thaFormula.com - For those artists with dreams of being a "rap superstar", what does it take in your mind?

Pharoahe Monch - For the most part it definitely starts with the artist themselves and their integrity and outlook and their vision. Then from there, from my standpoint it takes a great team to launch that artist to the standpoint that he or she becomes a rap superstar. Then there are different definitions of what that is. For me there are a whole lot of rap superstars that don't garner the same sales of say like a 50 Cent, and we all know that 50 Cent is a rap superstar but I view like a J Dilla in that same vein in my mind. Someone who is self sufficient financially in doing production, but you know just one of the all time greats to me, but you know may not be superstar status in terms of his notoriety on a mainstream level. So it depends on what type of status you are talking about, because to me I think J. Dilla's career is gonna span many centuries. Even though he has passed, the music is just so timeless and just so heartfelt that it has nothing to do with the video or being on the radio or being number one or none of that. Its like "Fuck the Police" comes on in the club and it's just a bigger reaction than your number one million selling single ever was. So what do you say? But going back to from a commercial standpoint, you know you definitely need all the things in place you know. Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur had it in their heart and in their destiny but they definitely surrounded themselves with great producers and great managers that helped them to get to that point.

thaFormula.com - Some people feel that certain artists were meant to do this and certain artists were not, do you feel that an artist either has "it" or they don't and can "it" eventually be attained or is "it" something that you are just naturally born with?

Pharoahe Monch - I think an artist can eventually get "it" if he works hard enough and he has an open mind to understand what "it" is. There has been so many artists who have developed themselves over the years and a true artist and that's how you can point them out, is never really satisfied with the last thing that they did and you keep growing. Like I remember like 4 years ago I was at a birthday party for Prince, not Prince Po but Prince the artist. Common was there and I was like "yo what's up? What you working on?" and he was like "yo right now I'm just working on trying to get better and increase my skill level." I'm just like what!? I understood what he meant but you know artists are never really satisfied where they are at and are always trying to get better or challenge yourself in a certain area and shit. So you look at like a Lil' Wayne who is in a very controversial position because he is getting a lot of props. For me Lil' Wayne might be controversial because people are saying in the mainstream that he is the best or whatever. He is definitely an artist who improved over the years and he sold records in the beginning and he didn't have to become better, but it is very obvious that he is better then he was and I give him a lot of props for that because that's what artists do and that's what Hip-Hop is about. It's about pushing the envelope to get better. He knows he has improved and the people have felt he has improved since his beginning and that's a big accomplishment because when you come out and you don't sell records then there is a reason to try and get better. You come out and you do sell records it's so easy for you to get lazy. So getting back to your question, "it" can be attained if you don't have "it" in the beginning through a lot of different measures. By discovering what your voice is, what your sound is and possibly getting with a producer who can take you like say a Kanye West, Dr Dre or Jay Dee possesses the ability to take an artist and be like "this is what I think your strong points are and you need to focus on that and I'm gonna produce around that" and that strengthens you in itself. You know you discover what your lane is and you kind of master your lane. I think that's how you can obtain that stardom or become better in yourself and you can be like well this guy definitely has "it" when it comes to that. There is so many different elements to that. It's not Black and White, it's layered. From Supernatural to Nas. Nas is obviously a writer, a master of his craft. Supernat is obviously so comfortable in his element in what he does. Supernat has asked me to produce songs for him. How I would approach producing for Supernat is different then how I would approach producing for Nas. Its two different things. I want him to still be comfortable in his element, but I know he needs to come from the live element to the recorded element and master that in order for people on that level to see that he has "it".

thaFormula.com - The thing is when you see him on stage doing what he does, you can see that he has "it"...

Pharoahe Monch - Definitely and I've been studying on this tour because he asked me to produce some songs for him and that's all I've been studying. I was like "I could give you a beat, but that's not what a producer would do." A producer wants to make people understand how good you are and that's what I've been studying so I welcome the challenge and I can't wait to work with him. We worked before in the past but what we are about to do in the future I think is really gonna fucking blow peoples minds and shit.

thaFormula.com - Now that the delays have passed and you finally dropped your album, what have you seen the past few weeks in this industry that maybe you didn't expect. What surprises, disappointments, etc. have you faced since the album dropped?

Pharoahe Monch - Oh man! I finished this album and we went to mastering and in the mastering session I'm listening to this album with the Mastering Engineer Steve, and a couple of other upper echelon cats, were listening to this album like "man this is gonna be the first underground album in a long time to sell a million copies." We are listening to it like "this shit is that good." We come out the gate, we do 13,000 records and were like "what the fuck is going on?" There is a lot missing in Hip-Hop right now. Even on the Rock the Bells tour, in New York I performed on a weekend for 80,000 people. 40,000 people on Saturday and another 40,000 on Sunday, but on some of the dates throughout the country you know the crowds have been a little disappointing and I'm like Wu Tang, Nas, Black Star, Immortal Technique, Pharoahe Monch, The Roots and I'm just like "what the fuck!" So what is that? Its not just pinpointing it to Pharoahe, it's pinpointing that shit to an issue where radio and industry has fucked up the game more then we think they fucked up the game in a lot of different ways. Like people are watching my show like "oh shit I don't believe this guy is putting on a show." They don't even believe that artists can perform anymore and you could tell they are looking at the show like that because they come up to me after the show and say "yo that shit was incredible." They are just used to what they are being promoted, which is Hip-Hop that has a lack of culture in terms of artists that are in that shit for the money. The got love for Hip-Hop because it's a way to make money. They don't have the love for the art aspect, for the video aspect, for the dance aspect, for the DJ aspect. Its really bullshit in a lot of senses and that doesn't go for everybody but for what they are promoting as mainstream Hip-Hop, it's really bullshit and it's passé. Even some of the records that are good, they are here today and they are gone tomorrow so what that means to the audience is, you don't really care about me. I like it because they are playing it in the club, but as an artist, you have no love for me so we have no love for you and the new generation thinks that that's how it is consistently throughout the culture. When you have an artist like Nas that's on stage and I'm watching his show because I haven't seen him perform and he's really putting it in and I'm like "wow," here is a dude who is putting it down and even like on his level, his sales doesn't reflect how good the records are as compared to a lot of other artists that you consider at his level. It's really bugged right now. So my thing is to brand my name Pharoahe Monch, to do songs like "Guns Drawn," do songs like "Let's Go," work with people like Black Milk and to show people that when it comes to a certain brand of Hip-Hop, there is only like a handful of artists that would even approach a song that way, which helps me to brand my name so at the end of the day if your a consumer of Hip-Hop and your an artist of Hip-Hop, if I cap off at 75,000 worldwide then I can franchise myself that way and people can see the show and buy into that. I know that we haven't capitalized marketing wise but I'm really happy and I'm really good.

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Pharoahe Monch @Thaformula.Com/33Third Los Angeles Aug. 15th