Interview with a madman

On the heels of a new album and memoir, Scarface comes to Tulsa

Scarface’s gritty drawl prowls through meticulously crafted beats, lingering on lyrics that teeter between the murderous and sentimental. Ludacris called him “hip hop’s best storyteller.” Chuck D says he’s “Thelonious Monk reincarnated in spit.” 

The icon of southern hip hop (he hails from Houston) has had a career rare for its longevity (27 years) and consistent quality output, bolstered by a raw honesty regarding his lifelong struggle with depression and suicide.

2015 was a significant mile marker for Scarface. He released his first independent album, Deeply Rooted, this past September, and a memoir, “Diary of a Madman,” earlier in April.  

On February 11, Scarface will sing through Tulsa as part of his “Icon” tour, performing at The Shrine along with openers Hakeem Eli’juwon, Steph Simon, Oilhouse, and the MuGen Music Crew.

The Tulsa Voice: Deeply Rooted is your first album in seven years and your first independent album. How does that feel?

Scarface: I feel emancipated, I feel free. Period. I don’t feel like I’m doin’ this to give it away. You make music for these record labels and give it to them so they can own it. It’s your blood, sweat, tears, and years, and you get none of it. They keep it all. Sometimes you be lucky to get your money from it.

TTV: How do you think hip-hop has evolved since you started?

SF: It hasn’t evolved, not a chance. If anything, at first it was a machine for the community and now it’s a fuckin’ comedy show. It’s who can make the most stupid sounding shit in the world. I’m totally opposed to it, but it is what it is. 

TTV: Did you find that the process of writing your memoir contributed to the making of Deeply Rooted?

SF: No, not at all. I was the one that created that album with or without the memoir.

TTV: As a social worker, I had a hard time getting through the mental health part of your book because I felt that the mental health system failed you.

SF: Hold on, wait, you a social worker? Like for Child Protective Services?

TTV: Yep. I’m housed in a high school.

SF: Shit. You mean you’re over there talking to kids?

TTV: Every day.

SF: I could come by there and talk to them.

TTV: They’d love that. A lot of my job is finding kids therapists and, when I read about your experience, I couldn’t help asking myself, “Why didn’t they encourage him to write? Why didn’t they focus on the things that you loved and made you happy?” If they had, do you think your experience would have been a little different?

SF: Nah. I don’t. They could’ve encouraged me to write but I wrote anyways, you know? You feel how you feel. You wake up in the morning feeling one way and you go to bed feeling another. It is what it is. If it works out then it does and if it doesn’t at least you get to start over tomorrow. 

TTV: It seems you always stay true to yourself.

SF: That’s the only way to be. You turn around and you stray away from who you are, then you can’t find yourself.  There comes a time when you are lookin’ in the freakin’ mirror and you don’t know who you lookin’ at. But nah, I’d rather just stay me and suffer the consequences of bein’ myself. You are yourself so you just have to pay that debt. I don’t mind bein’ me at all. 

TTV: You describe your performance at Madison Square Garden in ’92 as the moment you realized your music was accepted at the birthplace of hip-hop. Can you elaborate on that moment or that feeling?

SF: In ‘87 or ‘88 we got booed in NYC, but in ‘92 we came back and the crowd went crazy, so that’s why I say that. You know, that’s how I knew they accepted us, because at first no one wanted to hear us. Nobody wanted to hear people talkin’ about sellin’ dope and doin’ what they do.  Now everybody sellin’ dope and doin’ what they do. So we were onto somethin’ way back then. Shout out to the Geto Boys. 

TTV: You talk about there being a huge amount of tension between the south side and north side of Houston; do you think Geto Boys having members from both sides helped decrease that tension in any way? Or Houston rap in general?

SF: I mean, it’s still north side and south side. Either you from the north side or you from the south side. It may be a little different to some people today, but for others no. I don’t even go on the Northside and I got a key to the city. It ain’t cuz I’m scared, but if you a gang banger or an ex-gang banger you still don’t affiliate with a rival street. I mean I ain’t trippin.’ I’m fucking 45 years old. I ain’t got nothin’ against nobody, but I still don’t go to the north side.

TTV: In your book you talk about standing up to the police and rioting as a good thing, yet in an interview with the Huffington Post you backtracked a little, emphasizing the importance of being careful of what you say—that words have an impact on people. Have you gotten backlash from these statements?

SF: I don’t give a fuck about backlash. If I said something, I meant it. I take full responsibility. But, I’m cautious about what I say because I know that my words carry a lot of weight. I don’t want nobody to do something stupid and go out and get themselves killed and it be on my conscious that I got a motherfucker killed. But I’m not gonna be out there talking shit and expect someone to handle my dirty work for me. I’ll deal with what I gotta deal with myself, by myself. I don’t need no army around. I’ll go handle it and that’ll be the end of it. 

TTV: You mention how that mentality is why Suge Knight had a lot of respect for you and your crew.

SF: I’m sure. I mean none of that shit scares me. I just stay relaxed. Only one of two things can happen: either we’re gonna die, or we’re gonna go home to our families tonight. I like going home but if it’s a night that I have to miss going home, then fuck it, it is what it is. 

TTV: And by “not going home,” you mean die?

SF: Yep.

TTV: There’s a lot of great hip hop talent in Tulsa and many of them look up to you as the artist responsible for putting the Midwest on the map.  What advice can you give to the artists who feel that being from Tulsa is a hurdle to success? 

SF: Everything is what you make of it. Hell, Michael Jackson was from Gary, Indiana. We can’t blame it on being from a certain place. Now, can you make it from where you’re at? I don’t know about that. I know Mike had to go see Berry Gordy and Diana Ross and all that, but he was still from Gary, Indiana, you know? I’m from Houston and that ain’t no music town either.

TTV: Do you know anything about Tulsa?

SF: Nah, I ain’t heard nothin’ bout Tulsa. But, do you have your own place?

TTV: I do. Just me and my dog RZA.

SF: What’s your dog’s name? RZA? (Laughs) I’m probably gonna have to come post up with RZA. We both dogs, we’ll get along just fine.

Scarface
Thursday, Feb. 11, 9 p.m., $20-$25
The Venue Shrine
tulsashrine.com

For more from Mary, read her profile of local emcee Steph Simon.