B96

B96, also known as WBBM-FM or 96.3 FM, is a radio station in Chicago, Illinois. Stylz & Roman (Doug "Stylz" Bobrowski and Justin Roman) interviewed American rapper Lupe Fiasco in 2007 and 2014.
== Transcripts ==
=== 2007 ===
Title 	Date 	Video	
"S&R w/ Lupe Fiasco" 	December 20, 2007	 	
"S&R w/ Lupe Fiasco PT II"	December 20, 2007	 	
Part I 	Part I 	Part I
Stylz 	B96, and if you're hanging out with us today, man, we want to say welcome back to the Chi. We got Lupe Fiasco chillin' on the Comcast couch. What's up my man? 	
Lupe Fiasco 	What up sir, how's things? 	
Roman 	Things are good, man. 	
Stylz 	Things are real good, great, how are things with you? 	
Lupe 	Can't complain, man. I'm doing phenomenal. 	
Stylz 	Yeah, right. 	
Lupe 	Phenomenal, man, phenomenally well. 	
Roman 	Now. Is this weird, I mean because obviously you travel all over the country and you do interviews at different stations and stuff. I'm assuming you've heard of B96 being from Chicago. Is it weird to kind of come back as like a celebrity on a hometown station? 	
Lupe 	B96, what's that? 	
Roman 	It's your favorite radio station, you know. 	
Lupe 	Nah, nah, that's my joint. I've been down since, since—is Julian jumping Perez? Is he still here? Is Bad Boy Bill, huh? I was down since then, listening to techno music when I was about like, what, 12. You know what I'm saying, on my house system, bumping B96. So yes, I am definitely a fan, definitely aware, and I'm very excited to be back. You know it's like a crowning achievement? 	
Stylz & Roman	Yeah, right. 	
Lupe 	You know what I'm saying, to come back and be like I'm gonna be 96. 	
Stylz 	And that's the same way that we look at it too because we were both grew up in Chicago and stuff like that and we've listened to Eddie and Joebo and like Bad Boy Bill like you said and now we're actually the DJs talking on the radio. So it's the same with us. So like when you were you went to Thornton? 	
Lupe 	Yeah, yeah. 	
Stylz 	High school. 	
Lupe 	Yeah. 	
Stylz 	You grew up on—now is that West Side or South Side? 	
Lupe 	It was in the South suburbs. I grew up I grew up on the West Side until I was about like like 12. um and then I went out to to Harvey to go to a different high school. 	
Stylz 	Okay, and then um. So isn't it cool to put Chicago in like Kanye put Chicago on this map, Twista put Chicago on the map, you as well represent Chicago to the fullest. And that's a lot of—people appreciate that, if they don't tell you. We appreciate that you always represent Chicago because a lot of people represent ATL, New York, you know, Down South. It's always good to have people from Chicago. Let it be known that Chicago is definitely on the map right now. 	
Lupe 	Oh, yeah. We're the best city in the whole wide, wide world. 	
Roman 	I agree, I agree 100. But because there really weren't that many people from Chicago doing it. I mean like you said uh Kanye, Twista, to R. Kelly. But like, that was really about it. Who did you look up to, was there anyone in Chicago you were like "oh, yeah." 	
Lupe 	Oh, yeah. Crucial Conflict. 	
Stylz 	Right, okay, cool. 	
Lupe 	Psycho Drama. Uh, my man J.D. Walker uh, uh D.A smart, um. Tons of Chi-Town. Triple Darkness, uh, Chilldrin of da Ghetto, all-all the kind of West Side dudes that had a claim, you know what I'm saying? And even even some of the South South Side cats, but those are like the early dudes. 	
Stylz 	I'm in the North Side, you know anybody from the North Side? 	
Lupe 	Who's on the North Side? 	
Stylz 	The Cubs. 	
Lupe 	The underground scene on the North Side was very dope, but that was like a distance, that was like so far. 	
Stylz 	And that's the funny thing about it. People-people think that. Like when I was growing up I grew up on the North Side, like, uh, you know Chicago. it was like you never went to the South Side, you know I mean. It was always like it seemed like it was like here to LA to get to the South Side. It just seems so far. But now that you're older, it's like you go to the South Side every si—you know, all the time. It's not the distance from when you-you know, when you're a shorty to now at your age, now. You know there really is no distance and everybody basically raps about the same things. You know what I mean, it's, it's all this like what happens on the South Side definitely happens on the North Side. It's uh. It's Chicago. 	
Lupe 	Yeah. 	
Stylz 	You know what I mean? 	
Lupe 	It's the Chicago experience. 	
Roman 	I grew up at Woodfield Mall we got rough over there dude you know Woodfield Mall is not to be knocking not for real, man. I mean all the guys you were naming are all very talented. I'm actually a big Crucial Conflict fan but like they never really, really remain mainstream. So where was your—where was your head at? What were your goals, what did you want to accomplish as a rapper, you know, from Chicago? Like how did you you looked up to those guys, but they never really were the MTV, the BBT type groups, you know? 	
Lupe 	Um, I don't know. I think for a minute I was kind of stuck on that you know what I'm saying? Because to me that was successful. 	
Roman 	That was making it. 	
Lupe 	You know, that was success. 	
Roman 	Right. 	
