Crooked I has been in the game for more than a minute now, but it’s his recent outings with Slaughterhouse that seem to be propelling him into mainstream success. In a recent interview with AllHipHop, Crook talks about the confidence Eminem instils in the emcee super group, and the potential of his former label, Death Row, releasing previously unheard tracks of his.
Eminem is the “overseer” of Slaughterhouse, and while the members of the group have had varying degrees of success, Em has shown them what it means to be an elite star. Referring to the Shady 2.0 Cypher from last year, “Eminem showed me what being a superstar is really about. He didn’t have to do the cypher for one, and he had about 50 bars memorized”, Crook continued, “here you have the highest selling artist in the last decade, and he still has the tenacity to get inside of a cypher and spit 50 bars.”
Not only does Em lead by example, but he’s been extremely supportive, “Eminem gave us a lot of confidence in what we already do...If one of the greats tells you that you killed a verse, it really is an extra vote of confidence. To have an MC be the boss of the company, is great.”
Recently WIDEawake Entertainment (formerly Death Row Records), has been putting old tracks of Crooked I’s on albums. Crook says they have some older, unreleased tracks of his, but if they want to use them the label will have to fork over serious cash.
“I know that the people that bought Death Row Records put out some shit called Hoodstar, and they used a few [of my] songs off of that album,” the rapper said. "[Death Row] called me and they wanted me to support it. I told them, ‘If you want me to do some shit, cut me a check for $1 million, and I’ll come over there for some solo shit.' I told them if they weren’t going to do anything like that, then I wasn’t going to support anything” Crooked added.
He feels after Suge Knight was replaced that the real Death Row was no more, “there is no real Death Row Records anymore. Once Suge was removed from the picture, there was no Death Row. You can’t be Death Row without Suge.”
Slaughterhouse welcome to: Our House drops August 28th.
