#1009 - Bugzy Malone - Harsh Lessons in Unorthodox Strategy

53:48What was this? Was the blood clot due to the crash? Something related to the crash? Yeah, like, so I'm in Salford Royal Hospital, right? And the nurses are a great laugh. We're sat in there. I'm like, nurse. She's like, what? I'm like, I want to watch a film. She's like, click on the film. Then I'm like, it costs money. I've had a crash. You're being a diva. I've got no dough. She's like, do you want me to lend you some dough? I'm like, lend me some dough. So we're laughing our heads off all day. And I'm on morphine. Turns out I'm a great laugh on morphine. I've never took it before, so I didn't know.

54:16so I'm just laughing my head off right and then it's COVID so loved ones aren't allowed into the into the hospital right um and when I was getting discharged they said you should put weight on your foot because I've got this broken kneecap and I'm in a cast um like a brace and I um I forgot because morphine is one hell of a drug you know so I'm not I wasn't better I just thought it hurts I'm not going to put weight on it I've got crutches I'm not going to put weight on it didn't put weight on it and then I changed my diet a little bit I started eating things I wouldn't normally eat right I was the guy training and eating salmon and eggs for breakfast and all that all of a sudden I'm having like scones clotted cream jam cup of teas in the morning I'm going mad and like it's thickened my blood you know and it's resulted in a clot and once a clot's there it does one or two things you know either lies dormant and and sort of um it dissipates if you like dilutes or whatever or it travels and um with me because i had bleeding on the brain they couldn't give me the full dose of blood thinners so there was two weeks there was two weeks that i knew i had a blood clot in my leg my girlfriend at the time her uncle died from a blood clot in the leg because it went through his heart and killed him.

55:43So I know what I'm up against. I've got two weeks of that where they put me on half the dosage of blood thinners I should be on because my brain's bleeding. And if my blood goes too thin, I am in all sorts of trouble, you know? And through that stage, it was Guy Ritchie that sort of leaned in closer to me. And he said, me and you'll speak every day until you come through this. And he just used to chat to me at some point and the dad had my dinner. And flipping the guy had chat to me, what are you up to? And we just had a little chit chat and it was just a strange period of my life. And the weirdest thing is, it was bliss.

56:27The only way I can describe that to you is, it's out of your hands. It's like, it's imminent death or not. You can't manipulate it. You can't run from it. It's not like someone's going to turn up and beat you up and you can run out the back door. It's like you're condemned. And in feeling condemned, I just felt bliss. It's hard to explain. I was happy. I was free. Because all of a sudden, it didn't matter whether I failed. Do you know what I'm saying? Surely you understand the sort of climb of building a thing. and the pressure that you put yourself under to achieve the things you believe you're capable of achieving.

57:10All of a sudden, that was just out of the window. So I felt relaxed about the whole thing. Before we continue, you are probably not eating enough fruit and vegetables and you know it, and this is going to help. Good news, AG1 just released their next-gen formula. It is a more advanced, clinically-backed version of the product that I've been drinking every day for years. So you still get the same one scoop ritual, but now with an even more thoughtful formulation flavor and four clinical trials behind it. AG1 has been evolving since 2010, continuously improving alongside the latest research. And AG1 Next Gen is the result, clinically shown to help fill common nutrient gaps and support gut health, even in people who already eat well.

57:53In one study, it boosted healthy bacteria in the gut by 10 times. And if you're still unsure, they've got a 90 day money back guarantee. So you can buy it and try it for three months. And if you don't like it, they'll give you your money back. Right now, you can get a year's free supply of vitamin D3, K2, and five free AG1 travel packs, plus the 90-day money-back guarantee by going to the link in the description below or heading to drinkag1.com slash modernwisdom. That's drinkag1.com slash modernwisdom. What have you learned from your time with Guy Ritchie?

58:29I mean look I've done a film I spent some time with him off set and I guess what you saw witnessing is just is excellence is just somebody that I could relate to and somebody that I somebody that makes you sort of understand that success in what we deem as success we look at his brand right and we see success it's the result of years of sort of work and refinement. And when you understand that, it breaks it down because it's such a big brand that if you're not careful, you just see a giant. And then when you speak to the human being behind it, you're like, oh, you've really worked your ass off for years.

59:17So I learned that. And there's lots of other little sort of details I sort of learned, but like that was the sort of main thing that I understood. Especially given that Guy makes very British films. Yeah. That feels like a very British philosophy, very British sort of takeaway. Yeah, I guess so. The not getting too big for your boots and sort of keeping your feet on the ground. Yeah. And that's difficult. It's a double-edged sword with British culture that we like to take the piss. there is a little bit of tall poppy syndrome, and that's good for keeping people humble and for making some people driven, but it's also disincentivizing for people that want to take risk because they're worried, well, what are people going to say?

1:00:10In America, it's got a lot of problems, but they're very supportive of people being exploratory, adventurous, trying new things, aiming for the stars. We don't quite have that same a bit different positive some influence in the uk maybe because it's a smaller country we're waterlocked the weather's not as good that's just the culture i'm not sure but to think that you've got like england's christopher nolan uh and he is still focusing on the basics yeah and and still turning up every day and doing the hard thing yeah it's inspiring yeah it changes your thinking because you think you've gone to a different level and at this point you can like kick back, chill a little bit and, you know, but you sort of see someone that's probably outworking the common man that turns up and, you know, goes to work or whatever.

1:01:04Somebody that's putting in like hours into the craft. You understand that it's time to just sort of double down and go again. Also reminds you that there's problems that money and fame can't fix. challenges that money and fame doesn't overcome for sure

1:01:24given that you're in an alternate universe like you're literally a different universe from the one that you started in yeah were there things that you thought the right amount of wealth and the right amount of attention would have just oh you know that's not going to be that's going to not going to be an issue for me anymore i'm going to be that is a byproduct of my situation not of myself does that make sense yeah yeah well you you you know it's a blur right you grow up in a household that's chaos and it's falling to bits and the finances are low and the morale's low and you know it's chaotic and violent and stressful and The blinds are closed Because the bailiffs knock on every day Like It clouds what the answers are Because the answers are actually quite sophisticated But for me It's interesting I've got a song called The Ten Graph Commandments You know And I say Stage one is make it, maintain it And what I'm talking about is You know In society if you've got no money you're just gonna come unstuck just because it's the way that it's the way that things are sort of built up you're just not going to get much free time you're not going to get time to think you're not going to get time to be yourself you've got no social mobility you can't you can't go to the places you want to go and you know some people need to heal man and that's why i've tried to make songs that touch on certain topics because people sort of are out there desperately needing to heal but without the freedom that money can bring you don't get the time to address

1:03:15certain situations you know so yeah in in my calculations which I'm quite accurate by the way a lot of the time I feel like even when I'm wrong I was right and in my calculations I thought first of all I need some dumb point blank and I'll get more sophisticated when I get there you know so when I got to a place where the dust had settled and I wasn't like new money anymore and I didn't feel like I was going to go tumbling back to level one which it probably felt like that for 10 years I I started to study on a sort of deeper deeper level because these these facets Rule two is protect your energy.

1:04:02It's interesting when... You're right. It wasn't everything, but it was the first thing. It's the launch velocity that gets you off the launch pad. That initial start. And without that there's multiple costs. that you pay and you can't do much without it uh but i think assuming that that was good and got me here means that that is all i'll ever need and is what will fix the remainder of the problems in my life is where people get stuck oh yeah because you do and like look by the way that's why i say sort of be inspired because if somebody comes from a two-parent household where the parents done well and the kid was able to go to university and whatever like it don't make that person any less of a person right they're still gonna have their challenges and and you gotta sort of respect the parents for building a platform but that child has still got his own challenges moving forward he can still fall to complete pieces you know so it it applies no matter where anybody sort of starts but if you've got no um financial intelligence there's no one to teach you about money then you just think that money changes everything you just think that it's the answer to everything and it's not until you achieve them sort of financial goals or certain car certain house size or whatever that you like because you can see the trophy right it's there and then you pick it up and it's completely hollow.

