South Deuce stoop, Brooklyn, NY
Friday, July 11, 2003
Interview by Jackie Marinese
Illustration by Adam Walko
Although his first full-length album just came out, don’t get
it twisted, C Rayz Walz is no rookie to the hip-hop game. This master
of metaphoric freestyles has been creeping in the underground for years,
putting out singles and blowin’ up open mics throughout NYC.
C Rayz’s album entitled Ravipops, named for his new
son Ravi was released last July on NYC’s indie hip-hop label Definitive
Jux. This debut project is a testament of a man making strides both
as an MC and as a father. In the song “Protect My family”
he talks about the change in his life since the birth of his son. In
“’86” he reminisces about his life within that year
in hip-hop history and how it impacted him. In “We Live”
he tells a piece of his own story of struggle and talks about the murder
of a close friend.
The content of his rhymes go to far reaching extremes and range from
the somber stories of his days of hustling on the streets of NYC to
some straight up silly and off the wall plays on words. In person, C
Rayz Walz comes off with an equivalent, mystic personal style. A true
artist, his mind doesn’t work in a linear dimension, and as he
speaks he goes in and out of character like an actor who’s practicing
a monologue and he also tends to throw rhymes effortlessly into regular
prose. I caught up with C Rayz in Brooklyn to talk about his new album,
where he comes from, and where he’s going; both physically and
spiritually.
Where does the name C Rayz Walz come from?
Just life experience. I think when people tend to stray away from the
regular ideals and concepts of society, they’re automatically
considered crazy. Growin’ up I always strayed and I always asked
a lot of questions and saw things for what they really were, so early
on people started calling me crazy. Initially when I first had my locks
in like ’92/ ’93 I started rappin’ a little bit and
I had a rap name called The Crazy Dread. I was just playing with the
words a bit. Then this one girl I had, wifey, used to say, “You
c-ray-z,” and I was like, “Oh that’s an ill ebonics
split up of the word crazy.” Walz was a nickname, so I just put
it all together.
You have your own meaning too though, as far as what each
element of your name means, right?
As my career goes on and as life goes on, I keep maturing into the meaning
of it. ‘C’ is the best part, it’s the third eye, the
child, and understanding things for what they are, not for what they
appear to be. ‘Rayz’ is the math term, the arrow extending
infinite. Where I’m going is infinite, my potentials are infinite
and nothing can stop that. Rayz is also the energy of the sun. I’m
emanating the truth and the light and shedding it on a dark culture
in a dark world where people want to be regular. Walz is walls are all
around you. Whether be it in your apartment, jail, work or studio, you
gotta break down those barriers of self-hatred, injustice, prejudice,
low self-esteem, ego, all those things that are gonna stop from really
unveiling your path and getting it on. So that’s the whole C Rayz
Walz story which means understanding life and breaking the barriers.
I’m just really a reflection of everybody who wants to be uninhibited
and themselves but are scared. Really C Rayz Walz is just that cat in
the mirror, I’m no one.
There seems to be political content in some of your rhymes.
Where in your life does that drive to rhyme about those topics stem
from?
That’s real because “The Substance”, the subtitle
of the album, is all a part of me from the earliest I can remember.
My pops got murdered when I was still young, so my mother was a single
black mother. She had a lot of knowledge. She used to hold discussions
around the house and always tried to have positive males around me.
She never had no boyfriends around the house that I ever saw, but she
always had positive role models around me. They’d be in there
talking about things that were going on like with Maurice Bishop and
she’d always have WBAI [99.5 FM, NYC public radio] on. Politics
were always around me so all that plays a part into it. As punishment,
I was forced to read books like 2000 Seasons and Manchild in the Promise
Land. Life is politics anyway and it’s gonna come out in my music
cause it’s gonna come out in my conversation.
So your parents were both Muslim?
Yes, but my pops got killed cause he was a Muslim turned drug dealer.
He was basically in my situation where I am, at this exact time. He
said, “Yo I’m gonna be a drug king pin.” He had a
good run, but all things come to an end.
There have been a number of artists coming out in hip-hop
and talking about organizing politically. What is your take on the state
of the hip-hop community’s ability to organize together on a social
and political platform?
I think especially in New York everybody’s on some piranha shit.
That’s why I love Nas when he said, “ Hungry ass hooligans
stay on that piranha shit.” Cats don’t have that love in
they self first of all. When you got a thousand MCs in the crowd looking
at you and you nice, they still judging ‘cause you better than
them. For that minute just be a fan and forget you an MC. Its like in
the revolution, a lot of people don these outfits and the red black
and green wristbands and shit. They talk all of that shit, but probably
still got old issues going on in their own houses. You and your brother
ain’t speaking three years. How you gonna be my comrade, and we
strangers? Dead Prez is the most real example of that that I see, ‘cause
they really live they politcs, they really active in it. I think a lot
of artists just come out and use it as a platform to be different or
because they can’t kick no shit as fly as Jay-Z. I could kick
some shit on Jay-Z’s level and mash him out of the game. But that’s
not the image I want to promote ‘cause I know what that does to
the youth and the community. You gotta overthrow the government in yourself
first. So before you topple the system, topple that bullshit that you
on. Be real, say what you really mean and feel when you really feel
it. Then we’ll make progress on a whole. And hip-hop , that’s
just a sub genre of life that’s gonna keep evolving. That shit
don’t even matter. Fuck hip-hop.
What do you mean by that?
I got a real phobia with names. Even naming an album. All that shit
is really to distract you. I love hip-hop and it’s a dope name
and that’s what it’s been, but like, yo, it’s either
a part of you or it’s not. So be honest. I would never shit on
hip-hop. I love the word, so personally I’m cool with that label
but it’s a bunch of labels that gotta go away cause it’s
just bullshit.
