestyle that turned into a record, and I got another record for her album that's coming out. So my features go on and on.

HipHop: You could eat off that alone really

Lloyd Banks: Yeah that alone, not to mention I'm Ghost writing too. Oh for who, (catches his-self) I guess you can't

Lloyd Banks: Ah, a good Ghost writer never tells. I'm just saying I'm a Hustler baby I'm not going to tell you.

HipHop: What's it like working with Eminem?

Lloyd Banks: Yeah he's the man, we click tight because he's a lyricist. We click real tight. I respect his opinion to the up most, he really listens. That kind of shocked me because he was doing my verses and I was like damn, this is Eminem this dude done sold a lot of records. From the first mixtape he knows the verses from them. He's a work-a-holic. Like we be staying in the studio forever.

HipHop: What's the future for you, where are you trying to end up?

Lloyd Banks: With me I'm real business minded man. I don't want to rap forever. 50 sold more albums than niggas do in their whole career. Like LL Cool J been in the game for what ten years, but this is his tenth album. Either or, it just takes that many records to sell that many records. If I can have the success that I think I'm going to have, I don't want to rap forever. I want to learn the boards, I want to learn how to produce, I want to have my own artists, I don't want to rap forever. I'm not going to be 30 years rapping. That's not going to happen because I got into the game so early, 10 years from now there's going to be another Lloyd Banks.

HipHop: Who is your dream collaboration with, artist wise?

Lloyd Banks: It will probably be Snoop.

HipHop: But you already collaborated with him though.

Lloyd Banks: Yeah I did, but I'm going to get him on my album, you know just a record with me and him. When Snoop first came out I was still in school. We have similar ways, like he doesn't have to be the loudest person to be the most effective person. He's calm, you know he has the smooth aura about him that just shows people don't have to be hyper jumping around all the time. My style is kind of similar off the record, on the track I'm a beast. Stevie Wonder too man, I want to do something with Stevie.

HipHop: You aren't that hungry

Lloyd Banks: Oh I'm starving. What I'm saying is you can finish your food in 60 seconds or you can eat slow because the girls are around and finish in a half hour. I'm hungry, but I'm hungry for bigger things too, when I go, I don't want to be the rapper, I want to be the entrepreneur. He [50] is an entrepreneur, he got his sneaker coming out September 11, a Saturday morning cartoon "Beaver Street Gang." It's basically about a bunch a kids on an orphanage hanging out outside. It's like the new age Cosby's, we'll be doing voices, we also have a video game coming out that'll be coming out around next Christmas.

[eS El Duque]

cool..nice read

[Darksider]

thanks

[Jome]

cool..nice read

[OpTiCaL]

Thanks bro, interesting read!

[AbbyNinja]

Good shit to read! thanx man.

[JTSimon]

I'm ghost writing for him too  

[7even]

to sum up, he's a lazy motherfucker

[PLANT]

to sum up, he's a lazy motherfucker

whos lazy?

im hope youre not talkin about Banks...