AG – The Unkut Interview

Photo: richdirection

Photo: richdirection

Andre The Giant has been holding down Bronx tradition ever since he first got his starting shot on Lord Finesse’s “Back To Back Rhyming” and “Keep It Flowin'” from the Funky Technician LP. From there he formed Showbiz & AG and ushered in the birth of the Diggin’ In The Crates crew. Twenty four years later he continues to rep the crew, as he and Show complete work on a new album. AG took some time out while touring to speak on his connection to The Bronx, inspiration, winning recognition from his peers and the memory of Party Arty in this refreshingly honest conversation.

Robbie: Do you remember the moment you decided you wanted to pursue rap seriously?

AG: I remember exactly when! I always played around with it, because my older brother LB was always into the culture. He’s a clothes designer now, and a great graffiti artist. He used to MC too, so I used to have to do what he did. He cultivated me – he kinda forced it on me at first – but I took to it cos I was pretty good at it. I just would play around, but the moment I heard ‘My Melody’ the first time in a park jam it was in 23 Park, in Forest projects in The Bronx. It was right before the summer of me going to high school, and the Five Percenters – the Nation of the Gods and the Earths – were in the same park, away from the crowd cos it was a big park jam, on the other side of the gate in a huge cipher. I didn’t know what it was, but I was attracted to the cipher at the time. I was just trying to figure out what they were doing. It looked so on point, they were disciplined, you could tell they knew what they were talking about.

So while the music is going on and my friends are looking at girls and talking, I’m staring through the fence at this cipher of about fifty people. One dude or one girl would get in the middle and start building and then go back and somebody else would get in the middle. I’ve never saw this before, I’m like, ‘What is this going on?’ So as I’m watching it, ‘My Melody’ came on. It’s the first time I’d ever heard it, I’m like, ‘This is dope!’ As soon as it came on, the cipher – all of them, simultaneously, just started shouting. At the time I didn’t know, but Rakim is Five Percent, they obviously related to what he was doing, so I connected that song to these people I was watching at the time. He sounded different to any rapper I’ve ever heard – the things that he’s saying, it’s not normal words and he’s not saying it the way other rappers were saying it. I’m like, ‘I wish I could have that type of power,’ because when his record came on a whole crowd of people gravitated with his energy and were synonymous with his record, and I wanted that. I’m like, ‘If I can do that, I’ll do it for the rest of my life.’

Right after that I saw Grandmaster Flash and Grand Wizard Theodore at 18 Park in my project, Patterson projects in the South Bronx. When I saw them control the crowd without words? I’m like, ‘This thing – this energy – there’s nothing like it!’ First I heard a dude rap and have a whole crowd gravitate to him, and then just by some dudes playing records and scratching and doing things with the record we’ve never saw, I saw a whole park gravitate and freeze! This is what I want to be a part of! I don’t want to be a DJ, but I know I can rap, and I want to be dope enough to do it this way. If I can’t do it this way? I’ll quit, I won’t do it. I have to be really good because the people I’m listening to – Rakim – changed my life. That was the very first moment I knew I’m gonna pursue this and do it the rest of my life.

So you set on a path of wanting to have the same power and impact that Rakim had?

Yes, but in a conscious way though. I was been inspired by Melle Mel, he’s from The Bronx, and when I heard ‘The Message’ I’ve never heard a record like this in my life. Everything he said in that song, with the burnt down buildings in the video – I lived right across from that block! They would come through with Rolls Royces and all that, and their outfits were crazy. I was definitely inspired by him first, but it wasn’t to the point of ‘I’m going to take this serious for the rest of my life.’ When I heard Melle Mel I probably wasn’t that good or I wasn’t rapping at all, so it had no correlation to what I wanted to do. When I heard Rakim I was writing rhymes, so that record really changed everything. I said, ‘I’ve gotta take this serious, cos I’m not as good as this dude who’s rhyming right now, and I need to be – or at least try to be!’

Were you calling yourself AG at that point?

