Unglossy with Bun B, Tom Frank and Jeffrey Sledge
Unglossy is a raw dive into the cultural forces shaping identity, creativity, and influence today. Hosted by legendary rapper, professor and entrepreneur, Bun B, alongside music industry veteran, Jeffrey Sledge and brand and marketing guru, Tom Frank, this is a conversation about cultural impact.
Through real stories and unfiltered dialogue, Unglossy explores how artists, entrepreneurs, and visionaries define themselves, move culture, and build legacy beyond the gloss of hype and headlines.
Tune in to "Unglossy" on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you catch your podcasts. Follow us on Instagram @UnglossyPod and join the conversation.
Unglossy is produced and distributed by Merrick Studios. Let your story take the mic. Learn more at https://wearemerrickstudios.com
Unglossy with Bun B, Tom Frank and Jeffrey Sledge
Hawaii Mike: Culture, Cannabis, and Connection
On this episode of Unglossy, hosts Bun B, Jeffrey Sledge, and Tom Frank welcome Hawaii Mike, a creative force whose journey spans road managing Mobb Deep to editing at The Source. Today, he is the founder of Chef for Higher, where hip hop, cannabis, and culinary arts come together to create community through dining.
Together the crew reflects on the growth of the Unglossy network and dive deep into the evolution of hip hop culture, the challenges of the music industry, and the power of authentic storytelling. Hawaii Mike shares how he’s blended food, cannabis, and culture into unique experiences, while the hosts explore themes of self-awareness, identity, and personal growth. From fashion and community to the global reach of hip hop, this conversation is a celebration of culture, connection, and carving out new lanes.
🎙️ Tap in. This is Unglossy.
"Unglossy: Decoding Brand in Culture," is produced and distributed by Merrick Studio and hosted by Bun B, Tom Frank and Jeffrey Sledge. Tune in to hear this thought-provoking discussion on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you catch your podcasts. Follow us on Instagram @UnglossyPod to join the conversation and support the show at https://unglossypod.buzzsprout.com/
Last week on Unglossy.
Speaker 2:I was actually having a conversation with Bun the other day because, you know, obviously I think the natural progression with a restaurant is to scale.
Speaker 2:My concern with scaling like we ship nationally right now on Gold Belly, you know we ship all over the country in Canada, and so that's been like a good, you know, a good filler for me, like where you know what cities is working for us and what's not working for us. You know what cities is working for us and what's not working for us. Obviously, I want to scale, but I want to scale at a rate that we don't compromise the integrity of the brand, and even locally scaling it showed me like how that can happen.
Speaker 5:From the top.
Speaker 4:I'm Tom Frank. I'm Jeffrey Sledge.
Speaker 5:And I'm Bud B, welcome to Unglossy.
Speaker 1:Real stories, unfiltered dialogue and the voices moving culture beyond the gloss of hype and headlines.
Speaker 4:So buckle up. Unglossy starts now.
Speaker 1:We are back yet for another episode. Another one Before we dive in, though, we got to talk about we're a month in now. We had a big launch about a month ago. I kind of think it went pretty well. What are your thoughts?
Speaker 4:People are mad excited. I got a lot of calls, a lot of texts congratulating me for opening up this network with you two, and people are excited.
Speaker 5:Absolutely. I got a lot of the same and we got some good response from media as well, did a couple interviews. A couple of people posted about it. You know I'm saying the words getting out there, just you know. Probably, just I'm I'm waiting for a little more feedback on what I might be doing wrong and you guys might be a little too kind to me to put it in the type of words I I'm a tough love kind of guy, so I'm just waiting for somebody to be like bro, your teeth was bugging.
Speaker 5:Like I'm just waiting for something crazy like that you know what I'm saying I feel like I'm too close to this thing sometimes, but I will say the conversations have felt great. You know what I'm saying. I feel like the back and forth we're we're getting a little bit more used to talking with each other. You know what I'm saying. I'm seeing less and less overlap in conversation, but also I'm really enjoying the people that we're conversating with. We're having really, really good conversations because people that have been a part of these conversations or they're not. I come from a space where, like with artists, you got to pull teeth to get people to really open up and talk. But luckily we've been able to get some people in here who are natural orators, natural conversationalism at the very at the very least, people that like to hear themselves talk, which is always good for a positive?
Speaker 1:yeah, absolutely, and I think it's fun. I mean it's it's like we're all I know we're not all in the same location, but it's like we're sitting in a living room and we're just like chatting it up with people and people are just we're talking about all sorts of crazy stuff and it's fun.
Speaker 4:But it all works out.
Speaker 1:It doesn't feel distant at all? Not at all. I have two things, though I got two things I want to say.
Speaker 5:Number one let me get my notepad Hold on your notepad.
Speaker 1:Number one, and it's not about you. Number one you know, in addition to our show, we have Mixed and Mastered with Jeffrey. That has been fantastic. I listen to it all the time, even though I record it, and I'm fascinated by some of the little nuggets of stuff that I had never thought about that, or I never realized that person did that, or whatever it happens to be. And we have the Comic Culture Podcast with Pete Rock. I mean they're rocking it right now. It's fun, it's engaging. Those guys are, you know, those guys are generally having a good time doing it. So both those shows have been great. So that's number one. Number two I would have never in a million years thought that I would be in a Houston Chronicle article with Bun B.
Speaker 1:I found it fascinating.
Speaker 5:You live long enough, you'd be surprised what happens. Yeah, you would, yeah, you would so we've had some great press coverage. It's been awesome We've been getting some really really good responses from people and inquiries. People wanting to know more and how we started, where we're going. I'm excited.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I really am I also think we're going to get more. I don't know if questions is the right term, but more people are going to start saying hey, I got an idea for a podcast. I got an idea for a podcast. Can I go on your podcast network and do this? I think we're going to get more of that too. People are excited about building this network, you know.
Speaker 5:I think so, because they figure if I can make it work, anybody can. You're good. I have for years been averse to listening to myself talk. I don't ride around to listen to my own music that much, and so I always thought it was a bit facetious. You know what I'm saying. But it does lend itself, in this new age of context like that definitely lends itself to to expanding your reach, creating deeper levels of connection with people. I'm all for it. I'm old. I don't want to die with this shit in my head. I need somewhere to get it out, I got to give somebody this game before I go.
Speaker 5:So this platform and this particular podcast offers me that opportunity and I'm excited.
Speaker 4:It's the great words of the poet Laurent Cee-Lo Green. I thank the Lord that my voice was accordable.
Speaker 1:I know that's right.
Speaker 4:There you go.
Speaker 1:Now talking about interesting guests. We got one today. We got one today. Today's guest is a true architect of culture, someone who's been shaping the intersection of hip-hop, cannabis, food and community for more than 25 years. You might know him as a road manager for Mobb Deep, a lifestyle editor at the Source or the branding mind behind projects with Nike, reebok, mountain Dew, but that's only part of the story. From sneaking into music conventions as a teenager to building Chef for Hire, a groundbreaking cannabis-infused culinary experience with over 200 sold-out suppers, hawaii Mike has lived at the cutting edge of creativity. His work blends entertainment, education and empowerment, bringing people together through culture, cuisine and conversation. He's been featured in forbes, the washington post and many more, and now he's here with us. Please welcome non-glossy hawaii mike that's good y'all.
Speaker 6:Thanks for having me. Hello.
Speaker 5:Michael man. So glad to have you here today, brother, because you have such an incredible journey that's still happening. You know what I'm saying and in the midst of researching there's just things I learned about you, having known you for over 20-plus years, that I didn't know about. You know what I'm saying. You're always just a kind brother. You always had great, engaging conversations. You came highly regarded from a lot of our mutual friends. It's been a pleasure getting to know you as a friend. You're becoming, I feel, like a brother of mine, getting to know you better, and I still realize there's things I didn't know. I'm excited about us having this conversation today. I will keep my notepad out to make some notes.
Speaker 6:That's why I started Mask Off was to learn more about my people, like when we did that episode with you, you know. So it's like it's that same thing and I think there's a we're at this point where it's like this constant evolution, and then I'm learning to reflect a lot you know what I'm saying and to look back, because one thing we don't do is celebrate. I want to get to that point. Man, we're alive with 50s. I had six people I knew well pass away last year in their 50s. I had another one two weeks ago. So it's like yo celebration is important and I'm not letting them take that away from us. I'm doing that intentionally with all of my people.
Speaker 1:It's funny. You should say that, because I had a neighbor of mine pass away recently and I read his obituary afterwards and I was amazed at the things I didn't know about this guy, and he lived right next to me and it's it's podcasts like this and your show that like I think that's really important to understand people's journeys and other people's story, because we all find these amazing things. I'm like never, never even thought about that or never, always wondered like where, how did he get from here to there or this, and why is he acting like this or that? And a lot of it is. We got to tell our stories sometime, and I think this podcasting platform gives us the opportunity to do that like we've never done before. So we got to start at the beginning, though. Hawaii, mike, hawaii.
