This guy his name is Viktor Duplaix. You ever heard of him?

What was your last impulse buy?

This guy his name is Viktor Duplaix. You ever heard of him?

Yeah he's out of Philly, right?

Yeah yeah, yeah. I thought he was from like the Midwest, ain't true, I might be wrong. I heard this guy and it was tight. And you know, I'm from Chicago and we enjoy house music to the fullest, know what I'm saying? I mean, at the time it was really really hip but boring and people were like embracing it, I was rebelling against it because, you know, not too long after the hip hop music came along. But I do have a extreme appreciation for the real house, for the REAL house, none of that techno shit or the super-duper electronic shit like the real house, the deep soulful house

Like Derrick Carter.

Yeah, exactly. So you know, I saw his [Duplaix's] album in the store and I was like "yo, let me grab this and check it out" and I was pleasantly surprised, pleasantly.

Is hip hop the new funk?

Uh, I don't think nothing can be the new funk, you know. Funk has its own thing. I think hip hop follows from funk. It follows the energy, it follows the sound, you know what I'm saying. It follows the song molds and structure and shit like that, but I think hip hop is its own thing. I was just telling the other guy, my theory of hip hop is it parallels the existence of Freddy Krueger, it's hard to explain, but bear with me alright, check it out.

Uh, the history of Freddy Krueger being that the supposedly he has the strength of a hundred men, right?

Right.

His mama got raped by a hundred mad men at one time alright and the result was Freddy Krueger. So is the result of hip hop being in that hip hop is a collage. It's son of a hundred musics you know what I'm saying, it's a collage of apparently everything, you got jack flipping every style of music to make hip hop, you know what I'm saying? So I think hip hop has a piece of everything in it. So in that it's unique among that kind of stuff.

What was your thought when you first arrived at Bonnaroo?

I was like "Oh my god!" I was like "god damn, look at all these people!"

How would you compare the fans and the vibe at Bonnaroo to what you encountered on the Warped tour to what you may find at one of your own shows?

At Bonnaroo, a lot, from what I was told, a lot of them people didn't even know who the fuck we were. And were there partying because they like what we heard. That in itself was the oddity of to itself. The Warped tour it was like people hadn't heard of us, we were just a hip hop group. None of these people who came to the show weren't coming there for the whole hip hop shit. So when they saw us either they gave us love because they like music or they didn't give us love at all because they were hardcore rock fans. We caused love and cheers and we caused rocks and bottles. A tour of our own, we know that the people who like us are coming, or if its people who hadn't really, who don't really like us or know our music per se, they got someone in their family or their immediate friends or their immediate circle who was all about us told them about us. They're like "OK, cool, I'm gonna go check this out." And eventually, I mean to me, those people are the ones who are expecting to have fun, they get drunk and they have fun.

If you came back in a next life, who or what would you be?

Um, if I came back in the next life, I'd probably be a fish, for real. You know who I'd be, I'd be the Incredible Mr. Limpet.

There ya go [laughter], aw man. Reality T.V.: thumbs up or thumbs down?

Um, the first day I thought Demolition Man, no no, 'scuse me, The Running Man. Remember that movie Running Man with…

With Schwarzenegger?

Uh huh, I'm on the phone believing that America, or just the media, they don't necessarily lie to you, they cut the truth. What better way to hide the truth than put it in book. There's a saying that says "What better way to hide the truth from a black man than to put it in a book." You know what I'm saying? It all kind seems like that but I honestly think that people get away with more shit in your face than they do behind your back. So when I saw Running Man I said to myself "That shit's gonna happen in the future. Watch. We're gonna have reality TV shows where they, you know, get a fucking convict or something and have 'em fight another convict to death for public entertainment. Eventually that's gonna happen." And slowly but surely that what this reality TV shit is. You know, you got people eating scorpions and sleeping in maggots and doing this shit, man, for the pursuit of currency, man. That scares the fuck out me because what does that tell kids who are watching that shit? This new one, the TV picks your wife and then you marry her. What kind of shit is that? What are they telling kids, man? And it kills me. I'm a firm believer that you know, your actions, regardless, if viewed in the public eye are that of a role model. You got someone looking up to you no matter what, whether it's your homie or the neighborhood kid that sees you got a cool car and wants it.

There's a responsibility there.

Everybody has that responsibility, some people don't live up to it. Some people have no distinction between right and wrong or being concerned with that distinction.

