Jarren Benton on Funk Volume Era, Major Label vs. Independent and More

These are what some of the industry people would say, and this is what I was running into. You need something for the radio. You need something, this or that. It was always something that I didn't necessarily have. The One More Time Music Podcast. Genuine conversations with genuine people about music. Hosted by Henry with a three and playback Ben. We're from people groups to piss off. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back for another episode of the One More Time Podcast. I'm your host, Playback Ben, here with my co-host, Henry with a three, aka The Trap Jack Black. Henry, who do we have on the podcast today, my friend? Welcoming in on episode 48 of the One More Time Podcast, legendary recording artist and undisputedly the best artist from Funk Volume. It's Hopsin. Yo, we couldn't get hot. Uh yeah, they couldn't get hot, so they settled for first best. Who is this?

Uh you know, some people call me fucking uh uh king. Uh you know, I let me I'm okay. Let me stop. I'm sorry like couldn't I it's cancel culture. Okay, let's go. Gotta check yourself. You're gonna say some shit. It was gonna get all of us canceled, so we're about to get canceled in the first 10 seconds of the episode. In all seriousness, this is legendary lyricist MC, your favorite rapper's favorite rapper, Jaron Benton. Your mama's favorite side, nigga, too. Facts. Yep. Sounds about right. Um, so you know, to dive right in, the bully. Yes. Yeah, it's kind of like a self-proclaimed moniker of yours. Is that stemming from like were you a bully like growing up? Was that no? I was I was really the nigga that was, I would take up for the niggas that was getting bullied. That was me. Okay. The bully came from a guy who labeled me a bully. So I just took the shit and just I thought it was funny. Just ran with it. But why but why did he label you a bully? I'm gonna break the story down.

So it was it was a guy, um, he was a rapper. He was you know, he was friends with Hopsin at first. And then I don't know what happened. He just got disgruntled about some shit with Hopsin and he started dissing all of us. And um I I never met the guy in my life, didn't have shit to do. I was just getting strays, right? And so this guy, we had a show. I forget what we well, where the fuck were we at? We were either in like some fucking midwest place, yeah. Of course. We had a show. It's easy to forget, it's like Ohio, Kansas. Yeah, it was the it was it was it was the funk volume tour. We had his show. We did a meet and greet, and usually before the meeting greets, me and Hopper would just get shit faced. And it was a kid, yeah. Shout out DJ Hopper, DJ Hopper. Shout out to fucking Hopper one time. I ain't even gonna say a kid, I hate saying kids because he was a grown-ass man. He was there with his girlfriend, he was buying us drinks, and they were cool. They were like they came to meet us and they're like, Sounds like a great guy. Yeah, He's buying drink after drink.

I'm like, this is a cool motherfucker, man. And so I noticed that Swizz was looking upset, and I was looking up Swizz and I was like, yo, damn, Swizz just must be in a mood this morning and some shit. And so after the meeting greet, Swizz was like, I know that motherfucker. I was like, where you know him from? And he's like, bro, I'm telling you, that guy that was dissing us, he was under the post. Swizz had some type of fucking radar. So Swizz went to his Facebook, found this guy. Found a comment, found the fucking comment, this guy. Jesus. And the guy was on the other guy who was dissing us. Um he was on his shit shit saying something like, yo, I've got tickets to their show. I'm gonna go there and record myself. I don't know what his plan was, but apparently he's gonna do something fucked up. Plotting. He was plotting. So I'm like, damn, I hope this nigga didn't do none of these drinks. Jesus. But you know, he was bringing it. Did you start feeling crazy like after that?

I didn't, I felt good. Okay. Whatever the fuck he did. Just normal drunk. Just normal drunk. Okay, there we go. Because it wasn't like we were at the bar buying the drinks with him. Yeah. We were doing a meet and greeting. He was just going back bringing drinks to us. So easily could have. Easily could have did something. Yeah. And so I was like, man, fuck this. And so I was like, I'm finna, I'm uh, I was like, wait till we do the show. And I saw him in the front row, and he with him and his friends was like fucking, you know, you know, they was happy to be at the show. Called him on stage. I made him seem like I was about to salute him. Oh no. And I just fucking went in. I pulled, I I called him out, and I pour a bunch of beer and shit on his head, kicked him off the stage. And his friend was right there, kicked his friend in the chest. Uh and so the guy did this fucking, he went on his the guy who dissed us, went on this uh this long tangent on Facebook about how I bullied my fans and how I was bullied. And everyone was just like, yo, that's fucked up.

He is a bully. We was at the show, he, you know. And so I was like, I just took the so I just said, fuck it, that's cool. I'm taking it. Bully. Damn. That's amazing. He he turned that situation into a positive lifelong moniker at this point. Yeah. So your shows have been known to be pretty crazy, pretty entertaining. You definitely, you know, you never know what you're gonna get when you go to a Jaron Benton show. Clearly. Yeah, you're gonna get caught up on stage in a beer poured on your head potentially. Kicked in the fucking chest. Yeah. Like, do you think that rap shows these days have gotten boring? You know what? I don't know, because I don't even I don't even go to rap show. You don't go. I didn't know. When's the last show you went to? Ooh. Rap show? Yeah. One guy on one mic. Shit. Not a band. That is it. Damn, I'm trying to think. Last rap show. Uh and I I went, I I don't count this because I was there by default. Probably it was logic. And I was just there because Dizzy had it. Dizzy was touring with him, so I just went there to do a song with Dizzy. Okay. Dizzy. That's cool. I think that was it. But I didn't like stay for Logic Show, so I guess don't stay for the logic of the show.

No disrespect to logic. I just Logic. he didn't mean it. What do you got against mixed guys? Yeah. You know what, man? So you have been known to like troll your friends, goof around, be kind of like, you know, definitely the life of the party, and you know, like to have fun, mess with your friends, mess with your fans, even sometimes, whatever. Blake mentioned that you used to prank call him. I did. Do you remember these these calls? I prank call I prank called Blake so much, I don't even I don't even remember Just to blur at this point. But like what were some of the voices you would do? And like so, do you remember like some of the things you would say? Just random shit. I don't even remember. But I know. Let me jog my memory. I do remember. I used to always I I prank call Mike, uh prank called Blake consistently, but I do not I probably prank called him so fucking much I don't even remember. Probably more times than you regular called them. Yeah, 100%. Yeah. Well, yeah, one of them I thought was funny was hey Blake, this is Cheryl. Uh I'm from the HIV clinic.

You I did get your test results, and they are positive. So that just just to jog your memory of like the type of call you would make to your alleged friends, co-workers, collaborators. I feel bad because it just made me think of some shit just yesterday. I got a homegirl who prank called him actually last week. No, I didn't. You should. I am gonna do it now. I had a homegirl, man. Somebody stole a dog, and I prank called her yesterday saying I was holding a dog for fucking. Oh my god. See? I gotta cut it out. I'm starting to think the bully thing's a little bit, you know, true. It's he's it's become a real thing. For sure. So, you know, speaking of Blake and you know, SMKA, right? Like, you know, supermarket knife attack. Prior to that's a hard, you know, prior to linking up, yeah, it definitely is. Yeah. Prior to linking up with them, how would you describe kind of like the music you were making? Right. And you know, kind of how are you like even doing music at that point? I would say it was a mixture because I still was doing outlandish shit, but just not to the extreme.

Mostly I was doing shit, I would say I would if you was to compare me to someone, I was making more shit like college dropout type shit or or kind of like backpacking graduation. Sort of backpacked, but like real. It was a lot of fucking um some soul samples in there, kind of soul samples talking about my life, talking about getting through hard times. It was real soulful. So it really changed. Yeah, it did. Yeah. For sure. 100%. So, you know, going from that, obviously, you you know, make the Jaron meets SMKA uh Huffin glue with Hasselhoff. Huffing glue with Hasselhoff. That was our first shit. Yeah, yeah. And I have a hard copy of that somewhere still. You do? Yeah, and Freebasin with Kevin Bacon. Can I have them? No. Okay. Dude, you got the original hard copies, I do. I think you're I think one of them signed too. You signed it in a red marker. I'm pretty sure. Yeah, he's gonna need those, Henry.

Yeah, I'm gonna need them, man. I'm gonna turn it to an NFT. Come up off of them. So Huffin' Glue with with uh you know Hasselhoff and then Freebasin with Kevin Bacon, right? Like clearly those are two like satirical, you know, drug related themes. Were there alternative names for either of those projects that were like doing this drug with this person? We went through a list of shit. Do you remember ones that got nixed? I don't, I don't. Um, if you were to come up with one right now, what would it be? Uh shit. That's a good question, man. Yeah, that's the kind of questions you're going to ask. We have Tough questions on the One More Time podcast. Ooh, uh fucking fentanyl with Frank Sinatra. I don't know. That's great. Something crazy. That's great. And that was the whole theme of them project. So what happened with that is in the journey of making soulful shit. Yeah, I was like, man, I'm tired of I wasn't necessarily tired of making that type of music. I was just, I was just wanting to have fun. I just want to say, you know what?

