ShareThis
Cypress Hill - Rollin' and Smokin'
CYPRESS HILL
Rollin’ and Smokin’
Interview by Keith Valcourt for HUSTLER Magazine
CYPRESS HILL, the first multiplatinum Latino group, has sold more than 18 million CDs while rocking audiences around the globe and preaching the positive aspects of marijuana. B-Real, Bobo and Sen Dog stopped by HUSTLER to discuss weed, filthy groupies, Jennifer Lopez and their dope new disc Rise Up—and weed.Wait! Did we already mention that?
HUSTLER: Do you guys smoke marijuana every day?
SEN DOG: Pretty much.
BOBO: Yeah.
B-REAL: The only time I think we’re not smoking is when we’re on a fucking airplane. If we could get away with it, you know we would. I did once many years ago. We were on a flight in maybe ’93. Our tour manager at the time was really addicted to weed. He could not be somewhere and not smoke. He went into the airplane bathroom and figured out how to do it. When he came back, I could smell he had just smoked out. He told me how to do it, so I went and smoked in the bathroom. The toilet and the sink, they both suck air down. So you just blow the smoke in there. That was pre-9/11 and will never happen again. It was a good trick while it lasted. (Laughs.)
With numerous medical marijuana dispensaries in Los Angeles, do you all carry cards?
SEN DOG: Nope.
BOBO: No.
B-REAL: I’ve had one for eight years, the amount of time that the 215 legislation has been in place.
Is dispensary weed better than the stuff you get elsewhere?
B-REAL: Back when it started? No. Eight years ago they had a bunch of generic stuff and Canadian stuff. It was just okay. In the last three to four years it’s really opened up, and now they have really great strains at a lot of these dispensaries.
Do you think we’ll see the full-blown legalization of marijuana?
B-REAL: Well, it’s on the ballot here in California in November. It just depends on how many people show up to vote and support it. I think we have a good chance. The perception that people have about marijuana now as opposed to 15 or 20 years ago is totally changed. People are more open to legalization now that they’ve been educated.
Safe to say you’re for legalization even if it means huge taxes?
B-REAL: We’re for it. I think eventually the price will come down. It’s like alcohol. There were all sorts of regulations when Prohibition was lifted. I think there will be the same sort of learning experience and process when it comes to legalization of pot as well. Obviously they’re going to put an age restriction so you have to be 18 or 21 to purchase it. They have to figure out where you’ll be able to purchase it. I don’t think it will be in a normal liquor store right away. I think it will stay in the dispensaries, but the dispensaries will change to being more like cigar shops. If it becomes full-blown legalization, they’ll change to a cigar shop kind of mode. Then you’ll see a Cypress Hill Shop. We’re looking towards that now. Whatever way it goes, we’re going to be involved in some capacity.
You guys have been together a long time. How do you keep it going?
BOBO: It’s been a wild ride, and we’ve experienced so much stuff together on the road.We’re like family, like brothers.We all still love making music together and performing. It’s great.We each do our own separate things as well, and we support each other in that. There’s no hate. Sometimes he (indicates BReal and laughs ) can be hard to deal with, but other than that it’s great.
Why is B-Real so hard to deal with?
BOBO: I don’t know. He has these pills that he takes. One is called a “D Pill.”
SEN DOG: D is short for dick. Obviously you can see he’s being a nice guy because he didn’t have one today. (Laughs.)
BOBO: You caught him on a good day, but you never know. It flips.
Are the D Pills prescription?
B-REAL: (Laughs.)
BOBO: Very much so. (Laughs.)
What is the creative process like when you step in the studio? First there’s smoke, then you guys hide B-Real’s D Pills?
B-REAL: The D Pills are first. We start off with a few insults, a few bad jokes. Then Sen Dog will come in and say, “You got some weed? Well, roll it up.” ’Cause he never brings his own except for the last two sessions.
SEN DOG: I actually brought some.
B-REAL: And Bobo is no problem at all because he just falls asleep through all this stuff.
