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Interview: In Gotti We Trust
- by Shaheem Reid, with additional reporting by Sway Calloway and Yvonne Spillers
"It's almost like a family barbecue type thing when we get together," Irving Lorenzo's best friend Ja Rule said. "It's just footballs, cards and gambling, a lot of talking sh--. It's just a good time."
Fresh off his 31st birthday, Irv was in London at the In and Out Club for Ashanti's U.K. album-release party. The only passes being thrown were by guys and girls trying to get better acquainted, and there was enough champagne at the bar to fill a Jacuzzi. Irv was appreciative that hundreds - including special guests like Wyclef and Shaggy - came out to show love, but it wouldn't have been the same for him if Ja Rule and the rest of his peeps weren't there. For the youngest in a family of eight children, kinfolk is still the most important thing to him.
As a teenager Irv was known as DJ Irv, a tag he shed long ago, and has since added the title of CEO and the last name of Gotti (Jay-Z, for whom Irv used to DJ, gave him the moniker around '95). Like John Gotti, the late Gambino crime-family boss, Irv is a product of the streets of New York who made his way to the top of his game: Lately such luminaries as Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston, Toni Braxton and Michael Jackson have been hitting I.G. up on the three 2ways and two cell phones he keeps around his waist like a ghetto utility belt. He's got beats, and he's become the latest muse of hip-hop and R&B.
"He pulls certain things out of you to make you your best," Ashanti said of her Murder Inc. boss and co-producer of her double-platinum debut album. "He's like a genius when it comes to creativity, to music, concepts of videos and the business. He gets it done - by hook or by crook."
While it's only recently that Gotti seems to be headed toward CEO superstar status a la P. Diddy and Jermaine Dupri, he's been cultivating a penchant for hustling for close to 15 years.
"Irv was a street DJ," remembered Jaz-O, who took Gotti under his wing early on. "He was doing all the street [mixtape] stuff before DJ Clue and all of them. He was doing those little cassette tapes with beats and mixes, selling them to the hustlers throughout Queens. He had a big name for himself in Queens and was getting some paper, too."
"It was something for me to do with my life," Gotti recalled. "I went at it hard."
His affinity for the turntables eventually led to his love for making beats. While working in the studio with his friend and production luminary Chad "Dr. Seuss" Elliot on the track for "Born Loser" around 1989, he caught the attention of Ruff Ryder CEOs Dee and Waah, who wanted the beat for their artist DMX. They decided to take him into their camp along with a pre-teenage Jadakiss, an even younger Swizz Beatz, and X, who was buzzing in the streets with his ferocious brand of line-spitting.
A few years later, I.G. got to implement his honed skills with Q-Boro MC Mic Geronimo. Gotti produced his single "Sh--'s Real." The independent release led to Gotti holding down his first position as an A&R rep at Blunt/TVT, which put out Geronimo's debut in 1995.
After Geronimo and Gotti had a falling-out, Chris Black, a "hustler n---a" from around Gotti's way, introduced him to his crew, the Cash Money Clique (CMC are due to put out an album on Murder Inc./TVT this fall).
"He was like, 'I got two n---as, O-1 and Ja Rule," Gotti recalled. "As soon as I met Ja, our chemistry clicked. If I was doing something with DMX, if I was doing something with Jay-Z, I would take Ja Rule with me. He had that star quality from the door. The voice, the presence, the persona. Everybody loved Ja."
Especially Def Jam head honcho Lyor Cohen, who caught CMC's 1995 grimefest "Get the Fortune" on video station the Box, and immediately wanted to sign Rule. Perfect timing: Blunt records was folding and Gotti needed another gig.
"When I first met with Lyor, he asked me what my five-year goal was," I.G. explained. "I said, 'My five-year goal is to become you and to f---ing destroy you, because you can't do this music better than me.' He hired me that day. He loved that sh--.
"I breathe this sh--. I am this sh--," Gotti continued. "Clive Davis can't know this better than me. Tommy Mottola can't know this better than me. While you're following me, I'm gonna find a new way."
Gotti subsequently helped carve out new icons for hip-hop. While soaking up everything he could from Cohen, I.G. saw the opportunity to put his longtime friends on.