Because that was starting to go into a slippery slope. So after the soulful shit, I was kind of experimenting with kind of outlandish type shit for a minute. Um, I would make a song here and there. Because that was always in me too. So I was like, uh, if I do a project with y'all, I don't want to take it serious at all. I just want to fucking let's think of the most outlandish, stupid name, and I'm gonna make the most outlandish songs I could make. Like, I don't want to take this serious. Yeah, so that was my approach with those projects. Yeah, It's just not taking this shit serious and just having fun. Yeah, and I mean, they they definitely introduced you, or I guess like made you feel comfortable on like more southern, like hard hitting 808s type shit. I feel like like you well, you know, sonically, there was definitely a shift, right? Yeah. you know, with that, not only the lyrics and the flow and like the tone of it, but like sonically too, right? Yeah, I'm I'm actually, I was still rap, even though I had soulful joints, I was producing shit for myself. So a lot of the shit I was producing was still kind of like 808. It's still sonically was similar to what I do now, just subject-wise, it was more, more serious shit.

But I also had the mix of the soul shit too. Yeah, like it would be soul samples, and I would just trap them out, kind of. Yeah. Or we would take soul samples and make them very boom bap. Yeah, yeah. I I definitely didn't know that you were a producer first. Oh yeah. Or I guess like in in the early age, you know, of Jarren Benton. And again now. And that's all I was gonna say. Yes, sir. Did it kind of go where you were producing, and then you kind of shied away from that for the majority of your career up until like, you know, as of late? Is that kind of yeah, I was or were you producing throughout? No, I was pr uh see what made me stop producing is probably I'm not gonna stop this time, but I'm having a feeling of like maybe I need to go back to getting beats. Is that it's hard for me to multi, not necessarily multitask, because sometimes you'll be you know how it is, You're a producer, you'll make a beat, and sometimes, and plus I'm just now, you know, it's a learning curve because I'm just starting with a new program. Shout out to uh Henry and Justin Patron for putting me on a logic logic gang.

So it's a learning curve with that shit first, and then on top of that, I'll make maybe you'll be making beats all fucking day. Before you look at the time, you're like, oh shit, I've been here for eight fucking hours. Oh, yeah. And that eight hours is like, damn, you know, if I write a song, it might take me like two hours, right? Versus making, and I get so lost in that shit, and it's like I'll be so lost. And I after those eight to ten fucking hours is making beats, I might have made three or four beats, and I might not even like any of them. Sure. Batting practice. I call that batting practice. Yeah, so it's just like it's it's such a process. So then it's like now I gotta fucking find some shit that I want to rap to. You know what I'm saying? So it's just it's just too much. Also, I feel like after three hours making a beat, it's like you've been listening to that beat for three hours. Do you really want to rap? now start writing a song to it and keep listening to it? It's like yeah, hell no. when I produce a song and then I gotta go mix and master it.

I'm like, okay. That's another Jesus. Yeah, mixing and mastering. Tell me about it. And like I don't know if it's the like you know, business mind of me, but if if I'm you, I'm thinking of like the ROI, right? The return on the investment of my time. Time. Sure. If you can write a dope rap in less than two hours, borderline, right? That could generate thousands of dollars potentially in income for you, right? Then you take the same amount of time to like make beats, then you have to spend more time to rap on them. I don't know, like it's it becomes like a business equation in my head. But like if you creatively like to do the beats, then I would I would say stick with it for sure. I have more fun making beats than writing raps. Interesting today, obviously. Yeah, always always. I just this guy really is like most rapper non-rapper ever. Always, man. I don't know, because you can just get lost with just listening to music. Sometimes you listen to samples and just going through samples, you end up liking songs, you end up just it's like it's a fucking pan, it's like a uh door to so many different things. Yeah, you get to like and samples, you get to listen to other artists, listen to old shit, and it's just like you get to experiment with shit.

Um, just ways you can't really do with writing. You know what I'm saying? But writing is you can experiment and go as far as you want to with writing. But with writing, you have your voice, and that's the one instrument that you have. And and you make words whole world, any instrument you want. You have words only. There's clearly a finite amount of words. Yes, you can somewhat create your own depending on you know, what what you're doing with lyrics or whatever. Sounds. sounds is literally infinite. It sounds infinite. It's pretty much. And not only that, you have your emotions. Sometimes you're like, I've tapped on so many different emotions that I just burnt out on certain things writing. Yeah, do you feel like you've like said the same shit in some different way? Yeah. I've said the same shit so many fucking times. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's okay though. No, it clearly is, but just it makes sense why he maybe gets like more excited about the potential of making a beat because it really can be something like so brand new. Yeah. It's a whole nother world. You might not have ever heard that certain sound that you like built around like a beat you well, you know, from versus like, you know, you're clearly crafting the same words, maybe, you know, historically.

So yeah, you're right. You're right. And with beats, I'm a I'm a person that listen to so many different types of fucking music that is endless of shit that I want to do. Like you'll find my like yesterday, I was just fucking making beats, and I was like, uh, I stopped making beats, and you'll get caught in this rabbit hole of you know what fuck it, let me try to learn how to play fucking something on the piano. I'm sitting there fucking teaching myself how to play, or not teaching myself, watching a fucking tutorial how to play pop life by Prince on the piano. And it's like shout out YouTube. Hours go by with you doing, you know what I'm saying? This beat making shit is so it takes you in the so it's so many doors that you just end up going into. And I'm I got ADHD, so I'm horrible with just yeah, focusing on one thing, yeah. Yeah, but some of those rabbit holes like are how the most beautiful shit is made. Same time. It seems they seem like sometimes you're not doing shit, but you might, like, unlock shit for three hours, and then that third hour you do something on accident, and you're like, what is this? Yeah, right here. Yeah, that sounds uh that sounds so overwhelming to me.

And on top of that, you have that business mind. And and you go to listen to sounds, like you go through these sound banks, there's so many fucking sounds, yeah. You'll find you like let's say I want a fucking uh a weird synth. You listen to a hundred fucking synth sounds, yeah, and you might get the 200 before that's the one you like, yeah. You know what I'm saying? All the time. I I could easily like even if you found one you liked, right? In like the top 50, maybe like the first 50, I could so see myself being like, but what if there's something better? Like yeah, that's 51, 52. You have to settle at some point. That's the worst. That's the thing about art, it's never actually finished. You just uh it's abandoned. Yeah, You have to decide that I'm done with this. Yeah, that's a piece of art. That's stressful. I'm like that, you know, I don't watch that shit like that no more. I'm like that with porn. Like, it's like yo, damn. He's like, I don't watch that shit anymore. If my if my wife or partner, whatever you got going on, is watching. Nah, baby mama. I really I really don't watch porn like that, like I used to, but you check your browsing history. You know what? Fuck man, uh damn, I can find a fat ass to miss. Yeah. You know what you mean? at some point you gotta settle.

Yeah, At some point you gotta settle. This will have to do, yeah. I mean, if if my wife's watching, I totally don't watch porn anymore either. So you know, so so schizo, yeah. I feel like that song is definitely one that kind of catapulted you, you know, your career, right? I mean, would you agree? Yeah, and it's the it's so many, it's so much irony behind that too. Oh, yeah. Because do you not even own that song? No, we don't. Crazy. I was gonna say, oh, I definitely wanted to talk about the business behind that deal. So doing all that outlandish crazy shit. So this was at a time like um the internet, like you didn't have social media then. Mm-hmm. I think we had Facebook, we definitely had Facebook. Sure, sure. It's like 2012 or some shit. Yeah, 2011. 2011, yeah. 11, yeah. But it wasn't like popping popping like that. Yeah. Um, so in saying that, so when I was, you know, meetings, I always thought, I didn't even always thought it was just these are what some of the industry people would say, and this was what I was running to. You need something for the radio, you need something, this or that.

It was always something that I didn't necessarily have. Um, they didn't think, you know what I'm saying? It was always just that something. We need that single. Yeah, we need that single. We need that single. Yeah. And that shit didn't sound nothing like a single. And I remember um, I remember telling my lawyer, I was like, yo, this shit. I was like, somebody want to, you know, uh buy this fucking song from me. I was like, I don't, I was like, I'm gonna be honest with you, it's a fucking crazy fucking song. I don't never see it being on the radio. Yeah, I don't see the shit doing, and it's so fucking crazy. Should I do it? She didn't say yeah. Um but he didn't say no. She didn't say no. She probably gave me the lawyer answer to where you know she won't do. I was just like, fuck it, I don't care. So I kind of think I might've, me and Kato might've made the executive decision and said, fuck it, we'll sell it. Because they was gonna give us and the money. I ain't even gonna, I'm not even gonna say the amount of money they gave us. I'm so curious.

It's gonna be so painful whenever you say the number. I hope it's five digits. No, it's definitely not painful. It's definitely not. No, yeah, no, it is more than five digits. Was it? It is five digits. Ah, okay. Yeah, yeah. I was thinking something way more painful, but like barely four. but still, if he had kept it, yeah. I mean, yeah, clearly. It was bad. It was it was bad. Yeah, yeah. Do you have any type of like back end though, or like you still get songwriting or anything? Oh, maybe cap. I forget what the cap was. Oh man, he really got fucked. We got fucked. Really fucked. Bent over. Yeah. Pants or shorts around the ankles. They put a cap on the like back end, like a certain amount of. Oh my gosh. Yeah. And I'm sure that maxed out mad fast. I don't know what the fuck going on with. this kid. So it's crazy. Because to him, it was just another song. I thought He had a million songs. you're making tons of music. You're new, you're kind of new to that like style, anyways. I mean, you said you had been dabbling in it or whatever, but like, yeah, you probably didn't know, like, whatever. Like, sure, I'll take like, you know, this bag, you know what I mean?

