Kool G Raps musical career has been a journey that most Hip-Hop aficionados could only dream of. Now the self-proclaimed Donald Goines of Rap plots a simultaneous comeback and exit from a profession he helped pioneer since the 80s. AllHipHop chronicles this expedition in THE REBIRTH OF KOOL G RAP, a reoccurring feature. Check in this week as G Rap discusses the art of the mixtape.
Kool G Rap: For people asking what Ive been up to, Im finishing up the mixtape. Green Lanterns gonna be hosting in. I pretty much been focusing on recording. I havent been performing much lately. The last two months, I been getting the mixes done. Ive been doing extra songs here and there – I already got a lot of songs. Everything I do now, is extra. Really, the songs is for both my mixtape and my album. Thisll drop within no more than two weeks.
As far as the time off since Giancana Story, I take two or three years between records because I really try to put my best into what I do. Im not the type of cat thats gonna bang out an album in three months. Its gonna take me longer than that. Im really tryin to be creative with it. But at the same time, time off is not nothin that I do intentionally. Im definitely my own toughest critic.
These days, its a necessity doing the mixtapes and all. You can do it with one DJ or a few. Im just doing it with Green Lantern right now. It really was my man Questchon that arranged me and Green Lantern to work together. He thought Green Lantern was a really good look as far as hosting the mixtape. I got a team of cats around me nowadays thats sitting here night and day, tryin to plot the next and best moves for G Rap. People thought Green Lantern was the best move. Other cats are nice too, but hes the top of the list. It happened to work out with Green, so thats the way we went.
Its not songs that I wouldnt be able to put on my forthcoming album. I pretty much treated the mixtape as if it was an album its not even a mixtape to me. I didnt go really go crazy doing a bunch of stuff over other peoples tracks or nothin. I pretty much did a whole catalog of original songs. You could sorta say this is like a G Rap street-released album. Its not so much the normal mixtape you would get of a cat rhyming over other peoples beats and stuff. I did that a few times, not too much of it. You couldnt pull out five songs like that.
When I was with Rawkus, I had a lot of stuff circulating the mixtapes, cause they was leaking everything. In my early days, Kid Capri and Ron G was doing it differently than DJs today. You gotta realize, 50 Cent set a standard. He made it necessary for artists to flood the mixtape circulation, so did the DJs who hosted his mixtapes like the Whoo Kids and them. 50 did mixtapes with so many DJs, I cant even name em all. They set the standard too, for mixtape DJs to do that with artists. Kid Capri and them wasnt really doing that back that. They was just putting out mixtapes with other peoples records and freestyles. They never really snatched up a particular artist or group and based they whole mixtapes around them.
This is all-new material. I pretty much set aside the songs Ive recorded by never released. If I aint like em enough to make the album, Im most likely not gonna like em a year after or two years after. A lot of mixtape DJs now, they snatch up all the old stuff that people aint throw on they albums, because its still vintage to them. Its still something special to them, cause its like Lost Tapes or like the lost episodes of The Honeymooners. Theres always a market for it.
Even after my albums release, I keep workin right through. I got a studio in my house thats available to me at any time. Before the studio, I would write here and there leisurely. But now, Im in the recording stages every time that I write. Im recording all the time.
People dont know that I was one that never liked a big crowd around me when Im working. Its distracting. I really like the atmosphere of the studio in my house. Now, I can get up, eat breakfast, go downstairs and record. You aint got no interruptions or distractions. Aint got people around me sitting there, boppin they head to anything and everything. Thats when Im most creative. This is what the fans will hear.
“Got Compton on my back, I’m startin’ to feel the pressure/
I’m lyrically Kool G. Rap, on these Dre records.” – The Game on “Westside Story”