As one-half of Dead Prez, Stic.Man has helped create one of hip-hop’s most memorable and outstanding duos.  Their fearless rhymes laced with political edginess and spiritual enlightenment continues to strive toward the spiritual, political, economic, and mental liberation of hip-hop listeners. 

Now, for the very first time since their rise to fame, Stic.Man is free of his long-time partner, M1 and is ready to carry on this mission as a solo artist with his release, Manhood. 

The album features Khujo Goodie, Dead Prez' M1, Young Noble and production from Hi-Tek (The Game, G-Unit, Mos Def), Sol Messiah (Chamillionaire, David Banner, Scarface) and Jwells (Snoop Dogg, Dogg Pound, Alkoholiks).   

Stic.Man recently spoke with Sixshot.com about creating an album without M1, the special guest rapper working with them on their upcoming Dead Prez release, why all “conscious” music does not have mediocre beats, his own definition of manhood, homosexuality in the hip-hop community, the high rates of depression facing urban males, his new role as an entrepreneur, and much more.

What would you say is different about your sound on this album than the stuff you do with M1 as p art of Dead Prez?

I think me and M1 bring out the raw political thing because that’s pretty much what we have in common.  I was rhyming before I met him so I always had an identity as an artist.  It’s the music that I’m influenced by in particular.  M1 might come and bring you the hot new Lil' Wayne remix.  I might come and bring you an old Curtis Mayfield demo.  So my style is rooted in soul, [John] Coltrane, and other elements of music.  I’m probably the last person that would know the latest whatever is going on in hip-hop because I’m a big fan of soul music.  So a lot of my own music has that influence.  It’s still the same concept, the same political views, but more personal.  

Was there any anxiety about doing a solo album since you’ve been part of a duo for so long?

No, because I’m a big producer in terms of Dead Prez’s music and concepts anyway.  I probably do 70-80 percent of the production and coming up with video treatments and all those things.  So for me to do this wasn’t a big anxiety.  But I was missing how M1 takes that concept and makes it his own.  He’s got his own swagger and style.  I was like I got to come with it because M1 ain’t here to do that.  He dropped a solo album, Confidential, a year before mine dropped.  We both wanted to give the people insight into who we are as individuals so they could appreciate it when we come together that much more.  We’re working on our new album now for 2008.  We just got out of the studio with Nas.  He’s working with us on our album and we’re writing and producing for his new album, N*****. 
 
There’s often a criticism with artists labeled as making “conscious” music.  The criticism is that the music lacks hooks and hot beats.  What are your thoughts on those criticisms?

I think music is a thing that’s based off your taste.  You can’t satisfy everybody.  You can say the same thing about mainstream music that got hot beats but lacks substance. [Laughs]  We always strive to give you good music and good content but we recognize that some people just like dance music.  Other people who listen to music to clean up and work out want a little more substance in their music.  So there’s room for all of it. 

Like with Dead Prez we always say we’re somewhere between P.E. [Public Enemy] and N.W.A. [N***** With Attitude].  We’re dealing with revolutionary but gangster and we strive to be a balance of good music and good content.  Definitely on my album, Manhood there’s music about relationships, "Whatever Daddy Wants".  I got a song talking about being patient in "Traffic Jam", and there are songs about reparations, grinding and hustling, and ill piano chords that remind people of Wu-Tang’s production.

There’s no one song on my album that sounds like another one.  It’s all genres from soul and hip-hop all in one.  Being a man is about having a diverse talent and being open-minded to more than just one thing.

You mentioned one aspect to being a man but how would you fully define manhood?

Manhood is two words; it’s the man and then it’s the hood.  It’s a connection between the personal and the community.  It’s accountability to the community, family, your children, your lineage, and your heritage.  [It’s] being responsible for the things that need to happen in your life and taking that responsibility.  You have to be in tune with yourself, have confidence, swagger, and pride in who you are.  You have to be able to walk your own walk and live your principles—hell or high water.  [Laughs]  It’s an on-going process and it’s definitely far form perfected, but that’s what I’m striving for.

Hip-hop often presents manhood as one single definition of being a thug or gangster, having women, and getting money.  Therefore has it been difficult growing up in hip-hop for you to create your own definition of manhood outside of that box?

I’m not trying to be the extreme of either thing.  I see the relevance of being a gangster and being a thug in a thug and gangster society that is a criminal, capitalist, exploitative, imperialist, and racist society.  So when you have people who say, “I’m a thug.  I’m a gangster,” it starts as rebelling against a system that’s anti-me and anti-us.  That’s the mentality of, “I’m not part of this because it doesn’t want me.”  If you look at our parents and their parents we had to struggle to sit down and use the same toilet or to drink a cup of coffee in the same place with this society.  So it’s not like out-of-nowhere we want to be thugs and gangsters.  It’s that we never felt like we were a part of society.  So the outlaw in a lot of ways in our community is celebrated.

So I can identify with a thug or a gangster or an outlaw in that sense.  I can identify with the need to eat and hustle.  But I don’t unite with the drug trade and what a thug or a gangster is.  The drug trade is controlled by people in the higher-up places in cooperation with the military, business owners, and medical industry. All these people are really who control the top level of the drug game. 

Ask yourself, “How does a young, poor, uneducated person in Brooklyn, NY that’s sixteen years old get an AK47 and a kilo of cocaine?”  How does he do that?  Is he organized to do that or is somebody else organized and making that possible for him to do that?  It’s about being critical in your nemesis and knowing historically where those things come from.  So I unite when Tupac says, “Thug life,” because we live in a gangster world and you have to meet gangster with gangster to survive out here. 

