Let's talk about that 12" which came out in January 1995 on Blunted Records, released by the Brentwood-based emcee K.A.O.S., acronym for Kicking Ass On Spot. The wax consists of the tracks "Who Inda House" which is the lead single and "Word Life", that were both produced by Roboe a.k.a Robb-o Fitzgibbons. K.A.O.S and Roboe met through a guy named Larry Clark (Larry Clark Management). Larry Clark is the guy who financed K.A.O.S Demos at that time, 5 or 6 songs fully produced by Roboe and "Who Inda House" got chosen to be the single.
First of all, could you tell us how everything started for you as an emcee ?
K.A.O.S : "I first started as an emcee going on tour with Public Enemy, the Bring The Noise Tour in 1987. I was on tour and EPMD hit me up... I was a header security with the whole group... Public Enemy, Stetsasonic, Ice T & The Syndicate, Big Daddy Kane, Jungle Brothers, EPMD, Eric B & Rakim...
Being around them all the time in the hotel rooms of course and listening to them write their songs for their next singles and for the albums... I was listening to them write their lyrics and one day I was like you know what I can do this … Shit I can do this…so I gave it a shine !!
After that tour, when I get back to New York, I set out to make my first single, which wasn't sold or anything like that ... when I recorded my first song and it was called at the time "Crack a Killer », it was the 80s of course, that's started off my whole career like my fever for want to be a rapper, I wasn’t just supposed to be a heavy fan... I'm from the Bronx, so it's a certain thing , you know that's where hip-hop first started, so I have to start there at that time.."
How did the connection happen with Blunted Records ?
K.A.O.S : "A producer who was working with me and was also working with Bad Boy at the time at the beginning, that was just before the release of Craig Mack and Biggie, his name was Lenny Ace Marrow and he had received my demo and he liked it, he liked it very much, so he took it to Blunted Records, and Blunted Records heard it and they flipped over it. He called me up and he told me the label wanted to talk to me... they called me up and wanted to sign me."
K.A.O.S : "He said « my name is Paris Fawundu, I'm the vice president of Blunted Records and we're very interested in signing you. We believe that you can definitely take our label somewhere ! », it was an indie of course. I liked the vibe at the time, I liked the way they approached me so I gave them the OK !! I went down with my manager and the next thing you need to know, simply just like that …with no lawyer…I signed for a few hundred dollars...you know what I’m saying…
They signed me and right away started to remake the single which was on my demo which was called "Who Inda House". Myself, I didn’t expect to blow up the way It did... with the work of having Lenny Ace Morrow and Robb-o Fitzgibbons, because Robb-o was like my main producer, Lenny Ace Morrow was more like my engineer.
But Robb-o, that was the man who made the tracks, he produced the tracks and I did the lyrics... nobody wrote for me ...no ghost writer believe me... that was the chemistry. We agreed to put Lenny Ace master’s name first on that album, considering his reputation at the time, he had more notoriety than Robb-o at the time... Lenny was the one who did the work with Bad Boy."
How and when did you meet Robb-O exactly ?
K.A.O.S : "I met Robb-o at that time through Lenny Ace Marrow. He introduced us both together, Lenny said that he knew a dope producer. I listened to some of his music that he was producing and his music was dope ! Especially it seems he was tailer made for me...for KAOS because everyone else was doing something different from me, they were all doing the same thing. My style was intricate, it was just different and deserved different attention, and that was the type of attention Robb-O gave to it and gave to me... the credit is to him, that's how we met ! "
Why was there no album released after the 12inch ? what happened ?
K.A.O.S : "The single blew up... I was doing shows with Mobb Deep, MOP. I was contacted and backed up by Fat Joe, Nas, that was around Fat Joe's first single and Nas's first album. It was blowing up on BET, Rap City, MTV, Much Music from Canada... it was on Hot 97, it was on heavy rotation in New York, but unfortunately the label got greedy, and started unbuzzling... wasn't paying Flex...wasn't paying radio guys anymore, and parked any money for shows you know…
That was already before I've noticed what was going on... I’ve already set up a block time over there in Manhattan and Harlem... block time is studio time you set up, how many hours you need to finish your project... That's what was done to finish the duty album, we started to work on the album but this guy from MCA Records came down from UK and offered my vice president 300 thousand Dollars for me, which back then was like millions of Dollars now. They told him to come back and they took the real money and I didn’t even know about it at the time. I didn't know until I got out of my contract…this is the type of shenanigans that was going on with this hooligans...
Meanwhile all these shows were going down, I remember a show at that time, this guy came to my vice president and said « Yo excuse me...do me a favor...put my man on with your boy, let my man open up ! » ...that guy who came to my vice president was Damon Dash and the guy that Damon Dash was asking to let open up for me was Jay-Z... you know what I’m saying, people don't know about it... Jay never mentioned it but I put him on twice and let him opened up for my Show … He got booed off stage for the crowd wanted to hear K.A.O.S the head liner !!! but he never mentioned this shit but that's what happened…you know what I mean, and meanwhile the label was getting greedy... they didn’t expect me to blew up like that and they just couldn't handle I guess the success, they got greedy... unexperienced in so many ways but that's exactly what happened so the album never got a chance to finish with them… you know, they really screwed up a real good thing ... basically I was a cash cow… and I was becoming a very big deal.
After that ... I reinvented myself and I pursued my music on my own... I changed my name from K.A.O.S to Fia (pronounced Fi-Yah) … and at the same time I opened up my own executive bodyguard business. I was a personal bodyguard for BabyFace, Withney Houston, Tony Braxton, TLC … "
Mad Props to K.A.O.S, Robb-o Fitzgibbons, Larry Clark & Lenny Ace Morrow... thanks for your time.
Underrated 12" and that demo sounds dope as hell. Any label in contact with the guy? would love to see this rereleased.
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