BEYOND LEGENDARY: Billy Danze
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK | BILLY DANZE
INTERVIEW KB TINDAL
When your music career spans almost 30 years and you’re still relevant in Hip Hop that is nothing short of an amazing feat. Often and mostly too many times in Hip Hop we write our legends off but those of us that know the depth of this culture recognize our pioneers and we place them on an artistry pedestal where they deserve to be praised for keeping Hip Hop alive. Billy Danze, who is also one-half of the legendary rap duo M.O.P. aka the Mash Out Posse, is one of those artists. He has worked with everyone imaginable and all of the who’s who of artists and producers in Hip Hop. His certified old original Brooklyn street flow as an MC has spanned decades and has never wavered from what he does best. From multiple major label deals to penning songs with the greats like Jay Z to releasing hardcore anthems that have stood the test of time like “Ante Up,” Billy has created a lane that few dare to roam in. He stays connected to the streets, because for him that is the essence of where it all started, but he has also grown and elevated his artistry to a point where now he is looked at as an elder statesman in the game. He is the shining example of what it means to age gracefully in Hip Hop and remain relevant.
His latest project “#TheReListeningSession” is nothing short of pure Billy Danze at his finest. Stay tapped in with us for a ride down memory lane with one of the dopest MC’s on the planet as we chop it up with Billy Danze about his past and his present and his future.
“If you go back and do the history on M.O.P., why we made music, the way we made it from the beginning is because that's what we were into. That's what we came right out of and came right into the industry from. There was nothing in between that. Now as a grown man with a family, I want people to feel me more than just the music and then you will enjoy the music.” -BILLY DANZE
VALIDATED: Let's start from the beginning. Where did you get the MC name Billy Danze from, how did that come about?
BILLY DANZE: It was a time where everybody was finding these names, these old mob names. I just kind of put one together myself. I put the Danze together myself. I use my father's middle name, which is William and Billy, short for William. I just put it together like that. I didn't want to do the Capone, the Gottis. How many Gottis, how many Capones we got? You'll never hear another artist with a name like mine.
VALIDATED: Growing up in New York, I'm from New York originally myself from Queens, what was your earliest memory of Hip Hop and the culture in general?
BILLY DANZE: It started in Queens on the North side. My family is originally from the South side. But my mother was living on the North side. On the North side, in those days there were the jams at the park, it wasn't even block parties, it would just be like the DJ just throwing his system out there. We had one song, one official Rap Hip Hop song was Sugar Hill Gang. And around that time, like I said, he was putting these speakers out and this whole jam was going on. I've heard a few local rappers. It wasn't that many. Especially not like now.
You have a few local rappers rapping or whatever. There was this one dude that was just mesmerizing. He was hopping from speaker to speaker. You know, the big speakers we used to have the Cerwin-Vega speaklers. The dude just kept going, Ladies Love Cool J in between the rhymes. I'm like, what is he doing up there, it was something different. I'm a little kid. I was mesmerized by that and that was my first draw into Hip Hop. It was good to see LL do something like that as a kid. And then two or three weeks later, is when he put out his first record.
VALIDATED: That's my neighborhood. I'm from Hollis Queens so I saw that from the inception. I know how you feel.
BILLY DANZE: I saw him killing it on 112 & Farmers, he destroyed it because I lived on 112. My mother lived on 112, my grandmother lived on 113.
VALIDATED: I know exactly where you were at. So far in your career, what's been one of your most memorable moments?
BILLY DANZE: I’ve made so many but I'm going to say the very first thing that happened to me as far as in music was going into that studio and literally making a song. Because we all would rap and do our freestyles, but I had never been in the studio in my life until I made my very first song. I'm going to say that’s one of the most memorable moments, but there was so many. But that one right there is what started it all.
VALIDATED: What song is that, do you remember the song?
BILLY DANZE: “How About Some Hardcore.” That was the first one!
VALIDATED: Wow a hit on your first try that’s crazy!