Speaker 6:Mike, so you grew up in Hawaii, is that correct? I was, yeah, so I'm born in San Francisco, though. So people think, like a lot of times people would be like Hawaiian Mike. I'm like. No, I'm not Hawaiian. I was raised in Hawaii. My mom was working with growers, hippie style, went to Hawaii, lived out there for about my grade school, like kindergarten through, I think, fifth grade, and then I moved back to San Francisco and, yeah, so San Francisco and then out here when I was 18 and where's out here? Where are you at now? Oh, new york, my bad, I've been, yeah, I've been, in new york for so long people think I'm from here. I've been in new york since 92 and when you say growers yeah, could you.
Speaker 6:Could you elaborate on that? Oh, yeah, so so I'm one of these people. Like my whole life I've been around the cannabis plant. My mom smoked with me in the womb. She dropped acid like two days after I was born. So the idea of spirituality through that lens, openness, finding self, that inner work, that's always kind of been there. And Hawaii, yeah, she was working with cannabis growers, so we were the people in the van outside. So I'm a little kid sleeping in a van with my mom and my stepfather Going to school out there and surfing every day. Mike.
Speaker 4:I was trying to remember. Did I meet you at Gavin? I met you before you came to New York, correct? I believe so.
Speaker 6:I mean I'm sure we probably hung out at the Gavin.
Speaker 4:Yeah, because you were really young.
Speaker 6:It was really when I was starting to see Fenster, like when I would go to Jive to see Jeff Fenster. I think we really started like. You know what I'm saying, but I think weren't you somewhere else before that?
Speaker 4:Before Jive, I was at Wild Pitch.
Speaker 5:Wild Pitch, yeah, wild Pitch, yeah. So we were marching over those guys, right, never do that Back into the new pad, never do that one, Jeff Michael was like a kid when.
Speaker 4:I met him he was really young. I turned 19 the month after I moved out here. Yeah, he was like a really young guy.
Speaker 1:Wait, you moved to New York at 19?.
Speaker 6:Yeah, so I was so alright. So my dad was a musician and to subsidize his income he was selling weed. So I was taking weed from him and selling to my friends and their parents and shit like that. And so you know, I grew up with the Invisible Scratch Pickles like Mix Master, mike and all those guys and you know Alex Aquino, and so that's always been fam, and so you know they were the DJs. There was other kids that were the rappers. We were the dancers. You know what I'm saying?
Speaker 6:I was a B-boy and so we would all figure out how to go to the Gavin convention to sneak in so we could meet people. You know, it was literally just photocopies of badges, and so I would go in there and slang trees too and met a couple people Shout out to Jameis and Albie yeah and Albie, those are the guys that got me out here. Literally pause in a bathroom. They were like yo, do you know where you're at? I'm like, yeah, I'm in a bathroom selling Yowie. They were like nah, this is like a serious music convention, we're from record labels. And I was like I know that part. He's like but yo, you guys got to have a hustle Like come to New York and we'll figure out getting you an internship.
Speaker 6:And you know I flew out. Actually, I drove out here and on the set of Diamond D Best Kept Secret I got hired. Shout out to Martha Reynolds, reynolds Jesus, you know, put me on to do college radio promotions as an intern. But really like rest in peace. This is one of the people I was talking about last year, my man Scoop. But really like rest in peace. This is one of the people I was talking about last year, my man Scoop. Like if Scoop didn't go to Tommy Boy, that internship might not have been there for me. You know what I'm saying and my story might have been different. So it's like you know he went to Tommy Boy, vacated that internship and then I got that. So first record I worked was Diamond D, Best Kept Secret. Wow. Wow, wow.
Speaker 6:Wow, yeah, bro, but yeah, I literally turned 19. That was probably my birthday month that I got hired. Wow.
Speaker 5:How long were you interning before you got like an actual position in New York?
Speaker 6:How long were you kind of just bouncing and hustling at that point? I mean, I only interned there and I want to say I might have got fired from the internship or the internship ended or some shit. And then the position opened for national director of radio promotions at Chemistry PWL and I went back and I got that.
Speaker 4:Who was on PWL at the time?
Speaker 6:So it was Diamond D and Ed OG, and the Bulldogs is probably the most known, and then another kid who passed away, scientific. Yeah, those are like the main ones. But in that office I don't know if I've told this story, but in that office there was another PR agency, paula Bradshaw. You remember Paula Right? And so she used to do PR for this group called Mobstop. They used to come by the office. I used to smoke with one of the main members, a guy by the name of AZ. I'm from San Francisco, bro. I have no clue who this dude is until the Painted Four movie comes out. When the Painted Four movie comes out, I'm like, wait what we used to smoke all the time.
Speaker 4:I had no clue. Me and Dante. Ross. He was on Mixed and Masted with me and Mob Style came up. We had a whole conversation about Mob Style and AZ and Gangsta Lou.
Speaker 6:Yeah, absolutely, yep, wow, yeah, but being from California, like I had no clue, you know.
Speaker 5:That's hilarious.
Speaker 1:That's what makes it great, right? So how did you switch over then? Cause you ultimately ended up at the source. Then Is that right?
Speaker 6:Yeah. So after I got after the job at PwO ended, chemistry records ended. I was kind of in the in between and one of my peoples was like Mobb Deep needs a road manager. They his their managers at the time happened to literally live on the same block, just around the corner from me Tammy and Peachy and and my man, loyal Thomas. I was like yo, come through, they want to meet you. So I went and chopped it up with them. They sent me on a show with Mobb and they were like yo, if they like you, you're the new role man. I'm like all right, I'm a, I'm broke. I'm like I'm 21,. I think, yeah, I'm 21. At the time I'm probably 140 pounds soaking wet. You know what I'm saying, but I'm the biggest dude in the crew.
Speaker 1:You're the biggest dude in the crew. You're the biggest dude in the crew.
Speaker 6:I mean, bro, have you ever met a dude? It's funny because it's true. But yeah, we hit it off. I was their road manager from January 95 through June when they signed with Violator I'm sorry, go back.
Speaker 1:What is a road manager like? What do you do as a road manager day to day?
Speaker 6:save our lives for this group exactly, particularly for this group, because there's the general, there's the general job description and then you can get into this group yeah, so there is the 2025 version that a lot of people know now, and there's a 90s version of rap music, Because I swear people have a fairytale story when you bring up the Infamous album, because this album is aged better than a lot of albums Most albums. This album has. Just like every time I listen to it, I'm like this is incredible. I was like how are these kids, 18 years old, doing this shit? It's insane. That was like how are these?
Speaker 5:kids, 18 years old doing this shit. It's insane. That was the thing right. It was the age, like the musical maturity I'm not going to say personal, because they were 18 and 19-year-old New York kids for sure why but the musical maturity was years ahead of many children. We see a lot of kids now at 18 and 19, and there's a lot of things that are more preset. I can say right, you do the House of Blues promo tour, then you go out opening for somebody and then you get your run. It wasn't like that. I'm sure you guys did a lot of club dates.
Speaker 6:It was mostly club dates. There was no tours, we was all club dates, spot dates, Like we used to fill in when Craig Mack couldn't be there. We'd be doing shows with Biggie. But it was like you know. I got to me. I got to go to Queens Ridge. I don't know the history of Queens Ridge, I don't know the first side, I know nothing. I'm going in there in the middle of the night. I'm going in there at five in the morning picking them up. I'm like I got to go to Hav's room and wake him up and step through bottles of liquor on the floor and try to shake him up. It's adult babysitting. When you have to go somewhere, You're the chaperone.
Speaker 5:A grown man.
Speaker 6:Well, not even a grown boy grown boys at that time, because they're not yes, grown boys, because then remember, remember we had to grow up early. So you know, a 19 year old now, a 27 year old now doesn't equate to an 18 year old back then from queensbridge. You know the things we saw, the things we did, how we moved, like it's way different, you know. So getting through all of that was nuts. And then you know it shows it's. We gotta go get that back half before we go on stage yep, I gotta make sure I don't lose the debts.
Speaker 6:Right, because we didn't have a dj, because we didn't have that budget, we're doing a show date. I mean we're just doing club dates, you know. So I'm the dj, I got the debts I gotta make Because we didn't have a DJ, because we didn't have that budget, because we were doing a show date. I mean we were just doing club dates, so I'm the DJ, I got the debts, I got to make sure I got backups and you know we can't just download from the cloud real quick I got to make sure everything's physical. Unfortunately, not unfortunately, unfortunately. Every time Shook Ones came on it was like a melee, like that was like the immediate fight song. If somebody had beef or somebody was too drunk or somebody just looked at somebody wrong, there was fights.
Speaker 6:And so I would have to literally, because also the sound man, if you're set up at a club, isn't always next to the stage, right, no, or we'll be set up in a ballroom at a hotel doing a show.
Speaker 4:The sound booth is like way in the middle of the stage we're completely separated.
