Boston, Addiction, The Town, 12 Years Sober

Slaine1:06

Well, before the before the internet too, like every neighborhood, you know, now I can look at a map and be like, "Oh, it's [ __ ] right down the street.

It's really not that far." You know what I'm saying? But it felt culturally like it was a big move every time I would go from one place to the other. And I always felt like an outsider growing up

And, you know, had to adapt. you know,

Slaine1:54

Yeah, it was it was a big deal. And and um you know, it was also just the city was different than it is. It's hard even now for people who are moving into Boston now. It's a totally it's a completely different atmosphere. It's a completely different city from when we grew up. You grew up in Boston, too, right?

Slaine2:12

And Somerville. Yeah. So, I mean, it was it's Somerville, too. It was a completely different place, right? Like,

You know, gentrification and and just culturally everything changed. So, there it's really not the same place that it used to be. So, when I was growing up in Lower Mills in Dorchester, there's a family with 12 kids across the street, another one with eight kids, another one with six. Everybody had,

You know, three, four, 6, 8, 10, 12 kids. There was 100 kids on my block growing

And no one had anything. And well, you know, it was a working-class neighborhood. People were,

You know, cops, firefighters, teachers, you know, construction workers, whatever. But it was chaos, man. There was a lot of alcoholism, which I didn't really know what it was at the time, but there was chaos when you go out the front door.

And it was it was at a time where there was no [ __ ] computers or internet. I remember cable guys going up and down the street. So it was before cable at the advent of cable with briefcases pitching cable.

You know what I mean? So in other words, everybody was outside.

Slaine3:13

So you would go outside and your head was on a swivel like from a very early age. There was chaos outside, there was chaos inside. And um [clears throat] you know that's you just had to kind of learn to adapt in that environment.

Slaine3:54

Well, it is. It is traumatic. It was definitely traumatic for me. It was probably traumatic for you, too. It's just that you adapt and it becomes your reality and you have to figure out a way to move through it.

Slaine4:05

And then years later, you have to unravel all this [ __ ] you know? I'm like,

Why am I always cl to this day, you know, 12 years sober now, too, and I'm still like my shoulders clench, my head's on a swivel, I have like at times I have paranoia, you know what I mean? And it's because, you know, growing up like that from an early age, it's just it's just embedded in you. And it's so hard to undo it and unravel it.

Slaine4:58

I didn't even realize that until my son was growing up. It's interesting like what being a father, you see your own childhood and and you start to learn things about your own childhood with hindsight and perspective. But, you know, I had been in a hundred fights by the time I was 8 years old. It was just part of you go outside, you would get in fist fights, you know? I remember very distinctly like sitting on my front steps like with my friend that I just got in a fight with and my mother's bringing us both popsicles, you know what I mean?

And it was just that was just part for the course, you know? And I'd get the [ __ ] [ __ ] beat out of me, my head slammed off the sidewalk and it was just part of the day.

Slaine6:10

And even like even coming into high school and all that, you know, like we would

We would go out every weekend in different parts of the city cuz I think I told you before we started, but I went to Bosow, which was downtown, and you had kids from all over different neighborhoods, which was it was great. We would go to all we would be in Charles Town one weekend, we'd be in High Park another weekend, we'd be in Dorchester, Savin Hill another weekend, we you know, we'd be in South the next weekend,

And we were getting fights every weekend. And everywhere we went to any of these like, you know, any of the events we went to or whatever, we always drinking and fighting.

Slaine7:11

There's always fights going out in

Slaine7:18

But to be fair though kids also now it's a different element cuz we didn't have you know not everybody had a camera on them a tracking device and all the [ __ ] that could be broadcast to the world so now if you got a beef with the kid you know and I know you know My son's had little things now. He's older. Um,

You know, and it's like that cell phone plays a big role in things because people, you know,

Slaine7:44

It's it's a machine that's going to broadcast it. You're going to get in trouble for it. The cops are going to be involved and all that.

Slaine8:04

He tells you right where he is. Actually, when I hang out with with Mike, I'm like, "Bro, no none of that in here right now. Not until later or whatever, you know, cuz I I I don't like to broadcast where I am in real time." You know, you want to post it later? Cool. But not right. Not while we're here cuz I want people, you know, maybe it's that paranoia, too.

Slaine8:26

I played baseball and I played basketball. Um, I was a good athlete when I was a kid, but you know, I think by the time, you know, 13, 14 years old rolled around and I started getting into drugs, like I pretty much abandoned the sports.

Slaine8:46

Alcohol always my drug of choice. I mean, I did every drug under the sun as time progressed. I I loved experimenting with all of them, but alcohol

Was the king to me. You know what I mean? like the se the first time I had a drink um it just like it made me stop clenching. You know what [clears throat] I mean? Like it just washed over me

And it felt like everything was perfect. Like this was the thing that I was missing that I didn't know that I was missing.

Slaine9:18

Yeah.

Slaine9:44

Because when you do the coke like you know then you you don't throw up as easily, right? You can drink longer. It's like a cheat code. That's when I started doing the coke. I remember I was in I was in Roslindale at a party and I was with my best friend Mike and um you know we were at this cookout. It was older kids. One of these kids was going off to the Marines or whatever and there was a keg early and I was

Drinking and smoking weed and and I smoked a blunt with the kid in in uh

In in the car in front of the house and I passed out. When I woke up

There's three other kids in the car and they're doing blow and I was I had the spins. I was [ __ ] up. And I was like, "What's that?" And uh and one of the kids was like, "It's Coke. You want some?" And I was like, "That's the [ __ ] that killed Len."

Slaine10:31

Right. You remember that from that era, too?

And he's like, "You'll be fine." I was like, "What does it do?" Goes make you feel better pretty quick. And it did. [clears throat and snorts]

You know, it did. I did a line of that. And I remember I shot right back into that party and I felt like I was

Like sober, you know, like just I it straightened me right out and I could keep drinking

And I remember going back up in and being how much did I sell this? Hey,

You got $20 on you. We get a 40 bag. And I I was off and running for the next 23 years with it.

Slaine11:13

Yeah.

Slaine11:39

And you're chasing it. You're chasing that elusive feeling that never quite returns to it original,

Slaine13:30

So So I I again like I I was moving around a lot and all that and and it was like a great connector for me in high school. Like no matter once I found drugs, no matter where I went, that became the culture. So then that culture overrides everything else cuz no matter where you go, you can always find people who were in, you know, the drug culture is bigger than than anything, especially at that time.

You know, people talk about like the opioid epidemic or the drug epidemic in Boston.

And I think in the city it start people talk about it being like 2007 or whatever after that. And my experience was it already happened in the '9s like it was and it was reverberating out to the suburbs. And by the time people labeled it the epidemic, it was already, you know, it was it was it had reverberated out, but it was already in the city. Like you said, when you're growing up, you're seeing heroin and and hard drugs all around you, right? Like that was my experience, too.

It was very much a cultural thing. It wasn't it wasn't a long leap to go from drinking and smoking weed to doing coke to opiates or to angel dust or any of that. It was like that.

Slaine14:59

See, I was I was always scared of the opiates because I had relatives of mine that were pretty bad with them. And um you know it was something that I always held up like I don't want to be like

Him. I don't want to be like her. You know what I mean? I'm not going to I don't want to throw my relatives under the bus. But

I um [clears throat] I I had a very clear example of how bad it can get with the opiates right away

And and carved those out as like I I don't want to do those. And then and then later the people that were very close to me too got got um have really tragic stories with those you know I think especially when the

When the pills came you know when the OxyContin came it just took the entire city by storm.

Slaine15:57

Yeah. didn't have the same stigma as, you know, tying your tying your arm off,

Slaine16:07

Now xylazine, which is even crazier.

