 Down-South:
What’s going on Killer Mike?
Killer Mike: Not a damn thang. (Laughs)
Down-South:
You know I been wanting to sit down and converse with you for a minute.
Killer Mike: Yeah, it’s
been a minute, but we’ve had good conversations over the phone though.
Down-South:
Let’s start the ball rolling by talking about your life. I know that you’re from
Atlanta, what neighborhood are you from?
Killer Mike: I was born and
raised in Adamsville.
Down-South:
That’s where Bonecrusher’s from…
Killer Mike: yeah, he’s
from the Ville too? When you start talking about Atlanta, really
Atlanta…west to east
starts and ends on like Moreland Ave. And
Moreland Ave. is known as East Atlanta. You can
even go as far as from Glenwood to Old East Lake Meadows where Old East Lake Meadows
Housing Projects, but we like to say that it begin in Adamsville and ends in Thomasville
and that’s as far west as you can got and as far east as you can go.
Down-South:
Is that encompassing the SWATS area also?
Killer Mike: Yeah Southwest
Atlanta is south of Adamsville. So Southwest
Atlanta is like Ben Hill, Cascade, you got two Cascades. You got the Cascade where the
Black bourgeoisie live then you got the Cascade where the [brothers and sisters]
that’s in the struggle live.
The
neighborhood that I grew up in was a poor and working class neighborhood like a lotta of
other neighborhoods that you hear about, they’re metropolitan
Atlanta. I’m from
Fulton
County, born in the county hospital, raised by my grandparents. You know the plague of
drugs took my mother. She ain’t dead, but they got her. My father, they never married
so my grandparents raised me. I just lost my grandfather. He was 80 years old.
Down-South:
I’m sorry to hear about that…
Killer Mike: He lived his
life like a man and taught me how to be a man. And right now I’m just trying to take
care of me and mine.
Down-South:
You’ve told us a little bit about the geography of your neighborhood, but tell us
what was it like growing up in Adamsville for you?
Killer Mike: In retrospect,
you know growing up it’s hard for you as a young Black male not to fall into that
self-pity-I ain’t got no mama, I ain’t got no daddy, my grandmamma raised me and
all of that. But I was fortunate I didn’t end up with abusive grandparents. I
didn’t end up getting raised by foster parents. My grandparents raised me which put
me in a two-parent household. I learned a lotta stability. I knew at the end of the day
when I got back home they were going to be there.
My
grandmother was a church-going lady, who booked the numbers back in the days (laughs). My
grandfather was an old [moon]shine runner who ended up being just a real working class guy
and raised the hell out of a lotta kids. So my life wasn’t a bad one. Of course you
get everything that comes with being working class and poor, but [we made do]. Like if I
wanted a go-cart my granddad went and found a frame and an old lawnmower and we built me
one. So I grew up with them kind of values…like if I wanted something I had to go out
and cut grass to get it. They didn’t let me fall into self-pity. I didn’t have
the luxury of thinking that I couldn’t do. Being raised by my grandparent—they
came outta abject poverty. They came out of places like
Tuskegee, Alabama and
Eaton, Georgia.
So I
had a good childhood, I didn’t have everything I wanted, but I was raised y people
who care about me. Like everybody else, I guess, whose twenty-something years old I found
drugs early. I ain’t talkin’ about that bullshit that you hear a lotta rappers
talkin’ about. I got my first package when I was ten or eleven and I was on by
fifteen. The first time that I saw dope I was about ten years old. I was visiting and she
had a party and accidentally left some on the kitchen table and I came down and saw it. So
I was exposed to drugs at an early age. At fifteen I had already had experience at being a
seller where older guys would give you a package and tell you that you get twenty cents
off every dollar sold. So you bring it home and sell five hundred dollars worth and they
give you a hundred dollars. But you get hip to that shit after a while and start get five
hundred to a thousand dollar and start running with the whole bomb.
