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Fairly soon. Stay tuned for those. This podcast is just a brand cardis on a Joe House. We talked about a lot of basketball, Tiger Woods, and we talked about Frank DeFort, who passed away one of my favorite writers this week.
You can check that out in the archives. Right now we have Ice Cube coming up and I'm going to give you my NBA Finals pick. First Pearl Jam. Welcome to the podcast.
If you're waiting for Ice Cube, he's coming. We taped it yesterday actually. I wanted to put my NBA Finals prediction down once and for all. I've looked at it from every angle.
Tates here with me. What's up, Tate? I've looked at it from every angle. This is the appetizer to the ice cube dinner on Trev, which was fantastic.
I think you guys are really going to enjoy it. But initially I thought we're some five. I did not like the way the Cavs defended myself. That had wide open shots the entire series and yes, most of them.
I thought that was a bad sign for the Cavs. Then the backlash started with, well, wait, Cleveland has a chance. Everyone's kind of the mountain. That whole thing I got a little caught up in that.
And now I think I'm in the right place. Go and stay in six. Just bumped it up one game. I bumped it up one game.
So we're 2015 Finals. That's where we are. Six games to win. Six.
I figure LeBron's worth one and Kyrie's worth one. LeBron will be awesome in another game that they won't win. My question is, debating between six or seven will Mike Brown cost the Warriors a game in this series. But I think these teams know each other so well.
And there's a predictability as good as they are with what's going to happen. It's not like Mike Brown is going to be like, oh my God, I never expected this. The Cavs have seven players who are going to play in this series, maybe eight. They are very specific about what they do and how they handle their business.
And I'm not positive. There's going to be a massive. What would possibly happen in this series that would be like, wow, it's too bad. Steve Kerr wasn't there.
Mike Brown can handle it. I think the only thing that you have to worry about is if someone like a Steph or Kevin Durant, if it gets to them, the insecurity of the moment gets them again. I think Steph had the insecurity happen to him last year when he really got in his head. The rants back for the first.
He was hurt too. Yeah, and he was hurt. But if you have one of those moments, I think that's when Kerr really steps in. Right.
And that's the only thing that I could see. So my counter that was they fell apart in the fourth quarter of the game seven last year and had Steve Kerr. And he was there. And he was there.
So Steve Kerr and Mike Brown difference. I don't think it's a strategy thing. I think I agree with you on it. It's a settle down guys thing.
And I really think it's even more more so a dream on thing because I'm sure the Cavs are going to try to provoke your dream on this entire series. This is part of their game point. Get him talking, get technicals, get him to do something dumb. Talk talk talk.
Hit him bump him elbow him. Get in his face. Try to get him out of his game. Did you think last year like Draymond had to he was trying to show that he was tough and the Warriors were tough and now he's not going to do that as much?
I feel like they what's the point the whole team has to prove they're tough. I feel like Draymond took it on himself and his own himself to show the bogey. He was like I have to be the tough guy. I have to stay tough in the series.
Yeah. And that bit him in the ass last year. Right now. Steph has to show his tough.
Clay has to show his tough. The rain has to prove that he's worthy of being on the stage again. Like all that toughness has to come from elsewhere. But then again it's Dremont.
I've heard that's a rant point made. Are we sure that the rain has to prove anything in the series? Not in my opinion. No.
I just feel like he's he won the MVP. He made the finals when he was like 23. Yeah. He seems very content with the play.
He's not a great team. He's not one of the great teams ever. I would love to pick 16 and 0. I think that would have been so much fun to root for, especially if they win the first two.
But I think Kyrie is great. He killed my team. I think we were going to win game four. As crazy as that sounds.
Not even playing that well when LeBron got the fourth foul. And Kyrie was just like I'm going to score all the time over and over and over again. And I'm going to make really hard shots even though you're playing defense. It looked like from the Olympics this summer.
The scary thing about Kyrie was they won the title. He hits the big shot and then go to the Olympics and it was like oh this guy is like the best score on Team USA right now. And he's like kept it up all year. So they don't really have any to guard him, which is a problem.
I don't think LeBron is unguarded when he wants to be. So you're talking about two guys in another team who can't be guarded. And then there's certain guys that the Warriors have that just aren't going to play in the series. They're not going to be able to play Zaza.
They're not going to be able to play Jeville McGee. I don't think they're going to be able to play David West. I think they're going to have to play like seven guys. So who's the one that guards Tristan Thompson?
Is it Dremon? It's like well all right. So they put Zaza on Tristan Thompson. LeBron calls him over and just runs screens so he can get one on one with Zaza.
So that would you know. Well he dunks on Zaza. Yeah. At any point if Zaza or David West or Jeville is out there, they always know they can run that screen roll.
