A Salute To Weed Carriers

Not content with continuing to push the envelope of lyrical slaughter (check J-Love’s “Come On” – aka the remix to Cormega’s “Tony/Montana” – for proof), Tony Starks has also become quite the weed owner in recent times. While Cappadonna provided full-time weed carrying duties thoughout the Ironman album, it wasn’t long before Ghostface realized that this was a task for more than one holder. So began the formation of the Theodore Unit.

Despite being awarded the dubious honour of one of XXL mag’s most hated crew names, Theodore Unit contains all of the ingredients of the perfect weed carrying squad. Trife provides the required skill quotient, Cappa is the link to the past and Shawn Wiggs is the all-important token “amazin’ Caucasian”. There are also some other guys such as Solomon Childs to make up the numbers for this well-rounded stasher set. As a bonus, Ghost even threw a couple of dope songs like “Gorilla Hood” on their album, which is a step-up from Biggie’s guest shots on Junior MAFIA’s debut.

I also dug-up an old tape with a radio interview with Ghost from 1996.

The Chef can rest easy knowing that “Only Built…” is one of the best rap albums ever made, and as a result his weed owner status will never be revoked. Ghostface was on almost every song, but obviously wasn’t holding for Rae. That position was filled by a guy by the name of Cappadonna, who could often be seen carrying a baseball bat filled with dank. He was so busy holding huge stashes for the two from the Wu that he neglected to develop things like timing and breath control when it was his time to shine in the booth.

It wasn’t until his outstanding appearence on “Winter Warz” that Cappadonna actually made an impression, and combined with his dope “’97 Mentality” 12″, dude actually had a nice buzz for his solo debut. Sadly, RZA’s weed carriers handled the production and Cappa was less than inspiring on the mic, making for a boring-as-fuck release that even the most devoted Killer Bee fan would struggle to sit through.

Remarkably, Cappadonna has proved to be quite resillient, and released two more solos albums following The Pillage before he was ousted from the Wu when it was discovered that his cracka-ass manager was a police stoolie. Proving that he’s got a heart the size of a whale, Ghostface was able to forgive Cap’s mistakes and allowed him to resume his weed carrying duties as a member of Tony’s Theodore Unit.

Raekwon has meanwhile gone through a couple of weed holding squads, as during the highly unpopular Immobilarity chamber, he had some guys called American Cream Team looking after the hydro. The release of The Lex Diamonds Story saw his weed carriers renamed Ice Water, although it’s most likely the same guys as the Cream Team (I really haven’t paid them enough attention to confirm this though). By the way, “Smith Bros.” and “Missing Watch” are fucking great songs if you missed the last album.

Next up: Ghostface.

Dwayne Wade, Shaq’s latest star guard weed carrier has to be careful not to get gassed. He scored double Shaq’s points in the final game of the Heat’s sweep of the Nets. Now everyone is adding his name to their hot-this-summer list, including P. Diddy who just signed Wade as a Sean John model.

Then there’s all the sports articles that read something like this:

“Dwayne Wade showed again Sunday there’s more to the Miami Heat than just superstar centre Shaquille O’Neal. Wade more than filled the void of O’Neal’s scoreless first half by scoring a career playoff-high 34 points and setting up O’Neal for most of his 17 second-half points…”

Whoa. Write-ups like that are bound to have Wade make the same mistake as Kobe and Penny and start to treat Shaq as a carrier instead of an owner. My advice to Wade- don’t do it, my dude. Keep ya mouth closed, and win a ring.

When it comes to the RZA, there’s no escaping the fact that pretty much anyone that’s been within a hundred miles of Staten Island has carried this guys weed. He’s never made a secret of his love for buds, and I suspect that his whole motivation to create the Wu-Tang Clan stems from his masterplan to create a world-wide weed carrying network. While Public Enemy once aimed to “create 5,000 Black leaders in the next five years”, Prince Rakeem promised to have “10,000 weed holders in every corner of the globe by Y2K”. Evidence of just how effective this plan was can be seen it projects such as The World According To RZA, which shows that whatever country The Abbott visits, his weed carrying requirements will be taken care of.

