ThaFormula.com - Now I know you have been asked a million times if "The Artifacts" will be getting back together again… but do you think that a group can get back together and reclaim the chemistry they once had, or do you feel that once you lose it, it's gone forever?

El Da Sensei - Not necessarily. I think that in the situation with me and Tame, and I'm being real honest and truthful. Just to know him and him knowing me, I won't ever say that it can't happen 'cause you never know what life will bring in the future. I always leave room and options for that. But then at the same time speakin' on the other term like when cats say it can't happen, you know I think they more or less think of like the chemistry. All that stuff does come into play. I try to explain that to a lot of cats that tell me they want to see us together, but I tell them em' "look, its been a minute since me and Tame been together, I'm sure he's a different person right now just as much as I am." I think it's really honestly just sitting down with that person and reconnecting. If you can really like on a man to man basis, not just sitting down thinking with a notepad and beat and stuff like that. I think its just being honest with the 2 people that are sittin' in the room together and admitting certain things that you might have been wrong about on both sides. Sometimes people don't think they're wrong, but then sometimes the pride and letting that pride down and just being human gets in the way. As of right now I can't really say that the chemistry is there as far as me and Tame. Number 1, I haven't seen him in a couple of years or even spoken to him so that will answer that question for anybody that wants to know that. Right now I'm in a zone where I have to look out for myself not only as an artist but just as a man.

ThaFormula.com - The reason I ask you this is because I was talkin' about this with a homie of mine. Can you name me a group that has ever broken up and got back together and done it just as good if not better then before the break up?

El Da Sensei - Well I'll tell you who came kind of close. I would say EPMD, but it's not gonna be the same. They even changed labels. They went from Fresh to Def Jam, but even just the fact of hearin' about it… When we heard that EPMD was getting' back together just the feelin' that you got like "ooh they're in the studio!" Even if you knew it wasn't gonna be the same 'cause they were workin' with different producers or just adding new flavor to it, but there is still always room for that. Just for the fan that asked that question or wondered, cause we can't never see De La breakin' up. I think that will never happen, but if it ever did it would be crazy.

ThaFormula.com - Now I just recently caught up with Phife and we spoke on the Tribe reunion. The problem a lot of people are having is that history has shown that reunions don't seem to work out. How do you see this Tribe reunion going down?

El Da Sensei - I think now, today, in these times if they were to get back together I think it would be dope because we need that right now. The game is so filthy. It's filled with unoriginality and no creativity. It's not about being an underground artist, it's not abut being a so called…I hate the term "backpacker." It's not about being a thug. It's about being for real. It's like "what the fuck happened yo?" Like really, we can sit there and have discussions all day, but the whole fact of the matter is that the people that are running the game now are really truly blind by the quick money. I don't even see money being it no more. It's just the quick fame like "American Idol" comes in and goes out type shit.

ThaFormula.com - When you guys were on Atlantic Records and you would walk into the label, how many people at the label that you all worked with really knew about Hip-Hop?

El Da Sensei - Well there was a lot of cats that worked there that knew about Hip-Hop. It's just the people that they were working with didn't know.

ThaFormula.com - Now what about in 2003, because it seems that when I walk into a label I don't see one person that really understands the music?

El Da Sensei - Yeah, it was like that when I went to a couple of labels like that myself. Not even to go look for a deal, but just going up with other people and just lookin' at it for myself. It's like damn, first of all where is everybody at? Everybody is on vacation! You got cats that just come in and out or they're on the road with the artists. So it's like nowadays you're like who's more important? The people that work at the label or the artists?

ThaFormula.com - So how are things supposed to change if you got a bunch of chumps workin' at these labels?

