Pitchfork

In true Blue Collar fashion, Rhymefest likes to take his own, hands-on approach to career-building, whether that means meeting with a member of British Parliament to discuss the state of hip hop, scheduling a tour where he will stay at fans' houses and document it for a potential TV show, or recording the theme song for "Crank Yankers". The Chicago MC discussed all of these things in a recent conversation with Pitchfork. He also talked to us about turning 30, his new album, and what it is that Chicago brings to hip hop in 2006 that no one has seen before.

Pitchfork: You just got back from a meeting with David Cameron, the Leader of the Conservative Party in the UK, who invited you to tea after reading a letter you wrote him addressing some comments he made about hip hop back in June. What was that like?

Rhymefest: It was crazy. I mean, he's up to be the next Prime Minister. And I'm the first rapper to ever go to the House of Commons and perform for them, and there were MI5 and MI6 everywhere. They had me in the papers like I was some big gangsta rapper. You had members of the opposite party rallying against me. You heard black people in black neighborhoods looking at me like I was Tupac-- and they didn't even know who I was-- saying, "Yo, he's speaking for us. He's speaking for hip hop!" All from a letter I wrote.

Pitchfork: Did you really perform for the whole House of Commons?

Rhymefest: No, it wasn't a performance. I went to the House of Commons to meet with him, and [I brought] Ged Doherty-- the CEO of BMG UK-- with me because it had to be a meeting of the heads. I'm an artist; I don't have control over who puts records out or who puts money behind them or who does promotion. Hell, I ain't worth platinum. My shit was a brick. As good as Blue Collar was, it didn't sell a hundred thousand records. So I had to take him because he's the one that can affect a change. And when I rapped for [Cameron], it wasn't a performance. It was more of a, "Look, rap music isn't all 50 Cent. It isn't all gangster. It isn't all misleading to the youth. Some of it goes a little something like this..." And I rapped for him.

He said, "All I'm saying is this: I never said, 'Ban hip hop.' Because I understand that everyone needs to be heard and I understand expression." And then he said the word that I have been talking about for the longest [time], and it really lit me up. He said, "[We need] balance." And I said to him, "I agree with what you're saying. But on the other hand, if your policies promote poverty, the problem is that the people don't believe you. If your policies don't coincide with your concern about our music and our expression, then the people are not going to respond to you. Rap music comes from disenfranchisement; it comes from urban rebellion. So until we can calm that down, then you're going to hear a lot of things you don't like. And you can't tell the people, 'Don't cry.' You have to ask them why they're crying, just like we're doing now."

I also wanted to show that rappers don't always have to put on their grills and their chains in order to be effective. I think that the loss of Tupac and the absence of Public Enemy as effective [forces] for the youth-- in the absence of that, we have somehow forgotten that a lot of us have minds, and it's cool to sometimes use your mind.

Pitchfork: Do you think that's one of the reasons that Blue Collar was a brick, because that's not in fashion?

Rhymefest: No. That would be to assume that everybody is stupid. And Blue Collar was very entertaining. It was not preachy. It was not, "Listen! I got something to say! Think, motherfucker! Think today!" Anyone who knows my music knows I intertwine wit and humor with philosophy. It's all in the promotion and the presentation, and I may have been kind of screwed over in those areas. I just got off tour with A Tribe Called Quest. We were tearing shit down! Everybody was like, "Oh my God, I didn't know!" I'm not crying, and I'm not complaining because I realize that, at the end of the day, success depends on me. So I have to right whatever was wrong.

I'm trying to figure out how to put it in my hands and use the machine to massage the things that I'm doing. I just did the theme song for the new season of "Crank Yankers". They made a Rhymefest puppet. At the beginning of every "Crank Yankers" show, my puppet's going to be running around doing the intro. I watched "Hip Hop Honors", and they started it off with "Brand New". To me that said something: "People like your song, man. Now show them that you're legitimate, that you're not just Kanye's boy. Show them that you'll keep coming back and that you'll be consistent. So that's what I have to do with El Che, my new album.

Pitchfork: Before we talk about El Che, tell us about your upcoming Plugg City Tour. You announced on your MySpace and SOHH blogs that you would "live with 10 different fans from 10 different states for three days each." Have you determined your itinerary yet?

Rhymefest: No, I haven't. It's so hard, because I'm trying to pull myself away from [doing] this "Flavor of Love" thing and staying with the girls and trying to screw them all. But I want to bring a video camera. I want it to be like a hip hop "Dr. Phil", where I'm like, "G, what are you doing living like this? Clean this shit up!"

Pitchfork: So you're planning on changing some things when you get there?

Rhymefest: Hell yeah! If I'm going to be staying there for three days, especially if we're living in trailer homes and projects, I've got to have some kind of comfort. They're going to have to change their attitudes a little bit. A rapper's in town!

Pitchfork: Have you gotten many entries?

Rhymefest: Thousands. I didn't expect it to do what it did. I want to get a good camera guy. I'm trying to get the money to do the traveling, because it's going to take some traveling and some capital. So I'm getting all the entries now and getting everybody together, and I'm probably going to go out in January.

Pitchfork: Are you going to release the footage?

