Matas
In terms of rap history, you're some-
times credited with originating the style
they call horrorcore. How do you feel
about that?
Well, first of all, it's not called horrorcore;
that's just a label they put on it. When we
made it, we called it acid rap, because when
you take acid you go on a trip and different
people see different things because of their
chemical make-up.
Tell me about the new album Wicket
World Wide.COM; what makes it different
from what you've done in the past?
Now, instead of just talking to America,
we're talking to the world. It's like the
Internet, where everything is public. We're
hittin' all sides of the game-the ghetto, Wall
Street. Anywhere people listen to music is
where we're trying to take it.
I was trippin' off the idea of the
Internet bringing anybody's culture into
anyone else's backyard.
Exactly. And anybody can punch up to it,
and that's what the album's all about.
The cover of the album is a medieval
painting; how did that come about?
It's like a relic, an artifact, and we've been
bringing new styles to the game. Everything
we do has to distinguish us and keep us
ahead of time and space and others. When
we first saw that picture, we knew it should.
go on the cover, because it fit the whole
project so perfectly. And it fit everybody,
because everybody listens to hip-hop and
there are all different colors of people in the
world, so there are all different colors of
people on the album cover.
You've had a reputation for dealing
with subject matter that is shocking,
but it seems like what was once
shocking is now commonplace.
People are becoming desensitized.
Do you think that's dangerous?
No, America is the only country that is like
that. In Europe they're cussing on prime time
TV. America is just parental. But the people
who listen to our music are adults, able to
make an intelligent decisions on their own. I
don't see a problem with expressing myself
the way I do, and we do it with a little class.
We've got too much class to just drag on with
certain topics and run them into the mud. We
always bring something new to the game.
VER the course of the last nine years, NATAS, or Nation
sold more records of hardcore rap than any other artist you've
never heard of. With 12 albums and 5 EPs, Esham, Mastamind,
and TNT are no strangers to the rap game, and with their latest
album, Wicket World Wide.COM, they plan to take their brand of
Detroit-based hip-hop gangsta shit to the next level.
The name NATAS obviously spells Satan
backwards, and I know you've caught
some flack for that. Do you have any
connection to Satanism? Do you listen
to death metal or anything like that?
Well, coming up in Detroit, because Detroit
is a rock 'n' roll capital, we've listened to all
kinds of rock 'n' roll music and experienced
the culture front and center stage. On the
NATAS thing, you'd have to be dyslexic to
look at it and see Satan. You don't look at the
word "live" and have it become "evil" every
time someone plays it in concert. We don't
live our life backwards. We live our life for-
wards, and for us it's "a Nation Ahead of
Time And Space." It's not Satan to us.
You've been a big influence on other big
name Detroit rappers like Eminem, Kid
Rock, and Insane Clown Posse; do you
If you could have a posse cut with any
five rappers from any time, who would
you have on your song?
Mastamind: Ice Cube, because he was
major influence, NWA and all that, and all the
hardcore rappers.
TNT: Eazy E, Kool G Rap, E-40, Brother
Marquis from the 2Live Crew, and my man
Ice-T for being so gangsta, baby.
Esham: Too Short, and then Tupac and
Biggie, and Grand Poobah from Brand
Nubian, and for my last one, to bring the
heat, Lil' Kim. She ain't gotta do nothing
but moan on the hook. But wait, I got one
more special invited guest: Brad Jordan
Mr Scarface of the Geto Boys.
"You don't look at the word
'live' and have it become
ever look at their success and feel like it 'evil' every time someone plays
should be you up there on MTV?
it in concert"
No, not at all. What we represent is
Detroit. The city of Detroit has the largest
population of black people in America, so
that's where we're coming from. All those
groups you've just named, you can see what
side of the fence they're playing on. And
why would we even be jealous of those
guys? Everybody has their time. To even go
deeper than that, we worked with all of
them before they hit stardom. Plus, you
know we've influenced them, so those who
need to know know. The truth shall come to
the light. It's all good.
Are you stressing getting on a major
label and blowing up like that?
If it happens, it happens. Nobody can pre-
dict the future. If you could you'd be out
there with Dionne Warwick. But it's going to
stay underground, no matter how big it
gets. We're not going to come to the
surface; it's going to come to us.
That's not what we're shoot-
ing for, or what we've
ever been shooting
for. We're just
making music,
and if we can
bring them to
world.
that's cool.
our
And finally, since this is a skate mag,
have to ask if you know about the
skater named Natas?
Oh yeah, that's our homeboy. Big ups to
Natas. Skating was part of our influence too
Our whole thing was partly from the whole
skateboard/thrash life; that why it's kind of
hard like that. We've been influenced by all
the extreme sports, bicycling and all that.
things that don't have anything to do with
rapping. We know Tony Hawk, but Tony
Hawk is more the glitterboy of skating. We're
more like the gritty, underground skaters. We
wanna give big ups to all the underground
skaters. True 54
LIIN
PLAYING GAMES
IS NOT A CRIME
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