Mack 10 and Ice Cube were once thick as thieves; not just as collaborative partners in Westside Connection but also friends. In fact, Ice Cube famously mentions him in the 1995 single “Friday,” rapping, “Mack 10 just got out of court/Rollin’ through the hood in his super sport bumping Too $hort.”
But times have changed. During a recent interview with The Bootleg Kev Podcast, Mack 10 touched on their relationship and admitted they haven’t spoken in nearly two decades.
“I f### with who f### with me, you dig?” he said. “That’s where I’m at with it. If you f### with me, I f### with you. But if it’s f### me, it’s f### you. I ain’t seen him or talked to him in damn near 20 years, so there it is.”
By all intents and purposes, it doesn’t seem like Ice Cube is “f######” with Mack 10. The 51-year-old shed some light on the situation during a 2020 interview with VladTV. He said the fallout boiled down to a financial conflict with Ice Cube’s brother-in-law.
“It was just an unfortunate situation, as far as what came out of all that,” he said. “It ain’t like that just happened … I went to Cube about four or five times before the conflict jumped off and told him to correct the situation. That’s the part that everybody leaves out.
“If it was my wife’s brother, I would’ve told him he can’t f### my money up and he can’t be out of line with nobody I’m getting down with. And if you got that big of a problem with him, stay at home. My wife’s brother wouldn’t have stopped s### for me, with him.”
Ice Cube formed Westside Connection in 1995 alongside Mack 10 and WC. The trio released their debut album, Bow Down, in 1996 on Priority Records. The project landed at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 and was certified platinum by the RIAA. The group’s second album, Terrorist Threats, arrived in 2002 through Mack’s label, Hoo-Bangin’/Capitol. It ultimately went gold. Westside Connection disbanded in 2005 after Mack 10 quit.