1993. Aberglaslyn, Wales.
A dorm full of pre-pubescent boys seek to reinforce their school holiday rebellion via the medium of tape player and badly pirated cassette. Press play. Crank volume. Await livid teacher’s imminent arrival.
Cypress Hill deployed to maximum effect.
Fast forward seventeen years and whilst my juvenile predilection for authority baiting may have diminished, Cypress Hill’s ability to transcend their roots and deliver caustic hip-hop that appeals to our inner thug remains remarkably vital despite the elongated timescale. Emerging from LA’s Latino hip-hop scene, Cypress Hill were very much a product of their environment; pitching the juxtaposed vocal styles of B-Real (splenetic nasality) and Sen Dog (menacing baritone) against a fetid heat-haze of gnarled samples that wilfully ignored G-Funk’s emergence in favour of something altogether more sinister.
Marshalled by the roaming ear of DJ Muggs, Cypress Hill went from scene curios to chartanistas in a matter of months following the release of 1993’s ‘Black Sunday’ – a record whose grooves leaked pungent bong water and adroit wordplay all over its patchwork production of grainy samples. Punctuated by shrill squawks and disembodied conversations, listening to Cypress Hill was a thoroughly bewildering experience akin to riding a Gaudi Ghost Train through South Central. All whilst being pursued by a fuck-off great hallucination that flitted between malignant hectoring and lectures extolling the medicinal benefits of marijuana…
This is an excerpt from an article that appears in the May issue of Clash Magazine. Pick it up in stores from April 2nd. You can read the full issue online HERE and subscribe to Clash Magazine HERE.
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‘Insane In The Brain’. ‘I Ain’t Goin’ Out Like That’. ‘When The Shit Goes Down’. ‘How I Could Just Kill A Man’. ‘Rock Superstar’. Stacking up a formidable run of mainstream hits without recourse to compromise, Cypress Hill successfully exported their Latin heat-haze across the globe – infiltrating an audience base that may initially have been ensnared through their naughtiness (hello!), but soon came to discover a band of texture and depth who wove complex political issues through-out their output.
Tarnished only by association with the kind of dumb-fuck student fans who buy Take Me To Your Dealer posters on Fresher’s Week then play ‘Hits From The Bong’ ad nauseam through your adjoining hall of residence wall, Cypress Hill are back following a six-year hiatus with their eighth studio album ‘Rise Up’ – wherein the band seem so narked at the West Coast hip-hop’s demise they’ve recharged their gobs to devastating effect. Catching up with Sen Dog ahead of the record’s release, Clash opted not to bear a grudge over the week of detention doled out in Aberglaslyn in favour of their new record, appearing in The Simpsons and why they’re only still here because girls like their music. Blunt!
It’s been six years since the last album – were you recording ‘Rise Up’ for this whole period?
No man. We started it July, August 2007 – round there.
There was a real decision to begin the new record, start fresh, you know? So that’s just over two years in total. Is that a normal timeframe for getting a record completed?
Well, we’ve been known to turn a record around in a year. But that’s when you’re contracted to a label and have more pressure! This one was the opposite, we had to start recording with the aim of actually get-ting a record deal. So we made the decision and went into the studio. It’s good that we have the discipline to police ourselves.
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How did Tom Morello come to produce the album? Is he someone you’re friends with or was it a more professional hook up?
We were friends a long time and it kinda came up in conversation. He was having some downtime with his stuff and we were doing nothing, so he asked, ‘What are you guys up to?’ and we told him about the new album and straight away he said he had a couple of tracks for us. We thought it would be cool then got a hold of the tracks and were like, ‘Word!’ That’s Tom Morello. (Laughs). He’s got the magic.
‘Rise Up’ seems aggressive and harder edged than many hip-hop records of recent years. Are people pressurised to make music that shies away from this in order to get played on the radio?
We’ve been away a while and knew that we had to make an impact record. That was what we were aiming to do.
So did you fear that people may have forgotten who Cypress Hill were since you last released an album?
No – we knew people still remembered us. We could post up to any city in the world without a hit record in the charts and sell out venues. Europe, Australia the United States; wherever the fuck we go the interest for Cypress Hill has never gone away, you know what I mean? Every time we post up somewhere, the peo-ple keep on coming to check us out. But I don’t walk around all the time thinking about the size of the band or how we have to reach out to different people and what it might mean to them. I just know that there are a lot of motherfuckers who like our group!
Where do you see ‘Rise Up’ fitting within your back catalogue? Is it an evolution? Or more of the same?
We’re not trying to reflect on what we did a few years ago, we still think we compete and bring something new to now – where our creativity is now. I suppose we could just fade away and tour forever doing ‘Insane In The Brain’ and ‘Rockstar’ and I suppose we would have an audience who would come out and watch, but it concerns us more to stay vital and come out with something which can survive in today’s music game. We still want to be talked about with anticipation in people’s voices.
Cypress Hill have always had a strong relationship with marijuana. Was it important to you to make this so central to your output?
Yeah, definitely. We’re proud of the contribution we have made over the years in getting people to understand it more. We always knew that the stuff we were talking about was true and now we’re seeing it come to pass; many States legalising marijuana for medical use and seeing that there are sick people who do do better with cannabis than regular medication. It’s 2010 man! We need to leave that 1950’s mentality where it is. As we get older and civilisation continues to grow, people become willing to open their eyes to things. The generation who only saw negative things in relation to cannabis are starting to fade away and disappear. It’s a new younger blood now running the world. They see the positive side to it, which is good.
Did the association with marijuana ever limit your career?
No, not really. For the most part people are willing to cheer on the guy who says ‘fuck the establishment and smoke weed’ even if they daren’t say it themselves. They’ll be like, ‘that guy is the shit!’ and says what they wish they could. The only time we’ve ever had problems and not asked to play somewhere is Saturday Night Live! Many years ago one of us smoked a joint during a performance and they’ve never asked us back ever again. Regardless what fucking song we had that was hitting, we have never been asked to play there again!
So how long will we have to wait until the next album? Another five years?
No, no – we have a record deal now. (Laughs) They tend to want more than one album. So they’ll be more!
Words by Adam Park
