Project Pat, O.G. Memphis rapper and Three 6 Mafia
affiliate, has endured a lot. Growing
up in the projects hustling to make ends meet, Pat dedicated years trying to acquire
enough wealth to escape the hood by any means necessary. Needless to say, although heavily
involved with the Memphis movement along with brother Juicy J, DJ Paul and
other original members Three 6, Pat’s lifestyle caught up with the law which nearly cost him 30 years in federal prison.
After having his sentence reduced and finishing his bid,
Project Pat released his first solo album Ghetty Green in 1999 where he goes in depth of his experiences from
surviving federal prison and his battle with a “rat” that contemplated
testifying against him. Mainstream Hip-Hop first got wind of the Memphis rapper
when he appeared on the hook of Three 6 Mafia’s famed song “Sippin’
on Some Syrup.” Soon after Project
Pat released his second album Mista Don’t Play: Everythangs Workin’, though he
was arrested again for violating his parole in 2001.
Despite numerous setbacks, Project Pat released two more albums
Crook By Da
Book: The Fed Story and Walkin’ Bank Roll after
his release from prison in 2005. As February 24th, 2009 approaches,
Project Pat is preparing to release his fifth album Real Recognize Real, dropping the first single, “Keep it Hood,”
which features OJ Da Juiceman. As
he continues to move on from a troubled past, Pat is adamant about one thing:
making lots of money to stay far away from snitching rats.
AllHipHop.com: You were spending time in Hollywood
with Three 6 Mafia, was it hard to adjust to that lifestyle?
Project Pat: What lifestyle? What you mean?
AllHipHop.com:
They were in Hollywood! Was it a shock dealing with a different caliber of
people in Hollywood than what you’re used to in the music industry?
Project Pat: Well, people in Hollywood are really fake.
Keep It Hood – Project Pat feat. OJ Da Juiceman
AllHipHop.com: How fake are they? What do you mean?
Project Pat: Everybody
is an actress, everybody’s a director—I mean, there’s
so many fake people out there it’s retarded. It’s just like meeting fake people in Memphis. It’s the same thing.
AllHipHop.com: Do you think that world is a better
place with a little Three 6 and Project Pat?
Project Pat: What do you mean “a better place?” I
mean, it wasn’t just supposed to be Hollywood. I mean, we went out there—you mean from doing a
show? Is that what you’re talking
about?
AllHipHop.com: When I say Hollywood I don’t mean the
place itself, I mean the caliber of people like the actors, producers…just that
caliber of people.
Project Pat: If I go to L.A. I would rotate in
Hollywood ‘cause that’s where the money at! I want to be where I can get me
some money. I had a couple of
dudes out there in L.A. and they asked me to come through to the hood…That’s
cool, but what’s that gon’ do for me? I need some money! I’m being real! Everybody else can say what they want
to say and all that ol’ “Keep it real” and all of
that. One thing a
n***a can’t tell me is he can’t tell me nothing about the streets, man.
These n****s are rats out here, real talk. You can’t tell me nothing
about these streets. I ain’t no rat, I’m stand up. When I was in Feds, I was in Beaumont,
Texas [and] I was in population.
You can ask anybody. Dude ask me that out there when I was in California. I told dude, I said, “That’s cool, but
what I’m a go out there for?” I
been out there, but I grew up in the projects. I was at my mama’s front door when someone got murked… Another’s words that don’t excite
me. Now if somebody give me some money, then I need to be around him! I’m trying to find out how I can get me
some money!
AllHipHop.com: What kind of
opportunities have opened up for you since you’ve been on your money
making road?
Project Pat: I mean, you know, there’s
been a lot of opportunities. There’s a lot of opportunities out
here. [long
pause] I had come across a lot of, um, you know—not even, just, not
really out there. Not really in
California, but I do real estate on the side and investments and, uh, I invest
in companies. That’s in Memphis,
though. Put it like this, it’s a
good situation.
AllHipHop.com: Going back in your past, I know you
served some time. Do you mind
talking about the charges you acquired?
Project Pat: We could talk about whatever, which
ones? You want talk about the
guns?
AllHipHop.com: Not the one that violated your parole,
but the initial one that you caught charges for in the ‘90s.
Project Pat: I had a robbery charge, aggravated
robbery. They were supposed to
give me 30 years on it, but I got it lessened and ended up getting nine. I don’t know if you heard the album Ghetty Green, but that was a real album. All the songs on Ghetty Green were true.
AllHipHop.com: So Ghetty Green was an actual testament of your life?