It wasn't even that I was new to the style, it was just that from what I was trying to do in music, I was trying to, you know, take the conventional route, get signed to a label and fucking be a big superstar, you know, the shit that we all think is gonna happen. Yeah, and so and that we all think is the only route. Exactly. Yeah, that's especially at that point. At that time, I thought that was the only route. Which is fine. And I was like, this song does not fit what all these people telling me that I need to have a fucking hit. And I was like, what and I was I wasn't really familiar with the independent scene like that, so yeah, I didn't have the idea that you know you can just put this shit out yourself and well, it also wasn't thriving like it is now. It wasn't. Nah. there were people doing it, obviously, but like yeah, it was a it was definitely people doing it, but when you heard about those people that do that did it, you always heard that they started with a crazy bag. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? Used to have to literally have a major label to distribute music. There was no distro kid, none of that. Yeah, exactly.

It was also hard to also just get your music in places, you know, like because there was still the day, it was still the days of physical product as well. Yep. Making sure you had tapes in the right places physically and stuff, yeah. Yeah, we just didn't have the knowledge, Yeah, and I remember saying I remember saying uh to this day, I that was the same, that was the shit I said. I was like, yo, it's not like this fucking song will go on the radio. Epic fail. Yeah. So like creatively though, obviously, this was the time when I think Tyler had just put out Yonkers music video, right? Like around that same time. I think So yeah, yeah, yeah. So the like the shock factor was kind of like what people were doing, or at least that was starting to be like what some people were trying. It's you know, needless to say, the video was crazy. Was fucking crazy. Yeah, we were just we watched it like three times earlier. And what's crazy about the, I'm I'm gonna go back into what me saying that I'll tell you, it's all gonna come together. It's gonna come together.

So let's see it, let's do it. The video is crazy because I uh we didn't have a budget. We had like a very low budget to do a video. So I found a video to shout out to J Cap. J Cap. We're just talking about J Cap, man. Shout out to fucking J Cap. Cobra Kai's fucking finest. Uh yeah. J Cap fucking um, he was acting on Cobra Kai. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, y'all can catch him on Cobra Kai. J cat. So this motherfucker. See you on Cobra Kai season one. And I was like, man, if you do a low budget video, because you see a bunch of low budget videos, with the shit like you would watch the DVDs or like all the trap rappers doing low budget videos, and it looks shitty. They was you know, they was always in fucking uh just with their crew in front of a car. A gas station, or a car or some shit. And it was just like the shit looks shitty. So I was like, if we go do something low budget, it has to be entertaining. So that was the only reason that video was I mean, the song is crazy. And I was like, let's just try to match every fucking thing I'm saying. Right. Yeah, and so there we go. Yeah, I had no idea that fucking video was gonna fucking go viral, neither.

Oh my gosh, yeah. I had no idea. Which is distributed by iHipHop. Does iHipHop still exist? Like other than owning your shit. You know what's crazy? collecting Jarren's royalties. I'm going to put him on a blast. He did a bunch of shit. And I remember uh he didn't want to be known for it, but he directed a lot of uh bullshit movies. I ain't gonna say bullshit movies, but cult classics. Who the iHipHop guy? Yeah, like uh Soul Plane. No way, yeah. That's kind of funny. That's actually cool. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of tight. I don't know how, but he's behind Soul Plane and a bunch of other kind of like a lot of those type of movies back in the day. Oh man, yeah. I remember watching Soul Plane. that's terrible. Um so from that video, that is how Hopson enters the picture, right? And and you know, funk volume at that point. Like he saw it. Was there like Twitter at that point? How did he see it? All right, so now I'm gonna tell you it was crazy. So check this shit out. So at the time, I'm skipping over a lot of shit because there was a lot of other shit that happened before SMKA, but it's just I'll get into that another day.

But so I mean, if there's stuff you want to share, by all means It's got a long story, yeah. So it's a long fucking story, but we'll just start with the SMKA shit. Sure. so I was me and Don Cannon were cool, right? Cannon was giving me beats. I was rapping over some of his shit too. And so Cannon calls me one time. I'm at the fucking movie theater. Uh it was me and my ex-wife. We were watching, I don't know what the fuck movie it was. But he hit me and I was like, fuck Cannon, keep calling me. This must be important. So I step out and get the call. And he it was he was like, Yo, man, um, I got fucking no ID on the phone. Oh, okay. So he was like, Yo, he just uh I was letting him hear your shit. So no ID on the phone. I'm talking, I'm I missed the whole movie. I'm literally in the lobby, sure. I'm talking to these motherfuckers for like an hour. As you should. I don't care what movie is going on. Yeah, like fuck Avatar. So Cannon was like, yo, I'm hearing this shit, man. This shit's crazy. And Cannon had just got up. He was working with Def Jam at the time.

Yeah. And so it was Skitzo. I'm shit on Skitzo now. Cannon's fuck, I mean Cannon and no ID, I'm on the phone with them. And no ID's like, yo, can you fly up to fucking LA to we want to fucking try to meet with you and get something going? Skitzo, so me, Mike, Ray, and Slow, we fly to New York, uh, fly to LA. I'm in there. Uh we go to Def Jam. I'm in the office with Cannon and um No ID, no ID. They and and so the it was another lady, some other um execs at Def Jam. They were making this shit, they were like, This is the craziest shit they seen. They was bigging this shit up, they were like really excited to do a deal. And they was like, Yo, rolling out the red carpet. Yeah, they were like, we want to do this shit now. And um, they was like, How can we make this happen? This shit's crazy. And I'm sitting here like, damn, all this shit I shitted on. This shit has got me in this office now. That's a theme. It's always the shit that people don't expect to blow up. That's such a theme.

Like, it's crazy how that works. So Def Jam wanted to sign me. Um, they wanted to make it work, and so they were like, Yo, can you stay in LA for a while? I was like, fuck it, I don't care. So they was like, we want you to meet with uh, I think a guy named Barry Weiss, he was the I think he was the executive over there at the time, and he was like, I he couldn't make it to LA. He was like, But so can we just can we just bring him here in New York? He was in New York. So um, I was like, Fuck yeah, I'll go to New York to meet with him. Make a long story short, I get back to Atlanta. I didn't hear from nobody. And I keep calling Cannon. I'm like, Cannon, what's going on? He's like, still gonna happen, man. Just um, you know, just be patient. So I'm being patient, and I'm just like, I'm running out of patience. And at the time of me being patient, that's when I fucking meet Hopsin and Dame. Yeah. So, but but how did they find you as well? Or like and so and I'm gonna tell you the irony of Hopsin. This shit gonna sound crazy.

All right, so it was a guy used to produce with Spitzwell. We had a we had a col we had a team called Beat Gods, right? So Spitzwell is playing Hopsin's video. I never heard of Hopsin. Yeah, was it ill-minded Hopsin? Yeah, it was the one where he was dissing Tyler the creator. He's like, Man, check this kid out. This shit dope. He's like, he keeps killing Tyler the creator. And I swear to god, I watched it, I was like, yo, I was like, he's snapping, but I'm I was like, this shit seemed corny. I don't like this shit. Yeah. That's a fair assessment of Hopsin. I was like, sorry, I was like, yo, I was like, I was like, he's snapping, but I was like, but this shit just I was like, something about it just seemed corny. Real true story. Um I didn't know him. So how did you go from that first impression then? It was another song I heard from him. I think it was the shit with him and Tech N9ne, the psycho shit. And I was like, which by the way, Tech N9ne, no one understands how much money he makes. Barry just posted like the top 10 earners. as an independent artist. He's raking in like 25 mil or something, like he's the top independent artist.

Yeah, he's the man. That's crazy. Yeah, so so okay, so when I so Dame hit me up, and once again, I'm fucking a space case. I didn't even check my email. So they've been trying to reach out to me. Okay, and I finally get in contact. Check your email, folks. Yeah, check your fucking email. There might be record label CEOs hitting you up for deals. I mean, facts. Who knows? And so I'm talking to Dame, and he was like, yo, I heard, you know, and I was like, oh shit, that's the Hopsin dude. You know, I was like, yeah. Cause uh as much as I thought that fucking video was corny, I can't shit on Hopsin. Like Hopsin's skills was crazy. I was like, yo, this motherfucker still a good rapper. When I heard it, the hurt, the song, I was like, he's fucking snapping. Yeah. But I was just like, yeah, I just didn't like the I was just thought the video came across kind of corny. Yeah. But who the fuck am I? So Jaron Benton. Exactly. The taste, maker. Jarren fucking. So I talked to Dame, and Dame was like, yo, we we we, you know, uh, we've been peeping you and whatever, yada yada yada.

And so he's like, yo, can you I was I you know, I expressed interest, like, fuck it, I ain't got nothing popping right now. Don Cannon hasn't called me back. Yeah, Cannon didn't call me back. No IDs. Fucking silent crickets with no IDs. Yeah. So Dame was like, yo, come up to a show. We got a show in um uh Arizona. Okay. But I met him in Vegas and we drove it. We drove we met in Vegas, then we went to Arizona. I met everybody and everybody was cool as fuck. Hopsin was cool, Dizzy was cool. He was there at the time. Dame was cool. This was the first time where I met, you know how this shit is with these industry people, man. And not shitting on industry niggas, but it's just a certain attitude and a certain a lot of bullshit that comes with, you know, when you're trying to chase the record label shit. These are the first dudes I met that were seemed like very genuine people. They had, they didn't, it wasn't promising, there wasn't overpromising anything. Everything they said that they can do sound like yeah, they was like, yo, we don't we don't want to change your music. We're not trying to look for you to do a fucking hit single.