Speaker 6:So I'd always have to fight my way through and get back to them to the car. It was nuts man. And then the other part is safety right, we can't pack because we're flying. So there's one story that P used to always tell, that I used to always tell and I never knew. He told it also until I saw it on a few podcasts. We was in Cleveland one time and we were at a steakhouse I forget who was with us from loud. They took us out to some steakhouse. I know where this is going At the end. I know where this is going at the end. I know where this is going. I see them take the knives. I'm like all right, I know what y'all doing, I get it.
Speaker 5:I I live this. I knew when you said steakhouse going bro because they're like that was a big part of waffleaffle House.
Speaker 5:Yeah, exactly Like if you had to fly somewhere. You know, for many years we drove, for many years we drove, but then, as airports started to open up, we used to have to fly. So we'd be like yo, let's hit Denny's, let's hit the spot right quick where we can get something. You know what I'm saying. Now, in certain cities, like in Atlanta, you can pull them to a gas station and get like crocodile duck meat type of things. Now, you know what I'm saying, but it wasn't always like that. I know exactly what he's talking about. I know exactly what he was talking about.
Speaker 1:I'm going to look at an IHOP completely differently now.
Speaker 5:I mean it was A steakhouse has a steak knife with a point Right, you go to IHOP and all of that. It's more of a blooded but it'll do the job.
Speaker 6:I mean take one of their tracks Survival of the Fittest Straight up.
Speaker 5:And these were young boys out of town, I would imagine, for the first time. You know, with different Voice accents and different people Trying to holler at different types of chicks.
Speaker 6:You don't say different slang but with one of the hardest records out right.
Speaker 5:That incites an energy that is so like I remember I was living in Atlanta in 95 and that was one of the probably the longest conversation at that point that I'd ever had with Andre. 3000 was when? Was when the infamous drop that he was like I'm not tripping this shit hard, right, I said I can't get past Godfather three, I can't get past it. Like this shit is really really really good. He's like and he's so young.
Speaker 5:I'm like it's like these niggas so young. I'm like yo, they're going to be a problem when they're like 25, 26. It's going to be a problem with these dudes, but they were a little too loose, I feel, to take full advantage of what they had.
Speaker 6:But also I think if they were to come out, if that kind of group that was that good came out like five, six years ago, they would be one of the biggest groups period. Because that's why that album matured so well is because musically, sonically, lyrically it was that good. It was just rap wasn't at that time is what you're saying it's the preponent to drill absolutely I don't even know that. I think it would be bigger than I don't even know what I'm saying is.
Speaker 5:What I'm saying is is that everything that drill is now? Oh, yeah, they were then. Yes, you know what I'm saying. Yeah, it's particularly when I because your drill gets separated between chicago and new york. Now I don't want to argue, I don't want to argue semantics about that, but I do see what new york drill represents. I see the age group, I see how they move and a lot of that is derivative of mob deep, probably without even understanding that it is because now that young white end mentality, is day for day, yeah, in new york, wasn't then.
Speaker 5:But those young kids back then they were so self-aware, bro, yep, like that was the thing that I drew from it. They were I'm like yo, these dudes are very, so self-aware, bro. Yep, that, like that was the thing that I drew from it. They were I'm like yo, these dudes are very, very self-aware. They know that they're young. They know they're probably a little too young to be out, not just talking like this living it, but living like this but it literally was who they were. They had hennessy jerseys. What?
Speaker 6:for bro. No, but now we're in the video and they're underage drinking. Yeah, I'm like now no, no right the labels. Somebody would have stopped that or somebody would have called and been like complaining about that right, but he said it in that record.
Speaker 6:I'm only 19, but my mind is old hey, they, like you said, they knew they were very aware. It was again the maturity levels coming from those. Our generation, like generation x, is special. I tell people this all the time. We are the translation generation. We're the last of analog in the very, very first of the invention of digital. Right, the way we're able to take that analog mentality and that do-it-yourself and understand, like really with our hands, figuring it out and going into tech, it was just different. It was a different time, man, and how we grew up and you know, being those latchkey kids and all that, like we were forced, plus we had OGs. True, we had the other generations outside. I always say the kids after us, especially the Gen Zs. Their OGs are the internet, like they just tap in the key If they got a question. They need to learn something, this, that and the third, or style, or girls or this. I can just go like this and it's right there for them.
Speaker 4:We actually went outside and spoke to the cats that we looked up to, got lessons, got for them. We actually went outside and spoke to the cats that we love to. Got lessons from the people like mouth to mouth.
Speaker 5:A real life.
Speaker 4:That's a great point.
Speaker 5:I still think that's necessary. That's why I make myself as available as possible. The second generation after me and the third generation that's out there right now. I still feel like some of this knowledge still translates right, like not every aspect of it. But I'd say to talk more about real life shit with artists nowadays, because I feel like young artists as far as getting money and all of that marketing and all of that, that stuff's there for them, right, that stuff's rented, that information is available, a lot of them come in a game knowing a lot of those nuances. But then it becomes okay. Now I'm getting real money from this rap shit and I'm touring and I'm not home and I miss my kids and I'm not seeing my girl and the relationship is getting distant and all of these type of things. You know what I'm saying. That's kind of what I feel like my value is to a younger artist, like how to make all of this that's happening in the industry make sense in real life.
Speaker 1:It has to be the person who comes out and finds you, though, because, to Mike's point, they all got this, and it's like we had to go figure it out because we didn't have anything. We had to go find somebody to talk to. Or we had to go figure it out because we didn't have anything. We had to go find somebody to talk to. Or we had to go figure it out because we didn't have somewhere to just punch in anything, and millions of articles would come up.
Speaker 5:I tried to be like the chauffeur right as soon as you got in the game. I'm holding a sign, like you know what I'm saying?
Speaker 4:Yeah, come get in my car.
Speaker 5:Come holler at your boy. And I never wanted to sign anybody. I was always taught that if you're in a space, if you allow other good people into that space, if you help them get into that space, that space can remain what it was when you got there. Yep, you know what I'm saying. So that was me. I just wanted to give people the same way. I had J Prince to give me game. I had Too Short to give me game. I had E-40 to give me game. I wanted too short to give me game. I had E40 to give me game. I wanted to be that type of an OG right that had those conversations that were almost invaluable because nobody else. When those guys sign, they don't have anybody to talk to. You know what I'm saying. They don't understand a lot of that shit and if they try to go and talk, to their homies.
Speaker 6:They understand it even less Bad advice, bad information, you know. I mean they kind of do it in sports, bad information, you know. I mean they kind of do it in sports right Like you go to the NBA, they got the rookie camps and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 6:It's not really like there's a draft, though, in the music industry you know what I'm saying when there's a certain time where you can get everybody together and everything just kind of happens. That being said, as you're saying it I mean, I think you do that already on your own, but that could be a thing you know what I'm saying that's kind of put out there. That could even be another content piece that's done on a regular, where you do those bits and then that connects again. That's so. This is why I got into streaming, cause, like Thomas was saying, they're all on devices now.
Speaker 6:Yeah, so we have to go where the attention is to create these connections, Then from there we can go offline you know what I'm saying and create these connections, Then from there we can go offline.
Speaker 6:You know what I'm saying and make real life, take it offline, yes, yeah, and then create the IRL stuff, like the events and all those other things where people can really get together. But that's been my whole goal, right, but doing it through the lens of this culture, because at the end of the day, like for me, I look at hip hop as a whole way of life, right, a whole culture. It's everything that we do and how we express ourselves, but to me it's the most authentic expression of our modern human experience, right, that's why it's not ethnicity-based, it's not geographically-based, it's an energy, it's a feeling. If we all turned our eyes off, we would be friends with every single kind of ethnicity on this planet through that culture. But because we use our eyes, we bring all of the prejudice, because all that information we have, that we've absorbed, even if we weren't paying attention, my eyes are picking up all this stuff in the peripheral and feeding that to our brains.
Speaker 6:Right now we get stored and we store. But now we have to sift through that. But if our algorithms, our programming, gets into bad loops, we're stuck on the negative stuff. We're not even seeing the good stuff. So it's it's a lot out there. That's why, again, like this culture. I got so much to say about it, but, again, that's why I started the streaming stuff. That's why I wanted to just have these platforms to be able to talk about it, and I've been holding back. Man, my media guy has been wanting to just like leap out, you know, and so it's so much to be said because I think we do have that opportunity, especially with this younger generation. A lot of them are still in the clouds. There's a lot of them that want to be grounded, though. There's a lot of them that are going outside in the world and exploring.
Speaker 4:There's a lot of them that are asking questions and pushing the envelope and and using their resources like to do whatever they want, and I think it's amazing watching these kids I think that was one of the amazing things about gavin convention and places like that, because you go out you know me as a new york kid go out to frisco and you're meeting people, everybody's yeah, congage from all over the country.
Speaker 4:So I mean, got some texas, obviously, got some to bay, a lot of guys from the bay, you know la, you know wherever, and we're a white, white, black, because there's a lot of college radio as well, and so we're meeting face to face. We used to talk on the phone, now we meet, and you said the. I mean I hate to sound like the old fogey dude, but the prejudice thing wasn't really didn't really matter, it was just like that's my dude, steve fournier from. He's got a record pool in texas. I didn't really care that he was white or black, I just you know, and we met for the first time. We talked to paul stewart or a variety of people. Those things are missing as well. That kind of brings people together.
