We on Boss Talk 101.  We be on fire, we be lit, lit. It's a unique hustle. Check it, check it, check it. It's a unique hustle. It's your boy, your CEO. And I'm here with the lovely, amazing official, Mr. Maker. What's going on? Nothing, nothing.  Man, hey, man. Make sure you like and subscribe to Boss Talk 101, man. It's a must, man. It's a new movement, man. It's going down. Hey, man. Coming to a city near you. Is that good? Yes, sir. But about a patron and all that stuff. Go ahead and tell them. No, no. I don't like it. Yeah. Y'all need to make sure y'all follow our new Patreon channel.  For a small fee, you get to see all of our full length interviews, which will not be on our YouTube channel after a while. So you definitely got to get on top of that. Just definitely going to the Patreon. Check out some information in here that they can't get, you know, the gamers be so not told, you feel me? Man, check it, man. We got a guy here. Y'all heard his voice, man. He don't really need no introduction, man. This guy right here, man. Man, this is a Grammy-winning guy. This is a Grammy Award-winning guy. This is an Emmy-winning guy. This guy got so many things going on. And then he come up out of Chicago, man. Malik Yusef is in the building. I am. Thank you so much for coming on Boss Talk 101. Thanks, big boss. I appreciate you. Well, the boss is tall. Come on. You know what I'm saying, man? So I'm here with the boss and the boss lady. I can't, well, what's better than that? Man, man. So, you know, we like to go down through that, man. Really get to know you, man. So I'm gonna hand it off to Miss Jamaica and let her do her thing. Okay, thank you, babe. So, from Chicago, Southside? Yes, ma'am. What was it like growing up in Chicago and was your household, did it have your mom and dad in the household together? Well, I mean, it had my mom and my dad, but I don't know if you ever saw my tear talk. My mother was abusive and neglective and so on and so forth.  My dad, my father was the, he was the, Passive one. What they called the non-protective parent.  I mean, once he did, when like, one time she almost killed me, I remember coming back to consciousness and not remembering him all the time. Hold on, hold on, reverse, reverse. Why would she almost, what sparked that isolation, that incident to escalate that? Well, it was everyday, it was anything. She just did it for no reason? I mean, she did it for her own reason. We say no reason, but she had her own reasons.  You know what I'm saying? She ain't like me, she ain't love me. You on her first child? Like we tried to figure it out. Yeah, that's what I'm like. We tried to figure out birth order. First son? Nope, none of that. Do you look like the daddy? Nope, not really.  It's just, because other ones look like my daddy too, but my brother look more like you. You know how you always feel like there's always a reason? Yeah, we can't figure it out.  And she, you know. Because you're all looking for closure where that is concerned? Well, we was looking for a way to heal, you know?  The tears wouldn't even come.   There's nobody, nothing. No. How many of y'all? It's five of us. And you the only one? Yeah. I mean, she wasn't, she wasn't like, you know.  Yeah, she knocked me down the stairs one day from I was outside. How old? Of course, I don't know, I might've been 10. Mm-hmm. And, you know, she just would pick on me.  And your daddy was there and? My father worked a lot, so he wouldn't see it. And she was able to get a report that she wanted to to him about his son, you know. I don't think that would go nowadays with people, but, you know, she was able to tell him, yeah, Malik is terrible, he is, he dumb.  Like I couldn't read, I stuttered, you know what I'm saying, I was clumsy, all those things. But that doesn't warrant, you know, the level of physical abuse and mental and emotional abuse that she gave me.   I got a question, cause you say you were autistic growing up, because I know some parents might not have the patience with an autistic kid and that can, you know, grow anger within themselves. Yeah. But I know nothing about this part. So it's just something I'm asking, I don't know if you know. But whenever a person has an autistic child, do they send like a counselor or somebody into these households to help that parent know how to, you know, deal with their child? Well, we had a family counselor. I can't think of her now, I think her name was Laney, Ms. Laney, my oldest brother's deaf. And so we had family counseling, she just, you literally chose to treat me this way, you know what I'm saying? And you could see it and I would beg her and cry, you know the same thing.   She was a negative person, she didn't have a real life. She couldn't drive, she didn't have a job, she didn't have a high school diploma. Shit like that. And my dad let it go.  How old were you when you moved out?  But I was really out of that motherfucker, like moving around, not being around in the street, like 15. 15. I was not getting outside then. She was like. Because of her. Yeah, when she was like, you know, hey, come back.  My father be like, when you gonna move out?  You feel me? I'm like, hi. Because when you got out there at 15 and you say you leaving, I'm like, how are you supporting yourself? How are you?   And I would, you know, I would. Who taught you to survive?  So at 15, I got a job at a car wash. My daddy was like, that's not a job, that's a hustle. And I was just like, well, I'm 15. He like, this is your my 15th birthday.  So that translated into my life in the street. And me and my boy, Mikey, my car street name, my best friend, Mike Stone, we worked at a car wash on a hundred seven. And people took notice that we was there at six o'clock in the morning and leave the 12 o'clock at night. So they figured we was trustworthy and they put some trust in us on some product, basically. And that's what changed my life.     So you were never ever disrespectful. Because you know, especially some men when they feel like they're making all this money and they I'm independent now. Well, I wanted her love. I wanted her to love me. I wanted my father to view me as a viable member. He put all his his eggs in the baskets of my siblings. Siblings, yeah, not you. He thought that they was gonna go, you know what I'm saying? And rightfully so, they put a lot of energy into them, you know?  So he's free to be funny, you know?  And growing up, how did this affect you mentally, like feeling like you were less than? Yeah, I still go through that. You know what I'm saying? I still go through that part of feeling less death like I got to take care of everybody. I got to prove myself all the time, but it worked well in this industry because I just became better than everybody, you know what I'm saying? Just better poet than all these other motherfuckers, a better producer, a better songwriter than all these other motherfuckers.   And that's what wound up happening. So I learned how to dress better than everybody else. You know what I'm saying? I learned how to be kinder than everybody else. You know what I'm saying? So my brothers and sisters didn't have to be concerned with kindness because they never had to treat me kindly because they mama didn't, you know what I mean? I like to say, I appreciate you for coming on the show. I just, I was just thinking about everything that you're trying to take in everything that you was, you know what I'm saying? Your mother, she did these things and it's something that, I don't know. Like I said, I went through sort of the same thing with my dad.  Oh yeah.  Yeah, but I wasn't. You know what I'm saying? I wasn't, I didn't believe that. Like, it's a lot of time you could tell me something. I just never bought into it.  And I was gonna give results no matter what. And at the end of the day, I think with, I mean, with what you've accomplished and I ain't gonna just skip ahead too much, but it just show improve, you know? I don't believe in that dumb, that talk right there. I don't believe that, bro. I just know that it's something that, you know, maybe you don't haven't, maybe the people who was trying to educate you or teach you or grow you up, maybe they wasn't wanting to didn't understand how to deal with it, you know? That's the truth. That's the whole, that's the play. Yeah, she didn't know how to deal with it, but you know, and I say, yes, I was dumb.  Yeah.  Yeah, yeah, yeah. So he, all the other ducklings is yellow and cute and quack and can move good.  He gray, he taller, he clumsy because he not made to be a duckling. You feel me? That's real.    I gotta ask you this, man, like a poem like that, that you made about your situation, something that was about like kind of in the area about how your mom treated. Do you know that poem? And could you recite a little bit of it for me? Yeah, I made a couple of pieces, but I got one that say, I said, he was moving through flipping shit on purpose, sealed no fate. He was a chubby little nigga, but he carried no weight. He was something like nothing, near zero. But apparently to his parents, he was an invisible child, but became the clear hero. Wow. His technique was immortal. He moved through several portals, unidentified flying object. Look at him way up there. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, that's me, man. No Tans Howard. Used to be scared of everything, but now he's no coward. See, it ain't sweet. Think it is and see how quickly it gets soured. Lake Bloomer, but look how he flowered. Man, that's hard, man. Like I said, you're very talented. Thank you, brother.  You know what I mean? Thank you, brother. I mean, I think that's what our people need, man. You know what I'm saying? All that thing about, when you think about, you go back to our people, even go back to slavery and all the different things, man. Come on. You can't keep a good man down, literally. You know what I'm saying? You don't matter how you try to shape and mold it. If God got something trying to pull out of you, it's coming. You know what I'm saying? And that's the part, I know, you know what I'm saying? So that's the funny part of me, because I'm the one, I get it. When you come from something where people didn't expect you to do nothing, come on, man. And then you blow up like that, like in their face, man. And it ain't even about them. At that point, it's about you. You ain't even thinking about them no more. It's okay. It's weird, man.  That's hard. And she'll like, roll a plate, pass me in my heart. We got a pretty nice-sized crib and she'd roll a plate, pass me and hit me, you know? Cause she just don't know what to do with the emotions that her daddy, you know what I'm saying? She don't know the pain and trauma I went through, so I don't try to share with her, you know what I'm saying?  