El Da Sensei - I think it's up to the artists now to really come together and understand the situation. If there was no underground or independent record labels or independent record stores, it would be really messed up for real, because there would be no one left to turn to except for the radio. So then you know the radio DJ's or the personalities don't know about the shit we know about that's going on at Fat Beats or any underground store that sells certain records that we know about. It's like were in 2 different worlds. The artists gotta come together as a whole and start some type of union, some type of togetherness or something because in the long run the game is gonna be run by the feds and the government. They're gonna start record checkin' cats before they get record deals because they're trying to figure out how all these criminals are sittin' behind the mic. The cats that are not into Hip-Hop are starting to look in the window cause they heard about certain people. You knew when Jam got killed, and I don't care if you was in the government, everybody heard about it.

ThaFormula.com - Let's get to the radio now El. How do we go about wakin' up a brother like Funk Flex cause he's definitely a Black Zombie right now?

El Da Sensei - I think he's definitely put in a position himself to sometimes have to pick and choose. It's just like doing a party where the DJ that DJ's the party has to make sure that he plays certain records that's gonna keep the crowd amped. On certain records that he puts on they might go sit down or get a drink. A DJ most of the time wants everybody on the floor dancin,' so I think that is more or less him wanting to hear the type of music that he knows he can play that's gonna be a party.

ThaFormula.com - When you guys recorded "The Artifacts" album, did you hear it on the radio?

El Da Sensei - No doubt. I ain't even gonna front. Flex, you know played a lot of joints that I didn't think he would even play. We went up there and did an interview with him. We got on the radio and he played nothin' but break beats for us when we was freestylin' cause he knew from us, like our resume that we was some cats that get on the mic and just go and he just spun for like for ten minutes straight. We stopped rockin' and he was still cuttin.' He was like "what's up!" I'm like "yo I'm gonna take a breath for a minute, ha ha!!" That's why I say there's room for it. It's just we as underground artists need to take it upon ourselves, and I make a note of this all the time. Just because you're on a label or independent anything, don't treat it that way because you never know who's gonna hear this record. You never know when Flex is gonna go in the record store. He might have heard the song and he might say "well shit I can play this." One might have that one record that a DJ like that might play and he will probably say to us, like "I'll play that shit as long as it's dope and it's not gonna make my party go down," and the dude ain't gonna bore me with it. That's with any record though. It's a lot of politics just getting' the product to certain kind of DJ's cause there is a lot of stuff out there I think they can play, but I think they are just not exposed to it. Because you got certain record pools that only service certain records, that might only service mainstream records. A lot of times they might not do underground. So he might not get that in his pile, or he might not get it sent to him, because also a lot of underground pools won't do it because they feel Flex won't play it. They think he is a certain kind of DJ. Don't be scared. There is nothing to be scared of. Dude is a human just like we are and that's like every radio station if you think about across the country right now has the same format, and it's not like they are trying to be like Flex. It's just that there is a certain format that these radio programmers go by, and if you don't have an ill DJ like a real scratch DJ or college radio DJ, the cats that support the kind of music that we want to be put out there, the rest of the world don't know. So we gotta educate everybody.

ThaFormula.com - Why can't we get dope artists together more often? What happened to the unity we once had?

El Da Sensei - I think because everything is so separated man. That's the truth. It's like I'm right there with you. I remember the "Don't Curse" video recently came on and I was just watchin' the video jump from artist to artist and the way the set was everybody was in their own world. G Rap was in his world, Kane was in with the girls, you had C.L. Smooth on the basketball court. You had a little bit of everything in there about each other, even Puffy was in the video, but they were all doing the same thing, Rockin'! It was all togetherness. Now today, you can't get that today because it's too much ego going on. Everybody wanna be Mr. And Mrs. MTV Cribs. It's too much ego and pride. It's too much individuality and no truthfulness. But until we all want it together like that and stop lookin' at certain shit that's on TV…It shouldn't be old school Wednesday on BET because it should just be everybody together. You can walk into Fat Beats today and go in the store and you will see one side is the underground side and one side is the mainstream side, then you turn around to the back and you got all the classics on that side. So that's what I mean about everything is separated. All the indie record singles and albums is in the middle rack lettered off, but they're not seen. So it's like a lot of stuff ain't being seen and heard so the cats get forgotten about, but then too, that's how fast the game moves. Every year is a new person. Also too, you gotta think about when we were all out at the time. Beatnuts, Common, Organized Konfusion, we were all on major labels. We weren't on independent labels, so that shows you that somebody didn't know how to handle what we was doing. Form Priority to Atlantic to Warner Brothers to Loud. From the Alkaholiks to Wu-Tang to fuckin' Mobb Deep to everybody that was out back then. The list goes on and on. Brand Nubian with Elektra then to Arista. If the man upstairs is not conscious and he is ignorant to other Hip-Hop that's around him and that's all you are gonna see is what we're being brainwashed with on TV and radio. If we don't sit back as fans and as consumers and take responsibility, we gonna keep getting' it.

