HHNLive.com writer St James sits down with the legend KRS-One to discuss race, the hood, Hip-Hop, longevity, cooking and more.

KRS-One on the Hip-Hop buying public: "the public is gullible and doesn’t know the difference. But then they grow up and suffer life and they start realizing I’ve been duped and their sitting in jail all that “thug thug” shit seems stupid to me..."

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St. James: How you feeling?

KRS: I’m good. Blessed blessed.

SJ: I just want to say I’m honored and I appreciate the opportunity to talk to you. Tell me about the togetherness and the Stop the Violence Movement.

KRS: Everyone together is the movement and that’s what I say at Roc the Mic studio where about 100 people came through in a place that held about 50 and all the press was out. Coke 2, graffiti writer came through, Crazy Legs came through, and the MCs went berserk on the mic. You’d be surprised. Conscious lyrics, I mean Cassidy just killed it. Lil Mama rocked out, and it was a real feeling of peace. Everybody was shaking hands, passing cards. You looked and it was like wow this is what hip hop is all about.

SJ: You’re a legend in this game. What has allowed you to sustain and continue to teach and be of service to hip hop?

KRS: I'll tell you. The first answer is that I really don’t know. That not knowing is what proves the existence of God for me. I look at that and I say “I really don’t know how I survived”. I really don’t know how I lasted. I’ve seen miracle after miracle in my 22 year career that put me in the place that I’m in. I’m humbled by it and I try to stay in line with the “force” that is moving me that way. That’s the first answer. But in the spirit realm, intellectually answering you, I would say that it’s the people. The people keep KRS alive. I don’t sell a million records, well that’s not true Criminal Minded sold like 3 million, the other album sold like 1 million but as an artist I don’t sell the millions of records and you don’t see me on MTV and my records playing every hour on the hour on the radio. Blessings to those who have that privilege, but that’s not KRS. The other side of my longevity is the love of the people. I have to have a genuine love and respect from the community I am entertaining so to speak. This has given me great longevity, the voice of the people and has kept me in line as well. There are things that the people agree with that I don’t agree with and vice versa. This has been my balancing act between myself and my community for so long. We are truly loyal to each other. The hip hop community has shown its loyalty to KRS time and time again for 22 years and vice versa. But it’s still a struggle to help those who are criticizing you at the same time.

SJ: What do you mean by the criticism? Do you feel that it’s the game in general or individuals trying to hinder God’s work?

