DX: And did I read correctly that [the album, I’m Not Playin’] somehow finally got released just last year?
Diamond D: Yeah, I think it was released through Traffic Entertainment.

DX: Did you have anything to do with that?
Diamond D: No. It was basically Jay still owned the masters, and it was something that he did. But he needed our signatures for it.

DX: Did that piss you off when you heard Chubb Rock’s “Just The Two Of Us” riding that same steel drum sample you guys used on “I’m Not Playin’”?
Diamond D: Steel drum sample?

DX: Yeah, on “I’m Not Playin’” I thought it was the same sample that Chubb Rock used for “Just The Two Of Us”?
Diamond D: Uh…well, he did use the same sample, but they’re not the group that I sampled. But yeah, yeah, I was like, “Damn.” Yeah, I felt a little funny about it when I heard Chubb Rock’s version [a few years later]. Also, Son Of Bazerk used [that sample] too.

DX: There’s another sample you used that I always wondered what you thought about [someone else using], and that’s the sample you used for “Bad Bad Man” from Fat Joe’s first album. That sample is now locked into the Hip Hop conscience as being the foundation of Jay-Z’s “Where I’m From.” Does that irritate you as a producer, or is it just like it is what it is.
Diamond D: No, because I wasn’t the first to use that [sample]. I think Biz Markie used that [first on "Check It Out"].

DX: So going back to Ultimate Force. Y’all were on MCA, but then you were about to go to Capitol, can you explain that?
Diamond D: What happened was Strong City had a distribution deal with UNI/MCA. [And] I guess right before it was time for our album to come out I guess the deal had went bad and MCA just basically stopped dealing with Strong City. And around the same time, when I was shopping my solo stuff, Capitol Records had got involved. And [then we] just went back and forth through a bidding war and I wound up over at Chemistry/Mercury.

DX: I think I read that a Capitol Records employee heard “Best Kept Secret” and wanted you to do your own album?
Diamond D: Right. He heard “Best Kept Secret.” And I think he heard maybe “Check One, Two.”

DX: It sounds like your solo career was kinda forced on you.
Diamond D: Nah, not really. Like, it just happened at the right time. It wasn’t really forced ‘cause I was looking for a [solo] situation. And I told Capitol, “You know, if you can match Mercury’s offer then we’ll do it.” [But] Mercury wound up coming to the table a little bit better than Capitol.

DX: And this kinda forced the demise of Ultimate Force?
Diamond D: Well, not really. Rob, he was supposed to be on [Stunts, Blunts & Hip Hop] with me. And for whatever reason, I think he just chose to fall back at that time and just focus on raising his family. He had just got married around that time.

DX: Let’s talk about your official debut. On the intro to your new album Fat Joe speaks on Stunts, Blunts & Hip Hop, calls it a “classic album.” And adds about the LP: “that music is so incredible.” So what would you say, especially to younger fans who weren’t into Hip Hop yet in ’92, to explain what made Stunts so incredible that we’re still talking about it 16 years later?
Diamond D: Well I think first and foremost a lot of those albums that were recorded back then would just cost too much to make right now, with just all the different samples. Just the way we were layering samples. You’d have to find a bass line, and then you might put another record on and grab a horn [sample from that]. But the trick is, you have to find all of these sounds in the same key. You not just grabbing records and forcing these sounds [together]. You had to just sit there and go through records and find all of these sounds in the same key, so that when you hearing it back you would think that all of these samples came from one record. And a lot of people thought that.

DX: I’m old enough to remember watching the “Sally Got A One Track Mind” video as a kid and being hypnotized by that flute sample. And those horns on “Fuck What U Heard” made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. [Laughs]
Diamond D: [Laughs] Thanks man.

DX: And that video for “What U Heard” I think was the first time anybody like saw Big L.
Diamond D: I’m not sure. Somebody else brought [that] to my attention. But I’m not sure, maybe.

DX: Since there have been so many rumors about this I thought you maybe could help clarify what’s going on with regards to another posthumous L album. You know anything about that?
Diamond D: Nope, I haven’t heard nothing about it.

DX: Do you have any unreleased Big L vocals you could put out there?
Diamond D: I got some stuff from my first album I never released, maybe about three or four songs. Continued on page 3 »