ThaFormula.com - How do you feel when they play your video on old school Wednesdays and label you guys old school?

El Da Sensei - Well I like it even still because at least it's being put out there for these little cats to see. I don't care if it's for a day. I was looking at a commercial and they was just showing all the artists that was ever on BET and I saw our name up there. I was like word! It was little as hell, but I was like word!

ThaFormula.com - But isn't it kind of upsetting that The Artifacts was only ten years ago? How is that Old School?

El Da Sensei - Shit, they think '98 is old school now! If you hear, on 105.1 they're like "back in the day…1997." I'm like "no, that was only a couple of years ago," but that's how fast we forget because so much shit is going on that it's not our fault that they want us to forget so fast. It's just that they are givin' so much. It's just too much. It's just completely over-saturated. You don't have time to soak in one album because the same artist is puttin' out another album at the end of the year.

ThaFormula.com - Who do you think is behind trying to throw away all the legends and just act like they never existed?

El Da Sensei - I think it's just like the mixtape shit. A lot of mixtape DJ's right now aren't playing these artists that you wanna hear. Their records get put into the promo bin. They feel like, "ahh he ain't hot right now." But that's only because the DJ is ignorant too because he thinks he has got to play the shit that is on the radio and that's right, everybody wanna hear that. But how do you know? You only one person.

ThaFormula.com - Speakin' about DJ's El. What the hell happened to all the real DJ's?

El Da Sensei - Man! They all get pushed to the side into the turntablism division.

ThaFormula.com - I mean I can't believe how many DJ's out there don't mix records anymore?

El Da Sensei - I think they feel like all this time they been trying to do that they didn't get paid, so now they figure all they got to do is make a mixtape, burn the CD, make some loot. Alight cool I'm good. So that's where that came from.

ThaFormula.com - What's up with the yelling' all the mixtapes man?

El Da Sensei - DJ Clue started that. He was the first cat to scream his name on it besides Kid Capri, but Kid Capri did it in a way where he was doing a party on a mixtape.

ThaFormula.com - And he could actually mix!

El Da Sensei - Yeah and he was scratchin' and makin' a party happen on tape. There is a difference between hearin' a party tape and hearin' "Exclusive!!" You can throw stuff on a tape like one by one and just say it's all exclusive, but then you forgot about the scratchin' part bro. So I think for one they might think it's doing good, but it hurts them at the same time. So it's a double standard. They wanna be Hip-Hop and they doin' the kind of Hip-Hop they feel is right, and 2 they also makin' money so it's hard to determine where everybody is tryin' to go because the DJ's is like they don't feel respected because you don't even have many groups anymore with DJ's in them. It's just the MC. The producer gets hired and he's like a freelance type thing. It's never gonna be like a Gangstarr or a Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth where you got the producer and rapper. The producer is the DJ and the Producer. You not gonna see that again in a group. The producers now used to be DJ's but know they make beats so everybody is trying to get they hands dirty, and at the same time like I said the problem is there is too much happening for everybody to handle. One person's album comes out and then another dude album comes out. You like both of them and they going neck and neck but then towards the end of the year one of them drops another album. So before the end of the year even happened, they put another album out in November and you ain't got time to soak up that one record. Come on man, what are you doing? So what are you supposed to do? You ain't got time to like that one thing.