Slaine16:11

That's the new [ __ ] that's basically in a in a lot of the stuff. It like eats your skin away.

Slaine16:17

I think it's something like I think it's even more deadly than than fentanyl.

Slaine16:22

And there's there's no there's no heroin left anyways. It's like we haven't we haven't seen heroin in years. Nobody tests positive for heroin anymore.

Really? It's all fentanyl.

Slaine16:47

So I what I was going to say is like I had a real hard run with the drugs in high school. So, I started off high school as like an honorroll student and by the time I graduated, I just barely graduated. I was barely passing anything. And I had a pretty pretty severe drug and alcohol problem. And that was the first time that I tried to get sober after I graduated high school. And um it didn't it didn't stick obviously, but I tried to like refocus what I was going to do after high school.

And I took a year to kind of get my [ __ ] together. And I ended up going to New York City. I applied to film school. I went to a place called the School of Visual Arts.

And I wanted to be a director, you know. So I always I started writing rhymes when I was 9 years old.

Slaine17:33

And I did it secretly because it was like something that,

You know, you would get,

You know, it wasn't like a cool thing to do. I know it's different now. It's hard to explain to people. It's like I know what you mean. hip-hop took the world by storm, but for kids like me and for the people I was around, it was like you were you were like a wannabe if you did that, right? So, so I had rhymes that I was writing since I was 9 years old stuffed in a shoe box hidden away under my bed. So, I wasn't like actively

Engaged in all that, but I had I had a real creative streak and it was an outlet. And in the beginning,

In the beginning, it was just like a kid who loved hiphop and who loved the art form and all that. But as I got older and I started going through things, it became like an expression on how how to get the poison out of my system, all the things that I was going through. So I would write this really dark, deep [ __ ] about things that I was going through and it became like a vehicle almost like I [snorts] think it I think it saved my life before, you know, it it was part of what saved my life before it almost took it.

Slaine18:37

You know what I mean? So, um, so but I I didn't see hip-hop as like a as a viable like career or or lane for the credibility, you know, like for for the creativity. So, I I I went to film school

And um when I got to film school, I felt like such a fish out of water. And that I guess that's the the story of my life is I always was like a fish out of water. I always felt like I never belonged where I went. And when I went to to it's basically art school in New York City and I'm surrounded by all these kids who are just nothing like me with the blue hair and like just like really alternative kids and

You know at that age now that wouldn't even move the meter with me. I love to be around different kinds of creative people and and now I've seen the whole world and it's just I see the world through a different lens.

But then I just felt like what am I doing here? right? You know, I linked up with the kid from Queens and we we hung pretty tight and uh about 7 months into my freshman year there and uh we got in a beef with uh it was like a door man/f facilities worker at the place that that we lived and um and I ended up having to leave film school. So

Slaine20:42

It hardens you though, man. It definitely does. It definitely

It's like anything. It's a gift and a curse. And I obviously have incredible respect and admiration for Ben and Matt. I wouldn't be here today if it weren't for Ben specifically finding me and and giving me an opportunity. But um I think it's different in Cambridge too, though. And and and look, like I love Cambridge. I I would honestly raise my kids here if I could, but uh but I love it. I love that I I feel like in Cambridge it kind of it pushes the arts.

It it it gives kids opportunities to have these things. And I think that's really healthy, man. It's not

It's not just like education is sit down, memorize the facts and and then take the test and, you know, write the paper and all that stuff. It's like I feel like in Cambridge they they're kind of they recognize that there are different kinds of learners. there are different kinds of avenues and that's important and I don't think it's really it's really um integrated enough into the American education system. You know, there's there's kids, you know, I think this about my son and one of my daughters, too.

Uh they're not students to the effect like where they are going to fit into that box, but they're they're some of the brightest kids I know. Like I would hire them. Yeah.

You know what I mean? But I I I think um they don't necessarily think that they're like the smartest kids. And I'm like, "No, you are smart. You're smarter than half these kids in your class or more. You know what I mean? You're a really bright kid. You're just you have to fit in this algebra box." And I failed algebra, too.

Slaine23:21

And that's how I feel like in Boston, there's an extra layer of, you know, like you said, it's crabs in a barrel. And and I love this city. I'm not I'm not

Talking [ __ ] about my own city, but it really hardens you because it's people saying, "What are you [ __ ] stupid? You're not going to be able to do that." It's like that becomes the dialogue. And I think it becomes so many people's internal voice as they go forward like I'm not going I can't do that's stupid. I wouldn't be able to do that. And it's like

I luckily my mother always kind of put into me like you can do anything that you want like you you can use creativity. So my mother was was an art teacher in East Boston when I was a a little kid. Then she was a a florist and and later became a teacher again with media and and communications and stuff like that. And you know she went through a lot of [ __ ] in her life and and um I just spent the weekend with her in Pennsylvania and uh where she lives now.

And it's interesting as you get older and your values and your perspective changes, I'm able to look at some of the things in my childhood in a much different light now. Like if she didn't give me that kind of encouragement and positivity despite all the negative [ __ ] she was dealing with and what she had to the storms she had to weather to get through and all that. I think when I was younger, maybe I only could see that side of it and I couldn't see what I see now.

You know, if she didn't put that in me, I don't know that I would have survived, you know,

Slaine25:43

The fear and the self-doubt like it it turns the voice down on it. That's right.

This is why I hated smoking weed

Slaine25:52

The voice goes up. It's self-doubt. It's self-loathing. It's fear. It's insecurity. I can't even walk into the [ __ ] movie theater store. I'm like, "No, no, turn around. I'm not going. I don't want to answer the phone." You know what I mean? I just want to lock myself in the house isolate. I know it's not like that for everyone. For me, that's what's smoking weed.

Slaine26:11

But when I drink, when I have a drink,

It all just goes away. You know what I mean? And I feel like anything is possible.

And especially you add some cocaine to it

Because, you know, one of the things I did I I was not diagnosed with when I was a kid and which I see very clearly again through the perspective of of a father. You know, when I see like my son is such a smart kid, he's a bright kid. He has great instincts. He's, you know, so many things I admire about him. And then he's really he was struggling in school at one point. And um I should say he struggles in school. He's not he's not uh a focused student.

He's looking out the window.

Slaine26:51

Like I was

And when when he did get diagnosed and I read his diagnosis with the ADHD, it was as if I was reading about myself. Yeah.

Does that make sense?

Slaine27:02

And you go, this is what I was dealing with

My whole childhood, my whole life. And now I've been able to say to him like this is not a handicap.

Slaine27:13

This is a superpower. You just need to channel it the right way. That's right.

I can't sit at a [ __ ] desk and for 8 hours a day and do a task list and all that. I need I need to operate in a much different way. I have 15 ideas going at a different time all at the same time and I'm going back and forth between them and I get like manic energy towards one and I get progress on that. Then I get manic energy towards another and it and it's much better if I can get other people with me who are good at some of the things I'm not.

Like I'm a I'm a vision guy and I'm an ideas guy and and a relationship guy and I can put these things together but I need help with some of the other stuff.

Slaine28:12

I went to film school. I got kicked out of film school, but during the time, so I was hanging out with this kid. Sorry, I just went off on an ADHD thing there, but sorry. liter the you know literally and metaphorically. But uh so at the time I I I I was hanging with this kid from Queens and we were rolling thick as thieves and uh we started going he was rapping and now I already

I already did that but I wasn't doing it like him. Like he was going out he was hitting open mics. He was you know freestyling. He was doing ciphers on the corner and all that. And so I started spitting my stuff to him and he was like dude that's dope. like you need to. And I was like, "No, no, no, no, no. I'm here to do film." And

And he's like, "Nah, you need to do this." And um and he signed me up. We went to I went to see him at an open mic that Barbito from Stretch and Barbido

Did at a place called the New Eurekan Poets Cafe

And he signed me up without my knowledge and they called me up and and I was nervous, man. I get up, they put a beat on, and I did my little freestyle thing and uh and the place went nuts and I got love and respect and that was it was like the first time I did cocaine. I was off and running.