KRS: All of the above. I think it’s personal between some artists and myself. They say they don’t like KRS-One so they are not going to join a campaign to save our children. Me, I’ve joined forces with people I don’t really care for, for the bigger cause. If there is clearly a bigger cause I am with that. You see I respect those that don’t respect me. So if you don’t like me or whatever, it is what it is, but in the larger scheme of what hip hop is it hurts because we can’t help the community because we can’t come together and create something together that by ourselves we could probably not come up with. There is also the community part of it in addition to individuals though. Dr. King spoke about this as well. He was highly criticized by the black community of those times. His principles were criticized by the very people he was trying to save and help. You find that throughout history, and I’m growing from it now. I do understand history and those who have also struggled before me. Right now I’ll call my suffering my growth. That is my challenge to continue my mission in the face of adversity especially from my community. When I was young, in hip hop it was clear that the corporations were the enemy and that you didn’t sell out to their interest. You didn’t give your talent and time to someone that had no interest in your interests. Hip hop has always been clear that it was willing to do business with those who are willing to do equal business. But if you are just going to rape the culture and not give anything back then we were not going to do that. A lot of brothers have now opted to take that route. I want to take my portion of hip hop, sell it to the corporate world and have them say that this is what hip hop is. We were clear in the early days with that. Then something happened. What happened was we won. Everyone that was protesting the corporations became the corporations. Even I had a chill job at Warner Bros. Not because I wanted to be an executive but I did want the experience and opportunity through David Kahn. He had signed my wife at Columbia Records and we kept a friendship. I took a job to see what that world was like. I was there 2 years and I gained enlightenment. It’s fake and phony and no one wants to be there and I saw that. But when I saw that I wasn’t going to do a real service to my people I quit. And I’m not saying that in a rhyme or proudly but in the context of this conversation if you’re in a place, spending millions of dollars a year through the company, keep in mind I was in a good space individually but my purpose was not being fulfilled. The reason I was KRS-One was not being fulfilled. Knowledge wasn’t reigning supreme. Cash was reigning supreme, executive title and who you know was reigning supreme. So I quit. That was the end of it. I suffered financially from that and my wife and I said that this is bs. We would rather MC at a 500 capacity club for the rest of my life than betray my principles. I say that to say that the public didn’t understand it. People didn’t understand my Nike commercial. People don’t understand the mix tape me and Premier did with Smirnoff. The issue is in one breath, people couldn’t still see me from 20 years ago and I can understand that. Nothing is wrong with 20 years ago. It’s called tradition. Now all the fans of Criminal Minded, Edutainment, By All Means Necessary, etc. that whole crew are attorneys, doctors, CEOs, FBI, police, Marines, you name it. It’s a weird paradox now that my own people are coming back to me saying yo “Listen I have $1 million for you, I’m working at Proctor and Gamble”. Now when I was growing up we used to point out on the back of the Ivory soap how Proctor and Gamble was the devil. That little symbol with the moon and what not. We were on the corner like “don’t use Ivory soap”. Now we grow up and who knows what it means really. Because now OUR people are running that company. Not in contract with, or in the management. We are the CEOs of these companies and the radio stations and movies as well. This is the other challenge that we face. How do you update the knowledge of your people without interrupting tradition. Because we respect tradition. A lot of that wisdom that we have in tradition was brought about through real experiences of those who taught us “don’t go down that street”. So you don’t just shake tradition. Scott La Rock still means something to me 22 years later. But that other side of that is that there is new knowledge and ways to survive based on the new movement in humanity. The growth of civilization and human society. There seems to be a developed advancement in the way we do business today and it seems to be inclusive of the way we DIDN’T want to do business before. It’s not just signing up with the corporations but we are sitting in the seats now. The interests are still the same, they are trying to sell products to the community, but the community usually has a governing body, counsel or representation to make sure that those that are selling their goods to our community and taking the money out of our community for their profit, that they are not hurting our people with their goods, that money is circulating back into the community and that’s what we intend to be on that level. Whether it be the Temple of Hip Hop, Hip Hop Congress, Stop the Violence, Zulu Nation, any organization that is professing to try to fulfill this purpose. That is what I hope we get out of this movement.

SJ: Where do you feel with your influence and structure that hip hop his headed or how will it be without? Where are we headed?