ThaFormula.com - Now you say ego is a big thing in this Hip-Hop world so is that what has been the main thing stoppin' the Artifacts from getting' back together?

El Da Sensei - Well I wouldn't say it's ego. I just think it's more or less a lot of things. You know, do people really wanna hear the Artifacts again? Especially with everything that's happening. But like I said that's gotta be a whole majority wide vote. But with me and Tame the problem is more Pride than Ego, and I think it's almost like the same damn thing really when you think about it (Laughs).

ThaFormula.com - That's one of things that upsets me El. A lot of the fans out there deserve to have all that put to the side man...

El Da Sensei - I think that's why I'm still doing what I'm doing because I know there is people out there that is wondering about that, but at the same time, MAN! My people out there who know, I wish you all knew what I went through as far as in my travels with Mr. Tame One, and not to even put no business out there, but many people can tell you pretty much what went down out here that made the decision come about and that's on a straight up man/personal level you know. Being a man.

ThaFormula.com - One of the things that really has disappointed me with many artists is the size of ego that they carry with them and the way they treat a lot of people like myself and fans. The fans deserve a lot more respect then what they get?

El Da Sensei - Yeah man, they don't realize that. I mean I'm still to this day wondering why fans liked our music so much. I wanna ask them why. I mean let's sit down and talk about why you feel that way. Not to even make my head big, but I wanna know what the hell I'm doing that's making you like it. I know how it was for me when I was growin' up. I had too many heroes that I liked from Rakim to Krs. These were not just cats I listened to, I felt like they was like heroes to me 'cause it was something that I could escape to when I came home from school. You know I would throw my cardboard on the floor and I would just start practicing, or 9:00 came and I sat in the house and taped the radio, Marley Marl and Red Alert. So I would hope that new cats feel like me when they hear my music.

ThaFormula.com - I was also thinkin' about how all these new wack ass superstars on the radio have special guests on almost every track. It's just a bunch of wack rappers rappin' together on every album it seems. But it seems that it's really hard to get the real MC's and producers to hook up on tracks together?

El Da Sensei - Yeah, that first of all is mostly a money issue and I didn't understand that too. A person like me won't be able to get a big name artist because they will look at me and say "okay, what have you done lately? How many records have you sold? Who was on your last album?" So then you sit back and say "well that ain't got nothing to do with it, if you like me, then we could do the song," but then most of the time it's not up to the artist no more. To say "I like your style and I want to do a song with you," nah. It's like "Talk to my manager, uh talk to my lawyer," and then they're gonna tell you how much.

ThaFormula.com - That's it right there man. Everything nowadays is talk to my manager...

El Da Sensei - Yeah, there is no more talk to me.

ThaFormula.com - Now let's get to the album El. How has the new album done so far man?

El Da Sensei - Well, right now it's doing real good. I think it's pickin' up since the album came out. It's been a slow process just because we are on a smaller level. It's just getting everybody up on it. It's funny when I see some of the reviews that I have gotten from the album. I think people are more surprised that the record sounds the way it does because of the scratchin' and the beats and stuff like that. This one cat straight asked me, "yo did you do that on purpose?" and I started laughin'. He was like "what are you laughin' at?" I said "man let me tell you something." I said "that's me." I didn't want it to sound a certain way, that's just how it's gonna come out. Even if I'm not even doing the beat and just pickin' the track, there is certain shit that I like.

ThaFormula.com - That's another big thing right there man. Why do artists have such bad taste in beats nowadays? Some of these dope MC's nowadays be rhymin' over the worst beats?

