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4/3/2006 How have you been since our last interview? We've really been promoting and we did what we wanted to do with "Institutionalized." It's important for me to touch the streets and reflect on what I've been through. "Institutionalized" showed the quirky nature of my personality. Now we have "Revenge of the Spit." Everybody always has mixtapes with their guns out and their so hood with it, but I'm like, "Whatever, I like 'Star Wars.'" We're going to keep it gangster, but I'm going to use a light-saber instead of a gun. I wanted to do this to let you know there are people out West doing big things. I got Dow Jones, who as far as I'm concerned is the hottest DJ on the West Coast, to put it together. We've been blessed with a lot of good response and feedback from it. You're the only one that could make Yoda seem gangster. (laughs) It came out dope! The light-saber is Xzibit's. George Lucas gave that to him. It's one of his toys at his house. Every time I'm over there, I fuck with it like, "I love this toy." My homegirl Tiffany wanted to take a picture of me with that with a mink on. X was laughing at the pictures, and I told him I was going to do a mixtape with that picture. You have to go to those Star Wars conventions to sell the tape. You know what, I should! I don't think I'd get permission. I don't think George Lucas would be fucking with me. I kind of did this under the radar. It's definitely a Hip Hop mixtape. There's a lot of spitting on there. If the Star Wars people wanted to fuck with it because they're Star Wars fans, great. I'd probably sell thirty-million of them. So you're not dressing up as Luke Skywalker? Nah. That's not going to happen. I love Star Wars, but I'm a normal dude. I was looking at the pictures of me and laughing. I don't give a fuck. I wanted to step outside of the conventional rap. The Hip Hop heads are so "keep it shell-toed Adidas," and the industry dudes talk about how many guns they have. I think they're both equally cliché. People identify with a group and then they look like them, and that shit is corny. I'm an individual. This mixtape is me expressing my individuality. What was your state-of-mind on "What If"? I don't know, to be honest. It was something that was kind of personal. You always think in life that "what if I did this?" and the causes and effects. I was thinking about how us as a people, or me specifically, how we would react to different things. It had to be dope working with G. Rap. Oh yeah. I've always been a fan. That was a blessing. He showed me so much love. I reached out to him and he reached right back. That was peace right there. You and Royce seem to have great chemistry. Have you ever thought about doing a project with him? That's my homie. We get along real well. I respect him as a person and as an MC. I respect him on some real shit and we go at it. It's like two homeboys boxing against each other. How did your track with GZA come about for the "Think Differently" album? Dreddy Kruger's my man. I had met GZA a couple of times. I don't know him as well as Killah Priest. Priest is my friend-friend. He just reached out to me and he said he would like for me to do this project with GZA. I said, "Of course." He's one of the greatest lyricists ever. He sent me two beats. I did the wrong beat first. (laughs) That was his fault. Then I went back and did the other one. It was cool for me because I laid my vocals and I never got to hear what GZA put on it until the finish. I like doing songs like that. I like doing whatever the beat tells me to feel and letting them put it together to see how it gels. Out of all the members of Wu Tang, do you feel like GZA would be your best fit to work with? GZA's definitely, in my opinion, the lyricist out of the Wu. I fuck with everybody in the Wu. I think they're an incredibly talented team. Me and RZA did a song together with Easy Mo Bee and it came out crazy. I think I would work well with anybody's that dope because we all offer different facets. It just depends on picking the right song and direction for a particular record. Alchemist did a drop for your tape. What's going on with you and Al? We officially buried the hatchet. I was supposed to get with Al this week. We're about to start working ASAP. How did that happen? I definitely want to say that Chace Infinite helped mend that, and Dilated Peoples helped mend that, and Shade45 and Al helped. Al continued to reach out and I was stubborn, but I had to grow up and get over it and move on and try to do something constructive. Me being stubborn and everyone else pushing us got us together. We're both West Coast dudes and we have to try to support each other. You haven't been in a lot of beefs throughout your career. Why is that? Let me try to say this without being arrogant. No rapper has ever wanted beef with me. On some street shit, we're all about even. On the mic, it's unfair. I'm the big bully. I think that's the big part about why I never had beef. Biggie Smalls was like, "More money, more problems." When I sell three-million records, I'm sure someone will try to take a potshot because they're haters. Then they'd win based on the attention they'd get from the beef. I think it also has something to do with my personality. I'm a cool dude. I say what I do and I do what I say and my music reflects who I am. You don't meet another motherfucker after hearing my music. A lot of artists are like that. They're not who they say they are. I'm able to get along with people because I am who I say I am. Do you ever worry about your humor going over people's heads? A lot of times, it does. I think that's the cool thing about my music. Some people have told me it's a hindrance. You can pop my music in and get something different on the tenth time you hear my song. Or it can be a year later and you'll pick up something. It's like a grab bag. You get something different each time you reach into it. It's entertaining, and at the end of the day, that's the reason why I make my music. One comment from our last interview said, "I find it hard to listen to new Ras Kass music. I find it to be lacking the substance his earlier music had." How do you respond to that? If you can't get with it, don't get with it. You can't please everybody. I know my track record…first of all, after "Nature of the Threat," I should never have to say anything substantial again. So anybody that has anything to say, you can suck my dick. I'm not angry. I'm just saying, "Suck my dick." Nobody did that kind of research. Do you know how much time it took to research that shit? Fuck them. I'm not here to make "Nature of the Threat" parts two, three, four, ten, because that would be corny. I said at the beginning of my career that I'm Descartes' "Duality