Mixed and Mastered
Mixed and Mastered is the podcast where the untold stories of the music industry come to life. Hosted by Jeffrey Sledge, a veteran music executive and former VP of A&R at Atlantic Records and Jive Records, each episode dives deep into the journeys, challenges, and triumphs of the people shaping the sound of today. From label executives and producers to artists, songwriters, and managers, Jeffrey brings you behind the scenes to meet the minds driving the industry forward. There’s a gap in the marketplace for these voices, and Mixed and Mastered is here to fill it—one conversation at a time. Because the best stories are told by those who lived them.
Mixed and Mastered
Rob Markman
On this episode of Mixed and Mastered, we kick it with Rob Markman—Brooklyn-bred storyteller, journalist, and artist—as he rewinds to his roots in hip hop’s golden age. From bumping Ladi Dadi on cassette to catching inspiration from CL Smooth’s T.R.O.Y., Rob shares how the culture raised him and why storytelling remains the heartbeat of his music.
He opens up about navigating the grind—from freelancing for Vibe, Complex, and The Source to launching XXL’s digital presence and leveling up at MTV. With Bronx family roots that run deep—shoutout to his great uncle Willie Bobo and cousin Eric Bobo of Cypress Hill—Markman breaks down how legacy shaped his vision and fueled his path to becoming an artist in his own right.
We talk Genius, podcasting, media politics, and the pressure of public opinion—but more than that, we dive into what it means to keep hip hop honest. Whether he’s writing bars or crafting platforms, Rob stays focused on impact, mentorship, and building a future where artists can speak freely and fans can truly connect.
Mixed and Mastered is produced and distributed by Merrick Studio, and hosted by music industry veteran, Jeffrey Sledge. Tune in to the discussion on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you catch your podcasts. Follow us on Instagram @MixedandMasteredPod to join the conversation and support the show at https://mixedandmasteredpod.buzzsprout.com/
This week on Mixed and Mastered Rob Markman. From writing for the Source and XXL to interviewing legends like Jay-Z, kendrick Lamar and Mariah Carey at MTV, rob has lived hip-hop from every angle, now running both Genius and Worldstar Distribution, signing Ice Spice, wynn and Overcast all while still dropping his own music and writing comic books for DC and Marvel. This is Mixed and Mastered with Rob Markman. Welcome to Mixed and Mastered, the podcast where the stories of the music industry come to life. I'm Jeffrey Sledge, bringing you real conversations with the people who have shaped the sound of music. We're pulling back the curtain on what it takes to make it in the music business. These are the stories you won't hear anywhere else, told by the people who live them. This is Mixed and Mastered. All right, mixed and Mastered with my man, rob Markman. Excuse me, brooklyn's finest.
Speaker 2:That's love, man. Yeah, how you doing, man? Yeah, man, I'm doing great man, I'm doing real good today. Man, I'm glad to be here speaking with you. Man, you know it's a certain pedigree that you know, when you're in the presence of it's, just you know it just feel right, you know yeah same to you, man, I really appreciate you being here man, you know?
Speaker 1:Nah, absolutely man. So let's start it for the top man. Like I said, born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, BK, the fourth largest city in New York State, I think, I think you guys are bigger than Buffalo, and maybe to say you guys are bigger than Buffalo Might be the same you guys are.
Speaker 2:Might be Definitely the coolest, though you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:He go with the boy he go right away, right away starting up. So talk to me about growing up in Brooklyn, man. Talk to me about your experience growing up in Brooklyn.
Speaker 2:It was amazing, man, I wouldn't trade it for anything. I was born december 30th 1979, so like literally an 80s baby, like two days later, and boom. The 80s are right here yeah.
Speaker 2:So I was born in that era of of. You know, when I'm stepping out my house and starting to realize the world around me at six years old, seven years old old, whatever it's like. There's still graffiti on the train, yeah, people still walking around with boom boxes. It's just like the birth and the explosion of hip hop and all the elements Same, from graffiti to you still see B-Boys. There's still some remnants of park jams going on and stuff like that. And I grew up in Brooklyn. But all of my family my grandmother, my cousins, aunts, uncles were all from the Bronx and my mom and my dad were from the Bronx. They just lived in Brooklyn. It was also a lot of traveling from Brooklyn to the Bronx and we might stop in Harlem to get something to eat. So it was really just getting that whole New York experience again. In the 80s and 90s. It was just wonderment just coming outside of the crib and seeing hip hop everywhere. Really, just let me know what I wanted to do in life.
Speaker 1:You know. It's interesting, man, that you say that, because I didn't know about the Bronx part of your family First meeting you. Like you're a Brooklyn cat. Right For New Yorkers there's a certain energy that comes with being from one of the boroughs. You can pick it up right away. I can see a Queens girl from three miles down the road. Man, that girl from Queens. You know what I'm saying. But now that you say that you've got like a Bronx-ish energy as well, you're a Brooklyn guy but I see the Bronx yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a lot of people used to confuse me being from the Bronx, oh, you from the Bronx, nah. But you know like we spent a lot of time in South Bronx, of course, grand Concourse, you know. My grandmother was on Morris Ave before, oh wow, right under Yankee Stadium. Oh yeah, yeah, had family in Co-op City, so going all the way up to Co-op City, wow. Oh yeah, yeah, had family in Co-op City, so going all the way up to Co-op City, Wow. So you know, we had family all over. So it was a lot of time spent in the Bronx as well.
Speaker 1:That's cool man. So let me ask a question Was there a? Because in that era this is how you kind of know the eras Was there a particular DJ from like Brooklyn that was like the big DJ in your section was a?
Speaker 2:you know, because, even if it was a local guy because a lot of times it'd be like you know DJs, you know, yeah, flowers, or you know it didn't have to be Herc or Flash or one of those guys, it could have been like a local guy yeah, for for us, I mean one for my block, it was my man, kevin, and I don't even know what he DJed around on my best friend, damien, his older brother, kevin, was a DJ and mostly spun a lot of reggae because I'm from Flatbush Brooklyn, so it's just West Indian culture, and Kevin was the one who I don't even know what his DJ's name is, but he used to borrow his microphone and rap over instrumentals and try to make own demo tapes and just seeing him do his thing kind of turned him out A man. There's another local DJ named OS, from Washington, who was my other best friend, was his cousin Orlando Saba, and actually he gave me my first technique turntables and they created a record when I was like 15 years old. So we looked up to him but as far as like known people, us, it was he probably and Mr C was from Bed-Stuy, I wasn't from Flatbush, but I mean Mr C was probably like the first cat to me that I was like in terms of DJs go, that it was like, oh, he represents Brooklyn, like that I recognized right and from looking at, you know, in the back of um, you know he was on the back of the big daddy cane cover and they had a stat sheet, the nasty African and they had all of his stuff. Then, from hearing him on the radio and just his voice and the way he represented it. So you know, there's definitely guys that I came up with, who are DJs, that I respected, that the world doesn't know, but, being from Brooklynlyn, for me it was mr c, I'm from that era and c was the one who who embodied the whole borough for me. You know I'm saying so.
