thaFormula.com - How much production did you do on the RBG album Stic?

Stic Man of Dead Prez - I definitely didn't get as much credit for what I did on that album as far as production because a lot of the stuff that says Dead Prez was actually me on the ASR, but at that time I wasn't really trying to make it really clear on who was doing what. We was just like "we will produce it so we don't have to pay nobody." So I wasn't even really looking at it like "hey, I should have a career in producing for other people and stuff." "Hip Hop" was a beat I made on the ASR 10 at our Warrior Studios. "Mind Sex" I made in downtown Brooklyn when I had a little crib down there. But on that album I worked with Lord Jamar, I worked with Tahir who did a lot of songs. He did "I'm an African," "Behind Enemy Lines" and much more shit. But yeah on "Lets Get Free" I was doing production. Wherever it said Dead Prez that was me you know in terms of programming. M1 might bring a sample, he might be there with you and be like "nah, nah make a different sequence" so it was a collaboration still though. It was different people in charge of different elements. As far as that album, conceptually I was coming forward saying "how about a song about Mind Sex or Hip Hop where we gonna take this dirty south shit and we gonna spit some real shit on it." Like conceptually that's me, that's the part of Dead Prez that I bring. But as far as the political education that made those songs have that you know worldwide international black and brown everybody cold relate to the struggle, that's M1. We call him "Master Knowledge" M1. He's always soaking up game from like the movement and the political theories and shit and he will bring that into the studios with a blunt too though. He will have us at a rally or doing clothes drives putting in some real work. So it's not like just the music made it, but it was the whole thing. Lord Jamar had the crazy record collection so that was an element that in our production we didn't have so much or at least I will say in mine. Like I never had like crazy crates of records and all that extra shit. I pretty much try to play something on the keyboard or 2 or 3 samples, but Jamar had just a library of unique shit so we it was just a combination that time of everybody. Everybody on that album played their role in the production.

thaFormula.com - Did you ever think that you guys would end up having the impact on the industry that you did as far as building a straight hardcore following of fans as well as major support from political organizations?

Stic Man of Dead Prez - Yeah man, and I say it with all humility. Because I know that we need this type of shit and I was coming from it for real. It ain't like I wasn't in organizations. It wasn't like I ain't from the street or I ain't been locked up. It ain't like I ain't had no bullshit dish washing jobs. Out here they be trying to create images and shit and all that shit, but for us we already know that if you're real then real is gonna recognize this because we are out here doing it. It was like "let's create something that represents this lifestyle" and eventually we coined the phrase "RBG" because it was a balance of the political with the practical out here.

thaFormula.com - Brother J of X-Clan once told me that X-Clan was never a rap music group. He said that they were movement more then anything else. What do you consider Dead Prez to be?

Stic Man of Dead Prez - First of all, that shit is semantics because Brother J is one of the greatest MC's to do it and not just because he was on some black power shit but because his swagger, his knowledge level, the way he could phrase and put you in Egypt but with a pimp swagger though, he was the embodiment of that X-Clan shit. So I just wanna say that. They influenced us and I still bang them. In fact I was on their Myspace recently and they got some new shit that is harder than ever. As far as Dead Prez, we were both and we still are both. I say both because I don't just try and talk about the movement and shit, I'm an artist and I respect the lyrical skill of expressing yourself to music. I respect the whole aspect of being an MC, developing your craft and being nice with it and proficient with all the elements of style, rhythm, versatility, content and all that out side of just what my content is. But the man I am, the life I have lived and the experiences I have had, that's what gives me what goes into my MC'ing. So you hear mostly that in all of my music. As I got older, I have had different experiences, I have seen some things that I believed in when I was younger, I have seen the full spectrum of that and so I allowed myself to grow and try to get better and better. So if the movement has changed, if the movement is about having power then yeah we're still the movement. But if the movement is about stagnating and just rhetoric all day long and niggas never bossing up on top of their business then nah, we on some other shit.

thaFormula.com - How do you feel about the many people that were surprised at the complete switch in sound from "Lets Get Free" to the "RBG" album, sound wise many people felt it was a complete turnaround musically from "Let's Get Free?"