Slaine29:22

This was 1996.

Slaine29:27

Well, the Beasty Boys were huge in 1986. I know they were still popping in the in the in the '9s and all that, but the Beasty Boys were my big inspiration when I was 9 years old. That's when I wrote my first rhyme after I heard that License to Ill record. Oh, that was so good.

Yeah. And then and then House of Pain later on. Now, of course, I loved LL CoolJ. I love Rock Cam. I love Cool Mod D,

Uh, NWA, you know, that era

Was when I was growing up, right? So, it was like this. I loved everything about hip-hop. But when House of Pain came around in 1992,

Was it 91 or '92? I was in. I was all the way in because I saw that CD and they had the Shamrock on the cover and I flipped it over and they're drinking beers and the bar on the back and I was like, "This is me."

Slaine30:15

This is me. Right. So, they were like a representative and it and and it showed me for the first time

You could do this too.

Slaine30:24

So after the open mic, what happens with the rapping? So I start making little demo tapes and I start, you know, kind of getting my feet wet on that little underground scene that was going on in New York at the time. Little underground scene. It was the underground indie scene that was blossoming at that time. It was it was it was a movement.

Slaine30:45

So at that time it was um non-fiction and Il Bill who I would later connect with and would be in a a band with me and Danny. U it was company flow. It was the juggernauts. It was, you know, there was a whole underground movement going on. It was basically like the Fat Beats era in New York City at that time. That's where I cut my teeth.

And um after I got kicked out of school, I got kicked out of film school almost towards the end of the first year.

I came back to Boston. Now, what I what I I regrouped and I knew I I gotta get right back to New York and and I put a few things together and started hustling some things and all that back and forth New York to Boston and I moved back to New York and I really dove into the hip-hop [ __ ] for the next 5 years.

Slaine31:30

I lived in Brooklyn. So, first I lived in Long Island City, Queens and then I lived in Brooklyn down by Prospect Park.

Slaine31:39

I was hustling. Yeah. So, I you know I would do different things. I mean, I worked I worked at a Mexican restaurant answering phones at one point. I worked uh as a bar back for for a bar in a restaurant at one point. But, you know, I was also this was the the beginning of of ecstasy.

Slaine31:58

Really kind of hitting

Slaine32:00

You know, it took to me it felt like it just took everything by storm at that time and everybody was taking roles. Yeah.

And um I always like this publicly, but yeah. So, you know,

I found a connect to get them at a pretty cheap price in New York was hustling them back and forth to Boston where I could sell them much more for much more money back here.

Slaine32:28

Well, it's it took a long time. And I and I say this, it it was a different era, right? So you really had to get like an organic traction back then and it the internet really it existed but it wasn't it didn't exist to the point the extent it does now.

Slaine32:44

Nothing like that. There wasn't social media yet. There wasn't

You know it was like the

The AOL dial up line that took 15 minutes. You could jump in the shower while it was loading onto the internet. You know what I mean? So, it took it took a while. And I and I'm grateful for that because my first mixtapz, my first records, my first recordings, they didn't come out, you know what I mean? There was 10 years of development and doing those shows and open mics and honing my craft and all that. So, by the time I left New York City, I was already a pro.

Slaine34:59

So, my first exposure to like I'm going to get a record deal was with MC Shen. So, they took me in. He he had a a woman named Paula that would take me around to different labels and she brought me in with my demo. I went to Tommy Boy. I went to RCA and um RCA apparently was going to offer me a deal. Now I have no direct contact with these people. It's all through Shen.

Slaine35:23

And and his management team.

So they come to me and they're like, "Look, we have a deal on the table for you, but you need to sign this first."

And the contract that they proposed to me was basically like 25% of everything that I made forever. And like so if

Anything I'm doing now,

Slaine35:43

I would still owe them a royalty on like it was in perpetuity throughout the universe on any project that I do in the future. And I, you know, I I wasn't the brightest bulb, but I was bright enough to know like I can't sign that.

Slaine36:04

Right? And look, I got no beef with Shan. I reconnected with him a few years ago or whatever. And I understand from from his perspective, you know, because I would understand from my perspective, if I was going to cultivate an artist and work with an artist, right? You can't just plug somebody in, it takes it's a full-time gig for a long time to build a career with somebody, right? If you're at the beginning of that and you're given access to someone, I understand wanting to take a piece of that and all that.

What I should have done in hindsight was countered

And put like a term on it and all that. I didn't know better at the time and I thought like they're trying to [ __ ] me. Yeah.

You know, the same and I exited [clears throat] that scenario. Now for the for the next 3 years after that I was real sorry I did that.

Slaine37:46

Correct. And it's learned behavior. You know people come up in the music business and they think this is the way to do it. This is how I learned it. And um you know I'm sure there was there was stuff on his end or my end. And again, it's ancient history now, but for those next three years after that, I I I remember seeing um some of the people that we were working with on MTV and on, you know, and I was like, I'm sitting at home in Roslindale in my girlfriend's house going, "Fuck, this is the dude who was in the studio with us.

He was just playing the guitar. Now he's [ __ ] in Psalm 41. They're a big, you know, he's a big rock."

Slaine38:25

Yeah. It just kind It just kind of fizzled. Yeah. I think

Slaine38:30

I don't know.

Slaine38:31

I would think that they did, but you know, they didn't they didn't come back with the counter offer. It didn't It fizzled out and I was left kind of with my tail between my legs. I went back to Boston. I started bartending and I thought, "Well, that's all. That's that."

Slaine38:52

Yeah.

Slaine38:58

It did. I think I think it just it's like the itch that needed to be scratched. I couldn't just stop. I love to do this thing and now I had a taste of it and I would see people coming out and go, I'm better than this [ __ ] kid,

Slaine39:11

Yeah.

And uh you know, I guess that's how it's always kind of that competition thing. And you know, and then I also have been very resourceful. I think in general I'm resourceful and and able to talk people into things. So, you know, I did something that I wouldn't recommend to to to other people in my situation, but I I started uh I cut some different deals with some people that were not in the music business. And um you know, I pitched them on how this could be very profitable.

And of course, there's all sorts of examples. Yeah. of people getting very successful in music and it being funded by by people who are not in the music business who who uh you know who traffic in and uh large quantities of dry goods and all that and usually those people want their money back very quickly.

Slaine40:01

And uh you know they don't

Look at it like oh it's a risk that didn't pan out when it doesn't come they look at it in a very different way. So, I got involved in a few situations like that early on and um you know, ended up in some in some pretty hairy situations and dangerous situations. Luckily, luckily I survived some of those situations, but in uh one of those situations, I ended up uh moving into this warehouse in Roxbury. Now, when we moved in there, the plan was we're going to build a recording studio.

But we're going to start a record label and we're going to take over the world.

Slaine40:41

What actually happened is we started to do some construction in there. We moved in there.

We started doing construction. We had uh staging going up. We had uh framework being done. The carpenters were all getting paid on OxyContin. And the gentleman who was financing the project ended up catching a case

And he was looking looking at a significant amount of time. He fell out of the equation. Now I am living in there and for the next eight months um as that situation unraveled the lights went off you know there was no hot water any of that stuff and um and I ended up squatting in that warehouse for about 8 months.

Slaine41:24

Now at that time though I had put together enough material and uh there's a couple things running concurrently at the same time. So I had met Danny Boy. Yep.

