We giving out trees.
We gon’ give out a tree to somebody that want it in they apartment.
Put they kids’ gifts under it.
Did you always look forward to this time of year?
Yeah.
For the gifts.
Me and Lil' Jai used to run down the steps.
You know they had all the shits draped out.
Like a spread.
My people worked damn hard to make sure we had enjoyable Christmases because they used
to love their Christmases.
(singing) Frosty the saw man, he had came out here cutting trees.
Are we doing movie magic?
Like just three swipes, and then somebody comes and chainsaw that shit to the end and
we just, “Oh yeah!”
Go down, and just cut, like this.
I’m gonna be able to do this.
Wassup baby!
We chopping down trees in this bitch!
Goddamnit.
Fuck that shit.
I’m not a outdoors man.
I helped a little bit.
I think we can bend it now.
Tilt it back.
It’s chopped!
It’s fucking done!
Ayy man, I’m so glad you ain’t pick out the big tree.
Hell yeah, goddamn.
And then if you think about it, if we giving this shit away, who the fuck gon’ fit that
big ass shit in they apartment?
Now you enjoy giving gifts, man.
You dropped the ‘#1HappyHoliday’ EP.
I feel like you been planning that for a long time.
I called Tunde just out the blue.
I was like, “What you think about me flying my mama out here so she can sing a Christmas
song with me.”
He was like, “It’ll be dope.”
And I hung up the phone and I called my mama.
She was like, “Alright I’m with it.”
I know she was a gospel singer.
Still is a gospel singer, but she was in a gospel group as you were growing up.
During the New Horizon Music Ministries.
You know the services, she’ll be like, “I want my son to come up here and sing with me."
We’ll sing like “Eye On The Sparrow” together.
I started smoking weed.
The summer of 11th grade going to into the 12th.
Fuck this man.
I wanna rap man.
I got in trouble.
Fucked up grades or whatever.
I changed my report card, and my mama went for it or whatever.
I was changing niggas report cards and shit.
Got put on punishment.
All I could do was just go to work, and then come back home.
So I started skipping work to go to the fucking booth.
Man.
Three weeks was up.
She said, “Mook where the fuck is the check?”
She called corporate on Monday.
She said, “Wait.
Let me think to call the local office.”
Good God Almighty.
It was bad.
And now she on your album?
And now it’s lit!
I used to bug her for money all the fucking time.
You know it’s a blessing to be able to return it.
I think that was one of the most exciting times I had in the studio.
Just watching my mama get her shit off.
I think, too we’re in kind of a very important time.
I think with streaming and the way music is changing and the way albums are being rolled out.
You kinda did an unorthodox move by re-releasing your album with the deluxe version.
Usually the deluxe version comes out at the same time.
You can spend $9.99 or you can spend $13.99 and you get what you want.
But you breathed new life into this album.
It’s not time for the second album yet.
I made a lot of music off the mood of the crazy spring and summer that we had.
Why sit on them, and then also reintroduce many people to the album that they never heard before.
Probably my favorite song, ‘cause it just showed a whole ‘nother side of you, was “Daddy Pt. 2.”
Very heavy and vulnerable.
My biological father never been in my life.
To the point where like, I have nobody’s name for the father on my birth certificate.
Like I’m literally a bastard.
It was a point where my mother found my biological uncle’s profile Facebook and they got to talking.
And ironically, he was always dibbling and dabbling with the music world.
He stays in Atlanta.
You know, you cool.
If I run across him, he cool.
You know?
But this father guy, once word got out in 2009, this nigga was like he dealing with
some shit, gotta go to China or some shit like that for like a couple months and then
see about it when he got - Man that shit broke my whole shit.
And at that moment I was like, “Yo it’s fuck that nigga for life.”
So you know in 2015, once shit started rolling and shit, suddenly somebody pops up.
A guy named Michael Jenkins.
“How my son?”
The fuck?
Like fuck that shit nigga.
He didn’t pop up or look to even wanna have a relationship.
Until after, we talking about after “Broccoli,” after “Cha Cha.”
After “Cha Cha” late 2015, know what I’m saying.
It was like, “Damn.
This shit all over the place.
That’s my son forreal.”
I was from four to twelve?
Right. He could have found you.
Fuck ass nigga bruh!
Sitting, reflecting on it like, “Fuck.
That nigga really did not give a fuck about seeing niggas ‘til shit got lit.”
Man let’s talk about another song off the album.
You know, “Eyeyieyie.”
I wanna talk about Idnit, man like…
It sounds like he’s the ultimate wingman.
He is!
And people get so, so hurt if they do not receive his love.
He gon’ let you know if he fuck with your energy or not.
‘Cause he know me.
We like the same.
It’s been randoms come through, “Oh your dog doesn’t like me!”
It’s like seven of y’all. Y’all just…
You know with the holidays comes also a new year and new beginnings.
One of my favorite collaborations off the tape, off the original version of the album
was “WiFi.”
Like Erykah and DRAM got such chemistry.
I want more.
Yeah.
It’s a album in the works.
We’re working on a album.
We’re working on a project dude!
What does a DRAM and Erykah album look like?
Very conversational.
Topics that you really don’t wanna push too hard on, but you can because if you can
artistically word it, and make it digestible but still felt...maybe, you know.
Without sounding like I’m metaphysical, individual.
I feel like that’s how you approach a lot of your songwriting.
Another one of my favorite songs of you is “Cute.”
It set it off right there.
Like DRAM said if so I ain’t have to.
Yeah, right right.
On God, yo.
Somebody hit me up like, "Yo, I got my girlfriend thanks to this, I just slid in her inbox like
this what I think of you in the link and she bit."
Love spreading DRAM, Big Babes.
Will we get a album from you next year?
Yeah.
2018 of course.
You gon’ get a whole lot of shit.
If there’s one thing that you want people to know about DRAM, something that you feel
like they might not have gotten yet.
You know what I’m saying.
I am here to stay.
I’m really here.
On God.
Like, I’m here.
Definitely this tree.
This was special.
This holiday is special.
I can’t wait light up my holiday tree, when I get the fuck back in the goddamn.
(singing) We have a gift to lay under.
We wait for this. It's not summer.
A winter time in a Christmas tree.
Is all that I ...
Fuck that. GOLF WANG!