SIR JINX (PART 3)  (June 2008) | Interview By:

      

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Interview was done by phone in May 2008

Questions Asked By: Chad Kiser

Sir Jinx Gave Dubcnn.com A Shoutout! Check That Here
 

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Read Part 1 of this Exclusive Interview: Here

Read Part 2 of this Exclusive Interview: Here
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Dubcnn: Let me switch gears on you for a minute. How did that Death Row situation come about?

Well, that was really no situation; that was just Suge being a good friend. Suge did what them New York niggas did: “jinx, you got any money?” ‘No’. “You want to work on something?” ‘Yea!’ He’s the only one that ever treated me like that. I never signed or nothing. No paperwork. I was down and doing real bad, and then Kurupt come out the blue and asked me to come on the road with him. I told him I didn’t DJ anymore, but he told me to come out on the road with him, and then Roscoe’s album would be coming out soon so I could then DJ for him, too. So that’s how that was. I didn’t really feel accepted, but it was worth it. I felt weird, like seeing Kobe on another team or something.


Dubcnn: Do you have favorite story about being around some of the legends you’ve worked with?

Riding around with 2Pac & G. Rap during the riots! Pac was man, and that time I was working on the G. Rap album. We all were in the car driving and looting in my car. Me, G. Rap and 2Pac! That’s one story that lot of people don’t know. Driving down the street, having a good time and I took him over to my neighborhood. He was signing autographs and all that. That’s when that place on Crenshaw that had the ‘Cop Killer’ poster had burnt down. The whole store burnt down except the spot where the ‘Cop Killer’ poster was hanging *laughs*! I don’t know, what else?

I’ll tell you this: I want to see the first idiot from the west coast that’s going to get any kind of charge on the road. A lot of New York niggaz do it, but if you notice, back in that era west coast didn’t get no charges. No rape charges, no fighting charges, no nothing! Back in ’89-’90-’91 we didn’t even drink then! We hit the road and did our shit professionally. Eazy didn’t even drink. When he used to come out on 8-Ball he used to have motherf-ckin’ apple juice in the bottle! That was my job. My job was to pour it out and put apple juice in it, and then I also put the police “please don’t cross” stripe across the stage. $150 a week for 18 year-old to do that wasn’t too bad back then.


Dubcnn: Who would you say are your top 5 producers in music ever?

Well, one of my favorite producers is Dr. Dre, he’s tight! Not because I know him, but because of his accuracy and his consistency. He’s impeccable! Nobody can fuck with that. After him, Marcus Miller, who produced all of Luther Vandross’ stuff. He’s nice! Then Prince, Marvin Gaye and George Clinton.


Dubcnn: What about singers/emcees?

Of course I like Prince. Stevie Wonder has to be up there, as well as Marvin Gaye. I have to put this down on a list because I listen to so much stuff, and I really don’t listen to rap a lot. I might listen to it once or twice, but I’ll be mad. I like 2Pac and Biggie. I like 2Pac because of how far he went with his lyrics. I like Large Professor, too, he was pretty hot. I’ve been on some Stevie, I’ve been on some Luther and Marvin. When I go into the studio, these are the tapes I review that prepare me to do music. I like Sergio Menendez, too. I like Erykah Badu, Mary J. Blige, Roy Ayers, I mean we go off into a whole other place with this!


Dubcnn: With everybody you’ve already worked with, and with the names you just spoke on, who’s out there that you would like to collaborate with?

I would want to do an album with Beanie Sigel. I’d want to do a record on Young Buck’s project and see if I can really do an ill record with him. His vision is almost like Cube a little bit. I think he’s better than 50 Cent’s main homie, Lloyd Banks. But just like Eazy was friends with Ren and didn’t give a fuck about Cube, that’s how I see the 50/Banks/Buck thing. I think I can do a record on Young Buck, and that Ca$hville? I’ll run miles with that! And then I guess I’d like to work with Mary J. Blige as well. I love Mary J. Blige!