And Danny Boy,

Slaine41:35

Originally, I met Danny Boy in like 1998 in at CBGB's in New York City, which when I was living in New York, and I was working in the Lords of Brooklyn studio. Are you familiar with Lords of Brooklyn?

And uh I met Danny Boy for the first time there. Now,

Sometime later, at that time, Danny Boy was sober. Now, sometime later, and and like I told you, they were my heroes. Danny Boy was a hero. This is Danny Boy Corner from House of Pain.

From House of Pain. So, I had their posters up on my wall. I knew every lyric to every song.

I had every album

And uh the it was the first rap concert I ever went to was Cypress Hill and House of Pain.

And uh literally my heroes, right?

Slaine42:21

I was. And I wanted to have a drink with him, but he was sober

And I was [ __ ] you know, I'm at CBS at Stan Boy and he had heard my demo tape and um and I wanted to have a drink, but he he didn't drink and I thought that was kind of a bummer.

Now, fast forward some years later, he comes out to Boston to record with me in one of those

Deals that I was telling you about. And um he was not sober at this point,

But he was kind of on a darker

Slaine42:50

Journey than I was at that time. He wasn't like interested in partying or anything like that. He was very much in isolation mode.

Uh but but we met, we clicked up, and then he was like, "I got to get you out to LA. I want to plug you in with Lethal." So Lethal signed me to a pre-production deal.

Slaine43:08

And that be that was the very early the early beginnings of Lokostra. Yeah. So it was me,

This kid uh Big Left, and this other kid Opto.

Slaine43:20

And he signed all three of us individually to production deals. So he was

Slaine43:26

I mean, I got five grand. I thought I was rich. It was five. It was five grand. It wasn't much. I spent it the first week doing Coke.

And uh but he signed me to me to a deal, Lefty to a deal, Opto to a deal.

And basically, it was we're I'm going to make you a demo tape and try to shop it and see if it pans out.

Got it. and he would get like, you know, he he owned the rights to the Beats and we would be signed to his label which was under another subsidiary, you know, something like that. It didn't end up working out that way. What he did is he put all three of us together and we ended up recording a demo. Now, that started to get a little momentum and steam that also fizzled out. So, now I'm back in Boston and I got a mixtape and I'm squatting in this warehouse, right?

And I'm selling these mixtapz, right? So I I press up 50 copies.

Slaine44:17

And I give a stack of 10 to five different people that sold Coke. And if you wanted to buy a 40 bag, it was $50 and you had to take the CD. And we sold 13,000 copies of that CD.

Slaine44:30

The name of the CD was The White Man is the Devil Volume 1. And it was about a cocaine bender. So it was 21 tracks or 23 tracks and in between there was skits and it told the story of this lifestyle that I was living.

Slaine44:46

Now I didn't intentionally do that.

Slaine44:49

I I I didn't intentionally encompass what it was like to experience this blossoming drug epidemic in the city of Boston. At the time I was just writing my own experiences.

But what happened is it started to get a life of its own. M and you know now what I see in hindsight is there were a lot of kids in Boston that were living the same story as me at that time and they started to relate to some of the things I was saying in there and that CD started getting passed around the city and I started to get some real buzz for the first time now kind of concurrently lethal flew me back out to LA he started recording with me again cuz he somebody apparently said like we're not interested in a group like this, but we're interested in that kid.

So, I start so I start going out there with him for that. Now, around the same time, Everlast comes back into the into the picture, too. And now, Bill comes into the picture and and the Cocoa Nostra, as the world would later come to know it, starts to form

And we start recording together. Now, I'm still living in that warehouse at that time that that's happening. And I got a serious buzz in Boston going on at the same time. So people are thinking like I'm the next to go

And meanwhile I'm squatting in this warehouse.

Slaine46:10

So I get called in for an audition for a movie called Gone Baby Gone that Ben Affleck was here.

Slaine46:24

So the Boston Herald um I left this part of the story out. So, the Boston Herald wrote a story based on the buzz around Loka Nostra, my mixtape, The White Man is the devil, all that.

So, I'm drinking at an after hours spot up the street. I'm charging my phone every night at this after hours spot in Dorchester.

And I leave the after hours spot at 7:00 in the morning. Now, I know the Herald is writing this story. So, when I leave like, I'm going to go get the newspaper. I'm in the newspaper today. So, I walk up to Mass and Cass to the gas station there, which was, you know, a 10-minute walk from where I was uh squatting in that warehouse.

And I get every Herald that's on the rack.

Slaine47:03

And I walk back to the place that I'm squatting and I read [snorts] the article and I laugh and I pass out drunk. And I woke up at 3:00 in the afternoon and I had dozens of missed phone calls. A lot of it was people that um knew me, that saw me in the paper. Yeah, dude. I seen you in the [ __ ]

Slaine47:26

No, it wasn't critical. It was it was it it basically was talking about,

You know, me hooking up with a house of pain. Okay.

And you know, music and all that. It was a great story. It was a great story. It was a great photo. All that, you know,

And um Ben Affleck read the story. So, a lot of those missed phone calls were from the casting agency from uh Jim and 94.5. Like there was like an APB that Affleck put out for me.

So what he brought me in to read for

He brought a lot of white rappers in apparently. It was

Slaine48:10

He's like, "Bro, the the [ __ ] Ben Affleck is looking for you. He wants you to come in and and audition for this role in this movie."

Slaine48:17

Yeah. So, I call over the casting agency. They want me to come in today. And so, I'm [ __ ] bent, dude. Like, I I was like I was I was like, "Ah, can't come in today. I'll come in tomorrow." So, um I went in the next day

And I got good and drunk before I went in there.

I became friends with Carolyn Pikman. She cast me in a few other things and it was her casting agency

And she told me years later like, "You came in in those gangster pajamas. I don't know what you had, but I had like sweatpants on, you know, the all that stuff." and and I came in and I was loaded and uh and I read for the role of cheese. So, they were looking for, you know, like a white kid who was like a hip-hop kid who talked like he was black and all that. So, that's what they brought me in to read for. And I think once I got in there and Ben, I read for that role a couple times.

Ben was like,

He had me read for Bubba. Then I auditioned for that three times.

Slaine49:10

And

Slaine49:12

At the first audition,

Slaine49:13

Like, are you So, the first one I went in, like I said, I was loaded. And I and I had my friend uh Big Jig with me, rest in peace, my friend George. And uh and he was talking, we were both drunk. We went to we got we drank before we went in there

And he was like talking all sorts of [ __ ] or whatever like when Ben came out and then I went in and I sat down. I'm like,

"It's [ __ ] Ben Affle."

Slaine49:41

Okay. Yeah. And Carolyn Pikman did the lines with me. She came close. And and I think I what what I heard later on is as um as she said something like um [snorts] you know I I think I got to warn you he smelled like booze.

Slaine50:02

Yeah.

Slaine50:02

So but they brought me back in. That didn't scare my friend Ben away. He brought me back in. Now the next bunch of auditions it started to get real. Right. So the second one I came in. By the time they called me for the third one, they said, "We have a different character that we think that you're going to be good for." So, I went in for the third. Then I went in for the fourth audition. And when I came in for the fifth audition, I was like, "All right, I have a chance for this." And Ben said, Ben said to me, "I want you to put those lines down." Cuz I'm just reading the lines off the page.

I've never done this before, right? So,

He goes, "I want you to put those lines down. You know what's going on in the scene." He goes, "Forget about what the lines say. you know what happens in the scene, right?

He goes, "I want you to think about it as a story that you're telling somebody."

Slaine50:46

But you're in the story

And just be the guy.

