WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.960 I want you to try a mental exercise with me. 00:00:02.040 --> 00:00:04.919 Just for a second. Close your eyes. And I want 00:00:04.919 --> 00:00:07.280 you to conjure up the single most definitive 00:00:07.280 --> 00:00:10.300 image of West Coast hip -hop. What pops into 00:00:10.300 --> 00:00:13.740 your head? I'm willing to bet my entire record 00:00:13.740 --> 00:00:15.699 collection that it's a very specific silhouette. 00:00:16.000 --> 00:00:19.320 You're seeing the dark locks sunglasses. Oh yeah, 00:00:19.420 --> 00:00:21.920 instantly. You're seeing the jerry curl glistening 00:00:21.920 --> 00:00:24.019 just enough to catch the light. You're seeing 00:00:24.019 --> 00:00:27.160 that stiff -brimmed Compton hat. And above all 00:00:27.160 --> 00:00:29.489 else, you're seeing the attitude. That slight 00:00:29.489 --> 00:00:32.409 sneer that says, I know something you don't. 00:00:32.409 --> 00:00:35.450 It's iconic. Okay. It is an image that is absolutely 00:00:35.450 --> 00:00:38.289 burned into the collective pop culture retina. 00:00:38.390 --> 00:00:40.509 You are talking, of course, about Eric Lynn Wright. 00:00:40.689 --> 00:00:45.549 Yeah. But the world in history knows him as Eazy 00:00:45.549 --> 00:00:48.289 -E. Exactly. The godfather of gangster rap. The 00:00:48.289 --> 00:00:50.490 man who put the West on the map when, you know, 00:00:50.490 --> 00:00:52.750 New York was still hogging all the oxygen. Absolutely 00:00:52.750 --> 00:00:55.189 dominated the conversation. But here's the thing, 00:00:55.189 --> 00:00:57.149 and this is exactly why we are doing this deep 00:00:57.149 --> 00:01:01.090 dive today. When people think of Eazy -E, they 00:01:01.090 --> 00:01:03.270 usually stop at the caricature. They think of 00:01:03.270 --> 00:01:05.269 the boys in the hood rapper, the little guy standing 00:01:05.269 --> 00:01:08.150 next to Dr. Dre and Ice Cube, maybe the comic 00:01:08.150 --> 00:01:10.129 relief with the high -pitched voice and the gun 00:01:10.129 --> 00:01:12.450 in his waistband. They see the mascot. They see 00:01:12.450 --> 00:01:14.950 the mascot of NWA, not the engine. Which is a 00:01:14.950 --> 00:01:17.909 massive, massive oversimplification. In fact, 00:01:17.989 --> 00:01:21.129 I'd argue that if you only look at the caricature, 00:01:21.269 --> 00:01:25.790 the guns, the girls, the thug posturing, you 00:01:25.790 --> 00:01:28.840 miss the actual story entirely. The actual story 00:01:28.840 --> 00:01:31.200 isn't just about rap. It's about venture capital. 00:01:31.299 --> 00:01:33.519 It's about guerrilla marketing. It's about a 00:01:33.519 --> 00:01:35.420 kid who dropped out of high school in the 10th 00:01:35.420 --> 00:01:37.780 grade and managed to build an independent business 00:01:37.780 --> 00:01:40.239 empire that didn't just compete with the American 00:01:40.239 --> 00:01:43.280 corporate establishment. It terrified it. That 00:01:43.280 --> 00:01:46.000 is the mission for this deep dive. We are going 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:48.799 to unpack the man behind the shades. We're going 00:01:48.799 --> 00:01:50.420 to look at the source material and we have a 00:01:50.420 --> 00:01:53.159 stack of it, including extensive biographical 00:01:53.159 --> 00:01:56.739 archives from Wikipedia, discography notes, legal 00:01:56.739 --> 00:01:59.640 filings and business ledgers to understand how 00:01:59.640 --> 00:02:03.500 Eric Wright navigated really three distinct battlefields. 00:02:03.500 --> 00:02:05.079 Yeah, that's a good way to put it. You've got 00:02:05.079 --> 00:02:07.500 the streets of Compton, the cutthroat boardrooms 00:02:07.500 --> 00:02:10.800 of the music industry, and weirdly enough, the 00:02:10.800 --> 00:02:13.340 political landscape of. Washington, D .C. And 00:02:13.340 --> 00:02:14.800 we have to talk about the tragedy of it, too. 00:02:14.879 --> 00:02:17.060 We can't gloss over that. His life was incredibly 00:02:17.060 --> 00:02:20.500 short. He was born in 1964 and died in 1995. 00:02:20.979 --> 00:02:23.759 He was only 30 years old. 30. I mean, pause on 00:02:23.759 --> 00:02:26.159 that for a second. Most people at 30 are just 00:02:26.159 --> 00:02:28.560 barely figuring out their 401k or getting their 00:02:28.560 --> 00:02:31.199 first promotion. Easy had already built a dynasty, 00:02:31.439 --> 00:02:34.419 watched it crumble, rebuilt it, and changed the 00:02:34.419 --> 00:02:36.740 course of music history. And left behind a legacy 00:02:36.740 --> 00:02:40.060 that is... Let's call it complicated. That's 00:02:40.060 --> 00:02:42.120 putting it mildly. We are going to look at the 00:02:42.120 --> 00:02:43.960 central tension of his life, which you touched 00:02:43.960 --> 00:02:48.360 on. The thug persona versus the reality. Was 00:02:48.360 --> 00:02:50.979 he a hardened drug kingpin who happened to rap? 00:02:51.199 --> 00:02:54.639 Or was he a brilliant, intuitive marketer who 00:02:54.639 --> 00:02:58.000 understood that white America has a voyeuristic 00:02:58.000 --> 00:03:00.620 obsession with the outlaw? That is the question, 00:03:00.719 --> 00:03:03.800 isn't it? The myth versus the man. So, let's 00:03:03.800 --> 00:03:05.800 start at the very beginning. Okay, let's unpack 00:03:05.800 --> 00:03:08.840 this. We cannot talk about EZ without talking 00:03:08.840 --> 00:03:11.520 about the soil he grew up in. We have to talk 00:03:11.520 --> 00:03:13.840 about Compton. Context is absolutely everything 00:03:13.840 --> 00:03:17.259 here. Eric Wright was born on September 7, 1964. 00:03:17.939 --> 00:03:20.599 Now, the Compton of 1964 is not the Compton of 00:03:20.599 --> 00:03:22.479 straight out of Compton. At least not yet. Not 00:03:22.479 --> 00:03:24.180 the one we picture from the album cover. Not 00:03:24.180 --> 00:03:26.379 at all. If you look at the demographic data in 00:03:26.379 --> 00:03:28.159 the source material, it describes a community 00:03:28.159 --> 00:03:31.080 in rapid, violent transition. His parents, Richard 00:03:31.080 --> 00:03:33.340 and Kathy Wright, were solid working -class folks. 00:03:33.539 --> 00:03:36.340 His dad was a postal worker. His mom was a school 00:03:36.340 --> 00:03:38.419 administrator. So this wasn't a family living 00:03:38.419 --> 00:03:41.439 in abject, destitute poverty. No, not at all. 00:03:41.500 --> 00:03:43.560 It was middle -class existence. They owned a 00:03:43.560 --> 00:03:45.740 home. But the neighborhood was changing around 00:03:45.740 --> 00:03:48.740 them. And it wasn't an accident. The sources 00:03:48.740 --> 00:03:52.060 mention blockbusting. Now, this is a term we 00:03:52.060 --> 00:03:54.080 hear in history books, but can we break down 00:03:54.080 --> 00:03:56.680 what that actually felt like on the ground? This 00:03:56.680 --> 00:03:58.719 wasn't just people moving. This was a mechanism. 00:03:59.120 --> 00:04:02.039 It sounds so intentional. It was a predatory, 00:04:02.039 --> 00:04:06.060 engineered real estate scam, essentially. Real 00:04:06.060 --> 00:04:09.539 estate agents, mostly white, would play on racial 00:04:09.539 --> 00:04:12.479 fears. They would hire black women to walk their 00:04:12.479 --> 00:04:14.900 babies through white neighborhoods or hire black 00:04:14.900 --> 00:04:17.600 men to drive through with the music loud. Wow. 00:04:17.839 --> 00:04:20.410 Seriously? Oh, yeah. It was psychological warfare. 00:04:20.689 --> 00:04:22.529 Then they'd go to the white homeowners and say 00:04:22.529 --> 00:04:24.649 the property values are about to crash because 00:04:24.649 --> 00:04:26.949 they're moving in. Sell now. They'd buy the houses 00:04:26.949 --> 00:04:29.170 cheap. Below market value, I'm sure. Way below. 