Priceless

02/24/2003 4:00 PM, LAUNCH
Billy Johnson Jr

Even though the buzz on 50 Cent's Shady/Aftermath/Interscope debut, Get Rich Or Die Tryin', was comparable to that of the debuts for Snoop Dogg, Eminem, and the Notorious B.I.G., no one could have expected the Queens, New York-based MC to sell 872,000 copies of the record in its first week. But he did just that--in four days, to be exact.

50 Cent's success in 2003 was inevitable, especially considering that he made his mark on the scene in 1999 with the malicious "How To Rob," a parody that revealed his plan to knock off the year's big names in rap. But the anticipation for Get Rich was in large part due to the controversy that surrounded the man and his affiliation with two of hip-hop's known problem-starters, Eminem and Dr. Dre, who signed 50 to their Shady and Aftermath imprints, respectively. 50 fed hungry spectators numerous vicious lyrical assaults on Ja Rule, dissed fake gangstas in the track "Wanksta" from Em's 8 Mile soundtrack, and raced to the top of the video and radio charts with the Dr. Dre-produced scorcher, "In Da Club."

During a recent interview with LAUNCH's urban editor, Billy Johnson Jr., 50 discussed how he hooked up with Em and Dre, which artists responded to his dis "How To Rob," and exactly why he and Ja Rule just simply can't get along. He also spoke about his relationship with his former mentor, late hip-hop icon Jam Master Jay, the Run-DMC DJ who was murdered in October 2002.

LAUNCH: When we interviewed Jam Master Jay in 1999, and even way back then he was saying that you were off the hook. How did you come to meet Jay?

50 CENT: A friend of mine introduced me to him. It's funny--I was in the street, hustling, and I made some relationships, some people that I met...like, they knew people in the music business and they introduced me to Jam Master Jay. It's weird how who you know puts you on, and what you know determines how long you stay once you get there.

LAUNCH: What did it mean to have his support?

50 CENT: It was great. Jam Master Jay was a pioneer. We grew up watching Jay, so it felt crazy being around him. Like, when you were first around him, it was like, "Yo, that's Jay!" You know what I mean? And he was like, the hardest member of Run-DMC.

LAUNCH: What was the most significant thing that you learned from him?

50 CENT: Well, he kind of groomed me, period. Like, I had never been in a studio to record a record or make a demo or anything. That's the first time I was in a booth, in front of a mic, attempting to make a song, was with Jam Master J. Everything--my song structure, counting bars--I learned from Jay.

LAUNCH: Where were you when you heard that he had been murdered?

50 CENT: I was in a car on my way to Long Island. Like, I know anything is possible--like after the Aaliyah incident, and we lost Tupac and Biggie and then Jay, anything is possible. Nobody is exempt. If they feel like they are, there's something wrong.

LAUNCH: How did it hit you?

50 CENT: I mean, he's a good guy. I think the reason I got drawn into that scene, as far as the police is concerned, is because when someone gets hurt or gets killed, they ask questions. When detectives have no answers, they say, "Who are your enemies and who are your friends?" And Jay has a good aura around him, so there's not too many people that you can point out that are enemies of Jam Master Jay's, then they go, "Who are his friends?" And 50 Cent pops up. And the police precinct is like, three minutes from where I got shot at. I grew up in that area, with all the dirt I did coming up, even the stuff I actually didn't do that people in the street said I did--one time they chased me 'cause they said that I killed two girls in Bricktown. So the same officers and detectives are going, "Oh yeah, he's not just a clean-cut kid, he's in and out of trouble." And then they go, "Do you think that someone would do something to Jam Master Jay to send him a message?" And that's how I got dragged into the press when they started talking about his death.

LAUNCH: There are all kind of theories. What is your take on what happened?

50 CENT: Jay ain't a drug dealer. He makes records. And if it does have to do with something like that, it's going to be a whole of other things surrounding it, like it won't be him directly involved. I couldn't imagine that from being around him. I think people wouldn't be surprised that a situation like that happened over me and it was related to drugs, 'cause I come from that background--I sold drugs. But I didn't sell drugs 'cause I wanted to, it felt like the only option at the time.

LAUNCH: You have armed security with you today--do you have concerns about your own safety?

50 CENT: No, the security thing, I think it's part of this business. You're supposed to, 'cause if someone says something disrespectful to me and I go upside their head, they want to sue me. Instead of dealing with it like they would deal with anyone else in the street, people feel free to disrespect you when you make it to a certain status. They start feeling like they can say anything, like you won't do nothing. So you kind of have to have something between you and them that makes them feel like they shouldn't just do it.

LAUNCH: How bad was the backlash from the people that you dissed in your song "How To Rob"?

