Tomorrow, August 28th, marks the online release of Chamillionaire‘s volume 4 of Mixtape Messiah, the Houston emcee’s acclaimed series that led him to superstardom, a Forbes list and digital sales history.
On the heels of leaking the mixtape’s track “Internet Nerds Revenge” [click to listen], a track that’s second verse is devoted to HipHopDX‘s loyal readers and commenters, the emcee considered his career without the Internet. “My career would definitely be different,” began Chamillionaire [click to read]. “I definitely don’t think I’d be as successful as I am. Of course, I always put stuff out in the streets – the mixtapes and stuff like that. But to sell as much as I did digitally, there’s something goin’ on online. You can kind of tell that when I blast out a freestyle, people are paying attention. I definitely have a big online fanbase.” He added that he has kept a active website running prior to the days of MySpace, for communicating with his fans. “Those fans are still fooling around online. They run out there and support me and argue with somebody who says I’m wack. I feel like all that contributes to my success.”
The mixtape is releasing exclusively through Cham‘s Chamillionaire.com. At midnight EST on the 28th, the download will be available [click here].
The aforementioned song, “Internet Nerds Revenge” ends with the suicide of a disgruntled rap listener attacking Chamillionaire via message board posting. Clearly a joke in the context of the song, the Houston superstar admitted that he notes a change in who is using the Internet in 2008. “A lot of the people online…I’m kinda making jokes about it and everything, but I kind of understand how it works. I’m not really mad. Some people hit me up saying, ‘Oh Cham, don’t take what everybody’s saying to heart.’ I’m really not. I’m just letting people know that I actually am paying attention to it. I am looking at what people say. I’m not too cool to say I log onto HipHopDX.com and check out what people are saying.” The emcee encourages his peers to follow suit. “It’s very important that people pay attention [online], ’cause that’s where Hip Hop is going right now. They say, ‘Pimpin’ ain’t dead, it moved over to the web,’ That’s how I feel about Hip Hop right now.” Chamillionaire then noted the success of Soulja Boy as a testament to this.
Whether on HipHopDX.com or otherwise, Chamillionaire encouraged his self-appointed critics to continue. “I actually appreciate the fans that are saying that stuff – even the people that are talking trash, ’cause honestly I’m one of the people that can take constructive criticism. I know when people are sayin’ [I’m] doing too much of [something], or [who I should work with]. Sometimes you’ll be wondering who’s a good person to do a feature with, then you’ll go online and [see]. I’ll actually take the time to go and try to find that artist because the fans said it.”
As one of the leading mixtape-makers of present day, Chamillionaire admitted that his fourth installment in the Mixtape Messiah series avoids shock value. “With Mixtape Messiah, every time I drop one, it’s really shocking. I’ll be honest and go on record in saying that this one is not as shocking as all the others. Really, I was kinda upset at the whole Texas movement. Everybody was having egos, nobody was working with each other. So I said, ‘Alright, I’m about to wake up this whole Texas movement.’ It wasn’t really dedicated to fans, it was something that was gonna make everybody get on their toes and go, ‘Ought oh, is Chamillionaire talking about me?‘” The shock value content was halted when Texas rap pioneer Pimp C died late last year [click to read]. “I was supposed to drop it at the time that Pimp C passed, but I didn’t drop it then because I felt it would have been bad taste,” he says, noting that the UGK member was pushing for Texas unity even in his final days. “After that, I started changing it.” The emcee notes that Slim Thug, Trae and other rappers that may have been not cooperating, came together to work, resulting in content on Mixtape Messiah Volume 4. “A lot of times I’ll do skits where I’ll be talkin’, explaining stuff. I kinda listened to it, felt like I was doing too much explaining. I know a lot of people don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes. But if I’m bumpin’ a CD, I know I just want to hear some hot music. You don’t gotta explain. We’ll leave that up to the blogs and Internet websites to do that explainin’.”
