Ras Kass

I’ll never forget the day that I interviewed Ras Kass. Hours before we spoke, DMX was pronounced dead. We’d all been holding our breath that week, praying for the best possible outcome. The chances of recovery seemed slimmer with each passing day and when his fight was over, we were left heartbroken over the loss. April 9 was a day of mourning for many of us and I imagine we’ll be grieving for years to come. I was a fucking mess after I heard the news. His music has been a huge part of my life for so many years. But my connection with DMX goes deeper than that. He had few things in common with people I know and love, namely his battle with addiction. And there’s connectivity in trauma which is why I always had a lot of compassion for Earl Simmons, the man behind the dogg. When DMX died, it triggered a lot of shit inside of me. So, I went through a rollercoaster of emotions that day. One thing I was feeling strongly was guilt. I had a conversation scheduled with Ras Kass that evening and I did not know how I was going to get my shit together so that I could give him the attention he deserved. And this was about the time the universe did that weird it does sometimes, putting us in situations we don’t think we’re capable of managing.  

As soon we logged onto Zoom and started conversing, I felt at ease. I didn’t expect that to happen. Maybe it was because I was connecting with someone who understood what I was experiencing without explanation. I felt a sense of support in that. And of course, Ras Kass is a funny ass dude, so he was able to make me laugh. I swear he was a comedian in another life. We spent some time talking about X (we paid our respects right before saying our goodbyes), and we spent some time talking about death. It’s taken a lot from hip-hop lately and shit just isn’t letting up. April 9, we lost DMX. April 17, we lost Black Rob. April 22, we lost Shock G. Just as we start to process one loss, we’re faced with another. It’s a glaring reminder that life isn’t promised to anyone, not even our heroes. It was clear when I talked to Ras that these deaths have had a huge impact on him. It can’t be easy watching your peers leave this earth, one by one. I get the sense that while these tragedies have been hard to navigate, they’ve also motivated Ras to continuing building his legacy. He has spent the last few years putting his heart into projects he truly believes in because he wants to live life to the fullest while he’s still here. It’s clear that he’s hopeful for the future and appreciative of what this life have given him. And we have been fortunate enough to experience what Ras has given to hip-hop.

BVB: I'm really curious about the virtual reality show you did with Ed O.G. last week via HiphopinVR. I have a bunch of questions about it, but I'll start by asking, what was the experience like for you? 

Ras Kass: Oh, it's surreal. It's realer than doing a Zoom in a sense of, you know, I've got an avatar in there and you have an avatar, so you’re actually kind of engaging and seeing people and walking up and going around in an environment. There's an upstairs and a downstairs there's, you know, there's billboards and there's, you know, I went to a record store before I even went into the thing, like it's kinda crazy. So, I felt like it was more interactive, you know, as a human being than in a telephone. So, that part was strange because you're not there, but I was kinda there, I was kind of in this place, you know. But I thought it was crazy, you know, and then dealing with whatever. There's a certain capacity so the people end up in separate rooms, depending on if it gets, you know, I think it's 50 capped and then it opens another 50, but then engaging with those people that were in there, you know, walking around and talking. And then Ed O. performed as his avatar, so there's hands and like, there's a face, you know, it's you, it's just like an emoji if you got an iPhone, you can make your own little person. I call it Bmoji, I don't know if that's what it's really called anyway. So yeah, I have one of myself, I chose to perform live though. I just took off the headset and actually performed. So, that's big. Say you went to a movie theater, there's a screen and you can like get up closer. You could step further back. Yeah, it was bugged out. 

BVB: The concept seems so surreal, like you just said. I guess you can set it up through Microsoft or whatever, so I was trying to do that and I felt old as fuck. I'm trying to navigate that and I'm just like, avatars?? It was just sort of beyond me, but I think the concept is really dope. And I think it just further speaks to how hip-hop is always reinventing itself. What bugged me out is that I saw Grandmaster Caz trying to teach Red Alert how to do it. And I was like, this gotta be trippy for them.  

Ras Kass: He's already on it, like Caz and them are on it. So, like, it's funny when the older guy is like putting you on to something, like it's supposed to be the younger kids, but they're on it now. So, I was the old guy. I'm like, dude, what the fuck is this? And for some reason, cause I did it somewhere else, I wasn't on my wifi, which is probably faster than where I was, I pissed off a girl. Like somebody was asking me a question and I was talking, but they couldn't hear me. Maybe it's just my connection was bad. It was crazy. And I could tell she got offended. It was bugged out, man. Like it was like really being in a club, like the person thought I was ignoring them. I had to like, do a message and say, hey, I'm speaking. I don't know why you don't hear me, dah, dah, dah. Yeah, it was bugged out. I was in real time. So, it was like how we talking. And yeah, I hadn't had that kind of problem in like in a long time where they think I'm ignoring them and I'm like, nah, dude, I'm really trying to talk. I don't know why, you know, My audio, it was bugged out. It was a whole new set of problems, but it was cool to deal with it. Like it was awesome. 

BVB: Do you this platform is going to help younger audiences access you? 

Ras Kass: I think so. I also think it's just kind of inevitable that this technology (VR) is going to get easier. It's going to shrink. So, right now, you know, it's these glasses, but they already have the things where you just put your iPhone into it, whatever phone you have, it's like a sliding thing you just put them on. So, it's like a little, like let's say, swimming goggles and you just put your phone [into it], then you're already in it. So, this thing is going to get more and more accessible and easier and smaller and shrink. It's going to get cheaper. That's how things work. I personally think it's going to be the plot because you're meeting people. Like I'm able to interact with people in a way that, we're not sharing the same space right now. 