El Da Sensei - I think because there is too many cooks in the pot. It's not left up to the MC no more who he works with. Most of the time an A&R at the label might have signed the artist because he has ties to a certain producer or team of producers that might have that hot sound for right now, and that's what the game is about. They take shit, milk it for what it's worth and let it go.

ThaFormula.com - Why do you think a group like Dilated can get away with doing what they want to do on a major label?

El Da Sensei - The thing with Dilated is they already accomplished what they did so far with the sound that they had, so when you take a group like that and a major sees that and all they see is that all they have to do is just put backing behind that and they see!! I'm glad you pointed that out because that's a perfect example for a major label. They are only doing what all the other labels did back in the 90's. It's just that somebody took it upon themselves to say "let's do something different," 'cause that's what's happening with Interscope and Jurassic 5.

ThaFormula.com - So it's obviously proven that it can work, so why not do it more?

El Da Sensei - Cause they feel that maybe there is not enough artists out there like that to do it. It's like with Gangstarr, man I don't even know where to begin with them because that's like one group that we can all say stood the test of all time and is still givin' the same ingredients but different flavor all the time. They switch it up, but you know it's gonna be what it is. Primo on the tracks, Guru with the voice, and it's gonna always make a dope mixture no matter whether cats say they are played out or whatever. It's still Gangstarr and they have the symbol and sign and they have a sound. So I think a lot of the people that might work at Virgin grew up with them and grew up with their music and the people that might work on their project know them. They know them. They been out since '88 so they know them as artists to say enough to say "I can fuck with their product, I know where to take it." They know where they're crowd is. They know where they can send them as far as tours so it's already laid out for them and I think it's because they know it will make a certain amount of money. They know it will make a certain amount of sells. Why would you wanna not do something like that with a group like that? You would just be throwing away a certain percentage of gross at the end of the year. The label makes just as much money as Gangstarr would cause Gangstarr will make money just by not spending that money on another producer.

ThaFormula.com - I just get tired of watching these labels put out 100 albums and only 10 of these garbage albums actually do anything while the others from these new wack artists and even known artists completely flop?

El Da Sensei - And it's quite evident cause in the last 2 years the music industry has lost more and more money and it's because they don't understand what's happening. They are acting dumb like they don't know what to do. You know what to do. Stop the endless cycle of bullshit and let us come back out to the forefront. Let us, meaning us like Masta Ace. Come on man "Disposable Arts?" Unspoken Heard, J-Live, there is so many groups out there. But then also, and this is not to even knock anybody, but it's only a certain amount of underground MC's or crews that get light and I'm trying to figure out what they're saying that is so out of this world, that maybe a person like me or a J-Live or anybody that is not getting that kind of light is not? We can look at certain articles and certain reviews or shit that is in the stores. All right well "what is this dude saying that I'm not saying, and how is it that only this certain kind of weird Hip-Hop getting seen?" Like "what the fuck is these dudes talkin' about." It's just big words with like no topic. So it's like where is the music going? Like, are we trying to get messages back out there again and not even just sayin' conscious, but what happened to the X-Clans? You know I wake up everyday and I look at videos and I only tape the old school videos just to say what you say, what the hell happened?

ThaFormula.com - At times it seems like as soon as you start to diss this wack shit people start callin' you a hater?

El Da Sensei - And it's not about hatin'. Back in the day there was laws you had to go by. You could not bite. You couldn't use the same tracks, you couldn't do none of that. You couldn't do that. It was just impossible. It was like "yo, you was trying to be the most original dude, I wanna be nice, I wanna be the nicest or one of the nicest. I wanna be upon the elite." But right now everybody is like "oh I'm happy with my little spot, I'm just gonna be this." Everybody looks the same now. Every rapper looks the same. Everybody has got athletic wear and big hats and I'm like what the fuck man? It's like God man!!!

