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In the ever-watchful eyes of history the State of
Mississippi has always been cast in a bad light. Once described by the late Dr. Martin
Luther King as being a state sweltering in the heat of in justices, Mississippi’s
name instantly conjures up hideous images of racism, poverty and backwardness. Mississippi
is the poorest state in the union and it ranks at the bottom of everything when it comes
to things like education, employment rate and healthcare. But, despite all of these
discouraging facts, the truth is that a lot of great things, like the blues, have come out
of the Mississippi. In fact the Magnolia State has produced some of the world’s
greatest and most influential musicians; among them BB King, Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson,
etc. And now the State adds to its long list of great recording artists the name David
Banner, Mississippi’s first real hip hop superstar/producer and the man who is
destined to put his state on the hip hop. Hence the reason why he calls his long awaited
sophomore effort Mississippi: the Album.
Fresh
from the studio here is an interview with the man that calls himself the most phenomenal
feat of all times. |
 Down-South: What’s been going on with you since the last time we talked?
David Banner: I’ve been blessed, man. I got magazines calling
me a super-producer. I got my first big single as a producer, Trick Daddy’s Thug
Holiday. Right now, I’m trying to put together two albums and a movie. I’m just
trying to do some big thangs with some big folks.
Down-South: I know that you have been doing a lot of production with a lot of
artists. Could you name a few of them?
David Banner: Pastor
Troy, Snoop Dogg, TI, Devin, Lil Flip, Dirty, Fiend, and Trick Daddy. Bubba Sparxxs just
call me to say that he’s really considering getting with me to do something on his
new album. Right now I’m just trying to put myself in a power position.
Down-South: Ok, right now you’ve just produced the title tune to Trick
Daddy’s album Thug Holiday, which also happens to be the second single for Trick. How
did that happened?
David Banner: Well
Wendy Day had shot me out to Mike Caren, who is at Atlantic Records and he called me and
told me to send him some beats. He said that he had heard some stuff that I had did on a
couple of other artists and he said that he really liked my stuff.
So I shot him a CD….you know how people tell you that they gonna do some stuff, but
they really be bullshitting. Nine months later I got a call from Trick Daddy’s
manager called me and I almost hung up on them. I thought it was somebody playing. He said
that Trick had heard a song that he wanted and it was history from there.
Down-South: And that record became Thug Holiday…..
David Banner: Yep,
which actually ended up being Thug Holiday, which needed up being the title-track for the
album, which ended up being the second single to his album, which Trick Daddy said on
BET’s Tha Basement that was the best song he’s ever done to date.
So you know to be a part of something like that and to know that so many people are being
influenced by my music is truly a blessing.
Down-South: Okay with you it’s kinda like an interesting dichotomy.
You’re not only a producer but you’re also a rapper too.
David Banner: Yeah,
it’s funny too because if people know my history then they know me as the rapper
first. But after the problems that we through with Penalty, which every magazine has spoke
about, if you’ve read any of those articles then you should know basically all of the
stuff that I went through. I didn’t want to go back to the streets. So production
became the easiest way for me to eat. I was still under contract with Tommy Boy so I
couldn’t make no major power moves anyway so the production had to become my main way
of eating. And it just happened to take off. And my theory is that when you working with
somebody you should never cross collateralize. You should never try to push yourself as a
rapper and a producer or you’ll end up losing everything trying to push yourself off
on people. So I just concentrated on being a producer because really, for a while, I was
really angry at the music business anyway. I really didn’t wanna fuck wit....
Down-South: Okay a lot of your fans started out with you when
you were a member of Crooked Lettaz and they’ve followed you on through a solo
career. What happened to you and Crooked Lettaz?
David Banner: I honestly think that a lotta cases in New York
arrogance gets in their way when it comes to dealing with us. It’s a lil’ bit
different now because we’re selling records so they have no choice but to acknowledge
us. But in a lotta case they think that their music is better than ours. They think that
we don’t know what we’re talking about no way so they don’t put the same
amount of money into us like they do on their artists. They never give us the same chance
like they give us. They know that we sell more records with less money so why put all that
money into us. I ask you when have you seen a UGK video in heavy rotation? Hell, when have
you even seen a poster campaign on UGK? And they sell more records with less money put
into their projects. Project Pat was in jail both times and both his albums sold more than
anybody on Loud’s whole roster that year!
Penalty, they didn’t believe in us. At the time when we came out Southern rap
wasn’t marketable to them. It’s always been hot to us. When our album first came
out Outkast was just breaking the mold and Southern rap had just begun to get its own
fame. Because back in the day they used to call Rap-A-Lot West Coast when they was the
South and even though Luke was doing his thing the South hadn’t stood up as a whole.
