RIP JUSTO FAISON
Today is the second year anniversary of the death of Justo Faison the man responsible for honoring DJs with the Mixtape Awards, that launched the careers of DJ EFN, DJ CLUE, DJ KAYSLAY and Papoose to name a few. For those who are not familiar with him here is an interview I conducted with him in 2003 after the 7th Mixtape Awards show.
Justo Faison, who started the awards and has held national rap promotion jobs at Nervous, Atlantic and Epic Records. The Mixtape Awards are touted as the street’s answer to the Grammys, the awards show honors the year’s best mixtape DJs, personalities and artists. This past Januarary the 8th annual mixtape awards were held. We had a chance to catch up with Justo after last years awards.
You basically got your start back in the day with Nervous Records and then on too Atlantic and through on to Epic, tell us a little bit about yourself through that whole time?
I actually started at a college radio, at a station called WDWN in Auburn NY, that’s why I made all connection in the music business, so when I graduated I was already in contact with people from the label. I did internship and then I went to Nervous Records.
What did you do at Nervous?
I was at Nervous Records at the end of ‘91, and I did promotions on Black Moon, first single I worked with was Gotcha Open, and then I worked Smif and Wesson and then I worked Mad Lion. I was there for three years. Well, I was at Atlantic Records for three years, and even though Atlantic didn’t seem like they had anything, then we got Junior Mafia, Lil’ Kim, and it went from there. Space Jam Soundtrack, Dr. Doolittle Soundtrack, we had just gotten Aaliyah, worked with Timbaland and Magoo, Quad City Dj’s. I went to Epic after that, I became VP of Rap Promotions and street marketing.
So what are you doing right now?
I opened up my own company about three years ago, I do marketing promotions for major labels and we also do the Mixtape Awards.
What were you looking to accomplish when you first started out the Mixtape Awards?
Just to get these mixtape guys recognized and get them into the real world of the music business. Let people know these are the guys that will break an artist and that you can make a living of this business
What artist are you looking out for?
There’s this crew in New Orleans called 54 Platoon, they been moving around the business for a minute, and a couple of years ago they signed with FUBU Records, so I just a heard a single from them called “She likes” and that may be the record for them. That may put them in the game as they say. I like Shells, Paper Boy (Shaheed), Gotti from the Source got Saigon, I am looking from the next new acts. I wanna deal with the next new people cause those are the guys that are gonna be comin’ out.
What are the perks of owning your own company or being VP of Marketing and Rap promotions for Epic?
Well the perk at being at a label is that you get an expense account. So you get to spend their money doing your job. Having your own business, all of these expenses are yours, so you have to try to add them in to your price of promotion and marketing. Because you do have to travel around the country, you do have to take people out to dinner. So, all those same things you did at the label, you have to do them for your own company. So those are the differences. You get to have more freedom having your own company but yet it’s a different kind of freedom. You work 18 hours a day when it’s theirs, but you work 24 hours when it’s yours, but it’s a freedom in the sense that you are in charge to say what you want to happen and with them you have to have meetings all the time, you don’t physically do any work, but you have to explain to the whole company how your thing works.
In the 2002 awards there was a posse cut titled The Champions by Kay Slay feat. Doo Wop, Tony Touch, DJ Clue, Funkmaster Flex, S&S, Brucie B, Kid Capri and Ron G how did that come about and was it performed at the Mix Tape awards?
It was supposed to be preformed but we never got to that point cause that whole incident went down. Well, Ralph Mc Daniels has got it all on tape, but what basically happened was I guess Kay Slay was down there having an interview with Ralph McDaniels, and Kay went through his whole spiel about being Kay Slay, a.k.a. Smack your Favourite DJ. And Pudgie P came from behind and was like I will challenge you right now, we can go out there on the turntables right now and Kay didn’t like that so he mushed him. It wasn’t really a fight though, he pushed him and it was kind over, there was a lot of screamin’ going on and it was a potential for it to get out of hand and get to where the crowd was at, and so we called it a night cause we didn’t want it to escalate. For people to say there was a fight at an event isn’t really a big deal. Now, if they say, there was a fight, and there was a shooting, or somebody got killed or they found a body in the bathroom, it’s a whole different thing, and now nobody wants to be involved with it ever again, so we stopped it from getting to that point.
What’s the Pink House award for?
