The Hip Hop Project Page #4

so I just started rolling

with gangs

and cats in the streets

who was just showing me

how to get money,

was showing me just how

New York streets works.

So this is Brooklyn.

This is the main

shopping district,

downtown Fulton Street.

And here's where we,

you know,

this is where we come

and get paid at, you know.

I was taught how to go

in a store,

and we could take

a whole section.

There's these huge bags

we would make,

that the alarm systems

wouldn't go off.

I always say the criminal mind

is a creative mind,

and it's all

where you put that energy.

At that time, all my creativity

was in finding ways to survive,

and now I'm using it

in other ways.

All right, person,

you come,

have your hand open

for receiving.

I want to put myself

on the examining table,

so y'all can do me,

so I can go home

with some stuff to meditate on.

- I would say something

to grow on

is being patient

with people's emotional problems

that they come to you with.

You know, some people

might see you as a person

that they never had

in their life

or the person

they wish they had.

So you cool, just be

a little bit more mindful toward-

you know, towards the question

and the emotions

that people come to you with.

- You never let me

give up on myself.

You're always there.

I appreciate that,

and I see that.

- All my life,

my father wasn't there.

So I didn't really have

that male figure in my life.

And when my father

finally did come in.

I look at you,

and you've been more

of a fatherly influence on me

than that man has.

- More than anything,

emotional ruts,

quicksand I call it.

You try to find yourself

when you're in those

and have people around you

that you can tap into

that can pull you up,

because once you go down,

you got to be careful

during them times,

because you're vulnerable

to a lot of things, man.

- Nobody's ever

emotionally stable, you know,

because life gives you all types

of different hands.

But how you deal

with those things

and that will come

from watching your breath,

breathe easy,

build your discipline.

All that emotion that you got-

because that's all it is,

is energy-

if you put it into something

that could channel

that out of you,

so it's something

that you're constantly doing

that is to get away from the everyday stuff

that stress you out.

The first three years of the program

is about self-development.

We became a family

because of it.

- The goal of the Hip Hop Project

over the next six months

is to produce

and complete this album.

We can't want it more than you,

so everybody's got to work.

And it's critical that you do

a lot of pre-production at home,

a lot ofwriting at home,

because now when we go in the studio,

time is money.

I've worked in every area

of the music business.

I started at Def Jam,

and then I went to Arista Records.

I was the director

of urban artist development.

- I went to this conference.

I saw Kheperah walk in,

you know.

And, you know, I was like,

"All right, she's fine, you know. "

- I see this brother with a kufi on,

red, black, and green.

He said, "How you doin'?

I'm Divine. "

- Everybody's pulling on her time,

and you know, I'm more humble.

I'm falling back or whatever,

and she was so nice.

She held my hand and said,

"I'll speak to you in a second,

brother," or whatever.

So, you know, she made me feel

so relaxed and calm.

You know,

she has a knack for that.

- The next day, he called me.

And he said,

"What's the thought for the day? "

And I was feeling that.

I began to look forward

to that call in the morning.

- And I think that was really

the moment it just sparked.

And ever since then,

it was just like chemistry.

- Yo

These are trying times

I'm livin' in

And Brother Hathaway sung it

And with pain I encounter

a large abundance

My faith seem

to hold mad weight

But when the hurt hits

I question if God is even

the one for me to run with

Why would the most high

put his children so low?

Wasn't no act of suffrage,

sh*t, I damn sure ain't vote

To choose a route

through such bondage

Through my mind and my soul

Ah, bring it back.

I met great people,

but God made man

They try to hate me

But it's he who overstands

the circumstance

Also the creator

who put me in this gloom

And made the decision for

my moms to transcend so soon

Also put many others in doom

I'm more fortunate

than half of the world

But yet I still feel omitted

Why must I feel misery

and be stuck and left with it

Trying to see it

in a way like

Maybe God did it to test

our strength and build it

For the end

which is the great one

But where I'm at

Feel like the ending reward

that I'ma gain one

Only God knows what's next

I wish his image projects

And I could reflect

what he truly want of me

And there's no such thing as death

But I feel like it's just stains

Left from my past life

haunting me

I don't know what to think

But I know what I feel

Feel a chunk of me gone

The other half getting killed

I don't know what to think

But I know what I feel

I feel a chunk of me gone

The other half getting killed

- Where it all started.

Mali, what's the deal, baby?

In the Bahamas, I was really,

like, a hip-hop fanatic.

Coming here was just

like destiny,

like I was supposed to be here.

- You know, he had this, like,

weird style of dressing

because we was always

with the baggy jeans,

and, you know,

that was our style of dressing.

He come through

with the leather hat, you know,

jeans kind of tight,

tight vest,

because he's fresh

from Bahamas.

And, you know, he had

the different accent at the time,

and we didn't understand nothing.

He was like, "And I believin'

that we should do this,

and we should do that. "

- I started getting into

the music scene,

and, you know,

I was managed by Doug E. Fresh

and this guy named

Donovan Thomas,

and I would go on tour

with them.

Hindsight 20/20

Take it to the cemetery

Whether the clock stops

early or late

Either you rot in hell

Or you knock

on the pearly gates

Every morn's a chance

to right your wrong

Don't sweat this song

Life goes on

- I would help him

get on at different places.

And we used to have

little sit-down talk sessions

about what he wanted to do

with his career

and the different directions

that he wanted to take.

I find what he's doing now incredible,

because he passed on

the information

and just carried on what it was

that I was doing for him.

- You go first, right?

- Then she go.

- Then she go.

Then it should be chorus?

- Yeah.

- Don't CaNNoN go before you?

- Nah, we changing that,

'cause, musically,

it won't sound correct.

- It's like, they're doing

the first 16, then-

- Hook.

- Then hook,

then it's CaNNoN and-

- Princess.

- Princess.

- Right?

- I thought they came after.

- Hold on, hold on,

let's stop, stop.

Yeah, I'm getting confused.

- No, it was supposed to be

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