That's that. She hit on me, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.  Yeah, they don't see none of that other stuff. She see me on the Grammys, we have replaced something from one grandma, my wife would be like, yo, I seen you on the Grammys, your face was turned up when this happened. I'm like, no, I was ready to trip in. So we go back and look at it on YouTube. My daughter, when she was seven, so she didn't see it, she like, what? Wow. My daddy on the floor, she did the Grammys, you know? And to me, looking at myself through her eyes, because I'm in the journey, I'm running, you know what I'm saying? That's real, that's real. So I don't get to feel it as much.  No, it's hard. You know, Rihanna did all the lights on the Superbowl Sunday night. And that's my song. Dang. Oh, my daughter, she couldn't have been happier and prouder.  She always says, she can see it if she want to. Right.  You know what I'm saying? She did what she did. She did what she did. I don't think she's gonna get into that, but I wanted to go back for a little bit. What was it at that time? Because you know how you said your mom, how she was treating you, and how everybody was treating you and everything like that. And I know what both of y'all went through, but what was it and who, or who was it that maybe had said something to you to turn that channel for you to grow for the better now and not be so, you know, not confident, not this, but change? Yeah. What caused that change? The vibrational aspect of it was people in neighborhood that didn't know. They were, you know, same stuff to me.  And thank you for doing this. And thank you for doing that. Cause like I say, I would shovel all the snow, rake all the leaves, pick up all the paper on the block. You know what I'm saying? I was that person, but that's also just innate inside me. That's who I am. I'm just a kind person. You know, I'm not perfect. You know what I'm saying? And I'm violent, you know? I'm violent. If I get on that, I get on that with them. You feel me? Yeah. You know, but I couldn't express that in my household. So it kind of like, you know, in my neighborhood with the people I wanted to be friends with, I would allow them to mistreat me. It's like allow my mother to mistreat me until I stopped seeking her love. Then I stopped seeking love from people that refused to love me. And that's when everything changed. I'm like, man, but I heard you say earlier about the street, the Black Pea Stones. Yes, sir. You know, that was the family. That helped mold you. Yes, sir. How did you even link with them? Was it the neighborhood? Because I don't know. It was the neighborhood. It was the neighborhood, yeah. So when you shovel the snow, it's the people there, you know, the guys that really matter. It's saying, hey, man, what you need? How can we help people there? And showing you that love. Yes, sir.  So that was a mandate. Cause I wanted my father's approval. I wanted his love. I wanted his adoration, you know?  Even against the toughest dudes in the neighborhood, little Larry, whoever, Kevin Woods, my father said, hey, man, they some punks. Why are you scared of them? But I wanted their friendship. But now when I decided to not need their friendship, then I could gladiate with them. I went up and interviewed Prince Amir. Yes, sir. And then I interviewed him in Chicago and... You talking to, you talking to Chief Bresson? Yes. Yes, sir. I was just asking, I was going to ask you about Jeff Ford, you know, like his release and everything. Like, that's the campaign, right? No question. Free Chief. Yeah, so... No question. What, when you, did you educate yourself about what you had become a part of? Like to know about the, you know, Jeff Ford's, cause I had to understand that when I came in I said, okay, I see this, man.  So I just wanted to just get your insight on just how important his release is and just give him a shout out. Yes, sir. So, my name is Malik, right? You know, so when I was a shorty, you know, we got, we came into the understanding, we came into the light as we call it.  And it's a family. But of course there's going to be a portion of the government that says, and rightfully so, that says these are the bad people. We want you to not pay attention to them or pay negative attention to them. And that right there, whenever the government tell you somebody ain't good, that's when you got to go ahead and do your own research, as we say. You feel me boss, man? No, I got it. Do your own research. I got you. So we get to get the laws and policies and bylaws and see that this demonstration is about uplifting, uplifting following humanity. Now it goes awry when money gets in and politics gets involved and so on and so forth. It goes awry. We know that. There's going to be some bad actors in this demonstration, some bad players that's going to come in and infiltrate. That's got, that took a job from the FBI. Yeah, yeah. That took a job from the CIA, you know what I'm saying? That's coming in on the Cointail Probe. So we got to stay close to the source as possible, to the root of the information as possible and what this demonstration started off to be and what it stands for. Go ahead. What that's all with? That what it stood for, what it stands for and what it continues to stand for and what it means to us and how it uplifts brothers that come from a home that's not broken, but it breaks him. Because I could have been without the guidance of this demonstration, without this nation, I could have been a serial killer. And there's times probably I did lean toward that. You feel me? Where I was opting with everybody that wasn't Blackstone and then even to the point where it wasn't 12A Blackstone, you feel me? And then even within that, there was subsections, you feel me? So when I start to learn about this demonstration and what was passed down through the new noble Drew Ali, who was the first and only Black man knighted, you know, in England by the Queen, you know, to have to be called a nobleman, you know, to be called sir and he came and why did he become that? Was he the greatest swordsman in the world? Maybe, but that's not what he got. Was he the greatest archer? Maybe, but that's not what he got it for. Was he the greatest athlete? Maybe, but that's what he got it for. He got it for bringing the Moorish science to England and letting them know where they come from and what this demonstration is and the Moorish science temple. And when we get this demonstration and see this Black man, upright, independent and fearless, you feel me? Cause you feel a lot alone and singularly, you feel me? So, you know, you can't feel death cause everybody gotta do that. Of course, I get it, I feel me. So we start to educate ourselves and my name happened to be Malik. So as I got older, some of the shorties couldn't differentiate between me and Chief Malik. So they would call me Chief Malik, some of the youngest. And I would say, no, I'm not Chief Malik. I'm one of the generals for show, but I'm not Chief. Chief Malik is in the penitentiary because America came and did their job on him, like they do upon any of our leaders, you know what I'm saying?  And that's just what it is. And that's what, you know, Edgar Hoover and all these FBI agents, CIA agents that have an exorbitant amount of budget to spend on dissecting and amputating from the community to the Black Messiah. You know, when I was interviewing Malik and Larry, it was worried that Larry Hoover's senior and Jeff Ford sit down and ate together. They go to the chat together. How big is that? Huge, for me, because I was one of the biggest on the GDK movement. GDK or whatever, disciples, blah, blah, blah. And it took me into becoming to my older age for me to embrace even my own flesh and blood cousins. That was on that side, you feel me? And sometimes wisdom come with age, sometimes age show up all by itself. But if you are forthright and seeking, then they come together. And, you know, as much as I love Vic Mensa, who was a star, Chance, who was, you know, on the GD side, I love both of them equally, you feel me? Dan LaDurk, who a BD, who I love.  Little Reese is somebody who I love. I was there the day they got signed to Def Jam, with them, you know, in the studio with them. These are men who I love. And then when Lil Ruga came with, let the GDs do the dough, I embraced him, bought him to Kanye. Kanye embraced him because Kanye GD, that's correct, you know, and put that whole thing together. There was some contingency inside of our group of should Kanye be indulgent?  Indulgent in this, that's who he is. And that brought Larry Hoover out. Wow. I mean, Larry were able to reconnect after 15 years. Wow. And become close. I've always been tied with his mom. Junior? This is Larry Hoover Junior. That's hard. Yeah, this is Junior. So he comes out and we connect and have a conversation about Ruga with the GDs and the Dough song, which was the biggest song in the country last year. You know what I'm saying? So, and people tell me, man, Mo, the most, you produced that song. I didn't produce it, I just, I remember that song. I told him, yeah. I told him to go get a hit and I'll bring him in. And I'm the person that I couldn't even stand to look at the GD in my life. You see what I'm saying to you? So we don't allow black men to grow in this country. We take them, we take a snapshot of them, we wrap them up and we throw them on the fire. We never let them, white men get to develop. They get to go through their protracted adolescence. They get to go to the Olympics and tear it up in some other country.  Oh, he's never been in trouble before. Well, I've never been in trouble before till the police arrested me. Well, that's real. I wasn't in trouble before. That's true, that's true. So we don't, you know, we don't allow black men to have the same protracted adolescence as white men in this same country. We don't give them the, we don't provide them the same forgiveness. So as me providing that, maybe for my own self, because I had some resources, was able to grow.  You know what I'm saying? Just on the street. That he ain't me. That's real. Out grouping. So I had to learn to close that chasm in between us cause there's no real chasm there, it's all imagined. That's it, that's it. It's all based on fear and lack of resources and all this bullshit. So to get him with Kanye changed his life. Changed the direction of the album Donter that we was doing. And everybody around me that called me like, man, so it took the most to let the GDs do the dope. And I laughed at it and say, yes. And knowing that him and Dirk was ops, but I love Dirk and I love Ruga. You feel me? And Dirk, when he did the TV show with me, he didn't have to do that. Bringing a little Dirk to that space with some GDs in the building. But Dirk has been somebody, I was there when his baby was first.    