Article From Tantrum
Magazine
By Charles B. Creekmur,
Jr.
Tonight is another one of those nights. A hot summer night in the city where tension is climbing steadily. New Jersey native Fatal and his entourage of wild ass brothers prepare to perform at a small community center in the innermost city of Wilmington, Delaware. Nappy headed children scamper about the streets, up way past their bed time and the teenagers grow up a little bit faster tonight. The crowd outside is fronting on the $10.00 cost of the show and only a few trickle in the heavily guarded doors. Eventually a couple hundred die-hard fans will enter and get rocked aback by Fatal.
Seeing Fatal perform is disturbingly similar to watching his old mentor and friend Tupac Shakur thug it out on stage. He sports many of the same tattoos, including the "Thug Life" arched across the stomach. And even though Pac is dead, Thug Life is very alive. Fatal talks at great lengths about Tupac and Kadafi, Pac's cousin who were both murdered. Kadafi was murdered in his New Jersey home apparently because he prepared to testify as to who murdered Tupac. Both unsolved deaths still haunt Fatal and it's evident because it dominates his conversation when interviewed.
He is often assailed with criticism from those who say he resembles 'Pac too much, in sight and sound. But those who say he is a deception are mistaken. They don't know that he and Kadafi visited 'Pac two hours everyday while 'Pac was incarcerated for rape. At times, he even refers to 'Pac in the present tense, as if he were still alive. And that he often receives word of revenge and death threats from cats that love Biggie Smalls just a little too much.
His crew packs heat wherever they go, even to little urban community centers like this. Even though during much of his show he rips some of 'Pac's greatest hits, the crowd of teens also know the lyrics to his album, IN THE LINE OF FIRE, word for word as well. They even seem to pretend that it is Tupac Shakur before them. It would seem that the stage is the only place where Fatal is completely comfortable.
C.Creekmur: What are
you giving people?
Fatal: I just gave (the
people) some shit. I was just letting niggas know. I came home. My man
'Pac got killed. My man Kadafi got killed. I ain't get hit. It ain't like
I bounced on Death Row either 'cause I'll still be on the Row if i felt
like rockin' that. I ain't feel like rockin' or rappin' then. Fuck rapping.
Fuck rocking. (getting louder) My niggas died! I went the fuck home. When
Kadafi died, when 'Pac died, we left California. Me and Kadafi, we were
on some straight Jersey shit. Kadafi died in Jersey so we ain't never
want to go back to Cali. It ain't like I left the world. I still be chillin'
over there 'cause it was dope over there. It was love. Even when I go back
now, shit is still off the hook! All the niggas down with 'Pac are cool
with me. I guess all the people that are enemies with him are enemies with
me, but I don't give a fuck.
Being from New Jersey,
Do you ever have problems on the East Coast?
Niggas playa hated on me
one time with that Mic Geronimo bullshit.
What do you mean?
That (song) "Usual Suspects"
I guess they felt I stole his show 'cause I said, "One deep from Jersey
on the Island doing sticks." So they felt a nigga from Jersy can't go to
Rykers Island, but it ain't nothing like that, jail is jail.
With all the heat surrounding
Tupac, did that affect your album?
Hell, yeah. It affect my
album. I don't know the whole shit on how it affected it. Everybody knows
what's going on, politics is politics. Everybody knows who controls New
York, who controls the radio. (Everybody knows) who's funny, who's twisted,
who's gay and shit. If I had it like (those in power), I would control
it too. Ain't nothing wrong with that, but I got to show them that 'Pac'
s shit ain't never gonna die. I gotta be strong. The mainstream to me ain't
really nothing. As long as I got the streets, mufuckas can't shut me down
'cause these niggas ( points to his crew) gonna be here. Other niggas is
losing they job, hiding in Hawaii or staying home. Fuck that staying home.
In terms of your career,
do you feel the whole Tupac situation helped or hindered it?
(Yelling) Oh, hell no! That's
the best thing that could've happened to me in my life. On the real, I
don't care what else happens to me. That's the best thing that could've
happened to me because I wouldn't be able to provide for my kid, if i had
one. I was able to come up outta that slump when my nigga died. Pac died.
That fucked me up, but if it wasn't for Kadafi, there would be no (connection
between) me and 'Pac. So I'm saying, "Fuck rap." What the fuck is rap?
It ain't got nothing to do with niggas dying.
Does that scare you,
the fact that those close to you have been murdered like that?
Nah. It don't scare me 'cause
I know shit like that happens everyday to mufuckas. I can't fear it because
it will make me more paranoid. As long as I don't smoke no weed...keeps
me paranoid. I stay one point when I'm paranoid.
What do you want people
to get out of you're album?
Really if niggas don't like
it, I don't give a fuck. It's a well rounded album. I ain't gonna rate
my album on no conceited shit, but to me, it's a well rounded album. It
ain't gonna be easy. I dissed the King of fuckin' New York (Biggie Smalls).
It ain't gonna be easy. And that little bit of play I'm getting now is
suitable by me.
I see some east coast
cats are on the album.
Freddie Foxxx, Swif-n-Wesson,
Cormega, Foxy...you know certain people don't care about that (East-West
Coast) shit, they chill with me. They got love for me. I be in the hood.
The problem is them (playa style rappers) don't be at home. They be somewhere
in Manhattan, living it up. I'll be in their hood soaking up all the love.
Downtown in Brooklyn handing out 'Pac posters for the first time and niggas
is taking 'em on some real "Against All Odds" shit. I ain't trying to be
naming my man in every phrase or nothin' but that's how it gotta be.
What inspires you to
to write lyrics?
I be in the slumps still.
I be on the block and shit. Chillin' with niggas. It's like I got two jobs.
I gotta be loyal to my dogs. First things first and then i gotta build
off my niggas 'cause that's real reality.
Do you feel like rappers
got away from that?
Hell yeah. Too many niggas
are on some growing money shit. So all the Rollies and the nice clothes,
that shit is dope but, come on, don't take it to that extreme. Niggas ain't
making that much money.
Are The Outlawz still
together?
No doubt. 'Pac's mind was
too strong to let niggas break up. He bonded niggas. I wasn't no little
muthafucka, I was on the front line. I just recognize mad, mad, mad rappers
is faggots. I'll tell a muthafucka that in the studio. But that nigga 'Pac?
He keeps away from the streets because your friends will kill you. That's
probably my only weakness, 'cause I love my niggas.