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One Be Lo How are you man? One Be Lo: What's going on? First off, tell us what the title of your new project R.E.B.I.R.T.H. stands for. One Be Lo: It's basically me recognizing a turning point. I feel it's a turning point within myself and a real career. A lot of things that I'm thinking of are not necessarily different, like making music in general. I just have a different understanding about what's going on and how things work. I feel I'm the same person, just better. You could say it's a new hunger. For a long time I was doing it and I loved doing it but I didn't really feel it either way. It wasn't about making money. There was a time where I was getting bored with it. The energy wasn't motivating me and no one was really around me motivating me to push shit to another level. I didn't really recognize what was going on around me. I think I need to be making music and the people around me need to hear what I got to say. I'm kind of reinvigorating my career. Who are some of the producers you worked with? One Be Lo: I got like four guys out of the Michigan area. My man 14KT and Texture who did like three joints on the record. My man D.L. Jones, I got two guys from Chicago, K. Krueser and Memo from the Molemen. Everyone else is from Seattle. I got a cat named Eric G, Bean one, Jake One and Vitamin D, so it's pretty solid. Most of the cats I've known for a while. The only one that kind of came out of nowhere was Eric G. I've been getting some real good feedback about the production, so yeah that's cool. It seems like you reached outside the camp instead of working with the Trackezoids. Is that just how it worked out or was it a goal of yours? One Be Lo: That goes back to just making music right now beecause it wasn't intentional. It wasn't like I'm going to do this album called the R.E.B.I.R.T.H. and I want these producers. I've been recording music over the last year and I get beats from whoever I'm feeling. When it was time to assemble this album I just got the tracks that I did and it so happened to be those particular tracks. It's not like I'm working with these guys now and I'm not working with those guys now. My interest isn't about who made the beat, it's about what I'm feeling. In the past it was more about rocking with my crew regardless of what it sounded like. Now I'll work with you whether you're in my crew or not. If you produce something crazy I want to fuck with you, you know what I'm saying? I owe that to the music, I owe that to myself and I owe it to the fans just to bring the best out for me. Whoever can do that, that's who I'm fucking with. Would you say R.E.B.I.R.T.H. is an official album? One Be Lo: Yeah it's official. It's definitely not my first album at all. It's me making a statement. It's probably my most important album for a lot of different reasons. I got some outside production on this one, it's following up the S.O.N.O.G.R.A.M. and Binary Star and all that other shit. I want folks to know, "Hey this dude is dope no matter who he works with" and definitely get cats aware for the future, so its one of my most important records. It was originally supposed to be released a while back, what was the cause of the delay? One Be Lo: Man you can call Fat Beats on that one. For whatever reason or a million excuses they had for not putting out the record. The biggest mistake I made and I don't even want to call it a mistake, but the problem is when I signed last summer I was just sending out my stuff like "check this out, check that out". This is by far not the best material I got, these songs are banging but I got some really amazing songs I have been working on. So I think when I was first turning in the project Fat Beats was like "Ehh". So yeah I agree with them to a certain extent but that's what I wanted to do, do this record and then setup. I felt like and not that I was jumping to an extreme, I feel like for me to be able to be doing some of the things I'm doing now I had to setup some of that shit, and I felt like this was a good transitional record. They just started making excuses so I had to work some legal shit with them just so I could be able to put out the record cause people want to hear something. It's been almost three years since my last record came out man and sometimes messing around with these labels can slow up the process. So you are releasing this independently? One Be Lo: Yeah, I'm doing this by myself. I'm going to check my resources and everything and just try to make it crack. I got cats I want to fuck with eventually but I'm not trying to go that route lright now. I'm just trying to take my time and build my shit back up. You spend a lot of time on the road, how do you find the time to record? Would you say you're a workaholic? One Be Lo: [Laughs] I mean I don't think I'm a workaholic because it's my life. Everybody else might describe it like that but that's the thing, I'm not doing business I'm just doing me. I think the difference between me and some other people is Hip Hop to them is a hobby or a business, but for me it's not either, that's who I am. I'm going to perform because that's who I am; I write rhymes and make music because that's what I do. And in my spare time that's what I do. I make money from it so it's the best thing I could do because for the last five years I wasn't even really working on music. The best thing I did was build that studio in my basement. Because now when I go home I wake up in the morning, I can just write a verse and drop it whenever I want. I'm on my way to the airport and get the buzz and literally run downstairs and lay something down just to hear it on the plane. That puts it at a different level for me being able to record whenever I want to or need to know what I'm saying. I think that's the biggest difference in the way I make music now. It really changed the way I write and it really changed the way I recorded and I think you can hear that. Are you on the road now, and what are some of the areas you're going to hit? One Be Lo: Right now I'm just setting up shop outside of Seattle. What I like to do is I like to setup shop in different regions so I have a headquarters I can operate from. So Seattle will be like my Northwest headquarters and obviously I have one in Michigan and I'll probably try to do the