Speaker 2:Rest in peace to mr c absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 1:She was a. She was a good dude. I liked him a lot. Um, so tell me about how your first sparklet for the music, like I mean, you know, obviously like seeing it around, but there was a, was there a particular thing? Who you know what, what kind of set off to be like? I really this is my this is me Couple of things.
Speaker 2:First of all, just being in school, six, seven years old again, being in the school, y'all going to the school with Slick Rick it was Slick Rick and Dougie it was Lottie Dottie. That was the learning all the words to, and being very deliberate. Cause yo, when we go to school, like we used to rap it and we used to have competitions of who could get through, cause it's just one long verse, like who could spit the rhyme from beginning to end and then who could beat box, so like I remember just being in the schoolyard just like rapping Slick Rick. So Slick Rick was was my. Slick Rick was my first goat, before I knew what a goat was. He was just my first favorite rapper. And it's so interesting looking back at it now because Lottie Dottie, first of all, it's a dirty song. Nothing about anything Slick Rick was doing. That time was clean, but the way Children's Story like, the way he presented it, it sounded so palatable for kids. You know what I'm saying. So that was the great juxtaposition in the artistry of Slick Rick.
Speaker 2:And then I remember writing the lyrics down in school to trying to learn nice and smooth hip hop junkies. It was always just a song. Whatever the song or the moment was, it was like yo, you don't know the lyrics to this If you can't rap this at the lunch table. And then it transitioned in 92. For me, I wrote my first rap to Pete Rock and CL Smooth they Reminisce Over you. That was the first instrumental and yo let me get my hands on this and let me see what I could do. And that was probably the first record where I became really enamored with songwriting.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Especially from a rap perspective, because that song was so dope and obviously, obviously it was something about that beat, just one of the greatest hip hop songs of all time. But at a young age I was able to recognize that CL and CL to me, I think, is an amazing and underrated rapper. I don't think CL gets the flowers that he deserves for being in pocket, like the pockets that he created. The shit he was rapping about CL was rapping about Chris Style and Fly, versace Silks a couple of years before Big, a couple of years before Jay, like CL, and that was that Mount Vernon shit. That was all Heavy D influence, because Heavy D was Fly too. But going back to CL and that Troy record, that was such a big record and it was CL just telling his story. We didn't know any of the people he was talking about besides Troy. On the third, verse right.
Speaker 2:But, yeah, I want to run my own business like my Aunt Joyce. If we're talking about cars, uncle Sterling got the latest. There was no reason for us to care about that record because of all the detail that he went into about his own family. But there was a magic in that record is that we can all change the names.
Speaker 2:I didn't have an Uncle Sterling, but I had an uncle like that. It was just so relatable and it was like yo, we shouldn't care about this record because it's so dialed in, why do we care about it so much? But it was the feeling that he emitted of telling his own story that made us all relate and being like nah, I know exactly what he's talking about, I know exactly the type of people he's talking about and I recognized that at a young age and I was like damn, like even more so than writing about how dope I am, and those were my first rhymes anyway, about how dope I was and how ill I was. But it was really like yo, you could really make somebody feel something through these records, through these lyrics. So, troy, was the first time I took my hand at, like trying to write something.
Speaker 1:So before we move on, I'm so glad you brought up slick Rick because he's definitely on my, my Rushmore and I think it happened so long ago. But it's tragic that he only basically made one album because he got into some legal issues and he was never able to get like as that first album is so incredible to me, I'm like what would the second album have been? He was like free and clear to do, like you said, the way he rhymed and how visual it was and the melodies and the nursery rhyme things to it. And you, like you could close your eyes and literally see it. You could see Veronica Place right near Children, like I could see everything he talked about and like I could see I could, you could see everything he talked about. He, he influenced to me so many people, including biggie and others, like with the visualization he was. Well, I don't say he was, because he's not, he's still alive with it, god bless but he's just um, amazing, um, quick story, quick story before we move on.
Speaker 1:So in that era I was just starting in the music business. Um, so two things from that song from children's story. I remember going to Bentley's right. How long ago this was.
Speaker 2:I heard about families.
Speaker 1:I'd never been to Bentley's but Friday night was the night, friday night. But Bentley's wasn't the night, saturday night too. But Friday night was the night. And I remember going to Bentley and I think these girls had to be the from Harlem or Queens. They would fly. It had the furs on. And I remember when they put on Children's Story, these three or four girls they just yelled that song all the way through, like in the corner. They knew every word. Like you said, you had to know every word. And I remember being like this record is way bigger than I even thought it was, because it's, you know, don't you dare laugh Like everybody was yelling the song and the second thing was um, I used to run into eric sadler a lot at parties back then.
Speaker 1:The legend. We started, yeah, we started communicating and you know, talking and kicking it. Could we see each other time? Yo, what's up? Erica? And I remember I like pause, I guess I cornered him and I was like bro, tell me about slick rick? And he broke it because you know they, they have the bomb squad produced Rick. And he broke it because you know the Bomb Squad produced that album. And he broke down everything how Rick rhymed and like his style and like how he did it in the studio. He said Rick would like leave these open parts. He would like this is funny, so okay, take me back. And then he would just fill in these other parts and like he would chop it up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but anyway I'm gonna. This is about you. I just I want to know that's now.
Speaker 2:This is about hip-hop man, it's about us like that's the beauty of these conversations is is, yeah, we learn more about maybe each other personally, but we uncover stories again that we all relate to. It's the troy thing. It's like, okay, this might be my story, but it is something highly relatable to somebody else remembering the first time they fell in love with help. How about the first thing that struck them. So I don't mind these tangents at all, brother.
Speaker 1:Like I think that's the beauty of these conversations, and with Troy, funny shit, me and Cielo have the same birthday, october 8th, and I was born in non Vernon. Wow, I know, I know I was born up the street from where they shot the Like that's Columbus Avenue. I know that. So, anyway, we'll talk forever about that. So, anyway, back to you. So college Tell me about your college experience.
Speaker 2:Yeah, my college experience was a lot like my high school experience. Man, I'm from Brooklyn, new York, so I went to Brooklyn Tech in high school and then I went to Hunter College. In college I never left the city. Yeah, you know I never had the desire to leave New York. You know I never had the desire to leave New York. We're leaving high school. All my friends. They might go to a SUNY, some might go to HBCUs and they leave in the city. And you know, I felt like the beginning of Doggy Style you going to give all this up. You got a flat screen TV, are you crazy? But I just had no desire. It never crossed my mind that I would ever leave New York. So, going to Hunter, I was commuting on the train, just like I was going to high school and I was working and I was living on my own. I had left my parents' crib at that time. Oh yeah, you were on space by that point. Yeah, me and my now wife moved in together. I left by the time I was 18, I left my crib, um and just so.
Speaker 2:I'm holding down the job in the mail room and I'm going to college. I'm, I'm, I'm a media studies major. So I'm very much in the media, um, and I'm still trying to make music happen as as like a rapper. So I'm doing open mics at the New Yorican Poet Cafe, I'm in the studio, I'm in front of Hot 97 handing out mixtapes to Mr C, to Angie, to Kanye and Raekwon when they would come do interviews, whoever would come through, and so I'm doing that whole thing. But I was a media studies major because I liked media. I don't know, I was buying Source magazines and XXL magazines and love film.