Be careful going home with that money cause everybody gonna need, I not want some, need some. Yeah, you know, that's right. Need, it's not, not want. That's real. It's need. Cause they got kids that's born the same day as your baby. Damn, they're all one on the way. You feel me? I can't keep a light song. Or my mama, they can't. So they go, you gonna go back home, take that money, build out here in LA. He went back home and you know, things, whatever happened, whatever happened, happened.  Right. You know what I'm saying? And people say, oh, Malik, how you condone that music? I condone people, you know, that's growing.  No. The more experience he have, he gonna change. But I'm not rushing that change. I'm saying, can he self sustain? That answer is yes. Am I proud of little Dirk being able to self sustain? That answer is yes. Can Ruga self sustain? That answer is yes. Am I proud of Ruga being able to self sustain? Answer is yes. Why don't you put Ruga and little Dirk together in the room and make a peace treaty? That's not how it works. I don't know peace treaties. I don't know peace treaties. What peace treaty don't mean nothing to me at that point. Now I'm for peace, even without the treaty. I'm for peace. So I'm gonna foster that. But I'm not gonna rush these men into a thing where they gotta shake hands and come out on TV and stuff like that. There's a lot of hurt between that. And we as black people gotta understand that we should be able to have the latitude to experience the range of emotions that come with my cousin, my friend, my brother being killed by your friends, cousins and brothers. They ask me on MTV one time, what you feel about Chief Keith leaking that music? I'm like, nigga, have y'all ever heard my music?   What y'all talking to me? I said, I knew my best friend was peddling. My wife was peddling, but I continued peddling. I got arrested before I got rich. Trying to make some scratch like trigger fee. This is on a R&B bad boy album. And Puffy let me rock with it. Shout out Puff. Shout out Carl Thomas. I'm not for the whole inoculized, sanitized version of life. Let these men experience their range of emotion. Let them go through their grieving processes differently and separately. So when they asked me about Chief Keith, I said, what? No, what did I say bad about Chief Keith? He's rapping and taking care of his friends and family. Wow. I want to go back. I want to go back to just how you and Kanye even linked up. I want the ground story on what, how does a guy who's being verbally and I don't know if physical, but abused by your mother. Yeah. Physical, broken nose. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean? Ostracized. Now all of a sudden you in a studio with a guy who produce producing. That's what I want to know about. Yeah, it's crazy. I met his mama and she was, I was introduced to her through, I want to call his right name, but it's Oscar Brown, the third Oscar Brown, junior son and Koresh Ali. Okay. Koresh Ali, his chosen name. And they had did a McDonald's commercial. Okay. And a lot of people in the spoken word and poetry and conscious community was upset about that.  That's where I'm from. That's real. Cause y'all ain't paying him. Y'all ain't selling him. I don't see y'all buying all his tickets at his motherfucking show. That's real. I don't see y'all buy his book out. Y'all ain't buying his motherfucking album.  No, it's real.   I'm not with that. I'm not on that. I don't believe in that. So every time he would be somewhere, I see a flyer, I will go. If what I will hopefully it costs 10, 15, $20. I'm going to pay. Show up. So they had an event and Haki Matabuti who was somebody who was an author and he's big time for me in the poetry world. As I got into the poetry world, his assistant introduces me to Don DeWest. And I talked to her.  I ain't say this stuff. Like I'm a black piece stone. I say, oh, dope. I shoot people. I got 80, I got 80 some arrests on my record. That ain't what I didn't give her that portion. You see, I'm saying to you, I gave her the portion that's going to make her leave and lean into you. She's like, I got a son that do music. And I want you to get around him. His name is Kanye West. I say, yes, ma'am. Because, you know, I got mother hunger. You know, I'm starving for a connection. And every, all of my friends, they know if you got a mama, I'm taking over. That's my mama too. Yeah, that's all. Everybody know. Rahim Devon know. Carl Thomas know. Common know. All my friends know. You got a mama. We share her now. That's all. That's all. I'm gonna be bringing Chinese food and more fun.  That's real. I want to ask you about the fact of what phase was this Kanye? Was he, had he done that? No, no, nothing. He hadn't done nothing. Let's talk about it. So, you know, Mama Donda. Yeah, Mama Donda. Well, before I went to meet him, I hadn't met him yet. Mama Donda had had a relationship with Noidee's mother. And Noidee was a friend of mine through common. They folk corner hustling. I'm a stone. And in their neighborhood, foals and stones don't get along.  He a folk. We went to high school together. So that was his people on 87th Street. I went to school on 87th Street. So in my neighborhood, the foals and stones is thick as steel. We friends, we brothers. There it was different because they didn't really had no GD ops in that neighborhood. So they were up with each other.  So the next time I heard about Kanye West was through my brother, Don C, who I love and talk to all the time. And I'm so proud of him. What he's done in his life, the Jordan deals and Nike deals and all-star weekend NBA, Spaulding Foot Lockets, crazy, Don C outside. You know what I'm saying? No games. No games. And he say, man, him and John Monopoly, who are somebody else who I love. He say, hey, can the Go Getters open up for you? I was the host of a bunch of shows in Chicago. I had money. They had to pay me. I won't always bring the best dudes out.  They got a little bit of money, you know what I'm saying? They can treat them good. You know what I'm saying?  So you understand, they gonna always attract to that energy and this human nature. No, I'm wrong with that. So I say, for y'all, yeah, Go Getters, okay. They some young GDs or whatever they say, man. And Kanye West is part of them. I say, oh, yeah, I know his name. His mama told me to be around him. I just don't have a way to be around him. So they say, yeah, he's, you know, he's that. He got a group and all that. And they got this song that my niggaz in. I think that was the name of the song that my niggaz in. And I had Card Blanc at the radio station.  That's me. And so I let them open up. And then I started to work on things happen and the Carl Thomas album went big. I started to work on the album. And John John, John Monopoli, who was A&R in my project with Zoe Rek is my man, Ola, in Nigeria. We have a very contentious relationship because, you know, he wasn't the best of listeners.  Yeah, of course. You ever tried to be funk? No, I didn't try to. No, you didn't. You're difficult. If you're talking to one, you better be talking in a way that y'all can come to an agreement. Exactly. And you can finesse them in the right way. Exactly. I got money. We wasn't here. But we pardoned it.  But John John said, man, I want to help put your project together. So we get Carl Thomas on the project. He said, you should get us off from Kanye West. I'm like, that's my third time here in Kanye West. Third time's a charm. So I slide over to his crib one day, you know.    But without the money. I figure so. So my fucker didn't really take him that.  You feel me? They didn't really take him that.   But I saw some talent in him and I saw some grit in him which was more important than the talent, you know. So we started to bop it, you know. And he saw me as the opportunity to have a big brother. His mother had already put the mandate out. I talked to his cousin the other day. She's like, Donna told you to stick with Cayenne and protect him. Are you doing that? I'm like, to the best of my ability. Just be. You know. And the reason that's big is because she's speaking from a different place now. It's on a whole another level. I do know that. And so I know, cause I got calls like that to where it, she ain't even got to see it. It's already being spoken to you constantly. No question. You live in it. You're trying to figure it out every day. And that's the whole game when something, cause it's speaking from a different place. It's heavy, bro. And I know that. It's heavy. It's heavy. I feel Donna's spirit all the time with me. Yeah, yeah. And somebody who I really looked at as a mama for real. Yeah. When Cayenne moved to New York, I was Johnny on the spot. You want to find these foods from your favorite place? What you want? You make it for what you want, mama. And I took pride in that. Yeah, yeah. I took pride in that. All the way up to Kanye got wounded in that accident. And then that took me out to LA. Yeah. To be around him, to be more present as a protector.   And my big brother was deaf. So he was a little bit like a little brother to me too. Had somebody I had to take care of. Yeah. He was deaf. And two people take advantage of a deaf kid in the neighborhood. That's real. He was the toughest nigga in the world. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.  He could knock anybody out. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He could run faster than everybody else. What I'm saying, I'm just saying, this is even stronger than that. No question. He could do all the flips in the world. He could get straight A's. He could play baseball, football, volleyball, basketball. He could jump. He could run, you know. So he didn't need that kind of physical protection, but he needed the protection from people emotionally tormenting him. That's right. Making fun of him. And he said, Malik, what they say? What they say?  