Speaker 5:Well, that part of the industry was not driven around monetary incentive at that time and everyone that was occupying those spaces generally wanted to know more about the culture, wanted to be more immersed in the culture. I don't think there was enough money flowing around for people to have the pure incentive of coming in and taking financial advantage of people. We didn't even understand how far and how long this thing was going and it was on its 20th year, but it was still breaking new ground and it was still incorporating new technology. Like Riding Dirty was one of the first we did, riding dirty on the beta of pro tools. So I mean that 95 96 era we were literally charting new territory. Jeff, you might remember, on riding dirty there's literally a skit that says if you're listening to this on a cassette tape you need to flip this motherfucker over, but if you're listening to it on the cd just let that motherfucker roll.
Speaker 5:Like we had to instruct people, we didn't, because we were they knew that was our first album that was released on the cd and one of the first rap albums. Like in that first year of cd implementation in hip-hop and I knew motherfuckers from my world didn't know what the fuck a CD was. That took a while to become common usage in the music industry.
Speaker 1:Can you imagine kids today flipping a cassette over Like that? Wouldn't even make sense to them.
Speaker 5:Well, the ill shit was around that time the auto-reverse started too. I know I'm dating right now, but this was when the tape decks were auto-reversed and so you would just let it go in and that motherfucker would just, it would stop and the rotation would go the other day and the machine would read it that way, which is crazy.
Speaker 6:Yeah.
Speaker 5:So, so let I want to talk about the era where I met you, in which was probably right after this, this role management era, because I met you there, go ahead.
Speaker 6:Cause.
Speaker 6:I'll give you the segue to how I even that. All that happened Right. So I hear real quick. I'll finish the story with P. So the knife thing, right. So we're doing a show with Biggie that night. I give them their mic, we queue up, put my dad in. All of a sudden I hear Biggie's music come on. Enough is DJing. I think he starts spinning. I'm looking at the sound man. I'm like what the fuck? And he's like they're playing from the turntables. I'm like shit, alright. Next thing, you know, the fucking crowd rushes the stage, pins the fucking security against the stage because, for whatever reason, they had the folding tables in front of them and then they were in between that and the stage. So they just got pinned. Crazy melee, everybody's fighting because everybody wanted to get that big. They were trying to test them.
Speaker 6:Cleveland was pretty wild back then. It really was. Finally everything calms down. I finally get backstage and I see P and half standing with knives like this, just ready for whatever it's ready for war. I get it, bro, let's go. So yeah, so it was. It was. It was just crazy. It was always something like that. You know what I'm saying with them. And then we'll take it to Atlanta now, 95. I'm with the Source. We're on the Source tour right, so back then the.
Speaker 6:Source van tours right. So Oos, that's the first time I met Oos. We go to Nikki's VIP together. Long story short, your man gets smacked in the face with a glass. Some chick threw a glass at him, cracked his whole forehead open, got him to the emergency room. We get there, I sneak him into the back to see the doctor. Cool, now he's like you're my brother forever. I want you to work with me, and so literally the next month month this was june the next month I'm working at the source. So the first, like the first, I think it was bone thugs in harmony. I was on the cover of that one. That was the last cover. Rest in peace. Chimo do shot and that was my first.
Speaker 6:That was my first issue, exactly right circle, full circle, right who's? The editor.
Speaker 4:Who's the?
Speaker 6:editor at that time james bernard at that time was I think, a dario strange yeah so what were you, what were your official duties Then, as?
Speaker 6:a lifestyle editor. Were you a lifestyle editor then? No, no, so, all right. So this is where it gets funny, so we'll get funny in a second. I'm the marketing mobile marketing manager. What does that even mean? Van tours. So basically, I do all the marketing for the van tours. I'm the liaison between the source, source, the labels and the drivers that are out there doing the events and driving around on tour. Right?
Speaker 1:which kind of makes sense from your experience?
Speaker 6:yeah, yeah no, for sure. Yeah, and that's the thing like I hope people take away from this, follow your passions and just do what you love and everything is going to just happen like I, I never got a job from going on an interview you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 6:There was always some other connection or something else. Every interview I went on never worked, like you know, um, but anyway. So I'm at the more market manager and then a gentleman by the name of Ray Benzino Well, actually, sorry, ray Dog they started a record label called Surrender Records and they put out this company started this compilation, this wise guys compilation, where he was taking different rappers from different hoods in the Boston area People who would normally fight and put them onto one album and represent Boston. I was doing the sessions, I was getting Rainbow Records, getting everything pressed up. I was mixing and mastering with Tony Dorsey over a master disc, Bro.
Speaker 6:it was all of that.
Speaker 6:And then they tried to get me to move to boston to run the label no without a contract no and I'm in hawaii at the time and I was just like I guess I quit y'all, y'all gotta fire me or something. I'm not going, you know um. And then I was doing like street promotions and all kinds of other stuff. And remember the source sports, like the source sports magazine I created so Chris Wilder was the editor in chief. I created a sneaker column in the source sports and then from that it led me to doing the sneaker column in the source. And then they were like will you do flavors of the month? Will you do this? And then I became the lifestyle editor. From that, actually I'm the lifestyle and tech editor, or style and tech editor, something like that. What was tech then? I mean tech was like bros. It was, uh, two-way pagers. It was like you know then like motorola razors, or you know, playstation 2, steam, sleep, 2. Xbox, like bro I was a beta tester for.
Speaker 5:Xbox Live.
Speaker 6:That's cool, so, being at the source, when Xbox Live first went on, before they even pushed it to the public, they had like a few thousand people on there, I think, testing it out, and so I was one of the people on there playing Halo, you know live. I was one of the people on there playing Halo, you know live, Because before then we would play Halo and like link four TVs together at somebody's house and link all this, yeah, and that's how we would play.
Speaker 5:That's the beginning of gaming as we know it now yeah, Gaming streaming, streaming and all that.
Speaker 6:Yeah, you know, but you know it was funny because that showed, like, the heart of what this country is and what I mean. You know it was funny because that showed the heart of what this country is and what I mean by that. It was the most racist motherfuckers on there that you could imagine and it's going back and forth which still exists today.
Speaker 6:Oh my God, it was so bad and now they still do it to this day. But again, once you take your eyes out of things in the ability to be physical, you see the truth, or you feel it, or you hear it, and you know I'm saying that's what we got so and so, yes, I basically like it's fashion, like. So I was, like you know, back then the source was one of what you had. The source, you had the vibe, you had vibe, you had slam and then you basically had the east bay catalog.
Speaker 6:Those are only places you could see new sneakers, sneakers, yep, right, and you know I basically got the job because I dressed well, I shopped and I always wanted the new stuff. So it's like they were like you could be, you could do this well and just developed all the relationships with everybody and, yeah, became one of the sneaker guys. So that's mainly what I did. So flavors of the month, anything that didn't have a model right, so it's all product based. So every time you saw flavors or any kind of like product roundups, or if you saw on the tech or the automotive side, like athletes or artists in their cars, like I would do all of that too, a lot of hats my man, yeah, I mean, but again it's.
Speaker 6:It's all things that were literally in my wheelhouse. You know, I grew up around cars. I always loved cars. Technology was always my thing. I remember my dad bringing me the, remember the LCD Donkey Kong, the little flip thing, back in like 84? I had that in 82. Oh, you got it early and my dad went to Japan, you know, yeah, and then he brought that back and then I was the only kid in school with it, so everybody used to buy batteries so we could all play on my job. I was like y'all want to play, you guys by buying a battery yeah, y'all want to.
Speaker 6:Yeah, you know. So, like technology, it was always there. And then what I would do is incorporate the other things that I enjoyed. So I would. I would take action. Sports, right, I surf, so I would put like surf gear sometimes in there, sneak that in. I started putting Burton into the magazine and other ski gear at a time when you could only buy Burton on the mountain yeah, they didn't have flagship stores yet and it was only at ski spots. You don't really have ski spots anywhere, so it was only on the mountain and that led to me starting to do product placement for them. So I would do product placement. I was doing product placement on 50, like all kinds of stuff which ended up in the other drama because the Eminem stuff with Benzino came up.
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Speaker 5:So where is food at in all of this, Mike, and all of these things that are happening in your life, moving from the Bay to Hawaii and back to New York, almost moving to Boston all of these things are happening. Where's food at in?
Speaker 6:your life All right. So I'll rewind. My mom is vegan, or was vegan, so she raised me vegan. I was vegan for the first nine years of my life and in Hawaii it's not that it's strange, but as a kid it's like you're watching all the other kids go to the lunch trucks getting lunch plates and I can't even have plate lunch, you know what I'm saying? Like what everybody else is eating. Well, I got to have the special meal at school in the cafeteria, because everything's fucking jello Right.