Lupe 	Um, and then it just went to actually getting in the industry and then my, my, my fans changed early. You know, like, like Jay-Z would come to Chicago and be like "yo, Lupe come to my hotel." Oh, what's going on, you know. And so it just sort of expanded really right after high school, right out right out of Thornton. I got my first record deal with Epic Records and it was like at 18 I was in the industry, so it just started to change. I started to compete like on a high level, like right off the bat, and this was like 2000, you know what I'm saying? Like in this game, with a deal, everything rocking and rolling, balling, running around here, all across the country. Um, and so you-you pull that over eight years, seven, eight years now, you know. It's like I didn't done everything, you know what I'm saying? I got my first—we got our first Grammy for a record we did on Beyonce. 	
Stylz 	There you go. 	
Lupe 	You know what I'm saying? like on the Dangerously in Love record so it's like we I've seen it. Before Food and Liquor, before like yeah, I need this, I gotta have that, you know what I'm saying. So I always look at The Shining Tower that is B96. And I hope that one day I will sit. 	
Stylz 	And the dream has been accomplished, man! 	
Roman 	I like the way he set it up. 	
Stylz 	Very dramatic Lupe, very dramatic. 	
Roman 	Do you think being on Kanye's "Touch the Sky," do you think that opened up like a lot more of a wider audience for you because of being on a Kanye track? 	
Lupe 	Oh yeah, definitely it took everything that we did thus far because I already had the Jay-Z co-signage. I already had to rock with him, I already had the the the acclaim within the industry, you know. But it was a matter of like how we gonna turn that on, you know and it was like "Touch the Sky," you know. And then right after that we was like, let's take that momentum and then "Kick, Push," you know what I'm saying? 	
Stylz 	Definitely. 	
Lupe 	Everything that we were doing and building for those years just kind of got turned on. 	
Roman 	What means more to you, uh, critically acclaimed or commercially successful? Because you've been critically acclaimed from day one. People were just like, "he's the truth," you know what I'm saying? Like, but do you wanna. I mean, like does that, is that enough for you, or do you want to be like the 10 million seller that like, you know, that Kanye is, or whatever? 	
Lupe 	Well, I think in this in this stage in my career it's best to get that critical acclaim. 	
Roman 	Right, for sure. 	
Lupe 	Because if you look at the people that just go straight to the top, really fast, they have nothing to fall back on. All their fans are kind of for the moment. To the point like a one hit like not even like a one-hit wonder they might have an album and they might your second single third single right but it's like you know a year, two years, there's no depth there's no foundation, you know. So one thing we did was we just got a foundation, we've been on six world tours. Like it's it's international. So for me, to get the four Grammy nominations, to get the all of the the BET award and all those kind of nominations, and all the GQ Man of the Year for 2006. 	
Roman 	Congrats on that, too. 	
Lupe 	Um, to get that stuff and know we had a solid fan base now we like, let's go sell some records, right, you know. Because now we know if we if we go out there and we get a big hit record, that it won't—it's gonna last, it's gonna be, it's gonna last longer. 	
Roman 	For sure. 	
Stylz 	And do you think your fans appreciate that, too? They were down for you from day one I mean now they look at you and you are like you just said GQ Man of the Year. Do you think like some of the underground fans are like is he selling out? 	
Lupe 	Oh no, not at all. Because we keep it the way I did it we didn't, we didn't concede anything, you know? I didn't compromise anything we we sold 400,000 records of Food and Liquor off-off of "Kick, Push." You know, off of songs like "Daydreamin'" and had that message that had that stay true to my fanbase, you know. And even now with with The Cool, you know, we're on schedule to do like 200,000 in the first week or something. 	
Roman 	Wow, congrats. 	
Lupe 	Thank you. So, even with that, that album you know is dense, you know what I'm saying. It's. "Dumb It Down" was the first single where people couldn't even understand the verses, you know? And so my fans love that, my fans love that. And all the commercial people that we got was just off that. Like, it's just like some commercial fans and then like a whole mess of genre fans. 	
Part II 	Part II 	Part II
Stylz‏ 	And when you were growing up, you said you started at an early age right out of high school but you probably always rapping and stuff like that. What made you not want to rap about like-like girls, and-and jewelry and blind. And when you listen to your lyrics, I mean, like for real. Half the stuff that-that rappers are coming out with nowadays is talking about [?]. You make it deeper, you and Kanye, Common, I mean everybody here from Chicago. Is there—Do you think it's a different boundary or something or do you think. What do you think it basically is, that you guys talking about more stuff, like knowledge stuff? 	
Lupe 	Well. And this is the idea, to be honest, you know what I'm saying. And I had it, you know what I'm saying. I had on my first record two diamond chains, diamond bracelet, Rolexes and wheels, honestly. 'Cause to me that was success, you know. And then what started to happen the material success started to wear off, you know. It started for me it just started to it didn't mean anything i knew that what i was saying didn't really have it didn't mean anything. And then when i i did a song called "Coulda Been," right. Which is probably like one of the first songs I did that had a real positive message ‏and it was like 60 ladies walk like, "I really like that song 'Coulda Been.'" And I started—and it was real, you know. It was real though 'cause it wasn't forced, you know. It was, it came from my background. My mother's an intellectual, my father, rest in peace, he was a Renaissance man, engineer, you know karate instructor, whole thing. So I just was like you know what, let me let me let me talk about some of the weirder stuff, the more stuff that's to the left, the stuff that's a little bit more positive.	