No, I had a thousand names! [laughs] At that time I was Dre Smooth. Right after that weekend when I went back to school, one of the guys from my class in junior high school was in that cipher, and I had to ask him, ‘Who were those dudes and what was that record played?’ He enlightened me, and then I became part of the Nation of Gods and Earths, so Rakim changed my life in more than one way.

Is it true that you were originally calling yourself Infinite in the early days?

Indeed, Infinite Barkim. I went to the New Music Seminar with Lord Finesse, while he was recording his first album, and Stu Fine – the owner of Wild Pitch. When we went to the Marriott Marquis on 42nd, when you register to get in you get a badge to let you in every event. Infinite Barkim was a powerful name, but I needed something that stood out so when a person looked at the badge and looked at me they would wanna know more about me. I needed something more universal. As a conscious dude, dealing with the Nation of the Gods and the Earths, I’m not really supposed to use my government name – that’s the name you give up, that’s your slave name – but once I had knowledge of self I thought I had the power to do whatever I wanted do, cos I could explain it, I could defend it, I could honor it. So I said, ‘You know what? I’m gonna be Andre The Giant.’ When I said that and the person filling out the application looked at me and laughed? I knew that was it.

Were you a big fan of the wrestler?

I was a big wrestling fan, but my uncle who lived next door called me that all the time. ‘Andre The Giant,’ because I was always the littlest guy out of everything, in height. I used to laugh cos he knew I liked the wrestler, but I had never put it together until that day. So now I’m walking around the Seminar and dudes are looking at me and laughing – not at me, but like, ‘Dag, that’s slick!’ So it worked tremendously. When we went to press the first record, me and Show, Andre The Giant was a name I couldn’t use, and I used to say in my rhyme, ‘Andre The Giant – AG for short.’ Show had to make a decision, so when he brings the box of records I look at the title [Showbiz & AG] and I’m like, ‘This is dope!’ I ran with it ever since. So Show kinda named me AG.

Was this the 1989 NMS?

Yes. That’s also a moment that solidified ‘No turning back.’ I met Salt ‘�N Pepa, I met Ice-T, I met Just-Ice, I met MC Lyte. I never knew I’d meet these people from television, and now here I am. Lord Finesse did real well in that Seminar – actually, he got jerked, he shoulda won – and the people were coming up to him, ‘Yo, you did so good yesterday.’ And I’m like, ‘Finesse – you know Salt ‘�N Pepa?’ He was like, ‘Yeah, they was there yesterday!’ I’ve got pictures with all of ‘�em. King Sun was the first guy in the industry to show me some real love, and I’ll never forget that. We ran around the New Music Seminar together and he had ‘On The Club Tip’ out and he had a hit song, so all attention was on him. We related from the Five Percent anyway, so he would pass the attention on to me and Lord Finesse.

Did you continue attending the NMS in the years after that?

It used to be a real big thing and I used to look forward to it for real, and then after a while it started getting watered down. It started getting really corny – the guys who were winning weren’t really supposed to be winning and the guys who lost went on to make hit records, so it was like, ‘OK, I’m concerned with that anymore.’ I was thinking about getting in it, because that’s my sport, but all the dope dudes who made the hit songs didn’t win, so I was like, ‘I’ll just stick to that.’

I’ve got this theory that everything in hip-hop boils down to a sport and that competitive spirit. Do you agree?

Yes. It’s about competing, and I think if someone doesn’t think that they’re even close or wanna say that they’re the best then I don’t think this is what they should be doing. Them guys who be like, ‘Nah, I know I’m not the best, I’m just trying to…’? Strive for that, or give it up, because that’s what this is about. This is a blood sport.

How did that first appearance on Lord Finesse’s Funky Technician album happen?

