Dwight "Beanie
Sigel" Grant stands at the crossroads – and perhaps the most pivotal point
in his young life. He’s been delivered his share of strife but The Philadelphia-reared
rapper is definitely facing the most turmoil of his entire rap career.
Currently, Beans
is facing federal assault and weapons charges, attempted murder charges and
drug possession charges that, if found guilty, could land him in prison for
over 20 years. Terrence Speller claims Sigel is the man who pumped two bullets in his stomach and foot outside a Philadelphia bar. Sigel denies these claims, expressing profound innocence.
In an exclusive interview, AllHipHop caught the Broad Street Bully and found, despite legal constraints, he still has a lot to say.
AllHipHop.com:
How are you doing, as a man going through some tribulation?
Beanie Sigel: Probably
like how a man would go through it. I’m good man.
AllHipHop: You
aren’t stressing it too much?
BEANIE SIGEL: Nah.
AllHipHop: How
are you doing as an artist? Is it affecting you as an artist?
BEANIE SIGEL: Same
sh*t. Ain’t nothing really changed.
AllHipHop: What
are you doing now music-wise?
BEANIE SIGEL: Right
now I got this house arrest sh*t, this monitor on my leg so its like hard to
come up here [to Roc-A-Fella Records]. I’m building a studio right now in the
crib so I’ll be back at it probably in another week. It’ll probably be a 2 week
process to get everything I need.
AllHipHop: So you haven’t done any recording since your case opened?
BEANIE SIGEL: No.
AllHipHop: Does the legal stuff get in the way? You are supposed to stay in
the Philly area?
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah,
so I don’t belong here [in New York]. Don’t tell nobody.
AllHipHop: You have to get a judges approval to leave?
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah.
AllHipHop: You aiight? This is pretty serious.
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah,
its serious, but you know, life is serious.
AllHipHop: You had a short stay in jail. How was that? Were you good?
BEANIE SIGEL: I
was cool.
AllHipHop: Nobody was messing with you?
BEANIE SIGEL: [stares]
AllHipHop: [laughs]
BEANIE SIGEL: Ain’t
nobody f*ckin’ with me, man.
AllHipHop: Alright, dumb question. Have you been writing about the case?
BEANIE SIGEL: Nah. I ain’t putting that out t there. I’ll wind up saying something
reckless.
AllHipHop: When Jay had his situation when he was accused of stabbing "Un"
Rivera, he got R. Kelly and even did a video about it.
BEANIE SIGEL: You know, his case isn’t as extreme as my case.
AllHipHop: You took some anger management, right?
BEANIE SIGEL: No, they wanted me to take that sh*t, but I’m cool. I didn’t do
it.
AllHipHop: Why, not?
BEANIE SIGEL: I didn’t need it.
AllHipHop: The State wanted you to do that?
BEANIE SIGEL: The Federal people.
AllHipHop: So, what did you do?
BEANIE SIGEL: It was in Minnesota…It was rehabilitation sh*t.
AllHipHop: What kind of rehab? Drug?
BEANIE SIGEL: Man, you know what it was! [laughs] You funny. If you know to
ask me that, you know what it was about.
AllHipHop: Seriously, I thought it was anger management, but it said something
about drugs.
BEANIE SIGEL: It was all that sh*t.
AllHipHop: Ya mom is like supportive?
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah, that’s my homey.
AllHipHop: You seem good man.
BEANIE SIGEL: I’m cool.
AllHipHop: We all had our little issues and many dudes crumbled under less weight
than what you have now.
BEANIE SIGEL: I’m good, man, I’m good!
AllHipHop: When you get the studio together, you plan to do a lot of material
Pac-style thinking the outcome may not come out the way you want it to?
BEANIE SIGEL: No. I’s going to go how I want it to go. That’s my outlook on
it. How I want it, that’s how it’s going to go. Prepare for the worst, pray
for the best. That’s it.
AllHipHop: What are your thoughts on how the Philly media treated you?
BEANIE SIGEL: Assassinating me. It was expected. That’s what they do, exploit
people for the negative. You don’t sell no papers talking about positive and
things like that that I do. I ain’t even going to speak on it now. Like, "I
am in the situation that I am, but I do this and I do that." I’m going
to do that regardless. The people know who I do things for and what I do and
as long as they still getting the benefits of that, helping them out I’m good
with it.
