Interview Time: Fabolous

Fabolous

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By being the right person in the right place at the right time, Fabolous became an overnight superstar in late summer 2001 with his debut single, "I Can't Deny It." Though the young rapper represents Brooklyn and is no doubt representative of the East Coast rap style.

He also happens to embody a large dose of the "bling, bling" mentality often associated with the Dirty South style as well as the "gangsta" mentality associated with the West Coast -- the makings of a true crossover artist. And the fact that he's young with poster-boy looks doesn't hurt either. So, in sum, Fabolous followed in the footsteps of other early-2000s overnight sensations like Nelly by representing his hood while also making subtle concessions to the masses. At the time, New York didn't have any ice-sportin', Cristal-poppin', hood-representin' rappers -- at least not since the death of the Notorious B.I.G. and the simultaneous popular demise of Puff Daddy. Fabolous filled this gaping niche perfectly.

DJ Clue certainly knew what he was doing when he made the young rapper the flagship of his start-up label, Desert Storm. Though a no-name at the time, Clue's calculation proved genius. He hired a handful of producers, rappers, and vocalists for Fabolous' debut album, Ghetto Fabolous: Ja Rule, the Neptunes, Lil' Mo, and Timbaland, to name a few. And by teaming Fabolous with Nate Dogg -- who had become a hot commodity in the rap community that summer, virtually omnipresent on the radio with hits like "Area Codes" and "Lay Low" -- Clue had an undeniable hit song to drive the album's initial sales. This song was the perfect crossover hit, merging Fabolous' East Coast image and rhymes with Nate Dogg and producer Rick Rock's West Coast sound -- and interpolating a trademark 2Pac lyric for the hook obviously didn't hurt. As expected, the song became a huge hit, storming up the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and built up ample anticipation for the album, Ghetto Fabolous. AMG

How did you get the name Fabolous?
I got the name from DJ Clue. When I met him I didn’t have a rap name so he went around telling everyone -- creating a buzz saying I got this hot kid Fabolous which he had got from me spelling the word in one of my raps, I was just saying I was Fabolous not actually saying my names Fabolous.

Personal question, how old are you?
 I’m 25

Your first single released (Breathe) from you third album 'Real Talk' is a banger... What other tracks can we expect as single releases?
The next track coming out is called “Baby” featuring Mike Surey.

What input did you have on the soundtrack for the new movie
“Coach Carter” and would you ever be interested in doing some acting?
They actually came to me with the soundtrack,  they just wanted me to add to the track, they had some ideas and wanted me to make it sound really hot. I just tried to come up with a hot joint.
I think Needles did the production.

And as for acting...Yeah,  i'd love to do some acting, just test the waters out a little bit see if I could pull it off - see if its something up my ally if not ill leave it alone and continue with my first love, music.

You have a label called 'Street Family Entertainment' but don't seem to have many artists signed, would you be interested in signing a UK Hip Hop artist, not a mainstream one more underground?
Im not really big on the UK hiphop scene, I hear stuff that leaks over to America. I do have an artist his names Mike Surey, he’s been on a few of my records in the past and he’s on this new album. We are currently just working with him getting him ready musically, mentally and emotionally, ready to be the next new artist.

Do you know of any UK Hip Hop artists apart from Dizzee Rascal?
He’s probably the only one ive heard of - I don’t really know their names, you just hear, they don't get wide play in America so its hard to get to know, but i've seen Dizzee Rascal on MTV, that’s one name that stuck in my head.

You featured on the track wake up everybody for the voter drive during the presidential election race, do you feel it was your duty as an individual to take part along side, Russell Simmons and others?
Definitely, I wanted to be apart of the wake up campaign. It was trying to alert and tell people to be conscious to the things that are going on in different communities, trying to help communities out in using some big artists showing people that we also care.

In previous interviews you’ve said you were harassed and wrongfully arrested by the police, do you think this Orwellian state (big brother?) is directed at black artists?
I think in this case it was the Hip Hop task force, they wanted to really crack down on Hip Hop, I became one of the artists under their scope for no reason, this is why I filed a suit for being wrongfully arrested for different things.

This so called HipHop police - are they like the FBI of rap, to our knowledge we don’t have this in England?
It’s like a task force really they follow Hip Hop artists, it’s not like the FBI it’s a task force put together under the cops control.

Fab then went onto saying he felt very tired and was ready to go take some rest....