We just want to we want you to do what you do, but we just want to help support it on an independent level. And so I met him. We went to we did a show. We had a show in Arizona. It was uh Hobson Kid Inc. And I feel like it was somebody else. Dizzy and somebody else. Show was crazy. Show was fucking crazy. And I saw how they were doing it. The energy of everyone matched exactly the same energy I wanted to do. And it matched the it was just such a perfect match, man. Yeah. Um and so I flew back, and Mike came out there with me too. Shout out to Mike. Shout out Mike Wahlberg one time. Mike, we'd love to have you on the podcast. For sure. Mike, come on. He's doing big, he's doing big stuff. Yeah, what are you doing, Rock the Bells, ain't he? Yeah. Yeah. So Mike doing A3C like chief. Who? A3C? No, no, no, no, no, he's with He's with Rock the Bells. Rock the Bells. Word. Like, I guess on the on the radio side and the festival side and stuff. He told me he was, he's He's doing like she's like chief creative or something. Who knows? Like chief content, something, but he's a chief.

Yeah. But yeah, so Mike is out there, so you like you know, really just fucked with their energy. You loved the presentation of obviously like them performing and shit. Yeah, it was just a cool bunch of guys, just good vibes all around. It was the vibe. It felt right. It felt fucking right. Yeah, you could see yourself with them. Yeah, yeah. And I was like, fuck it. And it wasn't like some crazy long-term shit they was trying to do. Um, and you know, we went back and forth with the paperwork a little bit, but other than that, man, I'm gonna say the deal was so fucking fair, yeah, compared to you know, other shit I've I've, you've gotten into since then. Yeah, exactly. A little foreshadowing to uh stuff we'll get to. Shout out, Rock Nation. Yeah, it's the rock yeah, but fucking uh they were cool as fuck, man. And um I took a chance. I remember I was talking to Mike, and he was like, Man, you can sit here and wait on this def jam shit, or you can see what happened, like you know, give it a year, see what happened. And I was like, fuck it.

Let's do it. Ah, like Def Jam. I don't know. Like, I don't know if I could have done what you did. What? I'm not, I think I might have waited it out. And that's why I'm saying, it's stories before that. Yeah, I've been through that before, So there was a bad taste in your mouth from waiting. Yes, yes, coming out empty-handed. Yeah, so you were done with that shit. I was done with that shit. That shit happened. Like, I know you ain't supposed to chew gum on the fucking. hair. You can do whatever you want, man. We unorthodox here. Yeah. You're fucking betting, man. Do whatever you want. We went through that shit so much. Yeah. Um, of the promising, meeting the labels and overpromising. They want to fuck with you, then you don't hear shit from them, then there's just always something. Yeah, because you've been in this shit since like oh three. Yeah, I've been doing it for a minute, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I was signed to a production deal with DJ Eddie F, um, who's heavy D's DJ. He he's he ended up in having he put on a bunch of art. Yeah, dude, production deals don't even like exist anymore.

I feel like I would never suggest anybody sign a production deal. I don't even, I don't even know if they're a thing as much anymore. They probably are. Oh, they are Okay. Yeah. They are. because I know that was like a huge, like it was bigger back in the day. It was like a quasi record deal, essentially. It was like the small, it was like a baby, record. you know, it's kind of like a light, version. It's sort of like they're filtering you, like you signed to the person, and that person signs to the lady. It's trying to get you a bag. So it's kind of like the joint venture route now, where maybe these like tiny independents are like securing , you know, bags from like majors and shit. It's kind of like that, I guess. It's sort of like the equivalent of like if I started not even a label. Let's just say I started a company where I have artists, producers, and I Jarren Benson Enterprise signs with fucking Warner Brothers. Yeah, and all my services are filtered. You know, Warner Brothers want to use my you know what I'm saying? So I got to deal with Warner Brothers, my you know, Jarren Benton Productions, but yeah, the artists are with me, so it's a I ain't gonna say it's shitty, but it is shitty in a sense, yeah, for sure. Yeah, It's a little watered down.

So one thing that you know, I was I was looking at some other interviews that you did, and I thought that this was you know important for people to know. So grandma's basement, the project, yeah. That that's a literal title, right? Yeah, That's actually his grandma, right? Yeah, that's my grandma. In the cover that's real grandma. That's actually your real grandma. That's my real grandma. Yeah, that's in her living room. Shout out your grandma, because that cover art. Rest in peace, because that shit was hard. I love that cover. Appreciate it. For those that aren't familiar, go look it up. But she's holding a fucking shotgun or something. Yeah, that's her. Mossberg. Mike was there. We went to my grandma's house. At the time when I did the album, I was not. Yeah, that's what I wanted. Yeah, no, I wasn't when I made that album, I was not living with my grandmother. Um, it was just past experience, you know what I'm saying? So I took that album was a reflection of when I was living in her house. yeah. And so, and so what was happening at that time in your life? It was just a time I had just had my daughter. Um, and it was it was and when you have a kid, some people go through it, so I'm having one in May. Oh, okay.

You know, okay, so I'm doing two months. You don't have your shit together, you go through this journey of looking at yourself, like, what the fuck am I doing? Yeah, and it's like, I gotta get it together. Like, holy shit, I'm having a fucking kid. Yeah. And I was doing bullshit, you know, running the streets, still doing, and I was like, you know what? I gotta make a point. Yeah, uh, to either go left, if you keep going left, you're gonna end up in jail. So you need to get it together. Go a hundred percent legit. And so that struggle, that's what that reflection. I I end up, I was end up, I ended up having to move in with my grandmother. Yeah. And um, that was that's my grandmother. That's where that came from. Yeah. Yeah. So that's yeah, I mean, I mean, but you mentioned like it was like real dark. Like it wasn't dark. Let me say this. In another interview, you had said some like I was dark. That's what I meant. Like thinking was dark. Yeah, exactly.

You were having like suicidal thoughts. I attempted suicide. Yeah. Oh, wow. It was horrible because I was looking at myself. I was thinking I was a failure. Because I was like, damn, I have a kid, I don't have no money. Um I had to move back in with my grandma. My kid's mom is only doing big things and shit. And it's like I was lost. I was like, this rap shit ain't working. I'm chasing a fucking dream. that's not promised. So it was just having the wrong thoughts. Like, yeah. So all of those, all of that negative thinking, uh, I was like feeling like I wasn't shit. I was feeling like like I was just, and it and it was just like thinking the worst of myself versus like loving myself and thinking positive, like thinking like, yo, bro, you'll get through this shit. It was just like, I don't want to do this shit, man. And then on top of that, not having to not not shitting on my kid's mom. Um, but having outside, like look and also reinforcing, like, yo, you ain't, you know what I'm saying? Just like you didn't have people uplifting you.

My grandma. But besides grandma, I guess, yeah. But like others that were maybe important to you as well. There were let me take that back. There were people in my circle, but it was like I was so in this fucking trance of trying to prove to my kid's mother that I wasn't a fucking fuck up. Yeah. So it was like I valued her opinion, and I think I valued her opinion a little bit too much. Um, and it didn't help. So it was a one point of time. Shout out to my homie Sterling, who's actually the trap king. Check his documentary out on Netflix. He a nigga that saved cats now. But yeah, interesting. Okay. Shout out to him. It's a weird occupation, but me and him both was going through some shit. But anyway, I was just in this dark place, man. I um was like, I'm I'm gonna fucking take these pills. Yeah, so I had a fucking bottle full of pills. But I it was like I knew I didn't want to die, but I knew I didn't want to live neither. So it was like instead of swallowing these pills, I'm gonna contemplate if I really want to do this, but I'm gonna let them all dissolve in my mouth.

Yeah, so I had a mouth full of pills, and the homie call, and when he called, I don't know what it was, it was just I spit him out and I talked to him, and he just like came over to the crib and just like gave me a bunch of just positive energy that I needed to help uplift me. But it's still after that, it wasn't still it wasn't a easy road, it wasn't like after that, it was all good. It still was me battling these dark thoughts of me being a piece of shit loser with a kid. Because it was, you know, it was crazy. Check in on your friends, yeah, checking on your friends, check in on your friends For sure. Yeah. Cause I mean, that shit's real, especially in today's environment, I feel like it's definitely getting like more shine. You know, people are talking about it more, which is probably why it seems like it's more prevalent. But it was probably just as prevalent back then, but just no one was fucking talking about it. I was talking about it. Yeah. And it was such a like stigma around it that you know it didn't seem like acceptable if you were thinking that way and like and that type of shit. What's what's interesting for me now that I'm hearing this story, because I thought it was all you were actually in the basement and you wrote the album there.

To put yourself back in that dark mindset, that's fucking that's suicidal in its own right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why would you do that to yourself? Why would you want to go back there? Not all and you know what? Not all of the songs was released. sure. But I mean, even just calling the project that, and even just knowing that that's what this project is about, because that was seems like fucking psycho. Looking back at that was so significant, yeah, changing. You know what I'm saying? Like all that shit that I went through, and and I went through all the shit I went through in my grandma's basement, Yep. And disclaimer, my grandma has a beautiful house, so it wasn't like everything. It was like a baller basement. My grandma, everything in her house was love, and she gave me love, and she would she would instill so much positive shit, but I was in such a dark place that I couldn't really take that information in. So I'm saying that to say is I've seen some of my darkest moments in that basement, and there was a time where I was like, I didn't wanna fucking live, and to and I couldn't even let alone seeing myself, you know, I've been chasing this rap shit and the shit wasn't working, and so to see, damn, how I pulled myself up out of that with the help of my grandma, and um, and to see, like, damn, just a minute ago, you know, we you know, we got skizo and shit done went off. I don't sign a deal to reflect back.