KRS: For Self Destruction! LOL

SJ: I set myself up for that one! LOL

KRS: Let me go a little broader with that. We are going wherever we truly decide to go. Hip Hop is not on auto pilot. I am not the only one thinking like this. This is why I mentioned these other organizations. Everybody is thinking and developing strategies and believe it or not a lot of those people are applying their strategies to get real results. If you would look on TV you would not think that hip hop has an activist voice. But that is the job of the activist to clear that up. Going to the Stop the Violence movement, you asked the question where is hip hop going? Well I’ve announced a Stop the Violence movement. We are announcing peace. We are announcing order if you will. This is not a passive thing. We would hope it is. WE are begging and pleading and hoping that we can organize hip hop with not a lot of friction, confrontation. The least amount of friction you have, the higher you show your intelligence to be. So for us it’s a challenge to figure this out, intellectually, spiritually, to figure this one out. How do you organize a community that is reluctant to save itself? Hip hop wants to party, it wants bitches, it wants niggas. It doesn’t want black people. Now there is a sector that does want the black family, black man, etc. Well I will retract and say that everyone wants that, even the gangstas. But we can’t front on the bitches we have in our community. And the niggas that want to be niggas. No matter how much knowledge you spit to them, no matter what you show them they are like dude “I am who I am”. But that’s part of our community. Look at the intellectual challenge we have when you ask “where are we going”? We may already be there. Here’s the challenge we have, in hip hop which is an all inclusive culture. The only culture by the way that is a physical manifestation of Dr. King’s Dream. All inclusive. Where is hip hop going. Where is that type of that movement going?? We have Christians, all denominations in our community. We have Jews and denominations in our community. Muslims and all denominations in our community. We have Buddhist, Hindus and all related entities. We even have atheists who love hip hop. Even though Dougie Fresh is saying “All the way to heaven” and they are chanting with that in hip hop. So you ask where does that go? The question may not be applying to us. It’s more of our observation. Like if you saw a rabbit and you were standing on the bank and asking where is that rabbit going? As opposed to us having influence over the rabbit like holding it by the ears and someone says “where is that rabbit going”, you’re like “in my pot”. But in this sector the psychology of the questions changes because what we are looking at is as an observer saying “look at that thing running across the street”. Look at us. Where are we going? Where is that we (hip hop) going. And you may need to follow it as opposed to influence it and following it may lead you to some weird places but nonetheless it would be the truth. This is the piece though. The truth doesn’t care about peace though. The truth doesn’t care about love or whether you like what is being presented. The truth is the truth. So in pursuit of truth we may find out some things about ourselves and the world we live in that we don’t like. So hip hop may be looking at needing to ask that question but we also must ask where am I taking it in that sense. Every hip hopper should ask themselves that question. But just below that surface ,where is hip hop as a global movement and cultural phenomenon going? Where is it going?? When we look at the nature of “it”. Is it leading us somewhere? To peace? Because it can only go according to our collective consciousness. That “it” we call hip hop is OUR collective consciousness. Not an individual consciousness. But all of our awarenesses together form what we call hip hop and that is going somewhere. So when you look at our people you can see the intentions in hip hop because it is our collective consciousness. So the people want peace, and more money, security, happiness. This is what the people want. So even if we follow hip hop and our own collective consciousness and somehow we will arrive at that. This is where we are going. We should really in a nut shell believe in ourselves because we don’t believe in ourselves enough as a culture and a real community of people that are specialized. In the fact that we are the world’s b-boys, MCs, DJs, you know like Italians are known for their pizza. Everybody makes pizza and Italy is not just known for its pizza but when you see the pizza you think of Italy. They have a graphic hold on the image of pizza in the world’s imagination. Like Chinese food. The influence of Chinese food has us growing up calling Thai, Japanese, and whatever else Chinese food. I point those out as examples of how hip hop has monopolized the urban image of urban life. There are other things going on in the hood. But we somehow monopolized what goes on in the hood. And our image of it is the world’s image of it. What a great power to have.

SJ: Responsibilities come with that right?

KRS: Great responsibilities that a lot of us are not stacking up to.

SJ: Do you think that the origin of a lot of hip hop’s pain and lashing out in violence is that we have never been taught to truly deal with our issues when they arise? We let it build up and then from what we are taught and see in the media we deal with it by anger when it spills out.

