This is his retirement speech.. (found it on www.ozhiphop.com) Interesting read whether your a fan or not....Or even if youve never heard of the guy.. He makes some good points...


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After much anguished internal debate and almost a decade of continuous grind all around the world I have decided that the next album I release will be my last one. My reasons for leaving are many but ultimately simple. I am not recieving what I expected given the unprecedented grind I have embarked on. Despite the fact I basically reinvented the paradigm for guerilla touring internationally and domestically (although all credit there goes to Icon the Mic King I simply had the balls to utilize the opportunities he created) no one knows who I am or care about what I do. My career reads like a checklist for the requisites of success: I established a strong local following, I achieved prominence in the national battle circuit (not for what I wanted but I had no control over that), I toured relentlessly and put out project after project, while securing co-signs from my genre's notables and beats from known producers. I went overseas plenty of times. I even became one of the few cats in indie rap who lived strictly off his music. I have been doing so for over a year now, coming up on two fairly soon. But in doing so I have realized that despite my best efforts I will never achieve the level of success that I feel I deserve no matter what I do. I have done it all and their effect on my career's health is arbitrary at best. The only thing that enabled me to live off of rap was the sheer amount of shows that I did all over the world and in the U.S. 300 dollars here. 100 dollars there. They paid my bills but this is not progress. Progress is a gradually expanding fanbase connected to the arc of an artist's career, purchasing each album spreading the word, etc...... I simply gave a phenomenal live show, had some run from being on the Scribble Jam DVD's and didn't take no for an answer. I didn't grow with my national fanbase. I convinced promoters to give me money over and over again until they were replaced by new promoters. I went overseas and did the same with even more success. I literally hustled my way to where I am. Some would ask what is wrong with this. Well absolutely nothing is wrong with this approach but I didn't pick up a mic to hustle. I did it to express myself and participate in a culture that I once loved. Now I regard hip-hop with hatred and cynicism. Any rapper who isn't my friend I hate and literally wish for their death. Any fan who doesn't approach me to give me money in some way I do the same. I spend all day on the computer chasing money around and mabye see my notebook a few times a month. I hate writing now and it used to be the only thing in my life I loved. I take no joy in the creative process all I want is money from other people and for every opther rapper to die or quit so I can take their money. Now this might be an awesome attitude/worldview for Gordon Gecko or a military tyrant but I wanted to be an MC. When I first fell in love with the culture and the way of life it was as if I was an initiate to a sacred knighthood who would cleanse hip-hop of wack lyricism for all time. I studied under some of my heroes to learn how to move my sword and I achieved succeses of my own. But what I really wanted seemed to lie beyond my grasp. First I thought I needed a label. I bankrupted them trying to make loot off my music. Mabye I needed to tour? Done that in a way no one else has and still I have no distribution and no hopes of getting a high profile booking agent. In hip-hop people come to help you for two reasons: when they grew up with you or when you ingratiate yourself to them. Or when you don't need it and they come in to do dirty work for a fee that you could do on your own, That's it. There is no altrusim in this game its just like any other endeavor of will. Its an excercise of survival and I am tired of fighting it to no avail.