That shit going through those hard times, helped make me that person to create that. You know, is that making any sense? Yeah, whether it was good or bad, it was significant. It was a turning point. It was the turning point, it was significant. No, which I'm I'm glad that you like had the courage to like put yourself back into because clearly, even if there were just a handful of records that were really reflective of it, to still like call the project that and to have it be that theme in your head. I don't know, that sounds like it's like owning your your demons. Yeah, like owning your demons up, which I think is actually cool. Crazy story is when I was living there. Shout out to my homie Sean Jesse He was another uh intricate part of my life who was just a good friend who was just helping me and instilling a lot of positive shit in me. But I also say this that I was working on a project called Stress, Anger, Frustration, and Entertainment. It was called Safe. When I was in my grandma's basement, I shot an album cover, literally writing the fucking shit in her bed. I just never put this shit out.

Damn it. This was before this was the before fucking you still have it. Yeah, the song's probably a bunch of places, yeah. Oh, okay. And uh, I know my homie still got uh all the photos and all that shit. Nice, nice. So that's the real my grandma's basement to be honest with you. Wow. that's that's dope. Um, so I do want to touch just briefly on the double XL cover, yeah, right? That was 2014. Um the cypher was incredible, like holy shit. Although I was long and cyphers, so it was a long, although I'm not a fan, although I'm not really a fan of Troy Ave, Lil Bibby, who was in your cypher. John Connor, I fucked with the people's rapper. I fucked with the people's rapper, even though he just did basically Eminem, you know, covers. But anyways, so I wanted to ask this, and hopefully you'll answer, but if you don't, I understand. Who should have made the the cover that did not? Let's start there. Who should have made the cover that year that didn't? Was there someone you like were really fucking with that didn't make the cover that year? That's I would answer that question.

I just don't remember who was like popping at that time. Okay. Let's do this. Who made the cover that shouldn't have made the cover? Um I and let me and I ain't gonna say they shouldn't have made the cover. I was just shocked when I saw um August Alcina on the cover. Don't even know who that is. He's an R&B. He had the one really big Jada Pinkett. Yeah. Oh that guy. But and I wasn't shocked because of his talent, he was just an RB singer. He wasn't a rapper. So it was so anti like double XL cover. Yeah, I was just like, oh, your freshman class type shit. I think he might have been the first RB singer. Yeah, I wonder if they've ever done that again. Amongst rappers. I think Ty Dolla $ign too was on there too. Okay. But Ty Dolla $ign rapped in the fucking scene. Yeah, sing rap. I wasn't shocked at Ty Dolla $ign. It was more, it was more August Alsina. And like I said, it wasn't that I didn't think he was supposed to be on there. It was just um it's an RB singer. Did he sing in the cypher?

I don't even fucking know. That's a good question. Cause I don't, I don't remember. Yeah, I only watched, I think I've seen it. Yeah, I only watched your part. Like I yeah, I didn't go back to the other. Yeah. I'm surprised you even watched that. Yeah, I've not watched that shit. So the other one that you know I watched, and I just wanted to shout this one out was the one with Cyhi that we were talking about off camera. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, just having you two back to back. Yeah, legitimate. It was just such an enjoyable moment for like rap fans. We love Cyhi. We've we've talked about Cyhi several times on the show. Yeah. We likened him to Jace, who's another like super dope songwriter and artist. Um, just pen game crazy. And then one of our other guests is just like a huge fan and kind of like you know, big inspiration for him. So Dre. Yeah, exactly. So I just I loved seeing that, man. That was like such a cool moment for me to relive. Just I I love doing my research for this episode, by the way. It was so fun, like diving back into your like chronological, like you know, past and just all the different shit you've done. I tell people, um go back to that double X.

I'll tell you a fucking uh a gym, a gym. I want uh I wanted to um get Russ at funk volume. Ooh, like early on, early, yeah. Nobody knew who he was at the time. And so I uh uh brought him to Dane, and Dane was like, yo, this he is dope. Uh he's like, he'll be the perfect fucking uh fit. I was like, bro, we need to jump on he like no, he he wasn't even known at all. And um, how did you know? him? Uh, someone I think somebody he gave his music to a friend of mine, okay, and a friend of mine let me hear, and I was like, This dude is dope. I was like, what the fuck is he doing? He's like, I don't think he's doing nothing. Yeah, and so um he's just releasing a song He's putting out music, putting out hella music. at that time he wasn't even releasing the song a week. I think he didn't even have like he might have had like 5,000 views total on one of his videos. So I really really, really, really, really fucking crazy. And so Russ, we flew Russ out to New York on my double XL performance. So he was there just watching, yeah.

He was yeah, he was there with us. Just yeah, he came to the fucking double X. Yeah, hell yeah. That's a cool, yeah. That's a nice tidbit. that's cool. Yeah, that's cool. So now he's got the number one song, I think, right now. Cause it's TikTok. Yeah, which is crazy for sure. So, you know, I don't want to be this to a pulp, like I said before we got on camera, but eventually funk volume would, you know, break up, they would fall apart, it would cease to exist, right? So, what is your just brief synopsis of kind of, you know, and you've said this a few different ways over different interviews, but I want to kind of hear, like, in today's, you know, setting, what do you think really wasn't wasn't working? Like, kind of, you know, what was... I think it wasn't nothing that wasn't working. I just think it was hopping down miscommunication and mental, I ain't gonna say immaturity, but just ego. man. When I say mental immaturity, I mean not immature in the sense of like uh you're fucking adolescent, but just just immature the way you handle things. So I think that was a little bit well.

I think miscommunication and just immaturity on handling confrontation. How much ownership do you take? None. I had nothing. Only ownership I take is I wish I would have called Hopson after he blew up and um talked him and and talked to him and say, Man, you you tripping. You know what I'm saying? I was more so like so. You were trying to stay clear of it, where maybe now in your you know, I think me... Today's mind you would say hey, I'd pick up the phone and call him. Yeah, today's mine. I would call Dame and Hopson. Yeah, and I would just explain to him like, listen, man, we got something fucking great. We started something great. Let's not like, let's not let this shit in over this silly shit. Like, this is just, we got something too big for it to end over something this small. Yeah, I wish I would have did more of that. Instead, I was like, Man, fuck y'all niggas. Um, you know, I was like, fuck it.

I just have to get it out, get it on my own. Yeah. So that and that's where I was at that time. Instead of, you know, I mean, I think I might have told Hop, I was like, fuck it, man. You only ended and hey, fuck it. That's on you. It was more of a nonchalant attitude I had towards you versus this. No, this can't end like this. This should be fucking, what are we doing? You know, we have such a great thing, a great infrastructure. Everything is great. And it's just this little thing, like to end something so big for something so small is. I feel like y'all were just right behind strange music when it comes to independent hip hop labels. Yeah, we was just fucking... strange and then Funk volume, right? I mean, what's crazy is when we ended it, I think a week before we all had a conference call, and we were just going to go into this big fucking thing of like things we wanted to change in the direction we were going. It was a positive. And um, we didn't even get we didn't even get to execute against that in a vision. Yeah, That's frustrating. I wish I wasn't Dizzy,

was that guy. I'm gonna give it to Dizzy. I think Dizzy did he call? I think Dizzy, yeah. I was just like, man. But he couldn't, yeah. He could, you know, he couldn't sway them, obviously, to work shit out, clearly. So Nah, he couldn't. Was it like a hard no, like, fuck you, Dizzy? It was a hard no, is I think from where Hobson was standing. And I think Hobson looked back at that shit and say the same thing. It was just like, it was so, it was just really what and not saying he he wasn't entitled to feel the way he felt, and Dane was, and I'm not saying Dane wasn't entitled to feel the way he felt. Yeah, I just think the um the action for the action was just a little too much for the situation. Yeah. Had they was it kind of surprising, or had they shown like signs of tension? Yeah, yeah, they always had signs of tension. Okay, cool. It was just like Bickering. Yeah, I just didn't know if it was like out of the blue. Were they 50-50 uh partners?

Yeah, I think they were 5050. As the owners? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think so. Yeah, it was always Bickering between them two. Um, so I wasn't surprised. That's why I and that's why I had the nonchalant attitude. Right. I was like, here we go again. Just another fight. We'll get over this. Yeah. To be honest, yeah, like the the infrastructure or the organizational structure does already kind of in my mind, like sound a little messy, right? You know, you have Dame who's not an artist, not a creative. He's just like a pure, like Business. he was like a business grad or something, right? But he but he but he what what he did though, the things that he brought to the table, no, for sure was amazing. But just the fact that he's co-owners with the head artist artist or the lead artist, like the founding artist, and he's managing him, and right? Yeah, but then and see, I don't know. I just like as I was saying it out loud earlier, I was like, that sounds like that. And that was the thing that we all and Dame wasn't managing me at first. It was when my homie died. I went to Dame because I was like, he would be the best manager. He knows me and I I liked how he moves.

Yeah. Um to people recommend you not do that. Like, did your lawyer recommend you not do that? Like your CEO is your manager, is that conflict of interest? Nah, I'm gonna be I'm gonna be 100% with you, bro. Uh, and it's like this to this day. A lot of times, man, I I never really had a close circle. I ain't gonna say my lawyer, I I let me not say that because I I never really had people that were a hundred percent like team Jarren. You know what I'm saying? It was kind of interests in my I was like, yeah, I was like always kind of on my own. They were more playing the straight lawyer, like giving you the best legal jargon, not like having your serious best interests at heart. They were gonna like talk... No, I think my lawyer had my best interest at heart, but I'm just saying, like my lawyer had a whole bunch of other shit to do too. Like she had a whole bunch of clients. So you were maybe like not as much of a priority as you... Yeah, there you go. That's exactly what it is. It was like when my homie died, who means he was team Jaron. Yeah, so after his passing, there was no team Jaron.