00:04:29.269 --> 00:04:30.870 And then they'd turn around and sell them to 00:04:30.870 --> 00:04:33.129 black families who had fewer housing options 00:04:33.129 --> 00:04:36.350 due to redlining at a premium. This triggered 00:04:36.350 --> 00:04:38.769 white flight. So you have this rapid demographic 00:04:38.769 --> 00:04:42.329 shift. Eric Wright grew up watching his community 00:04:42.329 --> 00:04:45.810 go from a mixed or predominantly white middle 00:04:45.810 --> 00:04:48.050 class suburb to a place that was effectively 00:04:48.050 --> 00:04:51.209 abandoned by the economic powers that be. Precisely. 00:04:51.209 --> 00:04:53.629 And when the Capitol leaves, the infrastructure 00:04:53.629 --> 00:04:56.810 collapses. The tax base erodes. The schools get 00:04:56.810 --> 00:04:59.910 worse. The Watts riots happened nearby in 65 00:04:59.910 --> 00:05:02.670 just after he was born. So the tension was always 00:05:02.670 --> 00:05:05.209 there. It's in the air. It's in the air. By the 00:05:05.209 --> 00:05:07.810 time he's a teenager, the social fabric is fraying. 00:05:08.139 --> 00:05:10.279 You saw the formation and expansion of street 00:05:10.279 --> 00:05:12.839 gangs, specifically the Crips and Bloods, filling 00:05:12.839 --> 00:05:15.360 that power vacuum. The streets became the governing 00:05:15.360 --> 00:05:17.459 body. Right. If the official structures fail, 00:05:17.779 --> 00:05:20.100 unofficial ones take their place. And this is 00:05:20.100 --> 00:05:22.100 where we get a really crucial insight from Jerry 00:05:22.100 --> 00:05:24.680 Heller. Jerry Heller, the controversial manager, 00:05:24.959 --> 00:05:26.920 the villain in the movie, the partner in the 00:05:26.920 --> 00:05:28.540 boardroom. We're going to have to spend a lot 00:05:28.540 --> 00:05:30.699 of time dissecting him later. We have to. You 00:05:30.699 --> 00:05:33.019 can't tell this story without him. But Heller 00:05:33.019 --> 00:05:35.120 had a quote that I think perfectly encapsulates 00:05:35.120 --> 00:05:37.920 the psychology of Eric Wright's youth. He said, 00:05:38.019 --> 00:05:41.040 no one survived on the streets without a protective 00:05:41.040 --> 00:05:45.019 mask. A mask. That's powerful. He analyzed the 00:05:45.019 --> 00:05:48.240 social structure of Compton and said, you basically 00:05:48.240 --> 00:05:50.379 had three choices of role to play. You could 00:05:50.379 --> 00:05:53.699 be a thug, a playa, or a dope man. It's almost 00:05:53.699 --> 00:05:55.620 like a role playing game where the stakes are 00:05:55.620 --> 00:05:57.759 life and death. Because if you weren't one of 00:05:57.759 --> 00:05:59.759 those three. You were a victim. That was the 00:05:59.759 --> 00:06:02.600 binary choice in his mind. Predator or prey. 00:06:03.550 --> 00:06:05.529 So Wright dropped out of Compton High School 00:06:05.529 --> 00:06:08.329 in the 10th grade. OK, so he's young. He's maybe 00:06:08.329 --> 00:06:13.069 15, 16. Around that age. Now, it's worth noting 00:06:13.069 --> 00:06:16.050 he did get his GED later, which shows he valued 00:06:16.050 --> 00:06:18.910 finishing that chapter. But at the time, the 00:06:18.910 --> 00:06:20.790 classroom couldn't compete with the economy of 00:06:20.790 --> 00:06:22.569 the streets. It just wasn't offering him anything. 00:06:22.769 --> 00:06:24.709 This brings us to the drug dealing narrative. 00:06:24.850 --> 00:06:27.910 This is the cornerstone of the EZE creation myth, 00:06:28.149 --> 00:06:30.689 right? The idea that Ruthless Records was built 00:06:30.689 --> 00:06:33.430 entirely on dirty money. It is the foundational 00:06:33.430 --> 00:06:35.810 myth. And I use the word myth carefully, not 00:06:35.810 --> 00:06:38.089 to say it's false, but because the details are 00:06:38.089 --> 00:06:40.149 heavily debated and more importantly, they serve 00:06:40.149 --> 00:06:42.509 a specific purpose. The legend serves the brand. 00:06:42.750 --> 00:06:45.750 The legend is the brand. The legend, the one 00:06:45.750 --> 00:06:49.329 Easy himself cultivated, goes that by 1986 at 00:06:49.329 --> 00:06:53.149 age 22, Wright had earned as much as $250 ,000 00:06:53.149 --> 00:06:56.230 selling drugs. That is a quarter of a million 00:06:56.230 --> 00:06:59.329 dollars. In 1986, cash. Let's just think about 00:06:59.329 --> 00:07:02.170 that. Adjusted for inflation, that's over $700 00:07:02.170 --> 00:07:05.670 ,000 today. In liquid capital. That is a staggering 00:07:05.670 --> 00:07:07.810 amount of liquid capital for a 22 -year -old 00:07:07.810 --> 00:07:10.230 dropout. It is. It's empire building money. But 00:07:10.230 --> 00:07:12.089 here is where it gets really interesting, where 00:07:12.089 --> 00:07:13.930 we have to read between the lines of the source 00:07:13.930 --> 00:07:17.310 material. Jerry Heller, in his memoirs and interviews, 00:07:17.610 --> 00:07:20.129 offers a conflicting account. Oh, this is good. 00:07:20.230 --> 00:07:22.810 He admits he saw Wright sell marijuana. He knew 00:07:22.810 --> 00:07:25.449 he was in the trade. He wasn't naive. But he 00:07:25.449 --> 00:07:27.790 claims he never saw him sell cocaine, which was 00:07:27.790 --> 00:07:30.290 the real moneymaker of the crack epidemic era. 00:07:30.350 --> 00:07:32.589 That was the big business. So Heller thinks the 00:07:32.589 --> 00:07:36.050 kingpin status might have been marketing. An 00:07:36.050 --> 00:07:38.670 exaggeration. Heller suggested that the dope 00:07:38.670 --> 00:07:41.410 dealer label was, to quote him, self -forged 00:07:41.410 --> 00:07:43.730 armor. I love that phrase, self -forged armor. 00:07:43.990 --> 00:07:47.810 He said he had no proof. Wright was a major dealer 00:07:47.810 --> 00:07:50.410 moving kilos. But he knew that the reputation 00:07:50.410 --> 00:07:53.750 of being a dealer was good for business. It accorded 00:07:53.750 --> 00:07:56.310 you privileges. It meant people hesitated to 00:07:56.310 --> 00:07:59.269 mess with you. If you're a 5 '5 guy in Compton, 00:07:59.389 --> 00:08:01.550 having people think you're a heavy hitter is 00:08:01.550 --> 00:08:03.970 a survival strategy. It's branding. Before he 00:08:03.970 --> 00:08:05.850 even sold a record, he was branding himself. 00:08:06.389 --> 00:08:08.730 He understood that in that environment, fear 00:08:08.730 --> 00:08:12.319 was a currency. Intimidation was an asset. Exactly. 00:08:12.600 --> 00:08:16.000 So whether he made a full $250 ,000 selling dope 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:18.699 or whether he scraped it together through savings 00:08:18.699 --> 00:08:21.360 and smaller hustles, the story was that he was 00:08:21.360 --> 00:08:24.000 a dope man. And in the burgeoning hip -hop scene 00:08:24.000 --> 00:08:27.399 of Los Angeles, that story had currency. Authenticity 00:08:27.399 --> 00:08:29.399 was becoming the new gold standard. And the most 00:08:29.399 --> 00:08:31.339 authentic thing you could be at that time is 00:08:31.339 --> 00:08:33.759 someone from the streets. But there was a turning 00:08:33.759 --> 00:08:36.460 point. The street life isn't a retirement plan. 00:08:36.580 --> 00:08:39.029 His cousin was shot and killed. That reality 00:08:39.029 --> 00:08:41.289 check, the moment where the mask stops working 00:08:41.289 --> 00:08:43.409 and the bullets become real. The violence of 00:08:43.409 --> 00:08:46.809 the trade hit his front door. That had to have 00:08:46.809 --> 00:08:49.669 been a huge wake up call. Wright decided he needed 00:08:49.669 --> 00:08:52.330 to pivot. He saw the hip hop scene growing in 00:08:52.330 --> 00:08:54.710 L .A., which was still very underground, mostly 00:08:54.710 --> 00:08:56.950 electro and fast tempo stuff, you know, world 00:08:56.950 --> 00:08:58.909 class wrecking crew in that scene. Right. The 00:08:58.909 --> 00:09:00.470 stuff they played at the skating rinks. Totally. 00:09:00.830 --> 00:09:04.389 And he realized he could wash that money or at 00:09:04.389 --> 00:09:06.710 least invest his earnings into something safer. 