When you start sharing and moving around and walking over to other people and then leaving, it's three dimensional and it creates a different rapport. So, I just think it's going to be something that's hot, especially for these games. So, once muthafuckas is playing like Warcraft and all that shit in 3D, you know, and all you needed is about, you know, just enough space to go 360 (degrees). It doesn't have to be a large environment and you're really interacting with shit. Cause they got gun games, so I was shooting, playing this gun game and the shit was popping up and I'm popping over here, it gave me the options to, you know, two guns, [etc.]. So, all this shit is like, this world is at an infant toddler stage of what I think it'll be in like four or five years. Plus, I'm a firm believer that once things happen, you can't never put the toothpaste back in the tube. 

I mean, think about the evolution of the turntable. I mean, some things come back in style, but you know, CDs don't exist, you know what I mean, for the most part. Like the way I was explaining it was you don't want to be, the dude with the carrier pigeons, you know, in 2020 when n***as got cell phones, pagers in 2021 when n***as got an iPhone. So, the toothpaste is out of the tube. I think this technology is only going to become more accessible. And the other reason why I think it's the future is because I'm a firm believer now that throughout the entire world, every three to four years, we will have a pandemic that will sit everybody down for about four or five months. It's going to happen again, and you'll be home and this will be the way to interact, you know. It'll be Verzuz, but just imagine Verzuz if you could have went up and said hi to DMX before he passed away. This is kind of all access to everyone. Like you have direct access to these artists in a way that a lot of times you can't get even in a real concert because you can't get back there. 

BVB: Yeah, I was going to say something about that. So, you were talking about interacting with fans and I feel like when you're at a show, I mean, I'm not an artist, but I imagine like, you don't really get the opportunity to do that in the way that you can in VR, unless you're like maybe at a merch table. But even then, it's not really that intimate because you got all these people around you, you've got to keep the line moving. So, you don't really get that one-on-one time that you would get in VR. I feel like it gives you the opportunity to really connect with people in a way that you can't in person. 

Ras Kass: Yeah, I mean, almost, you know, to some degree it was almost too much access. I'm not gonna lie. Cause it was just some people that kept talking and I was just kinda trying to move around and say hi to people. But you know, we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. But yeah, I was able to engage a lot more than normally. And then I'm engaging with, potentially, you know, people from around the world. So, not everybody's gonna to be at that one concert or that one thing. So, you know, let's just say for instance, Beyonce, because eventually it's going to happen. So, then Beyonce has one. Now you're talking about, you know, whatever, and they build out this, Black Is King environment, you understand what I'm saying? And now I'm just walking around, I see all these people and maybe Jay-Z comes by, and you literally might get that opportunity to say, Hey! Like it's different, man. It's really different. 

There's guys in Germany, there's dudes in Switzerland, there's dudes in Australia, there's girls in France, there's a dude in Compton, you know, whatever. And all these people. I'm just like, okay, wow. And then like in real time and shaking hands and hey, I do this or, you know, whatever. And shit, I came across a couple, that one dude was in New York, the girl's in LA, they ended up hooking up. I guess he looked at the real picture of the person and that's his chick. He's like, yeah, I'm flying out to LA. It's the next phase of social media. That's just what it is. 

BVB: I agree. I think that's where we're headed. So, hearing about this sort of made me think about seeing live shows in general. Watching your favorite artists perform on stage, whether it's virtual or in-person, can be an incredible thing to experience. And it made me think about what it's like for you when you're on the other side of the stage. I'm thinking about somebody like KRS-One who's heavily influenced you. Can you remember the first time you saw him or somebody like him perform on stage? 

Ras Kass: Yeah, even him, he never ceases to amaze me because he never really has the same show, you know. So, there's two parts for me because there's the fan that's just pure and I want to be entertained, I want to hear my favorite songs and all that, but then the other part for me is I'm learning cause these are my peers. So, I'm always like, oh, I like this transition, crowd participation. I saw Big Daddy Kane perform fairly recently (well, not fairly recently, but whatever, like a year ago). And you know, we have a rapport. I would say, you know, he knows my name, obviously I know his, we have drinks together, but you know, whatever, like he's a cool dude. But still again, you know, when he gets on that stage, he's Big Daddy Kane, and now it's time to shut up and watch that show. 

And it's always so cool for me to be able to, after the show say, yo, you killed that, but it's not speaking strictly from a fan standpoint, from a peer standpoint, like learning and to have that ability to have somebody talk to me and say, yeah, you caught that, this transition here, like yo bro, you know. We're fans, I think it starts from a pure place of being a fan first and the fan of me is always driving me to want to, you know, improve. And some of these dudes are just fucking polished as fuck. And it gives me something to work towards like, yo man, he's busy. And the crazy shit is some of the older, OGs, like they got to show some of the young cats. Our complainant with some of the newer brothers and sisters is you rapping over your vocals. 

You don't sound like yourself. Like if you can't pull that off, off top, then you'd already lost points for us. It's just like, say your song. I can buy your record. I don't need lip sync. I need you to perform your song. So, the people that can pull that off, that's already one thing like, do you sound like your record? Can you pull it off? And then can you put on whatever that show is. Not everybody's going to have dancers and a million lights. Not everybody can afford that type of shit. You know like a n***a on a unicycle. Like we all can't have all that, but at least rock and roll and let me know when I buy this record, I'm buying what you can do. 

