Where you from?
Brooklyn, New York
Brooklyn is a place where a lot of emcees have come out of. Can you describe what emcees influenced you on your way up?
I wasn’t really influenced by emcees. I was more influenced by fans and my own personal tastes in music. I started rhyming after hearing “Check The Rhyme” by A Tribe Called Quest. That was 9 years ago, but I developed my own style based on whut I liked to hear.
I noticed that you have an original style. Did you pay a lot of attention to originality when you started rhyming?
I didn’t necessarily concentrate on originality as much as finding ways to say whut I want. I always used wordplay, and I let the actual flow and rhythm come naturally to me.
Would you characterize yourself more as a battle emcee, a freestyler, or just a typical song writer?
I consider myself an entertainer. You could definitely call me a battle emcee…cause I been in practically every major MCbattle tournament known to hip-hop. But I don’t limit myself to being a battle emcee. I can do so much more. My main aim is always to entertain, though.
You’ve won MANY battle tournaments, and been in a finalist in mad competitions. When you walk the streets, do people recognize you?
Yeah…it’s kinda dope. Sometimes I feel bad for not recognizing people after meeting them, but to me, fans and all hip-hoppers in general are my family, so I treat them all as such. You can ask anyone who knows me that.
I feel that. Who are some of the iller heads you’ve battled in your career?
Damn, I dont even know where to start. Some of my better battles were with heads like Tonedeff, Pumpkinhead, Substantial, and Breez Evahflowin C Rayz Walz, Many Styles and Eyedea to name a few.
That’s some great competition. Speaking of Tonedeff, you and he collaborated to come in 6th in the Napster/Rapstation contest. How’d you meet up with him, and what made you realize that you wanna be on the mic with him?
I met Tonedeff at a battle, and saw him a few times later. We talked all the time online, and we decided to do that joint for Napster. The chemistry was dope. So we did another track with me, Substantial, and Session. It was hot, so we formed a crew now known as Extended F@mm.
Cool. How’d you hook up with Substantial?
That’s a loooong story. We had a mutual friend, and I met him through her. Then I saw him twice in the same day at two different shows. One was an open mic. To get on that open mic, you had to have your name picked out of a hat. I told him if one of us gets picked, we should bring the other up on stage with. We decided to call each other
Pack*y*Stan. We didn’t on that night but we kept the name. Now we been rockin the mic for 2 years strong together.
When you’re not recording music and practicing, what do you do?
I do mad different things. I’m a closet computer geek, so when I’m not at a show, you can find me in front of a computer or spending time with my girl, or working. I know a lot about computers, so I save money by not having to pay people to do graphics and websites and things like that. Plus, people paying me that same money to do it for them.
Getting that money…
Ha Ha
To you, what characteristics describe a good emcee?
To me, a decent emcee has to know whut he wants people to hear and not worry about whut people want to hear from him. He’s gotta be confident about whut he can do, but at th same time realize his limitations in order to advance. A good emcee is not caught up in himself.
Aiight, so what’s a great emcee then?
A great emcee has mastered all those characteristics of a good emcee, great mc’s uses those characteristics to invite the audience into his world.
What producers have you enjoyed working with, and what producers do you plan/hope to work with in the future?
My main producer is O*Asiatic he’s doin’ my EP. But I’ve worked with producers such as Tonedeff, Substantial, Blowout and Celph Titled. As for producers i’d like to work with in the future, I can’t really call it it all depends on the song I wanna do and the sound I wanna get.
What are some new and future releases that will hit the streets that heads should look out for?
Hahah where to start. OK my debut 12″ is droppin this fall. It’s called “Freestyle Marathon” inspired by a 6 minute freestyle that I did for a mixtape that eventually ended up floating around the net. The B side for that will be “Sky’s the Limit” featuring my crew Dominion (Substantial and Mecca) and the Double B side will be “Who’s That” (title subject to change) featuring my boy Wordsworth. I also got the Extended F@mm (PackFM, Tonedeff) project droppin’ this winter that’s gonna be “Evils that Pens Do” (all of us on that track b/w “Rock On” me and Substantial and “Broad Band” Tonedeff and Session). After that you can look out for my solo EP entitled “whutduzFMstand4” which should drop early 2001.
What are the pressures of being an underground artist? How do you keep from selling out in a rap world dominated by the Ruff Ryders and Cash Money Millionaires?
I mean whut’s sellin’ out? Thats the pressure of being an underground MC. If you do one thing that’s not “underground” you end up losing all ya fans….or they say you fell off or sold out. When all you’re really trynna do is make music. It’s really hard man.
RhymeLife.Com
interviewed by HeadLine