(AllHipHop Features) Responsible for the sales of millions of records hit producer, entrepreneur, top recording executive and Teamwork Music label head, Sha Money XL has released “Divine Time,” featuring Mobb Deep’s Prodigy, Tedy Andreas, and Stargiela. Prodigy was signed by Sha Money XL as a solo artist to G-Unit and recorded the song years prior to his passing. The album, Chain On The Bike, hosts the new song and the video premiers right now on AllHipHop.com.
“Prodigy was the very first rap star to come to my home studio and vibe out with me. During that time, we recorded a lot of songs and “Divine Time” was one of them. The song has always meant a lot to me so I wanted the perfect home for it. Chain On The Bike is just that,” Sha Money XL tells AHH exclusively.
Sha Money XL is as important to the current state of affairs as any of your favorite insiders. He’s the co-founder of the G-Unit movement with 50 Cent and the two of them revolutionized artists approach to mixtapes. He moved on and on to work with or break artists like Snoop Dogg, 2 Pac, Mac Miller, Bobby Shmurda, Big K.R.I.T., Lloyd Banks, The Game, Tony Yayo, DJ Whoo Kid, and more.
He talks to AHH’s Chuck “Jigsaw” Creekmur about every thing from coronavirus to G-Unit to Chain On The Bike.
AllHipHop: Yeah, yeah. How you maintaining in the pandemic, man? We never seen this before in our life.
Sha Money XL: Yeah. This s### is crazy, man. We maintaining, man. Thank God, everybody’s good. I do have people close to me that was affected by it, people that passed away. I’m just very saddened by all of this. We just taking the right precautions because it’s dangerous. We can’t be foolish about this.
AllHipHop: That’s what’s up, that’s what’s up. You came through at the right time because we got the whole project you got going on. Talk about the Chain On The Bike project and the title, too. That’s an interesting title.
Sha Money XL: All right. Chain On The Bike. Basically, the title comes from if you get on a bike, you got the pedal, you got the wheels, you got everything. If you try to move, you need that chain. You ain’t going to be able to move that bike without the chain. Basically, I am that chain on the bike. I’m that s### that you need on your team to get this s### moving, to get moving. I’m not the whole factor, but I’m a main part. That’s what that whole analogy was and that’s where it started with me and 50. He called me that back in the days. I always kept that because he understand my role at that time and we was just moving. We was just getting the s### moving. Sha Money, Chain On The Bike, I was getting it done. That’s what it come from.
AllHipHop: How’d you get the Prodigy feature? I’ve heard rumors that it’s not easy. I’ve heard things, just gossip, that it ain’t that easy to clear Prodigy’s music.
Sha Money XL: Me and Prodigy always worked. I been working with him for a long time. From the time even when he signed with G-Unit, we did Put Them In Their Place. I did like, four records on that album. We just kept recording. When I was in Cali, I called him one time and he came out, and we recorded with my boy Slim the Mobster. We was in the studio and we just [crosstalk 00:06:18] on him. We just kept cutting because he was [inaudible 00:06:20] chilling. I don’t know if he moved out there or what, he was out there though. It was out there at the time, living out there at the same time. It was a lot of work getting down. We worked. If I’m in the studio since back in the days til now, I don’t want to just be in there chilling. Let’s make some music. I’m a creative mind so there’s A&R side of me and then there’s a creative side of me where I got beats. When it’s that New York s### and when it’s that real New York s###, and when it’s that Queens s###, I’m all in. Me and P, I’m playing him beats nonstop, so we cut that.
AllHipHop: All right. Now, what makes you work this project with so many young talent, as opposed to leveraging your relationships and getting more well-known talent, more well-established artists, I should say?
Sha Money XL: I never been the guy that’s been trying to stand next to the guy that’s already been to the guy. I’m not that guy. That’s not my role in this hip-hop game. My game, I know my position. I know what God gave me the gift to do. The main part of that is for me to allow these new brothers the opportunity, the vision, the information, and the connects to get through this s### at a nice pace. Not a drowsy pace, not a lazy pace, but a good pace to real get to this success, get to this money, get to this life that you chose to make this a career, where you can say, “This is my career.” I know that for me, since the beginning, since with 50, since with everything I’ve did, it’s just like, “We know how to get this s### going from the ground all the way to the top.” That raw of energy of when it’s first starting, when that artist is first in the studio hungry, and when you giving them that direction, that’s the part where I like. After a while, they don’t even want direction. They good. They got the blueprint. They just take what they had from you that they needed, if it’s producer, whatever it is, engineer, whatever they needed and keep it going.
Sha Money XL: At the same time, for me, I got sessions with everybody. I been engineer, producer, so I been in the studio with endless artists as A&R, as a producer. With me and P, it was more like, “I got that.” Styles P, too. Shout out to Styles P, the Ghost. Back to your topic, it’s important for me to just get it busy and get creative with it, man.
AllHipHop: All right. Now, you are a part of a legacy that is not mentioned enough. That’s the mixtape era. When you were with G-Unit, you revolutionized the mixtape game. You were part of that whole thing. First of all, just talk about that aspect of your come up and relate it to where we are now, which is a little different, but it almost feels the same with streaming media, streaming services, whatever, Spotify. There’s a bunch of them, but to me, Spotify is the most powerful one, platform-wise that is.
Is there any similarities? Do you feel like a pioneer? What do you overall think?
Sha Money XL: For me?
AllHipHop: Yeah.
Sha Money XL: Yo, bro, let me tell you, man. Shout out to Hip Hop Evolution because they was able to tell a piece of this story. At the time, I didn’t know what I was doing. I was just a hustler and I just wanted to see it happen. What we did was the whole change of what it [doing mixtapes] was about the DJ. Then, it became about the artist. That mixtape became a street album. Today, people saying “mixtapes” because they want you to take it lightly. Or, it’s not cleared or it’s not … It’s their best effort. Some of people’s best efforts are shown in the name of mixtapes…
Sha Money XL: It’s like we know that that was done and they told the story, so I really appreciate that. I’m going to tell the story even more because it needs to be told. I know what we did and it was like … I told Fiff, I was like, “Yo, you got this for DJ Enuff, you got this for Flex, you got this for Kay-Slay. This freestyle was for Ron G, this was for Watt. Yo, let’s …” Everybody’s fan base ain’t hearing the same s###. Let’s put it all on one and let’s give it to them like that. That’s how that s### happened. It was like, “Yo, now we got a mixtape with one artist,” It’s him and his crew that he inserted in there and broke them at the same time. That was the beginning of that whole era.