Slaine50:51

Forget about any preconceived notions. He goes, "Because the people that I'm making this movie with, you've never been in anything before." He goes, "I think you're going to be great in it, but you need to show them that you can do it without looking at the paper."

And I did it apparently to their satisfaction. When I went on to that first day, hold on, there's another part of that. I flew back out to LA. Lethal flew me out to LA and I had done all these five auditions and I didn't hear or anything. And I'm driving through LA going to the studio with DJ Lethal and he's got like a Benz drop top Benz at the time, which is obviously like completely out of any possibility for me. Yeah. Right. at that time and um and I got a call from uh Carolyn Pikman and she said that I got the role and gone baby gone and I told Lethal and he was like ah whatever.

He he [clears throat] didn't think it was like he didn't know if I was bullshitting him or whatever and he ran in I think to a bank machine or whatever and I remember looking up while I'm sitting in DJ Lethal's car and I just got this movie roll and I just started crying.

Slaine51:56

Because I knew my life was about to change.

Slaine52:01

No, Caroline called me and uh and then the first day on set, so you know, my high school sweetheart, she had broken up with me. We had broken up for like 2 years and uh she was the love of my life. She was my best friend. Her family was like a surrogate family. I lived in that house growing up, you know, like

Slaine52:19

She was she was everything to me. And um I just couldn't as time went by and

I blew it, you know, like cuz my drinking and drug use. And she she was well put together and she was I mean she still is. She's great tremendous human being. The mother of my son.

Slaine52:36

I called her cuz I was sick. I got you know and I and and I hadn't talked to her in a while and I got food poisoning and I called her and she came to that warehouse and she walked in and she was like this is where you staying? like this is what you I was like yeah but I got a movie roll you know and I was telling her about all these things I'm doing and she had obviously seen the newspaper and all that

And uh she's like you can't walk onto a movie set like this you're a [ __ ] mess like this is a disaster

She goes you don't even have a hot shower or whatever so she rented a hotel I think Bill Gates was in town at the time so all the hotels in Massachusetts were sold out we went to New Hampshire she rented a hotel she got me a bunch of toiletries I took a shower And I walked onto that movie set the first day with like a little [ __ ] trash bag full of toiletries and they walked me to my trailer and the and the the girl was like, you know, like if you need like toiletries or whatever, we have all that stuff here.

You don't have to bring your own.

Slaine53:35

I was like, oh, all right. And I started shooting that movie with Ben Affleck. And then I start going on tour with House of Pain. And

Slaine54:02

Dude, I was eating prime rib and lobster. I'm [ __ ] living in a [ __ ] warehouse. You know what I mean? And I'm just like gorging myself with food.

And uh I mean the craft services is something special. If anybody's never been on on a real movie set, you know, I've done a lot of independent films since then and all that, like it's not like that on every movie set, but when you do like I when I did the Joker in LA

And when I did Gone Baby Gone in the Town, those are like you get top tier accommodations, top tier food.

It was something else, man. It was it was a dream come true, you know? I went to film school. I didn't think I could be an actor. It's the same thing with with hip-hop. I didn't think I could be a rapper. I didn't think it was possible for somebody like me.

You know what I mean? So to have those two things kind of happen.

There was 10 years, you know, when people say every overnight success story does 10 years of work before. There was 10 years where I was finding my voice, where I was grinding, where I was hustling, where I was taking dramatic chances, risking my [ __ ] life by the people I was associated with.

And it happened like that for me. Like it's like all the stars just aligned. Yeah. And it happened like that.

Slaine55:31

I was getting my ass kicked in every facet of life and I risked everything on a regular basis. Every day I risked everything.

Slaine55:46

It's all happening at the same time.

Slaine56:14

I did by the time I did the town.

Slaine56:18

No, I've talked to Sean about it. Honestly,

You know, Sean Sean is a friend, man. I love Sean.

Slaine56:25

I said to him on his show,

If it wasn't for the work you did with the tax credit, right? cuz he engineered that whole tax credit with Deval Patrick and brought those movies to Massachusetts.

If it wasn't for the work that Sean O'Brien did on that, I never would have got a shot. That's right.

I I think now as an almost 50-year-old guy who works in the system now,

I try to I you know, I try to influence the system positively for people like us, right? Yeah,

I think now I can see how everything works together and how important it is to have people

Doing like what I'm doing now or what Sean did to try to give access and help to other people. So to make it possible, not not giveaways,

Slaine57:08

But like to make it so there's opportunity out there for people who are really working and grinding and trying to build to have access to things like that. And it's like, man, if it wasn't for some of the stuff that Sean did, then I wouldn't even been a there wouldn't even been movies shoot here. And the same thing with Ben.

And why I say I'm eternally grateful to Ben and Matt. One, the industry that started that exists here. We almost have like our own film, the Boston film. Wow. We have our own genre in Boston. We've had so many great movies here. They created that. Yeah,

They started that with with Goodwill Hunting and then brought it here to do Gone Baby Gone and then the town which I was also

Lucky enough to be a part of. And I'm just

Ben Affleck is a is a brilliant creative artist. He doesn't get the credit that he deserves. He's a brilliant artist.

Slaine58:08

It was a trip, man. It was a trip. my so I had a a a project I did uh with Ed OG uh with our you know most people in Boston familiar with that OG is like the godfather of Boston hip hop

And uh another guy named Jon we had a group called special teams that album came out two days before Gone Baby Gone came out in the theaters we had a cut on it with DJ Premiere who was also like a you know yeah

My room growing up had hip-hop posters and records all over and it in in movie posters and all that and it was as if my childhood bedroom came to life and became my reality.

People talk about like a vision board and that being like a real thing. I had that vision board and my vision board came to life like that and very in a very real way. So

I remember going to the premiere for Gone Baby Gone and seeing my fat head on that screen for the first time. That was my first thought. Oh god. This is why everyone's been calling me fathead my whole life. You know, my head really is fat. I got a big fat head. And when you project it across a 50ft screen, you know, but uh I must have watched that movie a dozen times when it was in the theater, you know. I remember driving by a theater and seeing that it was playing and stopping in and just, you know, getting a ticket in the middle of the day.

I watched it like on pay-per-view and hotel rooms when I was drunk on tour

And it was just it's you know cuz above all

I mean being on a a movie screen like that I think anybody who grew up like at the time we did especially where like movies were king like that was

It was it was it was beyond a dream come true.

Slaine59:55

Well it's that thing that you said right like you know you get [ __ ] on and beat on and like nobody thinks like ah well you [ __ ] you're never going to be able to do that you you know

And I think the enormous support that I got from kids that I grew up with and I like I said it was multiple neighborhoods that I grew up in. So, I I've I had this real embrace come from the people of Boston that that I've continued with to this day. I mean, you're always going to have like people that hate on you and all that. It is what it is. It's part It's part of it.

Slaine1:00:35

Yeah.

Slaine1:00:39

And that's what it is. It has nothing to do with you personally, right? You just become a reflection for what they wish they could have done or for their failures or lack of action around some of the things that you did.

Slaine1:01:14

I am. So then I So

Slaine1:01:18

Not that much on the movie. I think it was scales at the time. I think scale was three grand a week and I was on for three or four weeks. The cash that I made on the movie was not the value of it.

Slaine1:01:29

Right. It was the platform that it now put me on.

Yeah.

Slaine1:01:47

Yes,

Slaine1:01:52

Not everybody you put that camera on, even if they're a character, is going to be good. You know, people people the camera comes on and some people can feel it.

Slaine1:02:07

Chill. Yeah.

Slaine1:02:09

And then there's a spiral that happens when you forget lines or you you know

Slaine1:02:19

So, this is the brilliance of Ben too, right? Like first of all, Ben super down to earth dude when you're dealing with him on a one-on-one level like that.

