Rapper and record executive Jim Jones (real name Joseph Guillermo Jones II) took a trip down memory lane during an interview with AllHipHop, recalling Jay-Z reacting to him bringing “20 bloods” into the studio.
Toward the end of the interview, the Harlem rapper recalled when Dipset (The Diplomats, which was signed to Roc-A-Fela) had a recording session at Baseline Studios in New York.
“Dipset, we was [fighting] for studio time and making music, and we right in Harlem, so we ain’t have to cross no bridges or nothing to get there,” Jones said. “It was literally a seven-minute ride to get down there, so we used to come in there all the time.”
He continued, “Me, probably in there with like 20 bloods with me. Jay looking at me like, ‘He crazy.’ I remember one day I came in, there was so many bloods, he said, ‘Yo, come here, come here, come here,’ like he was my uncle. ‘Let me holla at you.’”
“Like, ‘Listen, I’m not crazy about all the bloods you bring here, I don’t care about none of that. But if you bring the gangstas in here, make sure the gangstas holla at me before anything else because this is my house.’ I was like, ‘You got that, champ.’ Smooth like that.”
Jones recalled a lot of gambling in the studio, confessing that he had to borrow $6,000 from Memphis Bleak after losing to “Empire State of Mind” rapper in a card game called Guts.
“If you know anything about Guts, I had two kings and called Guts,” he said. “You got two kings, you calling guts. What’s the odds of somebody else having two Aces? And what’s the odds of Jay having two Aces?”
The “We Fly High” rapper witnessed Jay laughing and pulling out two Aces.