SEN DOG: It varies. Sometimes there is a track already waiting. So as soon as I get there, we work on it. Other times there are a bunch of tracks. I find one that I like and start writing to it. With the Tom Morello thing, he sent us a track, and we wrote to it. Sometimes we’re just sitting there playing John Madden, and an idea hits.
B-REAL: Before, we had to go record in different studios, and you only have a limited time. Since we did this CD at our studio, we recorded at our leisure. It made everything fun. There was no pressure. Sen brings over a 12-pack. I got the herb. Bobo is sleeping, so he can’t drink or smoke any of the shit we brought. We’re all having a good time.
SEN DOG: But Bobo wakes up the minute he smells smoke.
BOBO: Weed is my alarm clock.
Not to touch on a sore spot, Sen, but is it true you never buy weed?
SEN DOG: I do, but I never bring it to the studio. It’s become quite the insult to me, so the last couple times I’ve actually reached in the pocket, brought out the greens and contributed. I made sure that everybody in the room hit the joint that I brought. Therefore, there could be no further insults about me being a cheap weed smoker. I would like to say that on my behalf, at least, I bring some every now and then. Bobo, on the other hand, never in his life has.
BOBO: I don’t, and I’ll tell you why: Because I forget. I’ll smoke so much, and I will fall asleep. Then I forget what I have. That has been proven several times when we are touring in Europe. We’ll be coming back to America at customs.
There was this one incident where the customs dude asked, “Do you have anything?” I say, “No, I don’t.” He went in my bag and pulls out a little pipe. He said, “Oh, what’s this? Has it been used?” I say, “No.” He smells it, and it’s been used. Then he asks, “Got anything else?” I say, “No.” Then he finds little gremlins of weed and seeds. He said, “I’ve been asking you to be honest.” I said, “You know what, I honestly have forgotten.” I had a customs dude open my passport, and a roach falls out. I forgot it was there. It’s not really smart for me to hold weed. Because I’ll forget.
B-REAL: There was a time in France when the officials took us all off the bus to search it. They asked for our passports, and Bobo opened up his passport, and there is a ball of hash stuck to his face on the picture in the passport. The French guy was like, “What is this?”
BOBO: I think that’s a legitimate reason as to why I never have weed.
Are there places around the world where it’s hard to get weed?
B-REAL: It’s not as hard as it used to be. Five or ten years ago, man, depending on where you went, it was tough. But just last year we went to Israel, and we thought this is going to be rough. Man, they had some good weed and hash over there. In Israel! That was a first. I figure if we can get herb in Israel, we can get it anywhere these days.
Your records always have that element of rock ’n’ roll to them. Are you ever tempted to do a straight-up rock record?
B-REAL: Oh, yeah! That’s something that we’ve always talked about doing but never really found ourselves in the situation to get it done. I think if we were to do something like that, it would be more along the lines of an EP—maybe six or seven songs. Because our hip-hop fans would be “Whoa! What the fuck is this?!” if we did a full album. Kind of like when we put out our Spanish album. We put out a remix of all of our songs, but in Spanish, specifically for our Latin fan base. It wasn’t like a bona fide album. It would be too hard for our fans across the board to take a drastic change from hip-hop.
BOBO: The closest we came to a rock album was Skull & Bones, where we had a full hip-hop side and then a rock side. I can see us doing a rock EP.
How did you guys get Tom Morello on Rise Up ?
B-REAL: We’ve been friends with him for a long time.We did shows with Rage [Against the Machine], and Tom did a few remixes for us. When we were about 75% done with the album, as far as the hip-hop portion goes, Sen Dog gave Tom a call to see if he would be interested in doing something with us. Fortunately, he had the time, and he was down. We’ve had a friendship going with that dude for 20 years.Tom totally gets and understands Cypress Hill.We love all his work as well.
Did Morello add the album’s 25% of rock?
B-REAL: Yeah. He was the catalyst in bringing that part over. We played him what we had with the hip-hop stuff and said, “We don’t necessarily want you to do hip-hop. We want you to do what you feel we would sound good on.” He brought us the heavy shit.We love rock ’n’ roll so much that is was second nature to us, and it was fun. He gave us two great tracks.