So on the flip side, the Warriors have the same thing. They're going to put love in screen roll all the time. So if Zaza is in there, then Kevin Love can guard Zaza. And that maybe not get caught up in that.
But when they put the Durant, Dremon, Clay, Curry, and let's say, he would always the fifth guy, where's Kevin Love going? Whoever he's guarding, they're going to put in screen roll. So it's going to be, I think it's going to be the most complicated strategy matchup we've had from a, oh, you're doing this. I'm doing this.
Oh, you're going to do this. Oh, then I'll do this. And neither team has the answer. So those in-game situations with Mike Brown, that's what I want to see, how much he changes.
Because it's cursed traveling with the team. He's going to be making game plans. They're going to be like, if LeBron's going to guard Clay or LeBron's going to guard, he would try to hide on defense. We need to get him in these switches and stuff.
Right. How much does Mike Brown have say in making those changes in game? Well, not so like a chess match. What happens if the Cavs say we're leaving, we don't open the whole series.
Exactly. Knock yourself out. You tend threes again. We'll get them to you.
You'll make three. Yeah. So then that's where you want Steve Kerr to be like, oh, okay, you're going to do that. I'm going to have Iguadal run in the baseline and try to get layups and go back there.
They have so much movement. And I think the most encouraging thing for the Warriors is all the easy shots that Celtics are able to get just by moving versus playing one. And the Cavs are going to slow it down. They're going to try to get into, you know, first of all, if they make shots or they get an offense, rebound and put them in, then the Warriors can't go on the other end.
Yep. So- It was Tristan Thompson. Yeah. Tristan Thompson dominates the Warriors.
You can dominate. Yeah. That's a whole different situation. I think the matchups are really nice for the Cavs.
I just don't think defensively they're going to be able to get stops. If they- Love is going to have to play for them to win. There's too many shooters and they're not going to be able to run out in time. I watch it in the Celtics series.
Do you think Durant ever matches up and just says, I want to guard LeBron? He's going to have to. Yeah. Because obviously 2015 that's what Iguadal wins MVP is because he guards LeBron last year.
He seemed like he was a little short. Obviously maybe a little bit banged up. He doesn't guard LeBron as well. LeBron takes over.
This year, they have like instead of Harrison Barnes being the fallback guy, now they have Durant to come over to guard LeBron. And if it's LeBron Durant, that's a whole different. I mean, that's- Well, think about it. If he can play LeBron to his stance though, he's going to win the MVP.
That's how good LeBron is. to rent played in a draw here's your MVP trophy. Yeah, you already had the blueprint like you got just by playing defense. He didn't have to be hit some big threes and stuff, but just by playing defense on the Brown, they're like, Oh, you stopped at best by the series.
You're the MVP. But if he guards LeBron, the Browns get tried getting a voucher with the whole time. And that's the danger. And then you worry about his offense like if clay doesn't step up, does what I mean is the rant like the ego of the ramp being like, I want to stop LeBron where he has to work hard on defense, then he loses it on offense.
Clay doesn't step up. And then you get back into the curry has to carry this team. And then we get to, Oh, well, the Warriors are short handed. They're having to rely on Ian Clark.
They have to rely on all these other guys. So if if Katie guards LeBron and Curry's on Kyrie, which would not be ideal, you probably want to put clay on Kyrie. Yeah. And then they switch so that glaze on LeBron and Durant's on Kyrie.
That's a problem for Durant because Kyrie will be able to stutter step and shoot over him. That's why I think this is going to be a long series. And the rest is really going to help them. Yeah.
I went from thinking Warriors and five words and five words and five words and five. Then I looked at the schedule. They have a great shot to win game one, you know, perfect situation for them. LeBron with all this rest, where is Miss couple shots.
You're going to have a crowd that's going to be not your typical words crowd. A lot of big wig dudes, a lot of people are just there to be there. It's in their head too. They lost game seven.
And they lost game seven. And Kyrie is going to go into the series thinking he's better than Curry. Yeah. So you have the best two players on the Cavs think they're better than anyone.
The Warriors, which is a problem. That's not like, oh shit, we're playing the Warriors. They're going to go at them. They're going to be throwing swings.
I just think the Warriors have real shooting matchups in their favor. That they'll be able to get good shots anytime they want. And that will put an incredible amount of pressure on the Warriors to just match the scoring. Yeah.
Which, you know, the Celtics biggest problem was when they when they protected the three point line, then the Cavs could drive by them and they had no rim protection. They basically Al Horford and that's it. But usually was Olenek. Yeah.
So the Warriors have, have Dremon, who's the best defensive player in the week other than Kawhi and Durant too. So I do hate to say this, but I think foul trouble is going to determine some of this stuff. The rank gets stupid fast. But my pick is I think the Cavs and I think the Warriors win in six and I think KD is the most logical finals.
