Oscar Award winning hip hop group, Three 6 Mafia, has proven to be an undeniable and raw staple in rap and hip hop. Best known for their Academy Award for Best Original Song, “It’s Hard out Here for a Pimp” from the movie Hustle & Flow, Three 6 Mafia became the first hip hop group to win and perform at the Oscars. Having a street legacy, as well as mainstream success in hip hop is the best of both world’s; it opens up the opportunity for different perspectives and cultures to be shared through music, entertainment, and art!

I caught up with DJ Paul of Three 6 Mafia and we spoke about all things hip hop and we also got to speak about his passions outside of music! As the music industry evolves, more and more artists are becoming entrepreneurs and using their music as a gateway to their other talents. DJ Paul explains how music lead to him being a part of one of the first reality TV shows for artists, how reality TV lead to his BBQ & seasoning line, and a new solo music project.

Dev Gillespie: You just released your most current mixtape Mafia 4 Life(2017) and you don’t have too many features. Why did you go with a mixtape that wasn’t feature heavy?

DJ Paul: Features are cool, but I’m from the old school. I’m use to doing things myself, you know. We never depended on A&Rs and the record label or any of that when we were coming up, me and Juicy (J). I never depended on anybody, but a lot of artist need to depend on someone. They depend on other artists to make their record for them. They depend on managers and assistants and this and that. I do everything myself and I like to roll at my own pace. If I make a song, I like it, I’m going to just put it out there. I’m not going to go through my Rolodex and try to find somebody to put on the record. Everyone thinks you need a feature. F**k a feature (laughs).

Dev Gillespie: You have Yelawolf, OG Maco, and Jon Connor on there. How did you choose them to get on the tape?

DJ Paul: A lot of times I’ll usually do features with people I’m actually homies with, you know. Whether they’re hot or on the scene or not. I won’t go do a song with some kid just because he’s the hottest kid out. You gotta have a good heart, a cool spirit, or a dope soul. I like to do it like that and me and all those guys are cool like that. Jon Connor is an up and coming artist, shout out to Dr. Dre. He doesn’t even have an album out yet, but I like him as a person, he’s a cool dude. We actually hang out together and go to the nice restaurants in Beverly Hills and hang out. He’s just a cool dude, he got God all in him. Yelawolf has been my brother for a long time. I love Yelawolf, I was a fan before we met. I met OG Maco through my agent, we have the same agent that books our shows and we got cool like that and started hanging out. We have a lot of records together. I don’t do features to just do them. We bond and we get in the studio and make records.

Dev Gillespie: You posted on your IG that this tape is actually like a promo for your up and coming album Year of the Six (YOTS) that you’re going to drop later this month. Tell us a little about the album.

DJ Paul: The mixtape is like the direction that the album would be. The album will obviously have more harder stuff on it. You gotta save the super super hard for the stuff you’re trying to sell to them. Even though the mixtape is super hard and people love it. We got a little of everything on it. I didn’t go to the left or nothing like that. People know I do EDM stuff as well, but rest assured it won’t be an EDM album people. It’ll be stuff like that’s on the mixtape. Some serious subjects, some real songs, some gangsta sh*t, just the usually DJ Paul sh*t.

Dev Gillespie: Three 6 Mafia was one of the first people in hip hip to have their own reality show, Adventures in Hollywood, years ago & you did and won VH1’s Famous Food. Do you have any other plans of doing reality TV coming up?

DJ Paul: I do actually. I just got off a couple phone calls the other day with some production companies that want to do some shows with me. I get those calls all the time and I mostly turn them down because they come to me with all kinds of crazy stuff. I’m not interested in all these relationship shows and “Real This or That”. I didn’t want to do anything like that. I got two calls for two shows I am interested in. One of them I probably won’t be on the show, but an executive producer, I might be the host of it. The other one would be about me, showing a hobby that I like to do, which I’m not going to talk about now cause it’s so to the left. People are going to be like, “WTF he got a show doing this,”. It’s still in the works, but once it’s official I’ll let yall know.

Dev Gillespie: When you won Famous Foods on VH1 you started pushing your own BBQ sauce and BBQ seasoning, how’s that going?

DJ Paul: That’s actually how my BBQ was created, off of that show. With the show, to win the restaurant we had to show that we could bring as much value as possible to the restaurant. One of the ways I won is, for one I thought of the name and I did a lot of the major decorating. Then I killed it with the number one selling dish on the menu. It was “DJ Paul’s Memphis Mac & Cheese”, that’s what it was called. I wanted to make a soul food dish, but it was West Hollywood, borderline Bel Air, where the restaurant was. They were like, “Paul people don’t eat soul food out here like that”. I was like, “Come on yes they do!” They didn’t really want me to do that, so I broke it down to one dish. Instead of having ribs, macaroni & cheese, and cornbread on the side I did one dish and made “DJ Paul’s Memphis Mac & Cheese” and they loved it. Ron Artest when he was with the Lakers, Ray J, all kinds of celebrity friends of mine would come order it.When they saw how many we were selling it was a no brainer and that was just one of our recipes. I created the seasoning I put in the mac & cheese, the seasoning didn’t exist before that. People liked it and at first I was going to put out the mac & cheese like a frozen dinner, but I didn’t know where to start with that, but I knew how to start with a seasoning. In Memphis, TN a lot of people sell seasoning, the restaurants down there, so I made a couple phone calls and found out who could package it for me, then I made a sauce and more seasonings. Now I have 4 seasons out and a BBQ sauce and I have a beef jerky that’s coming out.

Dev Gillespie: So you just came through and killed em on the food scene. Where can we get your seasonings and BBQ sauce?

DJ Paul: It’s online at DJPaulBBQ.com I plan on eventually getting it in stores. I did get a call to put it in a prison though which is really funny.

Dev Gillespie: Do you have any movie appearances or soundtracks you’re working on? We know that’s also one of the things you’re really known for.

DJ Paul: I’m in talks for some, but nothing confirmed yet because I’m trying to get this album out the way before I do anything. My album YOTS, Year of the Six, is coming out October 28th and I’m actually finishing the last song and a half today. When I get off the phone with you I’m going in here and finishing recording. I just have to get the album out the way because it’s creepin’ up. 4th quarter!