TheSource.com had a moment to catch up with 50 Cent to speak on everything going on in the world of Fifty! The Hip-Hop mogul spoke on his recent project, The Lost Tape coming out of the mixtape lane and the blueprint he helped set up for today’s artist.
Source: Let’s talk about ‘The Lost Tape’ that has dropped recently
50 Cent: For me [The Lost Tape], It was a cool thing. It was fun to actually make this tape. I used Drama’s instinct. He sent over the 2 Chainz joint, I said I’ll touch it and didn’t take him off because traditionally I’d redo the entire record. I had a chance to talk to him, I feel he’s in a position to have success and I didn’t want to hurt that. The record was going backwards but went plus 70 spins after. So it went up because the record company had gotten off that song and went on with the single with drake [“No Lie” Ft. Drake] but that record is not over yet by any means….
Source: Are we going to see a possible series?
50: If not a series, a new beginning of the new brand which becomes a series
Source: Drama would be involved in that?
50: We’ll do things together, different things. I really want to put my album out so I’m probably just going to put my album out.
Source: Why the wait, The Lost Tapes have been in the works since… ’07?
Drama: I mean around the time when we were going to do the album is when the blogs became the new platform standard. Basically how music was received and handled instead of people waiting on the mixtape. You look at a couple of tapes after that, majority of them were without a DJ and had a lot of old school beats on it. I think through those years mixtapes started to become NO DJ tapes. You know Gangsta Grillz were one of the few, but the others were for promoting and still recognizing the power and importance of a DJ. 5 years later now being dominant, there was no better time than the present.
Source: The whole tape, from the track list I saw, looks good. What was the thinking behind it?
50: Everybody evolves or does things differently because of the music business, they’ll obviously gain success on the actual numbers and pieces you’ve sold. So they look at theses mixtapes to see if you have the ability to create music up to standards and to have that something happen. People like to have something off it so they can work with that something. For me, I did it in the very beginning building consistency allowing consumers to be comfortable buying something with my name on it, because they heard me, repeatedly, on the tapes and liked the whole tape. So they’re like “I’m buying his album when it comes out because I know its going to be good.”
Source: I got to give you a lot of credit for that though. Everyone uses that format now mixtape before the album.
50: But that’s my whole…it’s really from not wanting to be placed in a batch of artists in rap that just can’t song write. There are some really talented rappers out there that can’t figure out the right song to write. You got people out there that creatively don’t actually know who they are. They can say in riddles, when it’s scattered, the illest shit but not develop who they actually are. My music worked because it’s me. I always said there are artists that are better than me at certain things, but ain’t none of them are going to be better at me being me.
Source: Waka Flocka stated during an interview with us [The Source Magazine] “I’m an entertainer, I’m not a rapper. And 95% of the rappers can’t even make a single.” So do you feel like that’s true?
50: He’s [Waka] talking about that bunch of guys that really rap, out there writing punch-lines and holding themselves at a different point. My song structure is more on point to me because how I was growing [up]. You’re a product of your experience. The things you go through make who you are.
For instance my experience with Jam Master Jay, Jay told me he was working on his record company and I was hustling so he seen me. I had all the things an established artist would have, all the jewelry, all the shit. I told him I write, I’m hustling again just trying to work my way to an opportunity and he [Jam Master Jay] gave me a track to write so I wrote it. I put like a repetitive area where something was actually repeating but it wasn’t a four-bar chorus repeated, it was an eight-bar chorus going once. Jay was like “nah, that’s not how you do it. It has to have the thh-thh-thh-thh [Drum Hat Noise] for the four bars so I know how far to go and that same thing you said has to repeat again.” I went through that process, they would make me write the chorus to the song three or four times before I could actually move forward. He’d [Jay] pick out of those four which one he likes the best and then I’d write the rest of the song. Because he’d be like that part is easy for you. If I dont have the chorus, I dont know what the song is. I dont know what im writing about or what my subject has to be before it closes out before the hook.
Thats why ive had the success Ive had, without a little melody, its difficult to make material that can break language barriers. You go international in certain joints ‘Ima P.I.M.P….’ and you see the whole crowd. For instance Gamboa (Yuriorkis Gamboa Toledano) one of the best boxers I’ve seen in my whole life, he could sing the whole thing to you but probably cannot have a full conversation with you in English. But he can tell you the entire record. You see what im saying cause he knows it from listening to it and its interesting.
Source: Your structure has worked and people have adopted it and probably called it their own.
50: Yeah, but I mean like the guy actually handing you the mixtape he doesn’t know he’s doing that.
Source: Yeah I had at least 4 mixtapes handed to me today before walking up in here.
50: They don’t know they’re doing it because 50 cent decided he didn’t want to be put in a group of artists that couldnt actually write a song. I lost the ability to be marketed as an actual artist. You got people that think they made it when they actually did a record deal. A record deal isn’t making it because they want what comes with being successful and an artist but the deal is giving you enough money sufficient, enough for you to create a fisade. You can buy a nice watch, a decent chain, but if you lease the car you aint got no more money. According to how much they give you is how big of a lease that was. You be thinking bigger things because you think you made it and then over time, youll see it, that in order to actually achieve what they want they’ll have to build consistency. Consistency is the key to all success.
– Sean Lynch (@Kiddfuture)
Look out for part 2 dropping this week. Conversation heats up as 50 talks new album, The Source Magazine and much much more.