Me and Finesse battled, that’s how I met him. He came up to my school, cos I was running shit in my high school, me and my man Shabazz. Finesse was bold, man! He came up to my school with my home crowd, and Clinton at the time had like 4,000 students, so he really didn’t care. I’m in class and this guy comes to my home room and he goes, ‘Yo Inf, you need to go outside, cos this dude Rob is outside and he’s illmatic.’ And I’m like, ‘What?!’ My man 40 Oz., he was telling me in gym class, ‘Yo, I’mma bring my man Rob Finesse to school so we can get it in!’ Cos my man 40 Oz. was nice as well, and I would go, ‘I’m waiting! I’m waiting!’ When I walked out the building and I saw the huge crowd making noise and cheering that’s when the butterflies set in. ‘Oh, the dude’s really as good as they said he was!’ I just remember him that day, I’ve never heard nobody rhyme like that before. His punchlines, his metaphors, his humor – I’ve never heard that all in one. We’re going back and forth for a long time, but I’m saying a lot of scientific rhymes, cos that’s what I was into, I was into my culture, and he had the girls on his side! He had the dudes as well, but that was the school of the Gods, so a lotta dudes were very relative to what I was saying. In my mind, when he walked away I felt, ‘This is my school, this is my home crowd – if it’s a draw then he should get the advantage.’ When I walked up the hill to give him love he said the same thing about me, so we exchanged numbers. We lost contact, cos that’s how life is sometimes, and I was at a girlfriend’s house one day. I had just broken up with the group I was in – I had a partner and a DJ – and they just moved on, cos I was into the street too much. That kinda woke me up, it hurt me. Now I can’t record? This is horrible!

My girlfriend knew how much it meant to me and she goes, ‘They’ve got this guy over here who DJ’s. Maybe you can use him for DJ?’ Her brother goes downstairs and gets the guy, and it’s Lord Finesse. I’m like, ‘Oh shit!’ He was like, ‘You still spittin’?’ I spit a long rhyme for him, and he’s like, ‘I’m recording my album tomorrow, you should come with me.’ The next day I went to the studio, and when I walk in the first person I saw was DJ Premier. I’m like, ‘This is crazy!’ I’m watching him on ‘Words That I Manifest’ on the TV and now I’m in the studio and he’s right here. Show was on a machine, making a beat. That’s the first time I met him too. Stu Fine was there too, so I was like, ‘This is your shot, A!’

When I went in the booth, it had no windows, so they can’t see me and I can’t see them, so that made me go extra harder. The unsurety of not knowing if they liked me and I wasn’t sure if I was ready for records. I spit it with everything I had, and when I walked out the booth and I saw everybody looking at me a certain way, smiling, I knew I was ready. Me and Show start vibing like, ‘Yo, we should work on some music together.’ If you look on the Finesse album, the one he did was Art of Noise chopped up, and he was chopping it and I was like, ‘What is that?’ Dude’s was looping records, dude’s was rhyming over whole records – this dude took this record and made something else? This was a few levels up from the group that I was a part of, so I felt that I’d just took one step back and ten forward. We went in the studio and we recorded a few songs, and one of them was ‘Soul Clap.’ I knew from there that I was gonna rock with this dude for a long time.

What was the name of the group that had moved on without you?

The name of the group was R2D2 – it was my friend Rodney [aka Sick Lyrical Damager]. It’s ‘Rodney 2 Dre & Dre 2 The People,’ that’s what R2D2 stood for. They moved on cos I was in the street, I was bullshitting, I wasn’t taking it as serious as them. When I seen their first promo picture with matching suits and their names on the suits, it really hurt. I said, ‘Oh man, I messed up!’ I’m so thankful for Dana Brookes – that’s her name, my ex-girlfriend – she connected me back with Lord Finesse and it’s been a wrap since. That’s my brother for 26 years. Never had an argument, never had a fallout, he’s never had me sign a piece of paper for putting me on. That’s one of my big brothers that’ll hold me down to the finish. If you’re close to him, he’ll go all out for you.
That must have been crazy to be featured on his first album.

