HHDX: Oh, so you don’t agree with his single choice?
Duke: Oh, naw, I don’t agree with it. Half of the DJs in the country don’t agree with it – that’s why they ain’t playin’ it.

HHDX: What single should he have chosen?
Duke: He should’ve chosen the one that the streets chose. See that’s the thing about Boyz N Da Hood: you can’t pick our records, the street gotta pick it. Whether you like it or not, that’s what it is. The record the street chose is "Bite Down". But they felt it was too hardcore or too this and that, but at the end of the day that’s all the club is playing. You do the math.

HHDX: So is that a recurring problem with Diddy that you feel he chooses the wrong single, or –
Duke: He two for two with us. He’s battin’ zero out of a thousand now. The two records he picked didn’t work.

HHDX: So you’re not happy with your situation at Bad Boy.
Duke: I’m unhappy with certain things at Bad Boy. And it’s not just Bad Boy, it’s any label. I wouldn’t be happy at Death Row; I wouldn’t be happy at Interscope. I’m not gonna be happy anywhere where someone’s controlling my destiny, and don’t really know the direction we need to be going in. I got a problem with anyone who’s doing that.

HHDX: So why don’t you go the independent route?
Duke: Because you can’t do that once you sign a contract. We can’t just go independent. That’s how we started out – and it was going great, by the way, when we was doing that.

HHDX: So you’d like to one day move to an independent label.
Duke: Most definitely! My solo album’s gonna be independent, ‘cause I need to be my own boss!

HHDX: It seems like Yung Joc received significantly more publicity than you guys did. Why do you think that is?
Duke: It’s obvious man, he’s the more commercial cat! Look at his songs – "Coffee Shop". Joc is more of a commercial artists, you know what I mean? He’s not a Boy N Da Hood, know what I mean? Not sayin’ he ain’t from the hood, ‘cause that’s my dude! But his music is not like our music. He’s made for that type of stuff – that’s what Joc is. He do commercial, party, feel-good radio-type records. And the label probably feel that he just more marketable than some gangsta shit. That’s the same with anybody. Why Chingy promoted more than anybody in DTP when Shawnna was the hardest thing over there? It’s easy to promote something commercial, because the people in them offices are corporate commercial cats. They ain’t in the street, so they don’t know what’s hot for real. They read magazines or listen to the radio and listen to people talkin’, actin’ like they hear what the people sayin’, but they ain’t out here. Continued on page 5 »