Best line or lyrics you've heard or sung in the last month?

One of the lines that I said that I liked, it's off one of my solo songs: "They're trying to control the order of things / Since the fall of the Two Towers like on Lord of the Rings."

Wow, that's nice man. Describe the role of improvisation in your art. How would you compare it to the improvisation of, say a guitarist?

Probably the same, you know what I'm saying? It's most important to be able to do that, to be able to have improvisational skills because in hip hop things go wrong. Turntables, your DAT machine or whatever. I can go out and you better be on point cause if you're not, you can easily kill a crowd. The crowd will be like with you and then they won't be, you know what I'm saying? So it's extremely important, extremely. I mean it might be a little bit different when it comes to like a guitar player or a musician or whatever, but I can imagine that they forget one of their licks or whatever, their lines or whatever they have to strive to get to the next part. I think improvisation within music is really a necessary part.

Have you guys ever felt the pressure to rename the group Jurassic 6?

Nope, ever ever? Never.

Why do you think you were so readily adopted by jambands fans- a predominantly white audience- like The Roots were?

Shit, I couldn't tell you man. I just think that people are going to see jambands and shit like that, they lose their inhibitions and can not really focus on a certain style of music than just focusing on good music in my opinion. You know, not that fully the Grateful Dead… just going to see people like Phish and String Cheese Incident and shit like that. I see that people are just there to have fucking fun and I honestly think that people have fun when they see us.

Absolutely. Is hip hop, by nature, political? And should it be?

Yes and yes. You don't want to be too freaky with anything, you don't want it to shove your views down a persons throat. If a person starts to see your views and the way you feel, you want them to come about it on their own or by example, more so than anything else. Hip hop to me has always been the ghetto news, the urban post, you know what I'm saying, the thing that talks about what's going on in the city when the news don't. We've been talking about 9/11 from the beginning when it comes to hip hop. I mean from that other guy, from like Grandmaster Flash and Mellie Melvin saying, you know "Sometimes I think I'm going insane / That's why I might hijack a plane." I mean we be talking about shit, jump! You know what I'm saying. So you have the Public Enemies and the KRS-Ones and we been talking about this shit from day one, you know what I'm saying? It's always been a political thing. It's always been the voice of people who can't, who don't have a voice, even when you know you're looking at the big picture, you know what I'm saying. So definitely it should have some politics to it or at least be more focused on what's right and what's wrong, in some form or fashion. Like OK, I like some gangsta rap when that person who's doing it is talking from his heart and talking from his experience as opposed to talking from some fantasy aspect. Because to me, you know, as much as it can be misconstrued, it can also be learned from by folks, you know what I'm saying. So I think it's definitely important for any style of music to have a message to it.

Considering Ice Cube, Ice-T, Tribe and The Beasties have all filled the "rap" slot on the Lollapalooza tour, do you feel any pressure, what are your thoughts on that?

The pressure that I feel is just that of being able to go out there and do what we do the best. I'm happy to be in the league with cats like that, being compared with them cats, to basically walk in those shoes when it comes to this Lollapalooza tour. I'm very grateful and I just hope that we can get out there and do what we gotta do and people like it.

Can you dunk?

Can we what?

Can you dunk?

Can I dunk, me personally? Yes.

You just got done with a European tour. What was that experience like given…

Hold on, hold on, hold on, back it up. "Can you dunk?" "Yeah" Ok, so you just got off your European tour, what did that come from?

This is a Q&A we have called Parting Shots where we just try to throw all sorts of questions out there.

Oh, OK.

Random stuff, so there's no like necessarily rhyme or reason to the questions I'm asking, they're a little scattered to say the least.

Ok, I just wanted to know whether you were gonna go like "hey what did he say?"

You just got done with a European tour, and I read some of the journals and stuff, which were cool. What was that experience like given what's going in the world right now? I know you guys almost canceled the rest of the Ireland leg.