same thing in Colorado. From Colorado I could hit up Albuquerque, I could hit up Kansas. From Cali I could hit up Phoenix, Las Vegas and I want to eventually hit the whole country but in the beginning I want to just do release parties. I did a couple in Michigan. I got a couple in Seattle at the end of the month then come back and do Portland. You know, just the Northwest then I want to go to California and instead of doing a tour I'm going to concentrate on Cali. Then I'm going to do the same thing on the east coast instead of doing a tour I'm going to concentrate on Philly, Baltimore, Boston or wherever. Then when muthafuckas know it's out is when I'm going to go on a tour that'll cover the country. Do you get homesick when you're on the road? One Be Lo: See that's the thing, for me the road is home. It's been like that for about ten years. I get home sick when I'm not on the road really. I'm never home so I miss the road more. People say, "don't you get tired of flying" or "on't you want to stay home and just chill." I don't know I'm just so used to it man, it's just me. What's the status of your album called L.I.F.E? Who are some artists and producers that you're collaborating with? One Be Lo: Once again I'm working on an album called L.I.F.E. I'm putting out the album called the R.E.B.I.R.T.H. now. I'm just making music man. The music I'm making now is life music. When it comes to battle rhymes, when it comes to braggadocios shit, I'll do those on an extra track or whatever. I make life music in general. That's where I'm at right now and so if I wanted to do an album with 16 tracks I could literally do an album called L.I.F.E. right now and be content with it. But these producers keep hitting me with these bangers and its like I'm not going to say the album is done because every time I say that I get like three joints in the mail. Then I'm like, "Oh shit this has got to be on the record." So expect this to be an amazing record. I'm working with some of the same producers that are on this album. I do have projects I'm doing with specific people. I got a project I'm working on that should be out in 08. I did a whole album with Black Milk and I got a whole album I'm doing with this cat out of Chicago. So I do have those projects, but for the L.I.F.E. joint you might see some Black Milk tracks on there and you might see some Vitamin D, I mean I don't even know. I don't even know, you might not see any tracks from them dudes. I'm just working with a lot of crazy producers right now and I'm doing a lot of amazing shit. Regardless of whatever album it's on you're going to hear all of it man cause the shit is amazing. I don't want to put myself in a position again where I got all this amazing material and it's not coming out. If I recorded in 07 or 08 it needs to come out now man. I'm on some other shit now. You also have a project called Security with Magestik Legend. What's the status on that? One Be Lo: Me and Magestik Legend did a project but we had just kind of missed the window for that. Like it was supposed to come out two years ago. He's doing whatever he's doing now and I'm doing whatever I'm doing now. I feel like if the album came out now it would really sound dated compared to what cats are doing now. I mean I cant speak for him but I feel the window for that record to come out kind of passed. It's like the same thing with me and Binary Star. For me to stop what I'm doing and do a Binary Star record it's cool but that's just not where I'm at right now. So that's something we won't be seeing anytime soon? One Be Lo: Not anytime soon. I don't know about definite but I'm just trying to keep it moving. I can only speak for myself; I was trying to do all those projects before I got into the One Be Lo mode. Because I know once I go into One Be Lo mode it's like I'm not just doing my projects. I'm doing projects with other people, I'm working on a lot of shit. I'm working on instrumental albums so I'm just trying to place that shit and like the best records for me to do are the ones I can go on the road and perform. Anything that requires me to work with other people and involve them and have to take them on tour with me, I'm not suggesting it's a bad thing I'm just saying sometimes peoples' schedules conflict. I'm just trying to keep it moving and make it easier, stuff I can just go to the basement and knock it out, you know? I don't have to wait for nobody, I don't have to get anybody's approval; I don't have to ask anyone can you take time off of work or any of that  There are a lot of talented artists coming out of the Detroit area these days, who are some of your personal favorites? One Be Lo: In Detroit? Man it's hard to say. If I have to pick I'll say one of my favorites is Elhzi, but that's just based off some 1997 shit I heard. I don't really follow him like that so I don't know what he's doing now. I know he's a dope cat so I'll say Elzhi is one of my favorites, so yeah there is a lot of cats doing there thing right now. You drop knowledge in your rhymes but it also doesn't come off like preaching. Is it hard to find that balance? One Be Lo: I mean it's not hard for me I'm just being a person. I'm not trying to be a preacher, I'm not a preacher I'm a person. So as a person I like to eat healthy but I like popsicles too. S that's how I spit my verses. I'm all about the revolution but I play video games and I play basketball too. As a person I try to stay balanced and do the same in my verses. I mean there are some things I don't agree with but I don't try to share my opinion on things, I sort of try to share my perspective and experiences and be creative. No matter what I do I'm trying to be creative. Anything else you'd like to add? One Be Lo: Just let them know that the R.E.B.I.R.T.H. is here man. This is one project out of many. Check out One Be Lo, check me out on myspace, hit me up on OneBeLO.com . Just look for the rebirth of hip hop and the rebirth of One Be Lo. I think a lot of artists after this are going to do what they are going to do but they are going to have to step their game up, their mans are going to have to step their game up, it's going to make me step my game up. That's what the R.E.B.I.R.T.H. is, it's about growth. If everyone steps there game up, after being on the bottom there is nowhere to go but the top. Drew & Andy