W

ith visibility ever-important for record sales, Lloyd Banks knows there’s no better marketing machine than himself. With his sophomore release, Rotten Apple on track for a September 19 release, Banks wants to unveil some of his album to the very city that inspired it in.

Lloyd Banks breaks from his busy schedule to discuss touring, performing with his peers, and how he’s showing that G-Unit is also on their “New York S**t.”

AllHipHop.com: So you’re back in New York?

Lloyd Banks: Yeah, I’m actually just back doing radio and a few TV things.

AllHipHop.com: It just happens to coincide with the AllHipHop Week and the concert at Hammerstein?

Lloyd Banks: Oh yeah, definitely, this week I’m getting a few things together. A lot of us stay in New York, so you never know who’s going to drop through there. I look forward to it. The whole AllHipHop Week… it’s bananas, man.

AllHipHop.com: One artist on there, Papoose, he’s kinda like you in a way – young, and expected by some to pull New York up. How do you feel about sharing the stage with someone like that? Are you going to give him some advice backstage?

Lloyd Banks: We cool. I’ve seen him a few times, when we did the BET Awards, and in the studio and things like that. So of course, I’m sure he’s been waiting for this for sometime, he didn’t start rapping yesterday. I’m sure he’s been waiting on this for a while. He’s going to be ready to put on a good show.

AllHipHop.com: Have you been any interesting places lately?

Lloyd Banks: Nah, I’ve been home, I’ve been recording, been working on my mixtape. The album is completed, but I’m working on mixtape material. I actually have a CD out right now with DJ Whoo Kid entitled “More Money in the Bank, Volume 4” and I’m actually putting another Volume 5 and that’ll be out in about a week. I’ve really been in the crib and recording. The last few stops on the tour were Taipei and Bangkok, and the last performance I did was in Bangkok.

AllHipHop.com: So what about your big project, The Rotten Apple. I wanted to ask, I don’t know of any artists who’ve used that title. Can you talk about the project and how it will be about the “rotten apple?”

Lloyd Banks: It’s just everybody in New York City… they know it’s called “The Big Apple.” I just wanted to show the people more than they can see, when they come from other cities, they see the big buildings, the bright city lights, the yellow cabs – I just want to take them to the boroughs to give them a better idea and understanding of where I come from. I grew up in Southside Jamaica, Queens, it’s not an easy upbringing, but it prepares you for life.

AllHipHop.com: What’s on the album as far as production?

Lloyd Banks: Well, as far as production goes, I got Eminem, I got two from him, I got two beats from Havoc from Mobb Deep, I got Timbaland on the project … I have Jeruz, Nick Speed out Detroit, Black Milk out of Detroit. It’s a lot of new producers also, you know, I’d rather make a big-time producer than a big-time producer make me, because they will make another excuse for why you sell the record. I kind of keep that to a minimum. I like to dictate my own pace, I like to go to all the cities. I don’t have an A&R, you know, so I pick my music out. I don’t want the people to know I produced the record before they read the credits. As far as features go, I got, of course everybody in the crew is there. 50 is there, Buck is there, Yayo is there, Mobb Deep is on the album, I got Scarface on the album … Musiq Soulchild and Rakim on the record.

So when does the Rotten Apple drop?

Lloyd Banks: It’s slated for September 19th. <br<

AllHipHop.com: Is there going to be a supporting tour?

Lloyd Banks: Actually, the promotion tour, I leave this Sunday. I’ll be gone from this weekend until the actual album is released. Buck is going to be on promo tour with me because he has an album coming in the near future also, entitled Buck the World. I love to perform, so even though it’s a promotional tour, I’ll stop in the clubs and lay it down. Look out for a full-fledged tour, I did over 170 shows as a solo artist on my first album. They can expect me to get out there and every city can expect to see me at least two times – ‘cause I’m not going home.

I

t’s been almost four years since a pair of Virginia-based brothers showed everyone what it meant to truly grind. While Malice and Pusha T say that the next Clipse album has no resemblance to Lord Willin’, that hustle will be tested once more. Originally from The Bronx, the Thorton brothers will return home to a New York stage to show this new side with their current single, “Mr. Me Too.” (Tickets can be purchased at the door or Ticketmaster)!

Finally situated on Jive Records, Malice discusses the album, and is later joined by Pusha. Both express dissatisfaction with the content in Hip-Hop today, and as Hell Hath No Fury looms on the horizon, perhaps The Clipse will balance the game with their lyrical triple-beam.

