Greenville’s Supah Mario knows the paradox that is the Mississippi Delta all too well.

He has lived all of his “twenty-something” years there. His experiences serves as the main inspiration for his first record Waiting All My Life (Get Sum, 98) and his sophomore LP, Delta Life Vol. 1: From the Bottom to the Top. I had actually interviewed Mario a week before my house had caught fire, but never really got around to transcribing the interview. So when I got settled in my new spot Mario and Bam, CEO of Get Sum Records came over to say hello and, you know me, I took the time to get in a quick interview with him. Check it out.

Down-South: What’s up Supah Mario?

Supah Mario: What’s up Charlie, it nice to see you once again.

Down-South: It’s nice to be seen after all I’ve been through. Let’s start off by talking a little bit about your background; you’re from the Delta, right

Supah Mario: Yes that's right, Greenville, Mississippi to be exact.

Down-South: You hear a lot of things about the Delta being one of the poorest regions in the country. Tell us what’s it like to grow up there being a young black male?

Supah Mario: Growing up in the Delta basically is nothing more than the average youngster would see in the inner city only it’s not a city. It’s more poverty. It’s less things to do there. There's no positive influences there. We just have to find a way to break up out the gate. Growing up in the Delta, there were hellava role models for me. The economy is so bad and you’re dealing with racism all ya life and that’s what growing up in the whole state of Mississippi is all about. For sure Greenville is like no other because there’s no place like home.

Down-South: I imagine growing up in the Delta that you heard a lot of blues music?

Supah Mario: Yeah [I heard] a lotta blues. All my people –my mom, my aunts, and my cousins they all listen to the blues right now like kids from New York listen to hip hop today. Like in all the other cities in the country you see all of the big name rappers come to the City to do a concert at the convention or civic center; well in Greenville, you see all of the major blues artists come through and do concerts. BB King comes through and performs all the time so do Little Milton and others so the blues is a major thing in the Delta.

Down-South: How has growing up listening to the blues…having it be such a major part of your life…I was wondering how did that affect the way you appreciate hip hop? And most importantly, what was it about hip hop that made you choose it as your major mode of expressing your self rather than singing the blues?

Supah Mario: Because to me, growing up around my mom and my aunts, it just seemed like that it was music more for older people. I think that it was just my way of thinking. I now realize that that was wrong of me to think that way because there’s a lotta younger people like me who still listen to the blues. But hip hop touched me more than the blues did because I’m looking at a younger guy, he’s got on the same kinda clothes as I do and he’s speaking about whats going on in the hood. When I look at the blues I see this old man with a big hat on with a guitar, so hip hop, when I first heard it, hit me like a comet hitting earth.

Down-South: Okay let’s talk about some of your hip hop influences, who were they?

Supah Mario: Well, it all changed in the time frame because in the beginning, you had Salt ‘n’ Peppa….I love Salt ‘n’ Peppa, you had Kool Moe Dee, LL Cool J, the Fresh Prince (Will Smith) … I was inspired by all of those guys. Then it came up to the like modern day rappers like Tupac, he was a big influence, Scarface, Biggie, guys like Method Man. I’m inspired by the versatility of hip hop. It’s just really no major influence that you can say that rules hip hop because all of those guys are great and history will testify that those guys left a mark on it.

Down-South: Well, since you mention Tupac as an influence, I have to bring this question up.

Supah Mario: I already know what you going to say…

Down-South: A lot of people say that you sound just like Tupac, how do you respond to that?