During his busiest period in the mid-90’s, Clan members would have to battle for tracks – not with a war of words, but by a test of stashing abilities – to see who could get which of RZA’s in-demand beats for their solo projects. Method Man, ODB and Raekwon The Chef proved to be RZA’s most trusted weed carriers at this point, which explains why they had the first lot of solo albums to be released. Those who under-performed were sent back to weed holder training camp, which may explain why Masta Killa only just released his album last year. Female weed holders Blue Raspberry and Tekitha were rewarded for their services with cameo spots, but never graduated to weed owner status, despite numerous threats of RZA’s “blunted soul” project.

Now that RZA hangs out with guys like Quentin Tarinteno, he doesn’t seem to have the same weed carrying requirements as he once did, although the occassional Bobby Digital album sees new weed carriers like Holocast and Dr. Doom (which must be reference to Kool Keith’s Dr. Dooom album and it’s Robbie Analogue preview) – as well as weed holding mainstays like Killarmy – on deck to keep the stash safe.

A Salute To Weed Carriers takes it’s Stetson hat off to the RZA – Greatest Weed Owner Of All Time (GWOOAT).

As one of the original founders of the Clan (The Genius even had an album out on Cold Chillin’), this guy has never been known to require many weed carriers. In fact, songs like “Stay Out Of Bars” indicate that he was more inclined to sit with a drink and think. The late, great Ol’ Dirty Bastard held his stash once upon a time in exchange for the GZA teaching him how to rock mics (plus they were cousins).

Killah Priest put in some serious weed carrying work around the time that of the Genius’ Geffen debut, and was rewarded with his very own solo track on the CD version of Liquid Swords (aka “one of the most lyrically advanced rap albums ever made”). “B.I.B.L.E.” must have made quite an impact, as Killah was soon elevated to weed owner status with the release of Heavy Mental and the emergence of his own squad of weed holders by the name of Sunz of Man.

After losing such a great weed carrier, it seems that no one was ever able to fill Priest’s cheeba-stuffed shoes, which forced the Genius to stay at the crib more and more. This eventually led to him becoming so reclusive that by the time that the Wu started work on the Iron Flag album, GZA was emailing his verses to the studio, apparently unwilling to leave the smoke-filled confines of his apartment. Things have improved since that dark period, and although I can’t name his current stash holders, I hear that the Genius is out and about once again, getting lifted and shit and still owning his own trees
.

Without a shadow of a doubt, there is no group in the history of music that has spawned more weed carriers than the mighty Wu-Tang Clan. Their legacy is so extensive that a single post could never hope to even skim the surface, so think of this as an introduction of sorts.

There are several schools of thought regarding which members are owners and who carried for who, but I have a general rule of thumb that says that if you didn’t appear on the first version of “Protect Ya Neck”, then you’re a Wu Weed Carrier (sorry Killah Priest). Due to the massive number of weed carriers that followed in the wake of the 36 Chambers album, I’ll be doing individual articles for each of the original team, plus a look at the third and fourth generation WWC’s.

Stay tuned…

When a weed carrier graduates to weed owner, what happens to the guy he used to carry for? We all know what happened between Big Jaz and Jay-Z, no homo. Unfortunately, more often than not the former carrier and his former boss have conflicts like that. The most recent example is Fiddy and Teh Ghey (aka The Gayme). Even though Teh Ghey still carried for Dre and whomever, Teh Ghey was still a weed owner – his w/c’ing squad being “The Black Wallstreet.” Although Fiddy and Teh Ghey have kissed and made up, its unlikely Teh Ghey is carrying for Fiddy anymore. Another example is Ja Rule and DMX. Ja Rule carried for DMX, and when he started ownin’ weed (The Murderers carried for him), he felt he had to establish who was the top Fake Tupac Biter. The beef continued to rage until the public stopped paying attention and no one gave a shit anymore. Even in the mixtape DJ world this type of conflicts have started: DJ Big Mike, a former carrier of DJ Kay Slay, has released mixtape which disses Kay Slay, and Kay Slay has fired back with threats of “bitch slapping” Big Mike.

Never underestimate the weed carrying possibilities of russian hats.

