ThaFormula.com - The last time we spoke, "The Future Is Now" had just dropped…how did it end up doing for you guys?

Ill Bill - It did really well. The response was crazy and it opened up the door for us to tour and just get out there and meet the fans for the first time, 'cause it was mad spots that we hadn't gotten a chance to travel to overseas and in the U.S. We didn't expect it to do what it did. We just made the album that we wanted to hear. It's just crazy that as many people felt the way we did. We were a group that was known for putting out 12"'s since like '96 so people were wondering, "yo are these cats ever coming out with a album?" The average listener might have been thinking "yo these guys aren't serious about this," but in reality we had been trying to put out an album for a long time, we just kept hitting brick walls. So once the album dropped the floodgates opened.

ThaFormula.com - 2003 seemed to have been a bad year for the underground and commercial scenes, would you agree?

Ill Bill - Yeah I agree cause I haven't really peeped anything that was super hot in 2003.

ThaFormula.com - It seems like people ain't really trying to do any boom-bap type shit anymore. I don't know what it is but the feeling just isn't the same in 2003 when listening to the releases that dropped...

Ill Bill - I think the beats are changing a lot and I think people are scared of the boom-bap shit and people that you would expect to come with the hard beats have kind of strayed away from that and that's something that we're really conscious of while were working on this new Non-Phixion album right now. I was really conscious of it when I was working on my solo joint too. Luckily I have the kind of producers around me that really don't do nothing but the boom-bap. I think it's dope kind of 'cause its setting the stage for people to drop some hot shit right now. I think everything goes through different phases. So I mean right now its like people are taking a break. I think 2004 is gonna be crazy as far as dope quality shit dropping. I know we have a lot of shit on deck just from our camp.

ThaFormula.com - No doubt. Now after the album dropped the promotion seemed good, you dropped 2 singles but then it seemed like the promotion for the LP just stopped. What happened after the second 12" dropped?

Ill Bill - Well we bounced from Landspeed after that. Really it wasn't much longer after the album came out that we bounced and it's not so much that we bounced, its just that Landspeed isn't set up to promote an album the way a real company is setup. They are very bare bones and mad unprofessional.

ThaFormula.com - How many units did you guys end up selling?

Ill Bill - As of now around 70,000 units. I mean we really should have sold more than that but its just that the setup was incorrect.

ThaFormula.com - Now did you guys have the same problem that so many artists have had coming out on Landspeed as far as not getting paid?

Ill Bill - I mean the verdict is still out on that. We're doing the numbers right now but its weird when your dealing with any company man, that's why were trying to keep it as in house as possible. As we travel through the music industry and years go by we start becoming as self contained as possible. When you leave the job of collecting your money in other peoples hands there is always gonna be fuzzy math. Were definitely dealing with fuzzy math right now but the verdict is still pending.

ThaFormula.com - In your situation with Landspeed where you moved 70,00 units do you guys get paid any money up front, during, or do you have to wait 'till all the numbers are in?

Ill Bill - Our deal isn't necessarily the same deal that they give other people. I don't really know an across the border answer for that question. I can tell you that we ate off of that deal and you know it served certain purposes. Landspeed benefited from that deal and we benefited for that deal. In the long run it was a one off. That's how we stepped into the deal from the jump. There was no guarantees that we would be handing them anything else beyond the first LP. The situation we're in right now is a lot better. This ain't worth it if your not enjoying yourself. I mean that's the beauty of the music business man. If you can get past all the pitfalls and dodge all the bullshit, it's a lot better than shoveling shit.

ThaFormula.com - So after you left Landspeed, what did you guys do from there?

Ill Bill - Well, Uncle Howie Records has always been the foundation of what we do. So when we sat down with Landspeed, we handed them a finished album. We finished our deal with Landspeed lets say in like Jan of 2002, and the album came out immediately. 'Cause it's a 4 month process to set everything up. So it was a quick thing. Pretty much like 6 months after "Future is Now" had come out, we had already sat down with a bunch of different distributors 'cause we knew we weren't gonna work with them anymore and really to this day Landspeed will tell you they would like to continue working with us. But we had to make the choice to go with what was best for us.

ThaFormula.com - So what is that and what is the status with Non-Phixion now?

Ill Bill - Non-Phixion is signed to Uncle Howie Records and Uncle Howie Records is my label distributed by Caroline. It took like 10 months but it went through a few months ago. They have a network to get your stuff into the stores. They have a real staff and they operate professionally which is the most important thing.