00:09:07.230 --> 00:09:10.110 Something with a future. And that is the birth 00:09:10.110 --> 00:09:12.610 of Ruthless Records. And this is where the dynamic 00:09:12.610 --> 00:09:15.529 duo, or the toxic duo, depending on who you ask, 00:09:15.590 --> 00:09:18.110 comes together. Eric Wright meets Jerry Heller. 00:09:18.409 --> 00:09:21.269 This meeting is pivotal. Set the scene for us. 00:09:21.470 --> 00:09:24.509 Okay, so it's 1987. You have to picture the contrast. 00:09:24.929 --> 00:09:27.529 Jerry Heller is an industry veteran in his 40s. 00:09:27.529 --> 00:09:30.370 He had represented Elton John, Marvin Gaye, Pink 00:09:30.370 --> 00:09:33.850 Floyd. Huge names. Legit old school music biz. 00:09:34.129 --> 00:09:35.769 He's a guy who knows the ins and outs of the 00:09:35.769 --> 00:09:37.970 corporate music machine, but his career is in 00:09:37.970 --> 00:09:39.470 a bit of a slump. He's looking for the next big 00:09:39.470 --> 00:09:41.570 thing. And then Eric Wright comes to him with 00:09:41.570 --> 00:09:44.210 a proposition. He brings money and he brings 00:09:44.210 --> 00:09:47.509 a vision. Initially, Wright suggested a 50 -50 00:09:47.509 --> 00:09:50.490 partnership. Which seems fair on paper. I bring 00:09:50.490 --> 00:09:52.549 the money and the talent. You bring the connections 00:09:52.549 --> 00:09:55.750 and the industry know -how. It does. But they 00:09:55.750 --> 00:09:57.570 settled on a deal that is often misunderstood. 00:09:57.909 --> 00:10:00.529 And frankly, it's one of the most brilliant business 00:10:00.529 --> 00:10:03.210 moves in music history, even if it caused all 00:10:03.210 --> 00:10:06.570 the friction later. The split was 80 -20. Okay, 00:10:06.610 --> 00:10:09.629 wait. Usually when we hear about bad deals in 00:10:09.629 --> 00:10:11.789 the music industry, think TLC, think the early 00:10:11.789 --> 00:10:14.129 Motown acts, we assume the artist got ripped 00:10:14.129 --> 00:10:16.950 off. We assume the manager took the lion's share. 00:10:17.389 --> 00:10:19.649 But in this case... On this case, Eric Wright 00:10:19.649 --> 00:10:21.929 was the one getting the 80%. He got the 80. Wright 00:10:21.929 --> 00:10:25.000 got 80 % of the net income. Heller took 20%. 00:10:25.000 --> 00:10:27.860 That flips the script on the exploitative white 00:10:27.860 --> 00:10:30.120 manager narrative a little bit, doesn't it? Or 00:10:30.120 --> 00:10:32.320 at least complicates it significantly. Well, 00:10:32.340 --> 00:10:34.100 here was Heller's justification, and it's key. 00:10:34.559 --> 00:10:37.960 He said, I take 20, you take 80. You own the 00:10:37.960 --> 00:10:41.220 company. I work for you. He treated it as a management 00:10:41.220 --> 00:10:43.799 commission. See, most artists sign a recording 00:10:43.799 --> 00:10:46.259 contract where the label owns the masters, the 00:10:46.259 --> 00:10:49.100 actual recordings, and pays the artist a royalty. 00:10:49.259 --> 00:10:52.159 A tiny percentage. Maybe 12 % if they're lucky. 00:10:53.240 --> 00:10:56.080 Easy didn't sign an artist deal. He signed a 00:10:56.080 --> 00:10:58.779 distribution deal through Heller's Connections. 00:10:59.129 --> 00:11:01.570 He was the label. He owned the masters. That 00:11:01.570 --> 00:11:03.809 is a crucial distinction. He wasn't an employee. 00:11:04.009 --> 00:11:06.809 He was the bank. He was the owner. Exactly. Wright 00:11:06.809 --> 00:11:09.009 put up the capital, allegedly that drug money 00:11:09.009 --> 00:11:11.450 we talked about, to press the records, pay for 00:11:11.450 --> 00:11:14.429 the studio time, pay the manufacturers. Heller 00:11:14.429 --> 00:11:16.610 brought the expertise to get those records into 00:11:16.610 --> 00:11:19.629 stores. Now, Heller claims he eventually invested 00:11:19.629 --> 00:11:21.509 a million dollars of his own money. But at the 00:11:21.509 --> 00:11:23.669 start, it was Wright's vision and Wright's cash. 00:11:24.440 --> 00:11:27.080 This 80 -20 split meant that for every dollar 00:11:27.080 --> 00:11:30.340 of profit, Eazy kept 80 cents. In the music industry, 00:11:30.500 --> 00:11:32.519 that is unheard of. It's revolutionary, really. 00:11:32.600 --> 00:11:34.779 He built the model that guys like Master P and 00:11:34.779 --> 00:11:36.899 Birdman would later follow to become moguls. 00:11:37.100 --> 00:11:39.220 He wrote the blueprint. So they have the label, 00:11:39.320 --> 00:11:41.639 Ruthless Records. Now they need the product. 00:11:41.720 --> 00:11:43.879 They need the talent. And what a lineup they 00:11:43.879 --> 00:11:46.340 assembled. It is actually staggering when you 00:11:46.340 --> 00:11:48.620 look back at it. We tend to think of NWA as just 00:11:48.620 --> 00:11:51.960 Dre, Cube, Eazy, Ren, and Yella. But the original 00:11:51.960 --> 00:11:55.120 assembly was looser, right? Much looser. It included 00:11:55.120 --> 00:11:58.179 the Arabian Prince, a pioneer of West Coast electro. 00:11:58.419 --> 00:12:01.059 He was a producer and a rapper. Arabian Prince 00:12:01.059 --> 00:12:03.039 often gets left out of the history books, which 00:12:03.039 --> 00:12:05.419 is a shame because that electro sound was the 00:12:05.419 --> 00:12:08.220 bridge to the G -Funk era. You can hear its DNA 00:12:08.220 --> 00:12:10.659 in what Dre did later. He was instrumental in 00:12:10.659 --> 00:12:13.080 the early days. They started with the album N 00:12:13.080 --> 00:12:16.159 .W .A. and the Posse in 1987. Now, if you listen 00:12:16.159 --> 00:12:19.419 to this record today, it sounds... Confused. 00:12:19.480 --> 00:12:21.940 It's a bit of a mishmash. It was largely a compilation 00:12:21.940 --> 00:12:23.820 of tracks they had done with McCullough Records, 00:12:24.039 --> 00:12:26.620 another L .A. label. It was a bit of a party 00:12:26.620 --> 00:12:29.120 record. It had some harder tracks, but it didn't 00:12:29.120 --> 00:12:32.259 have that focused, razor -sharp edge yet. But 00:12:32.259 --> 00:12:34.360 the real game -changer, the prototype for what 00:12:34.360 --> 00:12:37.080 was coming, was Easy's solo debut. Easy does 00:12:37.080 --> 00:12:39.720 it. November 1988. This is where the persona 00:12:39.720 --> 00:12:41.759 fully solidifies. This is the mission statement. 00:12:42.019 --> 00:12:44.080 This album is critical. Before Straight Outta 00:12:44.080 --> 00:12:46.679 Compton exploded, Easy does it. Prove the concept. 00:12:46.940 --> 00:12:49.019 It was the proof of concept that this could work 00:12:49.019 --> 00:12:52.559 on a massive scale. It sold 2 .5 million copies. 00:12:53.039 --> 00:12:55.440 Two and a half million for an independent label 00:12:55.440 --> 00:12:59.360 release in 1988. That is absolutely bananas. 00:12:59.580 --> 00:13:02.159 They didn't have radio play. MTV wasn't touching 00:13:02.159 --> 00:13:04.120 them yet. None of that. It was a word of mouth 00:13:04.120 --> 00:13:06.460 phenomenon. It was trunk rattling music. It was 00:13:06.460 --> 00:13:09.039 passed around on cassettes at swap meets in high 00:13:09.039 --> 00:13:11.799 schools. And we have to talk about the sound. 00:13:11.899 --> 00:13:14.799 The sources describe it as a blend of P -funk. 00:13:15.179 --> 00:13:17.200 You know, George Clinton. The Funk Foundation. 