Jermaine Dupri Breaks Down His Billboard Hits: “Fresh Azimiz” & More | Chart History

3 months ago

Jermaine Dupri sits down and shares the stories behind his biggest hits including bringing Janet Jackson to set for the “Dem Jeans” music video, the story of how “Wat Da Hook Gon Be” title came to be, creating “Money Ain't a Thang” with Jay-Z, Bow Wow’s transition with “Fresh Azimiz” and more!

What’s your favorite song from Jermaine Dupri? Let us know in the comments!

Transcript

00:00What's up y'all, this is Jermaine Dupri and this is my Billboard chart history.

00:16Okay, so the first thing that I was thinking was like, this ain't my song, it hit me.

00:22I haven't heard that song in a long time, the first Jagged Edge record that I did featuring

00:26myself in the Brat.

00:27I just remember the video, we went all the way out for the video.

00:31I put like four baby grand white pianos out in the middle of a parking lot and let them

00:35stand on top of the pianos.

00:37I was just trying to make the biggest video I could possibly make for my group.

00:40It didn't work well, but.

00:43From the first time that me and Brat started rapping back to back, I just remember people's

00:47reaction to it and it being something that I hadn't seen in hip hop, like a Bunny and Clyde

00:53type of group in rap basically.

00:57I was just trying to find the groove that Chingy had on his first record.

01:03Pulling Me Back was such a big single, we just trying to follow up with something that

01:19that made people dance and that had that St. Louis and Atlanta bop to it.

01:25I was trying to make the beat feel like grills, but not like grills.

01:36I wanted the beat to give you a little break and then hit the 808 and then give you a little

01:40break.

01:41It's an interesting process.

01:42I remember making the videos, like a regular like, you know, girls and guys in the video.

01:46When I was dating Jaina, I had Dana come to this video shoot and the girl was rubbing

01:51her ass on me and I remember me and Jana getting into like a little argument after the video

01:55about that.

01:56It's a video.

01:57You know what I mean?

01:58It was like, it was crazy because it was like the one time that I'm like, yo, you should

02:02come to the video.

02:03We making a video.

02:04And that's what happened.

02:05That's what I remember about this song.

02:07I mean, that's the one thing I remember.

02:09But the song is talking about the girls and they know how they body looks in the jeans,

02:13so this is what was happening.

02:15But I chose to say like, bring your girl to work today type shit and this is what happened.

02:33What the Hook Gonna Be, Murphy Lee.

02:35This probably is one of the funniest records ever because the hook of the song is actually

02:40a question that was actually asked in this session.

02:44Nelly came and they're like, yo, what the hook gonna be?

02:47I don't think me or Murphy had a hook and we both was like, I don't know what the hook

02:52gonna be.

02:53I think the way it was said, it sounded like the hook and Nelly was like, that's the hook.

02:58And I'm like, what's the hook?

03:00It was almost like that scene from like Purple Rain when Mars Day and Jerome was talking and

03:05they was like, what's the password?

03:07The password is, and he was like, the password is what?

03:11It was almost like that.

03:12That was another fast one because it was just like, are we really getting ready to say what

03:16the hook gonna be?

03:17I don't need no fucking hook on this beat.

03:19At that point, it just started morphing into an idea that's just like, wow, what the hook

03:24gonna be?

03:25We don't need no hook.

03:26This is the hook.

03:27The hook became, no hook became a hook.

03:30This is a song that I remixed like three times.

03:47So the first version of this song was Me and Snoop Dogg.

03:51And it was on the Men in Black soundtrack.

03:54I did a remix of the song.

03:56The original song had Trey Loren singing the hook.

03:58I took Trey and Snoop off that and I put Usher.

04:03I replaced Snoop with Brat.

04:05Usher feature was just right after the success of My Way.

04:09It didn't make no sense for me to use anybody else.

04:11All I wanna do is make you dance with me.

04:21Dance with me.

04:22Yeah.

04:23Yeah, yeah, yeah.

04:24Bad.

04:25Yeah.

04:26Fresh as I'm is.

04:27This was a song that, in my practice of writing songs for people, especially younger people,

04:30and getting the best performance out of them, is that you gotta write something so good

04:36when you demo it, that they actually, they want to do it so bad, like they can't wait

04:42to do the song.

04:43This song I demoed for Bow.

04:45I was having some fun when I was demoing the song.

04:48I think that he heard that immediately.

04:51For him, this song sounded like Bow Wow transitioning into rap records that sounded like they was

04:57compatible with adults.

04:59I just remember his excitement about doing this song, like he's like, get out of here,

05:05go do what y'all gotta do.

05:06When you come back, this song gonna be done and like, and you can tell even when he performs

05:09this song, like this is one of his favorite songs.

05:26Money ain't a thing, me and Jay-Z, there's a lot of memories about this song.

05:29I called Jay, told him what I wanted to do, he's like, all right, I'm gonna come.

05:34He gave me a date, he was flying to Atlanta.

05:36So I'm sitting at my house.

05:37I was in the studio trying to make a beat.

05:39I was trying to figure out what we was gonna do, right?

05:42Because we hadn't spoke about creative, we was just coming to Atlanta to make a song.

05:46I left my house to go pick him up and in the car I'm trying to get in Jay-Z mode.

05:51So I put in Can't Knock the Hustle.

05:54I'm listening to him rap.

06:00In the verse he says, I was like, wait a minute, hold up, wait, wait.

06:06And by the way, this trip to the airport is not even 10 minutes.

06:09So I was already at the airport, still like messing with the CD, like going back, listening

06:14to it.

06:15And I'm like, that's it, money ain't a thing.

06:17And I remember me driving fast, trying to get to the airport, because I felt like he

06:21didn't want to make him wait long.

06:23My mentality at that time was, you know, screaming through the sunroof, money ain't a thing type

06:28of mentality.

06:29So I get to the airport, he get in the car, I'm like, yo, I want to sample this.

06:33I'm going to sample this part where it said, money ain't a thing.

06:36And I see him like not mouthing the rap, but I see him like thinking to himself.

06:41We get to my house, we get in the studio, I play the beat, I say, this is the beat I

06:45want to do.

06:46He hit a beat for like less than 10 minutes and he's like, I'm ready.

06:50And I'm like, you ready to do what?

06:53And he's like, I'm ready to go.

06:55And I'm like, when did you write your verse?

06:57He's like, I wrote it when he was in the car.

06:59And I'm like, what?

07:01Yeah, that was my first time watching Jay-Z do the no write on paper thing.

07:07That song taught me a lot.

07:10And there's a lot of memories about that record.

07:24I think they liked me was, it was this period of time where I was going through this like

07:29mixtape JD era where I was just like jumping on people's songs that didn't even like give

07:34me the permission to jump on their records.

07:37The Franchise Boys, they had a song called White Tea where I put a verse on that song.

07:42I was on their radar, they was on my radar.

07:45I was trying to figure out a way why I could call Universal and be like, yo, let's trade

07:48artists.

07:49Let's do something.

07:50One morning I woke up and Universal was like cutting ties with the Franchise Boys.

07:54And I was like, oh shit, this must be my lucky day.

07:58I went to Authors, I'm like, I'm signing them immediately.

08:00Oh, I think they liked me was on the radio in Atlanta, but it didn't have me, Bret and

08:05Bow-Wah on there.

08:06And at this time, Bow-Wah was Mr. 106 in part.

08:09Bow-Wah wasn't quick to want to be on this song.

08:11He didn't actually like this song at all.

08:13Didn't like the record when I first heard it.

08:15Didn't not like the song.

08:16Didn't understand it.

08:17I think that's when we're entering that new wave of hip hop.

08:20You know what I mean?

08:21That's when Atlanta, the snap music started taking over.

08:23Them Franchise Boys was also considered like Atlanta underground.

08:27I think that Bow-Wah was so commercial and so successful from a different side of the world,

08:33him not knowing about it and it being underground and not being in the clubs like that, it didn't

08:40really strike him as like, this could be the next thing.

08:44He went along with it, but he didn't like the verse.

08:46He didn't like the song at all.

08:48But I mean, that's cool.

08:49Usher didn't like damn near none of the songs we did.

08:53The first memory of this song was that I was in the studio trying to create a song for

09:12me and OutKast.

09:13I couldn't figure out what we were going to talk about.

09:15I'm in there trying to come up with ideas, come up with ideas.

09:19When I walk out the studio, I always used to keep like MTV or BET, something playing

09:24in the studio.

09:25The Ludacris video of Throw Them Bosers On and it's a doormat at the bottom of the floor

09:31in the house that says, Welcome to Atlanta.

09:33And I'm looking at the video and I'm like, Welcome to Atlanta.

09:36That's it.

09:37That's the name of the song.

09:38At that point, I felt like I can't take this idea from Ludacris and give it to OutKast.

09:44I got to make this song with Ludacris.

09:47So that's ultimately how that song came about.

09:50And I called Ludacris and was like, yo, I want to make this song called Welcome to Atlanta.

09:54The rest is history.

09:55This was a song that was supposed to be me and Missy, but the label didn't approve of

10:14the Missy version.

10:15And I re-rapped Missy verse on my second verse.

10:19And I just made the song a full Jermaine Dupree record.

10:22The label fucked that up, but yeah, that's what it was.

10:25I was trying to introduce the world to Jontae Austin as a songwriter.

10:28Cause I signed him at the time that I was at Virgin.

10:30So I put Jontae on the song too.

10:32Gotta get you.

10:33First of all, I wasn't supposed to be singing on this song.

10:49That's supposed to be T-Pain.

10:50I made the song and I'm like, let's get T-Pain on there.

10:53For some reason we didn't get T-Pain.

10:54I don't know if somebody was just like, nah, let's just keep JD on the song or whatever.

10:58But we didn't get T-Pain.

10:59We couldn't get T-Pain for some reason.

11:01Everybody just liked it with my voice on there.

11:03I didn't prefer my voice on the song.

11:05I didn't care.

11:06I'm not trying to sing on these songs.

11:08Same thing happened on the Can I Get Your Number record with Mariah.

11:10When she came to the studio, I was like, I want her to sing the, oh damn, I wanted to

11:15do that part.

11:16But she was like, no, I'll do this song, but you got to stay on it.

11:19And I'm like, I don't want to, I'm not singing on the song, but that's the same thing happened

11:23with this song.

11:24Working with Fab was very easy because he's so melodic and he got like a lot of different

11:29pockets.

11:30So if you are, if you can sketch out the right plays for him, it's a, it's a very much like

11:34easy way to get in the studio.

11:36He's definitely an easy, easy guy to work with.

11:38He's always trying to make better records.

11:40So you got to make things that push him.

11:42So this song actually was a record that I found before he came to the studio and I was like,

11:47yo, you got to rap over this beat.

11:49And when he got there, just like instantly.

Jermaine Dupri Breaks Down His Billboard Hits: “Fresh Azimiz” & More | Chart History | Billboard

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