ThaFormula.com - So how is the new Non-Phixion album looking and what's the plan this time around?

Ill Bill - We're working on it right now. We're working on the Q-Unique album and the Non-Phixion album right now.

ThaFormula.com - What's the production line-up gonna be like this time around?

Ill Bill - Well, Necro is about to hit me with some bangers. I would like him to do like half the album.

ThaFormula.com - Are you looking at going with the same production line-up as last time or are you guys gonna switch it up?

Ill Bill - Well we are going to be working with The Beatnuts, Premier, and Large Professor. We are gonna work with all of them again. We're gonna be working with other people too. We wanna work with Dug Infinite, he's got some bangers and he hasn't done anything in a while. We wanna work with him kind of the same way we worked with Extra P. 'Cause when he worked with us, he hadn't worked with anyone for a minute. Once we put out the Non-Phixion album we started seeing him popping up on a lot of projects.

ThaFormula.com - You guys seem to be good beat selectors 'cause that's one of the things that bugs me about most of the dope MC's nowadays, they just do not know how to pick a dope beat...

Ill Bill - We're mad picky. That's what it is and that's what we are going through right now. We're mad picky. We're listening to a lot of beats right now and we were mad picky with "The Future is Now" too. It took us a minute to get the beats that we were like "yo these are the bangers, these are the ones we need." There are mad producers out there that Non-Phixion hasn't worked with. Like I got to work with Alchemist for a solo joint and I would like to get something from him for this Non-Phixion album. Its like so many dope producers out there man. Basically whoever brings the hottest shit to the table at the end of the day.

ThaFormula.com - So how far into the album are you guys right now?

Ill Bill - We probably got like 4 joints recorded. But we got a lot of concepts that we're just sitting on that we're waiting for the perfect beats you know.

ThaFormula.com - When are you guys looking at getting the new album out by?

Ill Bill - Summer 2004. What we wanna do is, we wanna drop Q's album like in June, drop the Non Phixion album in July, and just go on tour. Do like a Non-Phixion Q-Unique tour.

ThaFormula.com - How was it recording the Street Villains mixtape with your brother man?

Ill Bill - That was hot. We did that shit in like a week. We went into the studio, wrote that shit, dropped it. It took us 7 days to record it, 3 days to mix it and we just put it out there for the heads that were asking us for new material just to hold them over.

ThaFormula.com - How does it feel to see a lot of New York rappers and legends in the game going to the bounce style when they were the ones that set trends in this shit to the point where if they really kept it real, they could probably still do it?

Ill Bill - The game changed. I mean look it how now every R&B artist is singing over Hip-Hop beats. Like remember back like in the late 80's or early 90's when mixtape cats like Kid Capri and Ron G and them were putting out mixtapes with blends and they would take like a hot R&B acapella and they throw it over whatever the hottest Hip-Hop beats was? People would get open off of that shit 'cause that shit sounded hard. Now, they are putting million dollar budgets behind joints like that and straight out the gate they are doing it. So its like the whole R&B/Hip-Hop culture has crossed over the way you got artists like Nelly selling 8, 9 million records which is like N Sync numbers. So when you get to that level man, it's like its gotten so fucking corporate that a lot of vets in the game that are stuck in that system have no choice but to cater to that. Look what happened to Wu-Tang. Wu-Tang stayed true to the game but mad people ain't giving them love. Hot 97 don't play Wu-Tang.

ThaFormula.com - Yeah but do you honestly think Wu-Tang can still make "Enter the 36 Chambers" type Hip-Hop? Not the same, but on the same level of quality?

Ill Bill - It's all relative. When you look at Ghostface, everything he does is hot to me. The whole thing is that they didn't even bother with the game. It's a combination of keepin' the rawness but at the same time keeping up to date and they didn't evolve with the game, but at the same time you have to bear in mind that everything is fucking clean right now. For the past like 4 or 5 years everything has been really, really clean as far as the shit that sells 5 or 6 million copies. To me a lot of the hot shit is coming from Kanye and like Roc-A-Fella. Them cats are putting out some grimy beats but a lot of it is influenced from what Rza did. They just updated it. We will see what's up when the new ODB album comes out. I'm curious to hear how that shit is gonna sound. But right now it's about some R&B Hip-Hop crossover shit. That's what the fucking problem is and its grown bigger and bigger. For some people it's a good thing. For you it's a problem, for me I listen to fucking Slayer. So I ain't even wrapped up in that cipher. I'll fucking go into my CD collection and pull out a Suicidal Tendencies album from '85. I'm not even worried about what muthafuckas are putting out now. I still listen to fucking Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden. I still listen to the first Cypress album and old Wu-Tang.

