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• Everlast on MTV
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Tavis: Everlast is a Grammy-winning singer/rapper and songwriter whose music is a unique mix of hip-hop and blues. The former House of Pain frontman is out this week with his fourth solo project. The CD is called 'White Trash Beautiful.' He's going to have to explain that in a second. Here's a clip from the video for the title track 'White Trash Beautiful.'

Everlast: White trash beautiful,

There's something you should know,

My heart belongs to you, girl,

I know you could've found yourself better guys,

But love you till the day I die,

I swear to God it's true,

I'm comin' home to you

Tavis: Everlast. How you doing, man?

Everlast: I'm good.

Tavis: Nice to see you. Uh... White trash beautiful. I've seen a lot of things in my life that were oxymoronic. And that's one if I ever saw one. White trash...beautiful. So explain this.

Everlast: I read a lot about a lot of different things. One of my favorite subjects is, like, Muhammad Ali, and it kind of just comes from... I read a lot of books, like 'Redemption Song,' and then there was this other book, it was a collection of articles that he did over the years, interviews and whatnot. And I just--you know, the 'Black is Beautiful' thing kept coming up and coming up and coming up. One day, like, it kind of rang in my head--white trash beautiful, you know?

Tavis: Yeah. Ha ha ha.

Everlast: It's the same kind of sentiment, you know what I mean? To kind of uplift. To uplift. It's half-funny, half, like, trying to say, like, you know-- right now it's kind of funny, because white trash is like this fashion statement, kind of almost right now...

Tavis: Right.

Everlast: With mullets and trucker hats and stuff, but--

Tavis: Right, right. Ha ha ha!

Everlast: So it's kind of clowning them, and then it's, like, kind of just giving, like, the people who really might be considered that, which is just lower-income white America something to say, like, 'Don't listen to that kind of crap.' You know. It's really meant to be kind of funny.

Tavis: So we have Muhammad Ali to thank for this.

Everlast: Oh, for sure. He might not like that, but it's definitely inspired by that.

Tavis: This is the fourth solo project. You liking this solo thing?

Everlast: I'm enjoying myself, man. I mean, the music is all I really care about, you know, so coming from where I come from in music, you know, starting in the hip-hop and as I was growing older and just remembering music that my parents listened to, you know. You hear songs that you rejected as a youngster because they were your parents' music or whatever, and then you hear them when you're in your twenties and you're, like--you know every word to it.

So I realized that there was a lot of different styles of music that I really dug and I was messing with already in hip-hop, because you go and dig through the records, and you take a little piece from the country record or a rock record or whatever and, you know--I'm still doing that. I'm just not using the records. I'm just using instruments now.

Tavis: Tell me how it is that you have been actually ahead of the game of most people and certainly as creative as anybody in the business, when it comes mixing hip-hop, to fusing hip-hop with so many other things. You don't abandon the label hip-hop. You wear that proudly, it seems to me, but you have been better than most at really mixing this hip-hop thing with blues and country and so many other things, so many other genres of music, and you still make it work, though.

Everlast: Thank you, first of all. Yeah. Hip-hop is the root. I mean, if you strip everything that I do down to like the lowest common denominator, it's a beat. It's all about just a rhythm and a kind of driving beat, which is--I always say you could strip the vocals off anything I do and probably rap to it. The way I write lyrics is still the same way I wrote rap songs. It's just, I try to incorporate a little more meaning now than I did when I was 21.

Tavis: Are you trying to suggest that 'Jump Around' didn't have meaning to it?

Everlast: Ha ha ha! You know, hey, I ain't mad at 'Jump Around,' man.

Tavis: I ain't mad at it, either, man.

Everlast: For such a silly song, man, it's done me very, very well in life.

Tavis: You're still doing 'Jump Around' out there.

Everlast: Oh, yeah, yeah. Just the other night, we were in London, we set that off, and the whole building looked like it was shaking, so it's crazy.

Tavis: Look back on those days for me, 'cause your hip-hop--your true hip-hop fans know that was one of the biggest, baddest cuts ever. Uh, look back--how many years ago was that now?

