June 14, 2007 @ 6:55 pm

A Man Scorned

by: Linda Hobbs

Two years ago, Saigon was the biggest conversation going on in hip hop. The New York native turned heads on the mixtape circuit in 1999, with the "Yardfather 1" and "Yardfather 2" releases, each selling about $20,000 copies. But it wasn't until Saigon, 29, signed with Just Blaze's Atlantic-distributed Fort Knox record label that he went from being another rhymer in the mixtape ring, to becoming the great black hope of hip hop. Things seemed good for the rapper/actor, who had also landed a spot on the hit HBO show "Entourage." But after all the hood hoopla and breath-holding, Saigon's album is yet to drop. And lately, he's been vocal about it, saying in his now-infamous MySpace blog that he might leak his own album. He later said that he felt his blog offended Just Blaze, the prime producer on the album. Today in his own blog, Just responded: "I have no vested intreest in his feelings towards the label, I wasn't even mentioned in his blog, so there was nothing for me to be offended about. To sum up what I said in my email to him, I explained that I didn't understand why he would post that NOW. Now that the album is pretty much done, and the only issue holding up the release of the first record is a sample clearance issue." Now Saigon talks to VIBE about Just Blaze, the sample clearance issue, and why he's down with Chris Lighty. You seem to represent the realities of the industry today.
I know. A record deal, that's where the work really starts. That's one thing I want to emphasize to people: a lot of times, you get a record deal and the only thing that is is a right to say, "Hey, I got a record deal!" That's when the work starts. And that's when you have to convince your company to invest this money in you. Because they can sign you and just write you off as a tax write-off. So you have to work extra hard to show them that there is an interest in you and people want you, and they can make their money back. I'm a testament to that, because I've been signed to a record company for two and a half years and they only put out one song. You were one of the most anticipated emcees, with one of the most anticipated albums. What happened?
Man, I'm trying to figure shit out too, that's the big question right now, because my album is finished! They approved my album. I have a great, great album that I stand behind. As a fan of music, I know the album is fantastic and the people that I played it for, everybody tells me it's fantastic, and there's so much red tape in the industry. And the industry is almost over. It's like a sinking ship, and not just record companies, but you see all the CD stores is closing down and everything's becoming digital. My situation, I couldn't even explain it. I've been doing so much outside what Atlantic Records have done for me, as far as getting myself on television, keeping myself in the public, whether it's "Entourage" or the "White Rapper Show," and keeping myself relevant, without them having to do it, you would think that they would strike while the iron is hot. But they dropped the ball. And I'm telling them, like "Yo, I'm not going to be able to keep maintaining and keep reinventing myself and keep people excited for so long." They just have a systematic way of doing things. I don't get it. I think artists come out with half the talent, and get on the schedule, and actually release albums. And not only that, I got some of the strongest people up at the label behind my project. Like, Gee Roberson is the head of black music over there. And he's the one who's handling my project. In your interview with HipHopDX, you mentioned that Just Blaze ate up your budget when you could have been working with other big producers.
Yeah, that's another problem I ran into, because they had Just do my whole album. And Just Blaze works at his own pace, but like, if we run into a sample clearance issue - and this is what they've been telling me, a sample clearance issue is holding up my whole album- so why don't we just go back in the studio, record a new song? They don't say that I record songs in one day. If you give me a hot beat, by the end of the day I'm gone have a dope song. Is it true that your catalog of songs is around 100?
You have no idea! I mean, great great great songs! I got songs with Faith Evans, Jay-Z, Q-Tip, Fat Man Scoop, I mean, the album is crazy. I'm like, ok, why is someone playing hide the ball with me? And nobody's really giving me a direct answer, and they keep telling me it's a sample clearance. Well, if it's a sample clearance, than let me move on to the next song. One song shouldn't stop this whole movement. You've also mentioned in interviews that you feel like your blog post offended Just Blaze. Did you ever find out why?
Nah, I haven't really spoken to him since then, and I don't understand why. And I feel like he sides with the record company. I don't know why. Maybe they got some thing going on between them. But in every single situation, Just sides with the record company. And I'm like, this is my album. Just produced the album, but he doesn't have the same sense of urgency I have. He works on other projects. Just is financially stable. Not that it's about money, but he's established. His phone doesn't stop ringing. Everytime an artist get a record deal, first person they call is Just Blaze. So his phone don't stop ringing. But this album is going to set the tone not only for my career but for my life, my well-being. You've said before that you felt like Atlantic is probably afraid of an album like yours, because it uplifts the black community.