1:05:38And you're like, oh no, because I thought inside that trophy was going to be the answers to all my trauma, all my pain, all my fractured and damaged relationships with family members that are dysfunctional and haven't transcended it. And I thought he was going to really, and he's like, no, no, no. What this does is gives you the freedom to do the work. and you know slightly you're telling me that this money is the entry ticket yeah into the assault course which i now have to go and do you go invest in yourself self-investment all the way through and and that's what that's what had to happen i i remember i remember i'm buying a lamborghini off the showroom right i'm say it's five six seven years ago i'm much younger and i'm brash I need rappers in London to know I'm serious.

1:06:31You guys think you're serious? Like we're not playing. So I'm big and boisterous about it. I'm filming myself on Instagram. I was one of the earlier doctors of like doing dumb shit on Instagram to like have people take notice. So I'm in the bank like, yeah, I need to put 200 ,000 down, please. So I buy this car and then I get it all blacked out. So everybody knows like it's paid for, you know, my name on the wheels and stuff. I remember like as I go to drive off the showroom I don't know what I thought was going to happen I probably thought I was going to take off and fly to Mars and like the rest was history I come off the showroom and I was like oh oh like nothing's changed not only has nothing changed now I actually understand that financial gain isn't going to change certain things like I'm still stressed out about that thing I was stressed out about this morning I'm excited because I'm driving a Lamborghini, but like that's going to fade.

1:07:30The novelty will wear off in 10 minutes and we're back to square one. And at that point, by the way, I've only really ever, in the come up of my career, I only really spent money on investments. That was an investment in the brand to show people that like, you know, I'm not just saying it. I think a lot of successful people are just sort of saying it and they're telling you how to, you know, I've been around people where all these like females that will have a BBL but they'll sell a workout plan it's not the real thing so I was trying to put my money where my mouth was and just be like look man I'm saying I'm big and boisterous and I can back it up so this was all self-investment however then I had to invest time energy and finances into sort of healing and understanding what the other great people that have existed on the planet understood.

1:08:31You know, people say, I'd rather be sad in a Lambo than sad in a Fiesta. Yeah, they're not thinking straight. I think that that's completely backward because if you're sad in the Fiesta, you still have the pipe dream that the Lambo might fix it. So in Will Smith's memoir, he says, when I was poor and miserable, I had hope. When I was rich and miserable, I was despondent. The point being that when you think the thing that was going to fix your problems is in your possession and your problems are still there, you ask yourself much deeper, much more difficult questions. And that sucks. So it's interesting, right?

1:09:09Because one night I end up sat with Jordan Peterson. He's around the table that I'm sat at. And I was able to tell him, I'm hundreds of hours into your work. You know, because I'm hundreds and hundreds of hours into psychology. Because, you know, a lot of people will go to a therapist and perhaps that works for them. But then a lot of people are trying to find somebody or something to depend on, to give them the answers. And I think that's going to null and void any process. Me, I just started doing the work and getting an understanding. I needed to break it down into sort of basic framework where I could get to the essence of what I was trying to figure out because the money didn't make it go away.

1:09:57And then the sort of key word that I figured was functionality. You know, functionality. What's that mean to you? You know, it's what we're looking for, right? So when you're saying that what Will Smith is, you know, rich and sad, well, it's because you've not focused on functionality. it should become sort of the main focus in your journey once you've got some finances like some people want a billion pounds they're not sure what they want a billion pounds for and then they get there and they get sad and some of these people commit suicide it's bad marriages, divorces it's just a mess and that's because what you've got to do is you've got to get some dough park up for a minute

1:10:44and start your march towards functionality. Because if you've come from a bit of a broken background, you're going to be dysfunctional. The people that brought you up are going to have been dysfunctional. The people you brought up around dysfunctional. So you've got traits and habits and neurological pathways that need reversing and breaking and snapping in half. And at that point, it's for you to understand this is a bigger job than getting some dough. because actually you shouldn't be greedy you should earn enough to be financially free right and once you've got to that stage you've got freedom so what you do with it is is up to you so if you want to build a business that sort of runs itself and keep some money coming in good for you because you're clever but if you're going to invest your full-time energy and everything into being more rich then you know it's the tortoise and the hare like the tortoise walks past you in the end.

1:11:39Was there something that you learned from Jordan in person that you hadn't picked up online? Was there anything you took away from your time with him? I'm like an obsessed person, right? So when I'm researching, I'm going all the way. I'm reading the books. I'm listening to the podcasts. I'm looking for the things that aren't there to be easily found, you know? So there was, there wasn't really, the conversation didn't go down that route because it's like me meeting you outside of sort of your work for me to pull you into a conversation about your work can just put a dampener on a conversation because I'm objectifying you as that guy that does that podcast instead of seeing you as a human being, right?

1:12:27So I was able to have just conversation with Jordan with the understanding of a lot of his sort of philosophy. And he's sort of one of many people that I've studied. A quick aside, you've probably heard experts like Dr. Rhonda Patrick talk about the benefits of omega-3s. They support brain reduction. They support brain reduction. They support brain function, but they reduce inflammation. They improve heart health and are backed by hundreds of studies. It's really tough to get enough through diet. No one's eating that much salmon. Come on. And with Momentus, you know you're getting the highest quality omega-3s on the market.

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1:13:53a checkout i love the idea of objectification uh i've been thinking about this a lot i sat next to tucker max no he is no so he wrote a book called i hope this of beer in hell he was a it was called fratire so it was um 10 15 years ago he was a young guy drinking and partying and fucking women and writing about his exploits it was like um american pie the book right like kind of like that it was like semi-memory stuff and he was really fantastic then he went away did a ton like five years of daily psychotherapy uh and came back a changed person much more aligned uh still very confident but much more aligned and i sat next to him at in Austin where I live now.

1:14:45And we were talking about objectification and he was saying to become successful as a man is to agree to allow the world to see you as a resource to be extracted from or a human to be objectified. So women have it in a different way. Women get objectified because of what they are, how they present, how people see them in the world. Yeah. Men get objectified because of who they are and what they can offer you. And people see you as a resource to be extracted from. And just that idea, whenever I think about male objectification, because we think about McConaughey or Brad Pitt or, you know, but I don't think that that's most objectification that happens toward men.

1:15:32I think it's somebody that has fame and you want to be in the blast radius of that. You want to be in the containment zone. Trickle down effect of somebody that has wealth and you want the opportunities or they get first access to investment deals or maybe they can give me some advice. And it's not reciprocal and it's transactional and transient and disposable. and I like the idea of sitting with somebody and not even necessarily having to talk about their work, not having to talk about the thing, but just seeing how they operate. And you can learn just as much from that as you can. Matthew McConaughey, I mentioned before we started, he's coming back on soon.

1:16:19I learned as much from watching the way that he talked about his tennis shoes. He wouldn't fucking shut up about these tennis shoes. These are the fastest tennis shoes on the market. I go straight from here to the tennis court. But just passion, commitment, charisma, kindness, open to the room. So he wasn't bothered about sitting straight. He decided to come in and he put his chair right out to the side. He sat like this. He's like, these tennis shoes? Fastest tennis shoes on the market. He's just talking to everybody that was sat there. And I just thought, so fucking cool. Nothing about how you do a movie.

1:16:51Nothing about how you act. And he's there and he's got nothing in his mouth. he's like the way he does like does this so cool but yeah to become to be successful as a man is to agree to be a resource to be extracted from or a human to be objectified yeah and it's it's a that's a difficult position to to existing especially if you're street smart you know they say the terminology you can't kid a kidder and people are trying to warm you up and you know they've got a goal in mind of what they're going to extract from you and what you're supposed to be is you're supposed to be blind to the fact that that's what they're doing and if you're not And if you do come from a situation where you're street smart or sharp, you see it coming every single time.

1:17:55And it's problematic because it changes your relationship to people. Much more skeptical. Yeah, well, just, I mean, you don't have to be, you can withdraw a little bit, right? And yeah, actually much more skeptical because exposure means that everybody can, people can sort of see, people can see you more, you're more, but actually you can see them more. And that's what they don't take into consideration. They're forgetting the fact that you're experiencing, if they're not creative, six people just used your same approach today. Right? And you're supposed to act like you can't see what they're doing.

1:18:38Okay, we're going through this again. That must be, you know, to fly the flag for the other side. I imagine that's what it's like to be a really attractive woman. I always thought this.

