FOR THIRSTY LISTENERS, THE “SECOND ROUND” IS ON OBIE TRICE
By Khalid J. Strickland a.k.a. Dirty Angel
You’ll still be able to drive home after this “Second Round”
In December of 2005, however, Obie was shot twice while driving on the Lodge Expressway in his hometown of Detroit. One of the bullets remains embedded in Obie’s head to this very day. At this time, no suspects have been brought to justice and the Detroit police, who are without a concise motive, are stumped. Obie Trice narrowly escaped meeting his maker, but the misfortune didn’t end there. In April of 2006, Trice’s good friend and label-mate, rapper Proof of D-12, was shot dead in a Detroit nightclub. Trice later made a moving speech at Proof’s funeral, where he addressed the catastrophe of black-on-black violence, lamenting, “I want to talk to the black men in here that’s coming up in the ‘hood, coming up in the struggle. We’re killing each other, dog. And it’s about nothing. We’re all dying over nothing.”
The tragedies of being shot and losing a comrade didn’t stop Obie Trice and Interscope Records from releasing his sophomore album, “Second Round’s On Me”, on August 15th, 2006. Apparently, these painful incidents have bestowed Obie even more vigor and resolve. In a recent interview with Insomnaic, Obie Trice spoke on subjects including his eagerly-awaited “Second Round” to the attempt on his life.
Obie Trice: This album shows a lot of growth. I’m doing a lot of different things on this album lyrically that I didn’t do on “Cheers”; a lot of different topics from “Cheers”, na’mean? And I’m a couple of years older so (“Second Round”) shows a lot of different things socially. (“Second Round”) has conscience messages in it. It’s just a different album.
Angel: The last joint on this new album, “Obie’s Story”, that s**t is hot, man. I like how the beat changed up. The beat gets stronger and changes up as it goes on. How did you come up with that? Were your verses written to the beat, or did you just go in and zone-out?
Obie: It was basically a zone-out thing. J.R. Wrotem, the producer of that song, was in the studio playing a piano. Riggs Morales, who works for Shady, he was like, “Yo, we should make a never-ending song… a different beat change-up type of joint”. So (J.R.) got on the piano, and all of that (on “Obie’s Story”) is live piano playing. I was just formulating the lyrics in the top of my head, and that’s how we did that song. For this album I didn’t write anything on paper. It’s a whole different type of album from “Cheers”. “Cheers” is more structured as far as lyrical content, because it was written on paper. (“Second Round”) is a little more spontaneous because I would think of eight lines off the top of my head and think of my next eight lines and piece it together like that. None of this album was written on paper.
Angel: That’s tight. So as a lyricist, because you have a lot of depth and substance in your rhymes, do you feel that lyricism has been lost in the current rap music?
Obie: I think it’s definitely not a lyrical game right now. It’s a more “hooky” game. The hook is what everything is based off of. What the listeners are grabbing hold to is something simple… a hook. That’s what’s going on. But I’m not mad at the state of Hip-Hop at this time. I think that it’s evolving and I think it’s growing and I hope it continues to grow. You get a group like Three-Six Mafia winning an Oscar, I think that’s incredible. I think there’s no roof on Hip-Hop music. It’s forever growing and I’m just glad to be part of it.
Angel: You have another tight joint called “Snitch”. I’m anti-snitchin’ myself. Do you believe that there’s a difference between a witness and a snitch?
Obie: Yeah, I think there’s a major difference between a witness and a snitch. A witness has not indulged in the illegal activity that went on. A snitch is involved in it. He’s a part of it. He’s been getting illegal monetary gain off of it with whoever he snitched on. He knows the ins and outs of it and he decides to give information to the law. So I think it’s total difference between a witness and a snitch. MTV and a lot of (other) people thinking I was saying snitch in the wrong aspect. They didn’t want to back it and didn’t want to get involved in anything that has to do with snitchin’ ‘cause they feel like the kids is confusing snitch with just being a witness.
Angel: Speaking of witnesses, in regards to the (shooting) incident that happened with you, have there been any witnesses stepping forward to offer any information to you?
Obie: Nah, the freeway was a little empty. There were a few cars, I remember. But it wasn’t crowded. I think somebody came forth and said something; a lady; but she really didn’t have enough information to find out who did it. It’s just one of them things, y’know? I was hoping the streets would talk by the end of the summer, but that didn’t happen. It’ll all come through though. They’ve been very quiet.
Angel: Do you think the anti-snitchin’ sentiment, or the people who get things confused, has something to do with people not speaking on that incident?
Obie: Some people want to be anonymous, some people come forth. It depends on the individual and what they have experienced and how they’ve experienced life. Some people don’t want to get involved. Some people don’t want to get pinpointed as the witness of a crime. It’s just one of them things, you got people who do it; you’ve got people who don’t.
