Juvenile scored the biggest hit of his career with 1998’s “Back That Azz Up,” but he recently shared that not everything was smooth sailing during its recording with Mannie Fresh.
In a new episode of Uproxx’s Fresh Pair, the New Orleans rapper revealed he was “at war” with the producer, as he felt that Mannie made a beat that wasn’t his style.
“It was like kinda like a war between me and Mannie Fresh,” Juve said. “I hear the beat and I’m like, ‘That’s not what I rap to, bro. I see where you at with it.’ Sometimes the producers, they be trying to beat us out some of the time.
“I ain’t have time to write so I took one word, the ‘yeah’ – same thing with ‘Huh.’ I took one word and I just finessed it all the way through. Don’t matter what I’m saying in between! Long as I end with ‘yeah,’ I’m good.”
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You can view the full interview below.
“Back That Azz Up” was famously sampled by Drake for his 2011 album Take Care, and the New Orleans legend is still reaping the benefits over a decade later.
During a conversation with Jeremy Hecht for HipHopDX last month, Juvenile recalled hearing Drizzy’s reworked version “Practice” when it first came through and confirmed he’s still receiving royalties from the sample, as well as from others who have used the beat (which includes Beyoncé, City Girls, Kanye West and Ty Dolla $ign and more.)
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“I was told it wasn’t gonna be like mine and they were like, ‘Listen to it,’” he said. “And I listened to it like, ‘This is Drake, muthafucka. I don’t need to fucking listen to it. Let’s clear it. It’s Drake!’ And they were like, ‘Nah, listen to it.’ And I listened to it and was like, ‘Okay, he made his own creative way of it. How much?’ [laughs]
He continued: “Nah but seriously man, Drake always do things his own way, so I wasn’t expecting him to do it the way I did it. He did it his own way and it worked. I actually do [still get random checks from that]. Shout out to all the cats that wanna sample it. Me and Mannie Fresh still own our publishing and everything so please, sample it! ”
You can check out the convo here.