Not only are EPMD one of rap’s greatest ever groups, they also spawned a huge number of weed carriers. It’s not known whether or not the firing of their first two DJ’s in the space of a couple of years was weed-related, but for some reason DJ Diamond J and K-La Boss were shown the door to be replaced by DJ Scratch. Dancer/weed carrier Stezo also broke camp to persue a solo career, which resulted in an enjoyable album but little weed owning. Unfinshed Business saw the introduction of K-Solo, who was a triple threat capable of holding weed, spelling while rapping and punching people in the head.

By the time their third album dropped, the LI-bred duo had aquired the services of a young Reggie Noble – who most of you will know as Redman – to carry their boom. When the fourth album rolled around, the fellas must have had one hell of a lah habit, as they now had Das-Efx, Redman, K-Solo, Hurricane G etc. in possession of their shit. They also had the briefly had the ultimate rap accessory – token white weed carriers – by the name of The Knuckheadz. Eventually, Erick got mad when he figured out that Parrish owned a hell of a lot more weed he did, so he got some of his buddies to break into Pee’s crib to steal his stash.

Obviously, this ended the EPMD partnership, so Erick tried to assemble his own crew of carriers, dubbed The Def Squad. The problem was, by this stage Redman and Keith Murray (who came equipped with his own weed carriers by the name of L.O.D.) were so far ahead of E-Double in terms of rapping skills that he was forced to carry for them on many occassions just so he could hang out with ’em. Luckily, Jamal from Illegal and Joe Synister didn’t mind carrying for Erick in exchange for some beats, so all was not lost. PMD was more successful in terms of maintaining his weed owner status, quickly assembling a group of no-names such as Top Quality and Nocturnal to carry his enormous stash of trees. Despite wins in this area, both of them proceeded to release some of the most god-awful solo efforts ever seen in rap since 3rd Bass went for “delf”.

Eventually there was a fake-ass reunion album and a bunch of songs with “2000” tacked onto the end of the title, which is almost always a bad sign. Sadly, Erick Sermon now has to jump out of windows in order to get a XXL feature and PMD has been reduced to rolling with guys like DJ Honda.

Marijuana Jones adds: Erick Onasis – just remember this dude called himself “The Rap Goddess” on wax. He has had more “Aye, YO!!!!’s” than Lord Sear and Bobbitto combined. Don’t sleep on the E, ’cause yo something might rupture?? HUH?! He also rolled with a dude called Big Him…

It’s that time of year again. The people are working over time trying to sell. People are generally happier. Big fat guys are buying, and his smaller friends are helping him. Then, the gifts are carried before they are used. No, its not Christmas and New Year’s and Hanukkah and Kwanzaa and what have you. Its Cuatro Veinte.

Like I said, the gifts are carried before they are used. Most blogs would deal with the usage. But not us. No…not us.

We would deal with the carrying. It’s a generally busier time for w/c’s worldwide. It’s a time when the stakes is highest, they have the most likelyhood of getting caught than your average day (due to stepped-up security, even the police knows about this Quatre Vingt, no homo), plus they are carrying more. But it’s also a time when a young, secondary w/c can deliver when it counts, no homo, and rise to primary holder, or even, if they’re real lucky, to weed owner. So competition is high. But even if a w/c does not advance in his/her holdin’ to ownin’ quest, many times, the w/o will be especially generous, often times leading to the w/c being owners for a day. To my man (no homo) Lil’ Cease and all other carriers, working overtime and risking their collective asses (no homo), thank you from all of us to all of you (no homo) for showing us the true meaning of 4/20: to achieve your dreams.

…

or to smoke weed like crazy. Whichever you prefer.

Robbie says: Check this piece from our new female contributor Marijuana Jones, who offers a much-needed perspective on the wacky-world of women weed carriers (phew! try sayin’ that fast, five times in a row while rocking gold fronts!).

First of all, gully gutter shouts to all the weed-carryin’ ladies in the house. Here’s to the ones with “weed inside they pussies with they minds on the finer things in life/Props is a true thug’s wife.” Yeah, yeah, you know: “a few bitches who fucked dreads, on Sudafed, pussies hurtin’, they did it for a yard for the feds”. Rockin’ – not lots of ice – but “four finger rings, and gold teeth, and ain’t afraid to hold” weed.