Dubcnn: Are you involved with the Warzone album?

No. Once again, the environment goes out of my reach. Somebody in that environment will get up to bat 4 times, before the even give a chance to listen to whatever I got. That’s where they’re from. Their people get first dibs on it, and I’m definitely not a Snoop Dogg producer. That’s a Snoop Dogg environment. Me & Kam go back like drop-tops, and if he wants me, I’ll be there. I’ve worked with Kam a few times. Kam is a good writer.


Dubcnn: Are you working on the new Kam solo project?

I will, if he calls me. Me and Kam go so far back because when we was on the road, and Kam was first starting out with Cube, you know he’s Muslim, so he wasn’t into a lot of stuff. Neither was I at the time because I didn’t drink or nothing, so we was cool on the road. He’s an exceptional rapper! Whenever he gets his time, it’s like I know there’s certain people that can help my career. You look at certain people on the east coast that keep going back to the same producers, but the emcee gotta get the ball first.

The quality emcees out here was not given the ball, so they couldn’t give me the opportunity. There’s a lot of them out here, but they don’t have no record label, so they can’t put no music out. Kam don’t want to look like that, and Kam is one of those guys that wants to look good. Kam made up the white t-shirt! If his situation ain’t correct he ain’t going to step out. I’ll always fuck with Kam.

We did a song called Clowns, that was a remake on circus song. My man Johnny Rogers makes the bottom music like big Las Vegas shows, and he has like a hundred cassettes of old show music that he did years and years ago. One of the songs goes [*imitates a show tune*], you know, some real cornball shit, but it connected with the Clowns song and made it like that Laugh Now, Cry Later kind of mean, circus-type sound. That was dope!


Dubcnn: So, as of right now, you haven’t done any work on the Kam project?

I haven’t done any work on no Kam project.


Dubcnn: Let me touch on something you mentioned just a second ago, when you said east coast artists stick with the same producers. Why don’t west coast artists do that?

Why, because the market is not made always for west coast producers. If you’re going to be an artist, you can’t be so loyal to the west coast to where you don’t venture out and hear other sounds. Yet, when you hear that other sound, if you don’t conform to it and bring in your west coast people that are in this position and put them up, then they’re going to go to the next producer with the cheapest beat. That’s bee the problem with west coast, is that cats out here don’t want to pay for no production. That’s why a 50 Cent record sounds like that because that was Dr. Dre and all these dudes exhaling, gotta get that punch out! I’m sitting at the top of my lid right now about to explode if I found a Game-type dude right now. You’ll be like ‘who is this dude’ because of all the stuff I have accumulated through the lack of other emcees not getting it out here.


Dubcnn: Right! Now let me ask you about another artist you’ve worked with, and that’s Yo-Yo. I was watching TV the other day and came across this ‘Miss Rap Supreme” show, with Yo-Yo & MC Serch on there.

Oh yea! Well, Yo-Yo is that type of woman. Back in the day, rap was just a vehicle for Yo-Yo. Rap made her who she is, but it kind of hurt her in the bigger picture because it kind of limited her from doing certain things that was open for emcees at the time. Now it’s real open, and you can be anything you want, so it works for her now. But a long time ago, a girl talking like that wouldn’t have been in a position that they’re in now.


Dubcnn: Do you and Yo-Yo still keep in contact? Tell us about working with her.

I talk to Yo-Yo all the time! I did all her songs that was hits. I did ‘You Can’t Play With My Yo-Yo’, ‘Ain’t Nobody Better’, ‘Home Girl Don’t Play Dat’, and all of them. Me & her. We made up the IBWC and all that. There was a format we had back in the day, and if you look at it, it’s like Dr. Dre was making NWA, and it was Eazy-E and the Boyz N Tha Hood. Then we made up Ice Cube and The Lench Mob. Then we made up WC and the Maad Circle. Then we made up Yo-Yo and the IBWC. Then we made up Del and the Hieroglyphics. When we made up her stuff, we were on the road together, so we were able to make up songs that related more to the entire country, rather than songs that was just what girls was talking about at the time. She wanted to talk about the upliftment of black women and women in general of all nationalities. I can’t wait for her to get her own TV show, that has to happen!