Rarely does it get mentioned the high rates of depression affecting black men and men in urban settings who are really vulnerable to issues of poverty, jail, and so forth.  What are your thoughts on the emotional vulnerability and silent depression many urban men suffer from?

Oh, that is a great point!  The mental ramifications of living in a society like I just described goes unnoticed or unspoken about.  How am I gonna survive?  How am I gonna be able to provide for my children, wife, and self-esteem when I can’t get a job?  If I get a job it’s paying me two cents and stripping me of my cultural identity.  So at no point are we allowed to be ourselves and celebrate that unless we do it independently.   Then if you do that you become a target, a radical, and you get blackballed in the industry.  So we’re dealing with all these realities and mentally we have to put that somewhere.  Where that goes is it makes you cynical, negative, and [you] expect the worst.  It creates that whole dysfunctional mentality that is prevalent in oppressed people—not just black people, but oppressed people all over the globe.  It robs us of our natural faith in self and our ability to accomplish whatever we need to accomplish.  And it’s designed by the institution and set-up by the system so that can keep control over us.

I know in hip-hop one of the main issues that can take away a male rappers street credibility and manhood are rumors or facts about homosexuality.  This is arguably the biggest taboo for men in hip-hop surrounding manhood.  What are your thoughts on the issue surrounding homophobia and the construction of male identity?

Homophobia—if I break that word down means you’re afraid of homosexuals.  I don’t think that’s the issue.  I don’t think men in particular are afraid of homosexuals.  I think the issue is that homosexual men have a certain natural tendency or instinct for other men and heterosexual men don’t have that.  So you have two different cultural expressions that are not compatible on the surface.  And then you have this society where the white male homosexual identity is suppressed because they are largely the most homosexuals in society.  They are in major points of industry and they suppress that and act like they are not homosexuals.  They put on this real macho man-dominates-everything energy and it screws everybody up.

Black male masculinity has been so suppressed.  We’ve been taught to be docile, raised without our fathers in the homes, we emulate characteristics of the people around us—the women and caretakers, and we get confused by the movies and so many things around us.  So it’s hard for us as a community to appreciate someone who is biologically born normally functioning as a homosexual person vs. someone who has been traumatized by this reality and is having a hard time finding their sexuality and their identity and all that. 

I say that humbly because I know there are homosexuals who contribute to the advancement of society on all levels: writers, scientists, soldiers, and you name it.  So I don’t have an issue fundamentally with a person’s biological sexuality.  I’m not God or I’m not nature to the point where I can judge that.  I think that there are cases especially prison where this lifestyle is forced on people.  And it contributes to more mental and social decay in terms of how we relate to each other in a loving environment.  You have men and you have women for a reason and there's so much oppression going on that it’s hard for us to see.  Then the Black and Brown people who happen to be homosexuals become extra targets because of the society and people saying, “We need to define manhood and that don’t fit.”  There’s no place where we can healthfully put everything in perspective and be able to at least co-exist with respect.

What is the most significant experience that has contributed either positively or negatively to your development as a man?

There are so many factors that contribute to your development.  There’s the fact that our community was ripped from our place of origin, enslaved 500 years ago, never received any reparations, we’ve been mentally abused, physically brutalized, spiritually cut-off, and we inherited the poverty of slavery.  All these things people say are in the past but we inherited it socially and kinetically.  So these things affect us in terms of our search for identity, independence, prosperity, and all these things.  So we go through things in the street instead of our regular rites of passages that we had culturally.  Now we’re getting into streets.  I’ve been a part of the negative repercussions just like anybody else.

At the same time I’ve been positively impacted by those that have resisted: Marcus Garvey, the Black Panther Party, Tookie Williams, Malcolm X, and Assata Shakur.  Seeing their resistance, intelligence, and tenacity under these conditions has impacted me and given me strength to take on part of the struggle.  I do [this] through music, writing books, film, and everything that I feel like I can contribute.  So I’ve been affected by the same things our community got affected by both positive and negative.

Besides the debut solo album you’re also an entrepreneur with BossUpBU, your books, Ammo magazine, and many other ventures.  What inspired you to move into the business aspect of hip-hop?

Being a slave on the plantation label inspired it.  Being on the plantation and seeing what they do and believing that we could do that for ourselves with our interests in mind.  Seeing that this whole industry revolves off of our creativity and the products that we make whether it’s fashion, intellectual property, our style, our swagger, our music, and the way we just move, who we are, and our look.  All of this is what makes hip-hop.  So I knew we could do some of this for ourselves.  All other communities are owning their own things.  But when it comes down to the black and brown community you see somebody else owning it.  Somebody else gotta give you permission and give you a  budget.  I was like that doesn’t make no Marcus Garvey-sense.  [Laughs] 

So we gotta try to humbly but definitely own our own stuff.  So BossUpBU was all about how can we get in a position of ownership?  There are too many people saying, “Master P and 50 Cent they’re rich and they’re millionaires but they ain’t talking about nothing.”  And I’m like why can’t somebody who is talking about something get in a position of economic power?  What’s wrong with that?  So part of our goal is to be financially successful so we can support the kinds of things we would hope Master P or 50 Cent would support but don’t.  And not to take nothing from them because I’m sure those brothers do things that the media doesn’t report.  I’m not trying to attack them.  I know how it is.  So I respect them brothers for the grind and at least for the example of being on top of their hustle.     

For more information and to purchase the album please visit:
 WWW.BOSSUPBU.COM