UGK’s Bun B Dishes on Life, New Music, Love, Guns & the Death of Pimp C | EURExclusive/WATCH

*You can’t mention southern rap without talking UGK, the hip hop group from Texas with Bernard “Bun B” Freeman and Chad “Pimp C” Butler.  Its been a long journey from a country church boy in Port Arthur, Texas to becoming the famed “Trill OG” who has worked with everyone from Jay Z to Drake, kept a marriage together for over two decades, and created Trill Burgers voted the best burger in America.  Bun B chops it up with EURweb Spotlight host iHeart Radio’s Jazmyn Summers.

YOU’VE GOT  A NEW ALBUM TRILLSTATIK 2.  TELL US ABOUT IT.

Statik Selektah is the producer . He’s probably in the top three producers I’ve done music with in my career over 30 years. And so we came to the idea to do it in real-time and allow people to watch the process. People were able to watch live as the tracks were laid as I wrote the songs and laid the vocals, had guests come in and laid their vocals and people were able to be a part of the entire process. We did it in l0 hours and 45 minutes.

YOU HAD OG’S TO YOUNGINS ON THE ALBUM INCLUDING LEGEND PAUL WALL, BIG K.R.I.T., STYLES P, PAPOOSE, DAVE EAST, AND ARMAND ASSANTE. WHY DID YOU INCLUDE A LOT OF THE UP-AND-COMING RAPPERS?

There’s a lot of really great new talent that’s following in the OG’s footsteps who represent the culture and themselves very well. And for me as an artist, I gotta make sure that I still got what it takes to keep up with the youngsters. We had Dave East, and guys like Nems and Jinell who’s an amazing R&B artist … as part of this.  It’s a blessing to be able to take new up-and-coming talent, and give them an opportunity and a platform cause people did it for me.

THE FLOW IS DOPE AND YOU’VE GOT SOME R&B VIBES IN THERE WHICH IS NOT NEW TO YOU.  BACK IN THE DAY DIDN’T YOU SAMPLE UNCLE CHARLIE WILSON AND THE ISLEY BROTHERS?

We sampled the Isley Brothers’ song, “Tell Me Something Good.” We sampled “Summer Breeze” and we were actually able to record with Ronald Isley on the album  “Underground Kings.” When Pimp C came home (from prison). And we worked with Charlie Wilson on two records on that same project. He and Pimp C got to build an amazing relationship. He was a great mentor to Pimp in his last years. And it’s just a blessing for life to come full circle for us to go from sampling people to actually working with people.  We had a very big budget and we could spend money on whatever we wanted. Literally, the first check that we cut was to Ronald Isley to get him on the album just to give back to him for letting us sample him on our first record.

YOU RECOGNIZED DRAKE’S TALENT BACK IN THE DAY.  TELL US ABOUT THAT.

Drake was found by Jas Prince who is the son of James Prince, the father of Rap-A-Lot Records in Houston. I’ve known Jas since a teenager from a very young age. And to see him moving into the industry was an amazing thing. And I remember he kept calling me saying, I got this artist. You gotta get on his album but I was recording my album. He hit me four days in a row.  On that fourth day. He was like, f**k, it’s now or never. We were actually leaving the studio when he called and I was like, yo, Jas never asked me for anything. His father gave me a lot of opportunities. It’s only right. I walked back in.  I laid the verse.  I ended up on “So Far Gone” on the song “Uptown” with Lil Wayne.  The rest of our relationship is history. I’m just blessed to not be stupid and selfish that day and support that young brother and look where he is now.  When he actually came to Houston and did his show,  he had all the women mesmerized in there. Me and the guys were like, who is this little light-skinned dude that’s rapping and singing to these women?  I was like I don’t think he’s going nowhere.

YOU WERE A COUNTRY CHURCH BOY FROM PORT ARTHUR, TEXAS. WHAT WAS YOUR LIFE LIKE BEFORE WE KNEW THE TRILL OG.

It was a very modest life. I did not come from a family of privilege.  All of my family was working-class people. They were laborers but they worked very hard to make sure that their kids could have a better opportunity. My parents moved to Houston when they first got married to make sure that their children would have a better opportunity in a big city like Houston as opposed to a small country town in Louisiana. But I still ended up finding my way into a small country town in Texas. But these small towns give you a very warm sense of community.  Everybody knows everybody. You never really feel alone. You can always go somewhere and get a cooked meal from people.  People watch you making sure you ain’t doing nothing that you shouldn’t be doing. They will call your mama and tell. I come from a town where people don’t mind getting in people’s business. Typically in the big city people keep to themselves.

Embed from Getty ImagesWERE YOU A GOOD KID OR THE ONE THAT GOT IN TROUBLE?

I was technically a good kid. My older brothers got into a lot of trouble. So I tried to stay outta trouble and be a good kid for my mom. But then when I found music – and keep in mind 1989 was not a time to be like I wanna do music for a living. There was really no money in it. My mother did not understand it at all. She’s supportive of me now that I’m successful. But when I first said I wanted to do it, she was not having that. I was supposed to go to college. I told her I didn’t wanna go to college. She’s like, well you going to do that! I can’t support that. You gotta go out and be a man You on your own. But I ended up moving in with my dad … my parents were divorced. But then literally the very next morning my dad woke up at six and said nobody lives here for free. So I had to get up and go to work. My dad did landscaping. So I was up at six in the morning cuttin’ grass.