Oh, fully. I know. One thing my daddy told me when I was real little, I was like four, maybe five. And I was telling my grandma. And when my brother came to play with me, he was two years old to me, he was seven. And the big kids who I really loved, the like teenager kids that used to let me be their little mascot, they ostracized him and kind of like made fun of him and abused him. And he was crying because they was bigger than him and they was bullying him. And my father asked what happened. And I didn't really know what to say. Because I seen it happening, not really having the vocabulary. My father said, man, don't you ever let nobody take advantage of or harm your brother. That's real. You stand with him and ever since then. It's been up. Ever since then. Me? Never, never, never, never, never, never, that I abandoned him in any way. You know what I'm saying? That's my big brother. And I learned sign language and that has taken me so many places. And I'm doing a book called, I learned to hear through a deaf man's ears. That's what made me such a cold songwriter and producer. Cause he could only hear Michael Jackson through putting the boom box to his face and then they go through his jaw to his brain. Cause the ear is dead. It's vestigial at that point and they ain't working. So the bone, the skull has to be his ear. The vibrations. And I see how he, the rhythm in which he moved. He's like, what are you saying? So I would tell him the lyrics then we got the tape. Cause he was here on the radio, we were taping from the radio but when we got the real tape, it got the words in there. So he could read along and I would give him the cadence. Wow. On that. And boom, eight Grammys. Wow. That's odd man.  Until he got better. And until basically I stayed with him until the spring time till it was time for his album to come out. Till it was time for, well, I had to go back to Chicago. I was still in the street. Yeah. So I had to go back to my hustle but I came out with 500. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. I came out to LA with 500. That's what he said he needed. And you know, the camera that they shot the documentary, the genius not a US genius documentary. I bought that camera. That's hard. That's hard. And they use a stolen camera. You don't want the energy of a stolen camera. You know? So I was like, let's buy the new camera. How much is the new camera? You know what I'm saying?   But I grew up with Cootie. Okay. You know? I grew up with Cootie and I put Cootie in a lot of positions to win put him into positions to get money, you know, the whole nine. And I, you know, Cootie was, I credit Cootie with one of the people that gave me the courage to leave the street. I kept trying to leave the street for years from like 94 until 2005 when I finally left. It took me like 11 years to leave the street officially. So I would leave and then I would go broke. Yeah, yeah.  One time I had to go to my little brother house Omar, he's on 113. He asked me for some money for his rent or something, pay something. And I said, man, okay. I said, bro, I gotta go back to these streets, G. I said, we prayed together. And my brother, we prayed in his basement. So I had to go back to the street. That was the one last time. And we prayed and I was like, man, I don't know how I'm gonna make it because I knew Niggas was telling and all that. And we prayed our way through it. And I'm blessed I never had to tell on nobody. What year was this? That was 2004. I left the streets in 2005. Wow. And we had a deep prayer, man. You know what I'm saying? So I do credit my brother with that. You know what I'm saying?   I mean, there's some guilt there.  He loved his mama. She was good to him. I understand that. I don't love his mama. Our mother, I don't love her. And it's okay not to love her. You know what I'm saying? It's okay. I don't hate her, but I don't have the love for her that you would think that you would need to have but a maternal unit that put you into the world because she was an antagonist, a consummate antagonist and enemy to me, an oppressor to me. And by him wanting to take up for her, it puts a rift between he and I, which is fine. He grown. And I'm just a person that's like, cool, that's who you love. Love her. That's fine. But you can't love her anymore. At the end of the day, I just feel like, and I never put nothing in a box because everything's always evolving. It's always evolving. So every situation, I don't take it to heart because I know all the time as God do his thing, everything will roll out. No question. But you gotta be patient. And without faith, you can't have patience. Without patience, you can't have faith. So you gotta have both. So at the end of the day, I'm able to work with everybody when it comes down to thinking that way. Talk boss. You know what I'm saying? So that's the only way to deal with people that you love and not detach yourself from. And I've proven my love to everybody. They've not proven they love to me. I get it. You know what I'm saying? And it's that time. And now it's the harvest, now it's the harvest time. Let me harvest what you planted. Y'all been harvesting what I planted. Y'all ain't never went without. Y'all got bombed out of jail. Y'all got y'all kids fed. Y'all got y'all rent paid. Now I gotta move to a new season because I can't have God being like, uh-uh. I told you, leave that alone. Y'all already done enough. You done that. Let them do for you. If they don't do it, they just don't do it. I'm not mad. No. But at the end of the day, even on Spider-Man, they say to who much is given, much is required. And I did all. Power comes great. Responsibility. There you go. So you already know what will come with leadership. No question. So at the end of the day, you are that one. And there ain't no way to get out from around that. Nowhere. Go ahead. Okay. I got a question. Yes, ma'am. Earlier you said you went to prison. How old were you the first time whenever you got in trouble? I never went to prison. I've been in jail. And I went to Illinois Youth, how old were you the first time? First time I got arrested. I think I was 13, 14.  No, I've had 82 arrests. 82 arrests. So how many of that end up being in jail? Only like four, five times. Oh, so you're lucky. Yeah. Lawyers, man. I'm blessed. Not lawyers. Not lawyers. That the thing I listened to earlier when you said about a conscience wrap. You know what really with that. I'm not a conscious rapper. I'm not a conscious MC. I think a lot of people have behind consciousness to make wack music.  I'm with music that matters. Music that makes a statement. I'm with that. I like music that uplifts people to make people feel something.  If you're not living that way. But when you think about you guys, you got a chance to rap or you got a comment out there on Chicago, like these guys are guys that basically, that's a lot of the where that terminology comes from. It does because, you know, what you guys saying, these niggas is having real conversations out here, though. Yeah. These niggas having real conversations. They really saying words. They're not, you know, I mean, think about common with, you know, talking about fighting motherfuckers and Wack MCs and I remember when Common and Drake was into it. When they were going in. Yeah. When Common and Drake was into it, when Common was into it, Ice Cube. Hold on, let me acknowledge this guy. It just came on the set. You got headphones right here, man. Yada, yada. This here is Kenyatta Sands, man. This guy right here is one of the reasons you on the platform today. It's my brother. I like to always keep it 100 on boss talk, 101 what a boss is talking. And this guy right here has been very, very, you know, dear to me too. You know, family man. So I gotta, I gotta, I gotta point that out. But, and then also his love for music, being one that love the music, being one that he loves to play the instruments and he just got a love for music and being with a brother like you, I couldn't help but put him on the panel, man. Thank you for coming on boss talk, 101 man. Man, you're welcome, bro. Yeah, man. I love this show. Thank you man. Boss talk, 101. If y'all don't know, y'all better know. Man, Yada was one of the first people that embraced me in this whole entire industry. That's all that I explained. So I didn't know about the clothing game. I did come into clothing early, but I came into it from the Frates. Okay. So we was hitting Frates and selling the clothes to some of the Korean clothiers and retailers that couldn't get the accounts. They couldn't get cross color. They couldn't get Carl Knott. Because the sales rep had their relationships with a lot of the Jewish shop keeps. So we would hit the Frates and if we could get the real shit, we'd give it to them. If we get the bootleg, we'd give it to them, whichever one they would buy from us. And I built the relationship with a lot of the Muslim and Korean retailers in Chicago. Wow. So much so, they embraced me and told me about different clothing shows which I had no idea existed. I had no idea they existed. No idea that clothing and shows existed. Whatever that meant, right? And then I met Shabazz brothers. And they told me about magic. Yeah. And this guy was working with Alvin Rodgers piece means piece. So we came out to magic in 1996 and there was a whole nother world. They started saying the magic show in Vegas.  Yeah, right. Yeah, that's what everybody said. Yeah, that's what I thought too early on. I'm like, what? The magic show? I ain't going no motherfucking magic show.  I'm saying to you. That's real. Some of the people that, because you're back in the days, the guy that was moving the most cocaine was working at the hotels. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They worked there. You know what I'm saying? Right, right, right, right. So you sell them a half a key or something like that and they look group or a key and they distribute throughout the hotels and then you stay out here for a couple of days. You might move four keys in five, six days. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was beautiful. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah, yeah.  So anyway, I was having a game change too. Yeah, yeah. Game always evolving too. The game evolved because they catch somebody and they motherfucking spill the beans. Spill the beans or either they find a new way to mess with the drugs and basically they water it down and they run the game, mess the game up. So it's a whole bunch, man. They're not businessmen. That's right. So when I came into the clothes and shit, I noticed hustlers that was also businessmen that kept the integrity of this game. That's right. So, Kenyatta's one of the first people. And the Knicks from the West Coast embraced me first. It's hard. Yeah, Kenyatta, Kimball, Dezo. Oh, wow, not Kimball and Dezo. Yeah, they from the jungle, I'm a stone. So the stone is in the jungle. Yeah, crazy. Yeah, so they embraced me. Carmen was beefing at the time. Bro was beefing with Q.  