AllHipHop.com: What’s up Mal?

Malice: What’s up brother, how you doing? I’m making it man, I’m good.

AllHipHop.com: Where’s your brother at?

Malice: I haven’t seen him all morning. We’re here in Indianapolis. We just doing promo, the Russ Parr. We just out here doing shows, promoting the album, the single.

AllHipHop.com: Does this mean that label politics are solved for the time being?

Malice: Yeah, well, you know, we’re off to a great start with Jive. They haven’t denied us anything that we’ve asked for so far. We got our own label deal out of the situation, so we’re off and running. I can’t say how happy I am going to be until I see how the album moves, but as of right now, it’s working.

AllHipHop: What can we expect with the new album, Hell Hath No Fury? It will drop on Halloween, right?

Malice: There’s a whole bunch of aggression and frustration on this album; it’s extremely emotional. Just pouring out our hearts and soul on these verses because the politics was getting in the way of everything and if you’re not careful you can get caught up and not really be creative, which is what [“We Got It for Cheap” mixtapes] Volume 1 and Volume 2 was about.

AllHipHop.com: You guys are an example of a group that mixtapes basically helped save from going into obscurity.

Malice: Absolutely.

AllHipHop.com: It’s ironic you had a single out called “Grindin” out when you originally came out. You ever sit back and think about that?

Malice: In the beginning, the mixtapes really didn’t work for us. When we first started, we were trying to get on any mixtape, and for whatever reason, we were never able to get on that scene; maybe because we are from Virgnia, maybe [because] we got caught up in the whole rap race … so we did the OutKast route, we were from this area in Virginia and didn’t have to compete with anybody. So, then, after the hiatus and it was taking so long … We put out “Got It For Cheap Volume 1.” We put that out, than we put out Volume 2 soon after. We got a lot of acclaim from a lot of different magazines. It was real therapeutic for us.

AllHipHop.com: How did you all push the tapes?

Malice: We did it all ourselves. We put it out ourselves, distributed it ourselves. We didn’t make any money off of it. It was a sense of urgency, a sense of “we better do something,” because, like you said, we were falling into obscurity. So we had to like, make something work, we had to produce something. It was good, because we were frustrated, so on the mixtape we were on the playground – just making the music we wanted to make, music that we like. [We thought] just like “to hell with the labels,” that s**t will work itself out, or at least it will do what it does while we put out these mixtapes.

AllHipHop.com: Let’s talk about the new album, though. Is it a brand new album or the one recorded as a follow-up to Lord Willin’?

Malice: This is a fresh ass album. We couldn’t come no less. We were ready to get into the thick of things with the success of the first album … the songs we had done were really hot, but at that point in time we were in a different place, we were happier. Time passed, and we saw it was a big hold up, and the momentum, the people that waited for us, we took too long. We couldn’t dare come out in the same mind frame as we did in Lord Willin’ – so, now we mad, we angry, we p##### the f**k off.

AllHipHop.com: Who are the producers you’ve worked with on this project?

Malice: The production on the whole album was again done by the Neptunes. We felt like we owed it to the fans. We wanted to keep the same chemistry that we had when we first came out. There’s nothing I can’t stand more than when your favorite group comes out one time and then they rearrange the chemistry of what they had at first. I think we owed it to the fans to hear these verses to the superior beats by Chad and Pharrell.

AllHipHop.com: While you two were gone, the trap/dope music genre has exploded in the South. What are your thoughts on cats like Young Jeezy or Rick Ross blowin’ up?

Malice: My thoughts on it are ‘it’s all good.’ Brothas are getting a chance to get out here and talk about what they do, what they have done. I feel we have heavily influenced a lot of it when we came out. A lot of people really emulated our style and our content. When we came out, there was a lot of criticism about what we talk about and whatever, but we don’t just say “keys, bricks …” but we use real descriptions: from the upside to the downside, we tell the full spectrum. Some of these cats have been rapping for years and they are Platinum artists and now they got s**t in their trunk? I don’t buy all of it, but I think for the most part, it’s good. There ‘s a lot of literature in [our] verses, like we would never dummy down, we really sayin’ something and it does take a certain intellect to keep up with the verses that we write. That’s what separates us from the rest.

AllHipHop.com: Were you inspired by cats like Nas and others who did the same type of music you do?