Now let me issue a rebuttal of what I know some will say to this. I realize that all of this is my fault. This is pro ball as Mos Def said and I obviously made very bad decisions on many things or I simply was never skilled enough to command the success I desired. Eitehr way I tried as hard as could and work as smart as I was capable of and while that does not exonerate me from the errors I have made both known and unknown it does provide me with a certain peice of mind. I can leave secure in the knowledge I have done all that I can. Whatever it is that I lack, talent, drive, connections, charisma, or all the above, I am tired of agonizing over. At the age of 24 I am completely burnt out from the only thing I have ever loved in my entire life and it is time to leave with some sembelance of dignity. My ambition exceeded my talent. My reach my grasp. My eyes for the success I saw indie superstars have were far bigger than the stomach I was equipped with to digest the bullshit this lifestyle entails. I am sick of seeing my family a few days a year and missing all of their important moments both good and bad. I am sick of living like an animal and staking my entire days food on my ability to convince drunken strangers to buy my CD. I am triply sick of the scum who have the gall to call themeelves promoters and the felonies I have committed from armed robbery to extortion and blackmail to get sums ranging from 150 to 500 dollars remanded to me. I have been forced to do some of the same shit to get loot from promoters that commerical rappers claim to have done. The same shit that makes the nightly news when it goes bad and someone gets hurt or worse. It demeans my soul to do these things. It makes me physically sick to my stomach to prepare to harm another human being grievously over paper. But that's the game and if my friends and I didn't back up our statements, we'd never get paid. Ever. I won't even speak on how being a rapper has damaged every serious relationship I have ever had I will just say that this is a pile of filth and those who prosper are cockroaches in many ways.

Finally I am sick of the masquerade that indie hip-hop has become. This movement went from being a viable alternative to the genocidal garbage American media manufactures to a precious little copy of everything that is wrong with its AIDS infected big brother-commerical rap. We have beef both real and fake almost all of it stupid and meaningless. I remember when going to underground show was dangerous because there were real thugs there who would test you for your garments. I remember when it became it became a sticking point for underground jams that there would be no violence as opposed to the bloodspattered battlefields that were and are the top forty clubs. Now my friends, grown ass men, bring their hammers to underground shows again. Not for the original reasons like in the 90's but because the same shitty small hoodie dude mentality that permeates commercial rap has leaked into the underground. We have a situation where every fan is a rapper and none want to accept any rapper as better than them. Now this would be healthy if all of this was done at the park or the rec center but this is not the case. The internet is a double edged sword that has given people access to many rappers, me included. But it has also equipped fandom with a reason to stay away from live shows and a means to never purchase any music. This has killed us. The mentality that you are as good as the next rapper and he should fall back is sacred. But if that is the case then get in some battles, win some shit and show and prove. But this will sound like Swahili to anyone under the age of 23 or so. Fuck it. We have stars and hangers on and as much intrigue and su••••ion as Versailles in the 18th century of Rome during the first. Rappers have become caricatures of what will get them money and girls. Which again is fine but we were supposed to be a counterculutre. Now we are exactly like commerical rap, or rock and roll for that matter just minus two zeros or so off of each paycheck. Finally we have monopolization with a few major-indies (when did that word happen?) controlling the entire pie and the rest of us fighting to the death over the 1f the market they don't control. There are no avenues and creativity or deviance from what is a hit in the underground is seldom heard. The movement has fractured into several dozen micro scenes each with their own niche artist. Its just not happening.

Yet despite all that I have said. Underground Hip-Hop will outlive my career. For better or for worse I loved it and for better or for worse I will leave it. But I will not leave it better than how I found it and that is my one true regret. I will miss this more than I can say but it is time for me to leave behind what had become an unhealthy obession with an entity that encourages character defects and try for the first time to be a better and complete person. I will always write and create. I just had to remember that I owned the masters to me.

(I will release my last album with Burns and will honor all touring commintments I have already made in Europe for November.)

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RIP jono, peace out bboy.
Pardon Canada Criminal Record Pardons Services Toronto

considering i don't know who he is. I really don't give a shit. Good post though. interesting to read.

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Kontroverzy's Myspace

damn dogg thats a great read
tha man sounds real
not some commercial bullshit

wen his album drops ima hafta try n get it

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www.myspace.com/imthakingpsc

I dunno..

Google it...

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RIP jono, peace out bboy.
Pardon Canada Criminal Record Pardons Services Toronto

Ight, can you sum that up real quick. It's late on the westcoast. Start with who he is and shoit

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nigga its only 12 o'clok ova there
it aint late

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www.myspace.com/imthakingpsc

It is 12, but I worked all day, so I'm tired. And niggas from CALI, if you aint out at night, you sleep by 10, or 11...it get dark in tha summer round 9

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