Konnan was recently interviewed by Damian Abraham for VICE Sports, talking about how he got into hip-hop, introducing music into wrestling, his interactions with past musical acts during his time in WCW / TNA, and more. You can read some highlights below:
Konnan comments on Master P working in WCW:
He had his own, all the big stars had their own dressing rooms, but he was cool. He would come into the locker room with his brother Silkk The Shocker. I’m going to tell you something about Master P—when I sat down with him he was explaining to me everything he was doing. When you hear him talk he sounds very ghetto but that motherfucker is one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. All you’ve got to do is go to any ghetto in the U.S. or Canada and you’ll see what great hustlers those motherfuckers are. You know, he sat down with me and was explaining how he didn’t really care about all the big chains and big cars and all that. He was going to start investing. He had a Footlocker deal; he’d invested in real estate; he had a phone sex company; he was making his own movies; he had a jewellery line, and an energy drink. I mean, he did a deal that I’m almost positive they’ll never sign again—with Priority records—that he’d retained 100 percent ownership of the master recordings, and he would get like 80 percent of the record sales with Priority getting 15 percent.
Bro, he went on to make hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars off this deal and I don’t think they’ve ever done a deal like that since. He would put No Limit out there, like, how now you might have Bad Boy records or Death Row—he was doing that before they were. He was No Limit. Like back then you would get a CD with like 12-15 songs—he would put 20 songs on there. So you would be getting more bang for your buck, you know? He would go out and give out his records to people with good sound systems and they would just bump it all over the hood! His music was real ghetto but it crossed over. He went platinum many times. I think what I took from him more than anything was how business savvy he was.
Konnan talks about running into KISS while in WCW:
I saw them backstage at Las Vegas at MGM. It must have been a pay-per-view that they did. I remember when I was a little kid I did like KISS a lot. I remember actually for Halloween dressing up as Ace Frehley! But when I finally did see Kiss, the two things I do remember about them was what incredibly over-top platforms they were wearing—it was ridiculous! I don’t even think a woman could walk in them, much less a man. And here’s the other thing that struck me—they look really old without makeup! I was like ‘Jesus Christ, thank God for makeup.’ You know, thank God for the makeup and the light switch.
How wrestling fans reacted to musical acts:
They pretty much don’t like anybody! I will tell you that Master P didn’t go over particularly well in some cities, they let him have it. But I mean it can’t get any worse than getting booed if they don’t like you. It’s very rare when they will applaud a musical act. You know who did do well, and maybe because Hunter was a friend of theirs and he knew how to present them, but Motorhead—they always did it right.
Does Konnan think there’s room for a more progressive wrestling company?
That’s the problem—there are no Latino agents, Latino producers or any Latinos in positions of power. It’s the same for minorities in general. Once somebody runs a company, let’s say he’s openly gay for example, and underneath him he’s got an African American, a Latino and Anglo-Saxon. Just a composite of what your demographic is, they’re not all white. But it’s been run by the same guy: Vince McMahon, a 70-year-old white billionaire. Do you think he really has a lot of interaction with poor people, Latinos, blacks, Samoans? Probably not! So, you know, like Dixie Carter (TNA Owner), she comes from a millionaire family from Dallas, Texas. It will happen.