Speaker 2:I took it because I liked it. I never knew I could have a career in it. I never envisioned my career taking off in media. I was just doing the things that I loved and I wasn't thinking too much about where it was going to lead me and little did I know at the time I was preparing myself for a career in music on the media side, and it was just, really just because I enjoyed media. But yeah, I'm in college just trying to figure it out, man. You know, again it took me six years to graduate college because again, I'm working full time.
Speaker 2:Like sometimes you couldn't get the classes you get. I failed a couple of classes, so my trajectory wasn't like that of a lot of my friends and my peers and a lot of people. You know they would kind of laugh at me or dance. Are you still in school, dan? What you going to do? Oh, like where you want to work, like you know what I'm saying, like this and that, and everybody is maybe have a path set. And I had my path set, but I just kept following my heart. You know what I'm saying and let me go.
Speaker 1:So so I read you. You did a lot of free. We're going to get to the artist part. Don't think I'm trying to skip.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no, no, no yeah.
Speaker 1:But I read you did a lot of uh, a lot of freelancing, at first for no bread, just kind of honing your craft.
Speaker 2:And, like you said, doing actually getting paid for a lot of it. So so I graduate college in 03. Okay, so I'm in college from 97 to 03, so it took me about six years. And then in 2004, um, a brother by the name of tim hotep, who was an old friend of mine, we went to high school together, um, really really close friends. Um, you know, especially during those years and he was working at Complex Magazine when Complex first started as a print magazine and they were looking for writers and we went to school together. He knew my passion for hip hop, he knew I knew a lot about hip hop, he knew I could write and, you know, I guess he just wanted to put his man on, to give his man a shot, and he gave me a shot and I never let it go.
Speaker 2:My first album review was Jadakiss, the Kiss of Death album. Wow, it was this Complex Simplicity. It was both in the same issue with that XXL, and I got paid for that, okay, and so I'm working full time in the mail room and then now I'm freelancing and then I'm getting paid a couple hundred dollars to do album reviews for Complex. So after Complex, the Source called Vibe Magazine, called Eric Parker, gave me. My second it was a ghost face. It was the Pretty Tony album, so I'm reviewing that. Is that the album with Run yeah Run was on that, so I wrote that review for the Vibe magazine. Eric Parker was the editor. Taught me a tough lesson then, but a great lesson in just writing and stuff like that. So I'm writing.
Speaker 2:What did he teach you? Enough, I guess it just wasn't. This was the third thing I ever wrote. My first two I knocked it out the park. It was good. The third one, I guess Eric was like man, this need to work. But he was also on that tight deadline. So I remember picking up the vibe issue, looking at it, my name is on it, but I was like damn, these ain't all my words. It kind of got rewrote but me and Eric never really talked about. He, just did what he had to do with the piece to turn in his deadline. But me being me and wanting to soak up game, I wasn't mad at him, I was disappointed. I was like damn, damn, maybe I'm not as good as I thought I was. You know what I'm saying. I was feeling myself at the two joints. So I took what was printed in the magazine and I took the copy that I turned into Eric and I just compared the two. I took the copy that I turned into Eric and I just compared the two. Okay, what did he change? Where can I strengthen up at? I took lessons everywhere I could get it Started writing for the source.
Speaker 2:That was the part where it was like writing for free because this is when the source, the Benzino they made zero as it's winding down the bankruptcy. So I was writing for the source and man them checks wasn't coming, I wasn't getting paid after a while. So they racked up. I racked up quite a bit, never got paid for. I got paid for some of the source stuff, but it was like $10,000 worth of shit that I didn't get paid for and it was a lot of money at the time. Yeah, shit, it's a lot of money today. Yeah, yeah, that's real bread. But that experience was priceless. So I say I never interned anywhere, but I tell people all the freelancers for the source was my internship.
Speaker 1:So wait, so was there. Is there a particular story that you wrote in that era that you're like super proud of, like it's something that you wrote, that's like you know, man, I killed this. And the source era, wow, the writing of that era of writing.
Speaker 2:So let's know all of it. Yeah Right, for Don Diva a lot too. I never want to forget Don Diva. Man, tiffany and Kevin Chaz really put me on, gave me my opportunities to write cover stories when everybody was writing album reviews and everybody told me there was people in the business who were a little more stuck up Like yo don't go write for Don Diva. That's not real journalism, hey man journalism, hey man, that Don Diva experience the way Tiffany and Kevin took care of me, the way they regarded me, the way they nurtured me, the way we was really in the streets talking to real people, it was incredible. A lot of that made me who I was. So shout out to Tiffany and Kevin for the opportunity. Shout out to Don Diva for the opportunity.
Speaker 1:They don't get a lot of credit, man, during that era I got pretty tight with the guys from feds. You know he's all living uptown, he's all in harm. So same kind of energy, like you know, like those magazines for those who don't know, feds and don diva were magazines that were street driven. For lack of a better description, I can think about guys who maybe you know, were in the streets and tried to who, guys who just came home, women who maybe you know cleaned up, people cleaned up, maybe she owns a beauty parlor now or whatever it was. But like the stories were really compelling because these are like you said, these are like from this is literally from the ground up. You know there's no airs and it was very and, like you said, the people were really cool. You know, I'm saying nobody ever treated me funny or something like Matter of fact. Once they knew I was cool with those guys, it was love, it was all love.
Speaker 2:I think people were intimidated by the access that they used to get. But the fact of the matter is is that hip hop and so much of the rappers were basing their lyrics off of these real life street stories. So Don Diva Feds says yo well, let's talk to the real people, let's get kind of the real story and based off of Kevin's history and and you know, I don't know too much about the group who started feds, but you know, kevin has a real history that he's talking about and he wrote a book or made a lot of sense, and I think a lot of people in the industry were intimidated by that and the run that they had and the power that they had, man, but they, they accepted me, um, and they they took me under the wing. I learned a lot. So it was amazing.
Speaker 1:But tell me, is there one I don't? I hate to use the word crazy, I don't like that word, but is there one kind of spicy story with writing for don diva that you had to go meet somebody in the block or whatever you know, and again, no, no, don't incriminate nobody, don't name it, just like you know, because it was a different energy.
Speaker 2:Not really, because they didn't always. They also knew I was the music guy, so I was the bridge between, like street and music. Right, I was working on a BMF story for them Wow, when, at the time when everybody was getting rounded up. So I think I might've got the assignment before the indictments came out, but right after I forget the exact. But I was working on a BMF story and not just interviewing people, but doing real journalism, research for people who remember the LexisNexis database and looking up arrest records, court records, local articles from Detroit newspapers about things I still have. I got to find it. I still have the folder of research that I was doing was like this and working on this BMF story, and then one day they was like we're going to kill this story.
Speaker 1:I think we're going to chill on that. We're going to chill on this.
Speaker 2:That was crazy. I did, and it might have been the first If it wasn't the first. It was right around that one. We're going to chill on this, but that was crazy. I did, and it might have been the first If it wasn't the first. It was right around that time. But Irv Gotti I interviewed. Rest in peace. Irv Gotti and Chris Gotti interviewed them right after they beat their case. Oh wow, murder in case. So you know, I was driving around with Irv all night and just asking him all types of questions and stuff like that. So I was particularly proud of that story, working on that story for Don Diva and getting the chance to do that. So, yeah, I was proud of that. Other stories from that era that I was proud of Rick Ross I did a Rick Ross showing proof for XXL in 2006.