1:18:52Hot girls on the internet complain that they struggle to get guys to treat them well, treat them normally. And I think that's because there's this weird reality distortion field. I'm going to try your drink get this in come on if you're lagging let me see what's happening no I'm not lagging I don't normally do I don't normally do caffeine okay well just a little just a little I'm just I'm very interested to see what it tastes like alright okay first sip review

1:19:22I mean yeah it's nice good and I'm not just saying it because you sat across the table thank you yeah well and that and that fuel your focus so I'm going to get more focus now a little bit could I potentially change here as the yeah well if we start seeing you levitate we'll know you've had too much oh is that what that is what happened yeah yeah vocabulary could increase and things like that well if you start rapping we'll know that it's um but yeah that must be what it's like to be a uh to be an attractive woman your value to the world is immediately available for everybody to see and you have how are you able to discern whether or not this person who's talking to you and seems nice and seems like they've got your best interests at heart what do they really want what do they really want from you so i guess on the same vein as that have you found that fame has brought more freedom or more cages in that way you know what i don't take it too seriously you know because i'm independent you know i so the actual term fame i just don't take it too serious i'm just i'm just who i am and i'm exposed sometimes i lean into it and do a bit more um and sometimes i take a step back and relax and um i guess i've i've i've been sort of magnetic since i was a kid i've always attracted a lot of attention for no particular reason it's like my spirit or something just people gravitate towards me and it's been like that since i was young so it's always been the same process so getting famous was just the accelerated version of that like I'm like used to it do you know I mean so interesting yeah yeah that's just the way it's sort of been and I think when I see people that take fame too seriously you know I just know that they're gonna come unstuck it's like you're gonna come unstuck because you're taking a thing serious that doesn't take you serious fame doesn't take anyone serious man it's just not it's just not gonna like because there's time and there's changes in trends and there's you know so one minute you're famous and you're popping and you've done that last thing and now people are treating you like this and then the thing you've just done everybody hates and now people are treating you like that you know that's gonna it's just gonna run run riot with your mindset if that's something that you identify with being a famous person.

1:21:54So I always sort of say, I'm not a celebrity, but that's because that's how I'm framing it to myself. I think if I sort of walked around thinking I'm a celebrity and X, Y, and Z, if I walk in a room and nobody has a clue who I am, which happens a lot, because you're in different places in the world and whatever, then you're going to be like, you know, yeah, like your identity has been messed with, you know, but if you can, derive a sense of identity from from who you actually are you got to get in tune with your spirit you know and and when you start to sort of get in tune with your spirit then no matter what changes around you the environment the surroundings you you know what you are you know where you stand you know so me coming to do this podcast today I told you before I was I'm nervous but it's because I know that it's different, you know, it's a different situation.

1:22:52However, I also understand that I deserve to be here as much as a guy that might be 54 and has way more experience than me, has way more accolades than me, you know, there comes a point where you start to understand that like you're enough and it's like a shame because society doesn't encourage that thinking, you know so when i i bump into a fan and he's like bro like you're my idol or i'm trying to be like you he's like no no you're you're trying to be like you and that's what you should be trying to do be the best version of you because for all you know the best version of you is better than me well where are the best that you can hope for if you're trying to be somebody else is being the second best in the world at something no one's going to beat you at being you exactly exactly the you can hope for is to be the second best Bugsy Malone.

1:23:47Yeah. Yeah. No one can beat you at your personal set of skills. So before when you were saying, you know, you're a single child and you start to talk about the components that sort of make you as a whole in terms of psychologically and physiologically, these are all of your specialities, man. You know, and that's how I sort of feel. I feel like you bolt on discipline. to all of your quirks you know i'm sure i'm on some end of the spectrum i'm sure i've got adhd you know i'm sure i've got a load of these labels right but if you if you bolt on discipline to that and you get the mind under control then all of a sudden the hyper focus in adhd just becomes a superpower you know and so so that's that's my thinking and i think that like when i see people that become like they feel helpless because i think society encourages that helplessness because then you're dependent on a drug or a certain chocolate bar or whatever it is they can sell you um you know i think you're in trouble when you become dependent and you don't understand that like actually like um i'm i'm enough i mean i can be whoever i want i looked at this really interesting study about bariatric surgery and gastric bands.

1:25:09So less popular now that Ozempic exists because we've got a pharmacological replacement. But when people who are overweight and want to stop eating so much, they get a gastric band fitted. Now there is an increased suicide risk after people have the surgery. Why? It's a very serious surgery. A lot of the time there can be complications. It's a big open wound that can get infected. There can be general complications people can uh struggle with just the pain and the recovery but the big underlying psychological reason typically is in the past people had an issue that they were coping with through food they now no longer have the ability to eat the food and the issue persists yeah so the coping mechanism has been taken away from them yeah and the problem that they were coping with has not so their ability to sedate themselves with food to hide from whatever that challenge was has gone away and the problem's still there so again functionality that's a dysfunction and you really got to be ironing them out and by the way i'm saying this from a position of being the most dysfunctional man on the planet you know i'm saying like there's this there's times in my life where I'm sure it was psychosis these times where it's been depression flipping like I've gone through in my songs you hear me talk about borderline personality disorder and that's because I'm googling away and I'm looking at all of the you know explanations got that yeah it's that I'm experiencing that I'm experiencing you know and if you're not careful and you start taking them labels seriously you you know we we've all got everything to some different extent but what are you going to do?

1:26:58Are you going to accept the fact, you know, there's a point where you just have to stop accepting the fact that you lose control of your emotions. Get it under control. Build discipline, like these ways, you know, and that's what I sort of had to study and figure out and actually when you actually break it down, it's all the basics. It's doing the fundamentals well. and she started doing the fundamentals well things just sort of drop into play you just have to do that on repeat really what are the fundamentals to you i think diet is a big one um gut health again you hear people talking about it problem is with people talking about things like that is then people turn up to capitalize on it being a popular category and people want to sell crap i was going to make not to deviate i'll get back to in a second my fundamentals but like I was going to make a protein brand with a guy.

1:28:01And what I sort of figured out is he wanted to make like a prime type drink. What I was interested in is making something more beneficial in terms of people's health. Just because when you've got a job that involves exposure, when you say to someone buy this thing they're trusting that you've done the research and this is going to help their life right so at that point i feel guilty if i'm selling somebody something that's not helpful so i had to pull out on the business venture anyway so one of them is diet it's a big deal training um it's not it's more than mind exercising the mind you know and the body I just think that like as we all know it's one of the biggest deals expanding your understanding I think if you're naive to history and like what's gone on in the world before you was here and you're just existing in this day and age blind and not knowing the like the patterns of history the cycles sorry, you know, things reoccur.

1:29:23So yeah, in that respect, study. You really got to study. And when I say protect your energy, again, I don't think everybody's got the best intention for you. You should probably understand that. You should probably try and pick people with the correct sort of morals and integrity and sometimes it's that people don't have control of themselves do you know what i mean they're they're they give in to their impulses it's a a challenge as well successful guy attractive woman successful woman attractive guy um you warp reality around you and it makes it harder for people to treat you normally even if they're trying i see this with uh joe rogan in austin um he has this comedy club super popular and sometimes after the show um they'll kick everybody out and then all of the comedians and their friends will go to the bar downstairs mitzi's and there is it's almost like someone flicks a switch and a frequency comes on that changes the whole room's behavior i get if he walks in or if he leaves right because it's this very specific niche where somebody just changes the dynamic and the people that know him well and are his friends typically don't change that much this frequency only affects the people who don't yet know him and they're like i'm trying to be normal it's like a really any guy trying to talk to an unbelievably hot girl like but like she's so hot just stop thinking that she's so hot why can't you just say something like you're in your own head about it.

1:31:09And it's kind of the same in that regard. And that was my point, I think, around fame, bringing more freedom or being more of a cage, that it makes you an object to be looked at. It gives people difficulty in treating you in the way that they might even want to. And then you've got to work out, is this person honest and awkward or contrived and conniving uh are they trying to get something and extract something from me these and the um you mentioned before about shame i think the shame of dealing with a problem which only comes as a byproduct of now privilege is a real challenge because who's going to give you sympathy for that no oh i'm so sorry that your fame is causing the amount of attention where you need to discern between people who are simply nervous, conniving, and actually good friends.