Malice: The people that I like in the game or in Hip-Hop period were those that took Hip-Hop serious; and when I say serious, I mean they were clever with metaphors, they put thought into the rhymes. It was the skill, it wasn’t about who you shot, or how much drugs you sold, but it was about swagger and style and really handcrafting these verses. I like cats like Big Daddy Kane, Kool G Rap, KRS-One, Large Professor. I like Jay-Z, Biggie of course … cats like that really inspired me. That’s the kind of Hip-Hop that I used to love to listen to, and that’s so hard to find now. And that’s what we do, we make the music that we enjoy. When we made “We Got It For Cheap,” I kept the disc in my car … it wasn’t because it was mine, when I listen to Pusha and Ab Liva and Sandman … it had nothing to do with this is my group or nothing like that … and it stayed in there I don’t know how long.

[Pusha T joins the interview]

AllHipHop.com: What up Pusha?

Malice: We in the same hotel, in different rooms. I don’t know what happened.

AllHipHop.com: Well, now that I got both of you here, I wanted to ask: what’s your attitude these days overall?

Pusha: My attitude is I really don’t like the industry. This s**t is boring, it’s not based on the actual talent of the artist anymore, and it’s just like, whatever, anybody can win. It just depends on the machine. I’m not into it.

AllHipHop.com: Speak on the new album. I heard it’s going to be aggressive. Who are you guys going at?

Pusha: I think that the whole album is aggressive in the sense of, like, letting the lion out the cage. We said everything that we wanted to say, and think about it … when rappers come out on they first album from the street, the next album is softer, because they made their money, and blahzay blahzay blah. These verses are just as hungry as the ones from the first album, or actually better, because we’re grown. It’s the same hunger, because a lot of other people have slacked off.

O

n his acclaimed eight-minute mixtape track, “Dumb Out,” Joe Budden professed, “Let me find out Hip-Hop turned Republican.” In the election for “King of New York,” perhaps Joe is a worthy third-party candidate. With hit records like the current assist on Ne-Yo’s “Sexy Love” and a rich history of introspective verses, Budden meets the parties halfway where most can’t go. If a campaign is indeed in order, then Friday night’s Hammerstein Ballroom stage is the New York Primary. (Tickets can be purchased at the door or Ticketmaster)!

The Jersey City veteran understands the importance of such a performance. Still, Joe promises to devote no extra energy than he would for any other show. However, the man who says he’s beginning his career all over again intends to add to an already cult-like fanbase. The night promises to be big, and the fan inside of Budden is equally anticipating some of his peers’ performances. From mic check to encore, Joe Budden has devoted his passion to keep the rhymes real and the seats packed. Friday night knows no different.

AllHipHop.com: I’ve never seen a Joe Budden performance before. As a fan, I’m excited to see what it’s all about…

Joe Budden: [Laughs] You know what? Quite a few people have been saying that.

AllHipHop.com: Let’s just start there for a second. When you’re performing for an Up North crowd, how does that differ from the ordinary old show? How is the New York stage more important?

Joe Budden: For me, it doesn’t differ. For me, there’s no difference at all in the actual performance. Of course, the crowd is always different ‘cause New York is one of the tougher markets to perform in. Them n***as will just f**kin’ stand there unless you performin’ [“It’s All About The Benjamins”] or some s**t. From a performance standpoint, I go into every show with the same state of mind: I’m trying to tear it down.

AllHipHop.com: Everybody talks about the two sides of your music – the club and the heartfelt. When you’re performing in New York, in the past, what does the crowd gravitate to more?

Joe Budden: Um…the club s**t. In 2003, when the album came out, I was getting maybe four or five shows a week based off of the club s**t. The die-hard Joe Budden fans, they knew that there was more substance to me. But I think, as of late, with the release of “Mood Muzik Volume 1” and “Mood Muzik Volume 2” and everything that I’ve been doing on the mixtapes, I think people are starting to appreciate the other side more. I’ve been to a lot more shows where people just want to hear that. I don’t know if it’s because I haven’t had a mainstream song out there, but people really wanna hear that other stuff a lil’ more now.

AllHipHop.com: Recently, I interviewed MC Eiht. He blew me away when he said that he can perform any song from the 400 or so he’s released. If I asked you right now to perform a mixtape track like “Dumb Out” verbatim, do you think you could?