Speaker 2:This was before Port of Miami came out. That was a big article for me because I believed in Ross. Then everything Ross said I remember that night and in that article this is before the first album he had just signed to Def Jam. I think he was in New York and he had just signed his deal because he was talking to me about meeting LA Reid for the first time, and all of this and everything Ross said that he was going to do in the music industry. That night, when I was in his hotel room and we were doing this interview, he accomplished.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And so I was proud of that article too, because I felt like I captured exactly who Ross was and what he was setting up to do, and I feel like a lot of that came to fruition. Wow, what else in that time? Wrote an article on Plies that I was real proud, real, real proud of. Um, there's a bunch of stuff, man. It was a whole bunch of stuff. Um, you know, I I'll find things um, anniversaries will come up Like, like the Beanie Seagulls becoming, I think, just celebrating the anniversary. And I wrote that album review for one of the magazines and that like people posting online like, oh shit, rob wrote this. So, um, also during that time I was writing under a pen name. This was funny.
Speaker 2:Uh, 50 has beef with the source at this time. He's not fucking with Benzino, cause of the M and M thing and whatever. But the source still needed. You know they wanted to still review G unit albums Like the G unit is the hottest shit in the industry. But they couldn't go to the listenings, the labels wouldn't let these albums available to them for the Lloyd Banks album, the Young Buck albums, you know what I'm saying, things of that nature. So I was a freelancer, I wasn't necessarily just writing for the source. I would get access to these albums through Interscope and be able to review these albums for the source, and I would just do it under a pen name so I wouldn't get in trouble. They found out I was writing it for the source.
Speaker 2:They won't fuck with me anymore, so I was still writing G-Unit stuff for the source and to the source's credit and to the editorial staff's credit, they didn't have a beat with G-Unit, they were all fans. Whatever was going on with Benzino and all of that, they were just like, and all of that, they were just like, man, we just want to cover this music. So nobody ever asked me to slant my review a certain way or anything like that when it came to the stuff. So that was cool. So I never got paid for it, but that was cool.
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Speaker 1:Before we move forward to your artist thing and some other stuff, please mention your uncle and your cousin.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, so my uncle technically my great uncle, my grandmother's brother, this was something that you know. Music has been in my family, but my great uncle is Willie Bobo is is is a famous Latin jazz musician who has played with all of the great, I mean Tito Puente, dizzy Gillespie. I remember one time being somewhere I think we were on vacation somewhere and we were staying in the same hotel as Dizzy Gillespie. Wow, and I was a kid then and my mom walks up to him and says yo, I'm Willie's niece, and so Dizzy just shows mad love. I'm like seven or eight, so I didn't really. I knew Dizzy Gillespie from the Cosby show, from the episode when he was on the Cosby show and he blows up his cheeks.
Speaker 3:So I'm like, oh, that's the guy from the Cosby show.
Speaker 2:That's crazy. You know I'm not. And then, obviously, dizzy Gillespie plays the sax yeah.
Speaker 1:Greg, he didn't play the sax. I always mess with Greg when I see him and say that.
Speaker 2:And then. So I remember being 78 years old, like me, and Dizzy Gillespie was like super cool, but it was the admiration that all these OGs have for my uncle and what he was doing. So Willie Bobo is my uncle, my grandmother's brother, but he passed away. I was like three when he passed away. I don't know if I ever met him. I don't remember meeting him, but I've always just had his picture hanging on the wall in the house and in my grandmother's crib, his records always played. And then his son, eric Bobo, is my cousin. He always lived on the West Coast. We lived on the East Coast. He would come by every once in a while but he had been playing since he was a kid. So he was always playing His father.
Speaker 2:Since five, six years old Eric was playing live gigs. But when he starts to get into a teenager and start coming of age now he's touring with the Beastie Boys and then he joined Cypress Hill. He's an official member of Cypress Hill. He's not part of the band. Muggs took a step back. This is around the time when Muggs after the first album, when Muggs didn't want to tour. I guess and I'm not sure the politics around that but Eric is touring with them, but also made an official member of Cypress Hill. I mean, I remember watching him the night this is my cousin. It was like, oh, they about to be on SNL and the night that they light up the joint and now they're playing from SNL the funky.
Speaker 3:Cypress Hill, my first rap concert ever was a Cypress Hill concert.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm saying, so that was highly influential for me.
Speaker 1:Cypress is one of my favorite groups. Yeah, groups, yeah, I mean they in my opinion, very underrated, even though they've had mass success, and I still like they don't get mentioned enough to me. Yeah, yeah, they were what they did.
Speaker 2:And even for me just bias aside, right Cause obviously my cousin is a part of it, so I'm a huge fan. But I was a fan cause he wasn't with them for the first album officially. It wasn't till black sunday drop that he joined the group. I copped the first album in real time as a kid because just cypress hill was dope and then so they was already. I was bumping that first album. Then the second album came out and actually, and then my cousin was like oh yeah, we're coming to new york, we're touring. I'm like what? Like yeah, no, no, I miss cypress hill. I'm like this crazy, I was already fucking with him, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, they're amazing, um. So let's talk a little bit about your um, your your career as an as an artist. You're still making records, sometimes still putting stuff out, you know, uh, independently.
Speaker 2:So just talk a little a little bit about that I mean, look, my, my whole thing was when I since I was a kid, you know, since c Smoove and Pete Rock I wanted to rap, I wanted to be an artist and so Cyphers, battles, battles and Fat Beats Shout Out to Destroy. Destroy just posted like footage of me battling when I was like 17 years old, and Fat Beats like real DNA in this shit, doing open mics at New Yorican Poet Cafe. My first studio session ever was playing Pat um, who went on to do shit with good music. This is before good music. Yeah, he produced my first joint. I hope he never releases it. It never needs to see the light of day is terrible.
Speaker 2:But so I've always just had a passion to do music. The media stuff took off first and this is how I actually get paid and make money. So, and I love media too, but I was doing both for a while and and I'm just happy doing music to express myself. And you know, now we're up to the blog era and I'm on the blogs.
Speaker 2:I got records on that right and two dope boys and you know, I'm saying like you know, and it's cool and I'm happy, but then came a point where I had to make a decision because I'm working with XXL and they're like it was. The way it was put to me is like oh, they see this as a conflict of interest and, man, if you don't stop rapping, they're going to let you go. In my mind I was like I get how it could be a conflict of interest, but I wasn't doing that wrong. It wasn't like I was trading features for spots in the magazine.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I had to make a choice at that time and I had two young kids. I'm like, well, I can't go back home and tell them yo, daddy, I want to be a rapper. So I got fired from my job. You know what I'm saying? That was irresponsible. I just did it on my own. I didn't put nothing out for years and years and years. And then, once my media career got to the point, you know, I turned around in 2007,. Rest in peace to my brother Hovane. Yes, he was like yo, you know, we could put something out right, like you want to put this record out, like we could put some shit out. And I was like, nah, no, I can't because I'm in media. And then I looked around and I was that genius. At the time they were a little more understanding. They, they got it and they weren't in full support of it. And so, yeah, I put officially, put my first album out in 2017. Man, rest in peace.