Supah Mario: Right, even when people see me, they say that I kinda look like him. It’s just for me, doing this thing the way that I do, bruh, that just the way God meant it. There ain’t never gonna be another Pac. I’m Supah Mario. It’s just up to me to make this thing work…I gotta let the people know who I am. And that's wrong when people misjudge you because you happen to sound like somebody else. I’m not trying sound like Pac. I can’t help the fact that my voice sounds like Tupac: That’s like Glenn White, the Stevie Wonder Guy or Loon who sounds like Mase or Shine who sounded like Biggie, people accepted them. But I guess because it’s Pac, it’s just a different thang to people. But me, I’m Supah Mario [and] I’m from Mississippi. Geographically, that’s a whole different part of the Untied States than the West Coast. Pac was born in the North. He was bi-coastal. I ain’t never experienced that life, but that just the way that God made it.

Down-South: How did you get started rapping?

Supah Mario: Well, it all goes back for me to mid 80s. Music has always been a big part of me. I always wrote all of these songs. I wrote my on music.

Down-South: I also heard that you wrote poems…..

Supah Mario: (pause) Yeah, how’d you know that?

Down-South: Don’t worry, I do my homework…you were saying….

Supah Mario: Well, songs are nothing but poems set to music. Rap ain’t nothing but modern day poetry. Only you’re speaking in a rhythmic pattern over beats with rap. With poems you doing it acapella, but either way, you’re still getting your message across.

Down-South: Ok, how did get hooked up with Get Sum Records?

Supah Mario: Well, Get Sum Records is like a home based label that was formed by Supah Mario and Fabian also known as Bam. Bam was a guy that I knew before we even thought about doing a record together. He knew guys in the community and around town who used to tell him about me. They’d tell him bruh, you need to get with Supah, he going to blow up one day. By him being a big music man and by me being that nigga who can rhyme, business wise we came together and thats how Get Sum was formed in 1998.

Down-South: Okay, that’s when you put out your first record, the EP Waiting All My Life?

Supah Mario: Right. It was a five song EP that we put out to test the waters. And it did real good. It was in mom and pop stores in Greenville and surrounding areas on consignment. We weren’t in the chain stores, nor were we sound scanning a lot of units. It was strictly underground. But we touched a lot of places with that EP. We sold a lot in Atlanta, a few out in Texas, we even went out to California promoting it.

Down-South: That was the record that made you the forerunner in the Mississippi Delta…..

Supah Mario: Yeah, it was. As far as radio play, club play, all of that. Like my first shit was played out there on 94.3 in my home town.

Down-South: David Banner said that you were really hot in Greenville.

Supah Mario: Yeah and I am thankful for that.

Down-South Tell us about the new album Delta Life Vol 1: From the Bottom to Top?

Supah Mario: It contains my life just placed in a rhythmic lyrical pattern, that’s all. I’ve got some stuff on there from the gutter lifestyle. I’ve got a song on there called Man gone destroy the world that’s dealing with harsh evil-doers of the world today. And I got shit for my soldiers telling them how money can come between them. I’m raising all hell on this album just talking about my lifestyle. There’s a lotta diversity in lie and you’ve got to give it to them on the album. And that’s what I do.

Down-South: You got some of Mississippi’s real heavy-hitters on this album….

Supah Mario: Fo’ sho’ I got Us From Dirt, David Banner, P-Boy Stone and Karen Brown who is a well known R & B artist out here are all getting down on this album. These are like major hitters out here in Mississippi and for them to come through and show some love and appreciation to me, all my love go out to them.

Down-South: Now this record is also making noise outside of Mississippi, I’ve heard it on OG Ron C from Swisha House chopped and screwed your record “Man’s Gone Destroy the World” on his latest mix tape entitled After the Kappa Beach Party 2002. That is major love right there.

Supah Mario: Oh yeah ya boy OG Ron C screwed one of the hotter tracks on my album, Man Gone Destroy the World and that was a major honor, man. Much love to my man OG Ron C.

Down-South: Any final words?

Supah Mario: Yeah, go get that Supah Mario, Delta Life Vol. 1. This album is got everything that you need to know about what’s going on in the Delta, and it ain’t all pretty, but it’s some of the hottest shit out right now.

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by: Charlie Braxton | Photo: Get Sum Records.  © 2002 Down-South.com