How important do you think it is that MC’s be responsible
about their lyricism?
I think it’s real important for them to be responsible because
these albums are the new Bibles. When cats is putting out this shit
that’s fake, they know it’s wrong. They feel it in their
stomachs. They’re like, “This is a lie. I can’t play
this shit for my moms. I can’t play this for my children. I don’t
want them listening to this. I’m gonna do it to get this money.”
I know it sounds corny and cliché, but that removes your soul.
So being that these shits is Bibles, I’d like to make my Bible
real so that when my son reads it or anybody reads it, they can get
a sense of the times; where we was out, what we was doing. Then I’m
connecting it to real life.
You talk a lot about spirituality. How does that figure into
your music and your life?
I believe that spirit is energy and the energy is just traveling in
an unseen form. You can’t see your intuitive form, but you can
feel it. When I got shot, something was like, “Yo don’t
go around the corner dog,” but I didn’t listen to my mind
and it was like “Boom, boom, shot, shot, shot!” The other
time I got shot the shit was like, “Yo, stop arguing with this
girl and go in the house. If she wants to stay here, fine. If she wants
to follow me, fine. But it’s like 12 o’clock. We’re
outside arguing. It’s loud. Chill.” I didn’t listen
to my intuition and somebody came from the window and was like, “Pop!”
I had to stay in the hospital for a week for the first one. The second
one went straight through my leg.
How did you get involved with Def Jux?
Def Jux is family. Canibal Ox and me go way back. Just ciphers. I was
on Ox’s album, Aesop Rock’s album and El-P’s album.
Me and El-P have been friends for years. My music didn’t have
any real direction before. I was putting out singles. It was song for
song to pay my rent. In 2002 I think I dropped like eight singles. El-P
stepped to me in September of last year and was like, “Yo we gotta
make something happen.” That’s why now C Rayz is trying
to be the best father I could be to my son and give him good support.
Now I’m trying to become Ravipops. I was a man before, but now
I’m somebody’s father. I was wild running around, and I
gotta be there to support my son. I can’t be doin’ no singles.
I’m growing with it. I’m still growing.
There seems to be some repetition of themes in hip-hop these
days. What would you say are some experiences you’ve had that
make your story a unique one?
There’s a couple. You know I used to be a stick up kid. I used
to love doing it. I had a good run. Towards the end of my career, me
and my OGs was gonna hit an armored truck, but you gotta kill armored
guards to do that ‘cause they got guns, so there’s no other
way to get them unless somebody that’s working with them tips
you off. If you live after robbing an armored truck, that means you’re
working for them or you’re gonna get caught up on some crazy shit.
You gotta bust, you gotta shoot. You have to murder them. I didn’t
want to kill nobody. I was feeling spiritual and I don’t know
why. I went to my aunt who deals with the spooks and spirits and said,
“I’m about to rob this armored truck yo. There’s some
real cake and we got the plan and we got everything ready.” She
goes, “Yeah you all ready? You got it?” She’s gangsta
like that. I can’t tell my mother that, but my aunt gangsta like
that. She was like, “Yo but it’s near the date of your father’s
murder.” I was like, “Word?” We had planned to do
it on the week prior to the year mark of his death. I was feeling like
if I did that shit that I was gonna get murdered or I was gonna be doing
life. I was like “Nah, I ain’t killing no one.”
So how’d you call it off?
I just told them. I was the main man since they had both already done
like ten years. If they got caught, they would go back for life, so
they left me in charge of the poppin’ off. I told them that I
went to my aunt, what she said, and that I had decided to do this rap
shit. They knew my pops was a gangsta for real and that I had to get
out of the game. I was robbin’ big shit when I was fifteen. Like
stores. Not like bodegas in the hood, but chain stores.
You ever get caught?
No I never got caught because the angels was with me. And I never had
to shoot nobody either, everybody cooperated. It was all places where
I didn’t really hurt nobody. Soon, like two weeks after that,
my man got locked up for five years. Also earlier that year my man Dougie
got murdered. On the same night I had to do a show I found out. That
was a turning point for me.
If you weren’t rhyming, what other type of art do you
think you’d be doing now?
I’d be painting, I’d be a visualist. I studied architecture
when I was young so –
Didn’t you go to the High School of Art and Design in
Manhattan?
Yeah it only lasted a year though, a year of terrorism. The entrance
test is ill. They do shit like give you a page with two solid black
horizontal lines and you gotta make a picture out of it. So I made a
dude with a polo shirt slinging a gun. I tried to give niggas signs.
I made a double cheeseburger with a roach in the middle, with worm lettuce.
I got in that shit though. For the first three months I was focused.
Then I met one of my brothers and we started robbin’ the whole
school. Prodigy and Havoc (Mobb Deep) was in there. They was our right
hand mans. That was the top of the food chain in the school. We were
smashing the school out, stealing everything. I had just come from juvenile
jail too.
When did you decide to completely cut crime out of your life?
In ’97 I did my last stick up.
What producers are you working with on this album?
Belief, DJ Sean One, Etch A Sketch, Steelo, 4th Pyramid, Wally What
and others.
What are your plans for the future?
I just plan on growing. Definitely 360 to a 720, 1440. Just keep it
going. I would like to add on and build. We gonna’ drop off the
wall to Walz. Listen to that album for real. Try to hear things that
you don’t hear. After you hear it, then listen to it. I would
like to let them know like they say in Philly, “That’s ’Sup.”