Speaker 1:The whole thing, yeah, congratulations man, thank you, so talk to I was. That's funny. I'm glad you brought up, because my next question was tell, tell me about the XXL experience.
Speaker 2:It was great working at XXL, man. I learned a lot. I got there right after, like immediately after Elliot Wilson was fired and that whole drama, oh wow. The funny thing is that Elliot called me because at first I was working at scratch magazine. So I left the mailroom and I'm working at scratch magazine. Scratch magazine, for those who don't remember, was the sister magazine under double excel, and scratch magazine was to focus on the djs and the producers.
Speaker 2:Yep, when he brought me into scratch, they said listen man, this thing is on its last legs. We're really trying to save this mag, but it might not last another three months, so we we're going to hire you. The job is let's turn this shit around. They couldn't turn it around. The magazine went under and I was let go and Elliot was like yo, as soon as something opens up at XXL, I'm going to give you a call. I'm like all right, but I'm still working, I'm hustling, I'm doing me. Three months later he's like yo, I got a spot for you, let's meet on Monday. Wow, I'll tell you all about it. That same Monday he got fired, but Elliot, I always say, kept my name in the air or something, because a couple of weeks after they still needed to fill the slot. Plus, now they had an editor-in-chief slot they needed to fill. So I got hired at SSL.
Speaker 2:Vanessa Satin was the one that hired me. Okay, daytuan was the editor-in-chief for a while, but mostly the years that I was there worked under Vanessa. So those were the years when the freshman covers really took off. So I was there at the ground floor for that freshman cover, like the one with Mickey Fax and Cuddy and Asher Roth and Wale. Then we did the next one with Nipsey Hussle and Rest in Peace and Jake Hole and Big Sean and Freddie Gibbs, and then did the one after that with Kendrick and Rest in Peace, mac Miller and Big Crid and Meek Mill and Yellow Wolf was on that cover, much people's on that cover. So I had kind of did refreshment covers with them. It was cool. I got there, I started as the assistant music editor and by the time I left I was the co-deputy editor, so just right under the editor-in-chief. Oh wow, it was tough. It was tough but definitely underpaid tough. But I learned a lot, man. That's really kind of. Where I made a name for myself was at XXL. So I'm grateful for that experience and everything.
Speaker 1:All right, I'm going to ask you the same kind of question again. Any spicy story for XXL era?
Speaker 4:Again, you don't have to say names, you don't have to incriminate nobody.
Speaker 1:I don't want to get nobody in trouble.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to think there's plenty.
Speaker 1:I'm sure.
Speaker 2:That's why I asked it Damn, what can I talk about? You know what I didn't like? There's a lot of shit, but there was a Rick Ross cover where he was wearing some fake Louis Vuitton glasses or some modified Louis Vuitton glasses. I remember this. Yeah, even in the story Ross is a big guy. So even in the story the writer went with him to, he was going shopping or whatever. So he's buying like silk Versace shirts. But Ross is so big he had to buy two of the same shirt because they didn't fit it, they didn't make it in his size, and then he had to take two of the same shirt, take it to Taylor who was stitching together and make something. So he was modifying all of this high-end stuff. Right, and on the cover he's wearing Versace glasses. That I think the base model was real and they just modified it to fit his face. They might have tricked it out and added some on it. You know, bust it down, or something like that.
Speaker 2:And Louis Vuitton have written a letter to XXL Like I don't know if they were going to sue or whatever, but basically wanted us to print a retraction or something or somehow say we don't stand by counterfeits or whatever. And we kind of threw Ross under the bus, damn. And I wasn't with that from the beginning. I didn't understand in my young mind. I'm like, well, again thinking about hip hop, thinking about how much power we give to these brands like Louis Vuitton. Yeah, there'll be Louis Vuitton. They'll still make money without hip hop. But it's like fam. You know how we elevated this shit.
Speaker 2:And Louis Vuitton don't spend a dollar in advertising with XXL or anybody in our culture. Why are we picking Louis Vuitton's side over Rick Ross? But we did. And the next issue, we had to print a thing of saying hey, you know whatever we didn't know and we didn't. I don't think anybody on the staff knew that they weren't like real glasses or whatever, but just how, we don't support counterfeit shit. So we got put under pressure by Louis Vuitton. I thought that shit was whack. I thought we should have stood with Ross that. You know, freshman cover shit was always cool.
Speaker 1:It was always cool to see those Was there anybody that you guys picked for the freshman cover that didn't do it for some reason, like didn't show up or turned it down or whatever.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, I believe, if I'm not mistaken. I'm almost, I'm like 98% sure. I got to ask State Tuan about this, but I see he was the NN Chief at this time. But we wanted Jay Electronica for the cover for the one with Ash Roth Wale, bob Cuddy, Mickey Fax. Jay Electronica was invited to that cover, I believe, but I believe this was not long after Katrina. I'm not sure what his reasons for not doing it was, but for whatever reason they they, they didn't do it Wow.
Speaker 1:Wow yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think Ace Hood ended up getting that spot and Ace was a controversial freshman because he didn't fit in with the rest of them. They were all kind of blog era and Ace was maybe more of a traditional sign to a record label, kind of blown up through the record label system, and some people rejected that. But I love that Ace Hood pick man. Ace Hood was, I mean, he had plenty of. He had, like I don't, he had gold singles. He had records that were absolutely moving and the Freshman Cover was before a lot of those records. I think he had Cashflow and that was it when he did the Freshman Cover.
Speaker 2:But Ace went on to really have some success, be influential in the way you know. His flow was something that was copied a couple of times and Ace could fucking rap. Yeah, and Ace could rap. So I think Jay Electronica would have been legendary. I wasn't mad at Ace Hood. Okay, you know what else? Who else didn't make it or who else turned it down? Yeah, that was the one I remember. That was the one that sticks out Okay.
Speaker 1:So after XXL you went to Genius, I went to MTV. After XXL, MTV.
Speaker 2:Okay, and what were you doing in MTV? I was the hip hop news editor is what I came in as. So I was doing writing on the digital news side. And how was that experience? Yeah, mtv News, that was great because look at this time, vibe magazine had folded and maybe they just came back. The source wasn't what it was. Print took a hit. Print was dying.
Speaker 2:Late in my XXL years, there was this thing for print writers. At the time, there was a stigma against online journalism. It didn't feel like the same quality and, quite frankly, it wasn't. Online was built for speed. So we would write an article and it would go through a copy editor, it would go through a fact checker, it would go through several rounds of edit. You would really curate that thing ready for print. And the internet was built for speed.
Speaker 2:There were a lot of writers who just were unwilling or unable to see, or unable just to make the transition to a digital world. And in my last days at XXL, I started working on the website more. I started, you know, before anybody was hiring a social media manager. I was like I was the one who actually started the XXL Twitter, like I started the account and the way we did it because nobody had a position in their organization for a social media manager. You weren't hiring somebody to manage your social media, like that. I remember I was like, okay, we're going to start this account and every week a different editor has to fill it with content and just tweet stuff out. So week one is me, week two is whoever, week three is whoever, and we were working cycles because it was really nobody's job but we felt like we needed a presence.