BVB: I imagine that probably gets better for people as they gain more experience and exposure. But I think being able to rhyme on stage is a skill in itself. 

Ras Kass: Yeah, I mean, maybe I just come from a different era where that just was a given, you know. If you couldn't pull it off there, why let you waste money in the studio? If you can't do it in real life, then don't do it. But definitely now that era's gone. As far as the expectation of these newer artists, I still think it's an important task. I always use the metaphor of LeBron, James and I said, you know, if I went to the Laker game and they call out LeBron and, you know, they give him the ball and he can't dribble and a little Mexican n***a jumps out of his back pocket and takes the ball and dribbles and dunks on n***as, then I don't want LeBron. I want the little Mexican n***a in his back pocket. 

So, that's my approach to the music. Where's your songwriter or whoever, because if you can't pull this off, I want the person that can cause you suck. And music, really rap for the most part, has been the only sport, entertainment, competitive thing where you don't have to be good at what you're doing. A not funny comedian does not get the concerts. You know, if LeBron had the Mexican n***a in his back pocket, the Mexican n***a would get the Nike deal. Can't be a rock dude and not be able to thrash the guitar. Can't just be holding a guitar. You gotta be able to play it. It's the race car driver, if you keep crashing cars into the wall, they're not going to let you drive their million-dollar car. Rap is the only thing where they like, oh, that's too rappity. That's too much rap. Like we've lost. Nobody tells singers like, you were singing way too good, Mariah Carey. Can't do that. It's bullshit. So, we kind of lost the true essence of the craft, of the talent. And, you know, hopefully some of these younger brothers and sisters remember that there's a talent involved, and we should care about that. 

BVB: Why do you think that happens though? Why do you think rappers don't have to be good at their job? 

Ras Kass: Because corporations did that. Of course they did. Corporations, the owners of the company were normally not people of the culture, of the music. So, I got in trouble once because I said, you know, whatever, I was probably 20, and I said, well, you know, the owner of my company, he's a 47-year-old white guy. And he likes to play hockey. Ice hockey, he likes to play ice hockey. And he shouldn't try to inform me of how to write my rap records. He should be smart enough to know that he knows hockey and he likes to sniff cocaine and play hockey. And that's cool. That's not what he signed me for. He signed me to have an expertise of what I do. And he’s financing that. The problem really became around the 2000 era, the success of the West Coast, and then they started being able to pin down what could sell. Before that it was kind of free-for-all. Like yeah, Nas can sell, Wu-Tang can sell, NWA could sell, and it could all be different things. Biz Markie could sell, Run-DMC. So, you got a variety. And then with us, with the rise of the West Coast, there was like, well, this sells and let's just stick to this because this shit is selling. 

And it just got more and more pinpointed, like, you know, oh, the South, girls danced, this shit is going to work here. So, strip club music is what sells and that's what you have. All of this is what we have. The successful trap songs is pretty much strip club music. But the execs decided that. The owners would tell the execs, the execs would come down and like shit runs downhill. And then he would repeat these things. And then the artists started repeating them. So, all the "hot", all the "relevant", those terms, it's not no shit the hood would make up. That's some shit the executive would say. "Oh, it's not relevant." And then the artists started repeating it and puppeting what their master told them. And then you get a whole wave of n***as that misled people, you know. But it started from the owner to the exec, to the player. 

And then the player believing the nonsense because he got rewarded for being a good n***a. And now we have the fans repeating essentially what the hockey playing white guy told them. So, really what happened is a three-part thing. Again, owner, exec, artist. And the fans only, you know, have only compared it to what their favorite artist said, you know, which is nonsense. "It don't matter if I rap, I'm just a hustler." Well then you should hustle because, if you hustle and you know Pablo, then why you rapping cause you should make a lot of money cause you know Pablo. What the fuck is you doing? That shit don't work in boxing. You going, yeah, I know Pablo, it don't matter about the boxing. N***a you getting knocked out. Why are we were rewarding the n***a that don't care and ain't good at what he does? 

BVB: I'm wondering why we as listeners tolerate that because we have a choice. 

Ras Kass: It's just training, you know? Why did we eat a lot of McDonald's when we were kids? They marketed it to us. McDonald's doesn't make the best hamburger. It's just available. They run a lot of commercials, got a lot of bells and whistles. "Hey, you get this meal and then you get free fries." They market it to us. So, I get it. Mercedes-Benz, all the biggest companies, a third of their money is spent in marketing, promoting. Because that's the thing. The best doesn't win. The thing that we see the most is what wins (laughs). So, that's just how that works. So, I get it, like they market it dumb to us and we bought into it. And then, you know, you got over at least 10 years of, in general, the least creative rap music [that] has been marketed. So, now you got kids that are 20. They were 10 years old when it got completely dumb. So, you got grownups now that all they've ever known was dumb ass shit. How are they supposed to know that there's some other variety out there? It's hard to go backwards. I mean, you know, you can ask that to any heavyset person that just had bad eating habits as a child. It's hard to undo your bad eating habits, right? So, you are what you eat even mentally. You put that in there, it's hard to unthink all the dumb that you associate with good, cause you were taught it was good. Some of the dumbest, stupidest records ever, like that's my soundtrack to my life. I can relate to it because I got my first kiss to the stupid song or whatever that thing was. I get it. They trained us and we're not even talking about a 20-year-old. Now we talk about from like 35 down, a lot of muthafuckas just trained off dump shit. 

BVB: So how do we fix that? Can we fix it? 