Down-South:
You know that’s interesting that you should mention being on the street hustling and
going to church at the same time, because I find that there is a lot of spirituality in
Southern gangsta rap. It’s like no matter how hard a brother is on the street, they
know that there is a God, who they have to answer to and you can hear them struggling with
these issue of morality in their records. That’s what makes Southern Gangsta rap
different from other regions like the East and West Coast.
Killer Mike: Naw, it doesn’t. It’s just not the same. And that’s not to
say that other regions music is any better or worst, it’s just is what it is. I think
that a lot of the time the rest of the world is uncomfortable [with us] because they
don’t understand Southern artists. What makes Scarface so dynamic to us is that he
was able to talk about his relationship with Christ and the pull between Christ and devil
which for him the devil was equal and parallel to the drug game. Some of the biggest drug
muthafuckin’ dealers I know and grew up around are the dudes that kept small churches
going by giving them small donations. They were in church every Sunday.
Take someone like a J. Prince, the CEO of Rap-A-Lot, he goes to church and readily admits
that and he’s like one of the cornerstones of gangsta rap. So it’s like at the
end of the day we know that our soul belongs to somebody else. We know that shit when we
stand in the trap, we know when we stand in the church. We’re not afraid to
acknowledge it. For me, that’s what people like Elderidge Cleaver capable of doing.
That’s what people like Fred Hampton was capable of doing. And to me if you’re
scared of talking about your relationship with God then you’re probably not as
gangsta as you say you are, you’re just wanna be. I mean if you’re scared to
show to show you’re relationship with God, then you must be on the side of devil.
You gotta look at
places like California and New York, these are places where people migrated outta the
South. And these people were taught to be ashamed of the South and there’s just no
honor in not recognizing your roots. I mean you’re in LA but you trace your roots
directly back to Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. People in Chicago can trace their
roots back to Mississippi, Tennessee and Alabama. The same for people in New York who can
trace their people back to North and But what kills me though is that the artists that get
celebrated are the artists from other regions are getting celebrated for doing what
we’ve been doing all the time. Like you gotta a lotta Tupac imitators but I think
that Ja Rule said it best when he was like none of us can be Pac, because none of us are
willing to do what Pac did and that’s speak truth to power. Well that’s true of
these niggas in the limelight, but that’s not true of southern artists because we do
that all the time –we talk about these parallel lives. We talk about the
schizophrenic lifestyle that we have. Like David Banner said he got a queen but bitches
hip him to the game. That’s like I said in my song “Blow.” I said
“pardon me woman, but I was taught the birds and bees by sluts and freaks.” I
recognize that there are women and I recognize that there are bitches and hoes because
they stood across the street from each other.
Down-South: Now let’s talk a little bit about hip hop
for a minute. One of my pet peeves about people who live outside of the South is when they
down our music the first thing they say is that we don’t have lyrics. I hate to hear
somebody say that because I know that they really don’t know what they are talking
about. I’ve listened to your album thoroughly and I have to say that you are one of
the tightest young rappers out there.
Killer Mike: Thank you. I appreciate the compliment.
Down-South: But aren’t most of those cats from other places. I mean
every time I go to ATL it seems that all I run into are cats that from up North…New
York, New Jersey, Chicago, Memphis, etc.
Killer Mike: Yeah, or just anywhere. It’s a lotta nigga that are not from up north
that’s from around here that are just as fucking lost cause they never grew up in the
city. They grew up around the city. They mama drove them into the city to visit the. But
they didn’t know what the fuck it was like to grow up in John Hope, to grow in
Herndon Homes, to grow up in Eaton Homes, to grow up on the West Side to grow up in East
Atlanta and Southeast Atlanta. They have no ideal. They’re not capable of
understanding what it’s like to be running home when seven o’clock comes
you’re running home from the MARTA station and when a van drives by you’re
scared as fuck because you think that somebody’s gonna grab you. They don’t
understand what’s it like to actively know members of Down by Law, which is one of
the first and largest They’re not understanding what it’s like for your mother
to be addicted to crack or your father to be on crack early in 84 so at like seven, eight,
nine, ten years old you’ve lost parents. They don’t know that side so it’s
impossible for them to do a fair representation of my city.