Speaker 2:But I started seeing digital being important and when the MTV opportunity came, shout out to Ramon Dukes, ramon Dukes, me and him started talking and he brought me over to MTV. So I'm doing writing, I'm doing journalism, it's just digitally, it's just not print anymore. So I went over there for that and about two or three weeks into me being there, I didn't have plans of being on camera. I didn't think that was a thing that was going to happen. And Sway kind of was like yo, I didn't know Sway before that. But once me and Sway got to know each other about two or three weeks, he was like yo, you're going to get opportunities. I'm not going to say when or where, but he was like man, I like you. You're going to be good on camera. We're going to find an opportunity for you. Just be ready. And then I started developing that side.
Speaker 2:So MTV hired me to do four articles a day. So MTV hired me to do four articles a day. I had to write four articles a day for the website. Okay, they didn't have to be original. I can interview somebody and do an original news piece. I can do aggregate reporting I could do. But the, the, the. The quota was four a day. I was doing seven to eight articles a day. I was on my fourth article by lunchtime. Wow, man, I just fit, fit into a groove. We had such a great team and it just became so easy. I'm like, nah, I'm like man, I'm going to pump this shit out. So it was partly my work ethic, just kind of my demeanor around and whatever. But I did very well at MTV, man. A lot of people really really supported me over there, and Sway and Ramon Dukes, whitney, Gail, benta was part of it.
Speaker 2:You've been on the show, I've been on the show, rebecca Thomas, like they really really set me up for success. But Sway helped put me in front of that camera and show me a whole different side to this and open up a whole different side of my career, which I'm grateful for Wow.
Speaker 2:Wow, and how long were you at MTV For four years. I was there from 2011 to 2015. You was there for a little run. Yeah, we had a run. Man, I was doing Mixtape Daily, something that was created by Ramon and Shaheen Reid. I was carrying on a lot of legacy that they. I just took the ball and ran with it when it was my turn. We had a show called Rap Fix Live that I was helping to produce and I had some on-air time with man. I was really like shadowing with Sway. We were doing Hottest MCs at that time, so that was cool. Oh, with those roundtables, yeah, yeah, I remember those People were controversial about that. People hated it. They loved it and they hated it, man. They loved it more than they hated it, man.
Speaker 1:I was in that category, love hate. I'd be screaming at the TV like what the fuck? But I mean, it made good TV. It made for good viewing, that's for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it made for good TV. My thing was I could stand on anything I said, right or wrong, I'll stand on it. I remember one time one year, french Montana didn't make it. People thought French deserved to make it that year and he didn't make it. People thought French deserved to make it that year and he didn't make it. And the day it aired, the same day, french had a show at SOB's. So I go to the show because I'm a French Montana fan. I said, man, we're going to check this show out. People looked at me like and I walked in dolo. Everybody looked at me like we see the ghost.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but.
Speaker 2:I'm like fuck that, but it was all by the end of the night, it was all love. It wasn't no, it wasn't no situation, you know, I think I think even when people didn't make it, I was grateful to get the respect of people, even when they didn't make it, because because I gave respect, it wasn't about shitting on people. To me, I remember one time when you had Pusha T didn't make it, and this is how me and Pusha kind of really got cool. Pusha didn't make it and he was overseas in the UK. I think he might've been with Semtex, Okay, Doing an interview. Semtex, if I got it wrong, my bad, but they were advocating for him. Yo man, you didn't make that high to some Cs. How could you not make that? God, those guys over there are bozos Da da, da, da, da, da da. So we started getting this Paul for the course it comes and Pusha, during his interview, was like hold up.
Speaker 2:He was like, yeah, I didn't make it and, yes, I still respect their position and their opinion and what they stand on. Yes, they got it wrong, but, man, I still got the ultimate respect for them and I was like, dang, he ain't had to do that. Yeah, he ain't had to do that at all and that. That. That that kind of like really sold to me because you see what media is now is is, hey, say, the nastiest thing about somebody to get clicks.
Speaker 2:I could say I don't like something or I don't agree with something, or this is my position or something, and I don't got to be disrespectful about it. You know I'm saying because, at the end of the day, I, I don't live solely online. We are of the culture. Jeff, you be outside, you talking about Bentleys, you have a DNA, you have a history in this shit. You go outside in this shit, you live and breathe in this shit. It's a certain way to move and we can still have our opinions, and I most certainly have my opinion, but I'll be outside. You know what I'm saying and I get respect wherever I go, whatever city, man, and and so that was just validation for me to keep doing my thing and keep treating this thing with love and the respect that it deserved.
Speaker 1:I see I um, we ain't got to get deep into it, but I definitely see the the vitriol for lack of a better term. You always get about the Kendrick and Drake. Yeah, people think, yeah, people thinking you're picking sides and it's not. I see, but again, that that comes from the new wave of social media and media where it says it's gotta, gotta go at people crazy, you gotta say crazy things and you gotta, you know, try to get people to retweet.
Speaker 1:It's like it's annoying, but I understand, it's the way of the world. So I'm not trying to say yeah, I'm, I'm, but it's annoying sometimes because someone like yourself, like you said, you know in some cases, myself as well as other people, we have like real knowledge of this stuff. You know from the history of it and from you know we have people that we can call like I might have inside information. So we have a different skew on how things go. So we have a different skew on how things go. And so when you, when you, you know, obviously only give away your inside information, but we're telling people that you really understand this shit, and then you're like talking to some kid, respectfully, from kansas city, who's 18, and they trying to tell you and say, bro, like what are we doing, bro, you know. So why don't you, why don't you just be quiet and listen sometimes, instead of always having to come back?
Speaker 2:That's just where we're at now, where everybody has a voice, everybody can get on camera and it's not even. It's just. It is what it is now. You can't put the lid back on Pandora's box. Yeah, with the Kendrick and Drake thing, hey, man, maybe I know some stuff that y'all don't know and I do On both sides Right, and there's certain things that I haven't said. People get mad at me on both sides too, because they'll be like just admit it, because every time I make a video, I'm like yo, me personally, not Like.
Speaker 2:Us is an amazing song. I think it's the greatest diss song of all time. At this point, I think this is the greatest battle that we've ever seen. At this point. Love the record. I personally do not think Drake is a pedophile. It's a great rap lyric. But I get Kendrick fans mad at me. Look at all the evidence. How do you not what evidence. And I'm just like hey, that's cool for you guys to do. I will say Drake lost. I will say Kendrick got the better record. Kendrick had the better strategy, the better lyrics. I'm not going to call this man a pedo. You know what I'm saying, because it's cool to do it in a rap battle, but I'm not battling him. Let me not say it's cool to do Anything goes in a rap battle.