00:13:17.460 --> 00:13:20.100 Def Jam style hip hop, like the hard drums of 00:13:20.100 --> 00:13:23.639 the Beastie Boys or Run DMC. And this specific 00:13:23.639 --> 00:13:27.139 mid 80s electro sound that was big in L .A. It 00:13:27.139 --> 00:13:29.360 was all produced by Dr. Dre and DJ Yella. It 00:13:29.360 --> 00:13:31.519 was funky, but it was hard. It had that bounce, 00:13:31.620 --> 00:13:34.840 but the lyrics were just grimy. Unapologetically 00:13:34.840 --> 00:13:37.100 so. And here is the secret sauce, which gets 00:13:37.100 --> 00:13:39.500 back to our marketer versus thug theme. Eazy 00:13:39.500 --> 00:13:42.379 -E was not a rapper. Not really. Not in the traditional 00:13:42.379 --> 00:13:45.750 sense of a Rakim or a Big Daddy. Right. I love 00:13:45.750 --> 00:13:47.549 this detail because it makes his performance 00:13:47.549 --> 00:13:50.149 so much more impressive in a way. He didn't write 00:13:50.149 --> 00:13:52.289 his lyrics. He wasn't a wordsmith. He was the 00:13:52.289 --> 00:13:55.990 performer, the actor, the vessel. The lyrics 00:13:55.990 --> 00:13:58.509 for Easy Does It were written by Ice Cube, MC 00:13:58.509 --> 00:14:01.850 Ren, and the DOC. They were using Easy's voice, 00:14:02.009 --> 00:14:05.950 that distinct, high -pitched, nasally, menacing 00:14:05.950 --> 00:14:08.990 whine, as an instrument. He was a character. 00:14:09.129 --> 00:14:10.470 I was playing a character that they wrote for 00:14:10.470 --> 00:14:12.570 him. It's like he was an actor in an audio movie 00:14:12.570 --> 00:14:15.509 directed by Dr. Dre. Cube is writing the script. 00:14:15.710 --> 00:14:18.009 Dre is doing the cinematography with the beats. 00:14:18.169 --> 00:14:21.440 And easy as the star, he's the Al Pacino. That 00:14:21.440 --> 00:14:23.720 is a perfect analogy. And because he wasn't a 00:14:23.720 --> 00:14:25.820 traditional rapper concerned with complex rhyme 00:14:25.820 --> 00:14:28.340 schemes or flowing perfectly on the beat, his 00:14:28.340 --> 00:14:30.440 delivery was unique. It was offbeat sometimes. 00:14:30.620 --> 00:14:32.820 It was conversational. It was raw. It sounded 00:14:32.820 --> 00:14:35.139 real. It sounded like the streets. Because he 00:14:35.139 --> 00:14:36.940 wasn't trying to be a lyrical miracle. He was 00:14:36.940 --> 00:14:39.299 just talking that talk. It sounded like a guy 00:14:39.299 --> 00:14:41.639 casually threatening you at a stoplight. It had 00:14:41.639 --> 00:14:44.080 an authenticity that a technically perfect rapper 00:14:44.080 --> 00:14:46.679 couldn't have replicated. And easy does it pave 00:14:46.679 --> 00:14:48.940 the way for the bomb to drop. Just a couple months 00:14:48.940 --> 00:14:52.480 later, January... 1989, straight out of Compton. 00:14:52.600 --> 00:14:55.120 The album that changed everything, the cultural 00:14:55.120 --> 00:14:58.120 ground zero. We don't need to rehash the entire 00:14:58.120 --> 00:15:00.580 history of that album, but specifically regarding 00:15:00.580 --> 00:15:04.100 Eazy -E, look at his contribution. He performed 00:15:04.100 --> 00:15:07.039 on seven songs and helped write four. He was 00:15:07.039 --> 00:15:08.919 the front man. He was the face of the danger. 00:15:09.480 --> 00:15:12.840 It's hard to overstate how scary NWA was to suburban 00:15:12.840 --> 00:15:15.360 America at that time. I mean, you see the cover. 00:15:15.419 --> 00:15:17.659 The perspective is looking up at them like you're 00:15:17.659 --> 00:15:20.360 on the ground about to get stomped. It's an intimidating 00:15:20.360 --> 00:15:22.799 image. And Easy is right there, front and center, 00:15:22.879 --> 00:15:25.419 holding the gun. They called themselves the world's 00:15:25.419 --> 00:15:28.059 most dangerous group. And people believed it. 00:15:28.139 --> 00:15:31.019 The FBI believed it. And Easy was the reason. 00:15:31.179 --> 00:15:33.519 Dre was the architect. Cube was the poet. But 00:15:33.519 --> 00:15:36.240 Easy, Easy was the one you thought might actually 00:15:36.240 --> 00:15:39.330 have a gun in the studio. He validated the lyrics 00:15:39.330 --> 00:15:42.490 with his presence. He was the CEO and the muscle. 00:15:42.769 --> 00:15:45.470 But as with all great empires, the cracks started 00:15:45.470 --> 00:15:48.389 to show almost immediately. And it all came down 00:15:48.389 --> 00:15:50.789 to what it always comes down to. Money. Always 00:15:50.789 --> 00:15:53.129 money. The fracturing of the dynasty. It starts 00:15:53.129 --> 00:15:55.210 with Ice Cube, the poet laureate of the group. 00:15:55.409 --> 00:15:58.789 It's 1989. They are on top of the world, touring, 00:15:58.970 --> 00:16:01.720 selling millions of records. But Ice Cube is 00:16:01.720 --> 00:16:03.480 a smart guy. He's looking at his bank account 00:16:03.480 --> 00:16:05.440 and he's looking at how much work he's doing. 00:16:05.600 --> 00:16:08.000 He wrote the lion's share of Straight Outta Compton 00:16:08.000 --> 00:16:10.379 and Easy Does It. He wrote Easy's biggest hits. 00:16:10.600 --> 00:16:13.039 He wrote Easy's entire persona into existence. 00:16:13.700 --> 00:16:16.639 And the math isn't mathing for him. He felt he 00:16:16.639 --> 00:16:18.759 wasn't getting paid his fair share of the royalties 00:16:18.759 --> 00:16:21.240 of the publishing. Exactly. He looked at Easy 00:16:21.240 --> 00:16:23.159 driving the fancy cars and living in the mansion. 00:16:23.279 --> 00:16:25.659 And he looked at his own check and he realized 00:16:25.659 --> 00:16:29.100 the structure of Ruthless, the 80 -20 deal, favored 00:16:29.100 --> 00:16:31.590 the owner. Not the writer. He wasn't a partner 00:16:31.590 --> 00:16:33.309 in the company. He was an employee, essentially. 00:16:33.549 --> 00:16:36.289 A very valuable employee, but an employee nonetheless. 00:16:36.809 --> 00:16:39.710 So Cube leaves. He goes solo. And that kicks 00:16:39.710 --> 00:16:42.409 off one of the most famous diss wars in history. 00:16:43.549 --> 00:16:47.350 NWA releases 100 Miles and Runnin' and Real Niggas 00:16:47.350 --> 00:16:49.649 attacking Cube. They called him a traitor, a 00:16:49.649 --> 00:16:51.669 Benedict Arnold. They questioned his street cred. 00:16:51.789 --> 00:16:53.769 It came at him pretty hard. They did. And Cube, 00:16:53.970 --> 00:16:56.169 well, Cube didn't back down. He went into the 00:16:56.169 --> 00:16:58.490 studio and recorded no Vaseline. The nuclear 00:16:58.490 --> 00:17:01.830 option. I really can't emphasize enough how destructive 00:17:01.830 --> 00:17:04.809 No Vaseline was. In hip -hop battles, usually 00:17:04.809 --> 00:17:06.630 you attack the other guy's skills. You say you're 00:17:06.630 --> 00:17:07.990 a better rapper. Right, it's about microphone 00:17:07.990 --> 00:17:10.809 skills. Cube attacked their business model. He 00:17:10.809 --> 00:17:14.009 attacked their manhood. He frames Jerry Heller 00:17:14.009 --> 00:17:16.670 as the slave master and Eazy -E as the house 00:17:16.670 --> 00:17:19.509 slave. He made it racial. He made it political. 00:17:19.730 --> 00:17:22.069 The line, because you can't be an N with a white 00:17:22.069 --> 00:17:24.740 man watching. It was just... It was a kill shot. 00:17:25.000 --> 00:17:27.460 And then it gets personal. Eazy's dick is smelling 00:17:27.460 --> 00:17:30.279 like MC Ren shit. I mean, the vulgarity was one 00:17:30.279 --> 00:17:32.279 thing, but the political and racial politics 00:17:32.279 --> 00:17:34.660 of it, calling Eazy a puppet for a white manager, 00:17:34.819 --> 00:17:36.859 that had to sting more than anything. It was 00:17:36.859 --> 00:17:39.099 devastatingly effective because it preyed on 00:17:39.099 --> 00:17:41.720 the insecurity that was already there. It painted 00:17:41.720 --> 00:17:44.700 Eazy not as a boss, but as a dupe. As someone 00:17:44.700 --> 00:17:48.099 who's being played. So Cube is gone. But N .W 00:17:48.099 --> 00:17:50.599 .A. kept going. They released Niggas for Life 00:17:50.599 --> 00:17:54.259 or Evil for Zagon in 1991. And it hit number 00:17:54.259 --> 00:17:56.140 one on the Billboard 200. This is important. 00:17:56.380 --> 00:17:59.619 They proved they could win without Cube. They 00:17:59.619 --> 00:18:03.799 were still on top. Musically, Dr. Dre reached 00:18:03.799 --> 00:18:07.000 a new peak on this album. It's darker. It's denser. 00:18:07.099 --> 00:18:09.880 It's the sound that would become the chronic. 