Lupe Fiasco: Cool Like Dat
Cool is as cool does. Lupe Fiasco has demonstrated a new kind of cool in Hip Hop since appearing alongside Kanye West in "Touch The Sky" in what feels like a lot longer ago than it really is. Having freshly released his sophomore album The Cool, this Chicago emcee only furthers what '80s John Hughes high school movies hinted at, "cool" might truly be another word for "nerdy."
With an album that's already climbing "best of" lists [click here], playlists and presumably the charts, Lupe Fiasco has a lot to say about the long, strange trip it's been. With his label backed up in distribution issues, its CEO goes back in to re-initiate his 1st & 15th movement that had been patiently waiting since 2004. He's touching on more influences in the gestalt of his art, defining abstract terms and elitism in Hip Hop. Fifteen years after the rebirth of slick, HipHopDX and Lupe examine the rebirth of cool.
HipHopDX: What is the meaning of “cool” is to you?
Lupe Fiasco: Being yourself, not really being worried about what people think. To me, that’s the illest cool to have.
DX: Can you buy cool?
LF: Yes. Cool is as eternal as a high self-esteem state of mind. You can always dress it up. You can always dress to have the look of cool. Some of the coolest people are cool because of the way they dress – the fashions. Marlon Brando comes to mind. Very cool. It’s more of what they dress in than what you see in them. Like, “Yeah, he was cool.” Then when you talk to ‘em, you realize they’re really cool.
DX: Does it ever work the other way? Somebody might read all the magazines or playlists and buy into it, but in reality, they’re herbs?
LF: Yeah. There’s definitely that level of everything not being what it seems to be. But you know, you can see how much of their cool is original and how much is artificial. It’s a balance. It’s not just, “to be cool, you have to be this upstanding, thinking person.” Nah, you have your flaws, and it’s how you deal with those flaws and how you portray those flaws that makes you cool. Sometimes. I don’t think that’s a flaw. I’ll do that. I’ll take cues from different people and buy into what they say and come to find out I was wrong. Like, “Damn, I thought this particular was really, really dope. But he turned out to be an asshole. I love his art, but I don’t really want to meet him.”
DX: I have definitely found that to be true in Hip Hop journalism many times over. What do you think determines cool in Hip Hop?
LF: I don’t know. It’s too much of an enigma. Cool is subjective. I can’t pull objective rules and guidelines of something like that. I think some of the coolest people in Hip Hop are people like Bun B…people like Snoop Dogg. They have a genuine kind of humility. When they’re with their brothers in music, their brothers in arms or whatever, they’re just cool ass people. There’s certain people with a certain cool about them in the world that are [actually] assholes. They dress fly, they dope, but they assholes. I can’t tell you what’s what and “this is cool,” I can just tell who is cool.
DX: I’m glad you mentioned Bun B. With the press during Food & Liquor, you came across as a fan of Nas and The Native Tongues and all that, but I also know that through your siblings, you’re a big follower of gangsta rap too…
LF: I was listening to [Pytor] Tchaikovsky. My brother was listening to gangsta rap. My sister was listening to eclectic…whatever. We were all listening to the radio. Trying to be cool with my brother, [I got into it]. At certain points with my sister, I’d say, “I can’t work with that.” They both had somewhat of an influence – not as much what my sister played, only some. She might play a Fugees album while my brother would be bumpin’ OutKast and Psycho Drama and N.W.A. and No Limit. They were both dope. They both had their highs and both had their lows. It was one of the things that was ambient. I kinda pull something from both of them.
DX: You’ve spoken a lot about your love for It Was Written. Most people go right to Illmatic. People are almost expected to love and study the same 15 classic rap albums or hear the same two every week. Maybe we saw this a little bit after the Vh1 incident with A Tribe Called Quest, but do you sense elitism in Hip Hop?
