Interview with Mike Jones

June 21, 2004

The Swishahouse motto has been "major without a major deal."

That has been proven by them time and time again. An artist doesn't need big budget tv promtion to make the streets talk. Take the man of the hour, Mike Jones. One of Houston based label's Swishahouse's premiere artists. Just one of his underground tapes has moved over 40,000 units. Numbers don't lie, labels do. Here's Mike Jones, a product of his enviroment.

Dj One 1X TyMe : What got you started in this rap game?

Mike Jones : I used to have my own mixtapes under Ice Age entertainment. I still do, ya’know’em sayin, I got “Hot On The Streets”. Knaw’em sayin, Watts and dem came at me, and ya know wanted me to down with Swisha House. Ya’know ever since then my name done grew a lil bit more.

Dj One 1X TyMe : Now Ice Age, is that your company?

Mike Jones : Yeah, me and my homeboy T. Flowers

Dj One 1X TyMe : Who’s on Swisha House right now?

Mike Jones : Right now it’s just me and Paul Wall.

Dj One 1X TyMe : What happened to the other cats?

Mike Jones : Know’em sayin Magno a.k.a. Magnificent dropped a mixtape competeing with Swisha House, and they didn’t like that, so he no longer wit the house no mo’.

Dj One 1X TyMe : How many projects have you been on with Swisha House?

Mike Jones : At least five ya’know’em sayin? Five right now.

Dj One 1X TyMe : I know you’ve got some underground tapes coming out. What’s the names and dates on those.

Mike Jones : King of the Streets come out June 5th and Platinum Underground come out November 18th.

Dj One 1X TyMe : I gotta hold of your underground Usher collaboration for “Whatever I Want”, Dat ish is hot man, what led you to make that happen?

Mike Jones : My homeboy from C-town he linked it up. He said this something new man, something fresh, so go on jump on it and let’s make it happen. We got on it and it’s history. His people sent it out to me. I went to the studio and had it done the same day!

Dj One 1X TyMe : So who’s project is it gonna be on?

Mike Jones : Prolly jus an underground exclusive

Dj One 1X TyMe : What’s your plans for your solo album?

Mike Jones : Right now I’m just staying independent until the majors respect what I’m doin’. I mean, I already done promoted my album for a long, long time. If any major want it they gotta basically pay for it. Cause I ain’t fin’ta jus give it up dat easily, you know what I’m sayin? Like a lot of people been calling me, like different majors been calling me like, we want you to sign an artist deal, we want the ‘Who is Mike Jones’ album, ya know’em sayin. They saying it cause they know it’s been anticipated, and I’ve been promoting it for a long time. So right now they saying we can give you three, we can give your four [hundred thousand], but I want a mil [million]. So I’ma stay chillin, stay networking, and keeping it independent until they give me what I want.

Dj One 1X TyMe : Let me get this straight , you already have moved over 40,000 units of just one your mix tapes, So really they just wanna give you face value?

Mike Jones : I’m collaborating with a lot of major stars so, that’s pretty good for me too. I just wanna stay independent and stay messing with major people because it’s gone build the hype for me a little bit more.

Dj One 1X TyMe : What about video, what have you got out?

Mike Jones : Oh yeah, I got my first single it’s called ‘Still Tippin’, it got me featuring Slim Thug and Paul Wall ‘The Day Hell Broke Loose 2’, know’em sayin, that’s in stores too. It’s a nice video for the first time.

Dj One 1X TyMe : I know you’ve got the underground DVD’s as well, but have you made the push to the major video markets like B.E.T. or MTV?

Mike Jones : Nah, we basically let the streets talk game, the major markets come to us. Jus like the majors [labels]. We don’t shoot nothing to the majors [labels]. The majors go to the retail stores and be like ‘Who hot?’ and they like ‘Mike Jones’ and they name all the other hot artists, and that’s how they come at’em, you know what I’m sayin?

Dj One 1X TyMe : So how many shows are you doing now on the average?

Mike Jones : At least four a week. [This week] Wednesday through Sunday. That’ll wrap me up for this week.

Dj One 1X TyMe : Where do you wanna be?

Mike Jones : We talking with the Source, with XXL, I wanna be like the first independent artist on the front cover. That’ll let the major’s know, ‘Damn this ni**a on the cover of the Source! He ain’t even signed, so I know he hot!’ I already done interviews with Source and XXL, they fin [about] to put that out but, if I continue to do stuff, like I did something with Jazze Pha, I’m doing something with Mya to, so I’ll be talking to her, we cool. I just stay in touch with a lot of people so, if that chance do come and I’m on other peoples featured on a major label, it’ll be like ‘Damn this ni**a on videos and he ain’t even signed to a major, so he gotta be doing something good, ya’know?

Dj One 1X TyMe : Who, if anyone, would you say influenced your style?

Mike Jones : The streets. I’m a game spitter. That’s what it is.

Source

Mike Jones Website