50 CENT: Jay-Z was the largest person that responded to that record, and that's hip-hop. Hip-hop's competitive: It's almost like the new kid is reaching for something and you slap his hand away for doing it. It's all good, and I looked at it like he was offering me a title shot without making me go through the ranks. I appreciated it...I should send him some champagne. Like, imagine I'm fresh out of the streets from Queens and you drop your first single, and Jay-Z is responding to it! He's not going to respond to something that's wack unless it's a direct situation. Like with a person like Eminem and Benzino, that's not beef, that's just a person trying to get attention. 'Cause they never had any altercations or any run-ins, and that's corny. But how do you not personalize it when that person is just speaking about you? You know, I spoke about 30 people on "How To Rob."

LAUNCH: Dissing in rapping is at its height right now. Do you think that coming out now is good timing or bad timing? Or do you not care, you just do what you do?

50 CENT: I just do what I do. I don't anticipate, I don't say, "Yo, I'm not going to say this because this guy was talking about that guy and that guy was talking about this guy, so if I do that it's going to feel like this." No, that's cosmetic. That means you're not going off your true feelings. If I'm upset about something, I write it. And if it happens to be a hit, then I'll put it on my record; other than that, it may be still be on the tape in the studio. If it's not a hit record at the end of the day, it's all good--I wouldn't pick my album based on I got to say something about somebody on my album. I think that's corny. If you really don't have an issue in you that's out there, that's wack. I understand if you bumped into someone or you have some differences somehow down the way that you really don't get along, cool. You got some sh-t to get off your chest, go ahead. But if you just picking somebody, that's not cool.

LAUNCH: So Ja Rule says that you have a restraining order out on Murder Inc.?

50 CENT: Ja Rule...you know what? He's obsessed with me. He likes me so much, I don't know. I couldn't pay for that kind of promotion! He goes everywhere, his whole radio tour--I mean it's obvious that nobody cares about his Ja Rule record in the 'hood. In the street, there's no heat; his new record sucks, period. Like, you can't keep doing the same thing. If you don't step up and make better music, you just going to fade, you'll go away. And his format, like his pop thing that he's doing, it's obvious he would like to sell records like 50 Cent sells records. He would like to be me if he could. As a matter of fact, he wouldn't want to be me, he would like to be DMX or Tupac, you know what I'm saying? That's who he would like to be, but he would like to sell records the way that they sell records, and the way I sell records is closer to that than what he's doing. And it bothers him. Like, you got people running around calling themselves murderers. I don't know murderers that call themselves murderers. I don't know none of them that do that. I know people that kill people who've done it before and will do it now if placed in that situation, but I don't know them to call themselves murderers. I think that anyone who would do that is a thrill-seeker. That means you just want to be known as that. You want that energy. When you walk in the room, so you surround yourself with people that make you feel respected, but in the end, gangsta style will weaken the weak. They'll take advantage of them. You see what I'm saying? A gangsta will roll with them so they can squeeze the paper out of them. He's going to keep squeezing them until there ain't nothing left. And then he going to get rid of them, leave with the benefits that he got from them and find somebody new to squeeze. Straight up.

LAUNCH: Where did the whole Ja Rule rivalry come from?

50 CENT: He got robbed. Like, our 'hood ain't that big. I know somebody that robbed him and we was in a club and I say, "What's up? I'm kicking it with the kid regular." "You know him?" "Yeah, I know him. You know I'm not going to say what's up to him because he robbed you. That's your business. If you're going to deal with him, deal with him. As a matter of fact, you not saying anything to him--he's standing right here." And he didn't say nothing to the kid but he treats me differently, like he's upset with me for kicking it with the kid. Or he don't want to associate with me 'cause I associate with the people that did something to him. I just think that when you become a rapper, other rappers feel like you're their peer. And everybody ain't been through the same thing, the things you been through make up who you are. Everybody's not the same, but because you rap, there could be somebody out there in the 'hood doing whatever, and as soon as they decide to rap, a rapper can be standing in your face and say anything to you--whatever he wrote in his rhyme, say it in your face like he mean it, knowing that he ain't going to do nothing that he say in that rhyme. Like, he ain't never did none of that and ain't going to do none of that. And that's the part of me moving from the street to music that I had--I had a bumpy road to go down, 'cause I was still dealing with my morals from the street and the music thing. Like, if someone says something about you in the street, I'm going to see what he talking about, 'cause there ain't no reason to be talking about me. If you got something to say, let's address 'em, and see what he wants to say then. Now it's like when there ain't nothing to talk about, they're talking about me. Everybody talking about me, whether it's the barbershop, the beauty salon...wherever you at. they're talking about me. Like I heard people say, "Yo, I don't like 50, but I like his music." You don't know me. All you know is my music. So if you saying you don't like me and you've never met me and you never grew up with me and we never hustled together, and that you don't like me but you like my music, what you really saying is that somebody told you something about me that made you feel like you shouldn't like me. But you like my music. It don't matter to me whether you like me or you hate me, just tell somebody about it so they can decide whether they hate me or they like me. As long as it's an issue, I'm relevant.