BILLY DANZE: Yes, my very first time in the studio.
VALIDATED: And you make an anthem like that. That's a legendary song on your first time out. That's crazy.
BILLY DANZE: I couldn't even finish the song because I've never rapped that way before, with so much aggression and so much focus. I've always just done it for fun. We literally got a deal with unfinished songs. That's when the record company Exec or A&R had passion for… It was all hustling and trying to steal the money, but they still had a passion for the music. That was the days when you could see somebody with talent in the train station, and someone would help them get a deal. It’s not like that no more. There’s no passion no more.
VALIDATED: I've heard you talk about hate and violence in Hip Hop. What do you do to try to personally curb that violence in the community and what do you think can be done to first of all, change the mindset of the young cats that's coming up, so that we kind of like, move forward as a culture and not move backwards?
BILLY DANZE: Violence in Hip Hop is something that never happened. It never happened. There wasn't no violence in Hip Hop, it was just street beefs going on, it's just violence in general. What I can do is what I can do and all I can do is, when I have interviews, and questions like this asked, I can just give my opinion on why we should slow the violence down. I can talk to the younger cats one on one, but we know sometimes that's hard. I think if we go way, way back because we're talking about our community, our people, we can never really grow because everybody's trying to pull each other down.
If you go back to Alex Haley's Roots, anything we know, even before that, when we talk about the south, or wherever the slaves were, you hear all these stories about the slaves, but you never hear the slaves actually hurting each other. You don't hear any stories about that. Fast forward to the 60s, 70s or whenever it was, our people got in their heads that they want to be better than their neighbors. That's when the jealousy kicks in. You mad at somebody else because of what they have. We are all stuck in this community.
Another thing that kills me about it is, and I've been saying this for so many years and I hope it doesn't happen, but it seems like it's been brewing up to be like this racial war kind of thing. God forbid, that happens, the person that you shot last, that was really down, that was a really down ass dude. He was really for it. If that happens, that's somebody that you don't have on your side. We basically dropping each other for whatever small reasons, but when push comes to shove, you might need that dude that you had that beef with across town. You know he is a real dude so he might have had your back. So you got to think about that brother.
VALIDATED: I know you’re from Brownsville, Saratoga Ave. I did my research and I watched videos of you being interviewed and stuff like that. I heard you talking, and I don't want to harp on this much. But I heard you talk about the activity you had shooting guns off the roof of the building at people and stuff like that when you were a kid. You also said that your junior high school was like Spofford Juvenile Detention Center before Spofford was Spofford. I want to know, when was the first moment that you saw a way out of that and felt to yourself like damn, I really don't have to be a victim of what's going on in my hood.
BILLY DANZE: Somebody asked me this the other day, “So when did you figure that out? Was it when you said that you wanted to do music”, it wasn't even that moment, it was years after doing music, and then traveling. Because as sad as it is, it's the truth. Most of us in our communities, we really don't leave our neighborhoods unless we are on the run. That's really the only reason why we leave our neighborhood. Me being able to get on planes and go to other countries, first just other states, and other cities, it changed my mind, it helped me see that there was something different.
Once I leave my neighborhood and go to another neighborhood and see it's the same exact way, but I'm not embedded in that neighborhood. I could blend in, but I'm not embedded. When I come into the neighborhood, I could see that these people need help here. Same in my neighborhood, we needed help. Really mentally, not that people are crazy, it's just that where we are mentally, that feeling of this is what we got to do to survive. Then it’s that term I am cool, I am out here on the block, what is it now? We outside. It’s dangerous out there. Why are you so happy about being out there?
Just going to other places and seeing other things. I had another conversation with a lady at the car dealership the other day, and I was saying how in Switzerland, it is a really beautiful country. You can get into it out there, but they don't know nothing about this kind of violence. They don't know nothing about this at all. It'd be great if we could have that here throughout our country. But we got whatever's going on out in Chicago, you got whatever's going on down in New York and Atlanta and Texas and all of these places. It seems like we don't know how to grow and just be men and be proud of just being a man and coming home and taking care of your family. It's like I want to show everybody else I'm tough. We just have to figure out how to get out of that mentality.
VALIDATED: Your latest project “#TheRe-ListeningSession”. Dope project, I've been listening to it the last few days. Some of my favorite joints off it just to give you my take, “Won't Lose,” “One to Grow On” featuring Havoc which is your latest visual that's out right now. And “Men of Honor,” featuring Cormega. On that song on “Men of Honor,” you say, “Magnetic the MC is ultra/ you would say I did it for the critics and the vultures/ Nah misdeal I did it for the soldiers and uncompromised rise of the culture”. Now, with that being said, you guys, MOP have always created heavy street music with a survival element to it. At the end of the day, when it comes to the culture of Hip Hop, how do you want to be remembered through your musical messages and just as a person that represented the culture in general?
BILLY DANZE: My first thought, to answer that question, I want to be remembered as a person. And when I say that I'm saying that because in the beginning of my career, throughout most of my career, people were afraid. Like they thought we were straight animals because of the young boy mentality we have, “we outside.” We've been outside. I just want to be remembered as a person, it's not so much to be the greatest artists because people going to have their individual thoughts about me as an artist and there's only so many words in the English language so how can I say something somebody else didn't say or how can somebody say something that this person didn't say? For me, it's more about just people understanding who I am. And that's the way that you'll get to appreciate my music. If you go back and do the history on M.O.P., why we made music, the way we made it from the beginning is because that's what we were into. That's what we came right out of and came right into the industry from. There was nothing in between that. Now as a grown man with a family, I want people to feel me more than just the music and then you will enjoy the music.
VALIDATED: What's your favorite song on the project and why?
BILLY DANZE: I like “Cyrus Returns.” I like that one because the beat and the hook is ridiculous. Shout out to Alonzo Fibonacci. This is one of the homies that we got a part of what we call the Construction Team because they reconstructed that thing and made it special, even more special. The first one was crazy but they did their thing. It's the baseline, it's the way it plays to us. It's like a movie. It feels like an actual movie, when you get a chance, really soak into that joint. We didn't want to call it “The Return of Cyrus”. We want to call it “Cyrus Returns”. I got nine videos. I'm just walking around in this black trench coat, which is burgundy. It's the same black trench coat, the same burgundy sweater, the same black Timbs, the same pants every video and I'm just walking through hoods. It's like, “Cyrus Returns”. I'm sure you know who Cyrus is…
VALIDATED: Warrior Cyrus?
BILLY DANZE: Right. That record is like, think of me as the grand piano, prestigious, the highest of the totem pole, the leader of the leaders. That's the line that’s the catch line and I'm still humble about it. Because I could literally walk around in that trench coat and just walk to something real big and jump in to speed off, about me showing the groundedness. “Cyrus Returns” today it's my favorite right now.
VALIDATED: I know Lil Fame and you have been on so many labels from Select to Relativity to basically Rock-A-Fella until you guys felt uncomfortable about that situation, from Loud to G-Unit. I have to ask where are you most comfortable? Are you most comfortable on a major label or are you more comfortable being independent?
BILLY DANZE: Right now because I've been doing everything independent, I've always had freedom with the exception of the first label, which was Select. Shout out to Mr. Fred Naofa for giving us our break in the business. Everybody else after that signed us because they were fans. We always had the freedom because they wanted to hear us do it just like that. The independent route it's better for me, especially in this time when nobody's actually making any money with music anyway. I could put up my own money, put my own records out, get 100% of everything I put out and still have the freedom and don't have to worry about the calls. We are so grounded. We only really want to hang out with people that we like.
The whole industry, rubbing elbows, we don't really want to do that with people that we don't really like. I know business is business and sometimes I pull myself out of who I am to do business. But I'm really not comfortable with that. So I'm cool with the independent brothers, it works better for me.
