What do you mean when you say “rap is watered down”?

Hip-hop was started off of shit like this. Rapping about what’s going on in the community, rapping about the culture. There’s been a lot of stuff that I wanted to speak on and Nip wanted to speak on. But me and Nip, we get blackballed a lot already, just based on being who we are and representing what we represent. Shows get cancelled, police always tripping on us, we losing a lot of money type shit.

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But every time something happens, me and Nip always be like, “Ay bro, we gotta do something, bro.” We always talk about it but when it’s time to really do something, we be like, “Damn, but if we do this, they really gonna shut us down.” So at first we were a little hesitant about stepping forward but with this Donald Trump shit, we were like, “Fuck all that. We gon’ do this and we’re gonna take whatever consequences come with it.” It was a challenge for me because that’s not my norm. People look at me like YG the turnt-up dude, hit singles and all that. And, yeah, that’s me, but I’m for my people, too.



You had to consider the possible consequences, but what do you think would be the best possible outcome?

Everybody gotta vote. I can’t go tell you who you should vote for because I don’t know what you got going on or what you tryna get. Me and my homies got a lot of homies that are in jail for real shit but the time they got — they shouldn’t have got all that time. Some homies got life sentences, you feel me? Hillary, she's with that life sentence shit. Death penalty, all that shit. So it’s like, “Damn. We got a lotta homies up in there, so that ain’t solid.” Each candidate is pushing certain shit and has their own shit so you gotta do your homework before you vote. Sometimes I think it’s all fixed, anyway. We’ll never know ‘cause we’re all the way down here, so we just gotta play it safe.

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One thing you’ve been talking about that’s unique to L.A. — and that’s super relevant in light of Trump’s policies — is the relationship between African-Americans and people of Mexican descent.

First things first, a lot of my fans are Hispanic. They’re supporters buying the albums, fucking with the clothing line, buying tickets to all the shows. They’re a large percentage of my fanbase, for sure. Then on top of that, like you said, being from where I’m from, we grew up with Hispanic people as our neighbors. And on the side of that, blacks and Mexicans in L.A. and on the west coast where gangs are at, we got a love-hate relationship. There’s gangbanging politics. It’s a lot of Hispanic hoods and gangs that have beef with black gangs, so there’s a lot of shootings and a lot of killings and a lot of beef going on. But at the same time, you go home and your nextdoor neighbor might be Hispanic.

That’s why we were like, “Fuck this, we’re gonna say something. We know what it is. We grew up with ‘em, we out here with ‘em. They supporting us on some rap shit.” I’m like, “Oh, ain’t nobody doing no real shit about this for y’all? Nobody speaking up like that for y’all? Alright, say no more, don’t trip, I got you.” And they love it, too. I walk down the street and it’s everybody going, “YG! Fuck Trump! Good lookin’, foo’.” It’s real love out there.

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It seems like you feel a responsibility to represent.

Yeah, because I’m concerned about the culture. I got a platform and a game. I got, like, people who look up to me, who listen to me. That type of shit comes with being a hip-hop artist period. It depends on your outlook on the game. I ain't telling people to go do no motherfucking crazy shit, or to make shit not safe. It's just, like, respect the game, though. Respect the situation, respect the culture, respect the lifestyle, respect the struggle.