Marc Live may not be a household name, but the New York native remains both one of the most enduring and one of the most creative forces in Hip Hop. The front-man for early ’90s Rap outfit Raw Breed, Marc has seen both major label peaks and industry valleys. Maintaining lasting relationships with his Analog Brothers Ice-T and Kool Keith, as well as the Sa-Ra Creative Partners, this industry veteran remains well-connected and well-respected.
Speaking with HipHopDX early this week in celebration of his nrew album, Episode III: The Revenge of Marc Rippin’, the veteran speaks about lasting relationships, bruised egos and the devastating changes to a culture and an industry that once embraced creativity.
HipHopDX: This is your twentieth year in Rap. What’s changed the most? What do you miss, and at the same time, what’s really helped within those 20 years?
Marc Live: Well I think the financial scope of music has changed. The digital market killed the business…its as if every Macy’s or Walmart went out of business and you’re trying to sell clothes and people just download shirts and jeans…they would be suffering also. Fifteen years ago, Warner Brothers gave my group, Raw Breed $450,000 for a [Blood Sweet & Tears] album budget; now the label won’t give you anything. It’s like they’re signing you to fail. I miss the New York raw Hip Hop. Everything coming out of New York [now] sucks. Guys are doing Down South records and trying to sound like Mystical. [There is] no innovation. What helped me in the 20 years I’ve been in the game is my stage show and knowledge of the business and that’s why I’m moving more into the management and the executive game in the music industry, [like fans have seen with Diddy].
DX: Throughout your career, you’ve maintained a strong working relationship with both Ice-T and Kool Keith. We, as fans, saw that come alive in the Analog Brothers’ Pimp To Eat album. At the height of the underground, that project really shocked a lot of people. To what do you attribute the collaborative loyalty with those two guys, and how do you look back at that album?
Marc Live: That was a great project, really special. It started in a garage in South Central [Los Angeles] and ended up being this amazing, crazy album. It was so powerful that the group broke up before we even released [Pimp To Eat]. But I will never forget Ice-T‘s mansion studio in the Hollywood hills and chicks topless and lots of gin and vodka. It was wild, but that was the formula. [Kool] Keith and I have been working together for 15 years, and Ice-T about the same, I’m both [of] their on-stage partners and have traveled the world with them. I owe them both my career, so I will be down with them to the wheels fall off.
DX: Tell me about The Revenge of Marc Rippin’. The song titles and themes are largely about revenge, returns, owning New York. Where is this demeanor rooted in?
Marc Live: Well, yes, “Marc Rippin” in my alter-ego from the Raw Breed days, and I wanted to bring that character back. I felt Hip Hop was lacking that early-’90s appeal, so I wanted to really have some raw topics based in a New York City setting. So [the concept is that] I’ve been away for 10 years, and they find me in the islands [with] the straw hat and bodyguards on the cover and they bring me back to take over Hip Hop…very Goodfellas, Godfather-type innuendos..but really just raw Hip Hop.
DX: Longtime fans will note the Tim Dog diss on the album. Care to tell us why you’re going at Tim, after projects together in the past?
Marc Live: Well, Tim [Dog] was a guy I looked up to, and is one of the original member of Ultramagnetic MCs. [All that being said], he just lives in the past and has a damaged ego, so he sabotaged a lot of things and alienated the crew, so then he did a diss record about Keith and myself…so I responded.
DX: You worked with Sa-Ra Creative Partners on this project. Do you see any parallels in the careers you both have had, bi-coastal, lots of projects and appearances? Can you describe the collaborative process with them?
Marc Live: Well Sa-Ra [Creative Partners] is like Prince & The Revolution. You go in the studio and they make the tracks from scratch, they ask you what vibe you want, what sound keyboards or samples…singing or rapping. [Then they] tell you to go to the store and eat something, and in two hours the room is shaking and the track is laid and done, and you’re like, “Wow, these guys are geniuses.” The rhyme just writes itself. I like working with those guys. I actually started Ommas’s career when he was 17, he worked on the first Raw Breed demos for Ice and Priority Records, and we later signed to Warner Brothers and Shafiq was a member of Raw Breed, and our main producer under TR.Love from Ultramagnetic, so we are all family and will be doing things together for years to come.
Purchase Episode III The Revenge Of Marc Rippin by Marc Live