It might go back to the days of the Juice Crew. Many have pondered as to how/why Marley Marl recruited a teenage Roxanne Shante into the crew at such a tender young age. For someone (presumably) named after Marley – Bob Marley – weed ownin’ was most likely right up there with making funky music – a must. MC Shan, Craig G., and all the cats rockin with the Juice Crew were easy targets for a bust, right? But not young Lolita Golden a/k/a Roxanne Shante. She could freestyle all day, cold get retarded with Biz, and all the while have a couple of ounces stashed away for good measure, unbeknownst to the D’s. She built a bridge for the queens of weed holdin’ that came after her.

Think about it. Every new-school crew worth it’s salt has a “first lady” right? Eve – the first lady of Ruff Riders. When Jada and Holiday Styles said “I need a ride or die bitch” they basically were on some “damn, I really need a nice-lookin‚ female w/c right about no” shit. Lil Kim started out as a weed carrier with the M.A.F.I.A. Funny, because she modeled herself after one of Brooklyn’s most O.G. bitches and a sho’ nuff weed owner, the original Queen Bee. Queen Bee used to rock flashy neon-colored wigs with matching fur coats, so she was obviously on some w/o shit. But Lil Kim, the Junior Queen Bee, she loved her some B.I.G. and wasn’t ashamed to find 100 ways to stuff a couple O’s up her scantily-clad coochie to prove it.

Now, one w/c comes to mind who really would have been an owner if gender bias didn’t run shit. That would be none other than the first lady of the Flipmode Squad, yeah man, I’m talking ’bout Rah Digga. First of all, her babydaddy’s her w/c – Young Zee – so there that go. Then, she damn near dope as Bussa Bus but gotta carry for him? It’s gotta hurt. Then, just because she’s Rahshida and not Rahquan, she gotta hold for this hypeman-ass Spliff Star kid too?! Pure fuckery, I tell you.

But see, the point of this thing is that there’s even some feminism in the owning/carrying dichotomy. There are some strong women holding it down – I mean their man’s holding it (on the down low). Their weed, that is. I give you Kelis, who’s definitely the w/o of her house. Take young Beyonce, who – heaven forbid – don’t puff trees. But if she did, it’s looking like Young Hovito would “hold it for her”. Lauryn Hill. Now, whether she’s still with Rohan or not – he’s Zion’s daddy and most def a pro holder. Even with the Fugees, L-Boogie mighta held for Wyclef, but we all know Pras had to hold hers regardless.

But now, speakin on Fugee Lah, I have to give a fat shout out to my man Jon Forte, who’s currently holdin’ it down in the Fed. Hold your head, Forte. We know you ain’t ask them blonde, Paris Hilton-looking skags to hold liquid coke for you. Shit, you can’t help it if Joni Mitchell was holdin’ your trees, and these random groupies decided they wanted to hold some other shit. Fuck that! Free Jon Forte.

I can’t leave without shouting out the mother of all weed owners. Ladies and gents – Ms. Erykah Badu. She’s had mad cats holdin’ all her shit, gone off the ism. The Baduism, that is. We all know Andre 9000 was always bugged the fuck out, but after he carried for Badu, it was a (head)wrap for son in the clothing department. I think he had Cee-Lo hold some of hers for him on the low a couple times, because look how he started wearing pink feather flamingo pants? Now all these backpackers are back jocking Common Sense, but it’s in the not-so-distant past that he was carrying mad isms for Badu and wearing manpris and floppy hats. Last I heard she had the D.O.C. holdin’ for her out in TX, and he was already funky enough before he hit the Baduism. I’m saying, her w/h’s and w/c’s go On & On. Shit, the only dude who ain’t hold for Erykah is M-1 from dead prez. Just goes to show you, dpz are from the old-school when it comes to holdin‚ and foldin‚, carryin‚ and marryin’.

So who am I holdin’ for? I pity the fool, B. Don’t play yourself. You know I’m the w/o!