of Man." They didn't even catch that, but they expect me to always say some pseudo-political shit. They don't even know what politics are. Descartes' "Duality of Man" is talking about your high and low nature. You talk about when you're mad, you're sad, you're happy, you want to fuck bitches, you want to smoke cigarettes but you can get cancer, and you want to have unprotected sex but there's AIDS out there. Whatever. I talk about everything. If you try to criticize me for being honest, that makes you the idiot. I don't go to sleep at night feeling bad. If you think I'm going to sit around wearing African medallions and saying, "Fuck George Bush" all day, then you're out of your fucking mind. I don't sit around all day thinking that. I do think about it, and I'll put it in a rap and keep it moving and talk about some other shit. You mention R.Kelly in some songs and also that you only mess with girls twenty-one and up. How do you feel about pedophiles? I'm not trying to single anyone out, but I'm not with that. There's too many grown women on the planet. Step your game up. If you can't get a grown women and you have to get little girls, you're weak. How do you feel about the way the media is covering Busta Rhymes' shooting? To be honest with you, I haven't been following that. All I can say is "God bless the dead." I wish Busta the best and my heart goes out to everybody, especially the wife and mother of the man that was slain. How do you feel about the "Stop Snitching" movement? I'm from LA and you don't tell. I've gone to jail for my homeboys. We have to protect ourselves. The code of the streets say that you don't tell. I don't tell. Fuck that. What new artists are you feeling out West? There are so many talented dudes. Of course I'm pushing for my team. I want to see my team do their thing. The artists that Re-Up entertainment will eventually have. Look out for 40 Glocc, who's Infamous/G-Unit. Spider Loc who's coming out on G-Unit. Xzibit and Strong Arm Steady, my cousin Bleu da Vinci…look for us. Are you looking to sign artists? I have to help myself before I can be a vehicle for someone else. There is definitely a lot of talent that hasn't had an outlet to be heard because our industry is kind of monopolized on the West Coast. What are you learning about developing artists? For most people, either you have the natural talent or you don't. I was only going to take directions from somebody I trusted, and I can only take it to the point where I'm comfortable. Eminem was not the same artist, he was the same rapper, but he wasn't the same artist he was after he went to Aftermath. He had to be around someone he trusted to change. If being Marshall Mathers got him that far, it can be hard to see why you should change since you got signed for being yourself. I don't want to have an artist come in and then we treat them like shit. We have to respect each other. They'd have to listen to my suggestions and try it. If it's trash, we don't do it. Is the Four Horsemen project any closer to coming out? I have to handle my business. Xzibit said it the best. He said, "Handle your business before your business handles you." I had to get rid of the situation I was in and we're almost at the end of that. We're going to do the Golden State Project and the Horsemen. There's a solo Ras Kass that's thirsty, begging to come out. The sky's the limit after that. What's Saafir been up to? He's just now starting to rhyme again. For awhile he was just getting his spirit together. I don't want to say what his religion is because he may not want me to. He felt it wasn't his calling to be an MC anymore, but now he's coming back because he feels he wants to. What is your label situation right now? We go to court and pray for me that this will be the last one. It appears that we're going to amicably be parting ways. That's all I really wanted. That really shows what kind of character Capitol Records has, that they would force me to go this far with it and for so long when they never did right for me. I wish I had a bigger outlet. I would just ask people not to buy their records, period. The way they treat their urban artists is slavery. Who do you blame for that happening? The label or the artists that keep signing deals? It's a two-way street. I knew it was dangerous when I took it, but I didn't know how dangerous it was. I definitely picked one of the harder places to get something accomplished. I don't cry about it. These labels don't give urban artists the same value they give their rock artists or their pop artists. It may be subconscious, but it's racism. They treat us bad and they treat white artists good because it could be their son or daughter. We're something different to them and we could be car-jacking them, so they think they're doing us a favor. Will urban artists be treated better? It's already happening. That's why Jay-Z did some of the things he did because of what happened to the Cold Crush. Think about jazz music in the '40's when we couldn't even put our faces on the album. Slowly but surely, we're making millionaires every year off of our talent, but a lot of great talent is broke. At least we're getting a little bit of our forty acres and mule. How's Killah Priest's "The Offering" sounding so far? It's sounding crazy. He has a song with Nas that's crazy. We have a Four Horsemen song on there too. Priest is definitely very underrated and a very smart dude. Are you happy with how "Institutionalized" did? Yeah. I'm not trying to put it in Tower Records. It was for the streets. I don't want a plaque for that. "Institutionalized" was for people that supported me and for my friends and family that kept my head up when I was in that hellhole. I'm happy with that. I'm doing "Institutionalized: Volume Two." We'll let "Revenge of the Spit" do what it does, and soon we should be going into the next project. I'm very optimistic. It's going to be a beautiful thing. What else are you working on? The main thing, my biggest project after all that, is helping Xzibit with his next project. Who else do you want to work with now? It'd be disrespectful to make a list because there are so many. I've been fortunate because I've been able to work with some of the greatest. I just want the opportunity to work with any and everybody. I don't care what you sold, even if you sold one because you had to buy your own record. If it's dope, let's work. What do you want to say to all your fans? Thanks for supporting. I appreciate all the love and I'm trying to give it back with the music. If you can get with it, get with it. If you can't, I'm not mad at you. Aside from that, catch me on MySpace and RasKass-Central.com. Make friends with Ras Kass at http://myspace.com/raskass

By Brian Kayser

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