Ras Kass: I'm never the guy that, you know, like, "Oh, you kids!" and you know, like I'm not the bitter old guy. I just try to share. You know, like there's a lot of different music, open your ear up. I'm not saying everybody has to sound like Ras Kass or KRS-One but at least care. 

BVB: Right. 

Ras Kass: I use this metaphor sometimes too. I say, man, you know, for you to not give a fuck about the people that paved the way for you is like you telling me, okay, I'm me, but fuck my mama, fuck my daddy, fuck my grandparents. Like, so nobody counts but you? Nothing ever happened before you got on? Is that what you're trying to tell me? So, nothing. Your mom and your dad, they don't count, you're just all about you, because that sounds pretty stupid to me. So, if you could be a person that gets into this business, this art form and says, I don't care about nothing, but just what I did. I mean, where'd you learn it from? In anything I ever love, I'm always investigating the history of it. Like chefs, you know, a chef will study other great chefs and like, "Oh well, the pancake was actually first created in...", you know, whatever that thing is, whatever you love, you tend to want to learn more about it. I mean, and so whether that's motorcycles, whether that's dope, whatever it is you like, you learn about it. And this is the one thing. Sometimes it's cool to just be ignorant about it. Like, you know, I don't care, you know, I'm a hustler and I just got it now. Like bro, you sound stupid. So, I just I think that's the best approach is when I try to tell people, look, I'm sure you like your mama or your dad at least. So, approach your mom and your dad and want to know a little bit about them. Give him a little bit of credit. You didn't pop out your mom's pussy and be the illest n***a ever, whoever you are. You can't not give credit where the credit is due for the things before you. And again, you should be interested in that if you're interested in this. 

BVB: I think some of that speaks to people's short attention span. That's changed so much. I think people just aren't interested in going back and learning.

Ras Kass: Yeah, that's true. 

BVB: How do you think Nature of the Threat would be received in 2021 versus 1996? 

Ras Kass: I'd be outta here. Dude, the people that kind of do woke records, they're like, oh my God, it's so smart, you know what I mean? I would have been viral like a muthafucka. I would have been everywhere, which is why we're going to shoot that video anyway (laughs). It's new to millions of people and so yeah, we're gonna shoot a very in depth [music video]. Like, you know, I really wish I had me some Black Panther money and then I'd really shoot the video the way I wanted to, like some crazy shit. But we gonna do an extensive video. I want to do a series of retro videos, like songs I wished I would've shot a video for in that time that was, you know, either no interest from a label or no money, and shooting videos back then, you know, you're talking about $50,000 to a $100,000 or more to shoot a video. 

So, now I'm like, you know, we can pull off some dope shit for, you know, relatively cheap. So, I'm going to do some retro throwbacks just for things that I wish I would've seen. And then I like to actually, you know, there's just other artists that have made some really awesome songs. They don't all have to be all political and shit but just dope shit that I wish there would have been a video too. I’d like to do that. Like me and my team. We want to kind of, you know, shoot videos for dope, just amazing hip-hop records that maybe never got one. 

BVB: Do you have your own production company? 

Ras Kass: We're building one out. We're building one out as we speak. 

BVB: I want to stay on Nature of the Threat for a minute. The origins of the song, you made it because it served as a way to expand your own knowledge and understanding of history. And after it was released, it was highly regarded as an educational piece for a lot of folks. I don't know if you know who Armand Hammer is, but in their song Furman Tapes, one of the rappers from the group, ELUCID, says, "I elect Nature of the Threat as the new Black national anthem.” So, it made me wonder, have you had people reach out to you personally over the years to express how the song has impacted them and do you still? 

Ras Kass: Yes, I do. The really positive thing is that people from around the world reach out and they're not necessarily Black people. There are many white men, European men, around the world that have reached out and said, you made me go learn. Like teachers, professors, again, male, female, not necessarily Black said, like, I use this in my high school class or in my college class I teach and thank you for, you know, for risking it, to do the research and actually put the information in [the song]. I don't know how digestible the song is. It's like eight minutes of no hook, but, you know, I'm glad that it could reach people. Somebody edited [the song] like a video, which I'm gonna use that as a kind of an outline for when I actually shoot the video. 

But literally every once in a while, I'll check in on it. And it has a life of its own. Like there are people that just heard it yesterday and have these opinions, like where the fuck has this song been? Like literally, that song has its own life. It's just, you know, my company was probably unwilling, unable, or a combination of both, to promote those things at that time. They didn't really even want me to put it on the album. But, you know, I had to do what I had to do. My mother felt like it was important that I put [it on Soul on Ice] because I had written it with plans of putting it on the second album anyway, and then I just recorded it just so I wouldn't lose the rhyme. I was like, yeah, knowing me, I'll lose my notebooks, so why don't I just record it so I already have it. My mother in particular and some other people were like, this is important because then, I already had it for myself. I'm like, okay, chronologically, I get, it kinda makes sense to me. But they felt that it was important that I just put it out then. And, you know, the rest is what it is. I mean again, I'm glad that I can help anybody at least question, even if you wanted to prove me wrong, that's okay. My whole thing was to create the dialogue. Once I put it out, that was the goal. I was like, this is going to get me in trouble, probably gonna fuck my career off, which it probably did, but, for me, I was like, if nothing else, you know, it could create a dialogue. If you don't like it, try to prove me wrong. 