Rhymefest: I'm going to take the footage and try to do a TV show. I'm going to take it around to VH1, BET, MTV, the Food Channel, whoever, see who wants to take it. But it's also not just showing me trying to live with my fans; it's showing me trying to work my record. It's showing me taking my singles around to DJs and saying, "Will you play this song?," showing the people what a rapper has to go through. This is what rappers really are: young guys going around struggling to get a record played over 50 other records, especially if he's not from New York, he ain't from L.A., he's not from the South, can he get his record played?

Pitchfork: Would it just be one season or would you want it to go on?

Rhymefest: If it's successful, I'll take it to different countries. If it's successful, it'll be like, "Rhymefest lives with different people in fucking Uganda, trying to get his record played."

Pitchfork: And what is the story with El Che?

Rhymefest: I'm going to drop the best revolutionary album since Public Enemy! It's titled after my real name [Che Smith], and it's going to be entertaining. What I'm going to do is take the revolution and love of Bob Marley, the passion of Pac, and the lyrical wit of the Fugees from The Score, and mix it together.

It's going to be on Allido/J Records. I still love J Records; don't get me wrong. I'm talking about things that maybe I didn't do right or they didn't do right, but, at the end of the day, I would not have had this opportunity had it not been for Clive Davis and J Records. I have a house. I have a nice car. I'm able to support myself off of doing music that I love. I'm very blessed. They're not going to drop me either. I've gotten myself into the interesting situation that I think they know Rhymefest might just hit one out of the park.

Pitchfork: With whom are you collaborating on the album?

Rhymefest: DJ Premier and I have hooked up. We're family now. He's just going to be heavily involved in helping me: "Yo, that's hot," "Yo, that ain't hot," you know? That was a relationship that I didn't have on the last album that I feel is very valuable. I have tracks from Jazzy Jeff already, and he and I have been recording. These are all the prospective producers on this album: Premo, Jazzy Jeff, Kanye West, a group of producers I found-- Animal House Productions, and Mark Ronson, of course. We're almost done with the album. I want it to come out in March. [For] the single, I'm trying to get with Kelis and Ghostface. Although I haven't gotten in contact with Kelis or Ghostface, it can still happen. The budget is open.

Pitchfork: Do you have song titles yet?

Rhymefest: "Corinthians", "The Letter", [which has] a John Mayer sample that I hope he clears, "Pretty Girls Are the Loneliest". We're still keeping the humor. Funny but true, that's the whole thing. El Che is the album of the revolution, man. Rap music today needs Rhymefest more than ever.

Pitchfork: Why is that? What is it that rap in 2006 is missing?

Rhymefest: Balance.

Pitchfork: You mean something that appeals to people on the street but also brings an intelligence with it?

Rhymefest: I wouldn't even say intelligence, but some type of cultural development. I think Kanye brings it. Lupe brings it. Common, Twista, Rhymefest: we're bringing something that has never been seen. We're bringing what I will call spirituality. We've had social/political with Public Enemy; we've had gangsta with the West Coast; we've had lyrics with the East; we've danced with the South. But who has moved our spirits like Chicago, like Kanye with the sped-up soul samples? Like Common saying, "Let's just be, be ourselves." Lupe saying, "When times get hard, just kick push." And Rhymefest saying, "Look man, I'm blue collar. I'm struggling; I'm working it out."

Chicago is the home of house music. Chicago was discovered by a black man, Jean Baptiste Point Du Sable, who doesn't even have a statue, by the way. It is the headquarters of the Nation of Islam. Yes, it's the home of Al Capone, the Gangster Disciples, gang culture. And it was described by Dr. King as one of the most segregated cities he'd ever been to. So out of all of that you get Rhymefest, you get Kanye, you get Common, you get spirit, spirituality. And I think that rap music has not effectively conveyed spirituality. It's only effectively conveyed urban rebellion.

Pitchfork: How does the kind of spirituality you're talking about differ from "consciousness" in traditional "conscious" rap?

Rhymefest: "Consciousness" is ego; "consciousness" is, "I know what's better, and if you don't listen to this kind of hip hop, you're wack." That's ego. We're not interested in that. I hate it when people call me a backpacker or a "conscious" rapper, but they don't know what else to label me as because they haven't seen me before. Kanye played up the backpack, but he's not even a backpacker. He's a well-rounded individual. I see a lot of rappers out here, and I'm not dissing them, but their names are "Young" and "Lil" and things that reference immaturity. At some point, we have to look at ourselves as young people and say, "It's time to grow up," grow up in terms of, "I'm going to get myself together. I'm going to examine myself, and I'm going to grow up, inside and out."

Pitchfork: Speaking of growing up, how do you feel about turning 30 next year?

Rhymefest: All of the best rappers right now are 30 [or older]: Ghostface, Jay-Z, Kanye West, Eminem. The list goes on. I'm excited about being able to do what I do for a living. The life expectancy of a black American male is about 65 years old. At 30, I'm halfway dead and gone. That's how I've got to look at it. The only thing I've got is what I leave behind, my deeds. And at 30, I've got to step it up a notch, and I've got to go harder. I'm ready for that.