iHipHop Interview- K.A.R.: Next In Line…

15 years ago view-show 3,305,610

kar-group-blog_phixrWhen it comes to crews of a Hip-Hop nature, they’re usually always formed within one area.

Whether it’s a neighborhood or a local hangout, odds are each member is generally from that same region.

However for the associates that make up K.A.R. (Kill All Rats), this is not the case.

Backed by Bronx Bomber Fat Joe and street legend Pistol Pete, the four-man collective of Rob Cash, Onez, Leader, and Mike Beck; all hail from different boroughs respectively, but the goal is still a united one.

With their album set for a May release, which will feature some of the top heavyweights New York has to offer, Rob Cash sheds some insight of how things came to be, and how they expect to make an impact beyond the city limits of the big apple.

iHipHop.com: How did you guys all come together as a group?

Rob Cash: We all just came into the studio at separate times… My man Mike Beck was the first artist down with Kill All Rats, and him and [Pistol] Pete were really close… I knew some of the guys who knew [Pistol] Pete, so they were like, “Why don’t you come down to the studio?”

So I went in there for a session, and they put a couple of tracks on, and I blacked-out and did what I do… I was in there with Tony Sunshine, and they called [Pistol] Pete up, and they were like, “You have to come through, and hear this kid.” So he came through, and he said that he wanted to work with me…

Onez is from my area, we grew up together, so I gave him a holla, and I told him to come through because there’s a good movement that’s about to start up… So he came through, and [Pistol] Pete liked him too…

As for Leader, he’s cool with Tony Sunshine, because they’re from the same area, so Tony [Sunshine] brought him around, and it just clicked… Everything was good…

iHipHop.com: Are all of you guys from the Bronx?

Rob Cash: Nah… Leader is from the Bronx, Onez and I are from Harlem, and Mike Beck is from Brooklyn…

iHipHop.com: With the music industry not what it was once, do you think it will be difficult trying to get people to come out of their pocket to support your movement?

Rob Cash: Yeah, it will be, but I feel like people go out and purchase a lot of garbage, you know what I’m saying? I feel like we’ll win them over with the story that we have to tell, because we’re all from the bottom struggling, but we’re living our dreams…

We have music for everybody, and it’s not just one-sided… We got commercial joints for the radio, clubs joint, and joints for the ladies, and a lot of good features… So I think we can do it…

iHipHop.com: What do you think separates you guys from all the other crews out there right now who are also trying to make a name for themselves?

Rob Cash: First and foremost with us it’s loyalty… We’ve been through a lot, and we’ve all been together for like 4-5 years now, and going hard doing what we got to do…

We’re loyal, and that’s the key… Once you have one weak link in the crew, that’s what separates everybody… Plus we’re all versatile, and we’re not one-sided like I said earlier… We might have started off gangsta, but we’re all talented enough to where we can switch it up…

A lot of the other crew out there are just gangsta, and that’s it… It’s all about how many times they can shoot someone up, or how many times they can do this, or do that… But you can take anyone of us, and throw us in a party joint…
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iHipHop.com: Your album is going to feature people like Jadakiss [Click to read The Last Kiss review], Sheek Louch [Click to read Sheek interview], Raekwon, and Hell Rell. Was it a conscious decision for you guys to try and work with a lot of New York MC’s?

Rob Cash: We definitely wanted to reach out to most of the dudes in New York, but the majority of the dudes that are on the album hollered at us… They heard the tracks, the songs, and they heard how we were on our grind…

They were telling [Pistol] Pete that they wanted to get on the album, and dudes were hollering at me, and hitting me up on Myspace and all that… Everything just clicked, but we definitely got to bring that unity back…

Right now in NYC, there’ too much beefing for nothing… Even though we’re in a recession, lets just eat and lets all get this money…

iHipHop.com: So what can people expect to hear from your album?

Rob Cash: I don’t know what the people will expect, but I know we got that heat… We got mean production, and the beats are crazy… The features are crazy, every song has a concept, and it’s a little bit if everything… People should be satisfied, and I buy a lot of albums too, just to see where an artist is coming from…

Then they only have 1-2 hits, but you can ply our album straight through, and I’m not just saying that because it’s our album… There’s really good music on there, so we’re going to see…

iHipHop.com: How was it like making the record? Did everyone agree with the same concepts?

Rob Cash: Since we’re all so talented, we vibed together and went through the beats… From there is was like; whoever’s going to be on it, is going to be on it… Whoever came up with the hottest verses, or had the meanest flow, and from there, we just did what we had to do… We split it up: Some people are on certain tracks, and some people are on other tracks… It was all good…

iHipHop.com: So it was basically like a friendly competition between you all to come up with the hottest material?

Rob Cash: You can say that, because we’re all striving to be the best anyways… As artists we all go hard, and everyone was up for the challenge… We all knew that if you wanted to make the album, you had to come with your best… So we all got focused, and it was good…

petejoe_big_press2iHipHop.com: Besides [Pistol] Pete, Fat Joe is also backing you guys. So is that added incentive to try even harder?

Rob Cash: Yeah… Especially since everybody knows [Pistol] Pete’s situation… Everybody thinks we came into the game on some rah-rah sh*t, and we ain’t even about that… We came in really humble, and we just want to put our talent out there, and let the world know what we got…

We know we’re hot, and it’s time for something new… Especially with the [Fat] Joe situation too… He’s a big artist, and he’s been holding it down for years…

But we really feel comfortable, because he have [Fat] Joe in our corner and we have [Pistol] Pete, and we all know what they’re about… It should be really easy for us, because all we have to do is go in, go hard, and make this music…

iHipHop.com: Did you guys find it difficult at first to catch a buzz just because New York is over saturated with rappers?

Rob Cash: In my case, I’ve been around for a minute… I used to be Kay Slay’s artist, I used to run around with Benzino, I did joints with Floyd Maywheather, and I did some joints with Karl Kani when he was trying to start something up…

So I been around for years putting in work, and a lot of the other dudes are younger than me, but they’ve been around too… The talent is going to speak for itself, and once you have that you can override anything…

iHipHop.com: Right now Hip-Hop is real gimmicky, and you guys aren’t. Do you think that will effect if people are checking for you or not?

Rob Cash: It might to the fans who like that kind of stuff, and who are stuck on that, but I still think we can win them over… Once our album drops, and they hear the joints we have, we should be good…