ThaFormula.com - Things have changed not only in the East man, but also here in the West. Everyone is on the shit out here too…

El Da Sensei - I remember we came out there first when we dropped our first Artifacts single. Our album wasn't out yet and we didn't know if we wanted to go to L.A. first. Redman said it best when he told us, "Yo, I think that's the best thing you all ever did" was going to L.A. first instead of going on the East Coast tour. We saw shit that we didn't know existed within our own music comin' from the East Coast to the West. I realized then how many graf heads and Hip-Hop cats was really out there. I knew about the artists that came out of the West, but just to be out there and be in the streets and see the people... I thought everything was just gangs and colors and just seeing what I only saw in movies. Once I got over there man...I also think meeting Hieroglyphics kind of gave me a different outlook too. I met them at Bobbitos station in New York. They didn't even know me and Tame rapped when we was in the station. We was all in there smokin' and the next thing you know we got on the mic. They was like, "oh shit!" I done had a friendship with them since '91. So when I finally got out there and we did "Unity" with Bigga B and all that shit, cats showed us so much love. Ahh man, I got to tell you this story. We did a show with uh…Tajai was there and Del was there. I think Opio was there and this was the first time we seen them out in L.A. since we saw them in New York. It was like mad people outside. We was like damn, all these people came to see us? So we had passed out Artifacts markers in the line. Man, man, man! That was the worst thing we probably could have did cause there was a Hertz truck right in front of the damn club. Don't you know they tagged that whole truck yo! I'm talkin' about the top of the car, side, the back, everything. And they was like "hurry up yo so we don't get them in trouble," so they jumped back in line and got in the club. That shit was so dope. They showed us so much love. I was like damn that was incredible for me. Like damn, to be out there and hear how the slang was. Ooh hoo that shit was dope!

ThaFormula.com - Shit is different now man on both coasts no doubt. I have never seen so much wack shit in the underground like I see now...

El Da Sensei - Man! You go to the store and it's like people I have never heard of like all right that goes back to what I say, don't think people ain't gonna hear your records cause people go in the stores and might say "well the cover looks hot, let me put this record on." Ohh man! Like Diamond said, "Take that record off, don't waste my time" and it's a lot of that right now cause it's just like "American Idol." Everybody goes up there and thinks they can sing. Not everybody can rap.

ThaFormula.com - That's my thing man. You got all these wack muthafuckas rappin' about outer space, Atmospheres, and all this gay shit that makes no sense. What the hell happened?

El Da Sensei - HAHAHA!!! That's what I'm talkin' about man. "Scientifical, outeryfical, dipycal." I'm like what?

ThaFormula.com - And you know I hear shit like, "Oh he's a multi-syllabic genius." I'm like what the fuck are you talkin' about?

El Da Sensei - (laughs) I know man. You know I looked at certain reviews and I got like a 3. The dude would give me mad props, but then the rating would be low. So I'm like all right what do you mean by that? But then I see this space dude here. Outerspace man gets 4 or 5 stars. What did he do that I didn't do? What is he sayin' that I ain't sayin'? Was it because he was talkin' crazy on some jackass shit? I don't know. I'm trying to be me. A lot of times I saw reviews where they were saying I was trying to do nostalgia and I was trying to capture a time saying I was stuck in time. I'm like, "look man, what do you want? What is your type of Hip-Hop? What do you specifically want to hear?" I'm not gonna be spacey cause I didn't come from space. I came from an era that was straight like yo, when you listened to Boot Camp and them you saw Brooklyn. When you heard Buck Shot you saw Brooklyn. You envisioned the streets. When you listened to G Rap, you heard Queens but you saw him and what he does. He gave you the yin and the yang. You know I do what I do, but I might not agree with it. Where now today cats just do. I'm a drug dealer, I'm a thug, I will shoot, I will kill, I will bang and it's like "damn, what are you accomplishing by doing that? You're not showing me the Hip-Hop side, your showing me your personal side, but can you be creative with that at the same time?" No, because it's not much to go on.

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