Because we was under the impression that everybody in LA was against us. You think like that? Yeah, I mean, I knew DJ Quik, Shout Out Blood. You know, I knew DJ Quik, AMG, second to none, Ceno, I knew them. But I didn't really know nobody else. I knew Park.  So he was not outside of our purview at that point. And I'm with the henchmen from New York. So it's all a kind of these dynamics going on. But niggas overlooked that and seen that I had some, you know, I was righteous, first of all, upright, stand-up guy. And these niggas embraced me and kind of let me until they click. Man, let me say this, man. They're a little group that, it's hard to get into them with these men like that. That's in the gang. They make they living out this gang.  No, no, no, and rightfully so.  You gotta deal with things delicately when it's got a purpose and it's something culture-driven. You know what I'm saying? So just think about this, man. You just say, Park, you know, he was going to jail. I just had somebody else on here say, Park, he was really quiet and he didn't even deal. You have so many elements of Park, bro. You're gonna have to interview so many people. Gemini, bro. They built so many different ways about Park and each one of them was totally different. Right. That's crazy, right? Yeah, yeah. He was laid back. He never did this. Yeah, when life's gone, it's a whole different dude. But when life's gone, all of you be in the corner. That's hard, man. I just, I had to say that, but anyway, man, like you one of those guys, I really can't get away from the fact of all of these Grammys, man, and all these options.  I don't know. I don't know if I had- You didn't enjoy it, did you? The understanding. I didn't have an understanding of what that meant. Yeah. Because that was not something that was aspirational in my city. You know, that was something for them other niggas, you know what I'm saying?  Not understanding this is an entertainment game. You know, not understanding that this is entertainment. Like we gotta keep it real. We gotta be authentic, you know what I'm saying?  And we're not understanding that we've been growing up looking at motherfucking James Bond, who's not a real person. The actor's a real person, but James Bond, not a real person. And we going through the ups and downs with James Bond. He in space, he getting shot up.  He driving a car into water. This entertainment, we living and dying with this motherfuckers entertainment. That's real. They getting it. Billionaire rich and we sitting here trying to sell some dope. Yeah. So we can take care of everybody. Yeah. Not smart. Yeah. But so I didn't understand Grammys and maybe it was a little bit embarrassed to have one. Wow. Wow. Maybe a little bit embarrassed. Yeah, maybe a little bit embarrassed. Like, I maybe had cheapened myself in some way. Yeah. More smoke mirrors, cardboard, plastic, water, and lights than it was concrete, base level foundational meat. What was that song that got you that great? That was, I think, All of the Lights, maybe? No. I don't know. Can't remember the first. Maybe it was All of the Lights. Or maybe it was Crack Music, maybe? Wow. Maybe it's Crack Music. Yeah. I think it was Crack Music. So many Grammys. Yeah, yeah, well, you know, like, I was just looking at it. You got 40, you know, platinum songs.  He got 30 something, maybe 40 himself.  That's crazy. I'm telling you, I deal with some people who, I thank God for you guys, man, because that's culture. Thanks a lot. You know what I'm saying? So, and without it, you know what I'm saying? These good moments, these moments we enjoy. I mean, you talk a lot about these moments. A lot of times music, music most of the time stimulates a lot of these enjoyable moments, man.  Thank you. I gotta thank you, you know what I'm saying? You got a favorite, bro? Yeah, you gotta ask that. You got a favorite song, bro? I mean, it's story, right? It's layered. There's a whole bunch of variables involved in that. The favorite song, I felt the most vindication from all the lights, because I fought really hard for that. But also, I fought very hard for Gold Digger to be the single. Also fought very hard for Good Life to be the single. Hold on, hold on, hold on. You know what I'm saying? I want you to go back to all of the lights. Just give me, you and I gonna just say these songs. Yeah, you gotta give me some details on how you even end up producing that and how you even, you know, give us the details in order for our people, our listeners to understand how they came about. That's the history. My production on All the Lights was, you know, honestly, you know, me trying to make the song viable enough for Kanye to like it for the album and to maybe be the single. That song was one of my favorites, though. Yeah, so that one right there, I feel the most connected to because there was a lot of fights. Okay.  And my biggest production on that was not just working with Elton John on the keyboards and Jeff- Another name would just drop and just- Elton John's big, man. Yeah, but how do you just have Elton John in your studio? Well, Elton John came with Mr. Hudson, who Kanye signed, who wound up doing a song with me called Here She Comes Again. And he also wound up doing Forever Young with Hove. So while he was in the States, he did a bunch of songs. I never knew that. You ever knew that, man? Yeah, Forever Young's, that's still my man to this day. You know, I'm kind of, I got like a lot of clout in London, you know what I'm saying? And so, but really I think my biggest contribution to all the lights outside of, you know, writing and stuff like that was, what I took away from the song. Okay. That's also production for everybody out there just to know production is also what you take away. What you take away. I agree with that. So I took away the Muhammad Ali sample that Kanye had in there. The champions here, boom, boom, boom. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now I'm a Muslim from Chicago, grew up idolizing Muhammad Ali. Of course. Of course.  Man, Muhammad Ali's like this and he punching him in the nose. Yeah, that's his love. So we, you know, all black people, he's the most famous person in the world for a very long time. So we took that sample out and it hurt to take the sample of Muhammad Ali's voice out. Cause I had the opportunity to meet him several times and even in my adult life to meet him. Man. And to meet his daughter. That's me. And we was at the Beverly Hilton hotel having breakfast and taking that sample out. Cause it was part of my life. I felt like there was in that sample. The champ is here, boom, boom, boom, boom. So I was trying to write the, I was trying to write the hook around that sample.  Was he in the win? Yeah. Yeah, just win. Go ahead. So I'm trying to write around that sample and it's not working. And I can't master it. I can't hit it.  That was cold, but it wasn't what it needed to be. And the spirit letting me know that's not, it's not there yet. All this makes sense. You know, the champ is here, the champ is here, the champ is here. Unless it was cool, but that wasn't what the song needed to be. So understanding that, I had the engineer Andrew remove the sample. Okay. Though it hurt, it was painful to me. It also opened the song up and let me have a different train of thought. So that's how we get to the, to the, all the lights. All the lights. Let's go to the next one. But the horns was probably like, The horns was there and the song was called Ghetto University. The song was called Ghetto University. And then when I came with the, all the lights. But I got to have, that kind of has like a rocky feel to it. Yes, it does. Like triumphant. That's what I'm saying. I was trying to, I was going to the directly, I was too, I was too on the nose of triumph and fighting and what the champion is. And we already had a song.  Yes, I did. I picked it up and brought it back to the crib. We had that song already and I'm trying to make another one. Okay. That wasn't what Spirit wanted. Spirit wanted that, all the lights. Well, the next one you had mentioned was. That's crazy though. What was the next one you mentioned? Gold digger. Gold digger. I said gold digger was a big one, man. Yeah, it was a big one. It was a big one for, for Kanye in my eyes. It was, it was, he helped. She ain't looking for no what? What? Yeah. They was on it. And Jamie that, I believe that pretty much pulled him out of a shell. No question. That opened up everything for him. No question. With dollar, dollar contradiction.  Yeah, just working with that, working with the fact that this, the Ray movie was so big and Jamie was so big from the Ray movie and people really realized that this man had that gifted voice like that. And so I had a relationship with him already from Slow Jams. Yeah. Yeah. We had the relationship. Sure was, sure was. We used with Jamie and then one of the stones from Chicago, Tayshawn Barrett. His daddy is Reverend T.L. Barrett that we got later on got a song from the father stretch. Wow. Sam will come from him. And me and Tayshawn, we close brothers.  So he was living with Jamie.  Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Jamie was our man. Okay. And Brandy as well. People don't understand our relationship with Brandy early on. We'd be at her house almost every day. Crazy. She would cook food. That's what she was married to do. Yeah, yeah.  So all these relationships in 2002, 2003 were formulating, right? And that's how we got that, that Slow Jams. Yeah, yeah. She had on some modern games. Oh my God. Some Luther Van Drols. Yeah. Little Anita. Will definitely set the party up, right? Hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm. That thing was so. That album was like, man, I'm gonna have to play this all night now, bro. So y'all knew you had something. Smoky Rob. Did you know you had something to be? Yeah, we know. I mean, I always know. I always know. But Kanye is such a like a grinder. He'll chop up a fruit, a beautifully created fruit salad to make fertilizer. I love it. Cause he's a consummate troublemaker. Yeah. He's a contrarian. Me, he told, he accuses me of liking good music. That's his accusation. You just like good music. You just want it to be good.  I'm like, bro, we can't live like that all the time, G. No human can live in that constant turmoil, my nigga. It's not good.   Yeah, right, right, right, right.  And that's when he's happy. That's why he made that poopity scoop, dupe. Yeah. That'll probably be a Drake song.  I killed this bars. I'm at his place out in Calabasas. I'm like, oh, you did? Okay. I wish I could have got some bars in there, but if you killed it, you don't need me, nigga. Let me just hear it.  