ThaFormula.com - Do you think people should just realize that the days of the hardcore Hip-Hop selling millions of records is over and that independently is going to be the only way it's going to survive?

Ill Bill - I think what its gonna take is for labels like Def Jux, Psychological, and Uncle Howie to get those million dollar budgets and to get them 750,000 dollar video budgets.

ThaFormula.com - Okay now lets say you do that. You know that people are gonna start saying "oh these independents are coming up but they're all owned by white dudes," because they say the same thing about the majors…

Ill Bill - Not really because okay lets take Def Jux for example. Their roster doesn't consist of all white artists, Uncle Howie doesn't consist of all white artists, Psychological as of right now is basically just Necro and Ill Bill. But you can't get caught up in that. I mean if you wanna argue that point, they say according to the statistics that 80 percent of the buying public are white kids as far as Hip-Hop goes and that I think that has changed in terms of the bounce shit, and that down south mid-western shit. New York has a bad reputation for supporting their local artists. It's a known thing.

ThaFormula.com - I see that man. Why do you feel that is?

Ill Bill - I think New York is too fly. In New York City if you walk by a high school schoolyard and you peep all the cats…16 and 17 year old kids are rockin' the most up to date wears and not to say that they don't do that in other parts of the country but New York has always had that certain flyness about it where everybody is a rock star and that's the attitude a lot of the fans have. They feel like, "yo man fuck him yo, I'm a fucking star," and I think that hasn't changed. If anything it has gotten worse with the fact that now the microphone and the turntable is like the new guitar. Everybody wants to be a mc now.

ThaFormula.com - Do you agree that making it in New York is the hardest place to ever try and make it in?

Ill Bill - Hell yeah. If you could make it in New York you could make it anywhere. That's an old cliché that is very true.

ThaFormula.com - So break down what Uncle Howie Records has and will be coming with in 2003 and 2004?

Ill Bill - You got "Brutality Part 1" which came out in September. I'm on like 5 or 6 joints on there. Then we got Uncle Howie records. Over the last few months we released a few 12"'s from Q-Unique, Immortal Technique, E-Dot, and Non-Phixion. Plus we are reissuing all the previously released Non-Phixion 12"'s so if you remember like "5 Boroughs," "Legacy," "I Shot Reagan," they'll all be reissued on Uncle Howie. Between the reissues and all the new stuff within the next year we're gonna be dropping at least 20 different 12"'s all coming through Fat Beats. The album releases will be coming through Caroline.

ThaFormula.com - What's the status on the Ill Bill solo album?

Ill Bill - It's called "What's wrong with Bill." I'm pretty much done with it and anybody that was feeling the Non-Phixion album is gonna love this album. Necro did the whole album. We sat for a while choosing the beats making sure that every beat filled a different description and I think people that are used to defining Necro as having a certain sound are gonna be surprised when they hear this album cause there is stuff on there that your gonna hear and be like "word? Necro did that?" I didn't wanna make the album sound obvious. I'm very happy with it and it should be dropping May 4th.

ThaFormula.com - How did you guys get hooked up with T-Ray for the "Future is Now" album?

Ill Bill - Well T-Ray had a label deal with Warner Brothers and he basically flew us out to Cali and started working with us. That's how we did the "CIA" remix. I've known T-Ray for years. I actually met T-Ray through Fatal.

ThaFormula.com - So what is T-Ray doing now man 'cause the track I heard you guys do was the first I had heard of him since the mid 90's?

Ill Bill - T-Ray produces rock groups. I know he's going to be getting into some stuff soon and we might be getting into some stuff soon. We might be doing some stuff with him but he's in the mix and lives in the studio. He's supposed to be sending me some beats actually.

ThaFormula.com - So getting back to what people should expect what is lined up for Uncle Howie?

Ill Bill - That first thing were dropping through our distribution deal is the Green DVD/CD which is coming April 6th. 2 Hours of interviews, live shows, videos and mad shit. Plus the Green CD is an hour of unreleased demos from the vaults plus some brand new shit as well.

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