Speaker 6:And so my mom was like, if you want to eat anything else, you have to cook it yourself. And called my dad, got recipes and started roasting chicken and all kinds of stuff at like nine years old, and so food for me has always been something I enjoyed. I loved because it was like a social thing to me, Right, because the other things is like. You know my grandfather, my mom's side every time we had a family gathering, he would barbecue and he would sneak me food, you know. Or my stepfather, if we went to the bay and we were here, we'd go sneak and get a burrito, and my mom wasn't looking. Or my dad, and you know what I'm saying. So food became like a treat or like this thing. So I wanted to explore it and then, randomly, my first job was a prep cook, like you know, working in a restaurant. My dad's lady at the time was the head chef and so she got me a prep cook job and so food has always been that.
Speaker 6:In the 90s, what food was Banging out? The corporate cars, absolutely, absolutely. You know people like Mattie C Scott Free, you know we all want to go, let's go eat.
Speaker 6:So our game used to be yo, where could we go and eat the craziest meal and smoke, you know?
Speaker 6:so we used to shut down blue ribbon absolutely out in there with the managers and smoke wow, you know I'm saying blue and sushi and on sullivan so we shut it down. In the back there was like this little like galley window it was weird thing that actually opened. So we used to always ask to sit back there. So every time, like most of the people cleared out or enough to where we could burn, we just open that up and blow the smoke out. Or, you know, monday nights I think it was Monday nights was Stretch Armstrong at Bowery Bar. You know, go get the little corner booth, what are the mash and spinach, and then just roll up and burn it down in there until somebody tried to kick you out, like it was just always that, you know. And so food, you know, just became and I always cook. I always cook for my family too. You know, when I was married and it kind of just became my alchemy, came something I was just really good at and I just love to do, you know.
Speaker 5:but you love to pair it with I was gonna ask that question that actually came out in dining right. You wanted to smoke and dine and pair with tree yeah right, so. So how does that go to? Where you find out this room to combine the two? Well?
Speaker 6:so I used to always either eat and smoke or you smoke and eat, right, it's either one, right. And so it was like the idea of like well, how do you just combine that into a singular experience and just eat and get high off of eating? That was kind of like the theory with it. You know, and, and from that you know, I've met a chef from Seattle that was doing this as well, and we started a company.
Speaker 6:Long story short, it didn't work out and then I just kind of got the bug and started doing it myself and I learned how to cook gummies from scratch, you know, and figure it out, like the whole science of it and understanding, like how you have to cook the bricks, which is like the ratio of water to sugar in a product, so you understand it could be shelf stable or if it's just going to melt or grow, all kinds of like stuff you don't want to eat that make you sick. And just bro just figured it out, you know, just kept going and that turned into chef for hire and so you went from lifestyle to making it a platform for yourself, right?
Speaker 6:I mean that that's, that's kind of the big transition well, it's always been like, and that's the thing for me is how do you live your life through everything you're passionate about and explore and make money?
Speaker 5:off of that.
Speaker 6:So that's why, again, that's why I'm such a big proponent of hip hop, because I learned knowledge itself through joining Zulu Nation. I learned knowledge itself through joining Zulu Nation. Right, I heard things about what you do and working on yourself through my mom and other spiritual people around us, but I learned knowledge itself. And it clicked in a different way when I got into Zulu Nation. And so that whole understanding that everything that you need is here individually, all of us, not one of us is going to find our true happiness outside of us and make that permanent. Like it just doesn't work that way. It's happiness, the total satisfaction amongst oneself, amongst you. You're not happy internally. Anything you put out externally is show, it's fake, it's going to go away in a while, it's temporary. Internally is show, it's fake, it's going to go away in a while, it's temporary, right.
Speaker 6:And so I had to learn at a very young age like to be okay with being different, coming from Hawaii, moving to San Francisco and then getting introduced to hip hop, becoming a b-boy but still surfing. There's, like you know, my dad's picking me up after school or we're coming from a morning session, the truck with surfboards, but I'm hopping out with fat laces and, you know, like listening to Run DMC and it's conflicting, but I'm like that's me, that's what I love, you know. And so it's kind of like all of those things and just living the lifestyle, even from after the source. Like I created LTE magazine and that was just me reflecting our culture through somebody participating in it, and then that turned into another magazine, inked magazine, being able to see something I loved which was tattoos in that culture and then being able to share that in a way that didn't pigeonhole it into just being about like tattoos. It was more. This is the lifestyle. This is people choosing to adorn art that they helped to create for life on their bodies.
Speaker 6:You know what I'm saying? Like I'm a walking canvas. Now. It moved away from just being like the flash tattoos on the wall when you're a drunk sailor going to get you know, and so again it's. I hope that we can all live this way. It's like that's just been. My goal is to if we can all go inside, we'll meet the people outside. You know what I'm saying? A lot of times we're in spaces where we don't need to be around a lot of people because we're not doing that inner work and we can't create the boundaries we need or we can't express who we are and what our needs are. You know what I'm saying? And so we allow all these different weird energy.
Speaker 5:But this comes with a certain level of self-awareness though, mike, to be fair, right. So when did you realize you know the self-awareness that you know? I realize I'm different, I realize it takes work to live in this way, and maybe other people might need this level of awareness.
Speaker 6:I'll say that's kind of twofold, right? So I think moving out here and seeing hip hop culture and seeing who's participating, who's really in it. So I've always been racially ambiguous, right? Nobody's ever guessed my ethnicity. Depending upon who I I'm with, like, I could be a bazillion different things, right? Especially when I'm around hip-hop. Most people just think I was mixed, right, black and white.
Speaker 6:That's what most people just thought no, you're the rock of hip-hop, for sure the wild thing is, most people don't think about my last name or where it could potentially come from, like if you say Salman Rushdie, right, or you say Prince Salman or this, you think Middle East.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 6:You say Michael Salman. That could be Right, could be Italian.
Speaker 5:And especially in our culture.
Speaker 6:Right. You know, what I learned is we. We shortcut so many things and use muscle memory, so my name is spelled Well. If you spell S-A-L-M, what's the next letter? Usually Salmon, salmon, right? So I was usually Mike Fish or Mike Salmon or whatever, right? So I always tell people I'm a man, not a fish. My last name is S-A-L-M-A-N, right, but my last name is S-A-L-M-A-N, right. But my last name is Arabic. My grandfather is from Bethlehem, like, so I'm part Palestinian.
Speaker 4:I never knew that, I never asked.
Speaker 6:I never knew that.
Speaker 5:Never in a million years.
Speaker 6:But if you get me around Palestinians, especially my kids, they all guess it. It's the. It's the strangest thing. And then my grandfather went to the Philippines, married a Filipino and Spanish woman. So that's my dad's makeup, my grandfather's Cherokee, and we think Scottish or something. We don't have a record on him because he was like some diplomat, cia, some shit. He goes to Brazil, marries a Brazilian woman and my mother's born in Brazil.
Speaker 6:The sister next to her is born in brazil. The rest are born in africa. Right, so I'm carrying all this information through dna. Wow, that's that's why I tell people eyes closed, ethnicity, race has nothing to do with it, like it just doesn't. Because I know this, especially when we got all these arguments in the culture that we have right now, I don't know anybody who will negate my participation as a person. No.
Speaker 5:I don't know.
Speaker 6:But then when it comes down to this ethnicity argument, about FBA and this, it's like it's craziness. Right, we have to get past that, because this is all about divide and conquer. It's divide and rule. If we're sitting there arguing with each other about semantic stuff that we can never prove or nobody can be right, because, especially if you come from the African diaspora, you have no clue exactly of what you, we can't trace it. You've been split from family, you've been split from tribe, you've been split from everything you know about yourself, except from 500 years ago. You know, but prior to that we don't know.
Speaker 6:So even for FBA to be arguing with the rest of the African-Athenaeans acting like they're not part of it, but what it's doing, though this is why I'm so adamant about celebration. If we were in the mode of celebration instead of destruction, instead of tearing each other down because of that scarcity mindset, we'd be in a much different place, right now We'd be looking to bring people in instead of pushing people out. Exactly. We wouldn't be blocking things, because what we're actually blocking is love.
Speaker 6:And we're inviting negativity. We're inviting the, you know, we're inviting the vultures to keep feeding off of us because we're decaying, we're killing ourselves, you know. So I know we went off on a little bit of a tangent, but, like, I think these things are important to talk about, right, because, again, if, if, nobody's going to negate my contributions to this space, why do we negate other people Because they're visibly white or they're visibly non-black, or they're right? It just to me is we're working against ourselves and we're adding fuel to a fire that they started and this culture is so strong.
Speaker 6:We've sampled everything. We've gone so far to sample things that have never been sampled before. We're touching regions and cultures that never would have understood this culture until we built that bridge, that sampling bridge, right, we make all these connections like hip-hop, I believe, literally, you know, you see the, the airlines, and they show all their travel destinations, they see all those lines. That's what I did through sampling. It just kept going and going and going, and now we have all these different destinations that we can go to, and not only go to, but see our footprint, and not only that, see the reflection of that seed that was planted by their expressions. That's why we go to these other countries.