Stic Man of Dead Prez - Check this out and print this right here so muthafuckas will know, we didn't switch nothing. When we sat down to do "Lets Get Free" we didn't have no formula. That's the problem. All these Hip-Hop purists muthafuckas will have you being fake because they want you to keep recreating your same shit and the way "Lets Get Free" came about was the same way "RBG" came about. Niggaz sat down in the studio and started fucking with sounds and we stayed true to them sounds. When we came in this game, not only did we realize that we was gonna be making an impact and an example in terms of a revolutionary ideology, but bigger then that, we knew that even the revolutionary movement is gonna be affected by what we are doing. Like we have been affected by the revolutionary movement and in turn as community members and artists and people who are involved in it, we are gonna affect that to. So our thing was to break out of so called boxes of whatever shit is supposed to be and get back to what shit is. Get back to being you and expressing yourself and being free to do that for the freedom of the music's sake. Being blocked in your mind like "okay I got to cater to these muthafuckas and I got to cater to these muthafuckas," that would be revolutionary in itself. Also we recognize that there is a lot of the so called "white crowd" who will be like "we love 'Lets Get Free'" but the issue is that they might not be able to relate to some of our mix tapes and "RBG" and some of our later work. It might not relate to them as much as "Lets Get Free" because "Lets Get Free" was focused more on international, socialist politics. And our other stuff is focusing on who we are as human beings in this time. Not just in theory but who are we as people. We feel like you got to know both of them. I wouldn't want you to hear "Revolutionary But Gangsta" without hearing "Lets Get Free" because you won't know what I mean by "gangsta." You won't know the context that I'm talking about and at the same time if you hear "Lets Get Free" and you don't realize that we are talking about power in our real life on our own terms, you might get it twisted and you might be thinking that we are talking about being some Marxist or some Leftist stuff or you know following these white liberals around and that's not our goal either. We have not even perfected our sound, our message or our movement. It's not perfect yet. We put shit out, we learned, we lived, we changed it up and when people hear my new album it's gonna be totally different from both of them albums. Hopefully every time I do something it will be dramatically different as I try to master the moment.

thaFormula.com - When you guys approached the second album, did you already have an idea of how you were gonna approach it?

Stic Man of Dead Prez - Not at all. I didn't even know if I would live long enough to make a second album. In my heart of hearts I knew this shit was a good album in terms of it being honest and it being a real expression, but I didn't feel like that was gonna be popular. I always look at what we bring as not necessarily a mass audience thing. It's for certain people that could really fuck with it and are true to themselves. So that is important for me on another level then being a million record seller. For "Lets Get Free" to be a super platinum album, there would be a fundamental change in the consciousness of our community first and then people would say "oh this is that shit." But right now, like Pac said, we might not be the ones who are gonna set it off, but we are gonna try to affect the person that will set it off. . 

thaFormula.com - So how did you approach the making the second album "RBG"?

Stic Man of Dead Prez - Well I have to say that at first I didn't have anything that I wanted to say. Everybody else around us was just expecting the same old thing, but I feel like we locked that down. Not to say that in no arrogant way, but as far as "Let's Get Free," G, we locked that down! That whole concept of using music to talk about our revolutionary situation, it's all over that album. I mean damn near every aspect of basic life we touched on. I don't have to keep repeating myself. In fact that is not my style. Now the problem is, when you talk about something else people say you changed or switched up and that's like saying I had on a Malcolm X shirt on yesterday, but I got on a Eazy-E shirt today and I done switched up. I don't wear the same clothes everyday, but I still got that Malcolm shirt in my closet. Catch me next Wednesday and I'm gonna have that on so it's about seeing the whole picture. Unless you are a one dimensional artist, it's very hard to give people your whole self in one project. It's almost like, I am a father now. I wasn't a father when I did "Let's Get Free." That's a project in itself. I'm a boss now, I wasn't a boss when I was doing "Lets Get Free." I was a slave on a plantation label. So there is so many new things that I want to share with those that might be interested in fucking with our sound and I think real fans are the people that say "I can't wait to see how they approach it next" and let your ass be free to create. As far as "RBG" we got what we needed to get from the label. We got over a half a million dollars from them and our mission was if we are gonna be on the plantation, I'm not trying to be famous. I'm trying to get these resources, use this machine and build up my own shit. So we had a plan. Our plan was something totally different with that album. We created a buzz around it based on what our objectives were. We pulled in Jay-Z from some of our homies with those links, we pulled in people that we always wanted to work with like Erykah Badu and Krayzie Bone, but we kept it us. We just wanted to let people know that this movement ain't never gonna die as long as it keeps evolving. I'm an artist so I'm gonna make you feel this shit regardless so my job is to put you where I'm at and not follow you. Let me let you follow this music in a creative sense.

thaFormula.com - What's the status with the next Dead Prez album as far as you're concerned?

Stic Man of Dead Prez - Like all of our albums, they can only come when they ready man. Niggaz got to love this life. Niggaz is grown men right now. So it's a lot going on and I think we would do it a disservice if we just throw some shit out there and put the Dead Prez logo on it. I think we both respect it enough to let it come naturally and let it be something genuine so that people can get it. So you know we are just working and in the studio and when it gets right that's when we are gonna drop it. The music handles the rest of it. It's about getting that shit right. We are always recording. I got a studio called Warrior Studios in Atlanta and Warrior Studios in Brooklyn so that's what we do. If I'm not checking these god damn emails, or traveling, or doing a work shop, I'm in a studio. If we ain't working out or at the range, we in the studio. So we always recording man it's just that there is so much haters and so many people out here that you can't just throw anything out. You've got to put your best out because people will try to tear you down no matter what anyway. So you've got to always come out with your guns cocked busting hollow tips on these muthafuckas.

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