I tell people that was my acting school. He taught me, you know, basically what he kind of ingrained in me is you have it. You have what we need. Be the guy. Just be the guy. Yeah.

You know these guys,

Right? And that it was a very it was a very warm introduction to acting for me because I knew people like I mean I I really wasn't far off from that guy. But I also knew people even with the town too. It's like I know people. I didn't rob banks myself, but I knew people.

Slaine1:03:03

He gave me the freedom to do that and the confidence. So you'd pull me aside and be like, "How would he say it?"

I'd be like, "Well, yeah, say it like this." I mean, even with the and I've told this story before, but even with the cocaine, like when the cocaine came out in the scene where I'm Bubba and we walk into the

The ped the house looking the tr house looking for the pedophiles and gone baby gone. It's one of the best scenes in that movie.

That was the second day of my life that I ever acted.

Slaine1:03:30

And when the prop people brought the cocaine out, it was like sitting in the bottom of a sandwich bag like it was shake. I go, "This isn't the way that cocaine's bagged." Yeah.

How would you bag it?

Slaine1:03:41

I to ripped it off of my teeth like this.

Yeah.

Slaine1:03:54

I would change it up and and he gave me license to do that. Try it like this. Try it like that. Oh, I like that one. Right. So it was it

That's what I mean about it was my introduction in my school because

Basically he gave me the freedom to be like don't worry about that. Like this is the scene but let's really live in the scene and be the guy. How would the guy say it? How would the guy do it?

And that that opened up a a whole world of possibility for me. Now it's about being the guy.

Yeah. and being in the scene as the guy would be. It gave me complete freedom. I I don't like doing rap videos and rapping to the camera. I I just never have liked doing that.

But it's such a freedom to step into somebody else's skin

And just be how they were doing it.

Do how they would do it. Now you take away any self-loathing, any self-criticism, whatever, cuz I'm not even me. I'm somebody else. I'm driving someone else's car here. You know,

Slaine1:04:58

So, but I'm going to qualify that on a big movie like that. So, when we did the Tre House scene, we did that over and over and over. I couldn't believe it. I, you know,

25, 30 takes, you know, and then you switch camera angles, right? So, you they got plenty of [ __ ] And it also gives you a lot of freedom to play with it and do all those things. So there's a famous scene where I say, "Uh, you fat busted [ __ ] You pull a gun on me, you better use it." Right? Now, we tried so many alliterations, different versions of that. Try something else.

You know, really like dig into her, right? So this poor woman who's the actress in it, I'm like,

"You [ __ ] sweaty behemoth. You poor woman."

And then I got to go, I'm sorry. I'm just He's asking me to say all this. Like it doesn't say that on the page. She's like, "No, no, no. I'm a pro. I get And I get I'm like, "You [ __ ] hair lip [ __ ] dude." You know, like I'm going through all this stuff, right?

Slaine1:05:55

So I'm sorry. He's telling me to do all this. You fat busted [ __ ] right? You [snorts] you know,

I could smell you from here. I'm doing all this [ __ ] vile [ __ ] and I'm adding it into the scene.

And um funny story is is a couple years later she pops up on my Facebook thing and I friend request her.

Yeah. and she denied me.

Slaine1:06:56

Everybody has preferences or opinions, but for a pure like go to the movie, get a pop popcorn and watch this movie. I mean, the town was it. It had humor, it had action, it had love, romance, it had suspense.

Slaine1:07:15

Fergie.

Slaine1:07:35

People ask me, "What's your favorite movie that you've been in?" And I've been on a lot of good movies, but that was my favorite because one, you know, you asked how long was I on Gone Baby Gun. You know, I probably shot 5 days on Gone Baby Gun on [snorts] the town. I was on for the run of show they call it, right? So I was on from the first day shooting to the last day shooting. I didn't shoot every day,

Slaine1:07:56

Yeah. I was on for the entire run of show. Like we had chase scenes. We had, you know, we had all sorts of stunts and driving and, you know, shootouts. So, I mean, that Fenway Wave robbery scene was seven or eight days of shoot, you know? It was there was a lot of shooting on there.

Slaine1:08:10

It was the time of my life, man. It was the time of my life. And

Slaine1:08:19

Yeah. I I'll tell you what, cuz when I shot Gone Baby Gone, I had no experience with that. I was just excited to be in a movie. And then when I saw the movie and,

You know, the critical acclaim it received, it was I was blown away. And I was dying to do another movie. Yeah.

So when Ben came back to do the town, you know, I messaged him, "Hey Ben, I'd love to audition for that." He's like, "Yeah, you know, I'll let you know, whatever." So there was a kid in the casting office, Peter Dudgeon, good friend. And um Peter and I got close after Gone Baby Gone. He helped me with some different hip-hop stuff for some videos. He did a bunch of production work. And uh Peter was like, "I think Ben sees you differently than he I don't think he really sees you as like one of the Cuz I'm like, I want to play a bank robber." He goes, "I don't think he sees you that way,

You know? I think I don't think he sees you as playing a Charles Town guy." And I'm like,

Slaine1:09:15

But that was valuable information that Peter gave me because when I did go in, Ben had me come in and read for one of the armored car drivers.

Yeah. And he's like, "I don't know if I see you as that." I was like, "Let me read for Clonesy."

Slaine1:09:28

He goes, "You want you want to come back in and read for Clonesy a different day?" I was like, "No, no, no. Just give me the lines right now. I'll go out and I'll come back in whenever you got a a gap in the schedule."

He's like, "All right." So, I went out in the thing and I there's a scene and it's the interrogation scene.

Slaine1:09:44

And it says, "No, no, no.

Um, I'm trying to you got it all messed up. I'm trying to make this sound authentic."

Yeah. So, I tried to go over the top with a little bit. So, when I went in for that audition, I said, "No, no, no. You got it all [ __ ] up. I'm trying to make this [ __ ] sound authenticious."

Slaine1:10:03

And when I got that role and I got the script back, they put that into the script, but that was based on the audition, the authenticious line.

Slaine1:10:11

That's how I got the role, though. I think that's that's what it took for me to kind of sway Ben. You know, when people when people are cast in a movie and they're looking at 150 actors tapes with the same lines,

You got to do something different.

Slaine1:10:27

You got to do something different. That's also true to what the character is. It's a It's a tricky thing, man.

Slaine1:10:58

It's a lifime sentence. It's a bid. I can't even imagine doing it,

Slaine1:12:12

Yeah.

Slaine1:12:14

Well, it's also I think I think we talk about like getting kind of beat down with people's words and [ __ ] on and all that stuff. Like that's rejection, right? So like

Every day you come up the corner and people are breaking your balls or, you know, zooing on you, whatever it is. And you're used to getting re I'm used to getting rejected and [ __ ] on every day. And everywhere I went, I was always kind of I was

I just didn't fit in, right? So

What that breeds, I think,

Is self-confidence, you know? Like if I don't tell myself that I'm good and I can do it, then who the [ __ ] else is going to? everyone's going to I'm going to listen what everyone else says and just say I'm a piece of [ __ ] and stupid

Or I have to engineer it so nah man you could do it you can do this you could do this and I think over time you build up

That core belief in yourself

Which is really important

You know what I mean like and I know what I can't do and I know what I'm not good at

But I know what I can do

You know and I and I and even if somebody tells me I suck at it I don't believe them it's like if somebody told me like Good Fellas sucks. I've heard people say that Good Fellas movie sucks.

Yeah. Okay. I'm not even going to pay you any minds, right? So, it's the same thing with the crit criticism of something that I believe in in my work. Now,

If I make something that I think sucks and somebody says it sucks, ah, it's devastating because I'm like, "Oh,

They've they saw my my my work that wasn't up to my own standard." But if something is up to my standard, like, you know, I've made songs and and records like that that people didn't get or whatever, and I'm like, "No, no, no.

