Birdman celebrates 30-plus years of Cash Money Records at Essence Fest | Music | Gambit Weekly

In the early-’90s, brothers Bryan “Baby” Williams and Ronald “Slim” Williams saw an opportunity in New Orleans’ burgeoning bounce scene. It was economic — a chance to make a little money for themselves and others — and so they started a record label.

More than 30 years on, Cash Money Records is one of the household names of hip-hop — and it has made more than just a little money. Today, Cash Money is the home of Hollygrove’s own Lil Wayne, Nicki Minaj and Drake, music royalty sitting atop an impressive coast to coast roster of rappers and pop artists. But the Cash Money story remains a New Orleans story — and one about the important part the city has played in hip-hop at large.

On Friday, July 5, Baby — aka Birdman — will present a celebration of Cash Money in the Caesars Superdome to headline the Essence Festival of Culture’s first night of concerts. Essence is this year celebrating its 30th anniversary and has said its evening concert series will be “firmly rooted in legacy.”

The full lineup for the show has not been announced as of press time, but Birdman will be joined by his Big Tymers partner and legendary producer Mannie Fresh and rapper Juvenile, who himself has been celebrating the 25th anniversary of his classic Cash Money-released album “400 Degreez.” R&B vocalist and rapper Jacquees, one of the younger Cash Money artists, also is on Friday’s bill, and New Orleans’ Raj Smoove, who toured with Cash Money on its 2000 joint tour with Ruff Ryders Entertainment, is the night’s DJ.

Ahead of Friday’s show, the city on Wednesday, July 3, will pay tribute to Birdman and Slim with an honorary street renaming. The intersection of Saratoga and Erato streets, where the Williams brothers once lived, will be dubbed “Honorary Williams Brothers Way,” with a ceremony held 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

The street renaming is the latest recognition from the city of the Williams brothers and their contributions to New Orleans: Earlier this year, Mayor LaToya Cantrell awarded keys to the city to Birdman and Slim. They also were honorees at this year’s Carnival-time Emline Ball, organized by the locally founded clothing brand.

The Williams brothers started Cash Money in 1991 and initially focused on bounce with releases by Kilo-G, UNLV, Ms. Tee and Pimp Daddy. Within a couple of years, they had convinced Mannie Fresh to be the label’s in-house producer.

As Cash Money started to gain a local and regional reputation, several of the first generation of artists began leaving the label, while at the same time young rappers Dwayne Carter and Christopher Dorsey — better known as Lil Wayne and BG — caught the attention of Baby and Slim. Soon after, the Cash Money roster also included Juvenile and Hotboy Turk, setting up the birth of Hot Boys.

In the mid ‘90s, Cash Money had become a regional heavyweight — 1997 alone saw now-classic albums by Juvenile, B.G., Hot Boys, Big Tymers and Magnolia Shorty — and the label had caught the attention of Universal Records. Cash Money’s $30 million distribution deal with Universal is legendary as both a big-figure deal and one that allowed Cash Money to maintain ownership over its catalogue.

Juvenile famously said, “Cash Money Records taking over for the ’99 and 2000,” and that’s exactly what happened. Cash Money artists began to dominate national radio, and by the end of 1999, the label had four albums simultaneously in the Billboard top 20.

Hurricane Katrina pushed Cash Money (and Lil Wayne) to relocate to Miami. And while there have been financial disputes and some industry ups and down, the label has continued to see major success.

Ahead of his Essence Festival appearance, Gambit spoke with Birdman about the world-changing three decades of Cash Money, the label’s early strategy and how things have changed.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity. It is part of Gambit’s history of New Orleans hip-hop project. Read more here.

Gambit: What do you have planned at Essence?

Birdman: We got plenty of surprises. And we just want to be creative as possible and have a great show. That’s what we do. That’s what we do as a whole. That’s what we do individual, a lot, but for a lot of us to come together — I’m just excited about coming home. We’ve been a fan of Essence since we was kids and getting the chance to be on their stage on their 30th — but you know, we got about [more than 30] years in this game. I’m just excited.

When Essence announced Birdman was playing this year — initially billed as “30 years of Cash Money Millionaires” — not only the city but the hip-hop community at large took note. Birdman as well as Juvenile have teased in recent months that the Hot Boys could soon reunite now that BG had been released from prison. So naturally, people have wondered if they’d see a reunion of the supergroup made up of Birdman, Mannie Fresh, Lil Wayne, Juvenile, BG and Turk. For months, everybody in New Orleans has wanted to know: Who’s going to be on stage Friday night?

Birdman: The [Big] Tymers gonna be there. Juvie. But we haven’t announced it with Essence yet, so I don’t want to break the mold. I know they want to announce it. But it’s gonna be intriguing. It’s gonna be exciting. We put a great show together, I can tell you that much, production wise. We spent a nice penny on our production to make it nice. I think that was very important for us. And for all us to be getting back together, it’s gonna be a good feeling. It’s gonna be a great night …

Essence in particular has leaned into the nostalgia aspect of the show. Their site now lists the show as “Birdman presents 30th anniversary of Cash Money,” which is a bit arbitrary. Cash Money itself predates 1994, after all, and the formal Cash Money Millionaires supergroup wouldn’t really get going for another couple years.

Still, for Birdman, finding himself able to mark 30 years of this sort of success and influence, whatever date people choose to start counting from, is worth celebrating.