And it was poop, scoop, to me. I was like, oh, jeez. Let me ask you this. What did you think about when he was dealing with the Donald Trump and going up to the White House and there were mega hat and all that? This is your guy now. And at the end of the day, you with him no matter what. I know, but let's just give me a spiel on it. I love him. You know, we brothers, we're not friends. Yeah, yeah. He's not a nigga that I would choose to be around. I'm not a nigga, he'd choose to be around. Yeah. We around each other on occasion when the interstellar universe line up. You feel me? It's like, if you're in a motherfucking Ferrari and it's Lamborghini at the light in front of you and y'all both turning right, because of the nature of the electronics of the car, your turn signal is gonna be off time.  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I never thought that someone would say something like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Then it goes back a ride. That's me and Kanye. That's dope. That's all. Every now and then. And beyond. When he, like he said, my mama presses my mamas with me. And she said, thank you for being here. Did not, no, I got a car. Yeah, of course. I got to show up. You know what I'm saying? Rather than that, we don't go to dinner together. We don't traditionally like the same kind of bitches. We don't like to be around the same kind of people. You know what I'm saying? He a GD, I'm a star. You know what I'm saying?  You know what I'm saying? Very much so. When I say this name, when I say Shug Knight, what come to mind?  And me and him had a very antagonistic relationship so much that it put me in jail. Wow. You know? And I was in this hotel. The last time I saw Shug, I was in this hotel and we got into it. We didn't, wasn't no fisticuffs or nothing. But we was in the hotel.  And I can't wind up late to Kanye's concert at the Palm for New Year's Eve. For New Year's Eve? What year is this? Six. Okay. Yeah. Kobe Bryant was there. Amari Stoddermeyer. This is where everybody was at. This is where we was at. So I'm late. I get in, I'm like, I ain't got time to go to my room and get in the show to make sure Kanye's straight. You know, I would be backstage and just encourage it. Man bro, we would say the prayers. And I thank God for Kanye West. Like bro, this time, you know, other places we's in London, he's like, man, I can't do this. I'm like, bro, we got to. Like we don't have a choice.  Can't do that, my nigga.  I'm VIP with this nigga. Yeah, he getting more famous at this point. It's just hot at this point. Yeah, he's getting fire, right? He came out the gate. Yeah, I had the famous crack music song with him and me and him in game at that point. So as the spirit guides me to be late and to leave my bags, I run directly in the shed. And this is six months, four or five months after the shooting. And I'm surprised that I went to jail for that because I didn't shoot him. Right, that part. I mean, look at the law. Look, look what the court say. The court say I didn't shoot him. I say I didn't shoot him. Do I know who shot him? Probably. Who shot you? Am I gonna tell who shot JR? I'm not gonna tell. No, I'm not. You know, that's not what it is. You know, you got shot in the leg, fam.  This means there's angels with you, boy. For real? This means there's angels with you. You get shot in the leg, fam. You don't deserve a leg shot. Nigga, you ain't earned that, but that's the mercy of a law, though. So you get a leg shot. And how I go to jail for that, man? Wow. How I go to jail? How do I go to jail for that? And everybody, oh, Malikus, you don't even know. He's the Illuminati. He with Puffy and them. He, me, me, me, me, me, me. Puffy my big brother, he helped put me in the game. More than anybody else, probably Puffy is responsible for my career.   And then he stopped me. And one day I addressed that with Puff. I said, man, Puff, we had a good thing going. I was paying you, he said, man, the money got way higher than that, Malik. Wow. Too much was at stake. This was in LA. We was in Santa Monica. He said, money was too much, man.  And I had to understand people graduate, pass their need for you, not that he ever misused me in any way. You know, and we still got a relationship. That's my big bro. We talk, you know, quite often, actually. But I had to understand, because I felt like abandoned by him. Now he got money, he don't need me. No, it's up to me to get up to it now.   Right. I'm saying, I'm the bad person. Y'all see Shook, that's how I hate when my fucks be on that.  Anybody could shot Shook. Right. Wow.   How's it me?   You know what I'm saying? How you know? How you know it was me? And why don't you tell? So, wait a minute. So he, he the one that he told me? No, there's no way nobody else told. Unless somebody was like, I seen Malik shoot Shook night, it might have been that. And, you know, and my adult brain, it could have been that. Somebody could have said it, but I don't get a rest a lot for people seeing me shoot somebody. Man. You feel me? It's possible. Yeah. That he didn't say a motherfucking word. Like he said, I ain't saying, I thought you would die if I had, you thought you had something to do with that. But anyway, no, man, look, Shook was doing what he had to do at a time. And then it turned bad. And you have to be able to balance, you know, the same rule, the same hand that you conquer with cannot be the same hand that you rule with. And once he conquered and became the predominant and preeminent music label in the world, he needed to be able to pull back and he didn't have enough people around him enough to engineer, to re-engineer his spirit to make him pull back. Because power corrupts.  That's why it corrupts.  That's what it looks like to you. And that's not the truth. Change that lens and look at it through a clearer lens. Not the lens that with all the mud and scratches on it. And that lens has to shrink and observe you only. Wow. I just interviewed Reg Wright and he was saying, he tried to convince Shook that you don't have to do all these antics anymore because you already got the wheel rolling and people already feared you. So you don't have to do all this stuff. Have to do all this. So he was saying, because they were friends, it's a grace to be saying, if you would just not even do anything and just your reputation holds its own, you don't have to be a part of it no more. But Shook just kept being Shook. kept being Shook. And the Malufs is, when they was the owners, that was they man. And he wasn't giving them the whole truth. And most people, it ain't humans emotionally, we make decisions, not logically. It's logical to tell the whole truth, even if it may diminish you a little bit in the story. But to be the victim or the victor is better than being the villain. Yeah. For humans.  And he's like, man, give me your number. I'm like, same number I've been having, bro. Yeah. It's like me. Same number I've been having, bro. I got niggas in the penitentiary that's doing life. That's right. Niggas are doing 90 years. Niggas on death row. I got to answer the phone cause they got children and now grandkids outside. That's real. You feel me? So I go to the VIP and a flailing self security comes like, yeah, we want you to, I'm like, man, y'all ain't having me move nowhere, Joe. Y'all like that? If y'all like that, then do something. No real time. Let's go. You know, do something. So then they go get another security couple, security guard and get one of them a loose. He's like, well, Mr. Knight is our guest. I was like, I'm a guest too. I'm here with Kanye. I'm the, you know, I'm one of the investors. I'm a writer, I'm a producer with Duke and he's the main actor. He can come in here if he want to. That's real. He could be in this place if he want to, but further seeing to me that he done told on me.  I went to jail on accident, I guess. And now here you go with on stone, man. On my mama, I feel like, you know, and they was bullying Danny boy. That's how I first got into it. They was bullying Danny boy. Definitely. And he out of Chicago. He out of Chicago, he from the West side. So I got a couple of hard hitters I know from the West side and we came out here to holler at these motherfuckers. Like you can't just treat a person like you want to treat them because Parker was my man. Parker was like, yo, they'd be definitely out here bullying Danny boy. I'm like, I'm on my way strong. Cause I don't like that. Cause I was bullied by my mama. That's real.   You were spoiled. That's when I was four years old. I'm like, the whole family holding the grudge cause my grandmother treated me special. That's what y'all mad at?  So you saying he, what did you, how did you guys approach that situation with them bullying Danny? How did you get your point across? Went to death row. Okay. Like, it's not sanctified and hollow ground it to me. You know, if it need, if it need to breathe and it can bleed, it can cease to exist. Yeah.  No, I agree.  Well, I agree. So y'all gonna stop. Went straight. No, some people ain't going. It just don't. It's a lot of dudes like that. That's why I always told people like, it's different where I come from. Like, you not gonna just do anybody in a kind of way and anybody can do you. It's real. Like, I told you about this and you might not know where I'm coming from. But somebody was telling me about 50 did this and it was Mike Cherry. And I was like, man, where I'm from, it don't matter how much money you got. You're not gonna disrespect like that.  Anybody can get you. So you just, you gotta move in a way the way you respect people. And I think a lot of time, different cities live by different codes. And sometimes people don't know they being disrespectful.  Brain so scarred from childhood or whatever. They don't know any disrespect. They thinking like, okay, I'm done disrespecting you. You should forgive me and let me back in your circle. I forgive you because I know where you come from. You come from where I come from. But I'm not letting you back in my circle because you don't have any learned your lesson on how to conduct yourself. You haven't learned. And it's gonna cause us to clash. Let me ask you something too. How much did this damage Danny Boy's career? When it held him back. In any situation. It held him back a lot. Cause we didn't hear a lot from him. Even after Pox Dev, we didn't hear. You didn't hear no more. He just kind of fell back when it was at the, he was at a pinnacle in his career. What? I ain't mad at you? Yeah, it fell off. Yeah, he was at a pinnacle. And it should have been something coming behind that. Yes, it should have been. It didn't, it didn't, it just feels like- He went out to flourish because you under this much stress, right? In the environment where you pose to be under the least stress. Not that you gotta be comfortable to create. You shouldn't be comfortable anyway, but the stress of danger and shit like that, it's very difficult for a kid like him. And you know, they knew a little something about his sexuality that we didn't know in Chicago. You know what I'm saying? Correct. So they use that against him.   