"He told Lyor he knew where the next illest n---a was," Waah said. "We happened to have him right up in the cage, in the kennel."
The carnivorous MC was DMX, of course, and Gotti helped broker deals
that saw X and the Double R as well as Jay-Z and Roc-A-Fella become
partners with Def Jam. Gotti kept Ja Rule for himself as the catalyst
for Inc.'s big jump-off in 1999.
Getting his product off the shelves hasn't been a problem the last couple of years. Ja Rule and Ashanti have been radio staples with offerings off of their multimillion-selling LPs, and Irv Gotti Presents the Inc. recently made a #3 debut on the Billboard 200 albums chart. Now Gotti can boast that Nas and Bobby Brown may even become team members.
By declaring that Murder Inc. is the "World's Most Talented Record Label," obviously the Murderers think they're the tightest on the mic, and they've also led us to believe that they're the tightest-knit unit out there. That is, until the past couple of weeks.
Vita, one of the first rappers down with the Inc., has bounced, and Seven Aurelius, co-producer of "Always on Time," "Down Ass Chick" and most of Ashanti's album, has one foot out the door.
"Murder Inc. is my family," Seven insisted. "But like any family, you gonna have conflict. With me, it's just like an NBA holdout. When you have a player that's a star and doesn't feel like he's getting what he deserves, he'll sit out 'til the owners come to him with a contract that's fair.
"Ja Rule is a genius and Irv Gotti is a genius," Seven continued. "Without me they'll be fine. But together, we're an unstoppable force."
As for Vita, the rumors are that she's upset with her lack of playing
time. She's not doing any interviews about her departure, but a month
ago the New Jersey native was very chatty.
Speculation aside, Ashanti and Charli Baltimore - who's scheduled to finally release her long-awaited official debut, The Diary (You Think You Know ...), later this year - did come along after Vita and have had their projects take precedence over what would have been the Murder Mommy's debut, La Dolce Vita. Charli, however, said she too had to do her share of sitting on her hands.
"Oh man, it was like the never-ending demo," Chuck said. "I'd known Gotti for two years before he signed me, and he just constantly made me work. Every song would lead to another song. And finally I did this one song and he was like, 'Oh my God, that's the song! You know what? You've just earned a spot on [Ja Rule's] Pain Is Love.' It made me so hungry."
The view from the bench isn't too bad for Caddilac Tah, who was indoctrinated into the family around the same time as Vita.
"Everybody is like, 'Man, what's up?' " the Queens native admitted about his three years in the cut. His first album, Pov City Hustla, was supposed to drop last December, but still hasn't seen release. "That's another thing I learned from Gotti - timing. You don't ever wanna rush into nothing. That's all I keep putting in my head is 'My time is soon,' which it is."
Tah, who's heavily featured on the Irv Gotti Presents the Inc. album and DVD, has been slowly building his buzz via the occasional solo streetsweeper, like last year's "Pov City Anthem." He also popped up with a high-profile appearance on J. Lo's "Ain't It Funny," and is eating good by ghostwriting for Gotti. Yes, Irv is following in the footsteps of P. Diddy and Jermaine Dupri as a rapping CEO.
"It's like I go out there and I'm Ja's hype man and I ain't gonna lie to you, I feel the people got love for me and I feel the people," I.G. said about taking his turn on the mic, most recently on "No More Love," the first single from Toni Braxton's upcoming album. "It's almost like they're calling me to say eight bars or they're calling me to make a record. I'm serious."
Gotti himself will be the first act off Ja Rule's newly formed MI2 (Murder Inc. 2) label. And while he helps (or hinders, depending how seriously you take him as an MC) get Ja's label off the ground, Rule's own rapping will happen on a much more limited basis in the next few years. The raspy-voiced rapper has said he has a couple of more LPs left in him, then he'll be heading for Hollywood.
Gotti hinted that the hanging up of Ja's jersey may be premature. "He's so passionate about this music thing, I don't know," he said. "I'm sure he'll be making music in some way. He could write songs for other artists all day."
But as the Incsters converged on the In and Out Club in London, nobody was thinking about leaving, especially Gotti. He's learned to keep the fam close.