Project Pat: Ghetty Green was
straight up me. Everything I was
doing right then was everything I did maybe a few months ago or a year
ago. I was rapping on this song
called “528 Cash” and the whole song is talking about my robbery case, how the
dudes that I wasn’t on the case with but didn’t snitch on was [trying to]
snitch on me… Like, he was sitting beside the prosecutor while I was starting
to take my stand, and I look and he’s sitting beside the prosecutor. Just in
case I did take my stand they were going to take me to trial and give me 30
years and he was going to testify on me.
It’s just crazy, but one thing about life—your “Realness Card”
follows you throughout life.
When it all boils down, dudes be
out here talking about they hard and they tough, the truth to that is they be
rats. They’ll squeeze a trigger,
they’ll do a mission with you, but they be some
rats. When you’re a rat, all the
street credibility you thought you had you just lost it. If you were to go to the Feds you have
a PSI that tells everything you ever did and everyone you ever snitched on and
told on and if you don’t show your PSI when you get to the penitentiary in the
Feds, guess what? You going to go
live in a hole or here comes 15 knives coming at you…You got real dudes out
here, but you got a lot of rats out here too.
AllHipHop.com: You violated your parole by carrying
two revolvers, how do you feel about T.I.’s case?
Project Pat: I mean, I feel
sorry for the man. It’s a mental
situation…I was around there when he got caught. I was [about to] go to the BET Awards and the police told me
they had just got him. I was like,
man that’s sad. I was walking in
and the people knew who I was and he was like, “Man, they just picked up your
boy.” I’m like, “Who are you talking about?” He said, “T.I.” and I said, “For what?” I thought he had gotten some wrong
information. That’s just sad
man, but you know somebody set him up.
Let me tell you something about T.I., he’s not a bad dude at
all. That man is a
millionaire. He’s not a bad
guy. He just had a little fetish
for guns. S**t, I had it! The thing is, he wasn’t [trying to]
hurt nobody. If he came out good
in this situation, which I heard he did—why give a man 30 years? He ain’t that
type of dude. He probably could be
that type of dude, but he’s not on that…
Everybody make mistakes. People try to look at folks like they God or something. Nah, that man is a human being. The thing I like about T.I. is he
brushed it off and he still out here shining, he looking good and he’s making
money. Even though he lost one of
them endorsements, hey you win some and you lose some. That’s how life is. I had lost a lot of stuff when I had
gotten locked up on that pistol. I
lost so much money, I could have been paid out here a
long time ago! Right now I’m in
the ring battling it back out!
That’s all I can do, I can’t do nothing else. I
can’t sit around and cry and whine and be mad at everybody else.
AllHipHop.com: Let’s lighten up the mood a bit. You have a remix out right now that you
did on Santogold’s song called “Shove It.”
Project Pat: Yeah! People been
telling me about that! People like
that! I heard people liked that!
Juicy told me the other day that people liked that.
AllHipHop.com: What do you like about Santogold & M.I.A.?
Project Pat: Santogold’s
swag of music is kind of like European.
I peeped the East Coast starting to employ a lot of England/European
music into their beats and stuff.
I see a few people doing that.
M.I.A., she’s from another country, so that’s just where she’s
from. She brought that where she
was from to the music world and it’s working. A lot of people in the industry are looking for something
different. A lot of stuff be sounding the same.
I can’t even lie and say it don’t. People been saying that about the South. Not all the stuff,
but some of the stuff sound the same.
People like stuff that’s different.
AllHipHop.com: What are you giving us in your new
album Real Recognize Real that’s
coming out?
Project Pat: I’m
keeping it gutta, of course. I got one track on there called “Horny”
and it’s got a girl saying the hook.
She’s not singing it, she’s saying it and it goes, “The weed got me
horny, got me horny/ this liquor got me horny, got me horny/this pill got me
horny, got me horny.” Paul made
the beat and when I heard it I had to have it ‘cause it’s different. It’s got an Arab melody of music. It’s hard and it’s got this bass in
it! When I put the girl on the
hook it just shifted. Real talk,
most of my album still got the same flavor that people like. I got that soulful sound that keeps it
hood.
That’s the thing about rap. When
you come into the rap game, you got to keep it how you listen [to music]. Real
Recognize Real February 24th
and it’s some real congo-bongo. It’s some real ham-wam
in the trunk, ‘cause we got to have some ham-wam in
the trunk. All the young kids in
America got to have ham-wam in the trunk.
AllHipHop.com: What is ham wam?
Project Pat: Ham-wam, that’s that bass! Ham-wam! Going ham means going hard. The bass is going to go hard in that trunk! I promise you! You’ll hear some serious ham-wam ‘cause this time I made sure I told the dude to make
sure he turns the bass up!
