Grammy award winning & Platinum selling MC Chamillionaire needs no introduction. But when we talk about the term ‘Underrated Rapper’, Chamillionaire is one name which comes to our minds. The Texas rapper has been out of the limelight since a couple of years mainly due to issues with his label Universal Records. But he’s right back on the scene now with his Playlist Poison releases and has immediately grabbed the attention of the Hip Hop world, again.
Now Cham chats with us about his game plan on releasing music in the near future, what exactly he intends to do with Playlist Posion & Major Pain projects, working with other artists, present equation with 50 Cent, his top 5 dead or alive and of course Prince vs. Michael Jackson.
HHNM: Thank you so much for taking out your valuable time for us. Although we try to be as unbiased as possible on Hip Hop N More, you clearly are one of the most liked artists on the blog.
Chamillionaire: Fasho. I appreciate the people that appreciate me.
HHNM: We all know the story now: You are off Universal Records and the ‘Venom’ album is not coming out. In brief, tell us what the future holds for Chamillionaire from now on?
Chamillionaire: People should just expect more material and higher quality material from me. The majors work hard to water down music because that’s what they believe sells. I’m just trying to release music that I honestly think is dope and a lot of it. I’ll be releasing a free download Major Pain 1.5 Mixtape on April 18th and a Major Pain 2 project after that. I’m gonna announce the details about The Playlist Poison album I’m working on later.
HHNM: The Playlist Poison releases have earned good praise from the fans and it’s nice to see a veteran like you working with new artists such as Nipsey Hussle and Big K.R.I.T. Can we expect more collaborations with other freshmen in the future?
Chamillionaire: Yea I have records with some cool artists who I respect musically sitting in my hard drive that are waiting to be released, but I don’t put too much thought into the feature until I’m in the moment. I like to work with people who I respect musically but who also fit the picture I’m trying to paint. Sometimes inspiration will lead you in places you don’t expect. I just feel blessed to have the respect of my peers and to be able to call up people and get them on records. A lot of times that’s not the easiest task when you’re dealing with rappers.
HHNM: You revealed the artwork for the next edition of ‘Major Pain’ during your recent UStream session. Is it going to be another individual mixtape, or a series like ‘Mixtape Messiah’? What exactly can we expect?
Chamillionaire: Major Pain 1.5 will be a traditional mixtape and the Playlist Poison album I’m gonna release later will be more of a full album. The Major Pain series will keep going and I plan to release a bunch of them. I get excited about the process of trying to build new brands and with mixtapes I have been successful in that process a lot of times. I’m not really about trying to explain to people what they can expect. After enough quality music is released I believe the people who have confidence in your brand as an artist will seek anything you put out.
HHNM: Sounds like a plan. Now that you can’t use ‘Venom’, have you picked an alternative title for your forthcoming album yet? And do you have a time frame in mind when you would want to put it out?
Chamillionaire: No. I don’t have one other than the Playlist Poison album I’m gonna release. I’ll treat that like a proper release and build up to it. So far that one is coming out really dope in my opinion but I’m still pretty early in the process. If any fans have any doubt about the Playlist Poison album I’m gonna release later then just pay attention to all the Playlist Poison records I’m leaking from Chamillionaire.com. When I get enough of them released then I’m sure you will see that I’m in a zone. I think I know what fans want to hear from me and Im glad I don’t have any “I know what’s hot” label execs telling me what to create. They really know how to blow an artistic high. The people that pay attention to what most artists say about their record labels understand what I mean.
HHNM: Definitely. So you recently posted a picture on Facebook of you hanging out with 50 Cent at a Vegas club. Keeping your past not-so-warm relationship with him in mind, what’s the situation like in 2011? As fans, we would like to hear you two on a track together..
Chamillionaire: I have never had any real issues with 50. I think maybe fans and some media tried to make a big deal out of comments he made but I never saw what the big deal was. In person 50 has always been cool. He sat in front of me at the VMAs one time and told me I was gonna win before I did. When I was in New York one time he showed me around his G-Unit offices and I even met his son. I don’t think he would have ever done anything like that if he ever had a real problem with me. We cool but what you saw was just a picture of us hanging out in Vegas. That’s just about it. I went back to my world after that night.
HHNM: Okay. Can you give us your Top 5 rappers, dead or alive? Doesn’t have to be in order.
Chamillionaire: The usual suspects. Pac. Jay-Z. Eminem. Andre 3000. I gotta count UGK as one person. That would probably be my list. Scarface, Nas & Weezy would probably come somewhere next on that list. I know this always debated and people always argue over this stuff but the people I pick are all OG’s in the game and are legends to me. I feel like you can’t be considered the greatest of all time if you haven’t spent a lot of time being on top of the rap game. I like Biggie also and his lyrical ability and wordplay was always ill to me. The only reason I wouldn’t rank him as high is because the subject matter of a lot of his music was kinda dark for me at the time. Death and murder always seemed to be a prominent topic when I would listen to his songs but I could never deny that he was one of the greatest. Unfortunately he didn’t get to live long enough to complete his musical catalog.
HHNM: One last question and this is something we ask everybody we chat with here at Hip Hop N More: Prince or Michael Jackson and why?
Chamillionaire: Michael Jackson because he’s the king of all music. In the world. Period.
Visit Chamillionaire.com | Chamillionaire on Facebook | On Twitter