I went to school with Yo-Yo and she was a girl that did speeches, and real good ones! The woman’s liberation-type speeches, and she was like 16 or 17 at that time! She would be tearing up the whole auditorium with those poems and speeches, and guys would be over there rootin’, and the girls would be rootin’. She did that without rap! Now she’s on a TV show? She’s on her way! It’s the next level of the game, but in this game it’s hard on the west coast because a lot of west coast people don’t put west coast people on! They put other people on. And if you have a bad relationship with somebody out here, that can stop your whole situation. Case in point: K-Dee. If Cube doesn’t care about K-Dee, then nobody’s going to pay attention to him because Cube is not involved.


Dubcnn: Tell me about the “Game Warden” album.

It’s a record that I digitally put together. All those vocals with those guys that’s on the record were never there. They were on mixtapes and stuff like that. Some of those vocals could be maybe 10 years old. How looked at it was, this is the end result of rap. This is where the consumer should be able to purchase music that they never heard before. So when I have F.A.B on it and I have Kurupt on it, they was never on a song together, but they ended up being on a song together. The Game Warden record was made with nobody in the vocal booth. Some of the guys, I said give me an acapella and watch what happens. I didn’t even tell them what was going on. This is why I made that record: I tell some of the emcees that some of the songs they have in your past could be some heat, if you changed the music. A lot of people keep moving forward, and you might have already written your hit. A lot of them songs had older, ugly, darker beats that probably didn’t surface, and so I changed those and put them under some brand-new, up-to-date, hot tracks. That’s why it’s narrated through with B-Real, David Chappelle said some stuff on it, and a lot of other people. It’s like a mixtape for a producer.


Dubcnn: What other projects do have in-store over the horizon? What are you working on right now?

I don’t want to use my name in vain, and jinx the project. I like for people to check it out and find out because I’m just a producer, not a messenger. There’s a lot of things I’m working on, but there’s nothing promised right now. I took two years off from music to take care of my life, my family, so I just got back in to it earlier this year. My man, Def Jef came over and made me learn Reason. So, by learning that, I felt like I did years ago with a new toy. So now, I have something to offer because nobody can see me on that. I just sent some music over there to Cube, so that’s one thing that’s going. There’s a lot of people in line that want to be a part of Ice Cube projects, but he’s such a close-knit person that you gotta know somebody that’s damn-near his family. He’s not a person that steps out and goes and gets all kind of beats, he keeps that inside his own environment. But, I’m also putting some shit together for Sadat X, and I know he’s going to love these beats!


Dubcnn: Sadat X? That’ll be hot!

I know! That’ll be the best thing going.


Dubcnn: Finally, let me get a campaign question to you: What’s your take on Barack Obama, or on the presidential campaign in general?

My take on him is, he’s the man, but McCain is one of them.


Dubcnn: Is America ready for a black president?

He’s got to get his crew together. He’s standing up there alone. Nobody knows who he works with. Like, John Edwards standing up and coming along was beautiful! No it’s starting to make Hilary look like she’s kicking and scratching, and she don’t want to leave. She should have just got in! It’s not her against the Republicans, it’s all the Democrats against the Republicans. She’s deferring the people so long that she’s going to make the vote be messed up in the end because she’s staying in the race so long.

Most people put their cabinet together after they win, but he has to start doing that now! He has to start pointing them out, and saying who he’s working with. I think he needs to do that immediately! Start acting like a winner, instead of acting like a runner.


Dubcnn: No doubt. Jinx, thanks for the time, and it was truly an honor!

Aight, fa sho!