Speaker 6:You can go to Asia right now and Bitcoin is prevalent as ever. It's huge.
Speaker 5:DJ culture. Korea's bananas, right Right.
Speaker 6:DJ culture, all of these things right. Here in the US we're fighting about a fictional date.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you wasn't there. You know what I'm saying. It doesn't really matter.
Speaker 6:Right, all right. So let's get into this one. I really want to talk about it, so I just Google and I Google, I use chat GBT. I asked who created jazz and who created rock and roll. What do you think it said?
Speaker 5:They didn't say black people.
Speaker 6:Yes, it said African-American culture, but not one person created it, it was an evolution. Hmm, right, so how could one person have created hip hop, hip hop. One hip hop isn't even hip hop. On the date they said it was created, nobody called it hip hop. Then period, right? So if I created something, I'm going to name it, I'm going to put a date on it, I'm going to do all this shit and I'm going to say I did it Like when they find a new planet Right, they find a new star.
Speaker 5:The person that finds it puts his name on it. Right, it becomes a Roman Freeman sledge whatever asteroid.
Speaker 6:Right, yeah. Or if you're born, you get a birth certificate. Here's your birth certificate no-transcript. Wasn't jazz? Wasn't all of the records that we sampled?
Speaker 5:before that age, the dances that are derivative of african tribal representation.
Speaker 6:So so my thing is hip hop isn't a creation. It's an evolution evolved from everything that was contributed by these cultures, especially African-American culture. Right that led up to all of this and it's still evolving and growing. So, just like Hawaii, the big island is the largest, but it's the youngest island because it's still growing. A volcano still erupts. We're still contributing to this. We're still growing and my theory is that because we sample, it's synonymous with foraging. It's how we learn to move around the globe period.
Speaker 6:Foraging and sampling are exactly the same thing. We just forage the things that were around us at that time in the Bronx. It started with our parents' crates. That time in the Bronx, it started with our parents' crates, their closets, the people in the OGs around us, the TVs, the movies and all this other stuff and all the music that came prior to that. How can we give it a date? We're giving it a date so we can argue about something that can never be proven. So we're distracted and their hands are continuously in our pockets. We're so distracted we couldn't even celebrate breaking being in the Olympics, Bro. That's the biggest sporting stage in the world, the most recognized sporting stage in the world, the longest running To have something that came from gang culture to stop violence become a sport on that stage.
Speaker 4:Australian girl yeah, Some shit from Australia.
Speaker 6:That was garbage, terrible. Yeah, the worst representation, but that doesn't matter to me, right, because it didn't take away that the fact we Breaking was still in the Olympics it was still there.
Speaker 1:It distracted, but that's what we should walk away with the fact we break, it was still in the Olympics.
Speaker 6:It was still in the Olympics, yeah. It distracted, it distracted, but that's what we should walk away with, and that's why I'm so adamant about celebration. Well, wait a minute.
Speaker 1:I got a counterpoint to you, though. If you think about hip-hop, right, we just celebrated the 50th anniversary, right, and I know you're not saying a date.
Speaker 5:Which is proverbial, right, proverbial.
Speaker 1:But at the same time it was a celebration Like it did mark a date for us to talk and to educate and to celebrate something.
Speaker 6:All right, but this is my issue. We don't celebrate on our own. They're programming us to celebrate when we're told or allowed to. So we have birthdays right. Those are normal. Everybody gets a birthday right. You might have an anniversary, something at your job, whatever. What else do you celebrate on a regular? That's not a national holiday. That's not on a calendar. You know how many national day of this, that and the third they have Because they want us to tell us how to celebrate. There's several of them on every day. Every day there's National Hot Dog Day, burger Day, cheeseburger Day, double Cheeseburger Day, smash Bro, it's wild. We have to step back sometimes from this to see these things, otherwise they just become normalized in our head. We are not celebrating intentionally. If we celebrated intentionally, I don't think we would continue to give away the most powerful and monetizable thing that we have our authenticity, which creates influence.
Speaker 5:And you got a great point here, mike, because I hearken back to the 50th anniversary and the Yankee Stadium show. There were a lot of celebrations of hip-hop around the country, but no one took more offense than rappers that were not allowed to perform at yankee stadium. But there was a lot of pushback from that because inside we looked at it as the biggest, the biggest event commemorating. Yeah right, but I don't know if hip-hop even put, I don't know if hip-hop factors or hip-hop creators or any of the leaders or pillars were involved with even putting that on.
Speaker 6:But that's what I'm saying. So it's corporatized, right, right, exactly. They create the dates and the celebrations to monetize it, but who gets the majority of the money? People that are not in the culture. Exactly that's my point. When are we going to take control of those celebrations and monetize for ourselves? We're not even celebrating the fact of everything that's happened. I was told in the 90s, jeff, I don't know if you were ever told this. I was told regularly, enjoy it while it lasts. This is a fad, it's not real music.
Speaker 6:Go, get a real job Go look at the music departments, study them.
Speaker 5:Yeah, absolutely, that was supposed to teach you to work other music right Exactly, yeah, it was freestyle In 1997, when I moved out, here was a dance station.
Speaker 6:Freestyle right. So when I went to my first summer jam.
Speaker 6:It was at the Jacob Javis Center. K7 hosted that 1994, they switched that format, and now, in 2000, I don't know what year it happened, but I know now, in 2025, 197 is a top 40 station. Yeah, so that means we're pop music. Now. We've gone from not even being recognized as music to pop Just means popular, right? We are one of the most popular genres of music, so when are we going to celebrate that, though, and stop giving this away? You know what I'm saying?
Speaker 2:Like it's great that we made it to Louis Vuitton, absolutely.
Speaker 6:But I know y'all remember Louis Vuitton telling us they don't want drug dealers wearing their clothes Right, and I see drug dealers sitting front row at every single show. I see drug dealers in their campaigns now Sponsored. What changed? They're sponsored now, exactly, we didn't change. So if one of the most well, the oldest, one of the oldest brands in the world, one of the most outwardly openly racist brands in the world, will change their values and ethos and sacrifice those things for money, because that's what they're doing it for they're not doing it because, they like us.
Speaker 6:They're doing it for. They're not doing it because they like us. They're doing it because they have to do it, because we move the needle.
Speaker 5:We're representative of the lifestyle that they believe caters to their brand.
Speaker 6:We are Well, no, no, no. Caters to sales, to selling their brand, sales right. I don't think we're the lifestyle that they want, catered to their brand at all. I'm going gonna talk about how. When did they start making clothes fat joe can wear? Like that's not?
Speaker 4:a shot at fat joe. That's, bro, very slim time they're.
Speaker 5:I was at a point where I could barely wear some of their stuff absolutely yeah, but now you have basketball players that are millionaires young black people of color that are millionaires, football players that are people of black and brown from baseball and soccer right, and they all have this expendable income and they want to look the part.
Speaker 6:But why aren't we? If they're going to change everything to keep making those dollars, why can't we just do that for ourselves? Why can't we make the brands and do that for ourselves? And the argument usually is we don't have the resources we have the resources.
Speaker 4:now, the other argument is we didn't have the resources. We have the resources somewhere.
Speaker 6:They're way ahead. They started somewhere. We all got to start somewhere.
Speaker 5:We control fashion week. I went to fashion week about two years ago and I had a long conversation with Don. I was like yo, this is dope. This is not what people think, bro, he's like. They wouldn't even let us in these shows. That's what I'm saying. They, they wouldn't even let us in these shows, that's what I'm saying. They wouldn't even let us in the rooms back then. And now we control almost every room, right, and I believe honestly. I believe. Rest in peace to.
Speaker 5:Virgil, I think he would have been part of a new way of looking at African diaspora through fashion. I think that was going to be the leading point Because, you see, that became a big part of a lot of people's campaigns about five, six years ago, right, and I think it was inevitable, right that Virgil and Pharrell and Kanye and them at a certain point, had the power, had the resources, had the vision to actually create the next fashion house, because one of the biggest fashion houses was relying on them for revitalization.
Speaker 6:If a company like Louis will compromise all their values and ethos. That means they need us, Right. If they need us, that tells me we don't need them. We need us. We just need us.
Speaker 5:We have to look at us the way that they we have to see ourselves the way they see us, yeah, as their threat, and not in the way we've been told we're a threat, but in the way they can see the value, the value which is the threat to them.
Speaker 6:Basically, what they're doing is I think hakeem from channel live told me the rappers are the cotton, like the influence is the cotton. They're just picking it whenever they need it.
Speaker 5:You know what I'm saying that's a definitely an interesting take. I'm not fully opposed to that. I think there's merit in that, you know it's a it's a tough one, bro.
Speaker 6:I just think again, we're at a transition point. What industries haven't we touched that we really want to touch right now? What penthouse, what? What penthouse aren't we in right now?
