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[courtesy hurricanechrisonline.com] Hurricane Chris Interview
Author: Adam Bernard


Unless you were living under a rock in 2007, and a very heavy rock at that, there's little chance that you didn't the phrase "A Bay Bay" at some point. In fact, you probably heard it a lot. The Hurricane Chris song launched the then 18 year old from the local fame of his hometown of Shreveport, LA, to national superstardom. In 2009 Hurricane Chris has the clubs buzzing again with "Halle Berry (She's Fine)" and "Headboard," which are the first two singles off of his sophomore effort, Unleashed. With Unleashed due out later this month, RapReviews caught up with the king of ratchet and found out he's not just about making the clubs go crazy, he's also dedicated to giving back to his community, and he'll whoop your ass at Call of Duty. Suspicious about that last item? Well, you can hop online and take him on yourself, he gave us his PS3 handle.


Adam Bernard: Hey, what's going on, man?
Hurricane Chris: I'm good, sittin here playing a game. I'm on that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. I'm doing the online thing.

AB: You're playing online? A lot of our readers may want to lock horns with you. If you don't mind revealing, what's your handle?
HC: I'm on Playstation 3 and my ID name is SmokeHisAss. I'm the best in the world. Come get at me.

AB: I'm guessing at least a few folks from the RapReviews community will be testing ya! Moving to your music, in 2007 you pretty much set the nation on fire with "A Bay Bay."
HC: Thank God. Thank God I did that. That was my first single, but you know I got a lot more than that now. Now I'm hittin em with that "Halle Berry" and that "Headboard" and I got another club banger that's about to take over the world. We ain't even revealing it right now, just look for my next new club banger and watch how we rockalate.

AB: Other than recording what have you been up to in the two years since "A Bay Bay" dropped? What's happened during that time? Where'd you go?
HC: We came back with the "Playas Rock," we dropped the "Hand Clap" single, I did "Drop and Gimme 50" with Mike Jones, I hopped on Chris Brown's album and did a song with him called "Picture Perfect," I did a song with (Lil') Wayne, a remix to one of my songs called "Gettin Money," I double backed and did something with Beenie Man, I went to Jamaica and did something with that cat. I've been droppin singles and just tryin to keep myself hot. I recently did something with Mario and Plies, that's my current single, it's called "Headboard." I've just been trying to keep my pockets fat. I've been messing around with a little bit of that real estate. I've got some houses. I've got like six houses in my city. I'm trying to keep branching out and do it bigger and bigger and bigger. I've been tryin to keep stackin dem chips, you feel me? Hurricane.

AB: Six houses!?! I hope you're renting some of those out, cuz you can't live in six houses at once.
HC: I can't live in six of em, baby, I gotta get money off some of em. We thinkin just alike, get money off em, baby. I have two halfway houses, too. We're just tryin to keep it movin. I'm active in my community, I got some events about to pop off right now for the autistic kids in my community. I'm trying to get em to bring some cameras down here so they can see how active we are in the community. We're trying to get J Records on that immediately.

AB: It sounds like you're doing a lot of inspiring things. Flipping that just a bit, what would you say has been the most inspiring thing that's happened to YOU since you blew up?
HC: One of the most inspiring things, I'd say would have to be me blowing up because coming from where I come from it's like a dream. Since I blew up another one of the most inspiring things was learning the business. That inspired me to keep learning more about the business. Once I started learning about the paperwork side of the rap game that showed me that if you aren't locked down on that side of it then you ain't gonna go far at all. I'm real inspired to show all these artists to pay attention to their record labels' decisions and their managers and everybody around em.

AB: No doubt. Ya gotta keep your business straight. Speaking of business, your new single is "Halle Berry (She's Fine)." It sounds like you had some mighty fine inspirations for this song. Care to share?
HC: {laughs} She's finer then a OOH! You like that. I had some good inspiration, man. I was inspired by the women who keep themselves up to par every day. Big, small, skinny, or tall, but they still got their attitude because they know they keep theyself up and they know they keep theyself fresh. They take baths twice a day, they're always in the mall gettin themselves something fresh to wear, and they keep their hair done and their nails done. That's Halle Berry. That's what that is. It don't matter where you're from, what color, what race, what size, it's all about your attitude.