00:18:10.099 --> 00:18:12.220 So from the outside, it looks like they weathered 00:18:12.220 --> 00:18:14.519 the storm. But the cancer was already in the 00:18:14.519 --> 00:18:17.579 system. Because now Dr. Dre started feeling the 00:18:17.579 --> 00:18:19.960 exact same way Cube did. Wait a minute. I'm doing 00:18:19.960 --> 00:18:21.680 all the production. I'm creating the sound. I'm 00:18:21.680 --> 00:18:23.940 the one in the studio for 18 hours a day. And 00:18:23.940 --> 00:18:26.480 Easy is still making all the money. And the common 00:18:26.480 --> 00:18:29.920 denominator, in his mind, was Jerry Heller. Dr. 00:18:30.059 --> 00:18:31.920 Dre felt that Heller was playing a game of divide 00:18:31.920 --> 00:18:34.880 and conquer. Dre's recollection is very telling. 00:18:35.119 --> 00:18:37.420 He said, instead of taking care of everybody, 00:18:37.720 --> 00:18:40.000 he picked one person to take care of, and that 00:18:40.000 --> 00:18:42.329 was Easy. So Easy was comfortable. His mindset 00:18:42.329 --> 00:18:44.509 was likely, hey, I'm the owner. I'm getting my 00:18:44.509 --> 00:18:46.750 80%. I'm taken care of. So what's the problem? 00:18:46.869 --> 00:18:49.349 But everyone else felt robbed. Right. And you 00:18:49.349 --> 00:18:51.750 can see both sides. Easy's thinking, I took the 00:18:51.750 --> 00:18:54.190 initial risk. It's my company. Dre's thinking, 00:18:54.309 --> 00:18:57.210 but I'm creating the value. It's a classic business 00:18:57.210 --> 00:18:59.829 dispute. A dispute that doesn't get solved in 00:18:59.829 --> 00:19:03.710 a boardroom. Not this time. Dre and the DOC, 00:19:03.769 --> 00:19:06.430 who was a brilliant writer and rapper, instrumental 00:19:06.430 --> 00:19:09.210 to their success before a car crash damaged his 00:19:09.210 --> 00:19:12.670 vocal cords, They want it out. They ask Easy 00:19:12.670 --> 00:19:15.150 to release them from their contracts. And Easy, 00:19:15.329 --> 00:19:18.150 being Easy, is a businessman. He looks at his 00:19:18.150 --> 00:19:21.609 contract, he says. No. You are signed to Ruthless. 00:19:21.730 --> 00:19:23.869 You are my assets. You aren't going anywhere. 00:19:24.230 --> 00:19:26.789 And this is where the story shifts from a business 00:19:26.789 --> 00:19:29.109 dispute to something out of a gangster movie. 00:19:30.359 --> 00:19:33.299 Enter Suchnight. Suchnight, a former football 00:19:33.299 --> 00:19:37.519 player, a bodyguard, a massive, imposing figure. 00:19:37.839 --> 00:19:40.319 He was the muscle Dre brought in to solve the 00:19:40.319 --> 00:19:42.599 problem that lawyers couldn't. He was the physical 00:19:42.599 --> 00:19:44.839 manifestation of leverage. That's a good way 00:19:44.839 --> 00:19:46.920 to put it. The sources describe an incident that 00:19:46.920 --> 00:19:49.779 has become legendary in industry folklore. It 00:19:49.779 --> 00:19:51.640 happened at the recording studio where Nigga's 00:19:51.640 --> 00:19:53.940 4 Life was recorded. This is the kidnapping story, 00:19:54.059 --> 00:19:55.740 right? Or the hostage negotiation, depending 00:19:55.740 --> 00:19:58.400 on how you view it. alleged kidnapping, but the 00:19:58.400 --> 00:20:00.500 details are consistent across multiple accounts. 00:20:01.619 --> 00:20:04.500 Suge Knight and his associates approached EZE. 00:20:04.940 --> 00:20:07.940 The rumor is that Suge told EZE he had Jerry 00:20:07.940 --> 00:20:10.099 Heller kidnapped and was holding him prisoner 00:20:10.099 --> 00:20:13.119 in a van outside. That is intense. Imagine being 00:20:13.119 --> 00:20:16.210 told... I have your manager, your business partner, 00:20:16.430 --> 00:20:19.329 your, in some ways, father figure in a van. And 00:20:19.329 --> 00:20:21.289 here's the thing that tells you about EZ's character. 00:20:21.990 --> 00:20:24.190 Even that didn't convince him to sign the release 00:20:24.190 --> 00:20:26.329 forms. He called the bluff? He wasn't going to 00:20:26.329 --> 00:20:28.349 be bullied. He essentially called the bluff. 00:20:28.529 --> 00:20:30.490 He didn't believe it, or he didn't care enough 00:20:30.490 --> 00:20:32.930 to fold. So what broke him? What makes a guy 00:20:32.930 --> 00:20:36.049 like EZ, who built his whole reputation on not 00:20:36.049 --> 00:20:38.890 backing down, pick up the pen? Sujanat had it 00:20:38.890 --> 00:20:41.250 escalated. According to the story, he produced 00:20:41.250 --> 00:20:44.480 a piece of paper. On that paper was Eazy -E's 00:20:44.480 --> 00:20:47.259 mother's address. Oh, that's a violation of the 00:20:47.259 --> 00:20:49.140 code. That's a different level. That changes 00:20:49.140 --> 00:20:52.019 the game. Suge told him, I know where your mama 00:20:52.019 --> 00:20:55.220 stays. That was the line. It wasn't about business 00:20:55.220 --> 00:20:58.180 anymore. It was about family safety. Eazy signed 00:20:58.180 --> 00:21:01.220 the releases. Dr. Dre and the DOC were free. 00:21:01.420 --> 00:21:04.160 And just like that, NWA was officially over. 00:21:04.500 --> 00:21:07.660 Ruthless lost its primary producer. The greatest 00:21:07.660 --> 00:21:10.099 production mind in hip -hop just walked out the 00:21:10.099 --> 00:21:12.970 door. That is chilling. It really highlights 00:21:12.970 --> 00:21:15.289 that the gangster rap lifestyle wasn't just lyrics 00:21:15.289 --> 00:21:18.349 for these guys. The stakes were real. The boardroom 00:21:18.349 --> 00:21:21.349 was just as dangerous as the block. So that launches 00:21:21.349 --> 00:21:24.509 the Death Row era. Dre leaves, founds Death Row 00:21:24.509 --> 00:21:26.829 with Sued, and immediately releases The Chronic. 00:21:27.029 --> 00:21:30.049 And on that album, he features Fuckwit Dre Day. 00:21:30.210 --> 00:21:32.549 Also known as Dre Day. And it was a music video 00:21:32.549 --> 00:21:35.730 and a song that completely mocked Eazy -E. They 00:21:35.730 --> 00:21:38.410 had an actor, a character named Sleazy E, dancing 00:21:38.410 --> 00:21:40.250 around looking foolish, holding a Will rapper 00:21:40.250 --> 00:21:43.109 food sign. It was pure humiliation. It was very 00:21:43.109 --> 00:21:46.049 public shaming. And Eazy, being Eazy, didn't 00:21:46.049 --> 00:21:48.569 take that lying down. He responded with his own 00:21:48.569 --> 00:21:52.930 EP in 1993. It's on Dr. Dre, a 187 -filled killer. 00:21:53.250 --> 00:21:55.170 Which is an incredible title. The title alone 00:21:55.170 --> 00:21:57.230 tells you everything. But I have to say, Eazy's 00:21:57.230 --> 00:21:59.569 response was a masterclass in petty strategic 00:21:59.569 --> 00:22:01.609 marketing. Oh, it was brilliant because he didn't 00:22:01.609 --> 00:22:03.670 just insult Dre back. He attacked his entire 00:22:03.670 --> 00:22:06.710 image. The main track, real motherfucking Gs. 00:22:07.069 --> 00:22:09.650 Eazy attacked Dre's credibility. He basically 00:22:09.650 --> 00:22:12.690 said, you are a studio gangster. I am the real 00:22:12.690 --> 00:22:15.970 deal. You claim to be hard, but I have the receipts. 00:22:16.049 --> 00:22:18.329 And he literally had the receipts. He did. He 00:22:18.329 --> 00:22:20.769 dug up old promotional photos of Dr. Dre from 00:22:20.769 --> 00:22:22.569 his days in the world -class wrecking crew and 00:22:22.569 --> 00:22:25.900 electro group Dre was in before NWA. In the photos, 00:22:26.059 --> 00:22:29.039 Dre is wearing these sequined, lacy outfits, 00:22:29.339 --> 00:22:31.220 shiny suits, and wearing eyeliner and makeup. 00:22:31.420 --> 00:22:33.680 It was the 80s. Everyone looked like that. But 00:22:33.680 --> 00:22:37.039 in the context of 1993 gangsta rap. It was fatal. 