PERCEE P

Apparently life begins at 40, which is lucky if you’re name is Percee P, because after a lifetime busting his DIY hustle in NYC – selling his tapes and CDs anywhere and everywhere – Stones Throw are about to release his debut album ‘Perseverance’ (featuring Diamond D, Prince Po, Chali 2na, Jedi Mind Tricks and Aesop Rock) and shine a lil’ light on one of the greatest rappers you’ve never heard of. It’s more than a little odd, especially given that Percee has been rhyming since he was 10 years-old and he’s celebrating his 37th birthday today (9th July), but we’ll let Percee explain himself.

You’ve been rapping since 79, your first cut ‘Let The Homicides Begin’ (alongside D-Nique) dropped in 88, but your debut LP is forthcoming on Stones Throw in 2007. What’s going on? That’s 19 years!

I’ve never been the type to go to labels to push my product. I never really did that. I just did my thing, a 12” here and there and just got out on the street. Then later on down the line, by the mid 90s I started selling old school Cold Crush tapes and that’s what got me into pushing my own CDs and stuff.

Basically I’d hit up anything hip hop oriented, so if there was a hip hop show I’d go down to Fat Beats because I knew a lot of flyers would be dropped off there. Plus more people who went there were more likely to know me than going to a big major chain store.

How have you seen hip hop evolve over the years then?

It’s always evolving. I’ve seen it from the parks and out in the street before people were even making records. They’d just bring their equipment out in the playgrounds and playing a lot of music, but at that time you never thought that it was gonna be on records. It was just people cutting up disco breaks and rapping over that. So when Run DMC came up, they were just doing what people like Grandmaster Flash, [Grand Wizard] Theodore and Cold Crush Brothers were doing, only they took it to another level. And you knew it was getting bigger because you’d see people like the Fat Boys on TV. People started believing in the craft more.

Did people recognise the roots of hip hop in Jamaican sound system culture back in the early days, or not?

Back in the days when cats used to set up sound systems in the park, they said they were jammin’. That was the term. They’re jammin’ down the street. And if you were MCing and somebody asked you how long you’d been rhyming, you wouldn’t say ‘rhymin’’ you’d say ‘rockin’’ – and ‘rockin’’ could’ve meant you were a b-boy, an MC or a DJ. I’ve been rockin’ since 79. But back in those times nobody really looked at it like, “Oh, this came from Jamaica.” The battles were pretty territorial back then in the Bronx.

Who did you used to go and listen to?

This guy Disco B who used to roll with Grandmaster Flash, Easy Mike and the Brothers Bass from my project – Patterson projects. Erm… Heartbeat Brothers, Easy G… My older brother, he used to DJ and rhyme. My uncle Coolie Breeze used to be down with T La Rock so they had a crew called The Undefeated Force and I used to go to my Grandmother’s house to watch them do their thing in her front room.

I guess your older brother must have been a pretty important influence upon you ‘cause he had turntables. Can you DJ too?

Yeah but I really learned more about that side of things because back in those times, the MCs more so had to know their breaks. You had to know your records. You see nowadays people are like: “Yo! Let me get that Nas record to rhyme over” but back then it’s be like “Let me get ‘Impeach The President’” or “Let me get Bob James – ‘Mardi Gras’”. You had to know your records like that.

My younger brother D-Nique and I started rhyming together from watching my oldest brother and my uncle and all of them. We called ourselves The Vicious 2 MCs, I gave him his name RKG which stands for Royal King G (people still call him KG). We had routines like the way Cold Crush and the Force MCs used to do it.

Do you think people hold enough respect for hip hop’s history?

No and it’s sad because if you don’t respect it, it’s gonna come back to haunt you. How are you not gonna wanna know about something? How are you not gonna wanna know the roots of it? What about when somebody asks you about your influences? If you don’t respect them and you don’t know about them, you’re just gonna look ignorant. You don’t know who the Cold Crush Brothers are? That’s gonna make you look bad. You should know who Kool Herc is just like you know who Jay-Z is.

I put out a CD called ‘Legendary Status’ and on the inside you see all the old school Cold Crush tapes. I did that on purpose. That’s my way of giving back to the pioneers. I put their names there, but it’s up to you to find out who they are ‘cause some of the stuff that you’re doing, they were doing the same thing. When I first heard J5, I was like this is what Cold Crush sounded like and they had two DJs and four MCs. If you ask me they had their shows more together than cats do now.

It pays to know your history because one day you’ll be the old school too – like me. People say I’m old school, but to me, I’m not old school like Kool Herc or whatever. I’m just old school compared to the artists out now. I’ll always big up the pioneers because I want them to know that they’re recognised and they ain’t forgotten.

GUILTY SIMPSON

J Dilla was the first producer to give Guilty Simpson a platform, recording him on Jaylib’s ‘Champion Sound’ album in 2003. The two embarked on an album of their own in the same year, but unfortunately it was never completed as J Dilla passed away in February of 2006. In the meantime, Guilty has collaborated with fellow Detroit residents Dabrye, Phat Kat, Black Milk and D-12 and is set to release his hotly anticipated debut album ‘Ode To The Ghetto’ on Stones Throw in September with production from Dilla, Mr. Porter, Madlib, Oh No and Jake One.