He's the best odds, but I think he's the most logical pick because defensively they have nobody to guard him. It's not just in Thompson. It's not Kevin Love. It has to be LeBron.
Yep. So the corporate now has to play. So he's out there either for Kevin Love or Jarrah Smith. Yeah.
So now you can leave him open and you can't screen with him at all. And I don't know, it's a chess match. It's going to be a great series. And the playoffs were really awful.
I did not enjoy them. But now it's going to pay off with some really good games that are almost going to play at like full-wall games. Like how we're like, oh, the Patriots against Atlanta. How are they going to?
It reminds me of that. It's going to be fun. I'm just worried if Durant does get the finals MVP, the free agency of Stephen Curry is going to be very fun. Oh, you're saying this is a Charlotte Finn?
I'm just saying in general the fact that now we have two finals wins for the Warriors in three years. EgoDawg wins a 15. My guardian LeBron when LeBron goes crazy. 2017 Durant wins.
Then Warriors Curry, you know. I think Steph's going to be great in this series. He's been unbelievable in the playoffs. That's been sort of strange how under the radar has been.
He and LeBron have both been the two best players in the playoffs. Yeah. You know what is a fun Warriors, Rinkle and why I do things as I will play and David West will play. They'll find spots for them as they're going to hit the shit out of LeBron.
Oh, yeah. And they will knock down Kyrie. You know, the most frustrating thing for me as a Celtics fan in that last series was just they had too much respect for those guys. And they didn't treat them like it was a playoffs.
Except for Jarebco. He was the only one. He's the only one that's not there. He's the only one who was totally undaunted.
But you got to hit those guys, man. And the problem for the Warriors is J-Mond and Durant, you can't waste a thousand that, but you can waste a thousand that, but you can waste a thousand with J-Ville McGee and your boy, the Rev, James McAdoo. Yeah. And you can spend 24 fouls just nailing people every time they come into the paint.
So it's not a bad idea to do that. I said the LeBron free throw thing will be a fun supply to just really stuck in physical with them and trying to make him shoot 24 throws in a game. If they do the hack a shack with LeBron and they hack LeBron and send him to the line. That will be so interesting because then it comes into that's an isolated experience and people are going to remember him missing free throws if that's what they try to do.
And they want, I mean, the Warriors got embarrassed last year by LeBron and I know that they want to do something to make him a focal point of some sort of embarrassment. So if he's missing free throws and they know that. Yeah. And Mike Brown knows that.
It won't be hack a shack, but it'll be every time he has a layup or a dunk you foul him instead of giving him the layup. You shouldn't say that. Just hit him every time. Yeah.
Because we know he's going on a layup or dunk, but he might be a 65% shooter in these playoffs and that flips it. And they're going to have the fouls because there's going to be six guys who matter. Seven. Six.
Six. The big four plus, Iggy plus Livingston. Yeah. That's six.
Yeah. And then the four guys with 24 fouls and those guys have to just hit the shit out of. And Kyrie is another one that I don't feel like gets knocked down enough. I'm not advocating violence.
I'm just saying like the guy goes to the rim really hard hit him. Yeah. Make him pay. Try to block it.
If you don't block it, knock him down. He'll get up. Make the free throws. You can't know.
Yeah. I don't think they do that, unfortunately. So what do you, what's your pick? I think it's going to go seven just because of, I don't feel like there's any way after the rest of the playoffs they don't want.
I think that fouls, you're going to see a differential some of these games where they get back into these games. I think it goes seven. I think the Warriors will get redemption at home in game seven. But it is weird that both years, whether we've had these two teams that the weight team is one, you know, not in their hometown.
So we've never even seen a team win the championship with their home crowd there. And that's, that's my fear with, if it goes to seven, if I'm a Warriors fan, is a casting coming in that has already won a game seven, which does not happen. Yes. It's the hardest thing in the planet today is winning game seven of the finals in the NBA.
You do it in hockey. You do it in baseball football, it's neutral. But in basketball, it just doesn't happen. The home team almost always wins.
I'm trying to think of there's any other X factor for me. I think personally, I think Pat McCall is a big X factor for the Warriors. If they just have like a little scoring bench where he just got it. He has at the Kyrie mentality, which looks very unbothered by any moment.
So if he just were to come in and hit three or four big threes and you're just like, oh, Pat McCall had 15 points last night. So you take this as your rookie and experience coming in. Pat McCall's not going to happen in fact. He's going to be terrified.
He's the tire finals. I know he's inspired now, but when you get to the finals, it is like big balls time. Yeah, it is like I've been here before. I just think it's going to come down to like, I think every game is going to feel like a game seven because usually in the finals, you have these peaks and then you have the game where like the young guys come in for the Warriors.