And yeah, we did all right pretty much cause I researched it thoroughly. Initially, I was going to have all my, which I should have, all my footnotes and I was going to publish the footnotes, which would have been awesome. And I should have done that, but I didn't. So, now I'm just like, I can't remember all the, you know, [sources]. Some shit is Encyclopedia Britannica, some of it is, you know, world history being from a college course, but it all added up. I mean, like literally everything. Like it's not that hard to find is what I'm trying to say. Like you can go to college and learn the shit. It wasn't no mystical, magical shit I was reading. Really just encyclopedias and history and you know, anthropology, physical and cultural anthropology books from college. And then I didn't go to like Harvard. So, it was not the hardest books ever to find. 

BVB: I've never heard anything else like it. Ever. It's so unique. 

Ras Kass: Thank you. I mean maybe just cause it's written like a thesis paper. I mean, it's just a thesis paper. That was my approach to it. It's just the thesis paper and me just doing the notes. But I mean, I love KRS-One and like, you know, You Must Learn and "Harriet Tubman freed the slaves at night" and so-and-so "made the traffic light", you know, whatever I'm like, yeah, okay. And Public Enemy was like, "Burn Hollywood burn". I was like, okay, those are great things, more symptoms than "What's the disease?", and that's the only difference. I tried to go for "What is the disease? When does the disease start?" So, we get humanity coming from Tanzania and then expanding out into the rest of the world. When do we get white people? 

What is a white person? When do we get Asian people? So, I've never thought it was that complicated. I didn't think it was a hard song to write. It just was a little time consuming to get the research and the notes together for me. But that's just how [my brain works]. I'm like smart, stupid sometimes. So, for me that part wasn't hard for me, but then, you know, other people, we all have our gifts, I guess. I guess maybe that thing is my gift. But it's kind of just what makes me tick. So, it was just easier for me to write. I've had harder songs to write than that. But I'm just glad that, you know, my curiosity and my need to know was something that could be helpful to other people. 

BVB: This is making me think about the fact that when you were starting out, you didn't necessarily consider rapping as a long-term career. You've labeled yourself as an accidental rapper. But one of the things you really did consider was becoming a history professor because of your passion for history. So, it makes me wonder having done this for years now, if you consider yourself an educator because of songs like Nature of the Threat and other means that you've used to educate your audiences. 

Ras Kass: I never did. I didn't. My mother was disappointed in me about five years back. She said, "I thought you would be a philosopher." And I took a step back and I said, have you listened to my music? I was like, that's pretty much what I am. I took a different medium to exercise my philosophical questions, but I am a philosopher. I'm not a historian 9 times out of 10. I just kinda look at the world through my particular prism. And, you know, we all have our own particular prism. You know, how we see the world and then I analyze it for better or for worse. I give my opinions based on the information. I also talk about my lower self. I acknowledge, you know, my idiosyncrasies and my sins. I talk about how I would like to be better at some things. And I also talk about how I enjoy being an asshole and other things. So, I'm more of a philosopher than a teacher. I never felt like I was qualified to teach anybody. I'm not your pastor. I'm not, you know, your history teacher because that's not all I harp on. I have songs where I'm just talking about me and my friends trying to get some money or, you know, get some ass, you know, whatever. So, I just try to keep it a buck about who I am, my pros and cons. And so that, for me, I would always consider myself more philosophical. 

BVB: I'm thinking about my experiences, and I've learned so much from hip-hop. Whether the song is about capturing, Black history or it's about hanging out with your friends and kicking it, I've learned so much versus sitting in a classroom. I've always considered hip-hop to be a teacher. 

Ras Kass: I think it is. I mean, you know, there was this documentary, one of the first rap documentaries. It was called Rhyme & Reason. I called it "The N***a News", especially back then, you know. There wasn't social media. So, how did I know what the slang or the dress code for Atlanta was, or Brooklyn, or Texas. It was the rap songs. That was my n***a news. Like oh, n***as out there do this, the n***as over here do that. They talk like this, they wear these brands of jeans where we wear these brands. It's always been informative, whether it was informing us how to do bad things or good things. It was always right. So, I mean yeah, I think so. I think hip-hop in its purest form is always about a redemption arc. You know, we started from nothing, now we here. You know, to quote Drake, but it's that, you know, "started at the bottom now we here." Shit was hard, it's fucked up, but we'll make it, we gonna make, you know, whatever. You know, making something out of nothing. And that's always a beautiful story to hear. It's motivation. Now Jeezy. It’s “thug motivation". It is, you know. It's like, we can get out of this hole. We can survive, especially when we talk about the KRS-Ones and the Public Enemies and, you know, the Lauryn Hills and, you know, those people, you know, the Commons, you know, whatever. Like those people, they make you feel like it's going to be okay. You know, and let's have some love for each other. And, you know, I think that's an awesome thing to have. I think real, quality hip-hop is about love and growth and knowing our better side. Me, I talk about that a lot but I also talk about some ignorant shit. So, I'm just, you know, I am who I am, no moral superiority. I was just born philosophically saying, that don't make sense. I'm kind of cool with that. You know, fuck you, this is cool. You know, it Descartes, the duality of man, essentially is what I've always done. 

BVB: It's a balance. I mean, I think that's what life is. You're not one way all the time. You're not interested in this one thing. So, I think that should be represented in your music too. 