Yeah, and I'm starting to think that that has a lot to do with [my album not dropping], the more and more I think about it. Because nothing else makes sense. And I'm like, maybe it's because all these songs I have, I'm not talking about killing a nigga, or robbing a nigga, or Cristal, or how much champagne I had yesterday, and my songs are about educating people, telling people to go to school, and spend your money right, do the right thing, and they don't want to hear that. And it's like fuck that! And then I look at the music, hip hop overall, and I'm like, damn, there's nobody out right now that's really about upliftment. And is that because they all get this type of treatment [as me]? Is that because these labels do not want to invest in your project, where they push whatever your message is out to the world. Maybe they don't want to invest in that. If that is the case, then fuck them, I don't care. Because once you become conscious, and I don't mean conscious with a fucking sweater vest on, but a conscious human being, and certain doors in your mind open up, you can't act like you don't see these things. A lot of these rappers are more detrimental to black children than they are good. Most of them. Ninety-percent of them, I don't give a fuck how much money you made. You're detrimental, look how many lives you've fucked up. But if you weren't at Atlantic, if you weren't rapping, what would you be doing?
I would probably have more time to put into my non-profit organization [In Arms Reach/Abandon Nation]. My non-profit, it works with like seventy-five kids whose parents are incarcerated and I've seen these kids all do three-sixty turnarounds. All these kids were on their way to jail or being dead. And now they know what colleges they want to go to. I want my life to be meaningful. One, because I hurt a lot of people in the past, and I've done a lot of destructive things, and I feel like I want to change day by day. All the fucked up things I've done in my life, all the bad things, I want to make up for that and then some. And I want to be remembered as a person who tried to uplift not just black people but humanity. We live in fucked up times. I can't even go out. Like, all these parties, this shit is like sickening to me man. Muthafuckas go out, drink, I mean it's all good to go to a fun party every now and then, but how do people go out three, four days a week? You're going to see the same people, hear the same songs! You know what I mean? Fuck your liver up, wake up with a hangover, like, "I'm never drinking again," then you're going to go out again. And it becomes a cycle. And people are programmed to live their life like this. And when you go to other places, you go outside America, you see that there's way smarter people than Americans in the world. How are you looking at things differently? Do you trust people less in the industry now?
Hell yeah man! Like speaking of [Hip] Hop, like, me and Hop been through it, I was like, "You let me down Hop. You're the reason why I signed on Atlantic, I wasn't even gone fuck with that company, and you told me you had my back." But I can't really blame nobody, I'm not the type to complain and point fingers. The only reason why I wrote that blog on MySpace, I was just frustrated. Like, "You know what? Fuck it man!" and I get too many people like, "Yo, what's up with the album?" and it starts the perception that it's me. Like I'm not good enough to see an album that's dope enough to compete with what's out there. When I know that my shit is way better than what's out there, not only just musically, lyrically, like relevant social commentary. I got songs that's going to make people be like, "Dang man, maybe I shouldn't drink so much. Maybe I shouldn't smoke weed every single day." I got all the elements there. And it gets frustrating when you know it ain't you, and you know it's just somebody sitting behind a desk who ain't making a contractual commitment that they're committed too. What's next?
Well, I just hired some big guns. I just signed with Violator with Chris Lighty. I took my situation to Chris, and I was like, "Chris, I know you're a move maker. We gone get this moving." I've been working with Chris now for about two and a half, three weeks now. So he's like, "I'm gone get to the bottom of it. I'm gone let you know what's really going on." So that's a good thing. I also signed with William Morris agency, the acting agency. I got like a ton of scripts, I'm going on castings, so I'm still doing the acting thing. Are you still thinking about leaking the album?
I'm not going to just disrespect Just Blaze because it's his work as well, but I wouldn't just leak it like that, because one thing I can honestly say is that Just put his heart into this project as well, I'll never deny that for one second, but I wouldn't do that without his permission. But I would encourage him, if they [Atlantic Records] keep playing games with us, to let the world know that we made a solid, fantastic piece of work. It would be a travesty for this album to not be displayed to the world. And I can't emphasize that enough.

Article tags: Man, Scorned 

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