Birdman: Never even thought it would exist. But being able to do it, because I experienced it. I put in the body of work. I dedicated every piece of my soul to it. Just appreciative. We know it’s a blessing from God and we just appreciating the groundwork. It paid off, and it’s paying off. And not just for us, for all our artists we worked with over the last 30-plus years. I’m excited for them to be still relevant in this game after making classic music for so long. And this is a genre of music that don’t last like that …

Just over all the years, with the music translating, with the generations translating, with how music has changed and we’ve changed and we’ve evolved. Just the whole package. I mean we’ve done it for a long time and still doing it. So just being appreciated for what we did and represent New Orleans to the fullest. We love our city, and our city is what made us. That’s what’s important to me.

We come up in a time when New Orleans was at its worst. The ’80s and ’90s, it was at its worst in terms of violence. We had to survive a lot, and help other people with us to survive. It wasn’t just about us. We had to teach these youngsters how to stay out of trouble. We became like a father figure to them, and they listened, and a lot of them lasted …

Two of the young artists that not only survived but thrived were of course Lil Wayne and BG. When Birdman and Slim first started working with the two rappers, they were barely into their teens.

Birdman: I just saw they was young and had talent and that [guidance] could make them to be something. I knew it wasn’t gonna be overnight. Wayne was a kid. BG was a kid. Even Magnolia Shorty. I knew that giving them an opportunity to be in the studio all day, they can grow, they can become better and we can take a chance with them. They’re kids and we can teach ‘em. And that’s what I did. I took them in and put them in the studio and I made them stay in there every day. I put them in private schools and the studio. Every day, straight from school, do your homework, and studio. Wayne’s still like that right now. He’s like a robot. Studio, studio, that’s all he know. Juvenile [too], BG since he’s been home.

[My mindset was] ‘Get the artists and put them in the position where they can grow. Get the artists and put them in a position where their talent can grow … keeping them in the studio and keeping them out the streets.’

That was my whole mindset. That was just like a ball player — you keep him on the field so he can be great. That don’t mean he was born to do that, but he can learn to do it. So my mindset was, just keep them in the studio and they stay out the streets. So I opened up the studio every day, all day. That’s all we ever did, and I think that formula got us to be great, got the talent to be greater.

Despite its fundamental impact on hip-hop, New Orleans has never gotten the recognition that New York, Los Angeles and even Atlanta have received as wellsprings for the culture. Not that New Orleans’ rappers, producers, DJs and industry moguls have ever paid that much mind.

Gambit: Was there something about New Orleans itself you felt helped Cash Money find success in those early days before the Universal deal?

Birdman: First off, we’re born, bred in New Orleans. Second, we did our music for New Orleans because that’s all we knew. All we knew was Uptown. All we knew was New Orleans, so we did our music for New Orleans. It happened to spread all over the world, but we never changed what we represented. And just our upbringing, how we came up, me and my brother — and all of them, too — we did music for our city, for our neighborhood. And once the world got on it, it was easier for us because we didn’t have to adapt to the world, the world had to adapt to us…

That’s why I say we come through different eras. Different times of genres, when the East and the West was winning and it wasn’t the South. I always feel like we had the best talent, and I was gonna keep that method of the studio going, so eventually, even though we didn’t have the East and the West, we always had the South. Always embrace the South. I knew if we keep fighting and stay with our craft, eventually things are gonna happen.

And that’s exactly what happened. I stayed with our craft and we went to these different Coasts and had to educate them to our music. And once they got past all that and accepted us for the music and the language, it was easier for us. But it was a fight. I ain’t gonna say it wasn’t a fight. It took years, too. The West Coast accepted us more than the East. It picked up quicker. The West Coast got a lot of Southern families, people that can trace more Southern than the East Coast is.

Gambit: Did you feel like there was a turning point, when you felt like they were getting it and finally paying attention to New Orleans?

Birdman: For a fact. It happened way back with the Hot Boys and Juvenile’s “Ha!” and “Back that Azz Up.” Especially when Wayne formed, it was over with. We conquered the world after that.

A lot of people were saying hip-hop was dead. We didn’t believe hip-hop was dead. We was here to keep hip-hop alive. And we did that single handedly as a brand, as artists. When they was saying hip-hop was dead, we didn’t understand that coming from the South. We had our own thing going. Nah, we didn’t understand that, and we brought it back to life …

A lot has changed in the years since Cash Money exploded. From how emcees rhyme to how labels produce and promote music, it’s almost an entirely different world. But Cash Money hasn’t just survived, it’s prospered in spite of the changing landscape.

Birdman: We changed with [the game]. And also, we got different genres of music. My brother just started a Latin company, where he’s got Latin artists, which is a big genre of music. And we still got a big catalog. We still in the game, we ain’t never stopped. I’m just appreciative of what we’ve done and how we’ve been respected …

I just think because we’re from the South — not just Cash Money, a lot of labels, I can only speak for us, but there’s a lot of labels that did it before me that deserve respect for what they contributed to hip-hop. A lot of them deserve respect to me and they don’t get it.

But do we deserve a lot of respect for what we did for the game? Yeah, ‘cause we single-handedly held it down. But I think because we’re from the South it’s like that. If we were from one of the Coasts, it wouldn’t be like that, but us being from down bottom, it be like that. That’s how this game was built.

Gambit: Do you think another Cash Money could happen in New Orleans today?

Birdman: The times we come on and the artists we developed, some out the same neighborhood, and plus Mannie Fresh — I don’t know, you can’t never say what can’t be done. I don’t believe in that. But that’s some big shoes to wear right there. To do the numbers we did and the long-term to survive, it won’t be easy, but I don’t believe nothing cannot be done. But it’s gonna be a long time. They say Rome wasn’t built in one day, and they still don’t know how to figure out a pyramid. So I think the numbers we did and the long-term we put into this game — I ain’t seen it been done yet by nobody in the world. Period.