I’m the only guy on that album, so he really showed me how he felt about my talent. He has a cousin that rhymes, Harry-O, who wound up on one of the other songs [‘Show ‘�Em How We Do Things’ from the second album], he had a lot of people he coulda put on. He took me everywhere, I started doing promo tours with him and Jeff Sledge, so I got to see it before I was actually in it. That was critical to learn that instead of just diving in, headfirst. Then I did this showcase called Car Wash – there’d be like twenty to thirty acts on it! Nine of the acts on it went on to make records and be famous, like the Fu-Schnickens. That was my first organized live show. DJ Premier deejayed for me at that joint, before I did any shows with Show. That connection was like family, and that’s when Premier lived in The Bronx – him, GURU and HL Rock lived up on University. I used to just go rent an OJ and go hang with Premier or Finesse. I had made some bad moves, like I said I was in the street, and I wound up going to jail. When I got out and they brought me out the back and into the courtroom, Lord Finesse and Premier were standing right there. The whole courtroom is looking at them because they both have videos and are famous at the time, and it just meant so much to me. It was like God helping me, like, ‘This is who you’re supposed to be hanging with.’ I’m cool with both of them to this day.

It showed you they were down through thick and thin.

I remember when Finesse took me to Pete Rock‘s house over on Mt. Vernon, before I was on or any of that, we went to his basement. I remember buying his first album, looking on the back and he shouted out eight people, and I was one of them. That was big for me.

We’ve seen a lot of alternative versions of Lord Finesse tracks released in recent years. Was that always the way you guys would record?

I believe everyone in Diggin’ In The Crates are semi-perfectionists. The process still goes on to this day. Me and Show are recording an album right now called While You Were Sleeping. Everybody’s on it, so there’s production from Diamond, there’s production from Show, there’s production from Buck, there’s production from ‘�Ness, we got a Big L verse that no one heard. But when I get back home all the Show tracks might totally be different. This is how my crew is. Runaway Slave was done over three times, and I don’t mean at one time – I mean each song. These guys hear a beat for a week and then next week they’re like, ‘Nah, I don’t like that no more, I don’t like the snare.’ So now I don’t even take records home when I do ‘�em, I don’t put ‘�em on my mp3, I don’t do anything until the album is fully complete because I don’t want to get used to a song and then it’s a new song! [laughs]

When you and Show did that first EP, that must have been an exciting to generate that buzz by yourselves.

That same EP was what we sold out the truck of the car, so when we got on Payday we just added a few songs and artwork. It was basically the same thing that we were running around the Tri-State area with. When the world heard ‘Soul Clap’ is was a year and a half old. Kid Capri was the first guy to really break the record, because he also was on the record ‘Party Groove.’ Show took one of his tapes and took the ‘Bend and stretch!’ and made a song out of it so he gave him the record in person and Kid Capri threw it on right there. It took off after that.

After the first EP, how different was the process of recording Runaway Slave?

A lot of the ground work to Runaway Slave was done in Jazzy Jay‘s studio. Jazzy Jay is a mentor to Diggin’ In The Crates, period. Jay is a great soul and he’s straight-forward, like, ‘You need to go back in the booth and do that verse over’ or ‘Yo Show, this beat is cool but you need to change the drums, they not hitting hard enough.’ And we would listen! He was guiding us on how to do an album.

Do you miss having Showbiz rhyming on songs with you?

I always felt Show was a real dope MC. A lotta people don’t know, on Runaway Slave if you listen to the songs, I start a lot of my rhymes the same way he starts his. I actually duplicated my shit after him, and I’m the MC! [laughs]

Plus he has such a good voice.

He has a great voice, his melody is crazy and his musical knowledge is crazy and he’s a hype record dude. ‘Fat Pockets’ and those type of records are really his records. If you listen to ‘Fat Pockets,’ he rhymes twice, I rhyme once. If you take me off ‘Fat Pockets’ and just listen to his rhymes, this is what a Showbiz album would sound like, and I would love to hear that.

Did that put a lot of pressure on you for the second album without him to play off?