Ras Kass: Yeah, I mean most artists pick a thing. I'm the dope dealer. I'm the positive rapper. I'm the trapper. I'm the playboy. And me, I just, I'm the gangster, you know, I'm the Blood. And I get it cause it's easier to market that way. It's just harder for me because I am the dichotomy of my personality and my experiences. I could never write that way and just be all positive guy and I can be a negative guy. I am so many things in between that, so many shades of that gray, you know. It was hard for my label to market me. And they were like, what do we market you as? It was like, you're too gangster to be hip-hop and you're too hip-hop to be gangster. You're too West to be East, too East to be West. I'm like, muthafucka just market me as me. Stop trying to make me either Wu-Tang Clan or Snoop Dogg. I neither one. Let me be me and they didn't get that. 

BVB: You were really embraced by the East Coast and the West when you started off. Do you think that gave you an advantage over some of your other peers in the industry? Or did that even matter? 

Ras Kass: No, because I never traded out, you know. There was a time when I think the olive branch was like, yo, role with the East Coast, being this New York dude. I just fit in either way. And then there were some jealousies, some people here that just were not happy with, you know, that I couldn't be in the box, but then maybe some of the people that they wanted validation from gave me validation. So, it really just put a target on me to be perfectly honest. I was a n***a to hate on. Like, oh, Ras Kass, he thinks he's better. It was a lot of that, a lot of jealousy, man. You gotta remember, this is still competitive. Muthafuckas would literally say like, you know, why they think you a lyricists and I'm not? 

I'm like, bro, I didn't say that. Like, why would you even say that to me? Some of your favorite rappers, like rap n***as said that type of stuff to me, like successful n***as. I'm like, bro, like the fact that you're a grownup man, mad at me, a younger n***a than you, for the opinion of another man is weird and you're supposed to be a star. Like that's weird. And this, you know, I called it pretty early. I called rap 13th grade. It was just like high school. And I was always popular in high school. So, I just remember like cliques. All the gangster n***as. Oh, the cheerleaders. Oh, the track team, you know, whatever. I was like, oh, this shit is cliquey and weird like that. And it never has not been, it's still that same thing. And it's just, you know, it's corny. 

It's unfortunate, you know, because I've never been a person that like fit into a clique. Honestly, even in high school, my friends would tell you, like I hung with the varsity football players and the varsity basketball players then had some nerd homies, and then, you know what I mean? Like I was all over the place, getting it in where I wanted to, because it's just my personality type. So, some of my friends was gang bangers. I didn't care. Just whatever, do you. I mean, I like some aspects of my gang-banging friends. I liked some aspects of, you know, going to the varsity football game. Yeah, it was fun, but I've never been a type that had to fit into the box. I just built the box around me. Like okay, you're cool, you're cool. But you know, I personally had worst times in this music industry than I've had in prison, in the streets of LA. Honestly, it's just very bitter, backbiting, weird, strange shit. I remember I said that, like they asked me, you know, when the Source really mattered and I came out and he was like, what did you learn from prison? I was like, I learned that I like prisoners more than I like rappers. I do, because it's funny and weirdos and jealous and emo and fuckin strange, bro. It is what it is. 

BVB: And you're saying that it's still incorporated in the culture today? 

Ras Kass: It's still there. Now it's just "cliquier" with the younger n***as, because now the younger n***as, you know, they did the age-ism shit, you know, they fell for it. And they have a right to feel how they feel like, yeah, you old n***as didn't like us, said we was wack but we on now. You can't tell them, hey bro, like you shouldn't take all those drugs. Like, "we don't care what you say." Then they OD. It's interesting. And you know, we never got the bullshit out of the culture. And we'll see what happens. You know, we just lost another icon. So, I hope that we don't look up in 10 years and the representation of rap is Drake and Eminem and that's it. Cause that's kind of where it's headed, you know, the people that get credit. That's what happened with jazz, what happened with rock and roll, and they'll write us out of the history books. 

BVB: It's like the one percenters of the culture are controlling everything. 

Ras Kass: Yeah. 

BVB: Sometimes having people going all sorts of different directions now and having the option to do that is rewarding because you can find music that is still representative of the culture, on a smaller scale. But the future of, I don't even know if you want to call them leaders, but people at the forefront representing the culture, it's scary. It's scary to think about. 

Ras Kass: Yeah, that part, we never really get to pick our own heroes and that kind of sucks. Even as a people, you know, we haven't really, many times, been able to pick really from the grass roots. Cause they'll just flood them out and make whoever else they want to be popular, popular. I've said for the past two or three years, amazing years for great music, but it's just a lot of people don't get heard, but people are making amazing music. No disrespect, you know, but all I hear is WAP, you know what I mean? Like, it's so many other people making like groundbreaking, amazing projects and I can't expect B.E.T. to give a fuck, you know. Like I can't expect my radio station to give a fuck. 

The craziest shit is when I started even going to the hip-hop venues and you know, they're not breaking records and being, avant-garde. Yeah, of course you're going to play me the new Nas. You know what I mean? But come on, [there's] dope shit out here and people ain't supporting it. And then how you expect it to be made? You know, that's what I always used to have to try to remind my people. This is a business. This is what I've done for a living, you know, one way or another, you know, whether it chose me or not, it still has to be how I paid the rent, how I create a project. So, if you don't support it, you know, if you're not pro-supporting somebody's art, then don't really expect them to make art. So, I get why some people just decided to make bullshit. It's easier to sell. 

BVB: Right, and if we tolerate it and no one's questioning you, then why wouldn't you, if you're getting paid to do it? 

