Although I ignore pretty much everything that turns up randomly in my email, the notes for this album caught my eye:
Shoutout to New York for giving me my entire style of production that I essentially ripped off from producers much better than myself. Shoutout to my worthless deadbeat of a father for abandoning my mother but leaving me well over 2000 records to sample from because you had no means to take them.
Turns out the album was a good listen, so I reached out to its producer and had a quick talk to him to find out his story.
Robbie: Can you tell me a little bit about yourself?
Cole James Cash: I live in the Bay Area, Ive lived here my whole life, with the exception of when I was in the service. New York rap is almost all I listen to. Im heavily influenced by guys like DJ Cam, DJ Krush, Ninja Tune, Mo Wax, so its been really rocky for me as far as gaining rappers to see my vision in the Bay Area.
You re-chop some classic breaks on the project, which is always good to hear.
You thought I was out here trappin, whoadie? [laughs] I tried to have an entire story that I really ripped-off from a movie called The Price of Glory. I have a lot of fight archive footage, so the second half of the album I tried to apply that to the last fight of the movie. You could say I re-scored it.
How long have you been making music?
I used to perform under a different name. I used to be known as C.I.A., I started off as a house music/drum and bass DJ. Are you familiar with C-Bo and Killa Tay? My friend from back in the day, Dobad The Assailant, he encouraged me to start producing. I got affiliated with him, Killa Tay started this label. C-Bo went and signed with Young Buck remember when he was starting his shyt back in 08? What ended-up happening was
nothing. I made all these beats, I had all these projects, I met all these rappers E-40, The Mob Figgaz, AP-9, The Jacka they all loved my stuff.
Then what happened?
I started sending my demo to all these labels and rappers but got no response, so I decided, You know what? All these people that are making it arent making it on talent, Theyre making it on image!. So Im going to take my favorite comic book character, Cole Cash, and add my name to it to avoid copyright issues, Ima start wearing a mask and obscuring my identity and Im gonna start creating concept albums.
What are your influences?
The second Onyx album, All That We Have Is Us, The Genius first album and the Group Home album had a huge influence on me as a teenager. I didnt hear Nas Illmatic until 2002, because Nas wasnt big over here. My dream artists to work with would be Ghostface Killah, Kool G Rap, Nas, AZ and E-40, because Ive always respected his work ethic. He had the entire East Coast hatin on him.
That story about E-40 setting-up Biggie was crazy.
Were very close-knit out here, we dont take well to being disrespected. No New York MC has ever successfully shytted on the Bay Area. Biggie had shytted on E-40 for some small reason, and basically he brought Biggie out to a show in Sacramento and there was nobody there. They set him up they were gonna kill him, until Biggie begged for his life.
What else are you into?
Back in college I knew a couple of porn stars. One of em was AVN Award Winner, Veronica Jett. I like big girls. Rest in peace to the big homie Killa Sha, but me and him have similar tastes. Hes going much bigger than me, Im in the 170-220 lbs range. To be honest, the average female out here weighs that. One of the ones Im the coolest with goes by the name of Desiree Devine. Shes probably 6 feet, 250 [lbs]. Thats the homie right there.