00:22:37.180 --> 00:22:39.740 It was kryptonite. Eazy put those photos in the 00:22:39.740 --> 00:22:41.700 liner notes of the album. He showed them in the 00:22:41.700 --> 00:22:44.500 music video. He deconstructed Dre's hard image 00:22:44.500 --> 00:22:46.700 by showing his past. It was an incredible move. 00:22:46.819 --> 00:22:49.460 And visually, in the video for a real mcuckuckin' 00:22:49.460 --> 00:22:51.980 geez, Eazy doubled down on his own authenticity. 00:22:52.619 --> 00:22:54.640 Right. He brought in real Compton gang members, 00:22:54.759 --> 00:22:57.319 DG Knockout and Dresta. He was reasserting his 00:22:57.319 --> 00:22:59.240 authority. He was saying, you are in a mansion 00:22:59.240 --> 00:23:02.380 in the hills with Suge. I am still here in Compton 00:23:02.380 --> 00:23:04.579 with the real Steppers. It was a very clear message. 00:23:04.779 --> 00:23:07.259 I'm real. You're fake. And the EP was a huge 00:23:07.259 --> 00:23:10.000 success. It went double platinum. Easy proved 00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:12.299 you could still sell records without Trey. So 00:23:12.299 --> 00:23:14.779 we have the feud. We have the music. But I want 00:23:14.779 --> 00:23:16.640 to pivot to something that I found really surprising 00:23:16.640 --> 00:23:18.319 in the research and something that I think a 00:23:18.319 --> 00:23:20.549 lot of people just don't know about. We talk 00:23:20.549 --> 00:23:23.670 about Easy as this street icon, but his politics 00:23:23.670 --> 00:23:28.089 were... baffling. Baffling is a polite word for 00:23:28.089 --> 00:23:30.430 it. This is where the story gets fascinatingly 00:23:30.430 --> 00:23:33.450 weird and defies all expectations. See, this 00:23:33.450 --> 00:23:35.529 is what I love about Easy. He builds this entire 00:23:35.529 --> 00:23:38.849 image of the ultimate anti -authoritarian gangster. 00:23:39.269 --> 00:23:41.549 Fuck that, police is his anthem, he's the guy 00:23:41.549 --> 00:23:43.950 screaming at the cops. But Easy was never one 00:23:43.950 --> 00:23:47.089 to follow a script, was he? Never. And that contrarian 00:23:47.089 --> 00:23:49.380 streak didn't just apply to music. It applied 00:23:49.380 --> 00:23:51.500 to his worldview. And this is where we get to 00:23:51.500 --> 00:23:53.099 the part of the story that breaks everyone's 00:23:53.099 --> 00:23:56.279 brain. The Republican luncheon. In March 1991, 00:23:56.819 --> 00:23:58.960 Eric Wright attended a lunch for the Republican 00:23:58.960 --> 00:24:02.160 senatorial inner circle hosted by President George 00:24:02.160 --> 00:24:05.220 H .W. Bush at the White House. Let that sink 00:24:05.220 --> 00:24:07.819 in. The cognitive dissonance is real. You have 00:24:07.819 --> 00:24:11.160 the man who the FBI sent a warning letter to 00:24:11.160 --> 00:24:13.900 literally government telling him to shut up. 00:24:14.039 --> 00:24:16.200 sitting down for lunch with the Republican elite 00:24:16.200 --> 00:24:19.279 wearing a suit. Albeit with his Compton hat on. 00:24:19.640 --> 00:24:22.059 He still had the hat. Still had the hat. But 00:24:22.059 --> 00:24:25.680 why? What was his reasoning? It's surreal. But 00:24:25.680 --> 00:24:28.440 when you dig into the why, it reveals a lot about 00:24:28.440 --> 00:24:31.420 Easy. His spokesman claimed that Wright supported 00:24:31.420 --> 00:24:33.920 Bush because of his performance in the Gulf War. 00:24:34.180 --> 00:24:36.619 So he was a hawk on foreign policy. It suggests 00:24:36.619 --> 00:24:39.400 a certain level of patriotism, or perhaps just 00:24:39.400 --> 00:24:42.299 an admiration for strength, Easy respected power. 00:24:42.809 --> 00:24:45.369 He respected the projection of force. And let's 00:24:45.369 --> 00:24:47.630 be honest, he was also a capitalist. The Republican 00:24:47.630 --> 00:24:50.369 Party platform of low taxes and free enterprise 00:24:50.369 --> 00:24:53.490 probably appealed to the CEO in him. It definitely 00:24:53.490 --> 00:24:55.609 complicates the narrative. He wasn't a liberal 00:24:55.609 --> 00:24:58.130 activist. He was a capitalist and a hawk, apparently. 00:24:58.369 --> 00:25:00.509 And then there is the Rodney King trial. This 00:25:00.509 --> 00:25:02.089 one is even harder to wrap your head around for 00:25:02.089 --> 00:25:04.529 a lot of people. This is a defining moment. for 00:25:04.529 --> 00:25:07.609 Los Angeles and for Black America. Four LAPD 00:25:07.609 --> 00:25:10.569 officers beat Rodney King brutally. The video 00:25:10.569 --> 00:25:12.509 went around the world, sparked the riots when 00:25:12.509 --> 00:25:15.369 they were acquitted. EZE attended the trial regularly. 00:25:15.690 --> 00:25:18.009 But he wasn't there to protest the system, necessarily. 00:25:18.390 --> 00:25:20.930 He wasn't there with the activists. No. He was 00:25:20.930 --> 00:25:24.690 often seen standing alongside Theodore J. Brezano. 00:25:25.200 --> 00:25:27.019 one of the officers involved in the beating. 00:25:27.160 --> 00:25:30.279 That sounds insane. Why on earth would EZE, the 00:25:30.279 --> 00:25:33.119 voice of fuck the police, support one of the 00:25:33.119 --> 00:25:35.859 officers who beat a black man on camera? Wright's 00:25:35.859 --> 00:25:39.200 logic was very specific and very legalistic. 00:25:39.299 --> 00:25:40.960 He wasn't supporting the act of the beating. 00:25:41.140 --> 00:25:43.059 He argued that the other three white officers 00:25:43.059 --> 00:25:45.700 were responsible for the beating. But he believed 00:25:45.700 --> 00:25:48.319 Brezano, who was Mexican -American, had actually 00:25:48.319 --> 00:25:50.900 tried to stop them or mitigate it. So he was 00:25:50.900 --> 00:25:52.539 looking at the tape and making his own judgment. 00:25:52.640 --> 00:25:55.839 He was quoted saying, I say, wrong. Three white 00:25:55.839 --> 00:25:57.700 officers were responsible. The other officer 00:25:57.700 --> 00:25:59.599 happens to be Mexican -American and he tried 00:25:59.599 --> 00:26:02.500 to stop them. He was drawing a line between who 00:26:02.500 --> 00:26:04.799 he saw as guilty and who he saw as trying to 00:26:04.799 --> 00:26:07.220 do the right thing within a bad situation. Wow. 00:26:07.819 --> 00:26:12.140 That is a nuanced take. He was looking at the 00:26:12.140 --> 00:26:14.339 individual, not the uniform, not the group. Exactly. 00:26:14.359 --> 00:26:16.539 He refused to group them all together. He looked 00:26:16.539 --> 00:26:18.480 at the evidence as he saw it and formed his own 00:26:18.480 --> 00:26:21.450 opinion. But I imagine the hip hop community 00:26:21.450 --> 00:26:24.369 didn't appreciate the nuance. Not at all. He 00:26:24.369 --> 00:26:27.230 was labeled a sellout. Willie D of the Ghetto 00:26:27.230 --> 00:26:30.130 Boys called him out specifically. It was seen 00:26:30.130 --> 00:26:32.490 as a betrayal of the race, a betrayal of the 00:26:32.490 --> 00:26:35.289 cause. But it shows that Eazy -E was a radical 00:26:35.289 --> 00:26:37.950 individualist. He didn't just follow the crowd, 00:26:38.049 --> 00:26:40.049 even when the crowd was his own peers. He saw 00:26:40.049 --> 00:26:42.890 what he saw and he stood by it. Popularity be 00:26:42.890 --> 00:26:45.819 damned. He was a contrarian to the bone. And 00:26:45.819 --> 00:26:47.339 while he was fighting these culture wars and 00:26:47.339 --> 00:26:50.299 industry battles, he was managing a chaotic personal 00:26:50.299 --> 00:26:52.200 life. Let's talk about the personal life, because 00:26:52.200 --> 00:26:54.740 the numbers are high. According to Jerry Heller 00:26:54.740 --> 00:26:57.740 and other sources, Wright had 11 children with 00:26:57.740 --> 00:27:00.859 8 different women. 11 kids. That is a full football 00:27:00.859 --> 00:27:03.900 team. He was a father to a very large brood, 00:27:03.900 --> 00:27:06.799 including his son, Eric Darnell Wright, who's 00:27:06.799 --> 00:27:09.279 known as Little Easy E, and his daughter, Evie, 00:27:09.299 --> 00:27:11.779 who's been very vocal about protecting his legacy. 