So we just got caught in a time warp. Plus we were caught up in some record label
politics. They already had their top man, which was Noreaga so they wasn’t really
worried about us in the first place. I can’t get mad at it because God works in
mysterious ways. Now I want my own. Now I won’t accept nothing else. I don’t
need nobody else to do nothing for me except move outta my way. If they can put me on TV,
that’s all I need. I can do everything else.
Down-South: Okay your solo debut Them Firewater Boys Vol. 1 made
a lotta noise for you, how did that come about?
 David Banner: To be honest with you it’s a long story but I’m gonna try to cut
it short. Firewater Boys, the song, was actually the remix to the song called Firewater on
Crooked Lettaz Grey Skys album. I never really wanted to do a solo album. I was always
content to be in a group. Crooked Lettaz always felt like something that laid on me by
God. But what had happened was I was going to show Tommy Boy that they was wrong about us.
I put that song in three separate markets and it went number one in all three markets. I
put it on the Pump It or Dump It shows in various markets where they would vote on it and
the most votes outta 32 tha anybody got was twelve, I got all 32 votes. The song went
number one by itself. I’m talking about without even going through the normal radio
politics of getting a song played. The song caught legs by itself. And Tommy Boy saw and
they guy from Tommy Boy told me we know it’s a hit, but we still ain’t going to
do n.
And from that point on I realized that no matter how hard I work for somebody
nobody’s gonna believe in me like me. And then at the point I felt like that the
people that I was surrounded by felt the fire that I felt. I felt like most people were
looking for a deal or something to fall out the sky. God blesses the man that has his own.
You just gotta embark down that path. So I just started doing more and more songs. And as
I started doing more beats for different people and we’d get to vibin’ and
I’d wind up doing a song with them. Just about everybody that’s on my album,
I’m friends with so I just said fuck it, let’s just do a song together. Great!
So one day I looked around and say that I had a nice little catalog of songs. I had enough
for an album. And then what really did it was I was going to stores and they were telling
me that they were getting 500 pre orders for an album that didn’t ......
Down-South: You’re from Mississippi?
David Banner: Right.
Down-South: Where at in Mississippi?
David Banner: I’m from Brookhaven Mississippi. I had a
professor who would ask us where we’re from and I would tell him I’m from
Chicago because that’s where I was born and he’s say that ain’t where
you’re from. Where you’re parent’s are from is where you’re from. My
parents were from Brookhaven, Mississippi. I was raised in Jackson, Mississippi. The first
seventeen, eighteen years of my life was spent right here. Then I became a man in Baton
Rogue, Louisiana, where I went to college at Southern. Then I went to graduate school at
the University of Maryland and then I came back here. So mostly all of my life has been
spent in Mississippi. And everywhere I ever went I’ve always screamed Mississippi.
Down-South: I guess
the obvious question is why is Mississippi so important to you?
David Banner: I’m
so passionate about Mississippi for two reasons. One reason is this is my home. It’s
where my family’s from. For you to disrespect Mississippi is for you to disrespect my
lineage and everything that I’m about, even if it’s incorrect. Right or wrong,
that’s where I’m from, that’s my bloodline. And if you really go deeper
into the African heritage or even if some people who are into the mob, it’s all about
your family, your click, your bloodline. If your family was punks then that means you a
punk until you do something to clean that up. Let’s look at music, outside of Africa,
the cradle for most contemporary music comes from either Louisiana or Mississippi. The
blues comes from Mississippi and jazz is from Louisiana. It’s time for people to
respect that. We always talk about people should respect their elders. Well Mississippi is
your great, great, great grandfather so bow down and r..
But, also keep in mind, that it’s no so much about Mississippi per se. I look at
Mississippi as being a symbol more so than a state. Because if you look at it if I can
make it from outta Mississippi with the way people look at Mississippi as being on the
bottom of everything then imagine what some little kid in Africa, a cat staying Europe who
surrounded by people who are not of his culture, imagine a cat in the deepest part of
Omaha, Nebraska or a kid from outta Alaska. Imagine somebody who ain’t seen nothing
but the block in Mississippi when they see me make and I’m screaming Mississippi.
He’ll think if that kid from Mississippi can do that, I can do that. David
Banner’s from Mississippi and he ain’t scared to represent it. Look at how many
kids go to college and they scared to tell anybody where they’re really from. They
lie about it. It don’t matter they can be from any small town.
Down-South: Now the
new album is called Mississippi: the Album, of all the names to name an album, why
Mississippi?
 David Banner: I’m
always gonna be honest with you bro. People always try to come up with some kinda of deep
reason as to why I named my album Mississippi is so every time you say my name you gotta
say my State. Whenever you talk about my album you gotta say Mississippi’s name. A
lotta people who have heard this album say it one of the best independent albums out
there. Imagine if the Chronic, Dre’s album was called Mississippi every time and
every where that they talk about that album, regardless to whether they wanna talk about
Mississippi or not they gotta acknowledge my state.