You're not looking at it the right way. It's a great [ __ ] album." Right?

The opposite is true, too. Like, if you tell me that something that I don't believe in, I shouldn't have put that song out. You tell me it's a great song, it's not a great song, I decide. I make that [ __ ] for myself. And then I decide, you know, that goes with the core belief system, too.

Slaine1:14:18

My life legitimately changed by that point cuz the Lokosta album we, you know, it started taking the underground by storm. We were probably the biggest indie rap group for a three-year period there,

You know, cuz this is House of Pain getting back together

Slaine1:14:34

And Il Bill is in it who was a legend in his own right in the Indian underground scene. And you know, we're touring all over the world. We're crushing it. Uh, you know, we had, you know, a very successful first album. The town came out. It was the number one movie in America.

And, you know, neighborhoods that I was very comfortable navigating my whole life now suddenly got [snorts] weird, you know, like I'm walking down the street, people are popping out of their car, whatever, photos. But it was just it was strange, man. And at the time I I I you know depending on the day like was either coked out of my head or hung over or what like I was you know not really prepared for that.

Slaine1:15:20

At the same time I I got married. I have a young son

And by all accounts I'm living the American dream. Yeah. Right. Like I have a home in West Roxbury.

I have a a wife that I love. I have a a a baby boy. And you know, I'm doing movies and touring all over the world and and it was a dream come true. Uh, unfortunately, you know, I was already going to detox and all that when I was in that warehouse.

Slaine1:15:50

And that was years before. Now you're talking about five or 6 years. Fast forward. Now I have access. Now I have money. Now I'm making good money. And

Slaine1:16:10

I never I never really made millions.

Slaine1:16:17

The accumulation over time. I made millions, but you know, I never was cashing.

Slaine1:16:26

I'll say this, like I was making probably like what a good lawyer was making. You know, I was doing well. You know, we're touring. We got merch.

Slaine1:16:49

Yeah, you get royalties from records, you get merch sales, which go all the time, not just on tour, right? T-shirts and all that. And um then you know we commanded a decent rate for touring and we would tour and I would tour solo after that. I was building my solo brand at the same time we had the group. So I had multiple different streams of revenue.

Slaine1:17:18

Me solo back then?

Slaine1:17:20

I don't know maybe five or 10 grand.

Slaine1:17:27

Yeah, of course. There's always overhead and expenses and like I said, it's the accumulation of so you don't just go do one show. You

Slaine1:17:37

So, so yeah, I mean it's the

You got to stay grinding. It's not like nobody's writing a million dollar check tomorrow. Like the the money is in the grind and the hustle and it's also in the other opportunities that the platform brings. Yeah.

So, you know, you got to continue to be a hustler. It's not

Slaine1:18:10

No, no, no. So, so I was told, man, you missed the boat cuz cuz I I came on after like the Napster. I came on before streaming. Y

After Napster, physical sales were, you know, sucked.

And you know, in the '9s when all my mentors and everyone that I was working with, they were all getting million-dollar deals, $2 million deals. I missed that.

Slaine1:18:34

Right. So my experience was

Keep your eye on the ball. Go out and get what you can get. That we used to have a saying and you know the fire is right there for Coco. Like pick up a stick, [ __ ] Like you know, light your fire off of that fire. And that's what I did. And I tried to find every

So I didn't I never had like a check every Friday. I never had any kind of real job or meaningful career for any extended period of time. Like

It was like I wake up and like how you going to get it today?

Slaine1:19:25

Well, it's like I said though, it's it's the ADHD mindset. It's a superpower. So, it's like vision and hustle and and the ability to juggle lots of things. To me, that's a superpower.

Slaine1:19:36

But I can't.

You if you give me a task list and stick me in an office,

I'm [snorts] quitting. Yeah. Like, I'm not going to make it through the week. you know, like maybe I could rough it through a week and if the stakes are really high and I got to support, you know, kids and all that, maybe I could make it a year, but I'm going to [ __ ] go insane cuz I just don't I'm not engineered like that. Which is goes back to that school system that says sit down, follow these tasks, answer these questions, memorize this material, which by the way

Is is a skill set that is gone now with artificial intelligence. It doesn't [ __ ] matter anymore.

That's right. So it tips it in our favor. Even more so like the vision, the idea, the relationships, the connection, right? All those things, they lean towards us. It favors us.

Slaine1:20:36

You can move things around sometimes. Sometimes you just got to rough it out. Most of the time you just got to rough it out. And

Even now, like if I'm sick, I might work from home, but I still got to work. I mean,

When you have a lot of responsibility and people working for you, like can't just not answer their calls.

Slaine1:21:00

It was a tremendous kind of rise there for a bunch of years. And I thought like, and this is where I left off, like I was going to detox already years prior. Now you put gasoline on it and I thought like I figured this out.

Slaine1:21:12

You guys can't drink and get high. I can. And I can. Not only that, it's expected when I show up at these shows. It's like a sideh show how [ __ ] up I am.

People aren't mad at that. The band was,

You know what I mean? Cuz these are these are veteran artists who already went through that time and I'm 10 years younger than all them. I'm the baby of the group and I'm out there like I've arrived and they're like, "Nah, dude. Like

You can't be doing that shit." So, I mean, there was like a lot of interventions and all that. And Danny, that's why I say Danny is like a big brother to me. I love Danny Boy. I never had a big brother

And Danny was my big brother. So, he was a hero when I was a kid. I saw Danny get sober and, you know, he he would always like try to help me and and take me around. And I won't say he never gave up on me. I think he he never gave up on me, but he u he was annoyed and frustrated with me for a long time. And then like, you know, I would come and I would relapse. I would come around, I would try to get sober, I would relapse.

We'd be out on the road, I'd stay sober for a week, I'd relapse.

And um I just I didn't lose enough yet, apparently. And uh [gasps and sighs] and I started to lose a lot, you know. I start I lost my marriage, I lost the house, I started to lose my career. You know, I I did a movie called Killing Them Softly with with uh Brad Pitt and James Gandalfini, Ray Leota, and I was going through my divorce at that time. And uh you know, I was just wasted on set every day. They're finding me passed out on the roof of the hotel, shitfaced, and um nobody tells you, you know, that the phone just stops ringing.

Yeah. you know, and the shows got smaller and the things started to dwindle and um you know, I was in a pretty dark place, but I um [clears throat] none of the none of the stuff really woke me up. None of the you know, the hospital visits, none of the friends dying, none of the even the losing everything. I've I always felt like I'll make it back. I could, you know, it was almost like it was just like the ego went wrong, you know,

But I think um, you know, I I I wasn't able to show up as a father, you know. So as as my son started to get a little bit older and you know once the fracture and the and the marriage happened now this is my best friend growing up you know she was like a family member to me and and when that all kind of fell apart because of my drinking and drug use I only had supervised visits with my son and I wasn't even really able to make those and and I started to see that it was affecting him and um you know it just like broke my heart.

I was I was uh I couldn't look at myself in the mirror after that. It was, you know, like I knew that I was I was not I loved my son, but I wasn't a good father and at that time, you know, and um there was a lot of trying and failing. And um on March 3rd, 2014, I was in LA and I walked into uh a meeting at the comedy store that Danny Boy was the secretary of and uh he said, "Welcome back. Been saving you a seat." And you know, for all the other times I went to the program for 20 years and I started going when I was 18, it took me 15 years to get 30 days sober.

Um I didn't even think sobriety was a possibility for me. I didn't, you know, like I I would I would get sober like if you took if you took drugs and alcohol away from me. I don't know how to do anything in life. Like I didn't know how to look someone in the eye.