VALIDATED: Keep your circle tight.
BILLY DANZE: I don’t have any new friends. My newest friend, we've been friends for like 22 years. That's my newest friend.
VALIDATED: I can understand that and respect that. In this age of independence, coming up on almost 30 years in this game, where are you guys at as far as owning your masters or getting your masters back from those early albums?
BILLY DANZE: I understand this from the block. You got to make money with somebody. As long as everything's fair... These people don’t understand, these people gave us opportunities. They put up a lot of money. They made their money back and we still have the splits that we have, that's cool. But moving forward, you get nothing. I'm not mad at you because these people gave me the opportunity to change my life and build a life for my family and have a future. I'm not mad about the way the music industry was designed from the beginning, I wasn't here. I fell into it.
My deals were the way they were. I ate well, there is still money generated from those records, and I still get my piece. But moving forward, you guys aren't helping me with what I'm doing moving forward. And let me really say this, I appreciate everybody who I did business with, the labels for helping me get into these situations. Because we are that part of society that people try to forget about, we voted most likely to be dead in jail in your 20s. They helped me navigate a way from the destiny that the hood has for most of us.
VALIDATED: That’s priceless. When you guys made “Ante Up,” did you know that it would cause so much ruckus in the clubs when it got played and did you know that it would still be as strong of an anthem today, as it was when it came out?
BILLY DANZE: No one has any clue about the records that they create. There was no clue about that. Plus, I was drowned in Hennessy, I was just having a good time. I'm so grateful and I really appreciate that the fans keep this record alive and we're able to keep going. I've been touring for years off that same record.
VALIDATED: That’s a blessing. Are you and Lil Fame planning anything for the 30th anniversary of “To The Death”?
BILLY DANZE: Maybe, I'm not sure. I've been having this request, “Where’s the M.O.P. record?” I will be honest, I'm going to do my part as an artist. Fame is going to do his part. How many comments am I going to see fire, I'm supporting it, I'm doing this, whatever you're the best. But I need y'all to do your part. I'm going to say this because I'm talking to my fans now. It's no disrespect intended. You know my catch line is “all disrespect intended” (Laughs). But I'm saying this to my fans and my family. No disrespect intended.
Ya’ll don't deserve an M.O.P. album. Because if you are going to be a 100, be 100. If I got to make the album only for me to support it, then I'll make it and don’t even put it out. Basically that's it in a nutshell. When the public or the fans, when we feel like they deserve an album, we're going to give it to them. We've been making records, we got M.O.P. records in the cut ready to go. We got an album. But we're not going to put that album out. We're not going to put it out until the public deserves it.
VALIDATED: From ‘94 to now, how do you feel you've grown as an artist?
BILLY DANZE: Tremendously. If you listen to the records that I have now in comparison to the records that I did 20 years ago, you hear this, I don't want to say preachy kind of deal but it's more of an educator, but from my angle. I think it is very appropriate and I'm going off the feeling of the records and the response from the records. I'm literally getting calls, texts, dms, emails from peers in the industry that I never got this from. Like, “I love what you're doing right now”, before, whether they liked it or not, it was the times they liked it in, and they were forced to like it because it was all over the place, it was all in their ear.
Now I feel like people are appreciating more the way that I'm doing these records. These are my solo records, which I still have to get, okayed, from Fame and Teflon and everybody. I have to get their blessings to put these records out. But everybody's loving what I'm doing and the direction. It may seem like a shift but I still have that feel so it's basically still point-blank range, but from a different angle.
VALIDATED: Tell the young artists, some of the sacrifices that you had to make, or the things that you had to go without, because you invested so much in your artistry early in your career. I think a lot of these young artists just feel like it's going to happen overnight. They're going to get put on and they're going to be at the top of the charts and they're going to be this major superstar and even with independence the way it is today it just doesn't work like that. Tell them some of the sacrifices that you had.
