Leaving Em’ Spellbound Once Again: K-Solo Interview By: Rob Smittix

If a Mount Rushmore of Hip-Hop icons was constructed, I’d vote to have K-Solo carved out of granite.
Today we are honored to be able to speak with original Hit Squad recording artist and the only East
Coast rapper shown enough “California Love” to be taken in by Death Row Records. His resume speaks
for itself but let’s find out what K-Solo is up to these days.

RRX: I’m sure you’ve been bombarded with this already, so real quick… I know people are going to want
to hear your feelings about DMX.

KSOLO: Oh yeah, well… Me and DMX had a love/hate growing up. In his passing, I forgive DMX and all of
that, I don’t hold that dark stuff in my heart. We’re in a very competitive sport, so you can tell how it got
there but… I don’t have dark feelings for X, I wish him a safe return to glory or wherever he’s going. I
wish him safe travels. I pray that peace be on his family and his children. I have no hard feelings against
him. But I am the creator and originator of Spellbound and I won that battle.

RRX: Amen to that. In a side note it would’ve been more believable if DMX claimed he wrote Tales from
the Crackside.

KSOLO: Yeah, I mean that would fit more… DMX’s artform is dark. He was dealing with neglect and
negativity. He made the best out of it in the only way he knew how to deal with it.
Like I said when I met him in jail we were friends, I don’t think he trusted me to be his friend. When I
had made it first, I think he was already accepting I would reject him and that wasn’t the case at all. He
never gave our friendship a shot. I had to defend as best as I could, it didn’t actually go my way in that
aspect. He winded up going to the people that put me on, then they got put off the label and then he
became the head guy that sold more records than them. I never was in a situation that could challenge
him. I just had to eat it and you know? That’s life, things happen and just had to accept it for what it was.
But the same people he saved with his artform didn’t even want to give him part of the label. So, it’s
kind of hard being mad at somebody like that.

I’m blessed to be in all of these guys lives before we made it. DMX is one of em’, Flo Rida is another,
Snoop Dogg was another and Redman was another. I was in their life before they became big. I knew
these people before the record deals. We worked on Snoop’s album; probably the one that was on the
platform who could actually be that, was Snoop. He had “Deep Cover” out that was it. We were there
putting it together with Dr. Dre, grooming him you know? And I want to say this in DMX’s case he was
the only one that went against me, everybody else was on my team. DMX was my friend first, we were
friends man… And then… it just went crazy… I don’t have no hard feelings against him because the world we live in doesn’t govern itself.

As a grown man looking at him, it’s sad. It’s very sad that we can’t coexist. Can’t be a wolf and a pit-bull, it’s crazy bro. So, I send him off with great admiration. I cherish the good times we had, the little bit of good times we had on the same side. That’s all I can do.

RRX: That’s a good way to look at it. Now, recently there was a reunion, we had Hit Squad, Def Squad,
the Method Man, Redman Versus and you showed up for that.

KSOLO: Yeah that was a good time. Redman is special in my life, to my children, he’s just very special to
all of us. I thank his mother for bringing him into the world and father. I would tell him before he even
knew, that he was going to outsell everybody. I just knew it. He just had it, I knew he had it.

RRX: Yeah, he did. Sometimes you just see the light in people.

KSOLO: Yeah, I was paying attention. He was always like my little brother. We were born on the same
day, we just had that energy. So, he brought me up, I flew up April 16th, the 17th we went to eat and
then we went and did Versus, me, him and my son Vaughn; we hung out.

RRX: It was really cool is that you brought your son with you man.

KSOLO: Victorious Vaughn Wolf, when he’s in trouble it’s Vaughn, when he’s not it’s Kevin. DJ Scratch
has been doing stuff with him, Redman produced one of his singles. A student in the game, he’s coming
out again. He’s on Road Warrior Records. You can check him out on roadwarriorrecords.net. His record
will be coming out real soon. I’ve got another album coming out with Spartan Academy myself. We’re
just going to do what we do, have fun, we’re not trying to compete with anybody. We’re shooting the
videos now, getting everything ready to launch the whole brand. What else? We’re working on a couple
of reality shows. We’re just making our voice known again, we’re going to pick up where we left off.
Waste Management Incorporated is where I’m going to be dropping. Vaughn Wolf will be dropping on
Road Warrior. We’ll present both projects and see what happens.

RRX: And today we see less timelessness but I see what you’re doing and it’s about the music.

KSOLO: We come from the era where the message is in the music and the parents always mattered. The
cheerleaders mattered in my era. You come home you couldn’t say the stuff now they’re saying on
record. Even Redman, he’s younger than me but he didn’t shame his cheerleaders. He always made a
record that his mother could listen to and be proud to tell the people in the room that’s her son. I think
that’s important, I think Hip Hop needs to do that. We have to dial back to where we get our gifts from
and honor that. Honor the music don’t mess it up with that kind of rhetoric that kills off the generation after it’s coming.

RRX: I totally agree with that.

KSOLO: It’s like when I make my music I think about the nuns that raised me at the Salvation Army.
Spellbound was written for people like that, so when I did it, I could be in the company of these people
and not be ostracized because of my language. So, when I made it they knew that signature sound,

there was no profanity and none of that stuff that was going to taint my performance. Back then in
those days, I thank God that I had so many people pulling for me. Uncle Frank, Uncle Walter Lee, Aunt Ernestine (to name a few).

RRX: Any last words for the fans and people who have dreams like yours.

KSOLO: Keep God first and everything else will fall into place.