By: R Tha BlockStaR AKA
HHC: I got your Survival Mixtape Vol. 3 , and it’s a nice mixtape, but when are we going to see an album?
Izreal: Well that’s coming in the first quarter of 2007, we’re in the middle of putting the final touches on it, and securing which avenue we are going to do distribution, we have digital distribution already, but we’re working out some stuff for physical distribution as well, so we’re just preparing the album, so we’re looking around April/May, lord willing’ it depends how things work out, its’ going to be a banger, so we’re excited.
HHC: Are you guys going to stay on the independent route? Or are you shopping majors right now?
Psalmz: So far, we’ve been independent thus far, and it’s working out just fine, and as we gain more leverage, we are going to consider the independent route, but work along side with the major, for distribution and promotions or what not. Independent is definitely the way to go, its’ the future, you know. For example, our label is called Defiant Entertainment, so it may be like a Defiant/Universal we’ll definitely have our hands all over, and it’s getting our hands onto a bigger level, and the reason we haven’t done it, is because we’ve been able to maintain our independence, now its time to take that next step. We still want to remain independent, so its’ going to be a combination. We don’t want a label to just come along, after we’ve put in years of our hard work, and grunt work, and just come in and put their name on it, and act like they built us, when meanwhile it’s like Nine years in the making.
HHC: Who will you guys collaborate with for the album?
Psalmz: We actually like to keep it in the house, and do it ourselves, to show people that we didn’t need a bunch of artists to make a good album. Besides, there are three of us already. We do have some collabos, like Pitbull on “Mira Mira” Trae from Rap-A-Lot records. There’s so much of us already.
HHC: Do you guys produce your own music?
Izreal: We produce some of it, but we also work with a few producers around the country. Our homey Fingazz out in I.E.,
HHC: I’m Latino also (Honduran) and I have this issue with Latino ARTISTS being typecast as one dimensional, that everyone is a Reggaeton artist, simply because they’re Puerto Rican, or Cuban, or whatever, how do you feel about that.
Arkitek: First, in
HHC: Example, as far as press goes for you guys, what was sent to me was info on a blog for a website that I’m not endorsing, but the blog was on _______ Latino, or record labels making a whole new label catered to Latinos artists, such as Rocafella with Roc La Familia, I don’t know if you’re familiar out here but Thizz, The late Mac Dre’s label, has a Thizz Latin offshoot, do you still feel a segregation? Because they separate everything when it’s a “Latino” artist?
Psalmz: We talk about this all the time; you do have the Wu Latino, the separate floor, or another roof. I feel that there are just so many of us in this world period, you got Puerto Rican, Ecuadorian, al these races and the influences from all over, and what do we do with it? There’s always two ways to look at it. It’s still breaking through, before we get into that level, this level has to happen.
HHC: I like your remix to E-40’s “tell me when to go” I’m from the Bay, and some Dj friends of mine would spin it at parties and people like that, does NY get Hyphy? Cuz I’ve been getting and hearing a lot of hate from The East coast when it comes to Hyphy, mainly because of a lack of understanding that it’s not a type of music, it’s a way of life.
Izreal: I happen to be out in the Bay right now. It depends, New York for a while we were stuck in the movement and the birth of hip hop, but all that as ourselves, we’ve been able to travel, and we see the unity in a lot of these markets, whereas new York has a whole different understanding, that used to be our mentality in hip hop. We had a tribe called quest, we had all that stuff. To me, being an artist is being a diplomat. Hip hop, the artist is so short changed because the artists don’t realize how big it really is. That’s one of our essences is we come to show that hey, all new York is haters, and the same time, we like to bring our influences back to New York so it becomes a broader scope. Hip hop is bigger than only one region, hip hop is international. You got Korean people rapping’ you got Chilean’s rapping’ Honduran’s rapping. You’ve got all of that,a and that’s one of the things is that even though we’re from new York, our album is more and the way we make music and the way we grind, we look at it as a global level. We want to be known all around the world, not just
HHC: What do you guys prefer, rapping in Spanish, English, or spanglish?
Izreal: We’re really mostly n English, but we never forget our heritage. Growing up, we grew up in a predominantly black neighborhood.
HHC: Do you think as Latinos, we need to be more united? The reason I ask that, is that a lot of people, and I’m not putting any names out there, but a lot of people example, rep like Cuba, or Puerto Rico, or Mexico or whatever, and go to concert’s and scream like “Puerto rico!” or “Mexico”, don’t you think we should be more united by representing Latinos period? I mean we all speak the same lengua (, we all like tortillas rice, chicken, and beans, Do you see how Latinos segregate themselves also.
Arkitek: It’s crazy and sad in a way that there’s so many of us in the world and it’s so hard for an artist to even go gold. We can all try and unite, what needs to happen is somebody in power, or someone on a higher level to be able to start to be the flagship of that and to push that. Latinos, we don’t’ have ah pi hop voice. It’s one thing to say unite all day, but if you’re not doing it and you’re not doing anything for Latin people, than how you going to make that happen. It has to start up top. We need organization. Most Latin people are poor. Look at how many Latin’s are in the
Izreal: Here’s an example, on our records, you have Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, white Italians, black, it has to start somewhere, and I agree with you and pslalmz and us working towards that that will happen. In
HHC: How do you guys feel about immigration? I’m in
Arkitek: It’s crazy cuz I read about this all the time. I realized that Latin’s do stick together in things like this, you had Puerto Ricans marching, lots of NY residents are from different descents, and you had Japanese and Chinese marching. I know that
HHC: Any Promo tour?
Izreal: We have a lot of that planned. Once the spring comes, T-Weaponz is going to be all over
HHC: No Doubt.
For more information on check out T-Weaponz