Joe Budden: Yeah. Anything that somebody wanted to hear, I could do it on the spot. ‘Cause I mean…I listen to my music. [laughs] From an artist’s standpoint, I’m listening to get different ideas, to see what I could’ve done differently, what I could’ve done better. Unless you go back… there may be two songs that I can’t do. That’s from very early in my career – songs I didn’t even like, songs that I didn’t even listen to.

AllHipHop.com: There’s artists out there that have songs that they will not perform though. I think LL Cool J has one even. Being such an emotional dude in your lyrics, do you have stuff that you just can’t do?

Joe Budden: No. I can’t say that I’ve ever had that problem. There’s not a song that I wouldn’t do.

AllHipHop.com: With the Ne-Yo “Sexy Love” record being so hot right now, how would you evaluate your current buzz?

Joe Budden: I feel great! I feel great not so much because the Ne-Yo record is spinnin’ so much, but I just feel like I have a lot of things in the works, I really feel like this is the beginning of my career all over again. I’m a tad bit more knowledgeable than I was before, and I’m a tad bit more talented than I was. I feel great. My label feels great. Everything is wonderful.

AllHipHop.com: Scratch magazine recently acknowledged “Mood Muzik Volume 2” as one of the greatest mixtapes ever. How did that feel?

Joe Budden: Oh s**t, I couldn’t even put into words how stuff like that makes me feel. For years, I went back and forth in this debate with my record label over the type of music that people want to hear or the type of music that sells or the type of music that’s marketable – and everything on “Mood Muzik Volume 2” was full creative control. I was able to do everything I wanted to do. I was on downtime where n***as wasn’t really checkin’ for Joe Budden. My label wasn’t puttin’ me to work. So I had time to do everything that I wanted to do, and pour my heart out, and put it out. It was received so well. S**t like that, when I see it in Scratch, XXL, and VIBE, The Source, and it gets such great acclaim, I can’t even explain it.

AllHipHop.com: There’s some mixtapes that deserved to be repressed. Mister Cee’s “Best of Biggie” is the kingpin. Tony Touch’s “Tape 50” is another. “Mood Muzik” is approaching that level to many…

Joe Budden: When the New York Times had it in there, that let me know it was being received pretty well.

AllHipHop.com: You had this record “When Thug’s Cry” five or six years ago. That was my introduction to your work, and something I consider to be a mixtape classic. Tell me whatever you can about that record right there…

Joe Budden: At that time, I was newly signed to my production company, On Top. My Def Jam deal wasn’t even finished yet. I was new to the mixtape scene, and I didn’t really know which way to go. I hadn’t done too many freestyles. The ones I had were a bunch of metaphors. The records I was doin’ were a bunch of Pop, mainstream sappy bulls**t that I was workin’ on tryin’ to get this deal. One night when everybody was gone, I had this idea in my head. It was an actually a song I was tryin’ to give to one of my artists at the time. They didn’t want it. It was four in the morning. My producer was knocked out tired. I woke him up and made him do this f**kin’ record – he was amazed by it. That was my first introspective record to hit the streets, ever. I just wanted to show people that there was a lot more to me than the metaphors and the similes and whatever radio bulls**t I was still doing at the time. Ironically, I’m still stuck in that predicament today. [laughs]

AllHipHop.com: On “Dumb Out,” you said “Let me find out Hip-Hop turned Republican.” What’s that mean to you?

Joe Budden: It did, it did, it did, it did – especially from a fan’s standpoint. Nowadays, the people supposed to enjoy the music – the “Hip-Hop activists” – they’re like a rarity now. Everybody’s in the business. Everybody’s so concerned with numbers and budget and f**kin’ Soundscan, and image, and everything that Hip-Hop never stood for. It’s just pretty f**ked up. I feel like on one side, you’ve got the Democrats which would be – I don’t wanna “the backpackers” – but [them], but the people that are in it for the love of the music and the art of it. [Then you’ve got] the Republicans – the people who are in it for the money, the people who stand for other things.

AllHipHop.com: Playing along with the performance theme, was there ever a point in your career, where a show went completely wrong?

Joe Budden: Hmm…hmmm. Um, yeah. [laughs] Actually, there was. There was one in Cleveland. It was on the Def Jam Vendetta Tour. Keith Murray was performing, Method Man – a lot of people who know how to perform were performing. I was the new kid on the block. My n***as didn’t know the words to anything. The system was bad. The music was cuttin’ on and off. I was nervous. I was buggin’ out on the stage. I didn’t get booed. I managed to pull it off, but everything went horrible. I screamed on my entire staff after the show. That’s probably the only show that I’ve ever screamed at the people that I work with. It takes a lot to get me to that point.