Speaker 6:you know, what I'm saying like we never thought we would be here. Nobody had these things on their bingo cards back then, or we'd have more ownership. Right now, we just keep growing and growing and getting bigger and bigger and bigger. They keep trying to tell us lies. Oh, it's not. All the cultures is all dangerous. No, we still continue to have the biggest records, the biggest moments. It just keeps happening. But we just keep wanting to go back to Reebok. And oh, let's go revive Reebok. Shaq and Iverson, let's go to Reebok. You know what I'm saying? Or Toby Toby just did a deal.
Speaker 6:Another dead brand, reebok was the number one brand when Michael Jordan got signed to Nike. They've never been close to that since and we just keep going back trying to give and why they were trying to get. Master P and Baron Davis were trying to raise $800 million to buy Reebok during the pandemic.
Speaker 5:Don't buy it, just start something new yeah pandemic Argument don't buy it, just start something new. Yeah, if it takes. What he's saying is if it takes you, tom, if Reebok wants to rebuild and rebrand and regrow their brand but they know they can't do it without you Then what's the stopping you from going directly? To the people that are looking to receive the vision, although the only reason you don't do it is if you believe that there's more value to going with them than there is in believing in yourself.
Speaker 1:Although my argument would be I'm talking about it would be if you're trying to purchase it Right and take it over. What you're, what you're ultimately purchasing, is a brand that at least somebody has ever heard of. It's going to take you three steps ahead of starting something new.
Speaker 5:But even if they've heard of it, tom, they're not going to buy it if it's not cool. No, no, I'm agreeing with you there.
Speaker 1:But if certain individuals were to purchase it and actually make it theirs. I think that's an acceleration to get to where they need to get, because you're starting with something that existed.
Speaker 6:I don't know if the perception will ever be that it's there, but there's not a collective, because we're not in a celebration mode, we're in a destruction mode. We still want to tear things down because that's how we've been programmed. If I see somebody rise, they're going to tear them down, because I want that position I want that money.
Speaker 4:Right.
Speaker 5:And people believe that's finite. People believe that that's finite, yeah, even though I see more and more billionaires every goddamn year, I see football contracts, basketball contracts. Baseball contracts get bigger and bigger every year, but we are constantly telling ourselves that there's only enough room. Yeah, there's not.
Speaker 6:This is not that and it's because, again one, we don't know who we are like when we say we, who's, we who's, who can be involved in we, just like I was talking about before, who can be involved in hip-hop, who's part of that right if we're arguing, if, if fba is arguing against afro, anything else, african, like that's wild right. So imagine anybody else arguing or being part of it. How do you identify who can participate?
Speaker 5:now, who can even yeah, yeah, by the team yeah, so where's the trust?
Speaker 6:where's the camaraderie? You know saying. Where's the trust? Where's the camaraderie? You know what I'm saying? Where's the building? I mean honestly. That's why I came up with the Fly Private Social concept was to create spaces where we feel safe to gather so we could be our authentic selves through the lens of hip-hop.
Speaker 4:Well, talk about that, and about the chef hire thing too. Talk about that.
Speaker 6:So Fly. Private Social for me is again we're the driving force of global culture. We got nowhere to go to celebrate it. We got nowhere. That's ours. You look at Soho House's programming in the United States, especially in the major cities. How much of that is programmed around what we do right. Why is DJ Premier spinning at Soho House bro?
Speaker 5:So other people can feel like they're cool and be a part of the culture Again so now we're giving the culture away piece by piece.
Speaker 6:We're here to break off that chip. You can take a chip home with you instead of saying, hey, why don't you just come to what we do and really feel like you know what I'm saying and create a space and allow everybody else in? Because, honestly, soho House isn't even a social club. They tell you don't speak to other members unless you know them. So how is that even a social club? Yeah, right, and I think if we can create spaces where we can actually gather, see the culture celebrated, like the idea is to have it celebrate everywhere, it goes right. So each city will celebrate the local history, traditions and culture.
Speaker 6:So New York or Brooklyn has all Brooklyn people on the wall. If we went to Houston, it'd be all Houston people on the walls right. Go to ATL, all ATL people on the wall. And then how do you crowdfund, how do you build where everybody can participate, whether through membership, whether through real estate, whatever it may be, but open it up for those opportunities, because it's like we do so much stuff where it's just about us, but it's for the culture. I want to monetize it, but it's for the culture, right. How do we monetize things for us, for the community. It can't be everybody, obviously Right, but how do we open those things up? And I think if we create spaces with that kind of intention, that leads to other kinds of collaboration within the space from the people, from the people participating, the members, you know.
Speaker 4:And now you put that I'm sure you're conjoining that with Chef Hire as well as a kind of collaborative kind of thing.
Speaker 5:Right Food is a draw?
Speaker 6:I mean, food is a universal language. Everybody eats, I don't know, anybody who doesn't eat right. So I want to have a conversation, a true conversation. I want to bring, or have the opportunity, ability to be able to bring, all kinds of people together. What are the universal language? Absolutely Right. I think food is the greatest one To me. The other one is hip hop. It's not universal to everybody, but it is universal to a lot of people, right, they're aware Even if they're not immersed. They're aware.
Speaker 5:Right, universal to everybody, but it is universal to a lot of people, right. They're aware, Even if they're not immersed. They're aware.
Speaker 6:Right. And so through food and gathering around food, we break bread right. That's part of it. Food is part of every celebration.
Speaker 4:Every celebration. That's how humans commune.
Speaker 6:Right. And then if we take food as knowledge, wisdom, understanding, information, energy, food can be anything that we exchange food for the soul, food for the mind right.
Speaker 6:And so, again, that's why the pillars are community with a capital, unity, because if we communicate unity, unity because our capital right culinary there's food in all kinds of forms and in culture, right. But celebrating of culture is because everything is an amalgamation of different cultures, especially if you're mixed, especially if you're living in this country, especially if you mess with hip hop, right, it's multicultural. We multi-hyphenates. At this point, we don't have to do one thing, we don't have to. I think we're so used to being in these boxes of things. But if we allow it to, if we really allow hip-hop to breathe, it's broken every barrier that used to be in front of us now, when you we get your chef hired thing.
Speaker 4:It's your Chef Hired thing. How can I? Is it a hip-hop? It's me, it's you. It's not a hip-hop thing, it's a mic thing.
Speaker 5:You're the amalgamation of hip-hop with all the other things, as well, I think what he's saying is that it all emerges from him. Chef Hired is an amalgamation of everything that he kind of represents as an example to other people to be able to come in and be whatever it is that they feel they represent and, at the very least, meet somebody you didn't know, maybe find out how much you have in common or, at the most like, actually build real relationship, real community.
Speaker 6:Right. Well, the other thing with Chef for Hire right, it's cannabis, Right, and so cannabis. What I learned? We have an endocannabinoid system, so we have a system in our bodies that regulates, just wants to create homeostasis. It works with every other system in our body. That's why, you know, you can get sleepy, right, you can be happy, you can get hungry, you can help to solve pain issues or other things of that nature, and again, it just wants to create homeostasis. And when I found that out, I was like, well, how do I introduce people to that Food, right?
Speaker 6:Conversation breaking bread Again. Everybody eats. So most people, especially people who don't smoke or never participate or don't want to participate with cannabis, are resistant to that fact because it's not taught in textbooks. It's not even taught in medical textbooks. Doctors don not even taught in medical textbooks. Doctors don't even learn this. Yet the information is there. They don't learn it because they can't use cannabis, because they schedule it at one and they say it's not medicine, even though cannabis was in the pharmacopoeia in 1851. There was over 100 prescriptions that had cannabis in it. It was one of the most widely used medicines in this country period. But come around in 1937, all of a sudden it's racially fueled right, and now it's all about race and control and they create prohibition to hurt people of color. It was black people, it was black, hispanic and Filipinos right that they named and they demonized this plant and until this day it's still.
Speaker 6:If you think about back problems and all kinds of other issues didn't start until the 20th century, true Right. One of the theories is cannabis used to grow freely. Cannabis is a healing plant. It reciprocates information back into everything that grows around Right, so that grass that grows out, that the cows graze on or the chickens feed. They're eating cannabinoids through that, right, you eat those animals. Now you're getting that. All of that is gone.
Speaker 6:Another part is control is cotton, right, it grows three times faster than cotton and it doesn't deplete the soil. Cotton, you have to rotate crops, right, every single time. Cannabis, you can keep planting, keep growing. They don't want that. Cotton is one of the hardest things to pick, it's difficult, it costs a lot of money. It costs a lot of money. It costs a lot of human labor.
Speaker 6:Cannabis can be automated now, or this one thing called the sun that's been given life to everything in this universe since our existence, can grow it for you. You know what I'm saying. They don't want any of that. It's all about control, right, but we get stuck on the little things. Oh, I can make money in the legal business, all right, but we need to fight to get this off of the schedule. And you now, which has potential to put a huge stop to everything legalization has done to this point, and maybe put it into the pharmaceutical industry's hands, because a Schedule 3 drug can only be delivered by a pharmacist through medical dispensaries. That's another level of control, right? So you know, they got Wiz Khalifa signing up for it now and he's promoting. You know we need to schedule this to three. I spoke to somebody at the FDA. He said they're going to amend it. I don't trust this country, that's crazy.
