Academy Award-winning
hip-hop group Three 6 Mafia are widely credited for sparking the Memphis rap
scene back in the late 90s, and have found mainstream success over the years,
garnering them platinum sales status, and featured reality television shows.
They are currently working on their 10th studio album, Laws of Power.
Q: Could you explain
what drove the evolution of your raw sounds on Mystic Stylez (released in 1995) to Last 2 Walk (released in 2008)?
DJ Paul: You got
to understand that there’s a different kind of raw these days. There’s the raw
for specific, smaller cult followings of people these days. You know, it’s
different. You got to go with the times, you know, just like everything else in
the world. Chevrolet can’t still be out here trying to sell a glass house for a
’72 Chevy Impala, but there is a small amount of people out there that’d still
buy it, they brought that car back, and I am one of them. But the majority of
the people in the world is not going to buy that car, so you got to keep moving
with the times.
Q: Could you describe
what it was like to start and be a part of the Hypnotize Mindz heyday of
Memphis hip-hop?
DJ Paul: It was
fun, man. It was crazy. It’s still fun, though, probably more fun, because back
then we was struggling. We was doing good, you know, but we was struggling
because we didn’t have all of the easy ways to get yourself out there like you
do these days. We had to pay twelve thousand dollars for a Source [magazine] ad
to advertise our album back in those days. These days, all you got to do is go
on Twitter and say ‘Hey, I got an album,’ for free. But you know, you don’t
sell as many copies these days, so I’d rather go back to the old days and just
pay twelve thousand dollars and be done with it. Times change. You got to work
harder these days, in a way, but back in those days, you had to work hard as
well.
Q: You guys helped a
lot of people build their careers back then. What’s it like looking back now
and seeing how much you did for the Memphis scene?
DJ Paul: It’s
good, man. You know, anytime you have something up that alley, you have people
that look up to you, people that look up to Three 6 Mafia, not just in Memphis,
but all over the world. We still get people today 20 years later saying ‘Man, I
really enjoy your music.’ It feels good to hear somebody like yourself say you
grew up on our music, and it really feels good when you run into somebody like
a hot producer right now that’s saying they grew up on your music and they used
it as a format to better themselves, a role model to create something that
worked for them. The super producer Drumma Boy from Memphis—he’s in Atlanta
now. He produced for people such as Jeezy, T.I., and a bunch of people, and he
said he grew up on Three 6 Mafia. When you got people like that been saying
that—it’s kind of like you reach out and pull yourself back together.
Q: How does it feel
when you look back and see that a lot of your affiliates like Gangsta Boo,
Crunchy Black and Koopsta Knicca drifted away over the years?
DJ Paul: We wish
them luck with everything they got going on. They chose a different route, but
we wish them luck with the road they chose. We’re just keeping moving and doing
what we know to do best, the same thing we was doing when we was with them. We
just kept the same thing moving.
Q: Do you feel like
the Memphis scene is the same today as it was back then?
DJ Paul: No. The
Memphis scene was at its best in the early, early 90s when it was me and Juicy
[J] and a guy named DJ Squeeky, DJ Spanish Fly—Spanish Fly was there even
before us—but the early 90s was when it was at its best, to me, when we was
DJing, and it was just straight raw. Making beats at the house, bringing them
to the club, playing them for the first time and seeing people go crazy, and
then releasing them on mixtapes. That’s when it was at its best. That’s when
everybody—there was only a few people in Memphis rapping at that time. You
could count them on one hand. There was only three crews, but it was really
only two crews, because me and Juicy was the other one. The other guys were the
two crews, and there was like 200 people in each crew, but everybody wasn’t
rappers. There might be like four or five rappers out of each one of those
crews, and the rest would just be their homies. But them was the fun days, DJs
and everything, sh*t like that. Put on a ski mask. Project Pat was around, Lord
Infamous, Skinny Pimp, things like that. Them was fun days.
Q: You guys have
accomplished so much since then. Do you think things could ever be as good as
they were back then?
DJ Paul: It’s
still around, man, it’s still around, and it’s gonna stay around. Them days is
still around. There’s more to come. Life’s a garden. Dig it.
Q: Could you guys
name a few up-and-comers that you think are going to break out?
Juicy J: Man,
there’s a lot of people, man. I could answer you all day. I’d say Mac Miller,
Machine Gun Kelly, you know what I’m saying. There’s so many people. This dude
named The Weeknd, the singer. Future, this dude named Future out of Atlanta.
Sam Adams out of Boston. I know so many people, man. Dom Kennedy.
Q: How do you guys
like where hip-hop is right now?
Juicy J: It feels
good man. We just feel like people’s in the game. It’s good being around, to
still be doing this. It’s a blessing to watch a person grow, especially when
you know it’s good talent that nobody’s ever heard before, and you can be like
‘Hey, man, listen to this,’ you know, just seeing them blow up. All these guys,
I knew them before they was big. It’s just cool to see that, man. It’s a new
movement. A lot of up and coming producers I work with and watching grow. Young
Sid, Lil Lody, producers out of the south. Baby E. There’s so many people, man.
They do what they do, getting their time, getting their shine right now, you
know? We feel like the godfathers, man.
Q: People have been
spreading all sorts of rumors over the years: could you guys explain the
meaning behind your name?
DJ Paul: That was
my old football number [laughs]. There was three people in the group, and it
ended up being six. Three six. Slam dunk.
Juicy J: So
people will get it straight: we are not devil worshippers. We do not worship
the devil, so they can get that out of their brains. That’s what we hear a lot.
That’s a question we always get asked. We get that question so much, man, it’s
ridiculous.
DJ Paul: It’s
been going for years.
Juicy J: We do
not worship the devil.
DJ Paul: We
worship God, and the beautiful women he’s created for me.
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