AllHipHop.com: As a fan, what’s one performance, aside from your own on Friday, that you wanna see at AllHipHop’s concert?

Joe Budden: Um…you know what? I’m anxious to see Papoose perform. I would like to see his performance. I’m anxious to see Lloyd Banks perform. Those are really the two that I actually anticipate. I wanna see how it turns out.

The champion MC from last year’s battle returns to show his lyrics and penmanship in AllHipHop’s Breeding Ground Showcase after earning stripes the old-fashioned way. Tickets can be purchased at the door or Ticketmaster)!

Almost a year ago to the day, a new Champion was crowned in the City of New York. It wasn’t Nas defeating Jay, or 50 snatching the crown with another diss record. It was Serius Jones defeating former “battle king” Jin at the AllHipHop/Fight Klub Competition. Although the footage has been played annoying amounts of times on several television stations, and it was great exposure for a masterful performance, each viewing seemed to further dry the cement beneath Jones’ feet. similar to most before him, The Battle Rapper tag was being placed on the Englewood MC like a clearance white tee from Marshalls.

Professing that he is a student of Hip-Hop and lyrical combat is simply one aspect to the art of Rhyme, the stage is being set for a new battle. With his new street album release, King Me Serius Jones sets on to convince the world that television has only shown one side of his arsenal. With more than one in the chamber the target is now successful record sales, staying true to himself and bringing change in the sometimes overexploited culture of Hip-Hop.

AllHipHop.com: Last year, The AllHipHop Fight Klub Battle blew you up beyond proportions. But now are you trying to focus more on songwriting?

Serius Jones: Nah, I ain’t trying, I was doing that before the whole Jin thing. It’s just that people make such a big deal out of it that, they don’t think you’re doing nothing else.

AllHipHop.com: Do you think it helped or hurt your career?

Serius Jones: Nah, I mean at the end of the day, none of this is hurting my career because all publicity is good publicity, unless it’s bad publicity. So I mean as far as the whole battle thing, my element is Hip-Hop , so it could never be bad that I get exposure for killing somebody in a battle. At the end of the day, it’s just America, like we don’t expect people to be multi-talented because we’re so used to just a quick fix. So when you come from another angle, it’s just a benefit. I love the fact that if anybody is sleeping on me, it’s my pleasure.

AllHipHop.com: You’ll be performing in The AllHipHop Breeding Ground Showcase. How do you bring your creativity to your shows?

Serius Jones: Everytime I do a show, it’s like I’m doing my first show. I’ll go off the top of the head and just start freestyling in the middle of the show, or I’ll have my DJ scratching in the background. I really just zone out and have fun with it. Hopefully, me having fun on stage comes across to the crowd. I don’t know what the hell to do – you know I’m too tall to be jumping around acting crazy.

AllHipHop.com: Tell me about your new street album…

Serius Jones: King Me is basically a statement. It’s a statement towards anybody who’s wondering what’s going on with me, or wondering my position, or who I am in the game. It’s basically just saying for all those doubters, or all those that don’t understand how I’m coming at the game. I’m coming at it like basically, “I’m a King.”

For those who don’t know, it’s not like I just battled Jin and battled on Smack [DVD], I basically have the Fight Klub crown because I beat 12 people last year in a row – in the most respected rap arena in the world. I battled people from England to Africa To Florida all over the world. As far as the underground, I don’t think that’s ever been done before. And this was for money. I mean I got 40,000 dollars from that. I got production from Needlz on there, I got production from my man Flako, I got 50 talking on there, I got Lil’ Wayne talking on there. It’s just a collection of everything I been going through. It’s definitely on par or better than the average album that you’re gonna hear and this is just my mixtape, you know a street album.

AllHipHop.com: You have some songs on your album that seemed to express some disappointment in Hip-Hop. Are you somewhat disappointed in Hip-Hop?