BILLY DANZE: One that I really, I don't know if I regret it, but I could regret it at some times. Like, when I walk in the crib, or my son walks in and he has this full beard, full mustache. I'm like, damn, where'd that come from? Or my daughter is married. Like, how did that happen? You have to miss a lot. You have to sacrifice. That's a huge sacrifice that we all go through as artists, a serious artist. I'm on tour eight months at a time. Come off tour, then I'm hitting the studio for three months. Rest for two weeks and then back on tour again. You miss your children growing up. That's what I kind of missed. But I'm there all the time. But still, you kind of miss it.
There are some things that I missed. But thinking that it's going to happen overnight is not it. Back to myself, I went out there and toured these dates, because I had to in order to grow the brand to keep growing the brand. These kids now think it's so different with them because it's not about the music. It's really not about the music. Even when they're streaming. They're so concerned with these streams. You got to have a million streams to get $4,500. What are the odds of just anyone getting a million streams? By the time you get a million streams, it'll be nine years later. You made $4,500 in nine years. I think what they need to do is you got to figure out another pocket in order to grow your brand, because everybody in the same lane, like it's clogged up in that lane. It's so clogged up in that lane. And it seems like the way that they get the attention now is by the violence or doing something crazy. And we had issues in our careers early on too. Everybody had it, but it just wasn't so crazy like it is now. They're using that for promo. Is it really worth that, somebody removes your entire face because you're trying to promo. You do something that makes somebody want to remove your entire face. I don't know if it’s worth it.
In our era, you didn't want that stuff to be seen. Nowadays they want you to see everything. They are taping it. These kids actually like they are dying. It is sad.
VALIDATED: I know you probably get asked this question all the time. Everybody always asked this question, but I got to ask you, if you had to choose who would be your top five MCs from any era from the beginning of time?
BILLY DANZE: First three, Scarface, G Rap, Rakim. Run from Run DMC, like I literally wanted to be the dude when I was a kid. And people go, that's not fair. It is fair because I'm 100% honest as a fan. I got to make records with this dude. The thing that hits me the most when I'm going to do a record with Fame is that I got to impress him because he's so impressive. Listen to me, the dude can't dance. It's funny how I'm saying this, but he's never off beat. Any song you ever heard him do, whether feature, M.O.P. records, or his own records, he's never off beat, always in the pocket. That's impressive. Then he says these witty lines. He's a rapper. He'll get on a joint and just put a lot of dudes to shame. That's definitely my starting five.
VALIDATED: You can never just pick just five, but I get you. What does Hip Hop mean to you?
BILLY DANZE: To me, it means something that belongs to us. It's this thing of ours, and I did a record about it, it's called “This Thing Of Ours,” when you get a chance just look it up. It's the only thing that's actually ours that we know we created and still dominate. Whether we control it or not, we got a little more control of it than we did, than we had before. You can take all the major league football teams and the tech companies, everything, even the mom-and-pop shops, everything you could take and collectively they haven't been able to secure more homes in our community than ever. We are talking about billion-dollar tech companies. We're talking about billion-dollar ball franchises, they haven't been able to secure as many people in the community as Hip Hop has. When you get a chance, you got to look the record up, it's called “This Thing About Ours.”
VALIDATED: Other ventures, what are you currently working on besides “#TheReListeningSession”? Where can people get the merch at, things of that nature and where can everybody follow you?
BILLY DANZE: Merch, you just gotta hit me directly. You hit me directly on my Instagram, @BillyDanzeM.O.P and I'll hand out the information like that. I like to handle things myself so that my people understand that's coming directly from me and not somebody who linked you to somebody who's linked to somebody who's linked to somebody else. Directly from me.
Doing a lot of filming. Putting a lot of film projects together, documentaries and short films and stuff like that. Currently, I just put “#TheReListeningSession” out, but I'm currently working on two more projects at the same time. Just finished another project. I'm just going and still putting the M.O.P. records together so when the fans do earn it I got it for them.