RP:
Lately, you've talked a lot about jealousy.
Eazy-E:
Those may hate you, but when you hate them…you destroy yourself [he coughs for a while. After a moment, he puts a tape in the deck]. This is some of the producing that I've been doing. I was thinking this would be a good track for me and Ren.
RP:
You did this track? I didn't know you produced.
Eazy-E:
I did a lot of songs on N.W.A. All that old @#%$. I didn't want the credit because I'm the company, I'm an artist myself, I had a solo album before N.W.A. was out, and I'm in the group (coughs). I didn't want the credit because everyone has egos. I'm getting paid for being in a group and (for) owning the company and being a solo artist. Here's what Dre did. Say me and Ren would come up with a whole idea for a song. Dre was good at putting it together. So we might have an idea for a song, lay it down at home on a little four track or 12 track, and (then) Dre would put it together, him and DJ Yella.
RP:
Which N.W.A. tracks are you talking about in particular?
Eazy-E:
"Findum, ****em and Flee," "She Swallowed It"…me and Ren did a lot of stuff. "Approach to Danger"… a lot of them. I can't remember all of them. A lot of stuff, you could tell if you knew Dre [and] his style. He was in N.W.A., but Dre came from the Wrecking Crew, but I got him to do this other type of music I wanted to do, the gangsta @#%$, and I got Dre away from what he was doing. Ice Cube was from C.I.A. and the Stereo Crew, and if you knew their style, they were like the Beastie Boys. I put' em together, and we formed N.W.A., and they changed their style. And they started hollering Compton because that's where we were from: me, Ren, and Yella.
RP:
You want me to put this in here?
Eazy-E:
Yeah. Whether I had some fake people with me or not. But when Ice Cube split, he never hollered Compton no more. He started hollering "How to survive in South Central." You haven't heard him holler Compton no more. If you look back in the people's pasts and check their style, you'll where they really came from. Go back to their past and see what they were doing in the beginning. Dre, if you listen to his style of music from N.W.A. to now, it's totally different. Dre stole that style [G-funk] from Cold 187um, Rhythm D and a couple of other people he stole from. Dre stole stuff from that, Above The Law's, Black Mafia Life's "Never Missing a Beat." [He coughs twice, then three times] They're good songs.
RP:
So how old are you?
Eazy-E:
Young. [Coughing] Just young. Nobody knows how old.
RP:
People say you got the money together to finance Ruthless Records by selling drugs?
Eazy-E:
They can say whatever, but whatever it came from, they can't prove it.
RP:
What's up with you and Cube these days? Are you working with him on anything?
Eazy-E:
Me and Cube is cool. That's all I can say. We've sat down an' talked a couple of times. I've got nothing against him.
RP:
What do you think are some of the misconceptions people have about Ruthless Records?
Eazy-E:
Number one…that it's my company. I'm the sole owner. There's no investors, there's no partners. It's my company.
RP:
Looking at the number of successful Black-owned record companies and how you were one of the first to…
Eazy-E:
Even if they're Black-owned, they're being financed by someone else. There's a lot of companies, like Russell (Simmons), Andre Harrell's Uptown Records, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis's label. You had Motown…
RP:
Motown is not Black-owned.
Eazy-E:
It was at one time. I said, "You had Motown." (He laughs) Jermaine Dupris is doing something now. Yeah, I was one of them. Then everyone else who broke off from me, some of them is doing good.
RP:
Getting back to misconceptions…
Eazy-E:
I treat my artists real good. All that, "He @#%$ me"…then why am I still making money off them? If someone @#%$ me, they wouldn't be making a dime off me. Dre went out running his mouth off, and nothing he said was true. Everything was false. I still make money off him; I still got about five more years to go.
RP:
So what you're saying is that if you were ripping Dre off, that courts would have ruled on his side? The paperwork…
Eazy-E:
Yeah, contracts and everything, and I worked out a deal with Interscope. I give my artists fair deals. I start them off at 12 points, with escalation at every 500,000. In the publishing, a 50-50 split. Today, most people take 100% of the artist's publishing. I know a lot of people who have sold 4 million records and ain't even seen a million dollars. That ain't no record deal. Now I'm not trying to give out any big advances because that's recoupable. That's your own money. If you take a big advance, you'll have to pay that back (if you don't sell enough units).
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