This is your first time in Europe and Ryde is the first place that you’ve visited in the UK. Given that, in your words, Detroit is basically “grimy as fuck”, what’s it like rapping about your life to a bunch of people chillin’ on the Isle Of Wight? Is it weird?
It kinda blew my mind to be able to come here and do my music and have people relate to it. In my opinion things don’t really change that much. I don’t care if you’re in Detroit or wherever. Everybody goes through stuff, even if it’s not money, it could be anything. I think we’re people first. Before I came here I had an idea… actually I had no idea of what it would be like here, but I was able to get on the stage, get the people’s energy and how much love and reception they showed me and it just let me know that no matter where I go, as long as the music can be my avenue it’s gonna link me with all kinds of people.

Can you tell us a bit about your crew: the Almighty Dreadnaughtz?
It’s like a loose collective. 10 MCs and probably about six of them are producers too. It’s like a self-contained unit. That’s who I started out with… I’ve been rapping with these guys for the better part of ten or twelve years. And they’re the people who actually got me serious about music too. A lot of people don’t know ‘em, but I hope to change that real soon ‘cause I’m getting a bit more of a platform now. Y’know that’s what people did for me – Dilla and people before me. They’ll link it up and open the door for the people who they think are deserving, let ‘em come through and showcase their talents and that’s what I plan on doing.

You were working on an album with Dilla when he passed. Is some of that material going to appear on your forthcoming album ‘Ode To The Ghetto’ for Stones Throw?
Yeah some of it, but basically I think Stones Throw have access to about six or seven songs that I did that Dilla produced ‘cause we was in the process of doing that when he passed. I’m not gonna put them all on one record, I’m gonna space them out, put a couple on this and put a couple on that… slowly give it to them y’know. I still have a good relationship with the Yancey family so I just always plan on always keeping his music alive through his beats… whatever’s necessary to keep his music going.

Was Dilla prolific like Madlib then? Would he give you CDs crammed with beats to choose from?
That’s definitely J Dilla… he had all kinds of stuff. You might skip a beat and not realise that the beat changed towards the end or in the middle of it. Sometimes you might have a CD that says it’s one track, but there might be three beats on there. That’s how I stumbled across some of the beats that I have… a couple of Madlib beats that I have are like that y’know. I might hear something that he played as an interlude and be like ‘Eh, what’s up with that?’ and we might go to the studio, loop it and y’know hey, it’s a song.

Another cat that you’ve worked a lot with is Mr Porter. Can you tell us a little about him?

He’s Kon Artis from the group D-12, but he’s Mr. Porter when he’s working as a producer. He’s worked with 50 Cent, Lil Kim, a lot of G-Unit people, Shakira and Beyonce… He’s incredible… and he’s one of my closest friends who has shown me a lot of ways through the music industry. Him and Dilla are like the two people who took me under their wings and put their faith in my music.

I wanted to ask if the untimely deaths of J Dilla and Proof (D-12) last year affected the way you approached your music?
Well I’m sad to say that my experience of people close to me dying didn’t start with Dilla or Proof. My music always had at least a dark element to it, just because being where I’m from nothing is guaranteed. I think it more or less affects the way I feel when I’m not doing music. It’s just kinda surreal y’know, especially for those two to go in that sequence, so fast. It made me get a lot more serious about what I was doing and put a lot of things in perspective about where I wanna go with music and my life basically. What kind of mark do I wanna make? I wanna be remembered as a person that put his heart in music and someone who wasn’t afraid to take chances and say what’s on his mind.

You’ve got a pretty aggressive vocal style but has that mellowed with age?
Right, when I started out I was extremely aggressive. I only knew one way, but now I’m starting to get a little bit more versatile. At one point when I’d just started out I didn’t really know how I wanted to sound, I just knew how I was doing it y’know? But now it’s more thought out and strategised. When I write a verse now, I might know exactly how I wanna say it, but it might be different to how I said my last rhyme – it comes with experience.

I think it has something to do with your tone, but your voice kinda reminds me of Ice Cube…
Hmmm… somebody has said that before. He definitely was an influence, but I’m cut from more of a Kool G Rap, Big Daddy Kane cloth. I still loved Ice Cube, NWA and all of that though, especially like the earlier Ice Cube stuff… y’know ‘AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted’ – that’s one of my favourite records of all time, some might even argue that is the greatest record of all time when you go song for song… much respect to Ice Cube, that’s definitely a compliment.

Do you think that hip hop and ‘the struggle’ go hand in hand?
Actually I think hip hop is a struggle. You’ve gotta look at the conception of it ‘cause nobody gave us an avenue for it. People just used to go out in the park y’know, masses of people would gather and DJs would spin records. We didn’t really have things laid out for us like a lot of different music variations did and of course it brought so many different people together y’know, races and y’know just everything. This is one of the few forms of music where you’ll look out in the crowd and see Black, White, Latino, Asian all in one place. I think it is a struggle because I think it breaks down barriers. You might struggle internally… by you not knowing me I might have a false conception of who you are, and you might feel the same way about me, so it’s an internal struggle just getting to know who each other are and the music kinda breaks it down. We’re sitting right here and talking right now because of music.