There was a DJ in Chicago, he was the one who Blew up Crucial Conflict, and Twista, any group out of Chicago he was the guy everybody used to listen to. He was the Funk Masta Flex of Chicago. I have been doing that award since he passed away about 7 years ago.
What about the Brucie B and StarChild award?
That award is for your pioneers. Brucie B and Starchild were the first guys to ever make a mix tape. Mix tape started up with those guys.
Clue vs. Kay Slay, who do you give the nod to there?
I gotta go with Kay Slay. I mean, you don’t wanna have to choose. 7 out of 10 people will tell you Kay Slay. I don’t down anything Clue has done in the past, but he’s moved on, he’s a producer now, he makes records. He sold 1 million mix tapes commercially. That’s his thing, I am happy for him. The mixtape game, the mixtape awards did that for him, helped him get that. Now it’s time to bring somebody else up.
Cutmaster C has a lot to say he’s been coming out with the fake tape awards mixtapes, which start off with a phone conversation between you and him, and he defends your accusation where he slashed your tires. And he asks you why no one knows his tapes. Why is he so mad? Does he have reasons to be mad?
There is a guy that nobody knows. Kay Slay had to do 5 or 6 tapes in order for people to even say his name once. So, when I first heard that Cutmaster C cut up my tires, I was wondering who he was in the first place. Nobody knows this guy.
How are the nominations and winners chosen?
Online and by the board of directors. It’s a combination of voting online and the board. Now, Clue had said yeah that’s cool but people in the business don’t know nothing about mixtapes, you know, only the street kids tell you that and I am trying to figure out what part of the streets he is from? Cause he ain’t from the streets. Dude was born in a house with 2 parents so how would he know what a high mixtape is. If that’s the case then the streets is gonna tell you. And if you go to the streets right now, 7 out of 10 people will tell you that Kay Slay is the hottest nigga.
Clue got some shit for 2001. He got booed picking up his award and then….
That was the guy talking to magazines saying that the people wasn’t booing because of him, I was defending the guy, now it’s time to stop defending the guy. He talking bad about the awards and making excuses of why he didn’t win. There’s no excuse, he is not the hottest guy on the streets no more. That’s the bottom line. It’s time to move on. He’s talking about money trucks backin’ up and droppin off money. Come on man. Stop being a faggot about the whole thing.
Herc came up with some strong things to say about Clue during last year’s event?
Yeah, Clue heard what everybody was thinking and that’s why they was cheering. Herc just said it. And then Clue gets on MTV and talkin shit about the mixtape awards. So, when you put my name in your article I am Justo a.k.a The Clue Killa or you can just call me the Clue Killa. It just came to me one day like an epiphany. I am the Clue Killa.
Are we ever going to see a Turntablist section for your mix tape awards?
Yeah, I mean at this point, I am going to be doing a DJ awards period. Like an International DJ Awards. It made me think about it at the awards because I couldn’t really say too much about Jam Master Jay, he was never a mix tape DJ, so it was hard to fit him into the mix tape awards cause he wasn’t a mix tape DJ. So I was like, well it’s time to do a regular DJ awards and represent all DJs, all walks of life. So of course we’re not gonna have a hundred categories, we’ll probably have 50, and only 30 of them will be announced. You can only have so much, and it takes to long, nobody wants to sit there. Turntablist will always be popular, can do shows, but you can’t sell it in an album cause people can’t appreciate every single thing that the DJ is doing, and we appreciate it and we wanna recognize them at an awards, but it’s not really apart of the mix tapes. We kind of touched on it with Lazy Kay. She came on at the last minute, did a phenomenal job, and was the talk of the mix tape awards. Everybody wanted her number
Are thes the mixtape awards ever looking to get put on, industry wise Like MTV?
If it comes it’s cool but I am not chasing that dream. That’s it, cause everybody wants some kind of control of your shit and I don’t want any controlling me.
Jay-Z or Nas, who do you think won that?
Oh come on, I am a Brooklyn dude and last thing I want to say is Nas, cause right now the dude has the crown. The whole thing about that is I don’t think it’s over. I don’t think that Jay-Z is gonna lay down and let this dude have the crown. But until Jay-Z answers, he can’t have that crown, he can’t have any records he sells.
How do you feel about bootleggers?