LF: It’s a bad thing. To me, it’s tantamount to racism. It’s tom foolery of me to think that everybody would be open to everything else because you have people in the south who shun stuff from the east coast; if you’re from the east coast, you shun stuff that comes from the south…there’s always peer-pressure. There’s always people who push to be the elite. Like racism, everybody needs to be at some level of universality where we at least respect that we all didn’t come up in the same circumstances. We all don’t have the same influences. We’re all trying to reach the same goals, and it’s all underneath Hip Hop. But some people will push it out, and that’s when it starts to get a little spooky. Don’t shun mine ‘cause it’s got 808 [drums] in it; I won’t shun yours ‘cause it’s got a bunch of Soul samples in it. It’s all trying to reach the understanding. It can get real serious, real nasty in certain instances, but it is what it is.
DX: In the last year, what’s the best experience you’ve had with your music?
LF: The touring. Going out there and performing. That’s one of the smaller things that I actually look forward to doing. Going on and jumping on stage and performing for my fans, and seeing their reaction instantly. That’s what music is. If you go back 300 years ago to the symphonies, there was no portable music. You had to come and see the music performed. That’s why you dressed up; it was an event. That was where it started. That’s the most fun – whether it’s 60,000 or a little club, it’s always exciting.
DX: As a more seasoned performer, how much did performance affect the making of The Cool?
LF: I definitely went back and made performance records. After Jay-Z saw me perform at Nokia Theater, he said, “Yo, your show is dope! You just need one or two more records to really get the crowd and build on the show.” If you look at Jay’s show, all Jay does is come out and perform all hits. All his records. He can do “Jigga, My Nigga” then “Hard Knock Life,” then go way back and pull “Dead Presidents” or something. Me going into this album, it was me making records that were ill performance records. We’re not even taking time off tour. As we’re leading up to this album, we’ve been phasing out records we were performing from Food & Liquor and just adding stuff from The Cool. In the middle of next year, we’ll be performing all Cool records. That’s definitely learning and getting [records designed for various points of a concert].
DX: How do you think the label, or the whole movement going into the sophomore effort would have been different had you won that Grammy?
LF: I don’t know. I don’t know. It could have been a catastrophe. It could have meant nothing. It could have meant everything. I don’t know. That’s such a small thing. The Grammy has a time limit. There’s a time limit where you can keep using it and keep using it, and then it don’t mean anything. For certain people. The powers that be. They’ll be like, “That don’t mean nothin’. What’d you do for me lately?”
DX: What’s going on with your label? We were talking about Gemini’s release this time last year…
LF: It’s hustling. The Cool is definitely the foremost, ‘cause that’s the bread-winner for the company. Gemini is next in line. Matthew Santos is definitely right there. We’re pushing a whole ‘nother lane. It’s a very small staff. We were focusing on expanding it and really kinda pushing on getting everybody out in ’08. We want everybody out there workin’ before we grow stagnant…before Lupe Fiasco phenomenon wears off and I fade away, I want to make sure I hit, hit, hit, hit. Gemini, it was problems with the distribution that sewed it up, but it’s done. Then The Cool came. Honestly, as an executive, I didn’t have time to focus on his and focus on mine. So let me just go out here and rock mine, do what I do, and then “Here, take this thing. Here’s your world tour.”
DX: Food & Liquor was the one time where an off-label executive producer really seemed to mean something. Jay-Z’s cosign was huge. With 50 Cent and Lil’ Scrappy and Freeway, that wasn’t as proven. With Snoop Dogg and Tru-Life, he’s still on the shelf right now. How do you think that helped, and what’s your overall view of this seemingly overused tactic?
LF: I think Jay just got his Quincy Jones on. I think it’s something that’s done in other genres. A lot of the Rock bands, you don’t even know about these producers, but they have producers, guys who are well-known that do a total jump. I just think Jay and other people are progressing into that lane where they take their expertise with the music and try to put that with other artists in a more production role. Not just, “help me on a song” and keep it movin’. [They are] actually behind the scenes, making it happen by pushing buttons. Things of that nature. I think that’s something that’s part of reaching that other level. For somebody to respect you enough to actually come out and do that, I think it’s dope, a progression.