He was like, ‘I’mma fall back and do these beats. You better hold this shit down.’ That’s why Goodfellas is totally different – sound-wise – than Runaway Slave. I feel like Runaway Slave was a better album, but it was directed by Show – most of the concepts, the songs, the interludes, the intro – I’m just playing my part. Now I’ve gotta be the front man and do everything. I accepted the challenge, and at one time during the album it was like, ‘Hmm, I’m doing OK.’ One day he’s driving me home and he’s like, ‘Yo, you gotta step up even more, cos you holding it down by yourself now.’ That took me to a whole ‘nother level. So we stopped going to the studio for a week. ‘Just stay in the house and get your shit crazy.’ So I did, and that’s where that song [‘All Out’] comes from: ‘If I was a nice motherfuck I wouldn’t be here!’ – the Redman sample I took. That’s my personal song, saying ‘Damn, I’ve gotta step up to the plate now, the pressures on!’ You’ll hear the process of what I just told you, in the rhyme. Show has always done that for me though – even now, even during this album – he pushed me to a place where if he wasn’t there I probably wouldn’t go to that place.

Is that why you recruited the Ghetto Dwellas [Party Arty and D-Flow] to get on that album?

This isn’t just a record thing for me. I had these two dope dudes in the same projects, right under my nose, and I just started taking them everywhere. I think timing and everything was perfect when he said, ‘You’re gonna do it yourself.’ I’m like, ‘I wanna throw my dudes on there’ and he’s like, ‘Do whatever you want, let’s just make it hot.’ So the motivation and the push that I needed, that I used to get from Show? I was getting from them.

My favorite Show & AG song is ‘Medicine.’ What can you tell me about that track?

‘The Medicine’ was really inspirational, because that went along with ‘All Out.’ It was me trying to prove something, and hip-hop at the time was sounding real crazy to us. Runaway Slave came out ‘�92, Goodfellas came out ‘�95, so that little hiatus we seen the changes in the music and the gimmicks that’s popping up. We were really getting conscious and bringing truth to the forefront, but dude’s is sick so that song was supposed to be the medicine. Originally [the album] was gonna be called The Medicine – the cure for these other dudes.

It was a great loss when Party Arty passed away. Do you have a specific memory of him you’d like to share?

I never met nobody like that dude. He really didn’t give a fuck, he was confident in what he did and he was a character – similar to Ol’ Dirty Bastard type character. He was before his time, I think he was better than me, then, and he would push me. His voice, his delivery. He came up under me, so I inspired him, but it came to a point where I knew – I didn’t guess, I didn’t think. On any given day, I really think I’m the best line-for-line lyricist, ever. That’s just the bloodsport of it. There’s days when he made me feel like I wasn’t. Just hearing him – so young, raw, untampered with – anywhere we went where we took the stage or song – he got the same response.

Big L is doing his album and he’s doing the song ‘Da Graveyard’ with Jay-Z, Microphone Nut and Grand Daddy IU. I was the other person on that song, and I pulled L into the other room and said, ‘Do me a favor – take me off the song and put my man Party Arty on the song.’ He’s like, ‘You’re buggin’!’ Show flipped on me, ‘Yo, what are you doing?’ I’m like, ‘Hear my man out.’ He hears him spit one time and he’s like, ‘All good.’ That’s how Party Arty got on that ‘Graveyard’ record, because I felt in my heart this dude might be better than me! Not to be disrespectful in any way, but if you listen the song he sounds way better than Jay-Z. I’m trying to show you how advanced he was at that time.

Can you recall any life changing moments from when you were young?

