Surviving The Game

09/01/2000 2:00 AM, LAUNCH
Billy Johnson Jr

"You can't open that," Ice-T says, referring to the biggest "little black book" I've ever seen. The three-feet-by-two-feet book, Pimpology, leans against a wall in Ice's Coroner Records conference room, alphabetical divider tabs running down its side. "You seen that movie Jumanji?" Ice asks.

"Un-huh," I answer.

"That book is like that," Ice says, implying that, like the Robin Williams film, the characters in Pimpology will come to life and cause havoc if the book is opened.

Ice-T, who happens to be the coolest rapper one could ever meet, is sitting on his black leather sofa, previewing songs from the still-unfinished album by his rock group, Body Count. Though he's a bona fide superstar, with eight rap albums to his credit (five certified gold) and an acting resume that's as long as his recording career, Ice seems to have a funny, matter-of-fact, down-to-earth attitude. VH1 recently interviewed him for its notorious Behind The Music series, and he just can't talk about the program without laughing.

Ice found the sneaky research tactics of one of the show's producers pretty amusing. After interviewing Ice, the producer contacted his friends, trying to dig up dirt; Ice's friends did not cooperate with her, and told him about her calls. Ice was surprised. When the producer showed up to interview him again, she never mentioned it. Things backfired for her, however, when she solicited the help of one of Ice's friends for a tour of the 'hood.

"She got robbed by one of my buddies," Ice flatly explains, trying to keep a straight face. "'Cause she said she wanted to go in the 'hood, you know. So my partner was like, '$600. Give me $600 [to give you the tour].'"

But when the producer changed her mind, deciding that $600 was too much, and that she would give her tour guide only $200 instead, things got ugly.

"So he threatened her life," Ice says calmly, as if he's witnessed such threats daily. "But hopefully, it'll add to the piece. You don't tell no kid in the street you're going to give them some money, and then don't give it to them, and think you're going to hide behind VH1. He will sit outside and find you, bitch. He just killed somebody for 50 bucks."

Ice intervened, called his friend, and told him to back off. But he jokes that the producer may not get off so easily when she works on the Behind The Music special on Snoop Dogg. "She might get shot over there, f--king with them," Ice says of Snoop's posse. "His guys are a little less mature than my crew."

Though Behind The Music has been known to delve deeply into controversies surrounding artists, Ice-T harbored no concerns about the kind of supposedly scandalous information the program would uncover about him.

"The good thing about me, really," Ice explains, "is I ain't had no major ups and downs. The side of my life, my career, with the films, is still pretty good. You know how they always try to show the low in your career? I think the only thing they're going to show is probably the 'Cop Killer' sh-t, they're going to take you into the zone.

Ice had reason to be unconcerned, since his early days as an orphan, teenage father, and onetime pimp have already been discussed in his many candid interviews over the years. "My life, honestly, has been an open book. School pictures. And I didn't spend that much time in my career lying. It ain't like I spent a whole bunch of time and you gon' find out that Ice didn't go to Crenshaw [High School]. That ain't gon' happen." "Hey, it was interesting," Ice says of the BTM taping. "I can't wait to see it. I'm quite sure there's going to be some 250-pound bitch showing up talking 'bout, 'That's my baby's daddy. He f--ked me on Dope Jam tour.'"

The veteran West Coast rapper is hoping, however, that the program will spike the sales of his best-of album, Greatest Hits: The Evidence, which was released a few weeks before the airing of the VH1 special. The album includes Ice-T classics "6 'N The Mornin'," "I'm Your Pusher," and "Colors," and reminds both new and old hip-hop fans of his significance in gangsta rap.

"The Evidence is the proof that I was here," Ice says, "what was done in hip-hop through my career, and also, sh-t, my records have been the evidence in a lot of court cases." The compilation's title had nothing to do with re-emphasizing his importance, however. He's pleased with the amount of respect he's received over the years.

"People always say to me, 'You don't get enough props,'" Ice says. "If I got any more props, I wouldn't be able to walk down the street! People would carry me down the street. I can't walk two feet without somebody saying, 'Yo, you changed my life.'"

Compiling the songs for the album proved to be a fulfilling nostalgic experience for Ice. It made him think of some of his especially explicit songs, like "Girls L.G.B.N.A.F. (Let's Get But Naked And F--k)" from his 1988 second album, Power. He couldn't help compare his music to the style of rap Eminem makes today.

Ice is such a big Eminem fan that he uses Em's first verse from "The Real Slim Shady" on a still-untitled song for Body Count's next album, Facial Cum Shots: The 13th Hour. "'You act like you never seen a black person before,'" Ice says, quoting his slightly altered Em lyrics delivered over a trashy, rap-rock track. "Because that's how we feel, you know. 'Eyes all on the floor/ Pam and Tommy just burst in the door/ It's the return of.../ Oh no, wait a minute/ He did say what I thought he did/ Did he?/ We back...' It's like the same thang."

But Ice's own recordings aren't the only projects he's excited about. He's anxious to launch the Internet project he's been working on for over a year. He plans on promoting 25 artists via his website, www.coronerrecords.com; each artist will have a song featured on a compilation titled The Game Of Death that will be sold over the Internet and in stores. Ice isn't signing these artists to extensive contracts: Any artist who lands a deal with another label simply must reimburse him for their recording expenses. And all the money made from the compilation will be divided among the groups.

"I'm pressing like 500 copies of each record off the album," Ice explains, "taking like 200 of them, and giving them to the groups, and letting them run the streets with them, and I'm mailing out the other 300."

Now sitting in his office at his desk, Ice navigates his Macintosh to give a virtual tour of his under-construction Coroner Records site. Like a kid showing off his new Christmas toy, he uses his mouse to click numbers on the cell phone on the computer's screen. "See, this is how you send me email," Ice says, as an email message box pops up on the screen. "This is going to be hot."

And it will be hot, because, after 16 long years in the rap game, you can still see the excitement in Ice-T's eyes.