Ras Kass: So, you know, our culture, it's definitely, I feel like there's a renewed energy. And maybe it was just COVID that muthafuckas had to sit down because at least for the first six, seven months of COVID, wasn't nobody dropping no kind of trap shit cause it wasn't no place for it. N***as was sad, life was real, n***as was in the house. They like, ain't no turning up. I don't want to hear no turnup shit. So, for a minute, reality kicked in. That shit was a real, wake up pill. It just wasn't applicable. It didn't mean anything cause there was no place to act that way anyway. And I thought that was a breath of fresh air, just six months of not having to hear, you know, [mumbling], "the money, the money," you know. Whatever, I get it and that shit's fine, I get it. I get it. But balance everything in moderation. So, after seven years of that consistently, it's just kinda good to not hear that for a little bit. That six months was great for everybody to decompress and say, I can't escape. I'm stuck in this house and this ain't making no sense right now. You know? And so, you know, maybe we need our random pandemic every three years. 

BVB: That's why I don't go out because I want to hear that shit. It's everywhere. 

Ras Kass: Yeah, I mean, it's in your commercial. Like they know the sound because they created it. And the crazy shit is the biggest producers [of] EDM, they get things down to the numbers. Oh, it's between 120 BPM. The hottest producers, it be these white boys and they just, it's cookie cutter because they do it scientifically. Now it's crazy when they train n***as to respond to something that ain't even soulful. It's a cookie cutter. And the response is, if I thin it out and then I make it go really loud bass, that's the drop. They can train muthafuckas. That's when it's sad. The toddler pokes her little diaper out, the fucking 20-year-old, the 40-year-old, the n***a, he poking his out ass when it drop too cause that's when you drop it to the floor. It's just crazy. It's a monkey show. And I call it a monkey show, they say I'm tripping. I'm like, bro, y'all all trying to do the same. That's weird. 

BVB: I think it's a brainwashing technique. 

Ras Kass: Of course it is. Those are frequencies. Like they study that so that it is it's makes you receptive to certain shit. And I'm just like, yo, you know. And it's not even creative. It's just all the same, generic. So, that's what freaks me out. I'm like, I don't know which one to like. Every once in a while there's something dope. Like No Type. When I first heard it, I was like, that n***a's voice is so weird and kind of mousy and that beat was crazy. I was like, first thing he saying in the song he undermined himself. "I ain't got no type, bad bitches is the only thing that I like." Well, that's a type (laughs). But it was still fire. I was like, I like this song, even though the n***a just completely lied. Like his first bar, the second bar completely contradict themselves [but] I liked the record. But you know, but the majority of these records, they all sound the same to me. So, I don't know which one I'm supposed to like. I used to be able to pick a hit song. Like, didn't matter, like R&B, pop, whatever. I listen to melodies. You're like, oh, okay. I could hear this, that melody's awesome. But these, I never know which one cause it can be so basic and everybody goes crazy like that shit is everything. And I'm like, I don't get it. 

BVB: I don't either. That's why I think we have to keep digging, even though it's a pain in ass the sometimes, and invest in the people that are really trying to push our culture forward. Otherwise, there's no hope. 

Ras Kass: Yeah. I always say, you know, I agree with you, you gotta be pro and not anti. So, I'd rather be pro good music than anti wack music. Cause I still take an energy to not doing anything. You know, if I'm all anti, fuck this and fuck that, I'm not helping something that could use that attention. So, I'm pro good music. 

BVB: Speaking of pro good music, a couple of years ago you released Soul on Ice 2. Amazing. Two questions: How long had you been planning a sequel to Soul on Ice and was there any hesitation to do it because you thought it might take away from the original? 

Ras Kass: I subconsciously knew I would eventually do it. I had no plans of doing it, but when I did, the problem was I was trying to do something else. Everything I was making kept sounding like Soul on Ice 2. And I was like, man, I can't escape this thing. It was just what was coming out, I guess. And so probably about six months before it came out, I was like, yeah, I just have to do this. I mean, I already had a lot of the records, but I wasn't trying to make those records. I was trying to make something else. It still hasn't even come out yet. This other thing that I was trying to do, but I kept making these Soul on Ice records and I'm like, all right. So, you know, sometimes the music tells you what to do and your vibe is revived, and you feel how you feel. And yeah, when it hit me, I was just taking inventory. I was listening to the stuff I was working on. I was like, this is Soul on Ice 2. This is not this other thing. 

If, you know, my name was West or my name was Jay-Z or, you know, Ice Cube, like "that album is incredible." "I stand by it." You know, I'm thankful to all the people that helped me make it the amazing album it is. But even with press, I was just like for it being my essentially 25th anniversary (Soul on Ice), I didn't get to kind of coverage that other artists get for 25 years. And we got people dying every day. But they didn't support it, you know? It's always sobering, it hurts. It hurts to know my industry, again, it's so political and so groupy until a n***a die. Then n***as would act like it mattered. And that's wack. But I know what we did and I'm grateful to every person on there. Snoop Dogg and Immortal Technique, J.U.S.T.I.C.E. League. N***as came together to help me make [this album]. CeeLo Green, everybody. It's an A-list, competitive [roster]. And we had records, single records. Like we had a record. We had an album, and we did a great job and I stand a hundred percent behind it. I still feel like it was arguably the best hip-hop album of [2019]. I feel like arguably two years down, n***as didn't fuck with what we did. I think just like White Power, you talk about Nature of the Threat, White Power is even more specific. So, we did a great job, and I didn't do it alone. I was blessed by all the amazing people that helped me make a really good project. 

BVB: The themes obviously are a continuation of some of what you were talking about on Soul on Ice, but it sounds so fresh to me. So, it's a continuation, but it also sounds new. I just thought it was really well done. 