1:32:06Like what a challenge. I'm so sorry that you need to deal with that. And that causes you shame because you think, I shouldn't feel discomfort at this problem because there are much bigger problems. And I have had much bigger problems in the past. What would previously think of me thinking of this is a problem you go well as you move up through the grades of whatever art you're trying to do the challenges become more refined and this is a more refined challenge yeah yeah yeah it's nuanced it's not simple no more and that's why you you've got to learn to rely on your you got to learn to rely on yourself man and and really you know i'm somebody that believes in god and i've recently understood that it's not my own strength that I'm relying on you know it's the the strength of and whether you call people some people understand God as the universe but it's source that um that source of of like love right and I've I've found myself reliant on that as opposed to my own I thought I was this cool guy that was strong but depending on where your belief systems are you sort of understand there's something more going on here and I found that I've been taking strength from the source if that makes sense and when he was just talking then I was thinking I'm making a fragrance right I'm doing my second fragrance I've got it on I've got the first one fortitude fortitude means strength and that with the second one i've called it intention i love that one so when you talk when you're talking about before the people the way people change around joe rogan or you know you're talking to a hot girl you know i remember when you know my career exposes me to types of people i've not been exposed to before not the type of people that walking around the estates I was walking around and it's your intention that defines the way you're going to treat them people because if you're talking to a hot woman your intention is to try and get her in bed by the end of the night obviously you're going to be stuttering your words you're trying to negotiate a pretty serious deal you know what I'm saying who's to say you're enough or she's interesting or She's interested or, you know, if your intention is just the same as having a conversation with the next person at the bar, you know, then all of a sudden it's a more natural interaction because at the end of the day, she's going to like you or not.

1:34:52And you're, you know, you're saying she's a hot woman, you're going to like her or not. But I think if you become a man in a certain position and you don't feel like you don't have options, so to speak, then you're going to look into who she actually is. Because a lot of hot women aren't what they look like. It looks like a great... Pretty on the outside. Yeah, it looks like a great person that can bring great things into a person's life. and I think some of them may neglect their other attributes you know and it's dangerous it's for anybody who has an outsized capacity anywhere because yeah yeah it Paul Graham's got this wonderful quote where he says a lot of people look at those who are successful jerks and assume the reason they're successful is because they're a jerk but that's not true the reason they're a jerk The reason that they are a jerk is because their success allows them to get away with it.

1:35:54Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's the same as not being a very nice person or somebody that's rich and an asshole. Or a girl who's hot and has no loyalty or isn't very kind. Their richness or their hotness is what permits them to get away with it. That's not why they have achieved the things they've achieved. Well, it's like being a boxer that's got a big punch, right? Very powerful. And he leans on that attribute. and he wins the area title. And if he's lucky, he gets the European title. But to be a world champion and to compete at world level, like you need to have rounded off your skillset. It's as simple as that.

1:36:32So, you know, I meet a really pretty girl and she's relied on that up until this point that I'm speaking to her. It's just so uninteresting because it smells of that. That's what it is, you know, where, and like you say, you become successful, you get some money and or fame or whatever it is if you've sort of leaned on that and just you're identified with that and that's who you are now and you've not gone and studied and you've not tried to heal and you've not tried to it just becomes a very unimpressive interaction you know i'm not interesting i'm not regulated i'm not kind i'm not self-aware yeah i'm not giving uh you mentioned that story of the guys who tried to rob your house oh yeah we talk about that if you like i do want to yes what happened i mean look there was

1:37:31there were some um like teenagers i've just moved into this house i made a big thing online i'm getting a new house because this is the game right this is the rap game you're gonna get to a place where you're doing well and people want to know if it's true or not did you have you really transcended the bottom is that really possible because that it's like in the batman film right and there's that that prison and to get out the prison you've got to escape and and jump out of the hole at the top and that's crabs in a bucket we're all looking at the top of the bucket thinking can we get out of there and once you're in the process it's interesting really because you gotta fake it till you make it right so you're sort of demonstrating that like here's where i'm at you know some people are less honest about it i was trying to be sort of accurate so like it's like i've bought this house and i've not really built up the walls on the outside or there's no blinds up at the time and there's like a group of like teenagers up on the wall and they're shouting me boxy boxy boxy and i'm flipping thinking whatever and then my hair my girlfriend at the time gets out of the shower and he's walking through the house naked and they're looking in through the window she's like the kids outside have seen me naked right and i'm like yeah just give them time to go because i'm thinking i've not moved here to then start like going out and just even chatting to the kids do you know i mean like i'm gonna try not to get too involved at where i live right so time goes by and time goes by and then eventually they just come a situation where i'd sort of left the house i thought the coast was clear left the house on this particular day i was trying to get my little sister to make friends with my mom and so we're doing a bit of domestic healing or whatever you call it and um i go and collect my little sister i've not seen her in it a long time and i'm going to take her to town first on the way to town and at this point now the kids are trying to like terrorize the house so my ex-girlfriend phones me up on the wall again and and it's all going on so then i drive back to the park and the house and the park I pull up and I see the kids and they see the car and they just want to see it's me I get the situation I get I'm a famous guy I live in the area so then as I like pull up they start to jog off through the park looking and whoever they must have been in the area, their brothers and family were tough guys and they've come back and broke into the house, broke onto the land, smashed the windows, tell him when he gets back he's dead.

1:40:31So that was the situation. I'm with my little sister in the car and we had to fly home. I drove home nervous because you don't like you're just in a situation where you're not sure and by the way there was a few little things happening around the house of like it was a big house and you don't understand the ramifications of living in a big house but it attracts a lot of attention you know and that to be honest has put me off like them kinds of luxuries because people see you as something different so now i'm like doing a lot of traveling and opening my mind and being in places with just a backpack you know to go back to basics anyway so the yeah so the they um i went back i was nervous you're driving back to deal with this issue i'm flying back flying back my mom's on the phone to the police in the background when my ex-girlfriend screaming on the phone and my heart's just beating I'm just like oh my days because you don't I'm saying to my ex-girlfriend did he have balaclavas on did he have gloves on do they have weapons she's I don't know and anyway and they're breaking in right and um yeah I sort of I sort of pull up and you're straight into the chaos of the situation and I think luckily at that point again I've just kept up boxing for so long that as I was getting into these interactions with these guys I was able to gauge distance enough to make one move and then threat nullified what's happening next do you understand what I'm saying and and and and that was that I mean these deeper detail I don't I don't know how much I should go into but they sort of barricaded the road off it's like a country road that takes you to the house and me and my sister are in the car it's been the first altercation we get into the car we're driving down this country road it's barricaded off with big boulders like that so i know there's an ambush coming so i look in the bush and there's a big guy with a brick so i put my sister's head down like that and really what he should have done is he should have just thrown that brick straight through the car created panic and attacked me but what he'd done is he tried to play mr intimidating and tried to um have me a fight with this brick but what he doesn't understand is what i understood is you have to jab me with that brick because if you start swinging it at me it's going to end up knocked out of your hand it's the nature of a heavy you know weapon of whatever description so he stood there I put my hands up in the air and psychology says that if I say to you what t-shirt is that again?

