Young Money's Short Dawg: 'Wayne Is Like A Puppy'

Recently GlobalGrind had the chance to talk to Short Dawg, one of the core members of Lil' Wayne's Young Money crew. During our conversation, Short Dawg spoke on how Weezy has changed from his release from prison, whether or not he feels pressure to live up to the success of Drake and Nicki Minaj, and more. Check out what he had to say.

GlobalGrind: How did you meet Lil' Wayne and how did you get down with Young Money?

Short Dawg: I met Wayne around 3 years ago thorugh Mack Maine - Mack and I were cool, we did a couple of songs together, so he introduced me to Wayne and we just hit it off. It was a basic friendship, and after we started kicking it, we did a couple of songs, and while he was building his Young Money brand he asked me to come be a part of it, and the rest is history. 

GG: Have you noticed a difference in Wayne from befoe he went to jail to now? 

Short Dawg:  He just seems more focused. He got an extra boost of energy, I don't know where it comes from, I guess just being locked up, caged in a room. It's like a little puppy when you leave him in his little cage for too long, once you open that gate he just starts running around in circles. It's just all of that energy coming out.

GG: Houston is one of the great towns of rap music - there are so many legends from Z-Ro, UGK, DJ Screw - who influenced you to start rapping when you were coming up?

SD: The funny thing about it was, being from Houston and that whole culture of the screw music, you automatically just take part in that becasue that's all you hear, every corner you turn you hear everybody banging Screw, UGK, Z-Ro, Fat Ball, Big Moe, etc.  The whole thing is they would go to the screw house and freestyle, so everyone in Houston pretty much began as a freestyler. Myself, I didn't take it too serious when I started because I was just doing it as wreckless fun.

GG: How old when you started taking it seriously?

SD: I was around 18 years-old. I got a late start. I was a good freestyler - it's funny, because I did it for entertainment. I wouldn't even take part in any freestyles if there weren't any girls around or a big crowd, I'd probably be the last one to come in and say something and everyone would go crazy, and then I'd leave - that's all I wanted to do, was just shock the crowd and leave. 

GG: When you're making music now is it still a freestyle-type process or is it more structured?

SD: Pretty much, I still don't write at the end of the day. My early stuff I would, because I had to learn how to count bars and how to put hooks in, but now I basically just do it off of emotions. Sometimes I might go over 16 bars or under 16 or do a 4 bar hook or 8 bar hook or I might not even do a hook because I finished what I had to say - it's just pure emotion now.  I go in when I get there, I don't think of the song until I get to the studio unless it's a song idea, but most of the time I don't make the song until I hear the beat. Everything I do is fresh, brand new. I never go in the studio with a prepared song because I'm one of those people that's inspired by music. If I'm not inspired by the beat I can't do it. Just like when I was freestyling if there wasn't a crowd or some girls I wouldn't do it, I'd hear people beating on the tables and walk straight by. I've always been one of those people that moves off of inspiration.