Well, that’s been the game since the beginning, and it’s a very gray area game and it’s hard to control that. You get in for the promotions or you don’t get in it. It’s a promotional tool. It’s nothing else. It has nothing to do with money. So don’t let those DJs make you think that they are getting all that stuff of selling tapes, that comes from doing shows and parties. It’s the bootleggers who are making the money.
What are your thoughts on these three new artists: Graph, Shells, and Joe Buddens?
Shells, I like Shells. I am gonna be a little biased with Joe Buddens cause he had something to do with Desert Storm, so it’s hard asking me about that. I like Graph too, but I think I like Shells a little more than the other dudes.
Basically, 50 cent changed the game last year, when no one was messing with him, he just said, screw it, I am going to take it to the streets with mix tapes?
All the artists were getting on mix tapes to help their projects, but none of them took it into their own hands, and did their own mix tapes. There were some who did it before 50 cent, but they weren’t as successful.
What part of the business excites you as much as the artistry?
I just like when nobody knows a artist and then he’s the biggest star for four, five, six months. I like seeing that. Going from a guy just talking to you, to a guy who is on David Letterman and selling a million records. I have seen Nelly, Lil’ Kim and a whole lot of artists do it. That whole excitement that you get when that stuff starts to take off and happen, that’s the best part of the game. The second best feeling is when they go up to an award ceremony and shout you out for working their album in the beginning. That would be the best feeling if it ever happened, but It hasn’t happened yet. There are a lot of artists I help blow up, yet they go up there and give shout outs to all the big label execs and don’t shout out the guy who was in the trenches with them. I am not mad about it, but you hope that they remember those times.
Besides Kay Slay, what other DJs up and coming impress you?
Whookid, Action Pac, DJ Rerok, Shogun, Green Lantern, Big Mike, Meddafore, Clinton Sparks, DJ Enuff. New guys, there are a bunch of them, and I hope they keep the game strong. We need that next Clue, that next Kay Slay. They have to stay creative. Getting exclusive is cool but what else are you gonna do to make yourself different from Clue and Kay Slay. That’s what they have to think off and come up with.
What’s your definition of Selling out?
Everything that Clue did basically. When you start ignoring people that you know, even artists. Acting like you’re better than them. Saying you’re from the streets when you’re not, when you actually an upper middle class kid, who got everything you wanted. Promoting all your own records on your own stuff. And that you’re gay, and don’t wanna tell people that you’re gay. You’re gay, face it. You’re a homo. Clue don’t want people to know that he was the first DJ for Pudgie the Fat Bastard, who, in the industry is the gay rapper.
What is your definition of Biting?
I don’t know what biting is now cause it’s so accepted now. I come from a time where biting is frowned upon. Now, everything Puffy did was a bite. He did everything that Warren G did and sold it on record.
Whoo Kid came out with the Grand Theft Auto series, and then Clue came out with the Grand Theft Audio series. Is that biting?
That’s biting man. Because Clue knows that he has a wider audience than Whoo Kid. Not for long, but at the time he put that out, he did. It’s like somebody playing a song first and then Flex playing it and him saying he played it first.
What do you think of the state of hip hop right now?
One thing you can’t control is the street. When people get sick of something, they gonna go on to the next thing, and the next thing is somebody who’s working on something in their basement right now. That’s the next thing. Nobody knows who it is, and nobody knows how it’s gonna pop off.
Where do you see the mixtape game going?
Mixtapes have been around since the beginning of hip hop in ‘78 ‘79 and it’s always gonna be popular. It will be around even if it’s not popular as it is now, cause the mixtape awards just made it more popular.
Where do you see yourself?
I am working on that straight DJ awards and I am going to be putting my own records out, and eventually I have to do that, cause that’s the only way to get respect in this business. I am gonna get artists, real singers. I am gonna start off with an R&B act and it will be easier to work my Rap Group. I just wanna put out records man. I am dealing with this girl named Mayonnaise, she used to be on Broadway, she did the show Aida. I am just trying to see what she wants to do. She’s got a great voice. She’s not your average normal soulful type voice. But it’s a pure sound. And you can make anything a sound for the streets. The streets doesn’t wanna hear good music as well. They don’t care if you sound like Ashanti or Amarie. They just wanna hear something new and hot. If you can make it hot, then it will sell. I have somebody who has the voice, can entertain and has the look, I feel like it will be a smash. You should hear stuff from her soon cause I will probably be putting stuff on the mix tapes by the time your article runs.
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