LAUNCH: Have you always been an outspoken kid?

50 CENT: I have a problem with authority figures, I don't like people telling me what to do. If I respect the person's opinion, then I'm open. But if not, I ain't listening to nobody. Even with management, even my business, I have to respect the person to take their advice. If someone is like, "You should do this because...just trust me," they have to show me facts for me to understand what they're talking about or I ain't doing it. A lot of time for me to understand the music business, I have to internalize it in a negative way. I have to take it back to hustling in the street. Corporate America, when they can't give you more money, they give a title--you know, you feel better when you go to work as a manager at Burger King, but you still work at Burger King. 'Cause you ain't making burgers no more you're giving direction, you feel better. It's the same thing on the block: When the police comes so many times that half your crew is locked up and you have a few people left that know all the customers, you don't let them sell crack no more, you let them show the new kids how to sell crack, who to serve and who not to serve so they know that they're not serving the police. It's the same thing; I have to take it back there in order to fully understand it and see what's fully going on.

LAUNCH: Do you think that your song "How To Rob" was the cause for you getting shot in 1999?

50 CENT: I think it's karma. I mean, I did some foul sh-t before, prior to me being shot. So it's kind of what goes around, comes around.

LAUNCH: What actually happened when you were shot?

50 CENT: I got shot out in front of my grandmother's house. It's like, it's right off the north conduit, South Jamaica. It's not a bad place for you to shoot somebody--you know, the parkway is right there, and so once you hit the corner and you turn and you're doing 70, you're not startling anybody, 'cause people are doing 70 up and down there all day. As far as getting shot, they say time heals all wounds. And when I talk about getting shot, it doesn't hurt all over again. Your memories of pain are a lot less than when you're going through pain. So it's not a big deal to me. I got shot nine times. The big deal is you start thinking that he shot you nine times and didn't finish you--that makes you feel like you have a purpose, a reason for being. I'm still trying to figure out what my purpose is; I think it's something positive. Or I might be right here to get rid of some of the negative sh-t that's here.

LAUNCH: Where on your body did you get shot nine times?

50 CENT: All over the place--my pinky, the face, a lot of leg shots. The guy was a professional leg killer. He was a pro.

LAUNCH: Nine times and you lived?

50 CENT: I've seen more. I've seen more. I've seen a guy get shot 16 times and not die. I mean he did die, but of pneumonia. So when God say you're gonna go, you're gonna go. How you gonna get shot 16 motherf--king times and then die of pneumonia? What the f--k? It's funny how life is.

LAUNCH: And you were was in front of your grandmother's house! How did she deal with that?

50 CENT: She's all right. It's not unheard-of, being shot, where we from. It's like, if the only place you see that is on television, if you only see that on news, if you only hear about that or see it in a film, it might be traumatizing for it to happen and you just like, "Yo, I can't believe this!" But a lot of my homies ain't around. So it's like you go home and go, "Mom, such and such got killed." And you explaining it, to make her understand--it's not like blow it over, but it's easier for her to stomach it knowing how many other situations have gone down around us. Especially when you get back up and your fingers and your toes move, and everything good--you keep pushing ahead. First thing I did when I got my paper was I went ahead and bought a Benz. I'm the kind of person that I feel I need things when I can't have them. Like, I felt like I needed a Benz, like I needed nice things. When you just in the 'hood and you don't have them, imagine telling a kid 14-years-old, "If you do good in school for six more years, you can get that car you want." And then let a kid's curiosity lead him through the street and he find out that somebody out in the street has that car that he wants right now, and he got it hustling for six months. It doesn't seem like an option, it seems like the only option. And a kid ends up in the middle of that sh-t. 'Cause that's what's right there for him to see, that's the only option that makes sense to him at the time. It is what is. Like now, maybe I grew up a little bit, 'cause maybe once I can have it, once it's an option, it's OK--I'm not sure I need to spend my money.

LAUNCH: So what is there that you don't have that you want to buy?

50 CENT: I'm content. I'm already exceeding everybody's expectations for me--except for my own, 'cause I've got big plans for me. But everybody I grew up with, I'm sure that they didn't think I would go from selling crack to doing million-dollar record deals with Eminem and Dr. Dre.

LAUNCH: How did getting together with Dr. Dre and Eminem come about?

