General Steele Talks New Project "Welcome To Bucktown"

By Starrene Rhett

Boot Camp Clik’s Smif N Wessun released the massive classic hit, “Bucktown” back in 1994 and have since etched their presence in the hip-hop psyche all over the world. Now, 15 years since their debut, Bootcamp Clik is still going strong. The best thing about them is, unlike most other crews, they branch off for solo projects but still come back together as a peaceful unit and make that head banging hip-hop that boom-bap lovers can’t get enough of.

Enter Smif N Wessun’s General Steele. Spinning off of the classic song, Steele has created an entire LP called Welcome to Bucktown (Bucktown USA/Duck Down/Koch), dropping on May 5. But the buck doesn’t stop there (no pun intended). He’s gearing up for more releases from Boot Camp Clik and Smif N Wessun, and is getting his grown man business on with his own imprint. That’s an impressive fete for a veteran in the game, especially one who isn’t backed by a major label machine. According to Steele, the secret to success is patience.

The Black Urban Times caught up with him to talk about how he maintains longevity in the business and how he puts together the pieces to his master plan for success.

Welcome to Bucktown is coming out on May 5. What can people expect?

People can expect a reintroduction to me—to classical hip-hop music. A lot of times we say we want something and we don’t know necessarily what we want, but when we get good music we are content with it and I think people can expect that from this LP which I choose to call a soundtrack—not an album—because it’s the soundtrack of life. I’s the soundtrack of ideas, it’s not just people rapping to beats. I think that people—when they hear it—will definitely take to it because of that fact.

It’s funny you called it a soundtrack because in a previous email interview about Bucktown the 70s movie, you mentioned that you hadn’t heard of it until after the song, so how did you get put on?

Just being in the hood and being in a time where you were looking for stuff. Bucktown the movie was just something that I found like a lot of the books that I found at that particular time. The Spook Who Sat By the Door was another one at the time that I found and when I found it, I just thought that it was another part of the puzzle that was supposed to be familiar to us. So it just worked out well.

I noticed you got some old heads like Shabaam Sadiq, Smoove Da Hustler and Trigger Da Gambler, what about those people did you feel would carry the vibe that you wanted to convey on this album?

For one, I thought that if I went for the generic young cats, that it would just be a compilation and anybody could have done that. Plus, nobody was really thinking about the ones that were actually good. Broken English was the bomb. Shaabam Sadiq was one of the first artists to be on Rawkus, he started it—not Mos Def, not Talib Kweli—it was Shabaam Sadiq. We deal with pioneers, and the pioneers that we deal with are hood stars who don’t really get the credit, just like Smif N Wessun and Black Moon. It’s like we share a parallel kind of lifestyle so to speak, because we are pioneers who are underrated. But if you ever speak about these individuals, they really don’t have a bad credit in the game. It’s always like “Oh word they doing it.” I totally respect all my other Brooklyn homies—the Mainos, the Fabs the Uncle Murdas—I respect them but they not pioneers of the Bucktown thing. They came on after and I’m sure they respect it because they keep the name going to this day, but the ones that pioneered that whole vibe, the whole 90s vibe—you felt what Brooklyn was supposed to be so I had to pull out certain people. It’s just a reminder of greatness and a reminder of good music.

And with Sha Stimuli, he’s the youngest dude.

Yep. Shi Stimuli—a lot of people would like to think that I’m a older rapper so people think that older rappers need to give it up and let the young cats come in. We don’t have nothing against the young cats coming in but the younger cats are coming in a room full of gangstas. We got our guns on the table. We been in here for a while so you gotta know how to carry yourself in a room full of gangstas, and Sha Stimuli is one of those cats. He has respect for the game, he has respect for the craft and he don’t play with what he do. He’s Brooklyn to the heart so it’s fabulous to have a dude like that involved in the project.

Duck Down has been able to sustain themselves from when they started through now. With how rapidly the hip-hop business is changing, they’ve been able to maintain and still sign artists like Kidz in the Hall for example, so what do you think the secret to that success is, and how will you apply it to your own situation?

It’s a few things. I think one of the things is patience. One way to have supreme patience is to have a love for what you do. The patience comes in because when you love it, you may make mistakes but because you love it you’re gonna always try to exact those mistakes. Bootcamp is still signed to Duck Down. We’re about to work on our 5th album. Smif N Wessun is also about to work on a 5th album. In addition to that, you have Kidz in the Hall, you do have B-Real, you have a DJ Revolution, you have a Buckshot about to release and album with KRS-1. For me, I’ve always wanted to be a part of something that meant something. Like Def Jam at one time, was the most powerful label in the world. You look at them now and you’re like who does Def Jam got? Def Jam has a lot of artists but they don’t even give a fuck about them. They got Ghostface, one of the illest cats but Ghost don’t really got a home because Def Jam don’t care. Chuck D was on Def Jam. LL Cool J was on Def Jam. You had the most powerful artists in the world on Def Jam. But now these artists are lost. Duck Down would be like the back pack of the industry—being the home of the misfits where you can come in and figure your life out type shit. So it’s like we had the patience to see where we can take it. We have the patience to look and see where our potential could possibly be so we start with a Boot Camp, that’s our essence because we’re telling you we’re starting with training. So after the training we’re telling you we can be more influential in what’s going on. It took a long time. Duck Down really just started signing cats aside from Boot Camp and Smif N Wessun. They just started going outside and part of the reason is because before you start dealing with other people you really don’t know like that, you kind of have to have your thing together first. A lot of people thought for a while that Dru was just on some bs because he wouldn’t sign nobody else except for Boot Camp but it took us a minute to structure our thing, and it’s still totally structured in a way that we know exactly what’s going on but it’s like aight, we know where to go.

I heard a rumor that Smif N Wessun was supposed to team up with Pete Rock?

I heard that rumor too [laughs].

So it’s not true?

It’s a true rumor. We’re working out paperwork with him. That’s what we’re cooking up right now. Inshallah we will be putting out our 5th LP with the homie Chocolate Boy Wonder.

Anything you want to add?

I want to let people know that Bucktown USA is going into their 5th year and me and my partner cynical have been going really hard to put out videos for Bucktown. Check us out at mogulist.com/bucktownusatv and duckdown.com.