I don't think this series is going to be like that. I think it's going to be each one's going to be like a game seven, which I don't really remember in recent memory anyway, a basketball series being like that. They always have little edge and folds. I'm sure Cleveland will toss away a game.
There's going to be a game where Golden State's just 22 for 38 from three and Cleveland realizes late in the third quarter. They're not coming back and they'll turn the Jets off. I also see like the garbage time say Warriors are up by a lot and they still have Stefan Dreyman of those guys in and if Cleveland's down, like Dante Jones comes in. Oh, yeah.
And those guys are in there too strictly trying to get a technical, trying to get someone ejected, trying to get something to happen that will shake the series up. So that was rewatching game seven. I was fascinated that Jefferson was out there for so many big minutes because he's not the same guy this year. Yeah.
So and they haven't really it's not like they replaced him with anybody different anyway. I'm excited I'm going to game one. Nice. I I will be back in time Friday for a recap and we'll be doing a podcast on that but perfect.
I'm excited for game one. Me too. I am excited for all the games and my pick is the Warriors in six. So anyway, we had ice you by an as promised.
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What a pleasure here with ice cube. Hey, yay. We actually sort of worked together a while ago on 3430. You were in the first series.
I remember being blown away that we got you to be involved with one of them. It was about the Raiders. Yeah. I'm in LA and who knew when we were doing that one?
What was that? Six, seven years ago that the Raiders would be in this. Now they're in Vegas where you must have been rooting for them to come back, right? Definitely.
You know, I felt like it was a perfect fit and everything was going right. You know, I was like the Chargers are coming, which the Raiders coming in Carson. They back. We got them.
You move charges to the NFC. Yeah, get rid of the Chargers. You bring the Seahawks back to the AFC. We got us a nice little family there.
We might even start rooting for the Chargers if they wasn't in the AFC in the same building. But all that money come in in St. Louis and the Rams and it kind of threw a monkey wrench in my dream of having the Raiders back. Well, that might seem like there might be a chance where the Rams build the stadium.
They needed the second tenant. Yeah. And it's like, well, why would it be the Raiders? And then, you know, I hate to bring up race two minutes in the podcast, but it really did seem like they were afraid of having Raider fans in that stadium because I can't think of another reason why you would pick the Chargers over the Raiders.
Well, you don't want to build a stadium and your tenant is more popular than, you know, so there was something like it was a Raider fan. Yo, we don't want to compete. We build a new stadium for our team and we don't want to compete for the love of the fans. You said, where'd the Chargers did?
They're not going to compete with any Chinas. I'll say take a word out and get about San Diego's. I don't think they're coming to Inglewood and I believe the Orange County fans are definitely not coming to Inglewood. So I don't know what they was thinking with this one.
I don't know. It really does seem like they've created the situation where the fans are going to be the other team's fans. Like, all the Bears are playing the Chargers in Carson. Yeah.
30,000 Bears fans. Chargers fans selling their tickets on the secondary market. Yeah. And that's where we're headed.
And by the way, when the Raiders play there, I promise you there's going to be all Raiders fans in that game. Yeah. I mean, you know, they're going to feel like even when they playing Inglewood, they're going to feel like the visiting team in their own stadium. Yeah.
It's kind of weird. So you were saying before we started that, you thought that that 30 for 30 that we did in a roundabout way kind of paved the way for maybe the movie happening, which is fantastic. Yeah. It's on HBO all the time.
Yeah, without a doubt. You know, it was a good thing. You know, what happened was it was just an influx of interest. Yeah.
You know, with, you know, not only with the 30 for 30, which was, you know, a whole new, you know, history that people really didn't realize, you know, so it was always there. But before we did the 30 for 30, you know, straight out of LA, people didn't realize that the true intersection of sports and music with NWA and the Raiders. So, you know, at the same time, VH1 did a world's most dangerous group. And then they did behind the music on me and Dre.
And it just was this influx of interest. And when people saw those documentaries put together, you know, they were more, you know, I guess open to see a movie. Yeah. Of this caliber because they knew it had all the ingredients to be a great movie if we did it right.
It was the 30 for 30 of us. And I like the lot of the ones we did with the first series, but we, you know, we did a lot of it on the fly and a lot of it, you're grabbing filmmakers and we're trying to get the 30, we're trying to match topics and filmmakers, all this stuff. And you don't really know what we're going to get. And I think I remember seeing a rough cut of yours and thinking, this is what the series is because it was, it was a story that was a story, but it wasn't like the biggest story ever, but it was a story that mattered.