With an album that's already climbing "best of" lists [click here], playlists and presumably the charts, Lupe Fiasco has a lot to say about the long, strange trip it's been. With his label backed up in distribution issues, its CEO goes back in to re-initiate his 1st & 15th movement that had been patiently waiting since 2004. He's touching on more influences in the gestalt of his art, defining abstract terms and elitism in Hip Hop. Fifteen years after the rebirth of slick, HipHopDX and Lupe examine the rebirth of cool.
HipHopDX: What is the meaning of “cool” is to you?
Lupe Fiasco: Being yourself, not really being worried about what people think. To me, that’s the illest cool to have.
DX: Can you buy cool?
LF: Yes. Cool is as eternal as a high self-esteem state of mind. You can always dress it up. You can always dress to have the look of cool. Some of the coolest people are cool because of the way they dress – the fashions. Marlon Brando comes to mind. Very cool. It’s more of what they dress in than what you see in them. Like, “Yeah, he was cool.” Then when you talk to ‘em, you realize they’re really cool.
DX: Does it ever work the other way? Somebody might read all the magazines or playlists and buy into it, but in reality, they’re herbs?
LF: Yeah. There’s definitely that level of everything not being what it seems to be. But you know, you can see how much of their cool is original and how much is artificial. It’s a balance. It’s not just, “to be cool, you have to be this upstanding, thinking person.” Nah, you have your flaws, and it’s how you deal with those flaws and how you portray those flaws that makes you cool. Sometimes. I don’t think that’s a flaw. I’ll do that. I’ll take cues from different people and buy into what they say and come to find out I was wrong. Like, “Damn, I thought this particular was really, really dope. But he turned out to be an asshole. I love his art, but I don’t really want to meet him.”
DX: I have definitely found that to be true in Hip Hop journalism many times over. What do you think determines cool in Hip Hop?
LF: I don’t know. It’s too much of an enigma. Cool is subjective. I can’t pull objective rules and guidelines of something like that. I think some of the coolest people in Hip Hop are people like Bun B…people like Snoop Dogg. They have a genuine kind of humility. When they’re with their brothers in music, their brothers in arms or whatever, they’re just cool ass people. There’s certain people with a certain cool about them in the world that are [actually] assholes. They dress fly, they dope, but they assholes. I can’t tell you what’s what and “this is cool,” I can just tell who is cool.
DX: I’m glad you mentioned Bun B. With the press during Food & Liquor, you came across as a fan of Nas and The Native Tongues and all that, but I also know that through your siblings, you’re a big follower of gangsta rap too…
LF: I was listening to [Pytor] Tchaikovsky. My brother was listening to gangsta rap. My sister was listening to eclectic…whatever. We were all listening to the radio. Trying to be cool with my brother, [I got into it]. At certain points with my sister, I’d say, “I can’t work with that.” They both had somewhat of an influence – not as much what my sister played, only some. She might play a Fugees album while my brother would be bumpin’ OutKast and Psycho Drama and N.W.A. and No Limit. They were both dope. They both had their highs and both had their lows. It was one of the things that was ambient. I kinda pull something from both of them.
DX: You’ve spoken a lot about your love for It Was Written. Most people go right to Illmatic. People are almost expected to love and study the same 15 classic rap albums or hear the same two every week. Maybe we saw this a little bit after the Vh1 incident with A Tribe Called Quest, but do you sense elitism in Hip Hop?