00:27:12.359 --> 00:27:15.019 It paints a picture of a man who lived fast in 00:27:15.019 --> 00:27:17.420 every sense of the word. He was promiscuous. 00:27:17.420 --> 00:27:19.920 He was active. He was everywhere. But he did 00:27:19.920 --> 00:27:22.779 settle down eventually, or at least he tried 00:27:22.779 --> 00:27:25.559 to. He met Tomica Woods in a nightclub in 1991. 00:27:26.220 --> 00:27:28.380 By all accounts, she was different. She was a 00:27:28.380 --> 00:27:30.920 business -minded person herself. She challenged 00:27:30.920 --> 00:27:33.240 him. They had a relationship that lasted until 00:27:33.240 --> 00:27:35.839 the end. And they got married. They did. They 00:27:35.839 --> 00:27:38.960 actually got married on March 14, 1995. March 00:27:38.960 --> 00:27:43.069 14, 1995. Keep that date in mind, everyone, because 00:27:43.069 --> 00:27:46.009 the timeline we are about to discuss is heartbreakingly, 00:27:46.009 --> 00:27:48.410 brutally short. This is the part of the story 00:27:48.410 --> 00:27:50.450 that always shocks people. Yeah. Even if you 00:27:50.450 --> 00:27:53.329 know he died, the speed of his decline is terrifying. 00:27:53.589 --> 00:27:57.150 So take us through it. It's early 1995. NWA is 00:27:57.150 --> 00:27:59.630 history. He's running ruthless. He's discovering 00:27:59.630 --> 00:28:01.750 new talent like Bone Thugs -N -Harmony. He's 00:28:01.750 --> 00:28:04.029 wealthy. He's only 30 years old. What happens? 00:28:04.329 --> 00:28:08.210 On February 24th, 1995, Wright goes to Cedars 00:28:08.210 --> 00:28:11.359 -Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He has 00:28:11.359 --> 00:28:14.319 a violent, persistent cough. He thinks it's asthma. 00:28:14.579 --> 00:28:17.079 He's had asthma his whole life. So it's something 00:28:17.079 --> 00:28:19.619 familiar. Right. Or maybe it's the lingering 00:28:19.619 --> 00:28:22.019 effects of a cold or bronchitis. It's winter 00:28:22.019 --> 00:28:24.279 in L .A. People get sick. He probably thought 00:28:24.279 --> 00:28:26.500 he needed some antibiotics, maybe a nebulizer 00:28:26.500 --> 00:28:28.599 treatment, and he'd be back in the studio by 00:28:28.599 --> 00:28:30.619 the afternoon. He walks in expecting a quick 00:28:30.619 --> 00:28:33.839 fix, a prescription. Exactly. He walks in expecting 00:28:33.839 --> 00:28:37.099 a prescription, but the doctors run tests, and 00:28:37.099 --> 00:28:40.460 the diagnosis was devastating. HIV AIDS. And 00:28:40.460 --> 00:28:43.579 not just HIV, but full -blown AIDS. His T -cell 00:28:43.579 --> 00:28:45.900 count was dangerously low. His immune system 00:28:45.900 --> 00:28:48.319 was already compromised. He'd likely been living 00:28:48.319 --> 00:28:50.119 with the virus for years without knowing it. 00:28:50.180 --> 00:28:52.759 This was 1995. We have to contextualize this. 00:28:52.839 --> 00:28:55.279 The treatments we have today, the antiretrovirals 00:28:55.279 --> 00:28:57.160 that allow people to live long, healthy lives 00:28:57.160 --> 00:28:59.799 with HIV, didn't exist yet. Or they were in their 00:28:59.799 --> 00:29:02.359 infancy and not widely available. Magic Johnson 00:29:02.359 --> 00:29:04.460 had been diagnosed a few years earlier, which 00:29:04.460 --> 00:29:07.019 raised awareness. But a diagnosis of full -blown 00:29:07.019 --> 00:29:09.900 AIDS in 1995 was essentially a death sentence. 00:29:10.160 --> 00:29:12.990 It was a countdown. It was. And he made a decision 00:29:12.990 --> 00:29:15.470 that I think defines his courage more than any 00:29:15.470 --> 00:29:18.650 song he ever released. On March 16th, less than 00:29:18.650 --> 00:29:21.250 a month after walking into the hospital, he released 00:29:21.250 --> 00:29:23.609 a public statement announcing his illness. He 00:29:23.609 --> 00:29:25.869 didn't hide it. He could have. He could have 00:29:25.869 --> 00:29:27.670 said it was pneumonia. He could have said it 00:29:27.670 --> 00:29:30.789 was cancer. The stigma around AIDS in the 90s, 00:29:30.789 --> 00:29:33.269 especially in the hyper -masculine world of hip 00:29:33.269 --> 00:29:37.349 hop, was immense. It was seen as a gay disease 00:29:37.349 --> 00:29:41.069 or a junkie disease. It was not something a gangster 00:29:41.069 --> 00:29:43.769 rapper was supposed to get. But he chose to go 00:29:43.769 --> 00:29:45.890 public. He chose to own it. And the words he 00:29:45.890 --> 00:29:48.369 used were so powerful. I want to read the key 00:29:48.369 --> 00:29:50.289 part of that statement because it is his final 00:29:50.289 --> 00:29:53.470 message to the world. Please do. He said, I'm 00:29:53.470 --> 00:29:55.289 in the biggest fight of my life and it ain't 00:29:55.289 --> 00:29:57.890 easy. I've got thousands and thousands of young 00:29:57.890 --> 00:29:59.910 fans that have to learn about what's real when 00:29:59.910 --> 00:30:02.269 it comes to AIDS. Just remember, it's your real 00:30:02.269 --> 00:30:04.470 time and your real life. It's your real time 00:30:04.470 --> 00:30:07.150 and your real life. That hits hard. It's him 00:30:07.150 --> 00:30:09.450 dropping the persona one last time. He's not 00:30:09.450 --> 00:30:12.200 easy anymore. He's Eric Wright. He was stripping 00:30:12.200 --> 00:30:14.259 away the glamour. He was telling his fans, this 00:30:14.259 --> 00:30:16.119 isn't a movie. This isn't a rap song where you 00:30:16.119 --> 00:30:18.200 get shot and come back in the sequel. This is 00:30:18.200 --> 00:30:21.240 reality. The belief was that he contracted it 00:30:21.240 --> 00:30:23.640 from a sexual partner, given his lifestyle. He 00:30:23.640 --> 00:30:25.400 was trying to warn the very people who looked 00:30:25.400 --> 00:30:28.220 up to him. And in those final days, lying in 00:30:28.220 --> 00:30:30.799 that hospital bed at Cedars -Sinai, there was 00:30:30.799 --> 00:30:34.099 some reconciliation, right? The feuds, they started 00:30:34.099 --> 00:30:36.539 to seem less important. There was. The walls 00:30:36.539 --> 00:30:39.190 came down. He made amends with Ice Cube. Cube 00:30:39.190 --> 00:30:41.569 visited him in the hospital. The feud that had 00:30:41.569 --> 00:30:44.750 been so bitter, so public, it melted away in 00:30:44.750 --> 00:30:47.190 the face of mortality. What about Dre? Did he 00:30:47.190 --> 00:30:49.970 see him? Reports vary on the specifics of the 00:30:49.970 --> 00:30:52.690 visit, but generally the vibe is that the animosity 00:30:52.690 --> 00:30:55.509 was dropped. Dr. Dre has spoken about how shocked 00:30:55.509 --> 00:30:57.950 he was, how he never wished that on him. When 00:30:57.950 --> 00:31:00.099 you are dying at 30... The business disputes, 00:31:00.339 --> 00:31:03.019 the real motherfucking Gs, the insults, they 00:31:03.019 --> 00:31:05.500 all seem very small. He seemed so petty. And 00:31:05.500 --> 00:31:09.140 then on March 26, 1995. Just one month and two 00:31:09.140 --> 00:31:11.240 days after entering the hospital with what he 00:31:11.240 --> 00:31:14.160 thought was a cough, Eric Lynn Wright died from 00:31:14.160 --> 00:31:17.740 AIDS -induced pneumonia. One month from I have 00:31:17.740 --> 00:31:22.039 a cough to gone. It's just unbelievable. It sent 00:31:22.039 --> 00:31:24.119 a shockwave through the world, not just the music 00:31:24.119 --> 00:31:26.900 world. The funeral was held on April 7 at Rose 00:31:26.900 --> 00:31:30.089 Hills Memorial Park in Whittier. Over 3 ,000 00:31:30.089 --> 00:31:32.730 people attended. Who was there? Everyone. The 00:31:32.730 --> 00:31:35.109 streets and the suites. Jerry Heller was there, 00:31:35.170 --> 00:31:39.410 sobbing. DJ Yellow was there. Fans, family. And 00:31:39.410 --> 00:31:42.210 the visual. It's iconic in its own sad way. He 00:31:42.210 --> 00:31:44.269 was buried in a gold casket. Fitting for a king. 00:31:44.490 --> 00:31:46.930 A hip -hop king. And he was dressed in a flannel 00:31:46.930 --> 00:31:49.750 shirt, jeans, and his Compton hat. He went out 00:31:49.750 --> 00:31:52.230 exactly as he came in. No suit, no pretense. 