AllHipHop: What about the streets of Philly, how are they treating you?
BEANIE SIGEL: Even before the situation, you know how it goes. Even B.I.G. said,
"There ain’t no guarantee they are going to love you tomorrow." So,
it went from "Yeah, that’s whats up, Philly’s on the map to "F*ck
that n####, He ain’t doing nothing for me." That’s just Philly.
AllHipHop: That’s a lot of weight. Ya whole team is from Philly. It’s not like
you pulling people from all over.
BEANIE SIGEL: That’s what I do. That’s where I’m from. I’m pro-Philly all the
way regardless. I been through a lot of sh*t. If I can help anybody come up
out of that, anyway I can, they got it.
AllHipHop: How is the State Property crew holding up?
BEANIE SIGEL: Everybody is good.
AllHipHop: They had to promote the album without you.
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah that was kinda f*cked up. That was the only thing that was
a lil’ frustrating for me. We had one of the biggest songs in the country [Can’t
Stop, Won’t Stop] and it ain’t get promoted how I feel it would have gotten
promoted if I was here. You know? So, that was the most frustrating part about
being down for a minute. Just not being able to be there for my team.
AllHipHop: Would you have done things differently?
BEANIE SIGEL: Oh yeah! A lot of people would have been doing their jobs. Believe
that. It was just that from the business point of view from me not being there.
Telling people to "do this" and "do that." I wish it was
pushed and promoted like it should have been. You got one of the biggest songs
in the country but when you look at the SoundScan, you can’t tell. I don’t know
what happened.
AllHipHop: You
got a lot of properties under your belt now. The label. You have State Property
clothing.
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah, I am still doing my thing with that, the business. With
the clothing line, I got a good team so, we good. My man Goldfish, Charles Southerland.
Everything is going to run itself.
AllHipHop: State Property has the illest logo out. I been wanting to steal the
logo.
BEANIE SIGEL: I
stole my logo. I ain’t gonna tell y’all from where, but I peeped something and
I said,"There it goes right there."
AllHipHop: What’s
next for the label?
BEANIE SIGEL: Putting out the music, man. Getting everybody’s situations tight.
It’s a process. We did Freeway. Young Gunz is next. Peedi Crakk. Oschino and
Sparks. Just making sure everybody is where they are supposed to be at. That’s
why we do the State Property albums. I’s a group thing, but its meant to break
one of the artists off.
AllHipHop: By the way,
Beans, what kind of kicks you got on?
BEANIE SIGEL: These are the State Property joints [sneakers] through Pro Keds.
They’ll be out in February. This is what we are doing. All sneakers are going
to match all gear. Pro Keds wasn’t selling in the United States for like 15-16
years. Two stores in Philly used to sell them and I used to buy them up. So,
I went to Magic [fashion convention in Las Vegas] about a year and a half ago.
I ran into them there and I bought about 40 sneaks and they said "Yo, you
the one that be ordering all the sneaks in Philly." We got to talking.
Now, I get 50% of these Pro Keds proceeds, all sneakers with the State Prop
logo. Holla atcha boy. The State Prop joints is crazy. All different kinds of
flavors .
AllHipHop: You had a cartoon at one point. What’s up with that?
BEANIE SIGEL: Its called "The Playpen." It’s like South Park, The
Rugrats, and Fat Albert and The Gang all mixed. Its gonna be crazy. It’s not
going to be a cartoon for coming on Saturday mornings. It’s basically about
the whole State Property squad and we do to this day care center everday. None
of us like it there. It’s like jail for us. The whole language is from the inside
[of jail]. We don’t gotta take naps, we gotta take it down. We don’t eat lunch,
we gotta go to chow. We don’t go to yard to play, we gotta go to rec. It’s gonna
be a funny cartoon.
AllHipHop: Is State Property doing the voices too?
BEANIE SIGEL: I don’t know if everybody is going to be doing their voice-overs
but I am going to be doing a couple of them.
AllHipHop: So when is it coming out or is it still in production?