We were kind of making people go, oh, I remember that. But then also going, oh, I didn't realize that. And if you do the, I remember that cross with the, oh, I didn't realize that. And it felt relevant in the moment too, because it was like perfect.
It was hitting all these different things. Then we had you as the ambassador for it. And I was like, this is, this is a blueprint of something beyond what we anticipated. Now I'm extremely proud of Straight Out LA.
It's a good one. It helps out. Yeah, without a doubt. And when you, in entertainment, you start off in music and you move to being an actor and then you say, hey, I want to produce something more and write something more.
I want to, you never know when you're stepping out of bounds. You never know when you've bitten off morning, you can shoot until some people tell you that suck. You realize I'm not that good at that. Yeah.
But so diving into a documentary style film was new territory in a lot of ways for me. We had done a series called Black White for FX, which it was a reality show where we took a white family and put them in with a black family to live together. But the white family, we put in makeup and made them black. And the black family, we put in makeup and made them white and had them go out into the community and basically talk about their experiences.
So that was the only little thing we had done diving into documentary type filmmaking. So to be able to dive into sports, to be able to dive into the Raiders at that time was a dream come true for me because I get to interview how long and I get to have interaction with some of these guys who are my heroes growing up. So it was kind of cool to be able to do that. And you had, that team intersected with video games because Bo Jackson was the greatest video game character who's ever lived in the technical bowl.
Then you had all the merchandise and stuff. I really do feel like that was the first team where it just seemed like everyone wore their hats. But this was the hats, the jackets, the gear, you guys, your group pushed that to a whole other level and then that became the model for the next 25 years of people wearing sports paraphernalia. In a lot of ways, yeah, because we would go to other cities, you know, we'd be in Cincinnati, we'd be in, you know, Houston.
And we'd go to buy Raider gear thinking, oh, they'll probably buy bingles gear here. Yeah, you probably got all the oils gear. So we'll be able to go get a Raider hat, something. No, all the Raider gear is gone.
And everybody else team stuff is up there. So we knew, then we go to the show that night, see the whole crowd in Raider gear. And we knew that this was a phenomenon that was happening that had little to do with football in the field. How much of that was luck?
A lot. Okay. I mean, you know, the Raiders even moving to LA in 83, you know, to 94. So that's the NWA sweet spot in a lot of ways because we come around.
We started hitting it 87, 88, you know, by 89, we got our whole flavor on what we're going to be look like do how it's all going to come out. And so the Raiders being here was a big, you know, was a big part of that because it helps them in our image in a lot of ways, you know, running around in purple and gold or running around in, you know, Dodger Blue, right, don't really convey, you know, the music we were trying to convey to the world. So the silver and black, you know, that patch, you know, the imagery. Plus the pirates.
Yeah. The pirates. And they will win it. And they won.
Yeah. You know, I mean, they won the Super Bowl and, you know, had marquee players. So it was, you know, it was, it was perfect time. We ran a piece on the ringer about the Raiders from somebody who worked for them as their GM for years and years, Michael and Vardy.
And he was saying, how Davis didn't even care what the first name of the team was because the hymn, it was just the Raiders. It was like, didn't really matter. And now they're the Vegas Raiders. It was like, doesn't matter.
The Raiders were the thing. It's so strange that they were in that way though, having, I've lived in that way now for 15 years, like the Raiders and everything there. And then just compared to like the Dodgers and the Lakers, as you said, like the purple and Dodger Stadium and the blue and then you have this Raiders command. That's one of the reasons I love the documentary so much.
Yeah, because it was like outcasts without a doubt. And if you go into the Coliseum, you know, it's feel like a street game. Blacktop tackle. You know what I'm saying?
So I think them being right there in the Coliseum, because the Coliseum is basically kissing the hood. You know what I'm saying? It's like, it's the Coliseum, you step across the street, you know what I'm saying? So to me, it was the element of LA that people don't want to look at and don't want to acknowledge most of the time.
People just want to acknowledge Bikini's and beach. Randy, do you even have L.A.? Yeah, you know. And that's cool.
That is LA. It's a underbelly, you know, that people, you know, now know more about than they did back then. But it's still a part of LA that people don't want to, you know, want to, you know, check up. I'll take it from my end because I grew up in Boston.
And especially when the 84 finals and all that stuff. And we were like, we're the tough guys, these LA guys, they're the Pussies. They're like, they're out there in the beach and they play soft and we're physical and we beat them in 84 because we were tougher. And we had no idea about the side that you just talked about.
Well, I mean in 84, you guys were a tougher team. Yeah, with the big clothesline. You guys had. And when looking back, the Lakers at the time got caught up in that and didn't play and they was worried about being tough.
But by 85, the Lakers a little tougher. They were ready. And they were ready for the challenge to be able to be tough and play and keep that composure. The magic got tough.