Down-South: Speaking of representing the one thing that I notice is that
there is a lot of socio-political commentary in your album Monster…
Killer Mike: Yeah. For those of y'all that don’t know what he’s saying, he
means that I say the type shit that’ll get a nigga shot. I say shit that’ll get
your ass killed. (Laughs). I’m that nigga dumb enough to say that I rap for Crips,
Bloods and Masons. Disciples and El Rukans. That’ll get my ass a federal case real
quick.
Down-South: Why do you feel the need to do that?
Killer Mike: Because there’s a verse in the Bible where the priest were gonna have
Jesus set up to get slaughtered and they told one his disciples to go ask his master why
doesn’t he come and chill with us. Why is always fucking hoodlums, criminals, whores
and prostitutes and drunkards and the sickly. Why is always fucking with the wretched of
the earth. Really what they was saying is this is your chance to get down with the bling
nigga. This is yo’ chance to get down with our team….because we fuck with ya, we
know that you’re powerful. Well, this is your chance to save yourself. And Jesus told
his people to go tell them does not a physician tend to the sick. If I ain’t the side
of the right, then I’m on the side of the wrong. I mean it just is what it is. What
explanation am I gonna give my children when they ask what have I done with my life? Hell,
I like gold, I like platinum, I like diamonds. I grew up a poor Black boy.
 Down-South:
Let’s talk about the album Monster for a minute. First off why did you give it that
title?
Killer Mike: Yeah, it was just that I feel like that as young Black male we get
villianized. I feel like things happen in our lives that turn us into monsters. And
it’s no a co-incident. I can call walking down the street as kid and ten people would
ask me did I have crack. By the time you get to the 12th person you start saying well,
goddamn maybe I ought to have some crack.. This shit is too easy not to do. What it turns
into is that things are set up in your life that allow you to shortcut, that allow you to
bullshit, that allow you to compromise your own humanity and before you know it you have
become the monster.
But the thing is are we monsters are we choose to be or because we’re helped and made
to be. And if you wanna kill the monster what about killing the Frankenstein; what about
things like poor housing, poor healthcare; what about terrible economic disparity. What
about the gap between the poor and the upper class. Me being from Atlanta I was fortunate
enough to see a Black middle class, but if you’re from the Mississippi there
ain’t no fucking middle class. It’s poor and rich. There very rich people and
there very poor people. Because like my cousin said wherever there are a lotta poor
people, there are a lotta rich people with a stranglehold on them. So Monster just comes
from the fact that there just situations that force us into bad situations. I was reading
this book called Our America. It was written
Down-South: I understand that you have an underground record that
you’re working on?
Killer Mike: Yeah, we’re working on it now. Well actually what I’m doing is I
have a crew call Grind Time. They’re actually working on the album and I’m just
lending myself to it. Like me I’m a big admirer of Roc-a-fella Records—Jay-Z,
Dame Dash, Kareem “Biggs” Burkes and all them. I do not look at things
regionally. I understand that at the end of the day, I have to understand that I am
Southerner. I have to understand that people look at me with a particular set of glasses
on, but that’s not how I see the world. I clap on the sidelines for jay-Z because
what they do is take young Black men and encourage entrepreneurship because they see how,
at the end of the day, it helps the bigger picture.
If there was no Roc-a-Fella and Murda Inc competing than Def Jam would not continue to
Blow. If you don’t have the Diplomats and cam competing with Bennie Segal and State
Property then Def Jam would not continue to grow. And that’s what I want to be a part
of with my crew Grind Time. We’re interested in competing with one another and
putting out better music than anybody else.
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