For as many record label offices that are laid back on an unusually warm New York Friday evening, G-Unit Records is functioning like a typical Monday. The mail-room is buzzing with outgoing packages. The video team is discussing letterbox editing on something exclusive. Tour managers are going over press credentials for next week’s overseas tour attendees. ThisIs50.com is on nearly every desktop computer, with staff going over content. The phone won't stop ringing. "Is this on the floor for a reason?" asks one employee, of a turned over framed poster. "Yes," replies another, leaving this writer to believe Young Buck's mug is likely facing the lime green walls of the fourth floor compound. And in breaks of rare silence, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson’s signature laugh can be heard through the walls as he chats it up with privileged members of the media.

When HipHopDX enters 50’s large office, a lot is going on. The lights are dimmed for the presumably tired eyes of Fif, Tony Yayo and Lloyd Banks. G-Unit is shooting another video in 12 hours. They've just spoken to MTV, and the trio leaves - with Whoo Kid for an international tour within 72 hours, as you read this. Seated on a couch and a chair, the group that's making the kind of music that made them so edgy five years ago, looks hungry. They lean forward. They look and sound alive. If they're tired, nobody's saying it. If they're angry, it's quiet as kept. Instead, the three men labeled villains that challenged the status quo of Hip Hop so abruptly in 2003 and 2004 are back to do it again, only this time they might plausibly be deemed heroes.

HipHopDX: Everybody that you talk to today is hounding you about what happened earlier this month. Out of respect for the music, I only have one question on the matter – how much is the media to blame?
50 Cent: With Buck?

DX: Yeah.
50: It’s not their fault.

DX: Why? People seemed to be trying to get this to happen…
50: Look, Young Buck has been around long enough to know how to respond to the media. He knows what their intentions are, so he knows how to not make the mistake. He’s choosing to make the mistake. He can say he was high, but he wasn’t high four times in a row. We know that. I’ll just say this to you: I accepted more from Buck than I’ve accepted from Game. I didn’t have a relationship with Game. With him, after he said what he said, it was, “Okay, get him the fuck out of here.” That’s just that. I only worked with Game for six days. I worked on Game a lot longer than I worked with Game. Because I made the records that he actually sold five million albums off of before he came anywhere near it. He didn’t know what the fuck his first singles were or what was gonna be his presentation to the public. [Dr.] Dre was getting ready to drop him. That’s why they provided the opportunity for me to share on the profits. [They said,] “If 50 can fix it, let’s let him do it. [The Game] has been in the studio for a year. He’s a good rapper, just not a great songwriter. He isn’t coming with the type of shit that’s making Dre feel like hands-down, this is it.” I delivered “How We Do,” “Hate It Or Love It,” "Special," “Church For Thugs,” “Get You Higher” and “Westside Story.” From there, Dre was like, “We ready. We good. This shit is it.” And we gave birth to Game. He wanted to be the number one person. For as much help as I gave him being around, he [wanted] to be in the position I’m in, so he felt he had to go against me and win in order to achieve that. That’s a big difference from what Buck did.

Buck felt like he was validating himself by going against what I was saying. He was wanting to be his own man. “I’m my own man. Just ‘cause 50 got beef with you, don’t mean I got beef with you.” That comes from him being in a southern based market where they like, “Yo Buck. We fuck with you Buck. But what it like being around them niggas? They New York boys; you from the south.” He gets that [everyday]. They’ve got that type of mentality going on where the crew that you’re a part of, you’re really separate as soon as you leave. We do everything together – everything. As soon as you go to the ‘ville [Nashville], you feel like you’re dolo. You start spending all your money to create that boss hog presentation for them. Then you start to spend so excessively that it hurts you. That’s when you start making comments like you didn’t receive royalties – ‘cause you’re not comfortable with where you’re at.

DX: Doesn’t the media ---
50: They do, but it’s their job. It’s their job to make a moment for themselves. If they can get you to say some shit that you ain’t supposed to say…it’s not right, but we not talking about right or wrong, we talkin’ ‘bout what their job is. If they can get you to say something out of pocket, that sounds crazy, now your article is better than the other guy ‘cause you got him to get crazy.
Tony Yayo: Perfect example: the Alicia Keys thing. She said something about gangsta rap and Hip Hop and all this bullshit [click to read], then she realized what she said, and tried to take it back later on, but it was [everywhere].
50: I enjoy Alicia Keys. I fall into that [gangsta rap] category. I ain’t ask to experience the shit that I experience, but that’s the harsh realities that I write – and they classify me as [gangsta rap]. They classify fuckin’ Mos Def and Talib Kweli as if they’re conscious, but I know exactly what the fuck I’m sayin’, so I think I’m conscious. It’s just certain categories that they place you in. Now it’s hard for me to like the shit that she doin’ now ‘cause I’m actually tryin’ to like the piano, the Classical vibe. She got style to her, but then that statement takes me away from her, and makes me feel like she ain’t got so much style. Continued on page 2 »