Stylz 	Because you stand out more now. 	
Lupe 	Yeah. Even standing out, I'm doing something good. You know what I'm saying? I know that I'm affecting somebody when I do songs like "He Say She Say," as opposed if I did a song where I'm like, "Yo, shoot 'em up in the club, shoot 'em up in the club," you know. 	
Stylz 	47 times. 	
Lupe 	Exactly. And that, yeah. 	
Stylz 	Six this morning. 	
Lupe 	Well, you know. 	
Stylz 	Album is out in stores. 	
Lupe 	As a matter of fact, "shoot 'em up in the club"—let me write that down. 	
Stylz 	Yeah. There's been a couple of remixes as well. 	
Lupe 	The Cool is in stores, right now. 	
Stylz 	"Superstar," man. Now who-who—Matthew Santos? 	
Lupe 	Matthew Santos. 	
Stylz 	Now is that, is that your boy, or did you discover him, or is he just on— 	
Lupe 	Matthew Santos, we actually worked at the same studio on the North Side. Shout-out to my man G-Ball, big cubs fan. 	
Stylz 	Nice. Smart guy. 	
Lupe 	We um, I met him in the studio, and he's actually on my first album, a song called "American Terrorist." And on this album, my new album, I knew I want to work with him again like such a phenomenal talent. Chicago-based. He was originally from Minneapolis but Chicago-based. Been around the city doing mad shows for a couple years now. Phenomenal guy, Filipino, mad talented and very dope. 	
Stylz 	Yeah, his voice is just like. 	
Roman 	It sounds like an alternative group or something like that, I mean I already heard before. Maroon-type voice. And it's so great that it's not one of those guys, it's your own guy, that's really, really cool. 	
Lupe 	Yeah. 1st & 15th—my company, 1st & 15th's own. He has mad range. He sounds like that because I really like that. You know what I'm saying? But he really does—his heart is like in folk music. His range is he can do and that's what's amazing about it. 	
Stylz 	And speaking about range, are you going to do anything. Let's talk about this real quick. Yourself, Pharrell, and Kanye West. Everybody's talking about some supergroup. Now, you guys kinda have a name of it? Is there gonna be an album, are you gonna be in the studio doing some stuff? 	
Roman 	Is this for ‏real, is this happening? 	
Lupe 	It's a real thing. We um, I was talking to Kanye yesterday, um, about it. And we just gearing up to actually how to do it, you know. We know we know if we just came out going to be crazy, but we want to make it last, we make we to do like some Led Zeppelin, you know what I'm saying. Crazy, uh, Pink Floyd situation. But it's coming, Child Rebel Soldiers. 	
Stylz 	When are we thinking, a couple years down the road, are we thinking like tomorrow? 	
Lupe 	Nah, nah, nah. We thinking like like late or eight, you know what I'm saying. We thinking like-like hit the momentum. We did one song called "Us Placers" with Tom York and it's actually a video. You can check it out on YouTube right now. Just search "us places, Tom York video" and it'll be on there. Um, and yeah. 	
Roman 	That's awesome. A lot of supergroups happen and I'm like i don't care about that supergroup. But this is supergroup that I really like be a part of that movement. That's really cool, I'm excited to hear what's gonna happen. 	
Stylz 	‏You can see Common calling you, like, "yo can I get in?" But you know, I know you're a really busy guy, we appreciate you. One more question for you real quick. Every artist has a rider. And for you listening at home, a rider is like what the artist would like in their dressing room or. You just have you have M&Ms, but specifically just... 	
Lupe 	Yellow M&Ms. 	
Stylz 	You don't like the other colors of the M&Ms? 	
Lupe 	Yeah, I don't. 	
Stylz 	That's racist, man, that's racist! 	
Lupe 	Well, you know, you know. 	
Stylz 	What is about the other M&Ms, the other colors, that doesn't fit with you? 	
Lupe 	I don't eat the dyes. 	
Roman 	Is that what it is? Is it bad for you? 	
Lupe 	Um, it's just a preference. 	
Roman 	Doesn't yellow have a dye though to it? 	
Lupe 	Yeah, yeah, it's certain dyes. It's liked Red40 I don't mess with. 	
Roman 	So yellow dye is cooler. 	
Lupe 	Yellow dye 95 is my joint. I wish I could be painted yellow dye 95. 	
=== 2014 ===
Title 	Date 	Video	
"Lupe Fiasco Hangs Out at B96"	February 3, 2014	 	
Stylz 	Cross BlueShield Performance Stage. Boom! Chicago's very own, Lupe Fiasco. What's up, man?
Lupe 	What's up, what's up y'all, how you doing?
Roman 	Welcome back home!
Lupe 	Yeah.
Stylz 	You know, you know you should come back to Chicago during the summer. Why do you come—you know how it is in November and December, January here.
Lupe 	I'm always here, I live here. I live here, I'm always here. Like doing normal stuff, and then it's like, you switch over into Lupe stuff and then it becomes like "ah, Lupe's in town."
Stylz 	Why don't you live in Florida or LA, where it's warm?
Lupe 	I have a house in LA. Um, I have a house in LA, I still have a house here, um, you know. This is home, you know. And there is kind of work, I go there to work, 'cause I wanna able to work here.
Roman 	And Thanksgiving's on Thursday, so of course he's home, man, come on.
Lupe 	Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Thanksgiving is here.
Stylz 	And you're at the House of Blues tonight?
Lupe 	At the House of Blues tonight. Um, speaking of Thanksgiving, I gotta do this. My man Steve over at Exclusive 733—773, is giving out turkeys right now.
Stylz 	Oh really? That's pretty cool.
Lupe 	87, is an Exclusive on eighty-seventh street, he's given out turkeys right now.
Stylz 	So while we're talking about Thanksgiving, do you do any cooking? Are you a beast in the kitchen?
Lupe 	A kind of beast, yeah. A kind of beast, but I leave it to my moms, you know. And then my mom's kind of passing her torch down to my sister, and so my sister is kind of like trying to take over my mom's space. And then my aunt is moving in from like the East, you know, slowly with her troops. And you know, and before you know, the-the battle is done.
Stylz 	So you got turkey, stuffing.
Lupe 	Yeah.
Stylz 	Sweet potato pie and everything.
Lupe 	Yeah. We're in the midst of the tour now, so that's what the show is tonight. The Tetsuo & Youth Tour. At the House of Blues. Stalley, Boy Illinois, uh, my man Dee-1. But we had to reroute the tour because we were supposed to be in Toledo on uh, on Thanksgiving. On our way to Niagara Falls, so what we're doing is kind of rerouting everything to come back to Chicago for like an hour. So the whole crew is gonna be my family this year, and we're gonna hang out and eat.
Roman 	That's cool, man. Obviously you performed everywhere, bro, I mean, so. I know the House of Blues here in Chicago is pretty legendary. Do you have a favorite venue? Is that one of them?
Lupe 	Um, I don't know. I don't know if I have a favorite venue, um 'cause I—like you said, I perform in so many places. From stadiums, to little clubs, to. I was at it, I performed on a table in London one time, where it was like I'd like kicking over drinks and everything, it was crazy, um. I don't know. House of Blues is pretty good, though. And House of Blues is consistent, they got really good sound, so when you do a. Like the tour we're doing, is how basically a House of Blues tour. So we're going to like two different kind of House of Blues and the House of Blues-esque kind of theaters across the country. Um, how about the really terrible venues?
Stylz 	Let's talk about that.
Lupe 	How about, how about Kansas City?
Roman 	Oh really, what's up with KC?
Stylz 	What's up with KC man, tell us. What happened, what happened?
Lupe 	Nah, nah, nah. We—nah.
Stylz 	Wanna go there?
Lupe 	No, we not going back there.
Roman 	'Cause we are streaming. Oh, you're not going back there? Okay.
Lupe 	Yeah, we're not going back to Kansas City. Sorry, yeah, we kind of got to write that place off. That don't exist. You can hate me, but you know what I'm saying, I'm sorry. Um, I don't know, but nicer things. New Orleans is nice, um, LA is nice, to be honest. Um, Dublin, Ireland is nice. Japan is nice if-if they don't smoke.
Stylz 	Right. That's the thing—are you used to, I mean being from Chicago, with that lobbying passed some years back where you can't smoke inside. Is that something that like affects you when you do these venues, though?
Lupe 	Yeah, we did a like. Similar to this. Like a little small club in Tokyo, and they were smoking, but they were like chain smoking and it was like. It was unbearable, and why we left the club smelling like cancer, bro, it was crazy.
Stylz 	Smelling like cancer. You have lung cancer now because of, because of China.
Lupe 	But it was still, it was still crazy. It was off the chain. Um, but yeah, you know.
Roman 	On a more positive non-cancer tip, how about uh, "Old School Love," man? You got a hit right here. How did Lupe Fiasco and Ed Sheeran, how did you guys hook up?
Lupe 	Um, Atlantic Records. We're on the same record company. And Atlantic has their kind of pool of, you know, this magic pot where they kind of bring in all their different artists and producers and create these songs and then kind of, "hey, would you like to take a listen to this." And Ed Sheeran being a huge fan of hip hop. Also a rapper, if people didn't know that.
Stylz 	Is he really?
Lupe 	He used to rap.
Stylz 	No. You're making that up.
Roman 	He used to rap?
Lupe 	Yeah.
Roman 	'Cause if you, if you put him in a lineup, and say who was a rapper, Ed Sheeran is not the one I'd picked.
Lupe 	No, he used to rap.
Stylz 	Is he good?
Lupe 	I heard he's really damn good.
Stylz 	Really? Then why is he not rapping now? Why is he just singing?
Lupe 	For what? 15 million albums later, it's like I wouldn't rap, either.
Roman 	Great voice.
Lupe 	But uh.
Roman 	I never knew that, that's crazy.
Lupe 	He was a fan of rap. When I first met him he was wearing Yeezys. And I was like, "here's a white guy Yeezys. Something's off about this." Uh.
Roman 	Not just a white guy, a red-headed white guy.
Lupe 	Yeah, the whole package.
Stylz 	And no disrespect towards him, he is not the best looking of dudes.
Lupe 	I'm not getting into that, because that's subjective.
