People: Kid Cudi Interview with Complex
The homie JLP from Complex interviewed Kid Cudi and asked him some of the tough question we all had on our minds for the past couple of months
Peep some of the interview:
When it comes to young rappers, it seems like Kid Cudi might be a bit better off than the rest of the gang. Not only did Cudi just ink a deal with Universal Motown, but he also has music’s biggest star, Kanye West, in his corner. Cudi and Complex have long had a relationship (he actually modeled for us back in 2006), but after we tapped him and his homies in a blog post and he responded, we weren’t sure if things were cool…
That is, until Cudi came through the eckoplex yesterday for his first press day, and he kept it realer than most. In this exclusive interview, the Double-O representer talks about how he wants to be bigger than Kanye and Lil Wayne, the screaming match he had with Wale last week, and that rumored Reebok situation that went down in Phoenix. Yup, we back friends like Puffy and Steve Stoute…
Interview by Joe La Puma
Complex: Obviously there was a little push back from the blog post we did about the new rapper retail deals…
Kid Cudi: Even in my post I said I have no problem with Complex. It’s been my favorite magazine. On one of my songs, “Cleveland is the Reason,” I actually shouted you guys out and I recorded that song in 2006. So when I say “I want my closet Complex like the magazine,” I was really dreaming of getting fresh. And I remember always looking in Complex and looking for the fresh shit. But when I saw that, it was kind of brought to my attention…like, I’m all good with jokes, I like cracking jokes, I’m a silly dude, we all know that, but I didn’t feel too roasted. I was like, that was an attempt to be funny but it just wasn’t funny. I was just standing up for my homies that were on the list. It wasn’t really like I was standing up for myself, and I wasn’t really attacking the magazine. I was just attacking this kid that thought he was being witty. But I wasn’t shitting on him. I was just like [silly voice] mannn you know…that’s not right man, that’s not cool.
Complex: Fair enough, we cool, ha. How crazy has the past year and a half been for you? I remember watching you at the T-mobile event and not many people knowing you, now you’re fresh off from shutting down SXSW with Kanye…
Kid Cudi: It’s definitely a mind fuck. Literally, since I’ve had “Day N’ Night,” it’s been bong, bong, bong. I know some people are like, man he blew up over night. Those muthafuckas ain’t follow my career. It was always a steady little pace from giving “Day N’ Night” to A-Trak at the “Stronger” premiere video release party, to having him play it twice, to ‘Ye standing there talking to people, and me from a distance trying to get his attention and pointing to my ear and saying “yo listen, that’s my song,” and him nodding back and giving me the smile like “yeah that’s what up.” He was like, “Yo, you have a lot of shit I’ve heard that I fuck with,” but nothing came out of it, but it was letting me know that I was on the right track. After he came back from Australia, he contacted Plain Pat and say he wanted to fly me out to Hawaii to work on the Blueprint 3. So literally, in my brain, I feel like I’m on this rollercoaster that’s not ending anytime soon and it’s just fresh as fuck.
Complex: So you talked about working with ’Ye—how much of an advantage do you think aligning yourself with him gives you over other young rappers like Charles Hamilton or Mickey Factz, who might not have that major co-sign?
Kid Cudi: Basically Kanye is probably the biggest fucking artist in the universe right now, and me being with such a dope tastemaker complements my taste in music. Whatever he does and whatever he touches is amazing and being a new artist and having that person say, “Hey everybody, this muthafucka is dope.” I mean, the talent was already there of course, “Day N’ Night” was already established and shit like that, but at the same time, it definitely turned the right ears to it. So it’s definitely an advantage for me.
Complex: The Universal deal. Why did it make sense for you to sign with them?
Kid Cudi: It wasn’t about the money, because I really don’t give a fuck about the money. Honestly, I don’t even have to do music anymore, I can just live off of 808’s and Heartbreak checks and “Day N’ Night” checks and be good. Then I have the HBO show in August. I went with Universal Motown because I know Sylvia Rhone believed in my vision. Like, Sylvia is going to go hard for me and I know it. She was ready to put her career on the line for this stranger, ultimately because she believed in my shit, not because I had this big song. Because she already told me that it’s about longevity. There are artists like a Lil Wayne that’s just going to blow the fuck up and just kill shit. And she knows that I can play the role of a Lil Wayne, or a Kanye and be as equally successful and that’s why she was like, I don’t give a fuck about what anybody else is talking about, I want this kid to do this. And that’s why I was with the deal.
Complex: What kind of expectations do you have for your career? Do you think you can be as big as Wayne or as big as Kanye?
Kid Cudi: My whole thing is to not to be as big as Kanye or Lil Wayne, but to be bigger. It’s all about progression. If I just set the goal to want to be like Kanye and Lil Wayne, that’s setting my shit to a limit and it’s selling myself short. I’m pretty sure when Kanye was aspiring to do his music, he wasn’t like, I want to be as big as Jay. He was like, Nah, I want to be bigger then Jay. It’s not necessarily saying that you are better than them, it’s just setting that bar. If I never am better then Kanye, in my brain, I’m always going to be trying to be, forever and ever until the day that I die.
For the rest of the interview visit Complex