Damn. And that's Mike was too, but Mike had He had A3C, A3C, he was Mike went and did A3C, yeah. So and I remember telling Mike, Mike, he's like, man, I just got so much shit. I was like, bro, don't feel bad if you can't do this management shit no more. Like I recommend if you got a good fucking opportunity, like you got my blessings to go after that shit. Yeah, and so that's no more Mike, no more slow, there is no team Jaron. I'm just in this, I'm just in this bitch There's just Jarren. solo dolo, yeah, trying to figure this shit out. So I say that to say that, yeah, that that's so when I went to Dame, that I was like, fuck it, he's the closest person. I've been dealing with him for a couple years now. So I'ma see, you know, what's up with him managing me. So that was my decision. It wasn't like Dame had some mastermind, like, I'm gonna manage all of these guys. You know what I'm saying? That was our decision. And I think at the time before they before funk volume split, Hopsin expressed to Dame that he was about to look for new management. I did too.

And Dame was like, Dame didn't give me any uh like pullback, like, no, no, you don't need another manager. He's like, Man, you feel that's something you need to do then, yeah. Do it, and so yeah, because I just wanted that team Jarren, yeah. So coming out of that situation, you know, you talked about this before on another interview, but I wanted to kind of dive deeper into it, right? Like you were you were kind of excited to say, like, fuck it, I'm about to do my own shit and like build my own thing, get my own fans, right? Because I mean, you were struggling with like you got Dizzy Stoner fans, you got Hopsin's weirdo fans that were like way this side, yeah, and you were maybe like over here in your you know area, but I feel like you probably didn't feel like you had necessarily just your fans always that you were kind of like pulling from these two other two worlds, and it was like fuck that. Like you wanted your own shit. So, like, what were you thinking? Like, you know, what were your first moves, or kind of like what were you thinking coming right out of that, like, you know, on your own. Um, I was like, fuck it, I'm gonna just try, I'm gonna just try to invest my money in me.

And but what I didn't realize, number two things, I was getting way too fucked up. So that's that was a down, that was like not gonna work. Um, and then I didn't realize, like, yo, bro, the reason why this funk volume shit is running like a fucking weld oil machine is the infrastructure. You know, the talent is there, and I'm not shitting on any, you know, of course, Hopsin's contribution, he's Hopsin, but Dame put we had such a great infrastructure, like um we had people to help us out with with merch, people to help us out with the touring. We had, you know, Jamie and Brooklyn there, and it was like um we had so many infrastructures, and at the time we signed a Warner too. So with Warner, they, you know, it was just a bunch of what's the word I could say? It was uh like role players, yeah. It was, it was, it was a well oil machine. It wasn't like yeah, like it kind of made you think probably you were taking it a little bit for granted that it seemed like it was working easier than like oh shit now I need to get all these people for myself. Yeah, yeah. or no now I have to do all this shit myself.

Yes and I didn't yeah when I then when I was so what was like the first biggest L like you know come and do your own thing like fuck I ordered the wrong merch or like you know what I mean like I don't know how to like biggest L and at the time and not shitting on the because at the time I had found a different manager, right? Okay. The manager I found and I'm not gonna put his name out there because I don't want this to come across like I'm shitting on him. We could probably find it out but go ahead. So that manager was used to dealing with artists that were in the mainstream like he managed oh this is Orlando McGee huh I was moving independently and so I say the biggest L was when I did um I ain't gonna say it's the biggest L because the shit still was okay was when I did my first project after Funk Volume which was slow motion two and just that rollout of how I never wrote it like if I would roll an album out with funk volume we had everything in place we had the PR we had yeah fucking the date we had everything it was just like you know we had conference call how we do structure yes it was structure of how we doing this shit. Yeah um we just let's do a press run yeah we milked whatever the fuck we did our best to to take full advantage of every project, yeah, each of us put out.

With this shit, it was just like, you know, we just kind of just we didn't, it wasn't you just uploaded it Yeah. yeah, we didn't have no type of rollout. drag the file here. Yeah, we had no rollout, we had no um, it was just night and day from what I was used to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But by me, just at that time, um, putting so much emphasis in fuck it, I'm just gonna party and just get fucked up. That I wasn't even really I cared, but it was like I didn't um I cared, but I guess me putting a substance in myself was kind of numbing me from fucking really paying attention to when you know when you're sober, it's like, oh shit, this is bad. Yeah, this is bad. Yeah, exactly. This rollout's not going well. Yeah, yeah. I knew it wasn't going. Versus like, Oh, I'm fucked up, so like eh, it's not going well. Yeah, it'll be fine. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. So I say that that was probably the biggest L just watching like, and that album came out like at a time where you I still could gain more.

It wasn't like the album came out fucking three years after the album came out, I think like three or four months after we departed. So you were still hot. Yeah, yeah. Or like you were still like very relevant, yeah, exactly. Like, and like, you know, definitely kind of like priming. Yeah, exactly. So every project after that was just like it just wasn't, it just wasn't that infrastructure the infrastructure that the funk volume had was just was definitely taken for granted. It's another theme that we've had is like the importance of uh a team that you can really rely on people to do certain jobs that you can count on, and you can call up anytime. Yeah, it's massive. No one's really doing the shit all by themselves. And I don't mean it just keep beating this funk volume shit up, but it was like I know I was saying we weren't doing it. every week, we would have a conference call. Every week there was a plan in place to like, hey, this week, Jaren, yada yada yada, dizzy, yada yada yada, Hopsin, yada yada. You know, it was a plan, a fucking plan. And we executed that plan, yeah, things to do.

It's not a fucking week to go by where we didn't have that was a good one. Where you didn't take steps forward. Yeah, exactly. There was not a fucking week. Even if you weren't like charting that week or something, but if you did X, Y, Z that week, you could look back at that week and say, it was a success. We were productive. Yes. Yep. Every week was productive. It's huge, man. We have to do a better job. We didn't miss a conference call. Um, even if even if he was on tour and had some other shit going on, and when I say on tour, he might have been out with Dizzy or he might have been doing his own shit. There was a conference, there was never a conference call missed, and there was never a point of each individual's um, you know, shit that they're doing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, like everyone's got homework. yeah, exactly. Everyone got taken care of as far as like what's the. this week, Dizzy working on an album. His first single coming out, let's everyone get behind Dizzy. Let's yada yada yada. Oh, Jaren, he's got a show here. So won't you go do this show? You know what I'm saying? It was just very, it was, it was organization, man. And it was. I realized that. No, Dame sounds like he definitely had a like, you know, the ship

sailing in the right direction. Yeah, Mike and Blake was on some a lot of them conference calls too. Yeah. Yo, shout out 808 Blake, a past guest on uh on the podcast. So most people would think that signing a deal with Roc Nation for a project would be like the mecca of things to do. Like it's the best thing. But like, but like it clearly was not the right fit for you. And let me say this, because I actually signed a fucking just I can't talk about Oh, God. that was a part of I'll talk about it. that was a part of them letting me out of the deal was I can't, but I'm gonna say this. It necessarily wasn't that it wasn't a fit. It goes back to that thing that I'm saying. There was never It's me trying to do this shit. It's no it's not a team Jarren, you know what I'm saying? It's not like it was just on paper Roc nation. It was yeah, and it's like if you don't have a team in a building with you, fucking you lost in the sauce because these motherfuckers, they ain't gonna really not saying that they don't care about you, but if you ain't got they have other things to do, they got other shit to do, yeah.

I mean, yeah, so that's what that was. It was it wasn't Jarren Benton Enterprises at that New York building. It wasn't it wasn't team jaren, and then the the person that I did have on the team, yeah, got fired from the fucking Roc nation. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. And then we shout out to him, yeah. And then when he got fired, you know, me and him kind of parted ways, and it wasn't just because he got fired, we parted ways because it was that same shit. It was like I can't even get this, I can't get my nigga on the phone call. You know what I'm saying? That's not gonna work. That was a tough year for him. That's not gonna work, yeah. So YuckFu, though, great by the way, great name of a project. first of all. And that was a collab project with Kato, yeah. Yeah, what's crazy is um they didn't, I ain't gonna say Roc nation, but they expressed ARs and people express because me and Kato had was working on that project before I got signed to Roc Nation, yeah. And we were just gonna put it out ourselves, and I was like, Kato, I was like, I'm I just got this deal. I was like, let me try to let me try to see if I can fucking finesse them letting us put this project out over there. And they were like, Man, you want your fucking first project on Roc Nation to be with uh, you know, uh uh unknown producer, yada yada.

I was like, he ain't unknown to me. That's I was like, that's I work with this dude. Like, I've been working with him with you know, damn near, you know, since the shit. And look at him now, yeah, He's crushing it. Yeah, and I was like, uh, and they didn't want to do it. They was kind of giving me pushback, and I was like, bro, this is this is it, man. Like, let me let me bring my dude over here. I even tried to get Kato on the cover with me. They were like, nah. Yeah, they cut that off. Um they shut that shit down because they and then it rightfully so they expressed it. Sounds like some racist against Asian shit. No, Rightfully, they was just like, yo, bro. We love you, Kato. This is my I'm gonna say this is a gift and a curse for me. If I fuck with you, I'm always trying to go hard with my people. You know what I'm saying? Because that's like I like that I like that. I like that team shit, man. You know what I'm saying? Like, I like that. Yeah, I like coming a place with my team and people I fuck with. Like, that's what I'm used to. These are the people I rock with, these are people I've been rocking with, so let me, you know, it's just uh it's just that's my support system. Yeah, so I was rallying so hard for Kato on that shit, and it was just like um, like we didn't sign Kato, like you really going hard for this dude.

