By Kelly Lewis

He’s on the list of record-holders as being the World’s Fastest Rapper and, he’s got his own column in the Chicago RedEye.  Not bad for a rapper.

With wit and style, Twista talked with Chronicmagazine.com about his new album, the controversy surrounding his removal from the McDonalds Tour 2007 and what it’s really like to be in the game.

So you’ve got a new album coming out. Tell us a little bit about Adrenaline Rush 2007.

It’s the tenth year anniversary since the first Adrenaline Rush that dropped in 97. So, I felt like 10 years was enough time to bridge the gap between my old fans and my new fans. I wanted them to know that I’m still doing it the same way and I wanted the new fans know, ‘man, this is what I got down with before you heard ‘Slow Jams.’ So, I just wanted to do something to bridge the gap to let people know that you can [do] the same thing 10, 15 years later if you’ve got your head screwed on right.

It’s a bomb effort. I don’t even want to call it an effort. It is what it is. If you’ve got part one, you’ve got to get to part two…It’s like, man it’s a collector’s item. It’s bigger than just a hot album…If you have the first, you’ve got to get the second.

Is it different from the first in terms of elements, or did you keep the same formula?

It’s the same formula but the difference is my elevation and where I’m at in my career in being able to get certain artists to feature on the album. When I did the first Adrenaline Rush it wasn’t about a lot of features on your album, the game was pretty different. So now that I’m doing this one, it’s in the era where people get a lot of people to do songs with them. So I’m fortunate to have like, some help on this album, T-Pain, Lil’ Wayne, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, R. Kelly, lots of people to come and help.

Your new single “Give it Up,” features Pharrell…How do you choose who you want to feature with?

It’s really a vibe from the music. Sometimes I’ll hear a track and think, ‘ooh, I’ve got to have T-Pain on this one.’ Over the years, I’ve acquired friends and people that I do business with, because I am the feature king and I do a lot of features- but Lil’ Wayne and T-Pain are catching up with me, though- but, Twista does a lot of features out here. So, I just reach out to my buddies that I do features with. I might say, 40, I need you on this one, or Game, I need you on this one. I can just grab anyone because I’ve been in the game so long and we have mutual respect for each other.

Did you bring Kanye back to work on production of the album?

Definitely, I brought him back, but with the timing of the album and the way things was coming out, the sample didn’t get cleared until late. So, what I’m going to have to do on the re-issue of my next album, which is going to make people go out and get it, again, put Kanye West on the album.

Cool, you guys are both from Chicago so you’ve got that Chi-town bond.

Yeah, definitely.

So, whatever happened with the 2007 McDonalds Tour? I read that you were on-board but you weren’t on the line up.

You know, I was supposed to be on the tour, but unfortunately some(one) from Chicago who decided to spend his congregation’s money on billboards that state ‘stop buying trash’ had me, Snoop Dogg, and 50 Cent listed as artists who he considered our music to be trash.

So this happened to [take place] right around the time that McDonalds asked me to be a part of their tour and he decided to take it a step further and say that Twista shouldn’t be on this tour because his lyrics are vulgar and his music is vulgar. And because he was speaking about Twista, he got some publicity and so once McDonalds got wind of his publicity they didn’t want [anything] to do with it.

So, I was upset with them (McDonalds) for not standing by my side and saying, ‘We’re still gonna have Twista. We know he’s a good artist and that he does clean shows when he has to.’ So, you know they didn’t stick by me and they put Twista under the bus and they kicked me off my tour so I’m like, “awww man.”

When people ask me about it, I voice my opinion about it and how hip-hop artists right now are taking a bad rap for what Don Imus said. As soon as he said his thing, everyone forgot that we have censorship stickers on our albums and so it’s a parental choice. He attacked the music when he shouldn’t attack the music, attack the parents.

Well, that’s too bad. But I’m sure your album will be hot and they’ll all regret it.

Well, I still got hella promotion on it. Bill O’Reilly had me on his show and showed me with my bling all looking great, so I got some promotion out of it.

Well, you now have your own record label, Get Money Gang. Do you have any plans to leave Atlantic or are you staying put?

Well, Get Money Gang is something that I’m doing on my own independent where I get to choose the artists that I like and the artists that I want to work with and get them out of the Midwest. Get Money Gang could be something that I work through Atlantic one day, so I’ll always keep my affiliation with Atlantic even though they fuck up a lot. You know, Twista has history with Atlantic. Sometimes we have our ups, sometimes we have our downs, but I’ve been in the game long enough to know that it’s just business, nothing crazy.

