Iraq War veteran Jase Cook will soon be throwing his hat into the rap game with his upcoming album, Troublesome ’08: The Life. “I was glad to be traveling, and not being back home doing ignorant stuff. I just had to get my grown man mind together,” Cook says of his initial time with the U.S. Army.
“A lot of my views come from being in that environment. I’ve been around the world, seen how different governments operate. My last CD was driven off of the anger I had when I was in the Army,” admits Jase, who lost 15 friends in service during their military tours around the world.
Troublesome ’08: The Life, is tentatively set to be released on January 29th. Currently fielding offers from majors for distribution, Jase spoke with HipHopDX about the album. The rapper revealed that the majority of the production on the album would be handled by South Carolina’s Juice.
“I don’t record songs for the army,” says Jase of his music. “I don’t put too much focus on it. That’s part of me of course; I use that in there. [But] I try to make sure there’s a purpose behind every song. There’s not no meaningless music on there – there’s music for everyone’s enjoyment. I’m not gonna try to bore people, or [oversell] the army thing. It is apparent though – the last song and a couple references throughout you’ll hear me reference it – but it’s not the basis of the album.”
“Over there, we try to entertain ourselves,” says Jase of music as a diversion from the difficulties of war. “Because we know, once we pull those headphones off, it’s back to work.”
Despite the welcome distraction of music, Jase made no secret of how he felt about many of today’s Hip Hop artists. “Today’s artists, to me, from what we’ve been hearing…is really not going nowhere. It’s like people just getting’ into the studio and putting songs together – and that’s it. I don’t like just going to do songs, I like going and making statements.”
“When you think about the war, it’s people like you and I…it’s people that volunteered their time, and have no guarantee of coming back. So anyone that supports that, they got a got heart and a good head on their soldier,” said Jase, concerning the mixed support that the War in Iraq – and the troops fighting it – has gotten. “And some people don’t support it because of the political [aspects] of it, which is understandable. But at the same time, you’ve got innocent people going over there fulfilling their duty and their job. So I think everyone should support it in that sense. We didn’t ask to go over there; if you don’t support the message behind it, at least support the troops over there.”
Troublesome ’08: The Life is tentatively set to hit stores January 29.