1:43:21exactly your brain starts to answer the question like your nervous system starts to answer the question before you get a chance to think so I jump out of the car and I've gone no way is it you is that a blue t-shirt? fuck off you and I'm asking him these questions and you can see his brain doing but I'm closing the distance and I'm sparring every day and I know how close I need to get and he won't think I can touch him but I can and I'm getting closer and closer and he's not getting the time to get his feet in place to swing the brick properly and when by the time he realises I'm close enough and he tries to do something with the brick I've managed to hit him and it just it just skimmed him and he spun around and dropped the brick so then it all goes to court obviously he doesn't try and press charges because me and him had a decent fight you know to be fair to him we had a decent fight but i won the fight and um and then i'd get in the car i moved the bricks boulders i get back to my house and that's the video that surfaces online of me flying down the drive i've taken your top off well the reason i'm taking my top off is because a van then comes screeching onto the path of their backup up so now there's a van full of guys to come and back them guys up so I'm taking my top off because I'm going now to get back involved again and honestly like when I when I turned up for the second time like I just turned up and was just shouting my head off like a lunatic frothing at the mouth and I was just like what I was explaining to them is like you're at you're at my family home my mum's in there you know you guys have turned up to beat me up I've turned up i've turned up here to die for my family this is two different situations you know and you think i'm like a celebrity i really come from the dark you know and you look like a bit of a plumber you look like you go to the pub on a weekend it's like you don't like that you're at my family home i ain't got nowhere to run and it weren't as articulate as that by the way but you know that was shouting and screaming i was shouting my head off yeah because you know i didn't want to hurt anybody else and it was getting out of hand you know because boxing allowed me to be able to deal with it clean cut but if I didn't have boxing then I'd have got into a fight with the first guy thrown onto the floor and maybe beaten up outside my own house you know so boxing was able to get me through the situation that was that there was a after the situation then they tried to phone the police you know and there was so there was a court case and um there was this moment in court at this point the court case was a couple of years later and at this point I broke up with my ex-girlfriend and she had to come and give evidence which was this mad situation for me and there was just this point where I had to speak to the jurors you know that are going to judge or this like a panel of people that are going to judge and you know what I'd done I just I just told him who I was because I understand that people look at a guy that looks like a tough street guy and oh he's a rapper and all these sort of stereotypes go with these people look at things in categories right because sometimes people are too lazy to understand that everyone's just an individual so I just spoke to him on a really human level and explained who I am and what my intention was going into that situation.

1:46:58And that was simply to protect my family. And I could have lost my temper and I could have took that over the top. But I feel like I dealt with every situation perfectly. There's many a man that would have pulled out a weapon and it would have been a different story in the news. But I risked it. I risked having a fair fight. And luckily by the skin of my teeth, well, maybe not the skin of my teeth, but I come out on top, you know, and I feel as if I was blessed because I was put, my back was up against the wall, you know, so I got not guilty. Do you know what I've never really spoke about with this, yeah?

1:47:36I'm sat in the room with my lawyers and that, and they're like, right, today's the verdict, you're either going to get guilty. Bro, if I get guilty, as a kid, I was a persistent young offender. I was in lots of trouble all the time. that was something I had to overcome and get out of the habit of being so I'm thinking for the criminal record I had when I was young if I get a guilty here this is looking like jail it felt like you were back there

1:48:08man what did it feel like because it's all over social media and the paparazzi are coming to my hotel I'm not signed to a record label I'm independent so for the newspapers to be turning up. When I fell off my bike, it's in the newspapers. When I got engaged, it's in the newspapers. It's sort of unheard of. I'm independent. I'm not a record labels cash cow, right? So you're going in past paparazzi every day. It was just a bizarre experience. And on the day when he's like, today you get the guilty or not guilty, my heart's beating, shit in my pants a little bit. And he's like, we've got a prepared statement for if you get not guilty.

1:48:47I said that's the one I'm interested in because now I'm doing the law of attraction in my head I'm like there's no way I'm getting a guilty today right he reads it to me I said okay it's COVID we're just coming out of we're sort of in COVID I'm doing a tour tour tickets aren't selling because people aren't sure whether to put the money into concerts because they might get pulled inside yeah do you remember that stage so I'm putting a concert on in the most controversial stage right I said at the bottom of that statement, just write that Bugsy is going to go away now and concentrate on the ticket sales of his UK tour.

1:49:26You used your statement as an ad read for the tour. Listen, it's turning a negative into a positive. Right. And in my heart, I believed I was righteous. What the judge was going to believe on the day is, you know, who knows sort of thing. But they did. They judged me fairly. and I got this not guilty and then and then I was on the stairs stood there in this pinstripe suit that I got made after John got his suit when he um got off his court cases I quite liked it it was tailored well I'm like stood there and I remembered oh yeah we've got all the news in front of us and he goes and and Bugsy's gonna go away now to concentrate on the sales of his UK tour and bro the tickets just sold out so I'd fell off my bike I'd come back from the bike accident I had this big court case from these guys that smashed my house up and I ended up selling out this tour, you know?

1:50:21So it was a triumphant, it was a triumphant moment. It was a negative into a positive, you know? The number of guys who hear stories like that, some dudes break into the grounds of my house and I would have had the top off and I would have had it and that would have been me i think it says an awful lot about what someone does when their backs up against the wall like that because we were talking before about velvet prison silk pajamas uh i have a i have a friend who went through a rough time a few years ago and uh he was explaining to me he said uh all my life i thought i was a coward so that i spend my time around hard men you know i like uh i like fighting i like um being around operators special forces people but all my life i was worried that i was a coward that i'd never fully tested myself i'd been tested i'd done hard things i'd chased after stuff it was always kind of on my terms yeah it was always i was electing to step into whatever the challenge was yeah yeah yeah and I wondered he used this line so fucking brilliant he said I wondered when my better self was going to stop clearing his throat in the room next door he said he could just hear him coughing next door like his his better self his best self and then he went through a really really rough situation he's like okay I'm gonna work out whether or not he's gonna stop clearing his throat or he's gonna kick the door down and come in and sure enough he kicked the door down and he was there i just love that idea and uh i i wonder how many people never get the blessing of being tested folly no here's the thing i think we do get the blessing of being tested but i think the test starts small and i think if you fail on the small tests you don't even get to the big tests if the small tests make you depressed make you think oh it's not working and make you give up on your dreams and you sort of become a victim it's harder for me it's easy for them and you just end up sort of stagnant then you don't get to the bigger tests i think the bigger test came for me in life because the little tests i was i was plowing through them you know so it's like a boxer in his career or a jujitsu practitioner you know he's he's building up building up he gets his blue belt and then he gets to brown he gets to a black belt it's the it's that you get to the black belt of challenges and that's the interesting challenge because they're the they're the ones that are like make or break you know and that's when the opponents get harder oh that's when the opponents are also world level you know because you do like once you've once you've overcome certain challenges you start to think i'm getting pretty good at this like i don't think life can beat me up you know and then bike accident court case pandemic no ticket sales you know selling albums Yeah, yeah.

1:53:29Like real, real, you know, you wake up on the floor in a puddle of blood. It's like there's the moment, but there's the transcend in the moment. There's the fight. You've got a 12-round fight ahead of you. And the people don't talk about the details of that. They'll see someone like me on a screen. They'll be like, oh, he's bounced back well. It's like, no, that was every single day for months and months and months. And do you want to know what the main fight? what I find is is the ability to believe in yourself and the bigger picture every single day you can't you can't take your eye off it I think the moment you sort of took your eye off it it's like the momentum the momentum slows if you know you're in a car crash and you break your legs or whatever it is and you think I'll never be that person I said I was going to be now it's like the momentum starts like slowing and slowing and slowing.

1:54:24And before you know, it's that standstill. And you've got to start all over again. So the seven years you've just been climbing for to get to that level of momentum can go. So when I fell off my bike, that's what I was fighting against. It's like every day when I woke up, I used to crack a joke every day when I woke up. I was like, oh, I'm achy-breaking. I make a big laugh first thing in the morning because I thought it's not changing my morale. It's not putting me in a bad mood, you know? And I just kept... So that's the first trick that I use is laughter. I'll make a joke out of whatever bad is going on.

1:54:55And it has to be a funny joke, by the way. It can't be a shit joke because it won't work. And then once you've done that, then it's having in your mind who you are and where it's all going to go. And again, the new fragrance, intention, these are all the things I'm talking about with intention. You have to have the intention of becoming your higher self or I don't think it will happen.

1:55:21when it comes to finding inspiration for your art form for rapping i've heard you say for me to find inspiration i have to live some life and almost forget about writing lyrics one of my favorite lines around this is in order for art to imitate life you have to live a life that uh comedians that spend a lot of time on the road all of their jokes are about airports, hotels, and dinner. Okay, okay, okay. I'm interested when it comes to creativity and the well that you're able to draw from.