Roman 	It is subjective.
Stylz 	But how does he get girls? Come on!
Roman 	Because 15 million albums sold.
Lupe 	Because he sold out Madison Square Garden, and he tells beautiful, weaves amazing tales, has a great voice, and.
Stylz 	But when a girl wakes up to him in the morning.
Roman. 	Anyways.
Lupe 	Come on, man, look at this. What's wrong with him? Why is he doing that?
Stylz 	I'm not hatin' on him, I'm just saying.
Lupe 	You kind of hatin'.
Stylz 	I'm not hatin'.
Lupe 	You're hatin' a little bit—
Stylz 	Maybe I'm a little bit jealous.
Lupe 	That might be it. Some envy, and that's a sin. If you're religious.
Stylz 	I am religious.
Lupe 	Then that's a sin.
Stylz 	I will go to confession on Sunday.
Lupe 	Yeah, you need to do that.
Stylz 	I will confess.
Lupe 	Because that is...
Stylz 	Can you imagine me in there?
Roman 	And apologize to Ed Sheeran, 'cause he's a big fan of our show, bro, he's watching.
Lupe 	Yeah, he's watching. And, and what's crazy is he's on the song that I'm on. Which is like, even more, like that's...
Stylz 	But Ed Sheeran knows what we're talking about, man.
Lupe 	But you don't have to say it.
Roman 	Anyways, so the song is dope. So what came first? The hook came first.
Lupe 	The chorus came first, um. The hook and the chorus, the hook in the track came and he sent they sent it over to me, um. And I was actually kind of asleep on it, to be honest. I was kind of like, it's a little soft, um. I'm not really like the super—even though I've had pop records, and kind of have big hits to a certain degree, um. I'm still more esoteric, weird, you know. Telling crazy things, stories, and stuff like that, um. So when I got the record, I was like, it's kind of soft. And even in the realm of like "Show Goes On" or "Superstar," it's still soft in comparison and I was like let's do some harder.
Roman 	It's a love song, man. It's a hip-hop a love song.
Lupe 	Whatever with that, man. So, but. It was actually. I was in studio with Guy Sebastian, me and Guy Sebastian have the big hit "Su"—uh, "Battle Scars." And he's like, "man, what you got for, what you got lined up for the next album." And I played, um, "Old School Love" and he was like, "yo, you have to do that record, it works crazy," you know. And I was like okay. So here we are.
Stylz 	Have you guys performed the song together yet on stage anywhere?
Lupe 	Um, no.
Stylz 	Any plans of doing it soon, or?
Lupe 	I hope so. We shot the video, so the video will be out, maybe a couple weeks. Um, but no, we haven't done it yet. It's probably being saved for something special.
Stylz 	Should I apologize to Ed right now? I kind of feel bad.
Lupe 	You should, you should feel bad, you should feel terrible. Like what, like. And all of the women that he's sleeping with right now, like you should apologize to them, too.
Stylz 	I apologize, I apologize. Where's the camera? I apologize.
Roman 	You should apologize, and you should be this Thanksgiving thankful for said Guy Sebastian for kind of saying, "yo man—"
Lupe 	Yeah, I give Guy all the credit in the world for that. Because it's one of those joints where was like. But Guy's a super huge Ed Sheeran fan. And we actually did a, me and Guy did "Battle Scars" and Ed did "A-Team" at this Grammy Foundation um, event in LA during the Grammys. And Guy was just kind of like, not starstruck, but it was just kinda like "yo, that dude there's the truth." And I'd never heard, I heard like 18 maybe once, but I had no real recollection who he was. But Guy was all for, and when he heard the record he was like, "man, you got a record with Ed Sheeran just sitting here?" I like, "yeah, man, like what." He was like, "yo, you gotta do that right do it."
Roman 	So on behalf of not in Chicago, but the world, thank you for doing that, and thank you Guy Sebastian for making him do that.
Lupe 	Yeah, shout out to Australia, Oy.
Stylz 	We had a tough weekend here in Chicago. Every time we go to the Bulls game, um. You're a big fan being from Chicago, you're always sit—
Lupe 	Grew up, down, and—listen. Grew up eight blocks—no, six blocks from the UC. Eight blocks, eight blocks from the UC Madison and Kenzie, right? My whole life, when it was the Chicago Stadium, right. I remember when they blew it up, right. Just there, watching it, every, look out, lean onto Madison. You see the bulge of it, the dome, so I'm. I got Bulls in my blood.
Stylz 	Right, I mean. We were both raised in Chicago too, so we're the same way we were all six titles here with Jordan. I mean to see to see Derrick Rose go to-to Simeon, to get drafted by the Bulls, and now get hurt again. I mean, what did you feel how did you feel when you heard about that news?
Lupe 	This is my Derrick Rose story, and this is why it was bigger than basketball, and that's why this guy right here—who y'all can't see down in the front row—
Stylz 	He's got the Bull's hat on, though.
Lupe 	So my Derrick Rose story is one of those days. Went to the game, this when he was last season, he was hurt. I think they were playing Brooklyn or something like that which I hate. The only one of the teams that I hate, hate you Brooklyn Nets.
Roman 	Hey, we don't like Kansas City or the Brooklyn Nets. Remember that.