KRS: You are completely correct. And to compound that we are not taught conflict resolution skills. These things are taught. You have to teach the human being that. These are not innate abilities for most people. Most of humanity is an aggressive species of animal and these skills have to be taught. You just spoke the truth. The other side to it is that when you are dealing with education, justice, medicine, technology, sanitation, and I’m pointing out the cornerstones of society. What makes humanity one. When the institutions of the society fail, the society fails. People don’t pay much attention to the importance of the institution because they themselves are apathetic to it. In one breath it’s the collapse of the institution and in the same breath it’s the individual nature. It’s like the institutions are only there long enough to save those who want to be saved. Within every “hood” there is a liquor store, a church, a crack spot, and a library. And you make the choice as an individual which one of those you are going to go to. But then the other part is after you get there, these institutions are not upholding the communities interest. They are not institutions anymore they become tax collectors. The church’s in the community extract from the people like the supermarket or the cleaners. The church is not in the community to spread Christ on the streets. They are there to survive. And to survive that means they have to get people in the church to get donations. And that’s what the church becomes. Then you have people not believing that God exists. Then there’s the liquor store, And the liquor store is just selling you the liquor. They are not telling you to drink responsibly or stop that guy that comes in for the same bottle day after day and tell him hey man “you want to talk to somebody”? Libraries completely collapse because we don’t support it and it has not supported us. Now take that to rappers, because that’s the example. AS rappers we sell CDs to the public. We sell songs to the public. Now if you want the public to continue to buy it, you have to show some sort of care to them. Even if you’re lying. You still have to show some kind of care for them. As rappers, many of those placed in the mainstream have put out the image that rappers care about the public. And the public is gullible and doesn’t know the difference. But then they grow up and suffer life and they start realizing I’ve been duped and their sitting in jail all that “thug thug” shit seems stupid to me. This judge is sending me away, my kids are out there and all of that shit I was listening to is no longer the back drop. It’s not what I need in the back drop of my life. So there’s something to be said about the nature of the person and institutions. I grew up in the hood like everyone else, but I didn’t smoke crack. I mean I experimented (no E and all that shit), but I grew up in the hood. I held a lot of guns in my day but I’ve NEVER shot anyone. We would bust off in Prospect Park, or let off the uzi on the project rooftops or whatever. But to take a man’s life, I don’t have that in my karma. I mention that to say that it’s my nature. I’m not better than anyone else, I was in the hood too, I just went to the Brooklyn Public Library. I loved knowledge. I don’t know why but it was my nature. There are others who are saying that they are going to the Marines. I’m like “do you know there is a war” and they are sending you off to Iraq? An they are like dude, I don’t care I’m doing this, this is me right now. Everybody is not in agreement with the war but there are some out there that are like I don’t want to join the war but I’ll join BlackWater and get mine off. I really want to go out there and fulfill my thirst for blood. That’s why you have hunting. It’s not only a tradition but it’s human emotion that wants that feeling to kill and eat. Or in the sense of war to kill and pillage. To kill someone and take their goods. There is a sect of humanity that is with that. There is an agreement and it’s called civilization that they agree not to do that to members of their civilization. They agree to defend the civilization because their sons, mothers, and daughters, are attached to that society. In another country where the govt simply pays the army and it’s not connected to anyone. You could even import them from other countries to police your country that would be a totally different situation all around. But because the American soldier is connected by family to the society that impulse to kill and eat is quenched by a higher impulse for love of your family. But you still have to get that done so you go hunting and they shoot innocent animals to secure that thirst. Some take it further and join BlackWater, or the marines, or special forces, and take on special ops and they get off on that. They can’t live without their adrenaline rushing. I used to ask myself “What type of human being would want to be a cop?” I would ask myself that when I was young. On another level, when I was older I said forget the dislike because they serve a purpose but what KIND of an individual would become a cop? On all angles, you know the police are shooting us down, since Jesus times. You know what the history is to our community, how are you joining that? On top of that, how do you collect a pay check for your life? Because that’s what you are putting on the line everyday. A cop actually puts his life on the line everyday, evening if it’s patrolling a construction site, you are still in danger.

SJ: Tell the fans something they don’t know about KRS ONE?

KRS: My life is an open book so I’m trying to figure out…….oh, I like to cook! I cook for my family no doubt almost every night. I like outdoors stuff. I have a mean RV. I like red snapper and people probably don’t know that me and Mad Lion come and cook together. He does this Jamaican deal and I do a soul food down south type of deal. But yeah I get down.