That’s the same reason why I called my group Crooked Lettaz. To be honest with you
that’s the only reason why I named it that. Now I can say that it became more later.
But initially it was just so people would have to say Mississippi’s name.
Down-South: Okay you said that the name took on an even deeper meaning later on,
what was that meaning?
David Banner: To
honest with you, I have a mentor and he keeps me outta trouble a lot of times because with
me you never know what you gonna get I can go from being street to a college kid in a
flash. And he sat down and talked to me one day, he didn’t even know that he said
something that affected me like that. He said that this album means more than just a
jamming ass album. You’ve got the spirit of dead slaves on your back. This state has
been cursed because of all of the things that they did to Black folks back in the days and
even now. If this album is going to be called Mississippi: the Album then people are
looking at it as Mississippi. They’re looking at it as a chronological account of why
Mississippi is the way it is now. And people wanna know why it is that way. You have been
call to do that. And I was looking at The Lord of the Rings and the guy told the little
hobbit, you’re a ring bearer now. If you don’t take this responsibility.........
Down-South: Who did the production on the album?
 David Banner: Whew! Boy we
got some heat on this album. We got KLC formerly of Beats by the Pound who now call
themselves the Medicine Men. We got Jazze Pha who is still prompted to do one for me.
Bread & Water, the cats that did stuff on Pac’s last album. Cyber Samp, Mixso,
Billy Hume, Lil Jon, DJ Low and Dommo and Blind Rob who did production for Devin.
Down-South: Why did you get so much outside production when you’ve been
doing all of these beats for everybody else? Why not just do it for yourself?
David Banner: I did
some, but to be honest with you I rap better over other people’s beats. SO
that’s why I had to go and give you my best. Remember, I’m trying to become the
best rapper too. So yeah I had some people to help me out on this one.
Down-South: Okay you got some high-powered guest appearances on this album. Name some
of them for us?
David Banner: Lil Jon,
Pastor Troy, Fiend, Jagged Edge, Jazze Pha, Too $hort, and Lil’ Flip.
That’s about all I’m gonna name for right now. But everybody that I rapped with
on this album are friends of mine. We deal with each other on a friendship level and on a
business level so it makes for a good album. A lotta people that was on the last album
aren’t gonna be on the new one because you know how some of the record companies be
trippin’ on these clearances. But one of the things that I am real excited about is I
scheduled to do a song with one of my favorite rappers Bun B. I love UGK and I did a song
with Pimp C before, now me and Bun are going to do a song together and I can’t wait
for that to happen. It’s gonna be jamming!
Down-South: What can we expect from Mississippi: the Album?
David Banner: I can
just say -and it might sound corny- [expect] the blues because my music has gotten better
because I’ve went through hard times. By me living in my Van again and by me going
through a lotta pain. I mean a lotta pain from watching my mentor’s house get burned
down to seeing my friends die to watching Crooked Lettaz knowing that we had two of the
strongest singles in the game and watch all that crumble. For me to watch my best friends
turn against me at the same time when I needed them the most. To watch people whom I
thought loved me and to realize that they didn’t love me for me, they loved me
because I was a meal ticket. To watch when I was broke and had no way to pay my rent and
watch people whom, I had housed, whom I had taken care of their children, people whom I
was that close to killing and they not knowing that I was that close to killing them; I
can honestly say that all of that is in my music. For me to get a higher.....
Down-South: What do you want people to walk away with when they finish listening to
this album?
 David Banner: I want them to
walk away knowing that they are not alone. I think that in a lotta instances what America
is trying to do is keep everybody locked down. Keep them in their houses, keep them on the
internet so we don’t know what’s going on in the real world. And what happens in
our lives, we think that we’re the only ones who go through this. That was one thing
that music used to do for us. We could travel here and we could travel there through our
music. Cats are being shot by cops in LA and New York and cats are being hung in jail
cells here in Mississippi, whether by the gun or a rope we’re still dying.
Mississippi is the last key to music. We’re the last degree in this circle. Then I
feel like it’s going go back and do something else again. We’re the missing
piece in the 360 degrees, I don’t care how far the music has traveled we’re
still the last degree. This where the music first started and this is where it’s
gonna end. And that’s what I feel the South is gone be: completion. I feel like
when people listen to my album then they’ll feel like okay, now I can close the book.
Down-South: When can people expect the album in stores?
David Banner: I
don’t know whenever I finish. The problem is I keep doing songs that are better then
the last batch of songs and pushes me to go back and add to the album. That’s
what’s taking me so long. But I set a mastering date for myself so I’m gonna
have to stick to that. I guess I’m looking at the first of the year…January or
February somewhere along in there.
Down-South: Any final words?
David Banner: Yeah and
print this, please. If you ain’t my friend and you in the game I’m at ya. They
didn’t let Mississippi in the game before, now we gonna take it. I don’t like
you, we ain’t friends and it’s on.
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