BEANIE SIGEL: Right now we are still in production putting everything together.
Hopefully it will be done by the end of this year.
AllHipHop: Jay brought you in. What’s
BEANIE SIGEL: Its like, its going to be a little damper on everything as far
as I am concerned. That’s who give me my will to do. Its not a competition thing,
but I am used to rubbing shoulders with him. That’s who gives me my inspiration
to do what I do.
AllHipHop: So, you won’t have him to bounce off creatively?
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah, you could say that. Right now, the music is mediocre. Ain’t
nobody getting into like lyrisc no more. They are looking for that beat to talk
over. The music is selling the music.
AllHipHop: True. You come from that era just before it lamed out. You’d get
on stage and spit 100 bars acapella. Cats don’t do that now. What’s up with
your album?
BEANIE SIGEL: The album was done but we were proud of a song with Chris and
Neef on an underground mixtape, "Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop," and it took
off. That’s what really made us push and put out that State Property album.
So, I took four songs off my album and put it with State Property so we could
capitalize off of that. So, the album is really wrapped up, but I’m feeling
as though I want to record a couple more songs. Its called the B-Coming.
AllHipHop: How are the labels supporting you, The Roc and Def Jam?
BEANIE SIGEL: I don’t deal with Def Jam. The Roc definitely has been supportive.
AllHipHop: Is your album still coming out fourth quarter of this year?
BEANIE SIGEL: Nah,
I ain’t gonna come out fourth quarter. I’m going to drop Chris and Neef because
they so hot. I wouldn’t do that, take from they buzz. I’ma let them get they
shine and I’ll come out right after them.
AllHipHop: So, we gonna have to wait a minute? Aw, man!
BEANIE SIGEL: I can’t do that to my boys. They on fire right now. I wouldn’t
do that. I’ma be droppin’ some sh*t though, but not my album.
AllHipHop: Some mixtape sh*t?
BEANIE SIGEL: Yeah. I might put out an EP too.
AllHipHop: Any idea what it might be called?
BEANIE SIGEL: I don’t want to spoil it, but a couple mixtapes are about to drop.
AllHipHop: Save the best stuff for the album, man. A lot of these dudes, put
their best rhymes on the mixtapes and the album is wack.
BEANIE SIGEL: See, you can’t judge the album off the mixtape. The album is for
everybody. The album is for the masses. The mixtape is for the underground.
That’s for us. So, I’ma hit y’all with that.
AllHipHop: There is a rumor that you had a dis record for Cam’ron? On a Cosmic
Kev mixtape.
BEANIE SIGEL: That’s crazy. Everybody asks me that and can’t play the record.
Why would I do that? Cam wears a Roc chain just like me. Ain’t no probs with
me and Cam.
AllHipHop: What are we going to see next?
BEANIE SIGEL: Everything as far as the business. Putting my artists out. Gettting
Chris and Neef their album, Youngest In Charge. Trying to get things
back to where they belong. Now, with Jay-Z retiring a lotta people think, what’s
going to happen? We good money. State Property is State Property. We just trying
to shake all that off. It’s a win/lose situation with us. Its like, "Damn,
that’s Jay." Everybody looks up to Jay. It’s going to be different without
Jay around. But at the same time, we get to really do us. People can see us
and what we do.
AllHipHop: Jay even said that some of the pressure would come off the artists
if he left because of all the comparisons to him.
BEANIE SIGEL: That’s why I said it’s like a win/lose situation. We used to Jay
coming in critiquing little stuff. We have full creative control over everything
we do, but its just like that advice. He deserves that sh*t. He can fall back
and enjoy his girl. [laughs] I don’t know if I was supposed to have said that,
but enjoy ya chick man! I know that’s what I’d be doing.
AllHipHop: You always talked about retiring yourself. You still thinking like
that or you going to stick around a little bit?
BEANIE SIGEL: I’m going to always be around as far as State Property and all
that, but as far as Beanie Sigel albums, I don’t gotta do that now. I got so
much other stuff to do. I’m a hustler. I’m in it for the money. Putting out
a record, it ain’t going to make enough money for me. I got my team so I am
going to do it for them, the State Property albums. But, I don’t know, after
my contract is up with The Roc, I don’t know.