And um, and so I was like, Man, look, I was like, let's let's put him on the fucking covers. Like, why you want him? You know what I mean? It was just a lot of a lot of pushback, rightfully so, not saying they were wrong for the pushback because they didn't sign Kato, yeah. They signed me, and the investment was Jarren Benton. Oh, man, I see where they're coming from for sure. Not Jaron Benton and the fucking producer, yeah. But he executive produced the project. He executive, Yeah, that's gotta count for something. And that's what I wanted. I wanted him to but his debut project. I mean, you know, I definitely understand where they're coming from. Yeah, like I I get it, I got it. You know, if you were a long-standing rostered artist of theirs, yeah, exactly. a few projects down the road, sure, do whatever the fuck you want. We've already seen some yeah, great, great stuff together. Exactly. But like, you know, so I I definitely see where you know they're coming from there. And also, I don't want to people at the people at Rock Nation was super fucking cool. So it really wasn't that it wasn't a fit. I say the thing that got me was just the way that um major labels like when we were on Warner we were on we had a distribution deal with Warner with funk volume. So funk volume and the way we move was still the same.

Nothing changed. With funk volume I mean with Rock Nation and any other mainstream um label you sign to is just directly an artist they dictate to you how you move you know what I'm saying and sometimes the way you move or the way they move may not be beneficial if you're if you're an independent artist and you're used to a certain type of structure that's not necessarily major label structure and then you have to do it a different way it might not it might not work for you. You know what I'm saying and plus at the same time it might not work and if you don't have a team and or people in the building is this this route it's just fucking me it's just me over there trying to talk to you know what I'm saying so I asked them um can I can I can I leave they they didn't want to at first it took me like a couple years to kind of get off yeah and um you were definitely in like contractual limbo for a while there I feel like yeah and I'm gonna say this I'm gonna just give one example and what I mean by okay so when you're an independent artist you can put out music how you want to and do what you want with with labels and not saying that this is right or wrong labels, you have to have, you got to submit the song you want. You gotta give them, you know, shit three months leeway.

And they might not even say they might not even fuck with the song. They might say, uh, let's let's try something else. So it's not like with independent, you can just do it the fucking. Yeah, it's not even like here's what I'm releasing. Yeah, it's like here's what I want to release. Yeah, and they're like okay, yeah, it's fine, or they're like, eh, try again. Exactly, exactly. So and and and with today's market, you just can't. If you're not like a big fucking artist, if you're not, you know, you don't really you can't do that, you can't play them type of games. And I ain't saying games, you just can't play that. You can't do that. You can't say, uh shit, I gotta wait three months to put a single or some shit out. You gotta keep the content and shit going. Yeah, I mean, so so since then, you know, that the the you know, it's kind of segueing perfectly. You haven't released a full-length project, you've only done the four song lost songs off of the Mink Coat Killah EP and all singles, all singles, and fuck tons of them, by the way, which is awesome. So, like, yes, definitely kudos to the consistency because we talk about this shit all the time.

Like, we do live in a day and age of the single and the consistently dropping, you know, artists, right? Can we expect a full-length project? I want you know what, and the reason for dropping those singles is just how the climate change, man. Yep. I like that. I love fucking making the album. Yeah, but it's like fucking you make the album, and then if you don't have the proper infrastructure to put the shit out, it just ain't gonna say it falls on deaf ear. But it kind of does kind of does. It kind of does, yeah. So it's much harder to market a full-length project. It's much harder, yeah. exactly. Exactly. So it's like now it's like instead of like unless the narrative's super strong, you know. Exactly. Like if you really think about like what is the story we're telling with this project, and like and then you bust your ass to tell that story, yeah, yeah, or yeah, unless some sh uh shit happens while I get some publicity. I need to go fucking go viral target or some shit. Jesus. No, y'all can't play. Oh you can't play. You can't play. You can beat somebody up and fucking target and shit. We just lost our monetization on this video.

We've been canceled thanks to Jaron fucking Benton. So yeah, so yeah, like it's just a singles culture, and you know, and you're just kind of and that's cool that you've adapted because to be honest, me looking at you like you were a project guy. Obviously, you know, you were doing steady projects, like kind of the traditional route, and then you've kind of evolved and like kept up with the times, if you will, to be in this singles culture that we live in. You know what I mean? So no, it definitely makes sense. I want to do the project shit, but it's just like it's gotta be the right situation. Yeah, so it's so it's not even on the horizon though, right? Like I haven't. It's just not yeah. I've been lying because people be like, yo, what are you doing for? I was like, yo, this year. So, chill out. I got a project. He's been saying this year for five years. I don't know, no, no project, to be honest with you. I do love how he's actually kept it a buck with us. Like he hasn't fucked with us much as yet. But but we are about to fuck with you, Henry. Let's go, let's go. We have entered a final segment of the One More Time podcast. Jarren, I'm excited to see this part with him.

Jarren, this is the rapid fire rampage. Let's go. I love these sound effects. They're great, right? Do you know where this one's from? It sounds like Michael Rapaport. It's from Archer. You ever see Archer. That's a funny one. I never watched Archer. My fucking cousin loves Archer. That's really good. I never watched it. So it's a three-part rampage. I'm gonna hit you with some short answer questions. Okay. We're gonna do some this or that, and then we're gonna do a word association. I'll break it down as we go. Are you buckled up? Ready for this? This is a pretty intense. I'll buckle the fuck up. Final portion. Okay, here we go. Episode 48 of the One More Time Podcast with Jarren Benton. Rapid Fire Rampage. What is the Jarren Benton motto or catchphrase? Jaren Benton. Zip it up. There you go. What can average rappers do to rap better? Ooh.

Shit that's irritating. Like, Listen to a bunch of. I ain't gonna say shit that's irritating. You gotta put a lot of work in. If you want to be a better rapper, study good rappers. That's my best advice. Study good rappers. And um when you study them, you know, you're probably gonna start off imitating them at first. Yes. But then you'll find your own fucking lane the more you keep doing it. So I it's just practice. I'll say practice and study the best. Yes. That's what I say. It's a fantastic answer. Hell Yeah. What is your favorite hobby outside of music? Ooh. What do you do? Uh just hanging with my kids for one time. Yeah, okay, fucking. For sure. Kicking it with my kids. Good dad gang. Good dad gang. Yeah. For sure, man. Yeah. If you were a professional wrestler, what would be your signature finishing move? Ooh. I take it back to like when niggas used to snap niggas' necks in the fucking 80s movies. You know, how you just like oh shit. Yeah. Like God.

So that's mine. That's a good one. You don't see neck snapping no more. No, no, you don't. Hell no. So I'm bringing back neck snapping. I feel like it'd be hard to fake. Sorry to all the people that think wrestling is real still. You couldn't even just fucking fake it in the movies. Yeah. We're just so fucking sensitive these days, man. There's no neck snap, no neck snapping anymore. No neck snapping. It's terrible. It's a terrible time we live in. It is. You can choose anyone alive or dead to executive produce your next album. Okay. Who is it? Trent Reznor. Woo. Woo. this guy is in his his rock bag. Yeah. Okay. Big time. What is one job you could not be paid enough to do? Um jerk off dudes. We're fucking cancelled, man. This is a good one.

Does anti homophobic motherfucker? No, I'm not say if you jerk off dudes. I'm just kidding. you jerk off dudes. It's just not for him. It's just not for me, yeah. Yeah, it's fair. You wake up as a deer. Okay. What is the first thing you do? Watch my back because I'm a fucking I'm prey. Indeed. Yeah. Smart. Look around. Hell yeah. You wake up as God. Okay. What is the first thing you do? Hmm. I'm ending life suffering, but still keeping understanding because it's like this is gonna sound too philosophical. No, we're here for it. I'm Ready? So like whatever this simulation is, it's goofy as fuck. Love that. So I say that to say if I was the architect of a simulation, I would end suffering, I would let everyone live I will end suffering, but not just suffering, I would also have an extreme level of respect and love for others. But I would also keep an understanding, even though it doesn't, even though being disrespectful and violence and all that crazy shit doesn't exist in this world, you don't know it's bad or good until you go through it.

So I'm still gonna keep the understanding of knowing what it is, but it just will not be allowed in my world. There's nothing but so knowing that you're being good for a purpose because the opposite is bad. Yes, you have to know that. But you're always good, but you're not gonna experience it. Yeah, okay. That's what I'm trying to say. I like it. I get it. Damn, see. He's asked us a few times. That's the best answer. That's the that's hands down the best answer we got. Jace other people said he wanted to get rid of peas out of all fried rice. That's what he would. That's what he would do with his godly powers. I was like, you are a selfish prick, bro. I mean, he said he would do other things, but he would start the peas aren't even that bad. They're not, they're not that bad. Nah. Straight. Jaren. if you were a chicken wing flavor, what would you be? What are you going with? I would be hot, but I would be, but the I if I was the flavor, I would be hot, but I would only be on extra crispy wings. My wife would love you, man.

