Interview: Disco Rick

Disco Rick has had a long and illustrious career as a DJ, artist, producer and strip club kingpin. Over the years he’s worked alongside 2 Live Crew, Henry Stone, Rick Ross and many more. Early on in his career, he recorded with The Dogs – an unapologetically political rap group from Miami’s inner city, challenging police, racism and the drug war. This being a Miami group, though, meant that there were also plenty of strip club anthems, comedy records, and good old-fashioned bass heavy dance music.

In this recent interview, Rick talks about performing to a packed stadium of Brazilians, watching Queen Latifah fight to his music and why you should also pay the stripper instead of the DJ to get your music played at a booty club.

How did you get started in music?

I was a DJ starting around 1980, 1981. I was a skating rink DJ and a street DJ. I followed Luke [Campbell] and the Ghetto Style DJs and the name of my group was the Party Down DJs. That was Pretty Tony’s crew. He’s the one that named me Disco Rick when I was young. First he named me Dynamite Rick back when I was just a little kid on the microphone, but later he changed it to Disco Rick.

We basically had our street equipment and sound system and we played fast bass music and the records being put out by Egyptian Lover, the Soulsonic Force, “Planet Rock.” All those things kind of shaped Miami and Bass music itself.

Then 2 Live Crew had a couple records, “Beat Box” and “Revelation,” which were hits in Miami. Luke brought them down here in 1984 to the original Pac Jam skating rink in North Dade. Then when Chris and Mixx did "Throw the D," in 1986 I got the first copy fresh off the press. Luke passed me one and I said, “I’ll play it.” He wrote 2 Live Crew “Throw the D” on it, and from there it all started. I played it at my party and then all of the DJ crews started playing it. We all went on the record. It was all love because Miami wasn’t in the scene. We had a couple rappers out but not much.

By the time I had Gucci Crew II with “Sally (That Girl),” I’m watching Luke and doing whatever he does. He didn’t show me, I just watched. I didn’t watch nobody else. This n---a jump this way, I’ma jump this way. When he went that way, I went that way.

After I left Gucci Crew II and went solo, one day I’m out there at the Splashdown, which was controlled by Luke, and he was stuck on stage having a bikini pussy contest. All the girls were on the stage and all the guys in the audience were chanting, “Take it off! Take it off!” My brain automatically filled in the space between what they were saying with “Show that pussy!” I started ad-libbing it between all the chants. Then I looked at my friend and said, “Show that pussy! Take it off!” And that’s when I decided to go into the studio and record it.

I needed a beat with a kind of 2 Live Crew feel and this Latin guy Danny Diaz did something, but the beat wasn’t right. So I told Calvin Mills from Richmond Heights the concept and he basically laid the foundation. Then I redid the lyrics to his beat and threw some scratches like I did for Gucci Crew. But you wouldn’t call it biting back then. It’s wasn’t bitin’. It’s called what we did in Miami.

When I got with The Dogs and started recording, our group concept was different than what was going on at the time. I was more political and less about bitches. Luke had hoes gettin’ naked, but I was like, “Fuck the police!” My album, The Negro’s Back, with the KKK hood and the noose on the cover? That album never made it to the store. That shit got banned quick.

I remember going to Brazil and filling soccer stadiums. It was crazy. They was having political problems and the only song of mine they cared about was “Fuck the President.” They hated Fernando Collor so much. There was all this security on me going to these political radio stations to promote [the event]. I’m thinking I’m gonna get killed. I get up there and do “Fuck the President” and they know every single word to the song. Then I got to sayin’, “Somebody say ‘Hey, Ho,’” and everybody gets quiet and now they don’t speak English. I’m like, “Somebody needs to interpret this shit.”

How did you get involved in the strip club world?

The strip club world was always into me. A lot of babies were born during the 2 Live Crew era and my era as well. We were strip club moguls. We had it on the road. In the Winnebago. On the tour bus. Travelling with bitches in the van. We always brought pussy to the show, well before strip clubs. We’d show up to nice places full of blue collar motherfuckers, put the bitches on stage, and take it back to Africa with the ass shaking. And the media just made us bigger.