Angel: Has your incident, and the incident that happened with Proof as well, changed your perspective on coming back to the hood at all? There are some artists and celebs who never really come back at all, because they fear incidents like that happen.
Obie: Well, my incident didn’t happen in my hood. I’m always in my hood, that’s where you’ll find me a lot. I don’t stay in the hood, but I’m always visiting my hood. The incident happened on the highway leaving downtown Detroit. But I’m welcome in my hood. I always come back and chill and kick it with my folks. I’m just like that; that’s just the way I’m built as a person. I stay very, very far from the hood but I’m there, though, quite often.
Angel: A lot of artists nowadays have hustles outside of the music. They got clothing lines or they got liquor or whatever. Do you have any hustle outside of the music?
Obie: Me and my family, we’re into real estate, so we’re doing real estate real tough. I’m trying to get a clothing line put together right now. I have this guy I’m really working with, my man Nino. (We’re) trying to get some proposals together and get the clothing line going on. But really, it’s about this music and getting this album, “Second Round’s On Me”, to where it should be. It didn’t have a good first week and that’s due to albums not being promoted. I don’t think the promotion on it was tough enough and I think it could’ve been promoted better. It was also pushed back, and I think that causes a problem. (I did) 75,000 the first week. “Cheers”, my first album, did 255 (thousand) the first week. So I know times are changing and the economy is different right now, but I just want to push this album and really get this album looked at like it should be. I’ve got a whole lot of faith in it; instead of just dropping the project and moving on to the third album. We’ve really got to push this album.
Angel: Do you have any feelings on people downloading music and the way things are with the computer nowadays? People can just jump on the internet and snatch up songs if they feel like it. Some artists are all for that. A person like Chuck D says that’s a good thing. A brother like Ghostface said he ain’t really with that. Any thoughts?
Obie: I mean, if you’re paying for it (it’s okay). You should be able to pay for it ‘cause this is hard work. A lot of people be getting it confused and think that (music) is easy. This is not an easy job at all. You want to be compensated for your music and with piracy that’s not happening. They’ve got it on some places where you can get songs for $1.99 or whatever the case may be. At least you pay for that artist, pay for that music and let that artist get what he deserves. And on the flip-side, if I wasn’t an artist, I would still go out and buy an artist’s record. I want the real record. I don’t want bootleg; I can’t stand bootleg movies. It’s just not quality. I want my thing to be quality. If I had a female buy me the CD or hustled up a few dollars or whatever, I’d take the time out and buy an artist’s CD. I’ve always been like that.
Angel: Do you feel that if you weren’t on a label as large as Interscope with so many huge artists, you’d do more numbers? Don’t get me wrong, platinum is nothing to sneeze at, I’m not saying you ain’t doing numbers. But you said things weren’t promoted right, so do you think that being around so many huge artists affect your project?
Obie: Yeah, I have thought about that before. That’s been something I have considered and thought of. I’ve even thought of where I’d go to; what label I would represent. At the same time, Shady Records is my family. Eminem is my family, that’s my people. D-12, that’s my people. So it’s like, for me to leave right when we’re getting started…. I do feel a little anxious sometimes; there are a lot of artists on Interscope and there’s a lot of people who are in better positions than I am, as far as record sales. At times, a label can look at that and say, “we’ll just do Obie’s project half-a** because he’s going to do his numbers”, instead of giving me that extra-strong push that I feel I deserve; (in order) to make that transition from just a mediocre-selling artist, a platinum-plus artist, to selling a great deal of records. I just think I need to be heard and seen more. You know, a lot of these deejays have an attitude with Eminem. They feel like they broke his records and made him who he is today, and that he doesn’t come back and see the core deejays and things like that. So they put these types of problems on me. It’s a political game. I’m just trying to let these people know I’m not Eminem, dude. That’s (his) situation. But since we are a team and on the same level people associate us to that degree. They’re like, “I’m not playing an Eminem record, so I’m definitely not an Obie Trice record. Eminem don’t know how to come back and holler at us.” And they associate me with that. So there’s a lot of different political things me as an artist have to deal with, and that’s just how it is.
Angel: You’ve been all over the place on tours and such. Do you feel that in other parts of the world Hip-Hop receives more respect? Is there a difference in the way people treat Hip-Hop culture as whole in other places as opposed to here in The States?
Obie: As far as shows and record sales, we just get a lot of music. We get artists coming to town every other week. Every other week somebody’s coming to town to do a show. So, we’re spoiled to the music. These people overseas and different places like that don’t get artists going there as much as the United States. So of course they appreciate the culture a little more than we do.
For more information on Obie Trice and “Second Round’s On Me”, visit www.myspace.com/obietrice.
For more stories and work by Khalid Strickland a.k.a. Dirty Angel, visit http://www.supremearsenal.com/ and www.myspace.com/blackpacino.