I don't like soggy. My wings, we order wings. Yeah. She preheats the oven before we go pick them up so that she can fry the fuck out of them more. Genius. Like she's a real G. Shout out to Lana. Shout out to Lana. your wife, man. Yeah, for real. Because she's the same way. Like, we ask for extra crispy from the restaurant, still not crispy enough. It's not No restaurant has ever. I mean, whatever. It's harder to do that. I don't know. No, and I think you can't. No, it's not the hot sauce. Oh, that's another thing. I wouldn't, I wouldn't overdo it with myself neither. Like I wouldn't just be too hot and be. No, no, I'll be hot, but I'm saying I as far as you don't ever get wings and it's just like, damn, there's so much sauce on this shit. Yeah, yeah. It's just the Perfect sauce. and the chicken wings gotta be crisp. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. These answers are great so far. Perfect. Jaren, it is a hot dog a sandwich? No. How many raccoons would fit in an ice cream truck? And that's like from top, you're stacking on top of each other too.

Mm-hmm. You can mush them in. Okay. I'm gonna say But fully grown. Fully grown raccoons. Standard size ice cream truck. I'm gonna say maybe 1500. About 1500. Okay. I like it. You're cramming them in, but I think it's good. Yeah. If you can cram the fuck in. Jaren, what is your favorite curse word? Fuck. Part one of the rampage. Part one. Moving on to the this or that. I'm gonna give you two choices. You just pick the one that gravitates towards you the most. Let's go. Part two of the rampage. Rampage! Rampage! Writing or freestyling? Uh writing. Streaming money or show money? Ooh, uh show money. Hooks or verses. Um I'm a verse type of guy. Home studio or commercial studio? I like the commercial studio. When you say home studio, you mean just in my personal home or just anyone's home.

I just like being outside of my fucking house, so either one. As long as it's not in my own. Not your home. Yeah. Gotcha. Okay, not Jaren Benton's house studio. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. Okay. Karen's or Chad's. What are Chad's? I think it's like a- Is that a new thing? I think it's like a guy Karen. Ooh. It's like a bro. I didn't know that. Poor Chad Tenney's. Sorry, Chad Chad Tennessee. I'm gonna choose the Chad over the Karen. No one likes a Karen. Chainsaws or machetes? I'm gonna go with uh machete. Sweet tea or lemonade? Lemonade. Silly hats or silly socks. Silly hats. Live the rest of your life with one giant hand or one giant ear. I'm gonna go with the giant hand. Giant hand? Hell yeah. You could do some stuff with that. Yeah, you can. A giant smack the shit out of someone. Everybody is so. I got small ass ears, but every look at me. So maybe you could, those are tiny little things.

So check this out. With big ass ears, everyone is gonna be able to look at your nasty ass earwax. If you got a little hair on them, they go see, it's just he's really thinking this through. Yeah, it's just too much. Smart answer. I'm gonna go with the big ass hand. Big hand. Yeah. And plus that's just let me get y'all canceled. This is a little bit more smackdown. It's a weapon. Do all my kids, moms. I'm bullshitting. I'm bullshitting. God, domestic abuse jokes. We'll cut that out. Pet- Will we? No. Pet moose or pet hedgehog. Pet moose. Huffing or freebasing? Freebasing. A 75% chance of a platinum album or a 25% chance of a diamond album. 75% of platinum. He's not he's he's he's he's keeping it low risk. He's Going for the bag. Part two of the rampage. Part two. Let's go. Minus canceling us. Yeah. He's

he's doing good. But that was good content. That was good. All around a good section. It's all gonna boil down to this final section. This is the word association. Let's do it. I'm gonna give you one word. Just first thing off the top of your head. Just whatever. Spit one word back right back at me. Okay. Here we go. Rampage! Microphone. Fiend. Jealousy. Uh ooh. My kid's mom. We've talked a lot about your kid's mom on today's episode. I got two of them, so Okay. Which one? I never say which one it is. That's genius. Know what I'm saying? They're always calling each other. Like, yeah, you think he was talking about you. It's never either one. That's the beauty of it. It's like not actually either one. Of course they're both. But the jealousy goes both ways, too. I can be jealous too. Sure. Sure. We all can.

Yeah. Gucci. Play it out. I mean, it's over over. The designer, not the artist. Oh, we're talking about oh, okay. I don't know. You got an entire birthday- Oh, I'm talking about the clothing. Right. Gotcha. Yeah. Alarm. Uh gift and a curse. Haircut. Jealousy. Bringing it back to the Elon Musk. Uh two things come to mind. Okay. Genius and weirdo. That's exactly what he is. Billboard. Billboard. Uh, it reminds me that I need to get my fucking billboard plaques that I've yet not fucking paid for. We talked about this on uh the last episode, actually. They're like a thousand dollars or something. Yeah, they are about the like the average Joe out there that's not in the industry probably thinks they're free. They're not free.

Yeah, because I definitely did until I got into music and I was like, oh, wow. Yeah, I didn't know that neither. Even with um plaques, all this shit you gotta pay for. Oh, yeah. Everything. Yep. That's crazy. Asparagus. It's okay. Harvard. Um, I turned them down. Great move. Cheater. Uh, that's definitely me. It used to be me. Used to be. Hence the ex wife and the other ex. It used to be me. Good call. Old Jaren. Old Jaren. Shadow. Ban. Ocean. Meditation. Bitcoin. Uh, I fucked up. By not getting it. Oh, by getting it. Oh, hold it a little longer. Not Bitcoin. oh, you said Bitcoin. I was just thinking cryptocurrency in general. I fucked up.

You bought some shit coins. I bought Dogecoin. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that was a good one. So Bitcoin also makes me feel like stressed out. Fuck up too because my home, you know, y'all know Flick? He used to be around. Flick back in the day used to tell me this was back when I was on Funk Volume to invest in Bitcoin. Um, trying to do that. My buddy's a Bitcoin millionaire. Yeah. And I I don't, I didn't, he used to, I swear to God, this was the one he's like, man. Tell you something you could do, man. Just it's like this. He was trying to explain that shit to me. I didn't get it. I didn't understand it. Yeah. And then Oh, I had no idea what the fuck my friend. I was like, dude, you're high. Like, I was like, what are you talking about? Like, because it it was basically much like when the internet was first coming out, and everyone was like, nobody knew what it was. Fuck that internet shit. Like, what is that's not gonna be a good idea. This is what people use to buy drugs. He would even tell me shit like this. He's like, man, I'm telling you, it's not even that big of a deal. Just put like $3,000. Yeah. And if you would have. Would have been $100,000 by now, easy?

At least. Yeah. Moving on. Lil. Over saturated. There's a lot of a Lil oversaturated. There's a lot of a Lil fucking saturated. A lot of Lil's studio. Music. music. Magic City. Um strippers. Pistol. Uh, I need to get a new one. Bully. Me. What a rampage. What a rampage. Really solid. Solid rampage for sure. Yeah. What's been the worst one? Oh, last episode. Yeah. Sorry, Verse. It's pretty bad. Last episode. Hold on, Verse. In the uh this or that was Verse here. He's a manager. Do you know Verse? I'm not saying the Verse Simmons. Yeah, not Verse Simmons. Okay, okay. Nah, nah. Ryan Burgess is his real name. But yeah, he goes by Verse. He manages Chi Chi, the producer, like a Lil baby's producer, and he's got a bunch of you know Grammy nominated records. This or that. He basically just said both. He just said both on

every single one. And we were like, bro, it's literally, it's literally called this or that. You're supposed to choose one. Not this and that. But anyway. We love you, Verse. Yeah. Amazing conversation, man. It's been awesome. it's been dope. I had a good time here. Yeah, good. We we appreciate you coming on. Such a dope story. You know, the fact that you and Henry have gotten to work together, and then we got to have you on the show is Shout out to fucking H3. You know what's crazy? Sir. Um, uh, we didn't talk about that at all. H3 fucking uh drum kits, and I never knew it was one time I was here, I think I was with you. I was like, oh fuck, I just thought that was just some fucking this guy posts stories of him making beats on uh on on the story, and like it's like H3 hat, H3 snare, H3 kick. I'm like yes, Shout out. I'm glad it's getting used. Hell yeah. And I remember I was here, and he was like, you know, H3. I was like, oh shit, and it makes sense. That's why it says H3. Yeah, I was like, oh, yeah, I didn't put none of it together. He just put the tag together. I thought that was some shit that was in the fucking shit, the logic, but it was some Patron. Shout out to Patron who gave me the shit. Yeah.

Yeah. So Patron's giving out your drum kicks. He didn't tell me he was doing that. I'm okay with it, but a lot of the H3 uh yeah. I really use a lot of your hats in uh yes, a lot of shit like that. That's dope man. good stuff. Well, yeah, honestly, amazing run so far. And you know, you're not stopping, it sounds like anytime soon. No, we ain't stopping, man. I'm about to get into this acting shit. Okay. Manifesting that. I just manifested that. Let's do it. Manifest. Yeah. Jaren will win an Oscar. That'd be crazy. I will. I will. I think you will. I think you already did, actually. I will. We're just watching it happen now. You already did. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Shut up. yeah. Shout out. I'm getting into the acting shit now. Yeah. That's dope, man. I think you'd be great with that. Well, amazing career so far. Thank you, man. Such great stories. So much fun on the on the episode today, man. Really appreciate you coming on. Thank you all, man. Henry, until next week. What are we doing? Getting the fuck out of here. We're getting out of here. Get the fuck out of here. Peace. Yeah.