Ras Kass: Thank you. I mean, it was all intentional. It had to feel older, it had to feel like my past, but really what it was was me, again, taking inventory. It had to be like, I was looking in the mirror and asking myself 25 years later, what is different? Do I feel different? Actually, the biggest question was like, is America racist? 25 years later, it's worse. So, it was kind of crazy, you know, it was like to do the inventory, did I fuck up? I acknowledge like I did the same shit over [again]. Like I kept fucking up things that I said I had learned about mistakes from. So, it was an inventory. It was taking inventory. That whole project was about me taking inventory about who I am, what I've done, and then looking at society. So, first I was looking at myself and then looking at society and has society changed much? And I was like, no. And finding the soundscape that felt retro but was futuristic too. And I feel like the producers, like everybody, they just helped me nail that. Like I just felt like we did a really good job for a part-two. Most n***gas' part-twos aren't that strong. 

BVB: That's one of the many reasons that I was impressed by it because I think that people are cursed by the second efforts of a project that was a classic. 

Ras Kass: I didn't want to do it, but it was also because artists are dying and I'm going die one day. But I'm blessed to have lived 25 years after my first project. And a lot of people, Nipsey didn't even get past 10, you know, the Pacs and the Biggies, right? It needed to be done as my homage, my thank you to hip-hop. So, in its purest form, we did what we needed to do. Of course, I would have loved for the awareness and people, you know, to really support it on a larger, more commercial scale. But even within my community to have had, you know, the DJs in New York, whatever, play those records. They didn't support [it], you know. I didn't feel like the DJs even supported just records in the clubs, but you know, all you can do is make it, that's up to them. But if I live another 25 years, you know, it would be nice, I hope I'm making another 25 and I'll give it another shot and I'll do [Soul on Ice 3] because n***as ain't living. N***as is dying, bro. So, if nothing else, it'll be my ode to, hey, we made it another 25 years and thank you, hip-hop. And hopefully, you know, I'm alive, I'm in a good mind state, living, living a happy, whole life. And if I am, then I'll document that. 

BVB: Talk to me about what's next for you. I heard you say to B-Real in an interview (I think it was last year) that you really wanted to do an album with a live band, which I thought would be incredible. Has there been any development on this? 

Ras Kass: I have not made progress on that thing yet, but it's going to happen. Quarantine made me kind of go through, oh, a couple of things happened, but whatever, I wanted to get all what music that I had from the engineers I still had contact with. So, I just wanted to create my own library of all my work, just in case, you know, whatever, just in case something happened. [If] I pass away at least, you know, my sister would have it all like, look, these are my songs and, you know, whatever. But, in the process of doing that, I thought about The HRSMN stuff. And The HRSMN was the first hip-hop supergroup. So, me, Canibus, Killah Priest, Kurupt. I was going through and I was listening to all this shit and I was just like, you know, we started this idea, we never got it done. Our homies are to some degree our little brothers, but not really our peers, our homies kind of took initiative from us and then did it. Slaughterhouse. So, I'm just like Slaughtahouse got two albums done. How come we can never get one? You know? So, I got upset and I decided I would take all that and build, you know. First of all, it was our time, our energy, I spent money in a studio, booking time, whatever. Fuck that. So, I put all that together and I created our album. So, I call it our debut finale, which is awesome. 20 years in the making, The HRSMN debut finale comes June 18th. Yeah, something like that. 

So, yeah, I'm really excited about that, that we're finally putting out our group project. It's ill and again, it's that time capsule. A lot of the stuff, for the most part, I just took all of these, you know, we had all these incomplete songs. So, basically I was just like, I had to combine vocals from one thing to another song. Then sometimes I was like, well, fuck that beat. And then I had to find producers, you know, to build around these vocals, but we did an amazing job. I'm pretty interested to see what the people [think]. We just have to do one. I just needed one HRSMN album. It's called The Last Ride. So, literally it was just a way for me to, you know, put this shit to bed. The fun part was like playing this thing for [The HRSMN]. Like, this is what I did. They were proud of me. The team did a good job. They're excited. So, yeah, it comes out soon. So, that's what I'm focused on. And then from there I have something else that I can't speak on, but this is gonna be crazy if we execute it. I don't want to jinx myself, but for the sake of hip-hop, I think it's going to make noise, noise, noise. We got some other shit in the works that we might fuck em up. It might be this one. This might give me some money money. We got some crazy shit brewing right now that I'm excited about. 

BVB: Well, whatever it is, I'm sure it's going to be dope. 

Ras Kass: It is dope too. It is. I'm excited. 

BVB: Beautiful. Ras, I think that's all I got for you. I appreciate your time. This was really dope. It was a dark day for me, losing X. So, I appreciate the opportunity to do this. Took my mind off things for a little bit.

Ras Kass: God bless DMX and his family, we send some love to his family and friends. You know, the music lives on and it lives on in our hearts and I'm grateful for the opportunities and the times that I, you know, did shows and toured with him and chopped it up. He was a cool dude. He was pretty hilarious sometimes.

BVB: That's what I keep hearing. People keep saying that he was really funny.

Ras Kass: I wasn't there, but even watching him with Snoop, that show just seemed like really good energy. I mean, you know, you never know when you're going to go, man. Just think of all that great energy he let everybody see, you know, just a little while ago. That was just awesome. Cause I was captivated looking at his responses (DMX) when I was watching the [Verzuz]. I was like, he's funny man. He is just having too much fun. But yeah man, God bless. God bless the dead.