And I was like, man, that's gonna stop, G. Yeah, yeah.  That's, that's finna stop. And if you don't like it, do something. And I'd say you had already been through a lot and it touched you in a different way. Touched me in a different way.  Exactly. So I didn't definitely get it, I understand. That's why I was able to be so well in 18 years old when I went to the army.  This on phase, me. It don't worry, it don't worry, do it. It don't worry. I don't feel nothing. These motherfuckers crying and leaving and going home. And I'm sitting here like, this is slow Sunday. This is slow Sunday for me. Slow Sunday. No, no, that's real.  I wanna ask you about the music then and the music now. I wanna, I wanna go to a point of how you feel about the music, how you feel about it, the way it's been distributed, how you feel about a million streams equating to $4,200. You know what I'm saying? I wanna know. I like it. Okay. Because no matter what, I can tell a shorty, hey man, go listen to my song on Spotify. Yeah. I can't say go buy my CD cause where they gonna buy it from? Correct. You gotta deal with what you got. Cause if I had a CD, I, my career would've been over if it was still in the CD game. Yeah, yeah, yeah. My career would've been over. Yeah, that's different. Cause when the CDs start to store, the store stop ordering them. Now it's on to the next stuff from Def Jam or Universal or whatever label. But now we live in an environment where it's ubiquitous, where it's always there. That's real. You know what I'm saying?  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Still gotta apply your hustle, man. So what do you tell that young kid that's trying to figure it out? That he's at home, he's watching, he don't know the algorithm. Is that kinda, he don't know but what he see and he wanna be a part of something, he see you and he see you with all the Grammys and all the different things that accolades that you carry. How do you get through to him and say, hey man, this is what you do, this is how you win in music industry? I tell him, I hit the lottery, man. Don't bet your career on hitting the lottery. I hit the lottery. I came up in Chicago at a time when I had money and I had skills and I had relationships all converged together. Becoming a, this version of me is so difficult. But the version of you that's never been done is very easy. Wow. Because you're making it as it goes. Be yourself, cause everybody else already taken. Wow. That's all. It can't be Michael Jordan, it's already a Michael Jordan. Straight up. Me and your Michael Jordan, man. Yeah, that's Chicago, man. No question. Save man, yeah. So I want to be sure of these to understand that, man. It's nothing that's easy. We make it look easy cause that's entertainment.  Four hours, wake up to 36 more hours on one song. Now don't take all that cause then Kanye is torturous. He likes to see people suffer.  He likes to see people in turmoil. He gets a kick out of it, that's his kink. I'm not, I can't tell him what his kink to me. You know what I'm saying? You know? So I feel like these shorties, they feel like I got a remote control. I could turn the channel whenever I want. I can call anybody that's in my phone whenever I want if they answer or not. I can go online and order the newest Jordans if I feel like it. Right. Why can't I just have the industry that I want? I can go and look at the baddest bitches in the world right on Instagram. I can communicate with her, even if it's a one-way communicate. I can be like, oh, you fine, shorty, but, but, but. So I think that structures the brain in a way where they think like, and then I should also have this thing that I have desired or I'm made for, I'm built for, I believe in myself so much. And I tell, I challenge these shorties. Do you believe in yourself or do you believe in your talent? Not the same thing. Believe in your talent, that's easy.  But do you believe that you can make it to the league? Cause that's a lot of work. You know, I learned something about music. I was talking about like, you know, even Beyonce mentioned that she was talking about just, you know, having a struggle, you know, having a life with, you know, with some type of conflict allows you to write better music. And, you know, a lot of what we're seeing nowadays is people not having that type of struggle. And then the music is being a little different. I think they're having a struggle. I don't think they just put it in the verses.  Man. The stuff that he's telling me, I'm sitting here, my mind has been gone, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, all the songs he don't touch. Now I was like, wait a minute, these are songs that I must have rotated at least a hundred times. That's, and that's the, that's the talent. My kid. The thing is I grew up, I grew up with two brothers out in the music industry. So my first brother introduced West Coast to hip hop in LA. So I was, I've been to personally as a little brother to big brother, some of the biggest studios. So I went, hey, he was my first introduction to studios. And then my second brother who's also into music and he's the West Coast bassist, live bassist, because at that time they didn't want to pay for the samples. So he was my brother that played the bass for all these songs. Yeah, yeah. So he worked with everybody. And I'm walking, coming home to like, you know, I'm seeing Dubs, he walking out the house. I'm seeing all these plans with, you know, with Ice Cube and what not. I even did a song with Ice Cube once. But being in the studio and then hearing what this guy had created, different level, man. Different level, definitely. The top of the artist of all time, Dead or Alive. Number one. Me and genre. Number one. I've asked you late about this all the time. But my number one, I would have to say is Jimi Hendrix. Man, good choice. I love it. I have to say Jimi Hendrix is number one. Why? Because of his versatility and his willingness to change.  We did not get to see, not even the best of him, but we saw greatness. We didn't see the best of him, but there was still greatness. Yeah, yeah. Feel me? Number two. Number two. Let's start with Henry real quick, though. Okay, go ahead. You guys got something you want to put in there? Yeah, let's go. The band had three pieces in this band. If you listen to it, music is selling, you got five people playing this music for us. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Spiritual, soft spiritual. The thing this guy had did with that guitar was undone.  But when you hear in the rhythms and how he's able to kind of just freak out when you think about that, nobody does that, but him. Nobody. Yeah, he starts the movement with everyone wanting to be Hendrix-like. Feel me? That's hard. Number two? Number two. And also I've asked you late about this and it's like, it's a hard one because that number two spot is so, you know, it's so many viable artists in that space. But I have to give it to Bob Marley. Me? Yeah. No, I get that. I get that. I have to give it to Bob Marley, man. He ain't even lying. And the third woman, it shocks people a lot. People don't like when I say it. They get mad at me, they get upset with me when I say it. And I do understand that. I do understand how people can feel, can feel a way about this person's music. And it sometimes embarrasses me because this is the kind of music that I love, that not only love what I like, but I love this music and I love this artist as an artist, not as a public figure, but as the tapestry that they paint it for people, the tapestry that is something that I can't, I can't let go of, you feel me? People say, oh, he was corp, he was constructed, he wasn't real, this person was made and all these different things. And I have to give it. And oh yeah, people in this band doing that have to give it to Prince, I have to. I can see that. People have a problem with that because he was a pop version of rock. He was a somewhat of a soul version of punk. Yeah. But the beauty of the convergence, the beauty of the convergence of that, he was like, oh, there's many people bad in him. Jane, he was a copy of Jane's Brown. He was a copy of this person, albeit true. I mean, who doesn't like Jane's Brown?  Exactly.  Crazy. Yeah, anybody would. He dressed just like Jane Brown. You looked at him. Outfit for outfit, he was being Jane's Brown. I do understand that. I'm not saying that. Why don't you just say Jane's Brown because Jane's Brown didn't move you like Prince. No, he was different from Jane's Brown. Jane's Brown was ridiculous. Evolved. But Prince was able to, you know, they say, good artist copy, great artist deal.  This guy didn't know how to, you know, read one note but can play what, 15 instruments? Who? Prince? Like a virtuoso. He's a polymath. 27 instruments. He's a polymath. Virtuoso. So he's getting out, I play piano. I'm listening to him like, wow, this guy can do that. Then he's gonna get up on a guitar. Then he's gonna get up on this. That man, that dude is a, for his choice, I can't complain, man. Prince is something. People, because people, they see him and they immediately see the perm and they see Jane's Brown. And he, okay. I'll say he took Jane's Brown whole thing but made it better. Man.  Man. That's real. If you're gonna copy my automobile, make a better version.  You know what's crazy? That concert that he had when he put Prince and Michael Jackson on there. I remember that. He actually did that on purpose because he wanted to see what his competition was like. He was still relevant enough to where he saw Michael Jackson and Prince as like, hey, these are my guys. I wanna see what they look like on stage. Wow. I was finna get up, dude. He said that. I wanna ask you about checking in. It's a check in thing people keep talking about. Oh, I definitely check in. I wanna know about how you feel about it. Oh, I love it. Let's talk about it. Oh, I love it. I love it when somebody comes to Chicago and be like, I'm in Chicago. I'm just checking in. These are my OGs that do it too. From Nike, from wherever, you know, from other cities, other countries. I'm just checking in there.  