The 84 finals was the best thing that happened to Magic. Yeah, I pushed him down too. I made him, you know, it made him, it gave him a dark side that I think he needed. Yeah, even though that finals like hurt me more than, it hurt me more than losing to Boston.
And you know, this last updated, you know, Kobe versus the big three. Yeah. Yeah, that 84 was painful. It was painful.
And now they're talking about this finals that we have now, whether this is the most star studded finals ever. Because there's seven all stars on the Cavs and whereas I still feel like that 84, 587 with the characters that we had with Magic Bird and Karim, three of the top six ever. Yeah. Worthy, Michael, Dennis Johnson, Michael Cooper.
It just, Pat Riley is the coach. Like it just feels like, I think there was more star studded back then, that's my point. It felt like it. Yeah.
It felt like more of a big deal. And probably because that was when ESPN wasn't like all over the place and all these other networks that bring sports to you more probably more than you would want. But back then it was kind of laser focused on all series. Now it feels like a manufactured fight instead of a...
It's a business arrangement between people who carefully picked their teams. Seems like it. Back then it just seemed like, hey man, these are the cards you dealt. You got to play with the cards you dealt.
And if you can win with the cards you dealt, you're a bad boy. You know what I'm saying? So it's a little strange nowadays. You know, when you see players really having the lead kind of, you know, by the ball so to speak, they can kind of go make a super team whether the fans wanted or not.
When did you guys get big enough that you started going to make your games with good seats? I started going around the time they got shot. Like a little bit before they got shot. So no, actually before that.
Late 80s? No, no, early 90s. I was in that, I was in, you know, I saw Jordan in the 91 final. You know, I had great seats.
Right. It was just seeing him up close, you know, and just like not believing this guy's going to get a bit of mileage. Yeah, remember in 91 it was like Jordan came in the big one. Yeah, it was.
Once he goes to one single final one. Yeah. Lakers one, gay one and then, you know, I put my feet up. I made a lot of money in the Lakers that's serious.
It was one of my first game, one of my first really bad gaming losses. I lost a lot of pride. Yeah. You know, I had to, you know, give it up to Michael.
You don't want to be a fan of Mike. You know, you want to, you know, we got magic, you know, we got Kareem. Yeah. We got teams who got rings.
This dude don't even have a ring. Right. And to see him ascend to greatness through all of these, you know, foes. It was kind of like, you know, seeing like Batman destroyed his enemies one by one, you know, it was crazy.
Right. Did you follow the 25th anniversary of Rodney King, all that stuff? There was documentaries and magazine pieces like six, seven weeks ago and it was, it was in the news cycle for about a week. We following that?
Not really. It's kind of, it's nauseating. You know what I mean? It kind of, it makes me feel messed up inside, you know what I'm saying?
So I don't really need to relive all this stuff. Right. I kind of hate the fact that, you know, some news channels just rehash a lot of mess for nothing. Yeah.
Yeah. What do you remember about those three days? Because I didn't move to LA till 2002. And when I was here, when I got here, it was like, you know, the riots, you had the earthquake OJ.
And it was like this four year span of just craziness and people were still settling down from it. And you remember that? Just mad. You know, I just remember being pissed off about everything.
And you know, the only good thing I saw come out of it was the peace treaty between the crypts and the bloods. You know, that was, you know, a beautiful thing. That was like what I hang my hat on when it comes to the riots is the peace treaty, seeing, you know, a park full of bloods and crypts settling their differences. And you know, you got casualties on each side, you know, they have just had Memorial Day.
We need a Memorial Day for, you know, the hood soldiers and the ghetto vets that's out there. But, you know, just seeing guys coming together and trying to work together, trying to figure it out, trying to unite. That was the most beautiful thing out of the whole riots. Did you get about that, though?
To a certain extent, you know, at the time, you know, I was always looking for a way to expand it, you know, to figure out a way to take it just from off the park, out of parks, just then bring it to the streets or to the public. So it helped us form West Side Connection, which was a group where it was me, Dubcie and Mac Ten. Me and Dubcie, we grew up on the crypt side of LA and Mac Ten grew up on the blood side of LA. So having us doing records together really did a lot for the spirit of the truce and for the spirit of trying to bury the hatchets and understand that we all together.
And you know, to me, it did a lot for that because to this day you still have, I still know, Christian bloods that kick it together, low ride together, hang out, motorcycle, you know, just from that truce, they never broke the bond again. And that's cool because, you know, it's a lot of divisiveness that's going on in LA. And so I always think back to that time. You were involved, I would say the three things that would bring everybody together in that situation would be music, movies, sports, right?
So your music assets, as you guys are sending from 87, 88, 89, it didn't matter where you're from, everybody was into it, right? Yeah. And I think there's people still holding out. It was still people holding out.