Lupe 	Um, but anyway at end of the game, end of the game. D. Rose gets up. Teams are still kind of walking back to the locker room. Crowd's kind of leaving but a big batch of the crowd is there. And the crowd of behind me is going crazy. They're like "oh!" And I'm talking to like one of the fellow billionaires who gets a courtside seat. Crowd went crazy, Billionaire started going like "huuuughn," right, one of those. And I look up and it's Derrick Rose fully in his street clothes, in a suit, walking full stride across the court, making a beeline directly for me. Right, walks right up to me just. Nobody else exists, gives me the biggest hug in the world, right. And it was like "yo man, I love what you're doing for the city, I love you bro. Whatever you need, let me know." Then just like vanishes like a ninja. So from that moment I was like, I was like starry-eyed, I'm like "Ohhh, D Rose."
Stylz 	He just pulled a David Copperfield.
Lupe 	So I love him, I love him for the basketball of course, but I love D. Rose because of that because he's from the city he chose to stay in the city, and he was a big like he. Paid for Jonylah Watkins funeral. He's done, he's done things in the city which may seem uh, you know, kind of cliche but he means it. When you see him sent up there crying at a press conference, he's part of that he's from that, he sees it, he wants to change it. And so I love whether he's hurt, not hurt, playing, not playing, MVP, worst player on the team, that guy is a staple for the city and an inspiration for the city and we need to support him in whatever he does, you know. In whatever he does. So, you know, I love to do to death, so.
Stylz 	Now he has Adidas. You design sneakers as well. You guys ever think about collaborating?
Lupe 	Um, I don't know, I don't know, maybe. I got all his shoes Adidas sends me—I have a great relationship with Adidas, so they send me everything D. Rose. So I have all the jerseys, all the shoes, every colorway.
Stylz 	And are you a sneaker head as well, or are you just?
Lupe 	A little bit, a little bit now. Not so much but yeah, it's there. I got the relationships, so I get the shoes.
Roman 	You got a lot of relationships, man, I want some of these relationships you got.
Lupe 	You gotta stop dissing Ed Sheeran live on air, you know what I'm saying? You gotta stop doing that.
Roman 	He did, I didn't. I think he's dope.
Lupe 	That's when he's like "oh, really? You're off the list. Stylz & Roman, they're both gone, they're done."
Stylz 	Delete button. Boom.
Roman 	I'm like guilty by association.
Lupe 	Yeah, you're finished.
Roman 	Man.
Lupe 	See what happens?
Roman 	Man, Ed Sheeran's got power, too, man. He sold out Madison Square Garden.
Stylz 	And I apologized, I'm sorry.
Roman 	All right, let's talk about hip hop because obviously man, you know you're not you're not like other emcees in the game right now. Are there, is there anybody else that you're feeling—
Lupe 	Yeah, I'm not young.
Roman 	Well no, not just that. You don't rap about all the things that a lot of these guys do. I mean, you've always stood out from the pack if you will, and I respect you for that. It's really, really cool. So-so in the in the state of hip hop today who are you feeling right now who's Lupe Fiasco—
Stylz 	Or do you not think that fans will make her dance, are you not.
Lupe 	No, listen, all that stuff has this place. Not, I. Don't get me wrong I grew up on 8Ball & MJG. A lot of people not gonna know any of the names that we're mentioning right now. I grew up on three 6 mafia, 8Ball & MJG, you know. I grew up on Geto Boys, I grew up on Too Short, I grew up on NWA, I grew up on Snoop Dogg—early Snoop Dogg when he was still ratchety ratchet Snoop. So that's in me. And I've seen it at work, it's for a specific place, for a specific time, it has a specific purpose. And it's all, it's all on how you interpret and how you choose to let it affect you, you know. Do you live your life by it you know to become insulted by it but then you're the type of person who turn around and laugh at somebody in elevator, laugh behind, bully somebody in school, or say something. You know what I'm saying? So it's like we got kind of these code of ethics that everybody's trying to like okay, we can follow him here but you can't. You know, I can say old girl's kind of fat and ugly but you can't say that, you know, or whatever. So it's the same thing with with everybody else. Say that to say you know that stuff is real, you know. The violence that's in a lot of music is real, um. The misogyny is real, um. Some of the ignorance is real, is very real things that happen on a daily basis and you can either get mad at the messenger, you can get mad at the message, or you can actually try and go and fix the problem. You know, and what I tried to do in my music is present in some instances, present the same situations but just with a twist. With a little bit more of a, you know. A solution behind it like not just giving you this for the sake of entertainment, or eye candy, like we shot a video for a song I got off my last album Food and Fiquor II called. I think it was the video for "Lamborghini Angels." And Lamborghini—it wasn't like a big hit or anything like that, it was just a record and it was like okay the video for "Lamborghini Angels." All it has, in the video, is fried chicken falling from the sky—
Roman 	That's a dream, that's like a dream.
Lupe 	There's like a sexy woman having orgasms, or something. There's a pile of Michael Jordan gym shoes.
Stylz 	The dream continues.