The experience was amazing, because in my opinion one of the biggest things about traveling overseas especially in the time of tragedy and calamity this year, is you get to see the news over there and you get to compare it to the news over here. And you can see that we, in America, are getting pretty bamboozled. We get water poured over our eyes every day, on day to day basis, man, and I'm not saying that all of the media outside of America is better than America, you know what I'm saying, I'm just saying that they show you more concise facts about what's actually going on, and that the news in America is a fucking freak show, it's a circus. I'm saying it's just like that, and I kicked it, you know? I enjoyed that. I'm in Holland, I'm in Switzerland, you know we in all of these different countries, we in Germany, we in France, I've never felt that safe when it came to some war shit! I felt safe as fuck. I was really scared for family, in America, or I was scared to go to London, knowing that Tony Blair with his fucking following ass. [small amount of laughter] I'm thinking to myself, well damn, you know if anything's gonna crack, whether it be a terrorist situation or some retaliation or whatever it is, it will be on London, it will be on in Americans, you know what I'm saying. So, all these other places we were at, man I felt mad safe, mad comfortable chilling with the, the people there, everything- you know seeing the vibe, the people, the everything. Reading their newspapers, seeing their news and shit like that, it's a, it's a whole other world.

Did you guys talk about it at all from the stage?

Yeah, yeah, we get you, we give you a nice little session on how we feel about this shit. And with the cool bejesus or something, and we was giving it every night too, that's the thing, cause it was amazing how many people… The one thing that I noticed about people oversees that the news was not doing, is that they weren't showing the full-fledged duality of the opinions of Americans. From their perspective, they feel like all these Americans are backing Bush to the fullest. I didn't fall for that crap.

Totally.

I noticed a lot of people thought that we, we as Americans are backing war, like everyone of us and we want this to happen and blah blah and they were like tripping out on how America has terrorist alerts and code colors and all that shit and they're like: "Now why would the government try to make the people of American walk and live in fear?" In actuality the American military and American government are the aggressors in this situation, you know what I'm saying, in certain instances, they bringing the war to their house. Ain't none of that shit with the Iraqis and America, and if you want to put 9/11, you know, if you want to mix up 9/11 with this Iraq policy shit you got to be confused, you gotta separate that; two different aspects, you know what I'm saying?

Absolutely.

So that's just a weird thing for me, it's just like I'm amazed at the fact that I'm old enough to understand it to the fullest and to be hearing it all my life that shit like this was going to happen, but to be alive when it's happening, this shit trips me out. I've got an 11- year old son. Where I'm looking, everyday I gotta teach him about this shit.

What's the biggest show you guys have ever done or most memorable, that you sort of remember?

There's a few of em. One, I'm just going to say the one here, at Bonnaroo, man, that was amazing. I never seen that many people in America at one place at a show.

Proud to say I was in attendance.

Huh?

I'm proud to say I was in attendance.

That shit was nuts! 55,000 people watching Jurassic 5?

Guilty pleasure album?

Um, guilty pleasure, like I shouldn't be listening to this but I do?

Or you know someone that you're not like necessarily "Hey I love this album" some thing you kind of keep on the down-low?

Well, I am listening to everything dog, I get everything to listen to, you know what I'm saying. I'm not a big fan of some of Jay-Z's latest shit, but like the The Dynasty Roc la Familia and the album he had, what was it, Reasonable Doubt, they was two of my favorite hip hop joints, you know what I'm saying? The Chronic and 2002? Them two albums from Dr. Dre? I make fun of them. But I have to say, they in my CD case right now. Guilty pleasure… Hmmm. I don't know man, I listen to a lot of dance hall and if you listen to any dance hall than you know that if you buy a certain person's album, whoever it is, then a lot of the times you've got to expect to just be, to have three songs, at the very most.

Right! And the rest you're like "eh, not so much"

And the rest of em is like "naaahhh" and there's a lot of cats like John Paul, Beanie Man, that I'm super-duper fans of, but I know that's what's going to happen when I buy the album, but I buy it anyway.

And, last question: Favorite summer pastimes?

Um, nowadays man, I just bought a house, so nowadays my favorite summer pastime is just to be in my backyard with my son and my wife.

Very nice.

Doing nothing, man I ain't got to do shit. I could be writing rhymes, I could be sitting there looking at the sky, so good.

Not necessarily like grilling or barbequing?

We could be doing that too, I'm down with that to the fullest, I love eating, I'm an eater. But, you know, if I'm just sitting there and I'm knowing I ain't gotta go nowhere and I ain't gonna have to get struck up on shit or compete with my fans, they're ain't nothing like that.

Very nice. Well Chali, that will do it. I thank you for your time, and I hope to see you at Lollapalooza this year.

Oh for sure man! And if you do see us and you're close enough to say "Hey that was me interviewing you," let me know something.

Absolutely.

Alright, thanks a lot man.