Everlast: I think, like, 10 or 11 now. Like, in '92, I think, it came out.

Tavis: What--look back on those days and tell me were you prepared for that, or did you all expect that? That was a huge hit, man.

Everlast: Um, you know, I mean, I wasn't prepared for, like, everything in life that came, but, like, the minute we made that song we kind of, like, and it was done and we all sat back and we were, like--

Tavis: You knew you had something.

Everlast: It was kind of crazy. Everybody that heard it, like, their eyes opened, and they were, like, 'What is that?' You know. The cat Muggs from Cypress Hill put that beat together. I knew it the minute I heard the beat, but, you know, then when the song came together, it was--it was, like I said, you know, it was fun. It was just about fun then. It wasn't about anything else. It was just go out, have fun.

Tavis: I was in a conversation with some folk the other day, and you know these numbers as well as I do--72% of hip-hop music is bought by white folk.

Everlast: Oh, for sure.

Tavis: 72% of it bought by white folk.

Everlast: Public Enemy went platinum, you know that? That wasn't all in the 'hood.

Tavis: And Ice-T sold a bunch of records, and everybody else. 72% bought by white kids, and yet, even with the success of Eminem, there are still folk who'll say that this is ours and that white folk ain't got no business owning a piece of this, and yet you've done as well in it as anybody.

Everlast: Um, you know, I mean, I can see both sides of that. You know what I mean? I can see that there's a generation of white kids in America that have grown up on hip-hop music, so it's their music. You know, they've grown up on it. But I see, kind of, the whole--you know, and not even dealing with Eminem, just the whole kind of fear of, like, losing a music-- losing control of something that, you know, it's like, yo, if I was in among the black people, I'd be like, 'Yo! This is ours. We do not want to let this get out of our control.'

Tavis: It happened with jazz.

Everlast: Yeah, you know what I mean? And--and I'm saying something right now that I don't know too many people that are saying it, it's happening. It's happening through corporate America, man. I mean, through the money, and the money's great, but, like, you know, you get a lot of cats who ain't never seen money, they'll--it's like, you keep throwing it at 'em, you know, they don't... I've had the benefit of being in this business for 20 years now, so, you know--I'm just showing my age, but, um, so it's, like, not about money for me. I love money. I like it. It spends real nice, you know what I mean? But, um, it's got to be about the music, and I think the music in hip-hop right now is suffering a little bit.

Tavis: I'm glad you said that. What's the best thing about the hip-hop game, even today, and what troubles you most about the hip-hop game as we sit here?

Everlast: Um, I'm probably gonna get in trouble for this--the videos I see on TV. If, like--if a white person was responsible for some of 'em, they would be like--it would be like straight out of 'Bamboozled,' you know what I mean? It would be like that.

Tavis: Negroes would be up in arms.

Everlast: I think so, I really do. Like, sometimes I see, I'm like, yo, does anybody hold up a mirror to some of these people and saying, 'This is really what you're projecting to children.' And I'm sounding like such a preacher or something right now. What I like about it is, I think, right now there is-- there's a lot of people in the game that are recognizing that it's going down the wrong path. You know, I think Jay's last record was--

Tavis: Jay-Z?

Everlast: Yeah. It was about him, you know what I mean? That's all you gotta do. I mean, I love 'Ghostface Killah,' man. I mean, this guy would cry on a record. You know, that's the kind of thing I love. Talib Kweli, I love all that kind of stuff, the stuff that has meaning and depth and some emotional value, you know.

Tavis: I suspected that maybe, you made a joke about the fact that you sounded like you were preaching and showing your age. You had to grow up faster than most, because for those who know your story--they know this very well--but for those who don't know your story, at 27, when I was on BET, the other network, before I got to PBS here--I remember this very well, almost the day it happened. I was on the air that night. Uh, at 27, you had a heart attack.

Everlast: Yeah.

Tavis: Almost died of a heart attack at 27.

Everlast: Yeah. Technically I think I did die for a small period of time. Um, I had a congenital heart defect that I was born with. It was called a bicuspid aortic valve, which essentially means 2 valves in my heart were fused together at birth, and they basically tore, and the result of that was my heart having to work so hard that it just collapsed after a day of this. Like, I really didn't know anything had happened. It's just my heart was overworkin' and overworkin' and overworkin'.

