(AllHipHop Features) Inspired by Jay-Z’s illustrious annual Roc Nation Brunch, David Banner celebrated his birthday in style with a black tie dinner celebration at the American Cut restaurant in Atlanta’s Buckhead area.
“Impressed with #JayZ ‘s brunch. We vowed to bring that level of excellence to the south. (We did.) Thank you #ATLANTA for being the home of #ABANNERVISION,” posted Banner.
The night began with a cocktail reception with drinks courtesy of Hennessy.
Shortly after, Banner’s guests moved the celebration downstairs to a private dinner that included notable guests such as T.I., Coach K, Ernestine Johnson, Jay Morrison, Terri Vaughn, Karon Joseph Riley, and more!
Banner revealed that he doesn’t really like the spotlight to be on himself, so he took a moment out to not only celebrate his birthday, but he also took time out to honor others who are making a difference.
AllHipHop caught up with David Banner to discuss his multimedia company, celebrating another year of life, and much more.
AllHipHop: How are you feeling today?
David Banner: I don’t know; a lot has happened in these last two days. I think the most high is working on me. I had a tragedy yesterday that don’t nobody know about. I’m actually putting my face on today. You know what I’m saying. Some really crazy things happened. But my mom told me that you can’t take everybody with you. If this is really a rights of passage, the bad thing is that everybody can’t come. So it’s like for me, I’m really emotional, and I’m not an emotional guy.
Most of the people who are here are actually people that I love. The people who are downstairs, not the people who are upstairs, but the people who are downstairs are real live people that I love, and to have people that I went to high school with and some of the rappers from Mississippi. You know to the first person in Atlanta who ever let me in the studio. These people are here tonight.
Tip showed up for me tonight. Coach showed up for me tonight. Like I didn’t really want the artists and the people who I really wasn’t close to. I wanted the people who really fck with me. Like if something happened to me that these people would show up like we were in high school show up. Like click clack show up. One of my best friends in the world who was with me when I was SGA president, he’s about to be a doctor, and he’s right here with me. He’s literally standing next to me. Like I wasn’t joking like he wasn’t standing next to me, like he real live standing next to me…ready to fck sh-t up too.
I know this is AllHipHop so I can say this. Now let me get back distinguished again. It means the world to me. My friends are here. My new friends are here. My new family is here, and I’m just honored. And for AllHipHop to be here it means a lot because we all started, and the owners who sitting back there paying the bills you know what I’m talking about we started together…when the owners used to shoot. Like I know the owners; they used to hold the cameras back in the day. So the fact that yall in New York chilling right now is all good. I appreciate all yall.
I’ma say this, I’m going to say this on AllHipHop because we have a relationship. Watch what starts happening tomorrow for my company. And I’m not saying this popping. Like we are about to help change the way people look at black folks period, and instead of begging folks to shoot our movies, we are about to start shooting our own sht.* Instead of begging people to give us radio, to give us pictures, and opportunity, we are going to start shooting our own stuff, and I’m going to pay for it.
I’m putting my life on the line, and I don’t even have children yet. One thing people don’t know about me is that, I’ve always…and people are going to laugh at this. I’m one of the few rappers that wanted to be married. I’m one of the few rappers that wants to have children and take care of those children, but I sacrificed a certain part of my life because I had to be selfish for the people, and for myself, and for my business, and for my employees. But this sht ’bout to start paying off ’cause I’m going to have to get somebody pregnant. You see this gray? This ain’t fake gray. People think I dye this sht. I don’t want to have to result to the blue pills.
AllHipHop: #MLK50 just passed and even though it’s a sad moment with his assassination, we choose to celebrate his legacy with the day. So we’ve come so far, but have so far to go. You as an activist, what would you like to speak on as far as how far we have to go, and what needs to be done?
David Banner: We don’t have to go that far actually. See I think when we say we have a long way to go it makes black people feel like it’s so far down the road that it don’t even make sense to even take that step.
Can I say it the way I want to say it? All we gotta do is start fcking with each other…. Like think about this. Imagine if me, Tip, and Killer Mike ran businesses together. I ain’t even talking about the millions of other people we know. I’m just talking about me, Tip, and Killer Mike period, and imagine if you added everybody else that we know and we did business together. It wouldn’t take but $50,000 a piece, $25k…sht if it’s enough of us it wouldn’t take but $5k a piece if we did business. Then imagine the people who are right here y’all held us down while everyone else hated on us. We don’t need nobody else. I gotta say it. If I had y’all I wouldn’t need them.
Black people have been fooled into thinking that the people who treat you the worst are the people that love you. The people who really fight for us, most of them motherf*ckers are broke and lonely. That’s the reason why I knew I had to go open up my multimedia company and get money the other way because our people don’t understand when somebody truly loves you, so we are going to have to start shooting our own movies. I’ma give yall one example of this.
Have y’all ever noticed: I want to do sci-fi movies. You know why I want to do sci-fi movies? It’s because when you watch sci-fi movies, they’re preparing you for the future, but you don’t ever see no black folks, so they’re really preparing for you to die….A little black child ran in she was crying to her dad. She said, “Dad are there going to be any black people in the future?” He said, “Why baby, why baby?” “Because I didn’t see none on the Jetsons.”
So if your kids are watching cartoons and they don’t see no black people, they are preparing you. You remember back in the day on all the sci-fi films they used to have this little black thing and you could teleport anywhere you want to? That’s basically your iPhone right now. You can do everything on your iPhone but teleport right, and that’s coming; keep your black ass alive. So it’s our responsibility to give our people vision, and that’s what we are about to do.