I took Chuck D‘s order when I worked at McDonalds. When he walked in I was in the back and my cousin was on the register. I was like, ‘You gotta let me take this order!’ Everybody there knew I was rhyming, so they were like, ‘Go ahead.’ After he ordered, I’m like, ‘Yo, I rap and I think I’m really good at it.’ He looked me dead in my eyes and said, ‘You can do anything you want if you put your mind to it, but you’ve gotta put your whole mind to it.’ It wasn’t corny to me, it wasn’t a speech – it was simple. I quit the next day. Now I’m AG – it’s popping, ‘Soul Clap’ is out – I’m at The Bronx Armoury, they have some Five Percent thing there, Farrakhan is there, all the conscious rappers from the east coast, west coast was there – it was huge, and Chuck D walks by and says, ‘You know Andre The Giant is the fattest name in hip-hop?’ I’m looking at him and I said, ‘Do you remember me?’ He said, ‘Nah, have I met you before?’ I said, ‘I took your order when I worked at McDonalds.’ He’s like, ‘Get outta here! What’d I tell you?’ ‘You said I could do anything if I put my mind to it.’ He said, ‘Yeah, that sounds like something I would say.’ Then I performed ‘Diggin’ In The Crates’ with Public Enemy in London in front of 10,000 people and he shouted me out on stage. I’m like, ‘This life is crazy.’

My man was on 145th street earlier in the year and Rakim comes up to him and says, ‘Yo, I know you from somewhere. I seen you around.’ He’s like, ‘I run with Showbiz & AG.’ He was like, ‘AG? Yo, I gotta get with the God,’ and gives him his phone number. I call him, we start chopping it up, I’m like, ‘Yo, I just need you to get on my album.’ He’s like, ‘Yo, sixteen for sixteen. I’ll do one for your, you do one for mine.’ That was the highlight of my career, man. Remember I told you I wanted to do what this guy did to this crowd, and now I got this guy reaching out to me, talking about he wants me on his shit! That’s crazy to me. It’s crazy to be in a studio and KRS-One is doing ‘I Can’t Wake Up’ and he shouted me out. I used to sit across from B-Boy Records to see if he would come out! I was really on it, and they never would come out, but it’s three blocks from where I live and I’m waiting for KRS-One. So when we finally met and he did that? Then I saw on VH-1 on the ‘�Top 50 Albums’ and he had Runaway Slave as the greatest album of all time? That was it for me, man. Not say that I’m gonna die, but if I die tomorrow? I’m above the clouds.

My first real idols were Run-DMC, because of the way they did it. The sneaker deals, the leather jackets, the way ‘Sucker MC’s’ didn’t have a bassline! Run-DMC and Rakim, all-time are my favorite. Rakim was so conscious and Run-DMC were so big and star-ish, rock group-ish, I just loved the contrast. Then I did the 19 Naughty III tour with Run-DMC, 53 dates and I’m with Run-DMC on the same stage! Then we did Barcelona with Big Daddy Kane. Big Daddy Kane! If you know the Rap’s Outta Control show with DJ Eclipse? The opening intro is me and Kool G Rap, we did a show in LA with Slick Rick. So somewhere along the line, everybody I really stole from or wanted to follow, we’ve all connected and it’s became full circle where we’re on the same playing field, and that validates me. Not no record sales. The fan’s love is always dope, but it’s the love I get from other artists that really makes me feel that I belong.

What is it about being a Bronx dude that separates you from the other boroughs?

The same concrete that birthed hip-hop, birthed me. I was raised right alongside hip-hop. I was born in 1970, hip-hop was born in 1973. As far as I can remember I’ve heard it, I’ve seen it, it’s different. Park jams – I witnessed every aspect of it, it didn’t have to get to me, it was right where I was at anyway. THat’s what I carry with me and I think that makes me different from anyone anywhere else. I lived around the corner from Funky 4+1, B-Boy Records was down the street, Afrika Bambaata lives right here in Bronx River, Kool Herc is right here over on Sedgwick and Cedar, it’s all right in my neighborhood! Seeing that, letting that be a part of me, putting it in my body – it’s forever. This is why I have to make the records that I make now. If I didn’t see that I probably could be some sell-out rapper! [laughs] I can’t do nothing but stick to the rules because it’s not something that I caught second hand. It’s something that I experienced first hand.

An edited version of this feature first appeared in Acclaim Magazine.

This interview is also available in the limited-edition book, Past The Margin: A Decade of Unkut Interviews, available here.