1:55:58How you still try and give yourself enough silence and enough slowness in a very chaotic life with lots of opportunities and the fragrance and the clothing and the shoes and the tour and the shows and attention. how do you continue to create something that is honest and resonates when there is so many distractions and potential avenues that you could go down um i mean it's a good question and i think it's a case of the pursuit of excellence there comes a point where you have to forget about money and financial gain there comes a point where you have to forget about accolades and fans and you know screaming supporters and you have to really figure out what you're doing it for and if you're an artist you better be in it to to make the best work that you can make because essentially this is what I'm going to be judged by um when it's all said and done if my if my life is a book when um it might have been Kevin Hart that I heard say that your life's like a book what's your book going to be like if my life's like a book in the end of it what's that how's it actually going to look and if I've not dug deep to do my best work then I don't know how happy I'd be with myself and in terms of the well that you talk about um I've just figured that you have to absorb in order to radiate so for me to for me to create on the next level I have to I have to go away and absorb I have to watch lots of films I have to study whatever it is I'm interested in studying at that time live lots of life you know I have to just absorb and forget about being creative and then all of a sudden a switch will just flick one day and you go back into creative mode and you've got all of these sort of inspirations and, you know, influences that have been filtered through your outlook on the world, you know, and then you're able to, you know, I'm a storyteller and that's what's mad because I'm not, I'm not a rapper, I'm an artist.

1:58:26Rap music has been my way up. It's one medium. It's one medium. and at this point in my career I'm interested in a more credible job description one that uses my full array of skills so people look at my the brand that I've built and my business and I can tell that they can't really wrap their mind around what they're looking at because who is this? yeah what is this? yeah I'm a very diverse person that's just the way it's become I've been through lots of different things I've been through lots of hardship lots of trauma lots of abuse you know I've witnessed areas of life that you only read about in the newspaper and that's been my reality and and then on the flip side of the coin I've had the discipline to be a legitimate person to run a business to you know so you become a really sort of diverse package in one and it's hard for not even just people but for you to understand like what category is it that I sort of sit in here and you have to...

1:59:32That makes people nervous. Not being able to easily categorize someone makes a lot of people nervous. It's the reason that we have archetypes when there's movies, right? The hero has big shoulders and the villain wears black and the maiden has big eyes and the nerd wears glasses because that's a shortcut. I can work out who this is. I don't need to do as much thinking and I can box that up and you don't need to do as much exposition i need to ask myself it's not as effortful cognitive shortcut and we in many ways love people who have depth and are interesting and unique but on the flip side it's very effortful it's very effortful thing to okay so it's it's rap but it's art but it's got this sort of self-reflective thing and it's growth but then it's film and then it's like this oh impossible impossible to understand at this stage in the in the trajectory impossible you know it's one of them things that consolidates as time goes by but actually i think it i think i think it's new and what i am is new i think people that come from the place where I've come from don't necessarily survive the initial stages of being famous coming into lots of money I think it plateaus you know and a lot of rappers they get shut they don't even get through the stage of being a rapper they don't even get to diversifying and because they're too busy with having them same vices that they had in their old life that worked in their old life.

2:01:13It's like you can't come into the light and have bad vices. It's going to cause you problems. You need to do the work before you get there. You've got to do the work. You know, look at, this is something when doing the research, which involved listening to a lot of freestyle from you, which is good. That first Fire in the Boot that you did with Charlie Sloth over 10 years ago now. Yeah, yeah. Just. did you realize at the time this is a moment this is a real the door has just been opened a little crack and I can wedge myself in was that did you sort of feel the gravity of the potential opportunity on the other side of that I mean look so so I've been writing this book like I say and I talk about this sort of moment and it was a stage where I'd been making music for five years but in making the music I was trying to make something that was palatable for a record label to sell so I was trying to make something that I deemed as generic and universally commercially yeah so I was softening my stories right and then there just come a point where I'm like I'm exposing myself like with no reward you know I've just done five mixtapes and I've invested in them all and no one's listening I put it on YouTube and a tumbleweed goes by and I'm just like there just come a point where I thought I have to throw caution to the wind and I remember in the book what I talk about is the turning point and the turning point was my mum had been evicted from very new road that I talk about in the fire in the booth she was living in a little um flat a one-bedroom flat with her ex partner it was going wrong and she was stick thin my mum was about five stone and on the verge of death and I was having these reoccurring nightmares that either my mum or her boyfriend hit one another with an ashtray I just just have this nightmare and sometimes my mum would get hit and sometimes she'd hit him and someone would die because the arguments between them was getting that bad and I'm driving around in this blue Audi A3 that I loved and I'm a bit of a street guy.

2:03:36I'm in the mix and I'm making music and I've got this dream in my head. I'm going to be a millionaire. I'm going to be a multi-millionaire because that'll fix everything. I'll be able to pay for my mum's problems to go away. And I remember seeing my mum and I was sat in her house and it was a bit like this. It was derelict. There was no carpet on the floors. And this was my mum's like reality. And I remember taking her out for a little bit of food and her boyfriend had let himself back into the house and locked her out and when we came back she was locked out and he'd rang the police and when I understood that the police was coming I've gone and sat back into the yard there because I was a bit of a street guy at the time don't judge me and as I'm sat there the police come they pick my mum up and slam her into the floor and as I sat and watched that

2:04:35It was a I've never felt so helpless because what am I going to do now? I'm going to jump out and what? Start beating up police, man. You just sort of sat there. She's on the floor getting wrestled and her arms twisted up her back like she's a football hooligan. And then I had a little pit bull at the time, Kruger, he was called. He jumps over the fence and he runs over. And he's capable, you know, because he grew up with me through my troublesome days. He's very capable. However, his relationship with my mum was different to his with me. I was like one of the boys. My mum was like an authority figure with him.

2:05:15So he like licks her face and she's like, it's okay. At this point, I've got my hand on the door ready to open the door because if that dog starts attacking police, it's going to be a mess and I'm going to be the only one that can fix it. And the police were able to usher him. I brought him up well. The police was able to usher him back into the garden. My mum gets wrestled into the back of the police fan i go home from that situation yeah shaking and i'm and then that's when i wrote a freestyle on a platform called jdz jdz media spitfire and it was the first time that i just threw caution to the wind and i was like you know what like yo fuck these songs that like i'm trying to be a nice guy i'm seeing like ed sheeran on the television and i'm like how do I act like I'm employable like him but it's like I'm not you know when I'm when I'm flipping nine ten eleven years old I know of when a man was murdered in my uncle's house I used to stay over at my uncle was holding his head together until the ambulance got there shot in his face these are my realities I mean you know and it's hard to sort of get your mind around you know what I'm saying so I was I was I was attempting to try and be something that I wasn't and in this liberating moment of fuck it because I even need to I even need to start taking making money more more seriously because my mum's gonna die in this mess I can tell that's what's gonna happen I used to wake up in these cold sweats my mum would die in these mad nightmares and my ex-girlfriend was like what's up and I'll be sweating I never used I didn't have the courage to tell her my mum's died in my dream again you know because I knew the violence was getting worse I've seen my mum got her nose broken a big gash in her arm she needed stitches down her arm because he'd threw her for a table you know it things like that are hard to wrap your mind around without going and overreacting that's another thing I'm proud of myself for because my stepdad actually died about a year ago and they've called the lawyers have called me to give me some money that his mum has tried to leave for me and I was like I can't I feel like I can't accept it because I didn't see her in the later stages of my life I didn't make the effort as a teenager that thought he was a bad boy to go and see her I sort of forgot the fact that she's shown me so much love or whatever anyway so you know he died and I was just proud of myself that like I didn't take it over the top I was a boxer I had a reputation on the streets and he was he broke my mum's nose and I didn't I didn't try and take retribution my strategy was to succeed I'm gonna succeed and I'm gonna change this situation you know so I drove home that night I'd done that JDZ media and I just exposed the truth I'm like here's where I am actually and actually I can't be bothered smiling because my head's fucked you know and I just sort of let it fly and that was the first video anyone give a shit about is that your Audi A3 behind with the door open exactly yeah Yes.

2:08:23Yeah, yeah. I know it. So that's that. And then off the back of that, that started to do numbers. And then a manager from London messaged me. I think he used to manage Ed Sheeran in the early days. He's like, come over to London. I went over to London. He's like, by the way, we'd have to change your accent. Like, you can't let people know you're from Manchester. Right? So I'm like bamboozled, you know? And he had this really sort of snobby thing going on where he's like, mate you're just some guy from manchester you want to get in the music industry kind of not going to happen and he was treating me in that way and i thought i'm not used to authority i'm in jail when i'm a 16 year old kid so he's like the way he's treating me is not going to work so when the freestyle i remember posting the the freestyle and i was like tell that guy that used to manage me it's been boisterous um that i'm from manchester and i'm coming to put money on the map and that that's where it sort of come from was the attitude in london towards someone that's from Manchester and I knew that attitude wasn't personal to me as an individual it was like you're from out of town and I thought I'm going to break that door down so that at that point sort of became my challenge so then in the freestyle after that I'm like tell you know because Stormzy was signed to a label and he was doing good things and x y and z and I'm like tell Charlie Sloth it's not just Stormzy that can get a reload it's not just and I'm just like letting him know like I'm I'm like a silverback gorilla just like crawling towards the fucking booth like let me in if I can get that opportunity and actually that was the nature of the um the clash between me and chipmunk was he he'd done the fire in the booth before me or a couple before me and I was so passionate about this um platform and the opportunity that that was to me that in his one he was at a different stage in his career to me he'd made it he was like a star right I was growing up watching him quite liked his music right and but he sort of got to a stage where he must have been a bit like a lost stage in his career so he was like doing he had points to put across so he's doing a lot of talking in the fire in the booth which i've seen as boring you understand like if he would have gone in and just spat his lyrics he's a talented lyricist i would have just liked it but in him talking and all that i thought you you've lost that thing you forgot that it's still an opportunity firing a booth i'd kill for that opportunity I can't even get it so by the time I got the opportunity I was saying you know fuck chipmunk and his A's and B's I didn't think I'm gonna have a clash with him that's just me thinking when I was in a position to get my A's and B's and I went to school with people that got A's and B's I was sat in jail you know my family are addicts you know I don't know what's gonna happen to my mom in the end and you know I'm sat in solitary confinement as a 16 year old kid and so there was probably a resentment to people that got the GCSEs because I didn't get to there was no way it was going to happen for me yeah there was just no way I was could have made it happen I couldn't make it happen you know so I was I was just it was a it was an observation that that like fucking got out of control right but I knew going into that fire in the booth that like this has to be the turning point for me if I don't kick this door off now then I have to take my other life more seriously and it just wasn't gonna end well you know so that you know that was that i went in there and i let my soul bleed out into the microphone man that the freak the frequency of authenticity and i was nervous in life i was worried i was scared i was angry i was I was pissed off.

2:12:04I was six years into making music that no one cared about. Like, you know, I was starving. And I'd looked at the guys that had done their best firing the booze. And it's weird because this was the moment that, like, the law of attraction really kicked in. Because you think you're doing the law of attraction, right? But it's not until necessity kicks in that you'll pull it off and your sort of vibration comes up. So because it was a real big moment, when I'm looking at you know rappers like Nines rappers like flipping Kate Coke and these sort of pioneers in London that got big numbers on the fire in the booth I was telling myself I'm gonna outdo these guys in fact I'm gonna have the most viewed fire in the booth of all time it's just little dreams that you've got in your own head but that's what that's what happened because of how much I needed it and how much I wanted it you know so that was that that gave me a start and and yeah here we are 35 million views on just that one video later no no i mean so look if we're looking at british rap music it's young um but i think things like my career take things forward i think there's a whole generation of kids that see can see a documented journey of me going from the minors to having things in life and being able to pay my mum's bills.

2:13:34I don't have a relationship with my family, but I'm able to look after certain people regardless. Is there a verse or a lyric of yours that still gives you goosebumps when you say it live?

2:13:48Yeah, there's lots of those.

2:13:52I think when I'd done the tour in Manchester, I saw that the arena had not been done before in the rap space. and I think I made friends with my mum at the time and brought her over to the situation the tour, sorry and yeah, in MEM3 where I'm saying that I told the nurse that there's no way I'm dying on this bed fuck that and it was a moment where when the blood clot had started going through my heart I went to get a nurse on my crutches. She was very blase about the whole thing because it's just their job, right? Like, people are dying all the time. And I'm like, no, no, no, nurse. Like, I'm...

2:14:37Do you know what I mean? And she was just looking at me as if to say, like, this is what it's like. And I'm like, no, like, I need the doctor. I'm going to need, like, you know. And, yeah, that moment happened. So on tour, yeah, there was a few goosebumps moments. There was a few little goosebumps moments, yeah. is rap beef genuine how much of it is just marketing in disguise yeah i think what was happening at the time yeah is that i was i was coming from being a street guy into an industry that i don't understand and i'm just trying to bulldoze my way through it's like i need some dough i need some attention i need yeah because i need my career to take off i need these songs i feel like my story's like worth listening to i feel like the music i'm making is interesting especially compared to what's going on and so I was trying to just bulldoze my way through and and in doing so I was just being I was just being clumsy and not caring if it was what it was right and so then when I remember when chipmunk dissed me back I was like um I was a happier body and in a sense I was like like I remember being at my mum's house actually and I was like, Mum, Chipmunks made a diss track.

2:15:53And she's like, she's listening to it, she's like, who does he think he's talking to? I'm like, Mum, you don't understand. I'm a hustler, you can't give me numbers. You can't give me numbers because I just know what to do with them. So I just, from that, what I think people don't understand is, you know when you watch a boxing match and one fighter, say Mayweather, he just wins the first seven rounds. and then the other fighter's desperately trying to come back and he wins a round and Mayweather's sort of backing off and moving and slipping and being neat because he knows he's won like I was never interested in the back and forth of calling names I sort of respected Chipmunk as a lyricist it was like the last thing I wanted to happen I couldn't be bothered with someone calling me names because I was I wasn't a rapper I wasn't a music guy it's like I take it personal if people say things about me.

2:16:45So I wasn't playing that game really. I was strategically making my way up because I had a goal. And with all due respect, I couldn't give a fuck about Chipmunk or the industry. It's like, my mum can't die in this stage that she's going through and I don't give a fuck. I don't care what I have to do to get up. You understand? And that was the nature of me turning up to Tottenham. You know, I was doing things that my whole heart was on the line. You know, when we was out, people say, oh, you went to Tottenham for half an hour it's like no we wasn't we was there all night and it was it was a serious situation Tottenham's not a joke place you know but you know we went there and anything could happen it was it was it was dangerous you were turning those things around really quickly as well I seem to remember you time stamping yeah when different when things were posted things were responded to yeah it's like I'm using boxing analogies because that's it's a thing I understand right but it's like fighting a dangerous fighter with a big punch sometimes sometimes you gotta try and get him out of there early so i was just firing back quick that was my strategy for the situation was just bam bam and knock him off putting pressure on him to do it yeah just i was just applying pressure because it was like if i can if i can put this to bed early doors conor mcgregor aldo if the fight would have gone on more than 13 seconds more than two minutes would it have been the same fight when fatigue starts to kick in and everyone's sweating and the punches are less impactful you know but kind of got in there and got it done early doors and that's what goes down in history you know so I was going in to try and take the win early doors so then the end bit of the situation that was like all a little bit confusing I was just sort of playing chess then because at the end of the day it's like I've got a career like I've got numbers enough to build like a future at that point i'm not interested in calling names i like chipmunk i think he's a nice guy who cares it doesn't work in a diss track though like who like who cares yeah like you call me names and we're gonna do it like whatever but who cares i don't care there's real shit going on you understand what i'm saying and this is an opportunity yes i had to focus on the real shit i was doing three or four festivals a week and i was just banking the cash and that's why by the time it comes to getting the lambo i was just focused on building the brand you understand And unfortunately, this day and age is Instagram and exposure.

2:19:15I don't necessarily like it. But when it's a part of your job description, you better get it done. How much was the solutions that you came up with? How much of them were emergent? I just trust my taste. I trust my ability to make decisions now and to follow principles. And how much of this was a plan? How much of this was I have goal? I've reverse engineered the direction. Does that make sense? how much you sort of making decisions as you go and how much of it is prescriptive and prescribed in advance to help you get through things in terms of sort of that particular situation all of it it seems in retrospect life makes a lot of sense yeah you can string a narrative together i knew that i needed to do this the bike crash helped me to get over but at least in the beginning these first opportunities you understood that okay this this feels serious this feels like it's worth putting my entire heart on the line for.

2:20:08I have nothing else to lose here. I need to do this, or I'm going to go in this darker, more difficult direction because that's the only other one that's available to me. Yeah. How much of that were you aware of while it was happening? So, so, so this book that I'm writing is on unorthodox strategy because that's what it's been all the way through. Because you come from an unorthodox situation. You've got a plan. I believe strategy is at the foundation of all victory, no matter what game you're in. And I think if you're just walking into something blind and like hoping it goes well, it's like it's unsustainable and unrealistic because at some point you will come unstuck and it's snakes and ladders.

2:20:54And once you've gone down one of the snakes, you've gone backwards. So for me, I boxed for four years pretty seriously. And what I realized during boxing is at the time I was emotionally unstable because of what I had going on at home, which would mean some days I'd go in and be the sort of biggest amateur prospect in the gym. And some days I'd go in, have a quick cry in the changing room and just get my head punched off all day. So I could understand that like, I've got a journey to go on in terms of like healing and dealing with this sort of family situation I've got going on. So then I decided to step into music because I felt like I had a skillset.

2:21:33Essentially, I'm a storyteller and I felt like I'm good with language, descriptive language or whatever. But I always just had the bigger picture in mind of where I'm going. So therefore when opportunities to propel me towards my bigger picture turn up, I take them without hesitation. And that's why I'm faster than a lot of people because a lot of people don't have their intentions set clear in the mind. And then when an opportunity does arise, they're too busy like laughing with the mates about it or they've not even prepared, They've not even tried to become the person that is ready to receive the situation.

2:22:12Does that make sense? It's the old adage of you don't have to get ready if you stay ready. You've got to be him before it happens. So by the time I had Limelight and I'm a rapper that's doing the most numbers, I set the record in this and the record in, I was him walking into that. because in my mind, I was already living it every day. I was looking at, like, you know, I had nothing to say nice about any of the rappers because I come from boxing. I'd just seen them all as my opponents. So I'd watch what he was doing. I think, he ain't like me. He can't do it like I have done it. And, you know, he makes a gangster song.

2:22:50I think he's not lived the way I've lived. When it comes to that self-belief, how do you have, like, what is the evidence if you don't already have proof? if that makes sense. Like you are believing that you can do a thing that you haven't yet done and don't have any reliable evidence you can do yet other than, I think I got this. Yeah. Again, it's the small things. So before when we spoke about the small challenges lead to the big challenges not coming if you don't overcome them. It's overcoming the small challenges that sort of give you the confidence to know that you can do it. So I just started small, like a driving license.

2:23:33Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm going to get my driving license and I'm going to get a car and I'm going to be driving on the roads. Simple thing, right? But what people don't take into consideration is if you're in jail when you're 16, you didn't get your GCSEs. When you go out into the world, into like, you know, official situations, you feel like you're a jungle creature in the zoo right you're a wild animal so you know studying for a driving test every night before bed is foreign like it's not your remit so I started with simple things and believing I can study for six weeks straight turn up on my test ace the test and get myself a car I started with little things like that and then I take the confidence from that I put it under my belt and then and then you start dreaming bigger and bigger and then eventually i just had the the minerals to design the bigger picture in my head i thought if all these little things are working here it means that i can i can sort of design my own future so i just started to picture it and these big ones like your house where you're gonna live i i i explain it as a description box that you gotta fill right and if you don't fill in a box of on the description box you're you leave it to random chance do you know i mean so if you if you leave the house box on thingy then whatever house you're gonna live in you've just left that to random selection that's intention intention and but it has to be you need to be pinpoint accurate i was walking past a guy in london the other day he's like you know the up-and-coming guys now they respect me because I've done good or whatever.

2:25:17And he's like, he's like, bro, I'm trying to do well. And I'm like, where are you going to be in five years? And he just couldn't answer the question. It was a bad answer that he gave me. I said, it's a bad answer. So you need to know. You need to really know. It needs to be in detail. And that's who I was. I knew in detail how I was going to live, you know, what car I was going to drive, you know, what life I was going to live, how that I'd be functional. I will be my higher self, you know, and it's all just things that like I've just spent time designing so when it does drop into play I'm like yeah I always believed that that's what was going to happen you know speaking of opportunities you don't do that many collabs no why TD TD is this guy that was sat in his mum's house in his bedroom at his computer desk at the exact same stage where I was when I had five mixtapes that no one gave a shit about right and that's not to say that like nobody gave a shit about what he was doing at that time but I related to his situation you know what I mean he's about to transcend and he's from Sheffield it's the north and people saying to me king of the north or whatever like it's that journey of there was a snobbery in london for anybody outside of london coming into the industry and breaking bread and someone had to kick that door off because that's not fair right and and so for me td was a direct representative of the guys out of the people i was representing you know and i seen um and by by the way like he'd done the work do you know i mean and he'd he'd made a beat um and he'd like call me out and enough people get uh his fans to tag yeah the person he wanted to do lyrics over an existing beat yeah in the car he was like tag bugsy malone in the comments or whatever so i just respected that work because you know by the time i got on firing a booth with charlie sloth i'd done the work to be there i was five mixtapes in five years in and however many freestyles so i deserved my opportunity you know so um by the time td had done the work and i heard the beat i was like oh right and like and i seen his energy i i i just leaned into it because i thought you're the exact type of an individual that like i relate to you've been sat at that desk in your mom's house in your bedroom for years your fallout four blue chair yeah yeah and you've been doing the work and you've you've had them moments where no one believes in you and you're starting to struggle to believe in yourself so I just relate you know so I leaned into it um and then I'd done the track and then I went to the mum's house you know I'm saying and just like went and had a chat to him and and and looked him in his eyes and, and, you know, just had that moment that, that allows him to feel that flipping it, actually I'm enough.

2:28:33Do you understand what I'm saying? Isn't it funny that it comes back to that, you know, we're giving ourselves, I think everybody is trying to find a good enough reason externally to believe that they are enough internally. It's like, I just want to know that I'm enough. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All of us, that's like the human condition in it. I think that's the thing that we all struggle with. I definitely like did and do at some point. I think when I get into new territory, I still suffer with doubting myself. Yeah. And I think that's the challenge of climbing to the next level. I think it's interesting with authenticity and what it means to remain authentic when that treadmill of fame switches on.

2:29:19authenticity is an interesting challenge when you're living in different universe to where you started keeping perspective about what that was keeping your eye on the ball not getting distracted from what the main thing is and then also not not trying to continue climbing a mountain that you're already at the top of yeah i've already done this thing i don't need to do that thing again yeah yeah and it's um it's evolution i always talk about like um crocodiles and they're from the dinosaur days man they're like the only creature to have evolved all the way through to like modern day you know that level of adapting to the terrain it's unheard of the T-Rex has gone, they're all gone and that's how I look at any game in rap music I'm the one that just kept evolving, evolving adapting, evolving to the new terrain, it's snowing now or whatever it is and diversifying I just think it's a big deal I think if you don't have the ability to evolve then it's game over at some point I think it's that simple dude i really appreciate you i think you are a really fantastic role model for the north and a fucking fascinating human i'm so so glad that you came through today thank you i appreciate you having me on i feel like um yeah this is a moment in my career that i'm i'm happy about you know because i'm on the other side of the camera in a situation that I've been sort of watching and respecting yourself and respecting the types of guests that you get on so for you to sit hopefully I've shared something of value you know hopefully I've shared something of value you absolutely have bugsy milone ladies and gentlemen thank you when I first started doing personal growth I really wanted to read the best books the most impactful ones, the most entertaining ones, the ones that were the easiest to read and the most dense and interesting, but there wasn't a list of them.

2:31:33So I scoured and scoured and scoured and then gave up and just started reading on my own. And then I made a list of 100 of the best books that I've ever found. And you can get that for free right now. So if you want to spend more time around great books that aren't going to completely kill your memory and your attention, just trying to get through a single page, go to chriswillx.com slash books to get my list completely free of 100 books you should read before you die. That's chriswillx.com slash books.