Speaker 6:Like you know. So it could easily just go with that route where all of a sudden because look at Dwayne Reeds and all Walgreens are hurting right now yeah, going away.
Speaker 4:Yeah, they'd be right back in the game.
Speaker 5:They'd change it significantly and think of the tax money that the government would get Exactly.
Speaker 4:Absolutely.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 6:Absolutely and so again, I think we just we need to broaden our vision a bit and I believe that's still again doing that inner work so we can see clearer, step away from some of this stuff and really see what they're doing. It's wild out here, yeah, man.
Speaker 4:So what's next for you, bro? What you doing, what's next?
Speaker 6:What's next? Yeah, man. So what's next for you, bro? What you doing? What's next? What's next, man? I?
Speaker 4:brought the podcast back, so I got Mask Off with Hawaii. Mike, I watched a couple episodes. I saw you in Spinner.
Speaker 6:Yeah, so we brought video to it now. So that's been fun. And then I'm hopping into the streaming space because, like we were talking about before, we got to go where you know the attention is, and so I'm gonna start live streaming, um, and just build that channel up and really get out there, like I did media for so long, um, or even management, like you know, when I was managing nigel and just being out there and when I went on to my that's the other thing I didn't say when I the first part was that like child journey, and the second part was in 2017 I stopped drinking and it just changed everything for me. I found breath. Breath is the first thing we do when we're born. We breathe in. It's the last thing you do before you die is you breathe out? What's the last time you thought about breathing? It's involuntary.
Speaker 4:I think about it because I work out.
Speaker 6:It's autonomous right because I think about it because I work out. It's autonomous right Because your system is just going to automatically do it.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 6:And you're automatically going to breathe. But we breathe when we need it. We breathe when we need to center ourselves, when we need to calm down. We breathe when we need to hold our breath, to go into the water Right. But if we thought about breathing on a regular, we might create some more gratitude around this stuff that we can't grab. But without it we don't have life. But we care about the things that we can grab and value these things more, right, or even our bodies, right.
Speaker 6:But breathing intentionally can put you into such a space, whether it's meditation you know, actual meditations, walking meditations, whatever else, box breathing like Wim Hof, breathing Like there's so many different things. Breath is so important, but, again, we're not present enough to think about these things. So for me, like, my goal, even with the streaming, is just to share our oneness and to inspire everybody to go on that individual journey to become their best self, whatever that may mean for you. It's not too late. Until it's too late, we can all do this. I see so many of my people are like I can't work out why I don't have time. You just said you binge watched this series.
Speaker 5:That's very different, you can watch the movie while you work out there, you different man.
Speaker 1:That's very different, and you can watch the movie while you work out. There.
Speaker 4:You go there you go Absolutely, absolutely. You can do more than one thing.
Speaker 5:Every GM has treadmills with TV screens on it now.
Speaker 4:Absolutely.
Speaker 6:And that's my thing is we can work out anywhere, we can do anything. It's a matter of getting into the mindset of starting, right Into the mindset of doing. I want to be better, I want to be healthy, thinking of myself 20 years from now, not thinking about what I fucked up on yesterday. You know what.
Speaker 6:I'm saying and like we all see our parents right now. You know whether they're healthy or going through things. That's potentially where you can be, you know saying when you're their age. We got to work on that. Now, like, like we have to work on being present and being in the moment so we enjoy life. We also have to work to how and where we're going to be health wise in the future so we can be there once we get there. And again, I think for me, people put me on this pedestal now because I started this journey and I'm like well, I still eat what I want to eat, I still go out where I want to go out, I still smoke, I still do all of these things. It's balance. You know what I'm saying. We can't go too far. If I drink too much water, I'm going to get sick.
Speaker 6:Absolutely. We can't go too far. If I drink too much water, I'm gonna get sick, like absolutely. It's like it's finding your balance. I'm not saying my balance, I'm saying your balance and where you're at right now and we got to get rid of the judgment. We got to get rid of the self-criticism as best we can, because that stops us from even starting, because we're comparing. Somebody else has been on their journey for years yeah, yeah, you know yeah.
Speaker 6:And so it's like how do we just get this started? No-transcript, monk, and you're only over. You know you can't do anything. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, let's have fun, like, let's do this to have fun and let's make it fun balance and moderation.
Speaker 5:My mom always told me moderation, moderation like you're, like the sign says behind you, tom, that life doesn't have to be perfect to be wonderful. That's right, exactly that is right. Just find your balance and everything should work out for you.
Speaker 6:The more you do those things and put yourself into those positive loops, the more the muscle memory starts to become that, the more your discipline is easier, the more you make better choices. It all flows, it all ties together because it's doing that right now to the people that are binge watching, eating ice cream, not doing anything right. That's their routine, that's where they're sitting at and they got really good at that program, right? They're very disciplined in that, you know, and now it's just how you go that way.
Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah man it you know, and now it's just how you go that way. Yeah, yeah, that was dope man, I mean, and I talked to this guy.
Speaker 4:I talked to this guy all the time. We talked to food. You do this with the 10-hour podcast. We got to bring you back he never ceases to bring clarity.
Speaker 5:Like I said, it's good talking to people because even if mike, even if got it Mike's like, even if you don't, that's fine too. Right Like you don't, you don't really have to have it Right Like that's, that's going to be OK too. That's cool too.
Speaker 5:You know and sometimes we kind of got to be reminded of that we can get so caught up in the whirlwind of everything that they tell us we need to care about and we need to be concerned about, and things that try to pull our attention and pull us away, for whatever reasons, and give us a different perspective and try to shift our perspective and our purpose in a way that benefits them more than it does us. You know, mike man. Thank you so much, bro. Like I feel like I know you and I didn't know you, I feel like I know you, yeah.
Speaker 5:I feel like a lot of shit that I didn't understand. It makes all the sense in the world now that I understand. Yeah, yeah, no, just because mike's so likable, mike's so personable, right, everybody likes mikey. It's very easy to get along with and it just, you know, listen to him talk about his life. This is just kind of who he is, it's kind of who he's been, and it's not a loud life. And you know, as we all know, being involved in the hip-hop and and all of this stuff, man, it can pull you in a bunch of different ways and it's it's. It's made some really really good people, people that you don't even recognize anymore.
Speaker 5:You know I'm saying but, mike, you have found a way to be very even keeled through this world. You know I'm saying if you're stressed, you don't wear. You don't wear it at all. I have to say. And, man, thank you so much for just being bro, like just being here, like just being in this world and being authentic to yourself. And you're even a better person than I thought you were and I thought you were a great guy. Now, but this shit don't make sense, bro. Like listening to your conversation and your journey and your walk, I understand you a lot better and you make you make even more sense now as to how you are, because we operate in a space where you don't have to be kind, you don't have to be nice, and you still get rewarded and you still get put on a pedestal and you still get glorified and all of that stuff. So kudos to you, man, for not being tainted. Right, yeah, for real. Yeah, thank you, that's off for not being tainted. Yeah, for real.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thank you, that's all, and being available to me too, by the way.
Speaker 6:You know, making yourself available. Hey, bro, like always man, you know, I think and that's important too. I know we didn't touch on that, but you and I have had a lot, a lot of real deep personal talks, and you know, I hope more of us do, I know you do it. I just hope more of us do that with each other, because there's so many issues that we think we're doing alone or it's only happening to us. Everybody's going through something. That's true.
Speaker 6:And everybody has something that they need to be heard. They just need to be listened to sometimes and just acknowledged and like get things off of their chest, and then maybe they don't act out in another way. So you know, I hope that people do take that away and have conversations, man, because they're important, bro, Like we helped each other through some some, some deep times.
Speaker 5:Very, very, very real. We we went through some very deep personal transitions in life during our friendship, and not at the same time either. So it's been a blessing to have a friend like you in my corner that can kind of keep me, keep me going, keep me lifted up, keep me encouraged, and I'm glad that I've been able to be that type of friend to you as well. And I think that's what he's talking about. When it comes to community, the more people you have in your community, the more people you have to help you work through things.
Speaker 1:And the more people you're in a position to actually help get through their shit.
Speaker 6:Yeah, thank you, mike, and I'll say this I'm gonna get in the mindset of celebration. Get in the mind hey, everybody, let's celebrate. Celebrate every single day you wake up. If you wake up, your eyes open, you got your faculties, you're alert. Celebrate.
Speaker 1:That's why, mike, and until next time. I'm tom frank, I'm bun b, I'm Jeffrey Sledge. Follow the show on Instagram at unglossypod and leave us a comment. Subscribe to Unglossy on Apple, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you catch your podcasts. Unglossy is hosted by Bun B, Jeffrey Sledge and Tom Frank. It is produced and distributed by Merrick Studios.