AB: Have you found a way to get this song to Halle Berry?
HC: She heard it. You can look on YouTube and type in Halle Berry and Ellen (DeGeneres) and they're doing the dance on the Ellen show. So she knows about the song and we appreciate her for helping the movement and pushing it further.

AB: What are the chances you could get her for another version of the video?
HC: Anything is possible. We gotta try to make it happen. We're gonna shoot another video that we got coming out and we might need to be looking forward to seeing her in that one. It ain't never too late. It don't really have to be the "Halle Berry" song itself because I done created a whole different type of atmosphere for women, that Halle Berry vibe, so the next song I'm talkin bout bad chicks, Halle Berry's still a bad chick, so I might just throw her in there.

AB: "Halle Berry" is off of is Unleashed, which is due out on December 21st.
HC: Yeah, December 21st. That's my sophomore album. 95% of this album is freestyle, there wasn't no writing, so you wait till you get a load of this one here, I'm wreckin everything in my path. I call myself the coldest rapper doing it. I ain't got no contenders, they act like they don't know what's going on, but every time they turn me on on the YouTube I wreck em and I destroy anything that's in my path.

AB: I notice you're still on some ratchet ish.
HC: Yeah, I'm still on ratchet ish. I'm ratchet as a muahfucka, ratchet as can be.

AB: How has ratchet grown over the past few years?
HC: It done grew. Everywhere I go they be like RATCHET! They all know about it now. I go to California and they love it. I go to Indianapolis and they love it. I go to South Carolina, I go to New York, and they be lovin that ratchet, get crunk, get stupid type of music. Every time they see me they be like there he go, there go the ratchet right there, he off the chain, he gonna do him, he got his own style, he off the meat rack, he's ratchet, that's Hurricane.

AB: Are you the official creator of ratchet?
HC: My city is the creator of it, because my city is the definition of it. My city was the first city to ever be ratchet, to ever do them without caring about what nobody else had to say or trying to blend in with what's going on in society. We just came out and gave em straight us, ratchet. That's why I tell them, when you're dealing with me you're dealing with the founder of the ratchet movement because I feel like I'm responsible for bringing that to the game. My city bred it and I sold it to the game.

AB: So essentially, ratchet, deep down, is doin you.
HC: It's doing you without caring what nobody else has to say. When a song comes on I'ma move exactly how I want to move to the song, exactly how it make me move, without caring what you got to say about it. I'ma do exactly what this beat tell me to do. I'ma go dumb. I'ma go ratchet.

AB: If someone were to develop a style and call it Clank, would you collab with them just so you could be Ratchet and Clank?
HC: {laughs} I saw that on the the TV the other day. They need to come holler at me and get me on that game. Ratchet and Clank 51/50.

AB: There's a Hurricane Chris Day, September 25th, at your old high school in Louisiana, Huntington High School.
HC: Yeah, the principal showed me some love and he did that and we try to show our city love and support for holding me down when I blew up because now every time I go back to my school they're showing me support and with them giving me my own day it's just a day for the kids to reflect on how ain't nuttin a dream, it can all come true. All you gotta do is stay focused and give dedication. I love my city for that.

AB: Is there any other way you'd like to see Hurricane Chris Day celebrated?
HC: I'd like to see people get out and start helping the community more on Hurricane Chris Day, get out and be around each other without no violence, make our community look good. Everybody needs to come out and support each other and love each other on Hurricane Chris Day.

AB: I don't think a lot of people outside of your own area really know about your work within the community, that you're doing things for autistic children, that you're putting up halfway houses, that these are some of your goals. What inspires you to do your community work?
HC: Basically, I come from nothing. I come from having nothing. I come from the bottom of the bucket. With that said, I automatically wanted to help people that were in the lower positions once I got high up and able to help people. As soon as I got enough money in my pocket, that's the first thing I wanted to do, go back and help everybody that couldn't be as good as I am today with the pockets, with the finance. That's why we started going to the nursing homes to help them out, give them a little luxury and buy them flat screen TVs and stuff. We just try to spread it out.

AB: Why don't you close out this interview by telling me two more things people may not know about you that you feel they should?
HC: "I am" is the first thing you should know about me, and the second thing you should know about me is "the coldest rapper." I am the coldest rapper, 51/50 Hurricane Chris.

You can check out Hurricane Chris on the web at hurricanechrisonline.com.

Originally posted: December 8, 2009
source: RapReviews.com

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