Silkk the Shocker’s rap career spans a long time with a lot of accolades.
The New Orleans rapper and No Limit Records representer dropped his debut album, The Shocker in 1996 and successfully released two consecutive platinum albums and a gold one. The 90s and 200s were his friend.
It Ain’t My Fault, Movin’ On, Ghetto Tears, Mama Always Told Me, Thug ‘n’ Me, were all classics.
After moving so fast with No Limit Records, he got burned out. As a result, Silkk took a 10 year break to enjoy his life and make business moves.
Appearing on the Scoop B Radio Podcast, Silkk The Shocker weighed in.
“To me, it’s extremely important,” Silkk told show host, Brandon ‘Scoop B’ Robinson. “I did it for a reason, I did it because you got to balance the two: when you do music in order to be successful, you can’t have much down time.”
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In the world of hip hop, to be on top, it takes a constant grind; something Silkk admires and respects. “If I take a Yo Gotti in the height of his career, he works hard,” he said.
“I heard he don’t sleep much. He works – he busts his tail, but he got away though. That’s with Drake and Meek Mill, you can’t afford to take time off unless you feel like you are really comfortable with yourself. Drake is constantly more music, more music, more music…he can take off because I’m sure he accumulated enough to where he can. I don’t think you can take a big significant amount like I took off, but at the same time, when you do it as long as I have – it’s almost like you do get a little frustrated and burnt-out because you’re like “okay, all my time is for everybody else. I’m always performing, I’m rehearsing.” Life is about living. You can get all the accolades, if you don’t enjoy them – you don’t have the hunger to do it anymore. You are going to get burnt-out. So, you aren’t supposed to take off as long as I took off, I feel comfortable being out-of-sight, out-of-mind. I don’t think that’s a good thing unless you are comfortable in your own skin; I was most comfortable because I knew I could fall back on actual business stuff. I like knowing business stuff that’s behind the scenes. So, to me, you do have to balance, I would say take time off to enjoy, to regroup, and refresh yourself and then come back out, But only certain people can do that though.”
So what exactly did he do during that time off?
“Whew! I literally took off … I didn’t want to do anything music based for 5 years. The next 2 – 3 years, I still did it but minimum. I would still do soundtracks, like WWE and stuff like that. Just stuff that I really didn’t have to do much in. I could just stay at my house, work, go to the office, work … yea, I would say 5-6 years I took off, I didn’t want to do nothing but, just enjoying and understanding and learning the business.”
Traveling all over the world, making money and being successful, Silkk believes that a light came on that told him to slow down! “When you are gone for 11 months out the year, and you come back, you’ll be like ‘oh hold up, I just brought a brand-new car – only got a hundred miles on it,” he said. “Oh, that’s crazy!”
“So, when I come back, everything looks different – That’s the part that got me. That’s the part that made me rethink – also you try to realize who really care about you as a person and more than as a brand. Like “why are my friends around me at the moment? Is it because I can buy them a couple of Rolexes, chains or whatever? Or why is this girl – does she really care about me or is it because I’m still for whatever?” To me, you want to take a step away from that, then you can see who really care. You just got to appreciate life. If you always in the moment, if you on stage and everybody’s screaming for you, that’s a good thing – but to me, I feel like I got to be able to enjoy it though.”