Lupe 	There's a pile of money, a pile of guns, a pile of drugs, pile of marijuana, a pile of kind of like lean, or whatever kids are drinking these days. And it's just these. And that's the whole video, right? And people's like "yo, why'd you make a video like that?" But we made a part two, and part two of the video was that same video that we all just watched. Now it's a little kid watching the video. And that whole video is a little kid watching the video for "Lamborghini Angels." And it was like it wasn't too you know I say it wasn't to glamorize that thing, but it was to put it in your face so raw. And then like now look who's watching it, you know. And how is he being affected by it. Are you angry, you know, should the kid be watching this. But it's this stuff that he's already seen is he seeing it somewhere else, you know? Is he seeing is not only a hip hop whenever he turns on the TV. Like is he saying people trying to get him to sell something to buy into a lifestyle, or something that's not healthy for him, or whatever. So always try to present I say that say I present the same kind of imagery, but I try to put a little twist on it to get people to kind of to ask a question about it, to investigate a little bit deeper.
Stylz 	That's always been so cool about you, man. And I want to ask you because you are a deep dude I want to get your you know firsthand take on this rumors how do you have a song called "Crack" what Chris Brown. Is that true?
Lupe 	Yeah.
Stylz 	Alright, so I want to get your deep explanation behind "Crack" featuring Chris Brown.
Lupe 	Um, it goes back. It comes from that you know we shot "Lamborghini Angels" and it was about let's just take these simple things and then just put them to the world and then see what happens. So I took that same kind of mentality going in to create this next record which is called Tetsuo & Youth, should be out early 2014. One of the records on there is called "Crack," you know. And the record is about smoking crack, you know, um.
Stylz 	It's a good title.
Lupe 	Yeah, you know it's just done. Like, gone. That's what it's about, no confusion, no anything. And it is, is really just taking you know smoking crack and presenting it in a way that hasn't been done before. More creative, more artistically. Less trying to push a message, less trying to be a little bit more social commentary, but just kind of more just creating this weird space, you know, about smoking crack. But is it about smoking crack, or is it about having sex with a girl? Or is it about this, or is it about that? Um, and it's just me kind of having a little bit of fun with a very serious subject, you know.
Stylz 	Now when you do that song with Chris Brown, do you, do you give him like any advice to try to, to try to help him. I mean like you know he's always in the news, not always in positive manner, you know I mean so like. Do you feel is like an older brother like should you like give him any advice or is it just you guys in the studio just making music?
Lupe 	Nah, Chris is the homie. And there's been many instances where you know reach out to Chris when something happens, you know and it's kinda like "yo, you cool?" Or to try and diffuse things before they happen, um. But at the same time to, you know, Chris is a young man, you know um. And Chris didn't come from. He wasn't babied from the suburbs, you know, and expectations for him were something else, you know. It's like a kid who grew up in the streets, from the streets. His friends are from the streets, the things he's seen in life, etc etc cetera and he's young and he's famous and he's rich and the world is out to get him, you know. And the world doesn't really understand or doesn't want to give it yeah. I would say that they don't want to... they don't want to they don't want to give him the benefit of the doubt that maybe he's reacting to something very serious, and we're just seeing the reaction as opposed to seeing the source of it. So we beat him up for the reaction that he do, when he does certain things. But if somebody tried to get on my tour bus, I'll beat they ass, you know what I'm saying? Like that's what security is for, and that's what's supposed to happen. If you don't think security is supposed to. If it becomes a physical altercation or becomes the safety of you or your crew, you know, then that situation has to be dealt with, that's what those people are for, you know. My security carries guns so it's like it gets to the point where if this becomes a lethal situation you got use lead to force for the protection of me, or somebody's in my crew.
Stylz 	Because you never know.
Lupe 	'Cause you never know.
Roman 	Exactly.
Lupe 	You know, we just had a girl throw two tomatoes at me on stage.
Roman 	We heard about this, now we didn't want to bring it up. Obvious you brought it up so.
Lupe 	And that's cool, 'cause I'm making t-shirts out of it, I'm going to make so much money off of that.
Roman 	Paint the picture for us. You're in Salt Lake City, and a girl from the, from the balcony through tomato at you?
Lupe 	Yeah, she got. We did like fifty minutes into the show. And this is all relative to what artists face. So what Chris faces, what Jay-Z, what Kanye faces. Even maybe some some stuff that you guys faces being on a radio and being public.
Roman 	We just wanna be recognized. So a tomato, whatever, they just throw at us. We cool.
Lupe 	But just the instances that occur when you in the public eye. So, you know, we're performing. We get maybe fifty minutes into the show we're performing "Kick, Push." And then I feel like, you know. I've been on stage a thousand times, so you know when something's on the stage so you feel something. It's like, "oh." I stop rapping, music is still playing 'cause now I'm trying to figure out like what just happened. Then another one shot and this time it gets on me, or whatever. I didn't get hit, I didn't get hit directly. It just kind of like splat or whatever.
Roman 	A crossfire. A crossfire tomato.