Tavis: It was all that jumpin' around, that's what it was.

Everlast: I was in a studio recording, smoking cigarettes, and, you know--and just not exercising, and it was a birth defect. It was gonna happen, you know. It was a matter of time. My doctors always told me, like, 'When you're around 50, we're really gonna have to pay attention to this thing,' but I guess I crammed 50 years.

Tavis: You were about 25 years ahead of schedule, weren't you?

Everlast: But in a way, it's, like, one of the better things that happened to me in my life.

Tavis: Why do you say that?

Everlast: Well, 'cause it really gave me a perspective on what's important, and, you know, up until then, it was only about success, and money defined whether I was successful or not.

Tavis: So what became important at 27 after you survived it? What became important?

Everlast: Um... Man, everything. My family, you know, my friends. I'm kind of--I'm a tight person. I can get real tight real quick--real tense, you know. So I've been working on that over the years, to let some of that go. Like 'why are you angry?' A lot of that.

Tavis: You a white man. What are you angry about? I can see me being angry. What the hell you angry about?

Everlast: Hey, man, white people can be angry, man.

Tavis: What do white folk have to be angry about?

Everlast: Oh, you're gonna get a lot of letters, dude.

Tavis: I'm serious, though. What you all mad about? Tell me that.

Everlast: Besides regular things in the world, nothing. You know what I mean? Nothing. That's the point. You know, being alive--besides bills and all the normal nonsense, nothing. That's the point I'm making. You know, I'm blessed. You know what I mean? And I've been spending the time since then just recognizing that. Whether your career is doing this or this or whatever, you know, you're alive, and, you know, I still do something that most people would kill to do.

Tavis: I suspect that having that near-death experience just allows you just fundamentally to appreciate life, to appreciate living every day, waking up, more than perhaps I ever will, unless I have a near-death experience.

Everlast: It's that, and it's also that, like, most people, like, your fear of death is based upon this unknown factor. You know what I mean? And I've kind of experienced that factor. It was a very painful death that I would've gone through had I died. It was very painful, that whole situation. And I don't want to sound crazy or nothing, but the things that happened in between, you know, whether I was dead or just unconscious or whatever, kind of gave me this sense that there's something there.

Tavis: Something out there.

Everlast: I don't know what it is. You know what I mean? I can't define it. I didn't see no lights or no voice-- you know, anything like that. It was just this sense. I try to explain it to people what it was like. It was like I just remembered a short conversation with a really old friend kind of saying, 'No, you ain't ready.' I didn't see no faces, no nothing, but it gives me this sense of like I'm not afraid. I mean, I don't want to die tomorrow or nothing, but I don't really have a fear of it anymore. So that frees you up-- your mind--of a lot of things, you know, when you don't got to think about that.

Tavis: Well, you're still alive, and you're still putting out good music. While when folk--'cause I mentioned earlier that you fuse so much stuff together. I want to close by asking, when people pick up this new CD with that wonderful title that we can thank Ali for...'White Trash Beautiful'--what are they gonna get on there? What are they gonna hear on this particular project?

Everlast: A little bit of everything, man. I mean, I tried to, like, on the last 2 records, like, 'Whitey Ford Sings the Blues' was kind of like a half songs, half hip-hop record. The one after that, 'Eat at Whitey's,' was more me trying to spread my songwriting wings, 'cause I had just really discovered that kind of part of what I do. This record is probably the best example of both styles fused into the same songs. You know, like really putting them all together. Not just next to each other, but blending them together.

Tavis: His name is Everlast, and now you know. Of course, if you don't or didn't know, you can ask your kids or your grandkids. They know who he is. Everlast, nice to see you.

Everlast: Thank you, man.

Tavis: I love that title: 'White Trash Beautiful.' I got to talk to Ali about this. Did you know that--never mind.

That's our show for tonight. As always, you can catch me on the radio on NPR, and I'll see you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from L.A. thanks for watching, and as always, keep the faith.