LF: It’s a bad thing. To me, it’s tantamount to racism. It’s tom foolery of me to think that everybody would be open to everything else because you have people in the south who shun stuff from the east coast; if you’re from the east coast, you shun stuff that comes from the south…there’s always peer-pressure. There’s always people who push to be the elite. Like racism, everybody needs to be at some level of universality where we at least respect that we all didn’t come up in the same circumstances. We all don’t have the same influences. We’re all trying to reach the same goals, and it’s all underneath Hip Hop. But some people will push it out, and that’s when it starts to get a little spooky. Don’t shun mine ‘cause it’s got 808 [drums] in it; I won’t shun yours ‘cause it’s got a bunch of Soul samples in it. It’s all trying to reach the understanding. It can get real serious, real nasty in certain instances, but it is what it is.
DX: In the last year, what’s the best experience you’ve had with your music?
LF: The touring. Going out there and performing. That’s one of the smaller things that I actually look forward to doing. Going on and jumping on stage and performing for my fans, and seeing their reaction instantly. That’s what music is. If you go back 300 years ago to the symphonies, there was no portable music. You had to come and see the music performed. That’s why you dressed up; it was an event. That was where it started. That’s the most fun – whether it’s 60,000 or a little club, it’s always exciting.
DX: As a more seasoned performer, how much did performance affect the making of The Cool?
LF: I definitely went back and made performance records. After Jay-Z saw me perform at Nokia Theater, he said, “Yo, your show is dope! You just need one or two more records to really get the crowd and build on the show.” If you look at Jay’s show, all Jay does is come out and perform all hits. All his records. He can do “Jigga, My Nigga” then “Hard Knock Life,” then go way back and pull “Dead Presidents” or something. Me going into this album, it was me making records that were ill performance records. We’re not even taking time off tour. As we’re leading up to this album, we’ve been phasing out records we were performing from Food & Liquor and just adding stuff from The Cool. In the middle of next year, we’ll be performing all Cool records. That’s definitely learning and getting [records designed for various points of a concert].
DX: How do you think the label, or the whole movement going into the sophomore effort would have been different had you won that Grammy?
LF: I don’t know. I don’t know. It could have been a catastrophe. It could have meant nothing. It could have meant everything. I don’t know. That’s such a small thing. The Grammy has a time limit. There’s a time limit where you can keep using it and keep using it, and then it don’t mean anything. For certain people. The powers that be. They’ll be like, “That don’t mean nothin’. What’d you do for me lately?”
DX: What’s going on with your label? We were talking about Gemini’s release this time last year…
LF: It’s hustling. The Cool is definitely the foremost, ‘cause that’s the bread-winner for the company. Gemini is next in line. Matthew Santos is definitely right there. We’re pushing a whole ‘nother lane. It’s a very small staff. We were focusing on expanding it and really kinda pushing on getting everybody out in ’08. We want everybody out there workin’ before we grow stagnant…before Lupe Fiasco phenomenon wears off and I fade away, I want to make sure I hit, hit, hit, hit. Gemini, it was problems with the distribution that sewed it up, but it’s done. Then The Cool came. Honestly, as an executive, I didn’t have time to focus on his and focus on mine. So let me just go out here and rock mine, do what I do, and then “Here, take this thing. Here’s your world tour.”
DX: Food & Liquor was the one time where an off-label executive producer really seemed to mean something. Jay-Z’s cosign was huge. With 50 Cent and Lil’ Scrappy and Freeway, that wasn’t as proven. With Snoop Dogg and Tru-Life, he’s still on the shelf right now. How do you think that helped, and what’s your overall view of this seemingly overused tactic?
LF: I think Jay just got his Quincy Jones on. I think it’s something that’s done in other genres. A lot of the Rock bands, you don’t even know about these producers, but they have producers, guys who are well-known that do a total jump. I just think Jay and other people are progressing into that lane where they take their expertise with the music and try to put that with other artists in a more production role. Not just, “help me on a song” and keep it movin’. [They are] actually behind the scenes, making it happen by pushing buttons. Things of that nature. I think that’s something that’s part of reaching that other level. For somebody to respect you enough to actually come out and do that, I think it’s dope, a progression.
