Right now, Huntsville, Alabama's 6 Tre Gangsta is doing what many rappers from Alabama have dreamed about but few have actually done: breaking through to the mainstream. His current single, "Fresh", is taking the nation by storm, he has a major label deal with Jive Records, and he’s working on his first Jive album, The Motion Picture LP. But while things are going great for 6 Tre now, it hasn't always been that way. In fact, things were down-right hard for him at times, and he spent much of his life in darkness. 6 Tre and I recently had a very long conversation in which we talked about many of the things he's been through - both good and bad. Read on to find out more about 6 Tre, his career and how he was able to come out of the darkness and into the light.
IF YOU'VE TAKEN A look at the little gray box to the right then you've probably figured out that the article you're about to read is not your typical article. But then my interview with Huntsville, Alabama's 6 Tre Gangsta was not my typical interview. It was different from every other interview I’ve done in one very important way: it lasted almost 3 hours - three times longer than normal!
I had not expected to be able to do the interview at all that day. It had been scheduled for the day before, but 6 Tre never called. The next day, when I called his manager, he informed me that he’d forgotten about the interview, apologized and suggested that I call 6 Tre directly to set up something else.
I called, and as 6 Tre didn’t answer, I left a message. He called back that evening just as I was getting home – and looking forward to tucking into the hamburger that I’d picked up on the way. I’d assumed that we would just reschedule the interview, but thankfully, 6 Tre was willing and ready to talk right then, so into the fridge went the burger, and off we went…and went…and went.
DURING THE INTERVIEW, I kept thinking the same things over and over: “This man can talk!” and “This is one talking man!” It was very rare for 6 Tre to answer any question in less than 5 or 10 minutes and without going off on a tangent. When we started, he was on the way out to dinner, and we talked on his drive to the restaurant, during his wait to be seated, through the appetizers, and right up until shortly after his dinner arrived.
A whole hour - and I was only about a third of the way through my interview questions! I was also feeling very bad about keeping him talking while he was trying to have dinner. Plus, I was hungry as hell, which made it very difficult to listen to him eating his steak. “We’re about to go over an hour," I informed him. "You wanna keep going, or you wanna go on ahead, and eat?” He chose to eat, telling me he’d call me back when he got back to home-base.
About an hour later, after 6 Tre G had eaten his hot steak - and I’d eaten my now refrigerator-cold hamburger (after tossing it into the microwave, of course) - he called back, and we continued our conversation. Again, I felt guilty for keeping him on the phone. I could hear that he had family and friends around and was sure that he preferred kicking it with them to talking to me. But I wanted my interview. And besides, I’d asked him if he wanted to finish the interview another day, and he’d declined, so instead we talked…and we talked…
I DON'T SEE NOTHING WRONG...
Now don't get it twisted, even as tired as I was afterward, I actually enjoyed my talk with 6 Tre and am grateful that he took the time talk to me.
Besides, there's nothing wrong with a good long interview because the longer the interview, the more information I get - and the better the resulting article will be.
The only downside is that the article itself can end up being really long too.
But if it's a really good article, who the hell cares?
...And we talked. My head was hurting. I was tired. I was sleepy. I wanted to cry. But still, we talked. I know 6 Tre was also tired and sleepy (and possibly wanted to cry too) because his voice was becoming slurred, and he had to think longer before answering my questions (of course, I don’t know what he’d had to drink at that restaurant).
But most telling of all, and the thing that really let me know that 6 Tre was ready to call it a night, was that his answers became shorter and shorter as we went along. He was now down to about 3 to 7 minutes, a marked improvement over where he’d started.
I could have cut some of my questions out, and I seriously thought about it, but I was stubborn. Again, I wanted my damn interview, and I was going to get it. And anyway, if you’re going to do something, you might as well do it right, and I knew I’d regret not asking certain questions later on when it was time to write the article, so I pressed on. 6 Tre G and I talked another hour and forty-five minutes until, finally, finally, it was over. Thank God!
I was drained, and my head was pounding, so I went straight to bed afterwards, and over the next week, I didn’t want to hear or see anything that had to do with 6 Tre Gangsta. I was like a wife whose husband has pissed her off: “Don’t touch me! Get away from me!” So I took my time getting started on this article. I finished up another article that I was working on. Then, I took care of some administrative things. But eventually, I had to face the facts: I had an article to write, and I had to start now.
BUT IF THE INTERVIEW was long, the making of the article was even worse. First, I had to transcribe the interview. It normally takes 3 to 4 hours just to transcribe a one-hour interview. The 6 Tre Gangsta interview lasted 3 hours. (You do the math. I’ll wait.) When I’d finally finished, I was looking at a 14 page transcript – even though I’d used only an 8-point font and the smallest margin possible.
Then, once I’d transcribed the interview, I had to write the article. But, oh boy. Where to begin? It was like looking at a ridiculously huge hamburger, and trying to figure out how to tackle it.
LAST WORDS
At the end of every interview, I ask the interviewee if he has any last words or if there is anything he wants to talk about that I didn’t cover during the interview. The answer is almost always no, but this is 6 Tre Gangsta we’re talking about here. One word answers don’t suffice...
“Shiiit!” he exclaims, laughing. “I don’t see how I can say anything else or hit on any subject that you didn’t hit on other than my prostate health! …So I think you have thoroughly interviewed me! And my last words are, ‘Have your battery charged up when Ol’ Girl hit you, cause G##D###, it’s gon’ be a ride!'”
And my last words are, “Make sure you’ve filled your belly, emptied your bladder and gotten at least 8 hours of sleep before you interview 6 Tre Gangsta cause gosh darned it, you’ll regret it if you don’t!’
I realized one thing right off the bat: There was no way I was going to be able to put all this information into one article. It would be too long. But I didn’t want to restrict myself too much either. 6 Tre has a very interesting story, and he’d taken the time to tell it to me, so I wanted to take the time to tell it to you.
"Besides," I thought, "This is a website. It’s not a TV or radio show where there’s only a small amount of time to speak on a few important topics. I can take as much space as I want." And on top of that, "It’s my website. If I want to post the whole damn 'Life and Times of 6 Tre Gangsta: An Unauthorized Biography', I can do so, and nobody can do or say anything about it."
So with those thoughts rattling around in my worried and overwhelmed head, I decided not to restrict myself and to write the article the way I saw fit. And if it was really long, so what? I’d split it up into parts, and release one a week.
And that’s just what happened. The article ended up being three times as long as usual, but I was able to tell 6 Tre's story completely. There are 8 separate parts. That’s a lot. I know. But hopefully, after you’ve read them all, you’ll agree that that was the best way to go. So without further ado, I give to you, the very long article/story, "6 Tre Gangsta: From Darkness into Light."