Speaker 2:In the lyrics. Anything goes, man, but I'm not going to get up here and say it To that point of them not understanding the game. You know we talk about this a lot. It comes up a lot with like Dochi and it was like oh, she's an industry plan. And it was like you guys don't know the way the music thing works. Like industry plan is something that we put on where we don't like an artist and what, what? What is TDE and Capitol supposed to do? Not market Doshi's record, not put her in a position. But then the other side of it is when you have an artist that you really love, that's signed to a label and it doesn't work, let's say for somebody like and God bless her because she's made it work independently on her own, somebody like Tinashe Okay, who everybody loves, is everybody's a fan of, but when it doesn't work on RCA, rca, oh, it's the label's fault. They didn't do enough. The label failed her. When, when it, when it doesn't work, the label failed her. When it, when it works, oh, they're an industry plan.
Speaker 2:It was like guys like, sometimes they're like yo, just be a fan, like, like, like the inside baseball is not really working, like, let's just talk about the music.
Speaker 1:Be a fan yeah, yeah, so wait. So the podcast that I was on, that you did for a little bit with the r&b stuff, what was the name of it? It was for the right. Was that for the record?
Speaker 2:red light special was red light special. Yeah, man, yeah, that was the record. You guys are headed.
Speaker 1:You guys are headed headed to curve with that, I feel, because you guys are discussing, um, a lot of r&b music. I had a great time being on there, by the way, and it's almost like, yeah, you were just ahead of the curve, because I think if you were doing it closer to now, with all the R&B stuff that's come out and R&B is kind of catching a wave now of new stuff it's kind of like you guys are just ahead of the curve.
Speaker 2:But it was a great podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you for that. Shout out to Kristen, who is my co-host. Kristen Carl, I fucked that up. I just had so much on my plate I just couldn't handle it. You know that was coming out on Loudspeakers Network, so rest in peace.
Speaker 2:To Reggie and Chris Morrow they gave us that opportunity to do the podcast. Chris used to tell me all the time yo you just ahead of the curve. You know, I started getting to the point too where I wasn't like seeing the results that I thought I should be getting for what I was putting into it, and not even money. I'm just talking about traffic. And Chris is like. Chris used to tell me all the time, and Reggie too yo you ahead of the curve. There's nothing out here like it, just stick with it. And I just had a lot on my plate. I had that.
Speaker 2:I had just joined Genius at the time, so it was a new job, I was getting used to new responsibilities. Then I had signed a deal to put out my first album. It was a lot going on and I had to pick and choose. And then the other mistake that I made is I built that podcast to be based on getting a guest, so I will have people cancel all the time and then when they cancel, then you don't have a show. Yes, I should have been more forward thinking of, and more belief in, myself and Kristen that, hey, we're the personalities and maybe with a couple of other friends, can kind of really talk about this music in a meaningful way. That way we don't need a guest to show up. I just didn't have the foresight. If I could, get a do over.
Speaker 1:I would love to learn, you learn, and maybe you'll do it again in the later day. You know, talk to me about genius.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, I joined genius in 2015. Um shit, it'll be 10 years in August that I've been there. It's the longest I've ever been anywhere. I've never been anywhere, started out as the head of artist relations. Right now I'm the VP of content and music. Wow, you know, if I'm being real, genius was a different company before I came in and after I came in In which way? Tell me, culturally. You know the guys who started it and they have since sold the company Tom and Alon and I love those guys. You know. I think they had a great idea. I think the community who works on Genius. It was a great tech idea. It was a great. They didn't have the cultural cachet. The way they were kind of moving in the beginning, because they were very front-facing, was just like outsiders in this thing, in this culture, and people question well, you know who are these guys really. You know what I'm saying and what are they doing, playing in this space, and you know me coming over. Added that cultural.
Speaker 1:You gave them credibility.
Speaker 2:The credibility and the creativity and the foresight to help develop content out of it. Hey, this doesn't you know. When I first sat with them cause they called me to come work for them they didn't even have an open position. It was like, yo, we just want to work with you, we'll figure out a position. I was at MTV at the time and I was like damn, I want to make Genius the new MTV. Not necessarily a cable network, but MTV, when we were coming up, was the place where you would go and it was just music all the time. And I was like I want to build that because at the time that didn't exist. At the time a shot of TMZ is not a shot. They've been successful. About a shot of my man, trent over there, Everybody was following the TMZ model of journalism.
Speaker 2:Even when I was at XXL, even when I was at MTV, it was like how can we get clicks? How do you get the headline to click? How do you get this? How do you get that? So artists would come around and the storyline around artists were about everything but their music. It's like clickbait, yeah. So I wanted to build a place where artists can come and talk about their music and feel safe doing that. Like yo, you could just come here and talk about the music we ain't got to get into all the other I don't care who you're dating, unless you wrote a song about it. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:And I'd like to think not only with Genius, with the content. I feel like we've also affected people around us. I think, after the success that Genius had early on, after I got there, I think it started to inspire a lot of other places to like, hey, let's focus on music a little bit more. You know, now the streamers got it, now it's all about streaming and it's back to mostly bullshit. Yeah, yeah, that's the way the pendulum swings, but it was great.
Speaker 2:So, you know, I think me going there was like a domino effect, because there were amazing people who came in after me, who helped to elevate the brand as well, like Brendan Frederick, who's now at Complex, and my man, opie and I mean I'm going to start naming people, I'm going to forget people, but I'm not saying it was me alone, but me coming in was definitely the signifier of a change, a direction for that company.
Speaker 2:And then you know we're in 2025 now the company was bought, was acquired in 2021. And you know it's about continuing to develop and build towards the future to fit into this changing landscape and not just fit into it but lead in this changing landscape. So that's the mission I'm on right now and we have we also have a distro on. So you know's the mission I'm on right now and and we have um, we also have a distro on. So you know, I've been signing artists and I've been working with world star and we've been signing artists over there. So it's been cool, man, to kind of have our hands in all kind of facets of of of music Is your.
Speaker 1:is your next project coming out through through that distro? No, no, no.
Speaker 2:Because and they asked me they was like yo, you know distro through genius. And I was like nah, because? A couple of reasons. One, I want to keep what's me. For me, my music is really expression and it's a therapy for me. I've been so blessed in the media space to really make a living. I don't need the music to do anything for me, but exist. I've been so blessed in the media space to really make a living. I don't need the music to do anything for me, but exists. Of course I want to be successful, of course, like I'm not in this to do bad business or lose money, but I measure my music by different metrics. You know what I'm saying. And then, two, I don't want to be on the same label as artists. That you know. When I, when I signed an artist to Distro, I kind of make a promise to them too. You know what I'm saying. So I don't want to put myself ahead of the artists that I signed.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just think it's bad optics, and people know my intention and I don't think anybody would take it like that. But what I'm at, I pitch for the artists that we signed. I pitch for them more than I pitch for myself. I put them in position more. There's one producer I won't say who's next, but there's one artist that I have that was like yo, I want to work with so-and-so producer. And in my head I'm like shit, I want to work with so-and-so. Matter of fact, I'm not even thinking about that, I didn't get there yet, but they were like yo, I want I done had so-and-so's number for a long time. We know each other.