Are strip clubs important for breaking records?

I tell guys every day, “Quit paying the DJ to play your music!” Pay the girl, and the girl will tell the DJ what to play. The DJ will only play your song one time, but the girl will dance off that shit every time she sees you.

What is the story behind the infamous song “Let Them Ho’s Fight?”

We was doing Fight Night at a club in Fort Lauderdale. Every Monday night for a whole year, nothin’ but a bunch of white people there, money flyin’ everywhere. This was 1992 or ’93. All the ballers used to hang out there at this white club, looking at girls fighting. One time we invited Queen Latifah to come and put on the gloves. This white girl got up there and punched the shit out of her. Latifah looked over at us like, “Is it OK to go in?” And then Latifah went and whooped the shit out of that white girl. So the song came from that, mixing up the white people dance music with the chant: “Time to rumble. Bitch get ready. Let them hoes fight.”

That song got big and made it up to Detroit and Chicago. They liked the beat and took to it. If I go there today, they can’t play that song. They showed me why. They put it on at the club one night. One bitch push another. Then another bitch pull a rollerskate out of her purse and split a bitch’s head wide open. That song cannot be played in Detroit. I didn’t intend for it to go that way. It was just a fun song to do in Fort Lauderdale.

Can you describe a Liberty City block party from the old days?

The best outdoor parties were at African Square Park in Liberty City on 62nd Street and 14th Ave. That was the center for all of us. From 1977 to 1980, that was everybody. I’d go watch Ghetto Style, Pretty Tony, Vicious Funk, everybody in that park battling each other with those speakers against speakers every Sunday afternoon till nighttime. Till the first shots ring out. Or, if we had to pay to go somewhere, it would be the National Guard Armory for the biggest DJ battle ever. I’d be in there as a little kid dancing my ass off. I learned from the battles the art of war when it comes to music.

Are you gonna continue as an artist in the studio?

I’m pretty much back in the studio about 35% or 40%. I know there’s records that need to be made to get paid and for shit to keep goin’ around. They come and they go.

We shaped Miami. And I thank all the rappers that were part of it. But some of the old ones still be trying to do it and they should just stop. I’m not gonna destroy my history. Dougie Fresh not in the studio. You don’t see Kool Moe Dee trying to make a record. You gotta put it down. I’m trying to tell people, you gotta let it go.

Michael Jackson can’t thrill no more. Run-DMC can’t raise hell no more. LL Cool J can’t rock the bells no more. Rakim can’t be paid in full no more. 2 Live Crew can’t be so horny no more. Betty Wright can’t clean up another house. Janet Jackson can’t control nobody. That’s the peak. I can’t do what I did before. All you gon' do is destroy yourself.

This young generation and this Internet shit, if you go gold and sell 500,000 copies, that really means five million people downloaded your shit somewhere else. Now that it’s all computers, what is the music business? Do anybody see a platform where a n---a actually making money besides shows? These n---s putting out records don’t even come with a record company. It’s not Atlantic or Capitol, it’s Homeboys Records Presents. It’s millions of motherfuckers in studios now saying they got a hit, but there’s only room for about six new artists a year on the market.

And people need to stop worrying about putting their picture out with the song. Nobody even knew Fetty Wap only had one eye till the record was a hit. You can’t stop a hit. He could have come out there with no legs in a busted wheelchair and they would have had to accept him.

I have learned to do records. Some n---a might get pissed off when I tell him how he needs to change his song, but I stick with what I know. And right now I know pussy. I know pussy and I know n---as with money wanna watch some pussy. I know what n---as like and what they want to look at. It is what it is.

I always tell artists, “Nobody is waiting on you.” You can always come out of nowhere with a hit, so take your time and do it right, but when you get that hit, nobody is going to stop you. When your shit becomes a hit, that’s when everybody wants to see you.” That’s what this world is about. You ain’t shit till you make some motherfuckin’ noise.