00:31:52.690 --> 00:31:55.289 Just... easy let's talk about the impact of that 00:31:55.289 --> 00:31:58.630 death because in 1995 aids was still widely misunderstood 00:31:58.630 --> 00:32:00.890 especially in the hip -hop community oh massively 00:32:00.890 --> 00:32:02.829 it was often seen as something that happened 00:32:02.829 --> 00:32:05.829 to other people for a hardcore heterosexual gangster 00:32:05.829 --> 00:32:08.849 rapper a guy who boasted at a sexual conquest 00:32:08.849 --> 00:32:12.750 to die of aids it shattered stereotypes it forced 00:32:12.750 --> 00:32:14.769 a conversation that wasn't happening in the barber 00:32:14.769 --> 00:32:17.009 shops or on the blog it made it real for a lot 00:32:17.009 --> 00:32:19.730 of people it made it undeniable magazines like 00:32:19.730 --> 00:32:23.720 jet Vibe, Newsweek, they all covered it. It wasn't 00:32:23.720 --> 00:32:25.740 just music news. It was public health news. It 00:32:25.740 --> 00:32:28.799 had to have changed behavior. It did. HIV testing 00:32:28.799 --> 00:32:31.240 rates skyrocketed in black communities in the 00:32:31.240 --> 00:32:33.839 months following his death. If Eazy -E, the toughest 00:32:33.839 --> 00:32:36.200 guy in the room, could die from this, anyone 00:32:36.200 --> 00:32:39.059 could. He's even commemorated in the AIDS quilt. 00:32:39.160 --> 00:32:42.079 That is a massive cultural crossover, a testament 00:32:42.079 --> 00:32:45.059 to his impact beyond music. So looking back, 00:32:45.099 --> 00:32:47.339 what is the legacy? We call him the godfather. 00:32:47.400 --> 00:32:50.279 Is that title earned? Oh, absolutely. He propelled 00:32:50.279 --> 00:32:53.420 West Coast rap onto the global map. Without Eazy 00:32:53.420 --> 00:32:56.440 -E, there is no Ruthless Records. Without Ruthless, 00:32:56.480 --> 00:32:59.440 there is no N .W .A. Without N .W .A., there 00:32:59.440 --> 00:33:03.150 is no Dr. Dre solo career. No The Cry. No Snoop 00:33:03.150 --> 00:33:06.150 Dogg. No Eminem. No 50 Cent. No Kendrick Lamar. 00:33:06.269 --> 00:33:08.630 The entire lineage of modern hip -hop flows through 00:33:08.630 --> 00:33:10.430 the veins of Ruthless Records. He's a foundational 00:33:10.430 --> 00:33:12.309 figure. And speaking of Ruthless, we have to 00:33:12.309 --> 00:33:14.250 mention his ear for talent. It wasn't just N 00:33:14.250 --> 00:33:16.250 .W .A. He was pivoting right before he died. 00:33:16.349 --> 00:33:18.650 He was still finding new sounds. Yes. This is 00:33:18.650 --> 00:33:21.109 so important. Even after N .W .A. imploded, he 00:33:21.109 --> 00:33:23.789 was making moves. He signed Bone Thugs -N -Harmony. 00:33:24.089 --> 00:33:26.690 I love bone thugs. And they were totally different. 00:33:26.849 --> 00:33:29.990 They were singing, harmonizing, that rapid fire 00:33:29.990 --> 00:33:32.809 flow from Cleveland. They didn't sound like Compton 00:33:32.809 --> 00:33:36.750 at all. That shows EZ's genius as an A &R. He 00:33:36.750 --> 00:33:39.630 didn't just want to clone NWA. He saw the vision 00:33:39.630 --> 00:33:42.269 for something new, something melodic and otherworldly. 00:33:42.289 --> 00:33:45.509 He signed them. He mentored them. And tragically, 00:33:45.509 --> 00:33:48.769 their biggest hit, The Crossroads, became a tribute 00:33:48.769 --> 00:33:51.250 to him. It won a Grammy. It won a Grammy. It's 00:33:51.250 --> 00:33:54.089 one of the most beautiful, mournful songs in 00:33:54.089 --> 00:33:56.750 hip hop history. And it is dedicated to Eric 00:33:56.750 --> 00:33:59.150 Wright. That's a powerful legacy. His influence 00:33:59.150 --> 00:34:01.869 is everywhere now. The movies straight out of 00:34:01.869 --> 00:34:04.809 Compton in 2015 was huge. Jason Mitchell played 00:34:04.809 --> 00:34:06.609 him. It was an incredible performance for many 00:34:06.609 --> 00:34:08.929 people. He stole the movie. The film was dedicated 00:34:08.929 --> 00:34:11.650 to his memory. It reintroduced him to a whole 00:34:11.650 --> 00:34:14.230 new generation who maybe only knew the name, 00:34:14.250 --> 00:34:16.570 but not the story. And there was also Surviving 00:34:16.570 --> 00:34:18.610 Compton in 2016, which showed a different side 00:34:18.610 --> 00:34:21.039 of him. A more sympathetic side in some ways, 00:34:21.139 --> 00:34:23.199 specifically regarding his relationship with 00:34:23.199 --> 00:34:26.260 Michelle. The film portrays him warning her about 00:34:26.260 --> 00:34:29.039 Dr. Dre's abuse. It paints him as a protector 00:34:29.039 --> 00:34:31.739 in that specific dynamic, which adds more layers 00:34:31.739 --> 00:34:34.019 to his character. And finally, the institutional 00:34:34.019 --> 00:34:36.679 recognition. The kind of stuff that would have 00:34:36.679 --> 00:34:39.880 seemed impossible in 1989. The Rock and Roll 00:34:39.880 --> 00:34:43.280 Hall of Fame in 2016. Inducted alongside his 00:34:43.280 --> 00:34:47.460 NWA brothers. And just recently, in 2024, a Grammy 00:34:47.460 --> 00:34:49.800 Lifetime Achievement Award. It feels like the 00:34:49.800 --> 00:34:52.159 world finally caught up to what he built. It 00:34:52.159 --> 00:34:54.480 took time. But when you look at the structure 00:34:54.480 --> 00:34:57.059 of modern hip -hop, the artist -owned labels 00:34:57.059 --> 00:35:00.059 like Rockefeller, Bad Boy, Cash Money Eazy -E 00:35:00.059 --> 00:35:02.219 wrote the blueprint. He proved you can own the 00:35:02.219 --> 00:35:04.360 masters, keep the lion's share, and tell the 00:35:04.360 --> 00:35:06.320 industry to kick rocks. He was a revolutionary 00:35:06.320 --> 00:35:08.539 businessman. So what does this all mean? We started 00:35:08.539 --> 00:35:10.480 by asking if he was a thug or a businessman. 00:35:10.940 --> 00:35:13.199 And I think the answer is that he was a survivor 00:35:13.199 --> 00:35:15.900 who became a visionary. He used the tools he 00:35:15.900 --> 00:35:18.789 had. The street reputation, the toughness, the 00:35:18.789 --> 00:35:22.210 fear to build something that outlasted him. He 00:35:22.210 --> 00:35:25.190 was complex. He was flawed. He made enemies. 00:35:25.329 --> 00:35:28.889 He made questionable political choices. But he 00:35:28.889 --> 00:35:31.389 changed the culture forever. It's a tragedy that 00:35:31.389 --> 00:35:33.909 he didn't get to see how big it became. Just 00:35:33.909 --> 00:35:36.050 imagine what ruthless records would look like 00:35:36.050 --> 00:35:38.050 today if he had lived another 20 or 30 years. 00:35:38.369 --> 00:35:41.500 That is the great what if. That's the final thought 00:35:41.500 --> 00:35:44.019 to leave people with. With his eye for talent 00:35:44.019 --> 00:35:46.460 -finding bone thugs when no one else was looking 00:35:46.460 --> 00:35:48.739 there, what other sounds would he have brought 00:35:48.739 --> 00:35:51.280 to the mainstream? He could have dominated the 00:35:51.280 --> 00:35:53.840 late 90s and 2000s. He could have been Jay -Z 00:35:53.840 --> 00:35:56.699 before Jay -Z. The landscape of hip -hop might 00:35:56.699 --> 00:35:58.599 look very different today. It's your real time 00:35:58.599 --> 00:36:01.699 and your real life. A haunting reminder from 00:36:01.699 --> 00:36:03.719 a man who lived more than 30 years than most 00:36:03.719 --> 00:36:06.460 do in 80. Absolutely. A true American original. 00:36:06.639 --> 00:36:08.860 That brings us to the end of this deep dive into 00:36:08.860 --> 00:36:11.239 the life of Eazy -E. We hope you learned something 00:36:11.239 --> 00:36:13.760 new about the godfather of gangster rap. Always 00:36:13.760 --> 00:36:15.500 a pleasure to explore these stories. Thanks for 00:36:15.500 --> 00:36:16.340 listening. Stay curious.