I think until 89, I think until the Straight Outta Compton album hit, you know, and then it was just kind of... Everybody's in at that point. Yeah, because it was so many things to set you up for that, you know, and the world was ready for it. It was perfect timing because it was, you know, it was right after like, you know, boogie down productions and public enemy, ICE T.
And these guys had teed up, you know, us for success. And you were tapping into stuff that even though everybody in LA knew about it, I don't think everybody knew about it. And it wasn't really until The Riding King and even the stuff that Earl Gates was doing, the two, three years before that, like living in New England, I didn't know what was going on. Yeah.
And that's why we didn't think we were going to ever, you know, be in rock and roll all the frame one day, you know, because we felt like this was something we were living in LA. And the people in LA didn't even want to know about it. So we felt like we didn't have a chance with people, you know, as far as Boston, you know, I mean, for us in New York, we felt like these dudes would never understand what we're going through and never even care because people here don't care. So by seeing it blow up and, you know, one day they called me and said, Hey, man, we got to show in Chicago.
I'm like, what? How do they know about our record in Chicago? We got to show regal theater, you know, and it was cool to start to see the music spread like a wildfire and go, you know, first was doing shows in Phoenix and Vegas and the Bay area. And then we're in Portland, we're in Denver, you know, I'm saying, then we're in, you know, Salt Lake City and St.
Louis and it just started to just grow, you know. But the reaction initially, at least from outside was, well, these guys are going after the police. You can't do that. You know, and you had that and it seemed like it took a while for people to actually listen to what you, what not just your group, but other people were singing about like what the genesis of that stuff was.
Yeah, with shocking, you know, at the time, because, you know, before us, Rodney King, any of that stuff, police could do no wrong. I mean, if a cop got on the stand pointed you out, you go into jail, man. I mean, it's like nobody ever questioned the cops motives. Right.
And, you know, so we do our song and now, and then I see what cop killing, you know, these two songs are powerful and they're right behind each other. And, you know, at first it's outrage, then you see Rodney King. Now the movie is starting to come into focus. Do you regret?
Is there anything if you could do that side of it differently and push the same attention toward what you guys are talking about without being as outrageous with the song? Do you think that would have been more beneficial or not? No, I don't think so because the song was, you know, therapy. Yeah, yeah.
For us, it was like, you know, you couldn't do nothing physically to the police. You know, that was just not even in our thought process, but this song was like our weapon, you know, it was like our way to, you know, protest what was happening and not be nice about it. I love your movie. And I thought how they set up that song was my favorite part of the movie.
Yeah. Because you could actually feel it. It's like, these are the moments that led to this song. And here's why you was able to feel it because, you know, you realize what the police don't, or what the police don't take time to realize is that, you know, you're basically dealing with some good dudes.
You're not dealing with that criminal element that you don't mind the police deal with in the way. You see what I'm saying? So that's what makes you say, man, come on, you know, these dudes are trying to make it out, you know, leave them alone. You know, I'm saying that's the, that's the feeling you have.
And you know, that's kind of how we were, you know, even easy, you know, doing what he was doing, he was basically trying to get out of that. This was his way out was music because he didn't want to do that no more. Yeah. Because he knows it dead in.
And so that's what makes you, that's what pisses you off, man, about the police, you know what I mean? It's like, you see a dude going to a church, you know, shoot up people and they walk him out in a damn bulletproof vest and they want nobody to touch him. But then they go beat up some 18 year old kid, mouth and off at the beach, you know what I mean? They want to rough him up and, you know, teach him a lesson.
It's like, dude, use that energy on the guy y'all putting in a bulletproof vest, kick somebody, ask, kick somebody, ask that you know who did it, who deserve it. It was a criminal, you know, not some kid mouth and off at you or, you know, so that's the problem. It's like, you know, it becomes, you know, a bully mentality and not just, you know, trying to take the bad guys off the street, teach them a lesson, you know, it's like, you're teaching everybody a lesson that you run across. How do you, I mean, obviously you're not talking about every policeman because we have great policemen too, right?
Of course. So you're talking about a couple of other people that spoil everybody. How do you reconcile that when you meet a good policeman, somebody who does their job well and has done everything right? And he meets you and he's like, you're the guy who's in that group where that's on.
Yeah, they usually love me. You know, usually you want to take pictures, you know, even if I do the song, they'll want to take pictures backstage because, you know, it is a good cop bad cop, uh, phenomenon out there. And you know, what we would love for the good cops to do is point out these bad apples, man, get them off the force. Yeah.
So you guys can get your respect back from the community. Right. Because the community understands the necessity of the police and why they need to be there. They love them the fact that they're there.