PIMP C WAS YOUR FRIEND WHO YOU CONSIDERED YOUR BROTHER. A LOT OF TRAGEDIES IN HIS LIFE. HE SPENT  EIGHT YEARS IN PRISON SIMPLY FOR VIOLATING PAROLE BY NOT MAKING SOME MEETINGS WITH HIS PAROLE OFFICER AND NOT MEETING COMMUNITY SERVICE REQUIREMENTS. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THAT?

We’ve always been overrepresented in the criminal justice system.  Bail can be a trap for many people cause people from the city cannot afford bail. So they end up staying locked up in jail longer than they need to. People lose their jobs, people lose their homes ’cause they’re not there to go to work, pay their bills. Sometimes people lose their families. So there’s a lot of change that we need to see within the criminal justice system. But then also when it comes to victim crimes, we see a lot of leniency nowadays on victim crimes.  You shouldn’t be letting people out just cause you feel like your jail is too full.  Your jail is too full cause you got the wrong people in the jail.

Embed from Getty ImagesWHEN PIMP C DIED AT JUST 33 YEARS OLD ALLEGEDLY FROM SLEEP APNEA AND AN OVERDOSE OF PURPLE DRANK (COUGH SYRUP), THE WORD WAS Y’ALL WERE BEEFIN’.  WERE YOU ABLE TO COME TOGETHER BEFORE HE DIED?

That’s a big misconception. People think that we weren’t getting along at that time, but we had already rectified everything a few days before he passed.   I said everything I needed to say to him. He said everything he needed to say to me. And the last thing I told him and the last thing he told me was I love you. He passed within three days of us having that conversation. But I would like to say that everybody out there don’t hold that grudge. Be the bigger person. Cause you never know what can happen. Call whoever it is that you love but just don’t like right now and say, ‘Hey man look, I know we got our differences but I don’t want anything to be left unsaid between us’. Sometimes you have beefs that are so old with family and friends, you forgot what it started with. So I deeply mourned his death, not just for myself but for his family and friends. But there was no stone left unturned between himself and myself.

YOU’VE BEEN MARRIED TO WIFEY ANGELA WALLS “QUEENIE” FOR 20 YEARS.   HOW DID YOU MEET HER?

I met her at a get-together at my friend’s house and I was like this is who I wanna be with. I knew she was going to be my woman. I couldn’t see as far as getting married, but I knew she was going to be my woman.

Embed from Getty ImagesWHAT’S THE SECRET?

You just gotta be transparent.  You just have to be honest There are things that are going to happen in a relationship and you’re not going to always get along. It’s going to hurt to tell people certain things sometimes or even to admit when you’re wrong.

HOW DO Y’ALL KEEP IT SPICY?

She wouldn’t want me to discuss that. Let me say this. I’m still very attracted to my wife. I love looking at my wife. I love touching my wife. Maybe sometimes more than she may like it.  What I got is good. Me and my wife have literally been through everything a couple could go through and we’re still together. And I don’t mean in terms of infidelity and stuff like that. I’m talking about having somebody come in your house and wanting to kill you.

Embed from Getty ImagesA BROTHER PULLED A GUN ON YOUR WIFE AND TRIED TO STEAL YOUR CAR OUT OF YOUR GARAGE? TELL ME ABOUT THAT.

Somebody actually came in our house and put a gun to my wife’s head. I told God and everybody that stood in the church that day, what I would do if somebody threatened my family.  In the grand scheme of things, I hate that I had to shoot another black man (he lived.) But when you come in my house, I don’t see race color or none. So if you’d been blue, you would been a dead blue m****herf**ker.   My wife  tried to stall this guy out until I could get to the gun. She was willing to put her life on the line cause she knew what I would do if she died, I would avenge her. And that’s a lot for somebody to have to think about it in a moment.  And once you go through things like that, you realize if there is such a thing as a soulmate, you got ’em.

Embed from Getty ImagesYOU ALSO RODE WITH BIG MEECH (DEMETRIUS FLENORY) OF BLACK MAFIA FAMILY. WHAT WAS YOUR EXPERIENCE WITH HIM?

He was a real one. In a world where most men didn’t trust each other, most men felt like everybody was out there to get them, he built a brotherhood amongst men from different cities and different places who normally be enemies. Instead of everybody trying to go after each other to get the money, we all got the money together.  He convinced a lot of these people that they should work together  and maximize the profit. I think he would’ve made a mark on the music game had he not been incarcerated. He had big ideas on the music industry and really changing the power dynamic in terms of the money. Record companies always took all the money and only allowed the recording artist a little. He really wanted to change that dynamic and give most of the money to the artist. He had a lot of big plans  that he wanted to achieve and he just didn’t have time to accomplish.  I was in a bad contract myself that I spent 12 years trying to change.

YOU’RE ALSO WINNING AT THE FOOD GAME WITH TRILL BURGERS.  WHAT’S UP WITH THAT?

Everything I learned about the music industry and the music business I’m using as a business model. I put the burger basically on tour the same way I would an album  and we ended up winning for ABC’s Best Burger in America. We want as many people as possible to get their hands on a Trill Burger as possible.

NOW WHY TRILL?

I’ve built 30 years of blood, sweat and tear equity into the brand. And it’s something that people understand even if they don’t know me personally, they know the word, they know the brand and they know the definition. And it’s one of the words that you literally cannot disassociate from me at this point. It says a lot without saying much at all. Trill recognizes trill.

You can catch the full conversation in the video immediately above. And please don’t forget to subscribe to  Jazmyn Summers’ youtube.  

Interview/article by Jazmyn Summers. Follow her @jaztalk1 on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook.

We Publish News 24/7. Don’t Miss A Story. Click HERE to SUBSCRIBE to Our Newsletter Now!