And when I come to LA, when I go to New York, I check in. Mm-hmm. What? Of course. What, where would you go? Where would you go in, let's say, the ancient world, right? Yeah. If you traverse the landscape between Asia, Eurasia, and Africa, and don't announce yourself to the Naya bingé. Yeah. Why wouldn't you do that? No, that's real. And you know what they like to eat, right? And they can bring that. Yeah. Oh, right, right, right.  I ain't checking in with nobody.  And that's 90% of this industry. Wow. Managing relationships. This my nigga. I ain't seen him in years. He said, my boy got a podcast. I want you to be on it. There's nothing else he got to say. Wow, that's hard. That's hard. And that's that code. Because his relationship means that much to me. That's real. That's real. That says a lot. His relationship means that much to me. To have him as an ally means I could take 30 minutes driving and 30 minutes to sit down. Man, he told me. He said, you got to do this. This one here is the one you got to do. I said, really? He said, yeah, man, this one here. I could wait to get up and tell you about that. Yeah, he said, I'll call me. But at the end of the day, I'm going to do it. It don't matter if you've been in Chicago and he said, you got to do it. He going to call me. He know it's a code you go by when you've been around like us, man. And God put us in this situation for a reason. I believe that. So I live by a different code than like that's broken. You have mentioned Donald Trump. We didn't get to go in on that. That's the same thing, though. Like Donald Trump, I had a relationship with Donald Trump. Not kind of. Kind of nothing about politics, first of all. OK, that part. He just know what he don't like and what he do like. And he weaponizes that to make people feel bad. Yeah. Because that's one of the things he likes to do. Yeah. And I don't think he would argue with that. If he was sitting right here, he'd be like, yeah, I do. I like to make people.  You know, you can tell that. Yeah, that's what he liked to do. I mean, more than he liked to do music, he liked to make people feel uncomfortable.  Yeah. And that's what he gets a kick out of, you know, as long as he ain't tying motherfuckers up in the basement. I'm cool. Do you, nigga?  But Donald Trump, you know, Mike Tyson introduced me to Donald Trump. Wow. That's me. And Mike Tyson, you know, that's my big brother.  And his introduction to Donald Trump for me in 2005. I didn't mean Donald Trump to 2005. I was late into it. Will I am a snoop and puff them already? Them niggas already knew him because they was famous.  Right. So Donald Trump was famous for giving niggas money. He's still it from white men. He was the Robin Hood, you know, other clique. He's still it from white men. He finagling about their money. That would never give niggas money, by the way, anyway. Real talk. So I'm not feeling sorry for them motherfuckers. And he give it to niggas. But what happened was he found out a slick. He's he takes the easy way to everything.  He didn't know how to get up and go to work. He went to the White House and seen all his work. He had to do. He just kept doing rallies. Hey, that's some stuff. Yeah, he just kept doing rallies. He never he never went to work. You know, you get hired in a place. And you just go there for the lunch breaks, nigga. You get enrolled in the best school that you want to get into.  You gotta really walk out with the Bible. He'll help you out with it right away. This nigga held the Bible upside down. I'm going back in. I'm going back in now. He didn't do nothing. He just, I gotta go inside.  That's it. Kanye probably about 10 of them. He made 26 million off Donald Trump has made in China. Straight up. Man, that is so wild, but so true. So he just didn't go to work. He was not used to working. And that's something I couldn't see because when I see somebody rich, because where I'm from, where we from. We work. This nigga worked. Yeah. So we take that and we superimpose that over everybody we know. That's somebody that's that big and not realizing that he went in that motherfucking, the four years of kicking it. Four years of kicking it.  Kicked it. He had a great time. Yeah, like a wonderful time. Man, that boy had fun and was melding, torturing people the whole time. What? In his own zone. I went to DC in October. Some of my OGs tell me, I'm a Republican. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They telling me, your boy was out here. He wouldn't even be in DC.  Man, that boy there, man, when he decided to send him up to that building and they got all through the window, I said, this dude, he going in like, like it's a different level, man. Like this here's something. Hey, America, you never seen it like this. Yeah, that's just the way it went down. They set them fools up, man. They've got them talking like, yeah, y'all should take y'all stimulus money. These motherfuckers using their stimulus money to fly to DC. They can't track this. But my question, my question is. You're not going to jail. And then the people in the White House, they say, man, what y'all doing in here? Man, we making money. Let me see your laptop. Let me see your emails. Yeah, they're like, this all illegal. They're like, it is.  They're like, it's still illegal, nigga. You was in the street. We was overlooking it. Yeah.  Yeah, that's the hour. Make all the pills in the White House, MyPillows.   I was just trying to figure out who was the guy who actually transported the noose out there, bro. I'm just saying, man, they had a four-hour, four-hour noose out there. It was ready to go in. A hangman stand, a hangman stand. They woulda did it. They kept the police, what you talking about? They wasn't playing no game. They was seized, man. They were serious. They believed every bit of that rhetoric, Joe. And I think he felt like I went too far. Yeah, but how was it not pre, like how was it not playing? It was playing. Supposedly, oh, he was just gonna roll up there, but how do you say something that's not playing but you got the noose set up? Man. Outside, bro. It's a 100% plan, bro. But the thing is, I'll be having, I'll be ruminating about this. Either Donald Trump was in with the Feds or he just all the way dumb. It's only two ways.  We got some stuff on you, you don't know about my nigga.  You ain't gotta say nothing.  I don't even know the thing. In the building. Check it, man. Hey, man. Listen, man. I'm trying to figure it out, man. There's a new music coming. What's going on this year? It's 20, hey, 2023. What's it gonna be, bro? Yeah, Jordan here. What they call in Greek, they call it Psy. Okay. This is Psy, the 23rd letter. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. In the Greek alphabet, Psy. That's the important number because it's pivotal. Yeah. You gotta think about Omega Psy Phi. That Psy is a pivotal number. A pivotal letter that represented by a number or a number represented by a letter.  I'm doing entertainment this year. Okay. I'm doing videos for songs I put out 20 years ago that I never did a visual on. I'm doing a movie about it. I'm telling the story about it.  That's hard. This is my first time really for the last six months doing podcasts. Oh, this one here, it's going in. Only on Boss Talk, they're back. Boss Talk, one on one. That's what you're supposed to be, bro. I am. I'm being real. No question. In Dallas, we're gonna do it again. And I'm gonna be honest with you.  Because at the end of the day, they need to hear from you because this and the foundation is real, bro. And when I- Especially with Texas. I love Texas. When you talking, you gotta realize people here and this man, it's gonna help somebody. You never met nobody like this, bro. No, no, no, no. I mean, I'm being real. It is gonna help people. That's what I know. I like that you said that. I gotta keep remembering that. That's the whole game. Somebody gotta get ahold of this and get help back. That's the whole game. Because I haven't been through all the rehabs. That's why. I've been addicted to everything except for nicotine and caffeine. Oh. Violence addiction, rage addiction, violence addiction, food, gambling, alcohol, Vicodin, 18 months. Every day, Vicodin pills. Wow. Wow. 18, that's almost two years. To be addicted to it. That's before we knew what opioid addiction was. They just keep refilling your prescription. As long as you keep paying, they get $83. They go, your bottle of pills, Joe. Come on back for some more.  You don't spit them up with bitches. Do whatever you wanna do. Give them to friends. Taste this.  Like, man, I ain't no junkie. These motherfucking pills, cause for my knee. My knee got hurt. North side. North South Chicago. South side. Yeah, I had a little bit. Yeah, that money ain't gonna north side of the man. Man, you're gonna need to have, like, 10-bop, 10-bop, 10-bop, 10-bop, 10-bop, 10-bop. We gon' get it together, man. Hey, man. We gotta set it down.  But man, love you, brother. Man, thank you so much, brother. Uh-uh, uh-uh. Listen, man, let's stop playing, man. When I say embraced me, you know. Love it, man.  It's going down. All points check out. It's going down, man. Thank you so much, man. Thank y'all. Hey, man, y'all, see what's going down, man. Can y'all have sands, man? Come on, man, believe yourself, man. It's going down, man. It's been another great segment of Boss Talk 101. What a boss-ish talk. Boss. Thank y'all.


To calculate the average temperature at the top of Earth's atmosphere, we need to look at the balance between the solar radiation energy coming into the Earth's system against the infrared radiation going out of the Earth's system. The solar irradiance is essentially parallel by the time it gets to Earth, so it is intercepted by Earth's cross-section, which is just pi r Earth squared. Since the fraction of the solar radiation is immediately reflected and scattered back out into space, this is what we call the albedo, we have the correct amount of radiation energy that Earth's system absorbs by subtracting off the albedo. On the other hand, Earth radiates all in all directions, so assuming Earth's emissivity is 1, then Earth's irradiance is in watts per meter squared, and if we multiply by Earth's surface area, really the surface area at the top of the atmosphere, then we get the energy leaving the Earth's system every second, that is, in watts. We can use the laws of exponents to rearrange this equation to get an equation for temperature. When we put in typical values for the Earth's system in solar irradiance, we calculate that the radiating temperature at the top of the atmosphere is 255 Kelvin, or minus 18 degrees C, or zero Fahrenheit.