50 CENT: Theo, my attorney, and Paul Rosenberg, Eminem's attorney and management, work closely together--they grew up and kind of came up together. And I gave them a CD I put out called Guess Who's Back and Em was in the middle of finishing The Eminem Show, and when he was done he got a chance to listen to it and at the time he was saying that he was kind of bored with what was going on with the same crews, the same artists, and that he wanted to do something different. So he took it to Dre. Him and Dre kicked and they flew me out. What was weird was, like, I got the call on Friday at 9 o'clock at night and they wanted me to fly out the next day. I had other offers on the table from other companies like Universal, J Records, Jive Records, Warner Bros., Capitol, a few other companies--you know, those situations take place from 9 to 5 and Monday through Friday, like during your working hours. It felt a little different, so I flew out met with them the following day in an editing studio, and Dre stopped by and we kicked it, and when I left, I knew I was doing the deal with them. So I got back to the city, and then the offers skyrocketed: The offers were all the way up to a 1.6 million once the companies realized that Dr. Dre and Eminem were interested. The numbers just went crazy. It was cool, I did the deal for like, a million dollars, but I still gained so much more out of working with Eminem and Dr. Dre that the other change for me means nothing. I'm in a good space right now.

LAUNCH: What was it like working with Eminem and Dr. Dre?

50 CENT: Eminem is so talented, it's annoying--he got a gift. If you believe in God, you believe in fate, and I think he's exactly what God intended him to be. You can look at him and see what he's doing on television and he's doing whatever sh-t he's doing and however the script should be or however the video director chose the set is what you see, but when you kick it with him and you kind of get to know him and you work alongside him, he's not even into this sh-t. He's into music, he just wants to make music. And the success that comes with it, your head might be so big--I know I'd be running around, you'd all probably have to tap me on the shoulder to turn my head because it's so big, my hat won't fit. But he's the biggest artist you there right now, and from my experience, from what I see from being around him, he gets more enjoyment out of making the music than he does out of seeing what it actually does in numbers after he's done with it.

LAUNCH: What about Dre?

50 CENT: He's the same way to me. No matter what situations come, he's always making records. Production-wise, I don't think there's a producer better than Dr. Dre, especially for me. He's from NWA--that's like the original gangsta rap group. How he not going to understand my lyrical content? When it gets a little edgy, he gets excited. He's not going, "Yo, I don't know if you should say that." He's not calling me in going, "I think we should switch this line." When I was on Columbia and I dropped 'How To Rob," they actually told me not to cut my hair. They thought I was supposed to look like Ol' Dirty Bastard. Just dirty, like, "You crazy, like the guy who said they would rob everybody." I couldn't even get it. Like Ol' Dirty Bastard did this record, like how are they supposed to know who I am when I shoot "Thug Love," which is the real single for this record? What is it going to look like? What are we going to do? We going to do Trading Places? "Hey, Mortimer!" Like somebody going to throw some money on the floor and I'm going to change into the new kid? It was just a record, and they wanted to make that the theme with me as an artist, period. I'm not with that. Columbia, I don't think that they understood me, period.

LAUNCH: How do you feel about Columbia Records pulling your album with them, The Power Of The Dollar, and never releasing it?

50 CENT: I didn't get a chance. Like, I was going to take off and then things happened, got interrupted. Like, I dropped "How To Rob," and the real single was "Thug Love" with Destiny's Child--and then I got shot three days before the video. After that situation, your phone stops ringing. People are different. They're afraid of situations that they can't handle themselves. In the end, I found myself in a space where I had to market myself.

LAUNCH: Tell us about your name, 50 Cent.

50 CENT: I got the name 50 Cent from a gangster from the Fort Green Projects. He died, and every time they mention my name, that breathes life into him. It's not like Al Capone or John Gotti, it someone from the 'hood that wasn't active. He got killed, so I took on the name like that. It's actually from the 'hood, instead of from somebody that wouldn't even say "what's up" to me if I seen them in real life.

LAUNCH: Has there been any flak from that?

50 CENT: I think everybody who knows it is excited about the idea. In fact, Rakim, on one of his album covers, Paid In Full, on the back cover he had a picture of him under the bridge, and [the original] 50 Cent is in that picture. He was an older guy, he was in that.

LAUNCH: Who are some of your musical influences, besides Rakim?

50 CENT: I like KRS-1, particularly before he started teaching, like when he was criminal-minded and the lifestyle that was around me was more that so I could zap right in. While you're going through that, that's what makes sense. I believe in God. I don't write gospel music, I don't go to church every Sunday, but I believe in God and I express how I feel, I curse. If you don't understand that, f--k you. God understands. Everything with me isn't going to make sense to you, not everybody is going to understand me or why I say what I say or why I do what I do. I already know that, so I'm content with the people who do tune in and understand it.