Lupe 	It is a big juicy tomato. So I look up, and it's like this white girl, you know. And she, she's like. Throws me two big birds, you know. And then I'm telling my security they get that blankety blank white girl. Go get her, she's right there, get her out of the venue. She, she jumps onto the fire escape three stories up and leaves. So security was going. And we're still on stage is kind of like making sense of it. The tomatoes were like scattered out, it was like "yo, she just threw tomato. This is crazy." So we were gonna. We were. the idea was to continue to show, but then it became, as you're sitting there and you're processing this live you're like, what if that was a brick? You know, what if that was a gun, you know. This, you know. I'm taking into consideration maybe she doesn't like me because I'm Muslim, and then become something else. Maybe she doesn't like me because I'm Black. Or then it becomes something else, not just "oh, Lupe is a jerk, I'm gonna throw—" we don't know what it is at this point. So we asked everybody in the balcony to come down to the floor, you know. It's like "yo, you know, she was in with the group with y'all, we don't know who you are. We don't know who's over there." So we'll continue to show, but everybody has to come to the floor, um. There was a pregnant lady there and I was like, yo, you're cool, but everybody else has to come down. Like if you're not pregnant, you need to come now.
Stylz 	When it's all said and done, safety is first, you know. I mean you wanna you understand everybody, but you want to be safe.
Roman 	I just love that announcement, though. If you're not pregnant, you need to come down. Pregnant people are cool though.
Lupe 	Because there was a lady who was tweeting me before the show, was like yo I'm 31 months pregnant—not 31 months, because that would be crazy. She's like 30, 31 weeks pregnant or whatever. But she's like 31 weeks pregnant or something. I don't even know if 31 weeks is right, but I think that's—okay, cool that works. The math works. But anyway, she's like she's pregnant, I'm up and she was sending pictures from the balcony. So I knew, it was I okay that lady's there. And so. There was some more people they were like, you know, "screw you, we're not coming down." And this is kind of well, I can't continue to show, you know. I'm sorry, you know, you got an hour but I can't continue to show. Sorry.
Stylz 	There could have been on lettuce being thrown at you next, maybe she was making a sandwich.
Lupe 	But we take it seriously, we take it serious. And that's what that's when it comes and you relate that to every other artist who's been in an situation. Some people are cool with that, and I was cool with it. But you know there has to be some give-and-take. I'm putting myself on the line for entertaining etc, etc, etc. But now the situation become unsafe, none of the security know what's going on, and before they react and overreact which happens and somebody gets beats up or somebody says something else or something happens like that. Like listen, let's just control the space, everybody come downstairs. But if the crowd isn't willing to do that then, you know, we gotta go on the next show.
Stylz 	So how are you gonna make money now, what do you do these t-shirts?
Lupe 	Oh man, I was literally, there's like.
Stylz 	What are you going to doing, what are you gonna do?
Lupe 	Um, they're only gonna be for girls.
Stylz & Roman	Okay.
Roman 	Pregnant girls, or just—
Lupe 	Girls in general.
Roman 	Alright, girls in general.
Lupe 	Girls in general. We're thinking of "show me your tomatoes." Two smashed tomatoes right here, kind of a sexual innuendo thing. Um, there's also the Campbell's uh, tomato soupée. We're thinking of doing shirts like that.
Roman 	And we got you a gift, actually. Reno, can you bring this gift over?
Lupe 	Is it a tomato, is it tomato soup?
Roman 	We got you a gift from the Stylz & Roman B96 crew.
Stylz 	Yeah, see, Soupée Fiasco.
Roman 	Soupée Fiasco.
Stylz 	Exactly, exactly.
Lupe 	Nice.
Roman 	Some Soupée Fiasco right there, bro.
Lupe 	I'm gonna donate this to my homie.
Stylz 	We're not even sponsored by Campbell's, but I think we are now.
Lupe 	Nah, but we're gonna take. We're talking about taking this and changing this to uh, Lupe. And then doing tomato soupée.
Stylz 	That's great. So you're taking like the negative thing that happened and you're turning it into a positive and joking around about is which is mad cool now the everything's cool.
Lupe 	I have a really good friend out in Denver, her name is Hip-Hop Mom, and she was like, "Listen, Lupe, you have. There's a lot of negative karma around you, you need to start neutralizing your karma." And I was like, "you know what, you're right." So instead of saying "screw you," you know, thank you for the opportunity for me to you know make some people laugh and sell some merch.
Stylz 	You know, when it's all said and done, you being from. You're just, you're just a really cool dude, though, you know what I mean? We've interviewed some people and it's like, ah you know, they're alright. But you're just like down to earth, just really cool, and I mean—
Roman 	Not as cool as Ed Sheeran, but you're cool.
Lupe 	Not anymore, he's not going to be cool with you now.
Stylz 	No, I'm sorry, Ed, I'm sorry. If he's watching, I apologize, I'm sorry.
Roman 	And you know what, controversy has kind of followed you here and there, whatever. But you know what, you're you are good dude and you're very talented emcee, bro and you know what you're doing the city very good. Now the single right now is "Old School Love," obviously featuring Ed Sheeran. The album comes out when?
Lupe 	Album will be out. Tetsuo & Youth is my fifth album, should be out early 2014.
Roman 	Okay.
Stylz 	And we're all coming over for Thanksgiving dinner?
Lupe 	Come on down.
Stylz 	Cool.
Lupe 	Nice, swag, 'ppreciate it.
Roman 	Hey man, congratulations on everything. Good luck tonight at the House of Blues.
Stylz 	Lupe Fiasco!
Lupe 	We'll be having soup as the main course.
Roman 	Soupée Fiasco!
== References ==
Category:2007 interviews
Category:2014 interviews
Category:Radio shows