Speaker 2:I've never reached out for myself. I want one too, but it hadn't occurred to me to advocate for myself in that way. It was easier for me to advocate for somebody who I had signed to. It was easier for me to advocate for somebody who I had signed to, and it wasn't a lack of belief in myself or a confidence thing or nothing like that. It was just like man. My music is so deeply personal to me. It's not the first thing that I think of. Who can I reach out to? What feature can I get? Whatever? But when I'm in distro mode, I can put that hat on. Oh, we can align so-and. Here we could do this, and it allows me to be a better advocate for the, for the artist I got you, so tell me what's next.
Speaker 1:What, what next?
Speaker 2:genius. Um, you know. Working on um. You know I want to build some new series. We have our verify series, which is classic yellow background. You know where artists break down their lyrics. We're gonna keep doing that.
Speaker 1:I love that I think we're about 1,600 episodes in.
Speaker 2:We've done a lot of those. We also have our open mic performance series, which is amazing and I love it A lot of people. Just recently we did the Dochi and the Issa Ray and put them together for open mic and shout out to my man, andres, who helped put that together on the genius side, really kind of came up with the idea to put that together and put that emotion. It was amazing. And then so we have those two series and but you know, this year is a goal of mine to start adding more series, you know, to do new innovative ideas way of storytelling. So that's one of the challenges that we're going to accomplish this year. We're working a lot with brand partners and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:So we got something by the time this comes out. We just did something really fun with Lupe Fiasco and Panda Express. It totally ties into who Lupe is. It's not just sticking somebody with a brand to get a check, just not for the check. When people see it, they're going to be like Lupe and Panda Express and then, like his fans, are going to be like ah, okay, I get it, like you know what.
Speaker 1:I'm saying it makes perfect sense yeah.
Speaker 2:So, you know, do a lot of brand partnerships and business. I'm looking forward to signing artists, and you know we just signed this artist named Saki, who is dope, and another artist named Mashu Wynn is coming this year on Genius Distro. We have another artist, 17 years old, out of Florida, and so now looking forward to that, and then me putting out my own project too. Okay, you know what I'm saying and continuing, you know I'm going to put out a project. I got a couple joints with Justice League that I'm working on. Shout out to Pete Rock. I got a couple joints with Justice League that I'm working on Shout out to Pete Rock. I'm trying to lock in with Pete Rock, good luck.
Speaker 1:I love Pete. I call him Pita. It's tough to lock in sometimes with Pete, but you'll make it happen.
Speaker 2:Which is a dream of mine, because I told you where I first started.
Speaker 1:Yes, full circle.
Speaker 2:I also told you how it's hard for me to advocate for myself. I just don't think to advocate for myself. Pete reached out to me one day. He just hit me. He was like yo, we got to get one in bro.
Speaker 1:What, when, where?
Speaker 2:I dropped my album on December 30th. He was like yo, I was supposed to be on that joint, what's up? We got to get one in. I said, bro, don't threaten me with a good time, like you say. They went and went. So maybe me and Pete will get something and shout out to P-Rod whether we do or we don't, of course.
Speaker 1:Oh, my God Legend.
Speaker 2:In fact, the acknowledgement alone means everything. Yeah, legend were starting to build this series um working for genius, very much dedicated to it, but it's 24 hours in the day and I love having my own YouTube channel. Just my thoughts.
Speaker 1:No, you're doing well with it. I mean you know you're consistent. I mean that's the main thing great opinions, like you said. Even if people don't always agree with those opinions, you can tell those opinions are sincere. You're not doing it just to get people riled up. You're saying what you feel it's real, whatever it is. You're doing a great job with it.
Speaker 2:Thank you, man, I appreciate it and you with this man you and I had this conversation when we were just talking about media and then to see you actually take off and do it, man, this is great.
Speaker 1:I'm just humbled to be here talking to you. I really appreciate it, man. Thank you, man. Thank you Rob Markman. He's a legend in media space.
Speaker 2:Jeff Sledge. Listen man, come on, man. You talking about being at Bentley's. I'm talking about being inspired by Slick Rick. You're like listen man, come on man. You talking about being at Bentley's, I'm talking about being inspired by Slick Rick. You're like nah, I was around. This is when I first started getting in the industry.
Speaker 1:I will never forget those girls. I don't know, I don't know them, I don't know them from a can of paint, but I just remember that energy man and them yelling those words you know, don't fade out. I just remember that I was like wow, it was just captivating to me to see those girls just go that ham over that record. And they were fly girls. They weren't like you know, rough girls, they were like you know. But again, it's not about me.
Speaker 2:No, it is, though. This is why this is so important, bro, and real quick, I won't take too much time here, but this is why this is so important. I was thinking about this today. These streamers, these people in the media. I'm about to go make a video about the guy. Aiden Ross talked about Doji. I didn't like the way he addressed it.
Speaker 2:I referred to it as a bitch. I thought that was terrible. It made me think of who are your OGs. You realize on the internet with these streamers and it's not to give him an excuse, they don't have OGs. It's not like they got put on by somebody. You put yourself on. This is the era of you put yourself on.
Speaker 2:So we respect the hustle of the academics, of all you guys, the self-made. There's a part of that that I have to respect. But it's like who taught you the guys I came up with in my neighborhood? I was taught by because I was outside swaying when I get into the media here with Jeff Sledge and being able for you to be able to tap me and speak to me on some peer-to-peer shit, when I recognize that you have seen more than I've seen. You have helped build the things that influenced me and I'm able to stand on top of that.
Speaker 2:I didn't build myself up. I didn't come out of nowhere. A thing was created that then somebody can help me get into you as an OG and I'm thankful to have OGs. I'm thankful to have people who came before me, who I can learn from, who I oh, this is how you do it. This is how you move it. This is how you and I wish those guys, for the health and the sake of our culture, would learn to do better and listen to some of these OGs when we tell you listen. That wasn't the way to do it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know what I'm saying I agree, no, I agree, yes, I know what you're saying, I agree a thousand percent. Then you know we could go for two hours on different examples of some of these streamers just jumping out the window and going left and it's like man, like what's happening here with you guys? Again, you're getting money and I respect it. You built it up, I respect it, but, like you know, it sounds coin to coin. I know you're a comic book head, but with great power comes a great responsibility and there's certain things, when you get to you know you're building your thing up. There's certain things you just shouldn't do because it's bad for the culture and it's going to affect it, because people are going to see what you did and just emulate because they think that's the way to go yeah, I want to leave something for, for I don't want this all for myself.
Speaker 2:You don't want this off. I want to leave something for the next generation. When I, when I clock out, I want leadership better than when I left it exactly. You know. You know I'm saying like somebody else, so my kids could, like, have a space in this. So you know I'm saying so the next generation have a space. This. But that's what culture is. And I think when you understand culture, you also understand wanting to preserve it. And I think if you don't understand culture and you don't prescribe the culture, then it's just a thing and you don't necessarily care if you burn it down.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You're just hitting a lick. Yeah, you exist in the culture, so act like it, because the culture is worth something. Man yeah, man yeah man.
Speaker 1:But thank you again, man, I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Nah, man, I appreciate being here. Man, anything you need, man, hit me up. Anytime, man, I'm here.
Speaker 1:You can catch Mixed and Mastered on Apple Podcasts, spotify, iheart or wherever you get your podcasts. Hit that follow button, leave a review and tell a friend I'm your host. Jeffrey Sledge. Mixed and Mastered.