You also got Marc Anthony and Pitbull on the track “Armada Latina.”
B-REAL: Our friend Jim Johnson produced the song and said he had an idea. He played the track, which features a Crosby, Stills & Nash sample.We thought, How we gonna get away with this one? But we were open-minded, and it started coming along. After Sen and I finished the track, they called Pitbull, and he jumped on it. Then they suggested getting Marc Anthony because Jim and Pitbull know Marc. I said, “Get the fuck out of here. He’s not going to do it. We’re Cypress Hill. We’re weedheads. They’ll never let him do it.” Sure enough, he was at the studio the next week knocking it down and telling us what a big fan he was. For a singer of his caliber—he’s the Latin Frank Sinatra—to take a chance being on a track with us is a great thing.
Did Anthony bring his wife, Jennifer Lopez, to the studio?
B-REAL: If he had, I would have been unable to concentrate. It’s a good thing he didn’t.
SEN DOG: She called when Marc was in the studio, and he put her on speakerphone. She said hi to everybody.
B-REAL: How do you concentrate with her around? How does he concentrate?
That’s why Marc came to do the track—to get out of the house because when he’s home, he just sits and stares.
SEN DOG: Word.
How would you describe the state of hip-hop today?
B-REAL: It’s positive and negative. There’s a lot of bullshit out there. No doubt about that. You hear it on the radio. You see it on the videos. Ten years ago there were maybe 200 rappers out there between the groups and solo artists. Now there are thousands.We’re all competing for the little 12 spots on radio and MTV.
A lot of radio gravitates to playing the generic, noncontroversial stuff. So there’s not a lot of substance out there. You see that as a fan, and if you’re new to what hip-hop is, that’s it. But if you look deeper and search via the Internet, there’s a lot of great groups you can find. Hip-hop is constantly growing and evolving and changing its face. I would say on a whole it’s great because hip-hop is still thriving 30- some-odd years later when they thought it was a fad that would only be around maybe five years.
We’re sure you guys have some crazy “Backstage Betty” stories.
B-REAL: There is this one story that is legend. It’s not graphic, but it shows the length that these girls went through to try and chill with the band. Our last show on the tour with House of Pain was in San Jose, and we were packing up to come home. House of Pain’s tour manager gets off their bus to retrieve a bag right before all our buses are set to hit the road.We see him open the luggage bay under the bus, and as he lifts the door up to get the bag, these two girls come rolling out of the fucking luggage compartment. They were trying to come to L.A. to hang out with House of Pain by any fucking means.
It was the craziest shit. Those chicks had some balls because the septic tank was right there. They were in there for maybe 20 minutes. I don’t know how they would have stayed under the bus for the seven-hour drive back to L.A. They probably would have been dead at the end of it or smelled like some awful piss. If the septic tank had leaked, those pretty little girls would have been all pissed on, and not R. Kelly-style.
BOBO: I remember one time at Lollapalooza. We had already been off-stage, and I’m walking toward the bus, and I see this circle of our crew guys. I look closer, and in the middle of the circle is this girl on her knees, and the crew guys all got their cocks out. She basically wanted to meet B-Real. The crew said, “You want to meet him? We’ll take you to him, but this is what you gotta do.” Eventually more and more crew joined the circle, and the chick realized that she really wasn’t going to get to meet B-Real.
B-REAL: Thank God. (Laughs.)
BOBO: She got up and was very upset. She left without meeting B-Real, but she left with lockjaw. It was ten to 12 guys.
B-REAL: That’s horrible.
SEN DOG: What number were you in the line? (Laughs.)
BOBO: No! No! (Laughs.) I was just a voyeur.
B-REAL: Bobo was number two. (Laughs.)
SEN DOG: He said, “I’m in the band. Band cuts. Move aside.” (Laughs.)
Click to browse new and back issues of HUSTLER Magazine.
Click to view subscription offers for HUSTLER Magazine.