What they don't love is the abuse. Yeah. You know what I mean? So, you know, and you think for like, the Rodney King was the one that became infamous, but I mean, was that once a week?
Man, that's every day somewhere, every day somewhere. Yeah. And the other thing that is because I was saying this coming up, you know, just how to police deal with people in our neighborhoods and in our communities is just too heavy handed, too heavy handed. And how do you keep your attachment to those neighborhoods?
Because you've had so much success over the last 30 years, you know, and it does seem like one of the ironies of somebody like you, Dre or Kendrick, anybody is, they hit a certain point and now they've kind of, they're able to move out. They're going to another neighborhood. The stuff they're singing about writing about is in the same stuff that would connect with somebody who's 18 years old living in the worst part of LA. How do you reconcile with it?
Well, you know, most of us are the most successful people in our generation. Yeah. And in our family. So, everything that connects us to family is usually still in the neighborhood, you know, except our immediate, you know, my Indian mom, my dad out, brothers just do my help out.
But for the most part, you know, all of our loved ones are still in it. And, you know, so if you're not a person who's trying to fly away, you know, you stay connected and, you know, now you feel, at least I do, I feel like I need to speak for people who can't speak for themselves. Yeah. So, you know, my ears to the street a little more just to be able to make sure that I can, you know, take some pain, you know, and hopefully, you know, help the world to understand what we go through, you know, and that's what it's all about.
You know, that's what's the beautiful thing about music is it's all understanding. It's all a way for humans to understand each other. Yeah. Behavior.
And it's all discovery. So, that's what it is. And yet, boys in the hood, I would argue, was just as powerful if not more. Yeah.
Right. Yeah. I mean, what do you think, what do you think hit more people? Your music or that movie in the early 90s?
Oh, man. It's hard to say because the movies are so, you know, it's the best LA movie. Yeah. I mean, it's a movie that really, to me, before a movie like that, you're just seeing people like Doughboy on the 11 o'clock news, you know, in the back of police car and you don't know his story.
Why is he like that? You know, why? Because there's some, yeah, sports illustrated profile or some sports center, Sunday night, five minute piece, that's it. And you never get to be that fly on the wall.
You know, when I first read it, I couldn't believe that they were gonna make a movie about how we grew up. Right. Is this movie worthy? You know what I mean?
Because when you end it, you don't think nobody give a damn about you or what's happening to you or what's what you're going through on a day to day basis. So to see, you know, Columbia, I want to put money behind doing a movie about what you live every day. It was kind of was was I was just curious like why, you know, I just didn't believe our story was movie worth. You think movies are like Batman?
Yeah, you know, like Charles, Star Wars, you know, right as a lost art. But you know, to to be a part of it is just. What was the time you watched it? Man, it's been about four years.
It's incredible. It is. It's a great movie. I don't think it got nominated for an Oscar, right?
Yeah, it did. Oh, it did. Yeah. What was the law?
Do the right thing? Didn't get nominated. Yeah, do the right thing. Didn't get nominated.
Yeah, it's I mean, it's it's certain movies are little snapshots of an era or a place or whatever. Yeah. And that's one of the best ones without a doubt, you know, and it catches everything we had. We had a writer, Kim Collins, for the Ring of Road, a great piece about how that was pre Rodney King, but kind of when you watch it now with the context of Rodney King and then even OJ after it's just it's almost like a trilogy without a doubt.
You could fill it. I mean, that scene with Cuba, Good and Junior and the cop is pretty powerful. And you know, we did that movie and it was my first movie. I remember when I was your first movie, first movie ever.
Wow. And John showed me the movie before it was done. And you know, if you ever see a movie before it's finished, you will say this is garbage. You know, it sounds, you don't hear, but you see, you know, I mean, it's just unfinished, unpolished.
It's like, it's like seeing a room right after they build it, but they don't put furniture or paint. He's just like, what is this? So that's kind of how I looked at. I was so mad.
I left, I called my manager. He thought it was like a career to strain movie for you. I should have did this. She said, was it that bad?
I said, I know music in it wasn't on sounds. It felt flat, you know, because they don't, you know, you got to put all those sound effects in the movie, you know, when the guy is put a cup down, you have to actually put that sound in there or you won't hear it. You'll see it, but you won't hear it. And so I was just disappointed.
And I didn't want to have none to do with boys in the hood. You know what I mean? I was like, damn, mistake, mistake, mistake. And Sean kept saying, let me finish it.
Will you let me finish it? I said, OK, all right, all right. So I didn't see it until we went to the Cannes Film Festival. So I'm like, we going to show this to a French audience.
Did you go? Yeah, I went because as a career move, you go. But I'm like, we're going to show this to a French audience, man. For one thing, the subject matter, they're not going to get what the hell.