The title track to the latest G&E project (Grouch and Eligh) offers various representations for the letters in the group’s name. However, the best representation might be one not touched on: Genuine and Enlightened. As two members of one of hip-hop’s largest collectives, The Living Legends, they have been around long enough not only to see the game drastically change, but they have seen themselves change as well. Whether it was the decision to quit using drugs or have a family, these legends are Grateful and Enduring. Their latest project, Say G&E!, is, from their perspective, their most mature album to date. With the relationship between these two venerable MCs likened to brothers and with them putting the importance of family at the forefront, it is easy to see how their genuine and enlightened approach has translated into their strongest project to date. URB had the privilege of speaking with these two legendary West Coast MCs recently to find out how being family focused has impacted them as artists, their feelings about festivals, as well as how their growth is reflected in the songs on this latest project.

URB: You guys performed at Paid Dues a couple of weeks ago. What was that experience like for you?
Eligh: Ah man, Paid Dues was great. It was like 8,000 kids in there. Me and Grouch had our own set in addition to the Living Legends set. The G&E set was really cool because I brought my mom out in the middle of it, and the crowd was just giving us so much love. It was all good vibes out there man.
Grouch: It was great man. We had a great response for both sets. We sold a lot of merchandise, met a lot of fans, saw a lot of friends; I had a great time.

URB: You guys are no strangers to Guerilla Union shows (whether it be Rock the Bells or Paid Dues). After being involved with it all of these years, is it still exciting; is it still something you look forward too?
Eligh: Oh yeah. Those shows are always big. Being on the stage is always exciting especially when you got new stuff out. Those big, huge shows are always exciting. Like, I do not know how long I have been doing this, performing wise, but I still get nervous and anxious before every show. That never goes away from me. It doesn’t matter if we are in a tiny in store with no stage; I still get nervous. So yeah, it is always fun to do those big shows.
Grouch: One that I still like seeing all of the time was Brother Ali. One of the guys that I wanted to see that I had never seen was Tech N9ne. Those two were good for me. Brother Ali never disappoints. I thought Tech N9ne’s set was really well put together. I don’t really listen to his music much,  but his show was really well put together.

URB: Beyond the Rock the Bells and Paid Dues festivals, you guys have been a part of other festivals as well, such as South by Southwest. How do you guys enjoy the whole festival scene?
Grouch: I love going to all of those big festivals. Sometimes, for me, I want to chill and see more of the artists, but I don’t get a chance to do it. I’ll go South by Southwest and there will be 100 artists that I want to see, and I will end up seeing one of them for 10, 15 minutes. Someday I just want to go as a fan and just absorb it as a fan.

URB: Looking over the lineup for this year’s Paid Dues, it seems like a family affair; is that once some of these festivals have become, a chance to get together with friends that might not have seen in awhile?
Grouch: I am starting to feel that the more and more time goes on. It is like setting up a camping trip or something like that. Let’s see who Brother Ali brings with him this year or who Slug brings with him, what kind of stage show it is going to be. In that sense, it is like a family get together.

URB: Listening to your new album and everything that you do, it is clear that you guys are still fans of hip-hop, at least the hip-hop you guys make. Being  that you are still fans, who were some of the artists you liked at Paid Dues?
Eligh: You know what was cool was to see Slaughterhouse because I have heard a lot of buzz about them; I heard about this odd, to me it’s odd, combination of MCs. Today we have to mix and match, and mix up genres. Cause to me the same old stuff over and over gets tiring. I know I am not the only artist who feels this way. Slaughterhouse was cool to check. I always thought Crooked I was a cool Rapper, and Slug and Brother Ali are my people, and they always kill it. Brother Ali and Slug are just super cool dudes, but the guy that I wanted to see was Tech N9ne. I had never seen him before, and he put on a ridiculous show. First of all, you know his style, his name is Tech N9ne for a reason because he shoots off ridiculous flows, which is if you know my flow is something that I am really into, that speed chopping it up style shit. He killed it man. He had a really dramatic stage performance. It was like straight through. He paints his face and does all of this dramatic stuff for the show.

URB: Since you guys share similar types of flows, could you see yourself collaborating with him?
Eligh: Just watching him from backstage made me want to run out there and be like “Me, I can do that too!” It would be tight. It’s in the back of my headman. Murs is about to go on tour with him, so it is within reach. If I was to do a song with him, he would make me want to step my game up even more because he chops it so clean. Even watching him in an interview online after the show, even how he talks, is like he is chopping. I was like I have got to do something with him. Like him, Twist, and there are only a couple other guys that chop it really hard like that.  It just makes your hair on the back of your neck stand up and be like damn.

URB: Talk to me a little bit more about brining your mom out on stage during your performance.
Eligh: We put out a project together on March 10 called On Sacred Ground: Mother & Son. We had no idea how people would receive it. First of all, it’s me and my mom, which really has not been done to many times that I can think of. Another part of it is she is from a totally different generation and background than I am ; She is a folk singer. She is all over projects I have done, but people didn’t know that Jo Wilkinson was my mom. It’s crazy all of the love that I am getting for this because people are connecting to it on a whole different level.  We did some in stores in L.A., San Diego, and Frisco, and in Frisco it was at some club, and I am sitting at the booth, and these old folks who didn’t know my mom personally, just wanted to see my mom. After I brought her on stage at Paid Dues, she told me that she was going to walk around the crowd. I told her you might not want to do that; she just said, no it will be fine. She goes out there and gets mobbed by kids, youngsters, saying, “Jo, I love how you sang; can I get your autograph” They are calling her Jo, not Eligh’s mom, which is what they might have called her before this came out.

URB: How did this project even come about?
Eligh: It was in my mind and what I didn’t know was it was in the back of my mom’s mind. It was just some funny, family connection thing. I am close to my mom like she was my sister. One day I woke up and thought of this title for this album, and I called my mom and told her that we have to do an album because I have a title for it. She starts laughing, and I am like what. She says that she had the exact same thought.  She lives in Tucson; I got her out to L.A., and she was here for 10 days and we knocked it out. We knocked out the important parts, but it took about 8 months to get the other rappers and instrumentation on.

URB: Will she be a part of the G&E tour?
Eligh: She is going to be on tour with us. It’s going to be cool because Grouch is bringing his wife and his three year-old daughter with him. It is a family affair. My mom is 62, been a singer all her life, but never got to live her dream. Now we do this album together, and I am taking her on her first tour.

URB: That is awesome.
Eligh: It is awesome. It feels really good, but it is also stressing me out because I feel like I will have to be taking care of my mom.

URB: The roles are reversed.
Eligh: Yeah, a little bit. And it’s going to be funny, doing what I do on the road with my mom there, just as far as talking to females because I don’t  party anymore; I don’t drink. I have been clean for three years.

URB: Wouldn’t this project have been even possible three years ago?
Eligh: I don’t think so man. I wouldn’t  have been in the state of mind to make this project. There are some deep messages on this album, and there are a couple of tracks that have recovery in it. When you are out there getting faded and fucked up, you don’t realize that you are not just hurting yourself; you are hurting the people that love you the most, which would be your mom, family, your boys.