Serius Jones: You know what, I’m proud of Hip-Hop, but I’m disappointed in the direction of Hip-Hop. It’s almost like you got a son or a child and you watched it grow up for so long. You’ve seen it grow from being a smart little student to you know wearing glasses to wearing a African medallion to wanting to be a gangster you know wanting to be tough. It’s like a child you’ve watched it grow. So you love the child no matter what it does. So you know that this child has to go through these phases to become a man and really mature. What I’m disappointed at is not Hip-Hop itself. I just thought that would be an interesting concept to battle Hip-Hop [on a record]. Being that I’ve never seen anyone do it to the level that I do it on the battle tip, I just thought that would be the only person left for me to battle is Hip-Hop. The only thing I want it to do as the owners and creators of Hip-Hop is to take more of it back ourselves so we’re not just selling ourselves out. If you turn on the radio or turn on the TV, everything you see has Hip-Hop in it, you know. You gotta ask yourself, “who’s getting paid off that? Who’s exploiting that?” It needs to be more us and less them.

AllHipHop.com: How will you avoid that machine that does exploit the art form?

Serius Jones: I think at the end of the day, it’s unavoidable, you just have to be able to go through the machine without being watered down to the point where you dilute your whole concept. It’s just like drugs, if you have a pure product, you don’t really make no money by watering it down. If you get some real raw product you have to water it down a little bit because the average consumer cant take it in a full real raw state. So a lot of times, I want to say certain things in songs, but if it’s a song I want to play on the radio, I might have to take out the line that says “f**k the police” or “f**k George Bush.” Because at the end of the day, I’m marketing myself as a product so even though I feel certain ways or feel strongly about my opinions, I got to be real with myself enough to say if I want to sell these millions and meet these millions of fans, that I have to live by this is a business. So there’s a thin line between that and selling out.

AllHipHop.com: Let’s think about your name Serius Jones in a much broader perspective, just play along with this.

Serius Jones: Okay…

AllHipHop.com: What’s the most serious thing you’ve ever dealt with in your life?

Seirus Jones: Oh wow, that’s crazy. Can I say life itself? I mean the most serious thing that I’ve dealt with is this whole music business. Because at the end of the day, if you really want to be successful at this, you have to live this.

AllHipHop.com: Is “Up North” Hip-Hop serious?

Serius Jones: A lot of times “Up North” Hip-Hop is serious, but a lot of times it’s too serious. Like people take it and are not having enough fun with it. You got people Up North doing the motorcycle dances and leaning and rocking with it because it’s fun. It’s because of the mind state up here because it’s cold and it’s the concrete jungle. It comes across where it’s a lot of tense energy and people have already heard that kind of energy from up North. So the whole up top movement has to come at a different angle.

AllHipHop.com: Is Southern Hip-Hop serious?

Serius Jones: Southern Hip-Hop is making serious noise and serious money. I like southern Hip-Hop, especially the legends that’s really, a lot of people sleep but there’s a lot of southern MCs that spit crazy. I listen to T.I., I listen to Lil’ Wayne, I listen to UGK. It’s a lot of Down South lyricists that spit more than Up Top lyricists.

AllHipHop.com: Now let’s switch to the last name Jones and give me you’re opinion on some famous Jones’…

Serius Jones: Alright…

AllHipHop.com: James Earl Jones.

Serius Jones: That n***a got an ill voice. I’d like to hear him spit a 16 or something.

AllHipHop.com: Mike Jones.

Serius Jones: He definitely is putting a strain of the Jones name [laughs], but he’s definitely a marketing genius; I’ll give him his credit. He’s making money with it, and he’s trying to personalize “Jones,” and I can’t be mad at that.

AllHipHop.com: Jim Jones, not the rapper, but the cult leader.

Serius Jones: I don’t even know about that guy. I don’t know the specifics on him.

AllHipHop.com: Jenny Jones.

Serius Jones: She’s a hustler, she hustled that TV money. I don’t think she’s hot anymore, but she had her little run.

AllHipHop.com: Star Jones.

Serius Jones: That was messed up what they did on that show, but I guess she’s a progressive black woman making it happen in a game that’s really like being a fish in a pool full of sharks.

AllHipHop.com: Nasir Jones.

Serius Jones: Nas is one of the most legendary MCs of all times. I thank Nas for a lot his catalog of music because it really inspired me to be an artist. Nas is one of the best MCs of all times.

AllHipHop.com: So you think you’ll reach that level one day?

Serius Jones: If these hating ass n***as in the streets don’t get me, and if God wants me to, then I know definitely that I’m going down in the history books. And I know that when it’s all said and done, Serius Jones will be in the Top Five MCs of all times. When it’s all said and done, true legacy speaks for itself.