Have you signed any new artists recently? I read somewhere that you were looking into signing more Midwest artists?

Yeah, definitely. I’m working with some new artists. I’ve got to promote them and get them out there so I’ve got to get their music while I’m out there. Right now we’ve got Speed Ar-Mobsters, they just signed a deal with Cox recently but they’ve been down with me since the beginning. I’ve got new artists like (Young) Scooter and Scooter is like one of the new hottest lyricists from Chicago and Young Cat who does his thing, he get it in like Lil’ Wayne. I’ve got another artist by the name of Anya, this young white girl, she does this different type of music. I don’t know what to call it, but she makes you feel different like riding thick or something. When people hear her music they’re really gonna wig out. Actually, they’re gonna trip out with the fact that Twista’s even involved with some music that’s so different.

I think it’s really important to change up hip-hop and do different things.

Yeah. You’ve got to - especially because I’ve grown up and I like so many different types of music now. It’s not just about rap music.  I like all music.

You mentioned something about working with Bone Thugs-n-Harmony. Are you still planning on doing an album together?

Yeah, that’s still on.  As soon as I finish doing my album [and] get through with the promotion of this album we’re just going to be getting the tracks in.  I’m going to be calling late and going crazy a lot in the next couple of months.  We’re going to really try to get it in and make a dope Midwest album for the people.

You were recently on Dancing with the Stars. Do you have any plans to follow in the footsteps of Three 6 Mafia and have your own reality show or do a movie or anything like that?

We may get into the movies a little bit. Me and my buddies are clowns so we’ll probably get into the movies a little bit. But, one of the things that people don’t understand about Twista is that I’m probably a little more silly and funny than I am serious. You see me, it’s definitely something that I got to have someone laugh.

You have your own column in the RedEye.  How did that come about?

One of my publicist’s buddies from Chicago knew the guy that owned the Tribune and he just talked to him about how dope it would be to have a hip-hop artist in the Chi to give his opinion in a column about certain issues and certain things that’s going on. I started, and I just thought it was a dope idea, but once I started getting the responses back from people who felt my opinions or people who had questions it just made me feel different from just being like a rap artist because I’m used to writing lyrics to make people dance and move and say, ‘hey, that’s dope’ so, when I started to write my thoughts down and really just sit back myself and realize what I was thinking and what I was saying I was like, ‘okay, so this is what a journalist feels, this is the high they get to be able to express themselves and their opinions and once I got to be able to experience the highs of journalists, it’s the bomb for me, its almost a must for me to be able to voice my opinion in the RedEye. I think it’s dope.

What sorts of topics do you write about?

Anything from what I feel about the war, or what I felt about the Michael Vick case or even issues with myself and the whole thing I went through with the McDonalds thing, getting kicked off because of vulgar lyrics. I just get to tackle any topics I want to talk about. The Michael Vick thing was like a real big one to me because I wanted to show two sides of the story and make people understand that Michael Vick wasn’t as much of a demon as people thought he was. He was raised in a culture that was, not necessarily right, but when you’re raised in a certain culture, certain things that are considered bad by other people are not as bad to you because you’ve seen it all your life. Give him a break and let him pay for his mistake and don’t demonize the man.

Your column and everything that you really helps to keep you relatable to your fans, and that’s one of the things that’s awesome about you. I mean, you were working at Burger King before you got your break. Do you ever remember things like that and try to keep yourself grounded with those memories?

Yeah, definitely. Even now. You know, when you look at the way, how much hard work it is to be in the music industry. I just want people to realize I’m just a man with a job. I’m an entertainer. Here’s a young rappers point of view and I try to make people realize we’re not just [people] standing on the stage cursing everybody out. We have children, families, mothers, people that we care about and issues that hurt our feelings just like everybody else. I just want people to realize that, hey, rappers are people and here is what we think sometimes.

You’ve been around for a long time now. At the end of the day, what are you most proud of?

I think I’m probably most proud of being able to provide for my family, first, and then second, just, being a pioneer in Chicago, being one of the OGs who helped put it down for Chicago. I was the first rapper to get a major record deal and I tried to promote other rappers and explain how dope it is, being from Chicago. I just think when people look back and think man, ‘who really put it down for Chicago, who really opened the door,’ man, it was Twista. And that’s something that nobody can ever take away from me and I’m really proud of that.