S. Samuel
Newly signed Cash Money Records artist Busta Rhymes recently opened up about nearing his 40's and why he feels there is no time limit on when he hangs up the microphone for good.
In addition to discussing hip-hop longevity, Busta briefly touched on working with new digital retailer Google Music to put out records.
“I’ve been blessed to be in this shape for a long time, but from young. I’m still a 38, 39 year old n*gga. I have a lot of peers that are older than me. At the end of the day, I can only speak for me, I’m just finding a new fresh powers source that’s gonna make things a lot more difficult for niggas if they wanna stand next to me and compete. I take great pleasure and great pride in respectfully competing. I don’t know it no other way; as long as everybody keeps it respectful. … [Google Music,] it’s displaying a new way of releasing music. It’s gonna be a grand, festive moment for hip-hop overall. It’s show people how greatly we can look forward to the growth of doing this shit the way it’s supposed to be. I couldn’t be more grateful for a better time in my career and evolution process at this point.” (XXL Mag)
Last week, Busta defended his decision to ink a deal with Birdman’s Cash Money.
“This whole experience that’s getting ready to happen is probably going to be one of the most defining moments in hip-hop and probably in entertainment overall,” said Busta. “This alliance with the Conglomerate and YMCMB and me and Bird and Wayne, the whole family, it’s something that’s been a long time coming because we just always had a respect level and a genuine and organic friendship for a very long time. It goes back in the day because me and Bird used to spend a million dollars a year on cars alone just to compete at the Funk Flex car shows and talk sh*t to each other and live it up and have fun.” (Derick G)
In addition to the announcement, Busta put out his new “Why Stop Now” record through Google Music.
After dominating 2011?s charts and cleaning up award ceremonies with his feature on Chris Brown‘s “Look At MeNow”, Busta Rhymes and Breezy join forces for this cut from Busta’s forthcoming LP E.L.E. (Extinction Level Event) 2: End Of The World entitled “Why Stop Now”. But that’s not the biggest part of things, the rap legend has joined forces with Google’s new venture Google Music to not only release the track for free (download it here), the new E.L.E album will debut exclusively on Google Music. (Soul Culture)
Although still in its beginning stages, a few major record companies have also partnered with Google’s new music service.
So far, Google has signed up three of the four major record labels — Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and EMI — but has not yet reached a deal with the Warner Music Group, which has a 20-percent share of the U.S. market. Among the Warner acts you won’t find on Google Music are Wiz Khalifa, Nickelback, Frank Sinatra, Green Day, Gucci Mane and Mastodon. (MTV)
Check out some recent Busta Rhymes footage below:
