+ abajo entrevista de J.J. a los B.E.P. (sucedió en el Warhol's Interview)

Johnny wanna be a big star
Get on stage and play the guitar
Make a little money, buy a fancy car
Big old house and an alligator
Just to match with them alligator shoes
He´s a rich man so he´s no longer singing the blues
He´s singing songs about material things
And platinum rings and watches that go bling
But, diamonds don´t bling in the dark
He a star now, but he ain´t singing from the heart
Sooner or later he´s just gonna fall apart
Coz his fans can´t relate to his new found art
He ain´t doing what he did from the start
And that´s ??
He decided to live his life shallow
Passion is love for material

[Chorus]
And its gone... gone... going...
Gone... everything gone... give a damn...
Gone be the birds when they don´t want to sing...
Gone people... up awkward with their things... gone.

You see yourself in the mirror
And you feel safe coz it looks familiar
But you afraid to open up your soul
Coz you don´t really know, don´t really know
Who is, the person that´s deep within
Coz you are content with just being the na¯ve brown man
And you fail to see that its trivial
Insignificant, you addicted to material
I´ve seen your kind before
Your the type that thinks souls is sold in a store
Packaged up with inscent sticks
With them vegetarian meals
To you that´s righteous
You´re fiction like books
You need to go out to life and look
Coz... what happens when they take your material
You already sold your soul and its...

[Chorus]

You say that time is money and money is time
So you got mind in your money and your money on your mind
But what about... that crime that you did to get paid
And what about... that bid, you can´t take it to your brain
Why you on about those shoes you´ll wear today
They´ll do no good on the bridges you´ve walked along the way

All that money that you got gonna be gone
That gear that you rock gonna be gone
The house up on the hill gonna be gone
The gold -- on your grill gonna be gone
The ice on your wrist gonna be gone
That nice little Miss gonna be gone
That whip that you roll gonna be gone
And what´s worst is your soul will be gone

[Chorus]


-------------------------------------

IN AN ERA WHEN GANGSTA POSES AND GRITTY PERSONAS STILL DOMINATE HIP-HOP, WHY IS A GROUP THAT GOES AGAINST THOSE FORMULAS COMING OUT ON TOP OF THE FRAY?

JACK JOHNSON: Hey, guys! Now, Fergie, I don't know if you remember, but we met at the Falls Festival in Lorne, Australia.

FERGIE: Yeah, that was the first time I performed with the Peas. I was really excited to meet you. [giggles] That was a memorable show because I was really nervous. It was my first time performing as an official member, and I had a few drinks before the show, [laughs] but I didn't think to go to the restroom before we went onstage ... We were doing "Let's Get Retarded," and we were jumping around--it was all very rock 'n' roll--and my bladder just started ... you know, nature called ... [laughs]

JJ: Really?

F: Yeah [laughs] ... I became a pea, basically. Somebody brought out these champagne bottles because it was the New Year, and I basically opened one up and squirted it all over myself so nobody would notice. [laughs] It was a very memorable Pea experience.

WILL.I.AM: [laughs] Seriously, I want to thank you for letting us take your vocals from the earlier version of "Gone Going" [recorded for Elephunk but unused] and incorporate them into this new version on Monkey Business. JJ: I'm glad it finally got used; I've been holding on to it for a long time. We did that a couple years ago now, actually.

Continue article
Advertisement

W: Yeah, in 2001.

JJ: That was fun. I was impressed with how eclectic your taste was. You kept pulling out Brazilian records and all kinds of old funk stuff. It was crazy how fast that all went; it just seemed like we were kind of demo-ing something, and then it ended up being the version you used.

W: We used the original guitar takes and the bass line. It came out dope. JJ: I dig your stuff a lot. What about you, Fergie? Were you a fan of the band before you joined?

F: Completely. I first saw the Peas et the El Ray Theater [in Los Angeles] in 1998, and I knew right away I wanted to work with them. I was in another band then called Wild Orchid, and we were parting ways and coincidentally had a show with the Peas--I felt like it was a sign. I knew it was hip-hop with a very eclectic twist, which is what I was inspired by.

JJ: So you guys got to hook up and do music?

W: Yeah, we didn't see her group perform, but a friend of mine suggested setting her up for a song on our third record, Elephunk [2003], and he was like, "Trust me, she can sing her ass off." So she came to the studio, and I was like, "You hear our harmony?" She was like, "Which one--the third or fifth?" I was like, "Wow!" I mean, she came in with knowledge! She came in and was just knocking it out in, like, 30 minutes. We work pretty fast--our thing is to capture the moment as quick as possible.

JJ: I experienced that when I worked with you. And that's how we'd like to do it too, just kind of quick in the studio. Are there a few producers who have influenced you?

W: There's one in particular: Mario C. [Mario Caldato Jr.] He put out this one underground record by Jorge Ben Jor from Brazil, and I think it was an Extra Large limited compilation. He was a big influence, as far as how he would put different styles of music together on the stuff he was doing with the Beastie Boys. And then when he produced your stuff, I liked how he stripped it down and just really captured each instrument for how it really sounds.

JJ: When a lot people first heard we were working with Mario, they thought it was a little bit out of left field because they knew him from doing the Beastie Boys. But after hanging out with Mario, just pulling out all kinds of records, Brazilian and Cuban and French and stuff, you realize his knowledge of acoustic music is pretty vast. I wasn't really trying to do a hip-hop thing, so it was cool that Mario knew the good hip-hop stuff but was also able to pull from a lot of other stuff for sounds.

W: The reason I gravitated toward you as a singer-songwriter is that I related to your approach vocally--to the music. But speaking of Brazilian music, I'm just finishing this Sergio Mendes album. It's like a samba/bossa nova, but from our perspective. It's pretty dope. I got songs with Q-Tip and Sergio Mendes, Stevie Wonder and Sergio Mendes, Jill Scott and Sergio Mendes-it's a beautiful record.

JJ: That's cool. I really like Q-Tip.

W: Yeah, he's on our new record too, on a song called "Like That."

JJ: Who else is around right now that you guys dig?

F: I like Back's new record.

JJ: I like that one a lot, too. So, when's the next chance you're going to get to Hawaii?

W: Well, we're going to Japan soon, and before we do, I'll go to Hawaii for a couple of days. I can't swim, so I'll be just chilling in a hotel. I almost drowned when I was 10, sol got a phobia.

JJ: We get some big waves just starting up around then, but I'll get you out there, Will. You just have to focus, get back into it.

W: Nan, even when I take showers I can't open my eyes. Once I get over that, then I'll learn how to swim. [laughs]

Jack Johnson's new live DVDs, A Week at the Greek and Jack Johnson Live in Japan (Brushfire) are out now. On opening spread (from left): Will.i.am wears a jacket and shirt by SCOTT LANGTON. Pants by I.AM CLOTHING. Shoes by PUMA. Sunglasses by CHRISTIAN ROTH. Taboo wears a jacket by Y-3. Shirt and pants by SCOTT LANGTON. Shoes by SEBASTIANO MIGLIORE. Sunglasses by RAY BAN. Fergie wears a shirt by PHILLIPE & DAVID BLOND. Shorts by TOP SHOR Shoes by MOSCHINO. Apl.de.ap wears a vest by DSQUARE[D.sup.2]. Shirt and tie by DRIES VAN NOTEN. Pants by TRUE RELIGION. Shoes by ARMANI JEANS. Opposite: Top by MISS SIXTY. Cosmetics by ESTEE LAUDER.

APL.DE.AP AND TABOO

BY MOOALLEM, STEPHEN

STEPHEN MOOALLEM: You guys are big into dancing. Did you both start off break-dancing?

APL.DE.AP: Yeah, I started in 1983.

TABOO: I started in '89. Growing up in a Latin household, I was exposed to a lot of Latin rhythms, and I would go to different parties, like Spanish parties called quinceras, and just battle. In my neighborhood that was kind of forbidden because it wasn't a Latin thing, so I would get a lot of flak. I didn't care, though; I just felt that's what I was good at.

SM: Where did you both grow up?

A: I was born in the Philippines, and then I was adopted and moved to Los Feliz, in L.A. I arrived in '89, and the first person I met was Will, 'cause his uncle was rooming with my adoptive father. We started hanging out and formed a dance crew called Tribal Nation.

SM: What was it like confronting hip-hop culture and break-dancing and graffiti culture and all that coming from a small town in the Philippines?

A: In junior high school it was easy to get into gangs, but being a dancer made me neutral with everybody, and that's what kept me away from all the stupid stuff.

T: My school was predominantly Mexican and Asian, but I would hang out with my four black friends and break-dance with them. We would practice after school, and people would laugh at us, but we'd just try to build our skills. We used to go to different schools to represent dancing from our area.

SM: Obviously dancing is a big part of your performance, but you guys also come from a politically conscious place.

T: Let's say "socially" conscious.

SM: Okay, so where did that come from?

A: When 9/11 hit, we were working on Elephunk. We initially had a bunch of party songs, but after that they just felt meaningless. Plus, it was our third album, and we didn't know whether A&M was going to drop us. We were like, "This could be our last thing, so let's go out with a bang." And we were also going through a lot of dark stuff in our own lives.

T: We've always had socially conscious songs, like, on our first record, Behind the Front [1998], we had a song called "Positivity," but with the success of Elephunk and "Where Is the Love?" the mass population got to know a little bit about that side of us.