I don't know how to tie my [ __ ] sneakers. Like I don't know how to like pay a bill. I don't know how to do anything sober. I've never done it. I never did it. I' I've been drinking and getting high for since I was a kid. like [ __ ] when I look at at my you know I have two daughters who are 13 and when my son they're like babies man that's I was I was drinking and doing hard drugs since I was that age and now like when I would get sober it was like I had been dropped into someone else's life

And I didn't know how to do anything.

Slaine1:25:28

And it was terrifying. And [clears throat] um when I went when I went back to the program I um I was hopeless. I thought like this doesn't work for me. I've tried this a thousand times. But like I I was just in so much pain that I was going to lose my son, lose my relationship with my son. And dude, I I crawled out of that [ __ ] hell like one step at a time. It was hard. I had to be willing to to give everything up.

Like I I I I thought I couldn't create music sober. I I couldn't walk on stage sober. I couldn't go to the studio sober. like I didn't know how to do it. So, I had to be willing to give it up. And there was only one thing I was willing to give that up for, and it was my son, my boy.

Slaine1:26:52

I came back to Boston with 28 days sober. I had been going to meetings every day in LA and working with the sponsor and kind of being held up and propped up, but I was so depressed. I wanted to use every minute of the day.

And when I got back to uh I walked into the house in in Roslindale and um and my ex-wife, now ex-wife, you know, devastated by that too. I was devastated. walked in to that house and um and I thought maybe they're gonna have like balloons for me or you know cake or something like that, but they were like not super happy to see me and

And she said, "George, I got to tell you something. And um I met a guy and and I think we're going to get married and man I was like you know my head just started spinning and spiraling and I walked out of that house stormed out of the house really and I and I drove to the bar and um I was sitting in front of the bar. I can remember it like just like uh very viscerally like I can feel

The feeling of it. And um for the first time in 20some years of trying to get sober, I called my sponsor before I walked into the bar. And he's like, "Uh, you obviously don't want to drink, otherwise you wouldn't have called me first." He goes, "You want to stay sober?" He's like, "So here's what you're going to do. You're going to go find a meeting." He goes, "I want you to raise your hand and I want you to talk about the way that you're feeling." He goes, "I want you to look for somebody who has two or three days sober.

You get 28 days sober. just asked them how they're doing and uh he had had me like praying and stuff like we're working on

Working some of the stuff in the program and he says uh and then when you leave that meeting I want you to go home. He goes you know how you've been praying right? I go yeah he goes I want you to pray that they get everything that they want. That sounded foreign to me. Why the [ __ ] would I do that? Why would I pray that they get everything? Do you understand what's happening to me? Like I'm going to lose my boy. I want you to pray that they get everything that they want.

And I did that. It was like so against I I didn't mean it when I did it in the beginning, but he made me do that for seven straight days.

And I was still sober on the 35th day. And um she uh called me up and she said, "I want you to meet I want you to meet this guy. His name is Bill. I want you to meet him before I introduce him to Terrence, who's my son. And my son's 5 years old, you know. So I call up my sponsor. He goes, "You can't believe this. She wants me to meet this [ __ ] guy." [sighs] He says, "Wow, what an amazing woman." I said, "What?

What do you mean by that?" He goes, "You mean to tell me you burned her life down to the ground? She was your best friend growing up, like a family member to you, the mother, your son. You burned her life down to the ground along with yours with your drinking and drug use. and she still has enough grace to ask you to introduce this guy. She wants you to meet this guy before she introduces him to your son. I said, "I didn't think about it like that." He said, "Yeah, of course you didn't." He goes, "But [clears throat] you have an opportunity to do something here.

You're going you're going to go look at him in the eye. You're going to show [snorts] him respect. Allow him to respect you back. And in doing so, you're going to help her start the rest of her life cuz she deserves that." And I did that. That was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. And then he says to me, um, you know, I struggled with like the the God stuff in the beginning, but you know, I um I had, you know, you have to find a higher power and and mine was the universe.

And he said, um, it's that's changed and evolved over time. You know, I believe in God, but at the time it was just the universe. I knew that was a power greater than me. It was indisputable, right? And he says, "Can you believe in the universe out there that uh that the universe has a plan and that this is it and it's going to be the best thing for her, the best thing for this guy, the best thing for you, and most importantly, the best thing for that little boy you love so much." I said, "I can try." and he said, "Uh, that's step three, right?" So, step three, I might be talking a little out of school for the for the 12 steppers, but um I came to find an understanding of what acceptance meant that I wasn't in control of everything that happened.

And, you know, I think I had a very childlike view of life and that things I needed things to be a certain way for me to be okay. like and um I I learned something and I found something uh in sobriety, especially in my first year and dealing with all this stuff that I don't think anyone aspires to and it's called humility. [gasps] I remember telling ill Bill when I was like 44 days sober, I think I figured out what the sobriety [ __ ] is.

He goes, "Yeah, what is it?" I go, "You got to learn how to eat shit." And that's what it feels like in the beginning, right? And it's like I got to walk through this difficult [ __ ] in life. I got to look at everything that I destroyed. I got to take accountability for the things that I destroyed. And I got to figure out a way to take one step forward one day at a time and start to pick up the rubble of everything that I [ __ ] wrecked.

Because like, yeah, I found all this success with all these things and I ran on self-will with a lot of the stuff and it was successful for me in in a lot of different ways, but it also almost killed me and almost destroyed me. And [snorts] um I will tell you like they they ended on ended up getting married and uh he's as good a stepdad and as good a man as you could ever hope. And uh they had two little kids that I love very much.

They call me Uncle George. And uh you know I have a tremendous relationship with my son. He doesn't remember me being the way that I used to be. And uh you know we coexist very well. And you know like I mentioned I have a fiance and uh she has two daughters. We have two daughters. I've been raising them with her since they were four years old. And um you know I I think I told myself this sad story that I lost my family an active addiction

And uh nothing could be further from the truth you know like I my family has just changed shapes like I still have all these people in my life I love them all very much and uh that's the peace of God you know I think like that's that's what I found in sobriety which was worth worth so much more like I think you know Danny Boy used to say say to me, I can see the change in you.

You could I can see the change in you before you can see it yourself.

Right? We can see the change in others before they can see it themselves. And I remember pulling out of my ex-wife's driveway, um my son's mother's driveway, my friend. I don't like to call her my ex-wife. She's still my dear friend. and seeing her with her family and feeling genuinely like grateful and happy for her. You [clears throat] know, this is years into her

And I thought to myself like I see the change in myself for the first time, you know, like I see the real change in myself cuz I wasn't capable of that at one point. It would have been all ego and

And all that. And um I always tell people my experience is like I really struggled to get sober for decades. And uh I think there's one thing that you need to be able to believe in order to get sober. I think it's it's you there's multiple pathways but I think you need to come around to believe in that in the higher power thing and also that everything happens for a reason and it's not happening to you, it's happening for you. M

If you can get yourself there, then you can get sober and stay sober and and you can do something really positive with your life.

Slaine1:35:42

Well, you know, we were divorced for a few years at that [clears throat] point and I was,

You know, in and out of detoxes and hospitals and everything, right? And

To me, it was a blip to her. She had to grieve the relationship, pick up, move on, raise our son by herself for a time there,

Which, you know,

I um I've made amends for. I

I don't carry that guilt with me. I'm just grateful that she was such a strong woman that she could do that with me being in the state that I was.

Slaine1:36:12

Um I think um it was all meant to be. It was all the way it was supposed to be. It needed to happen. Would I have even gotten sober if that didn't happen? Because it really raised the stakes there.

There are two things that get people sober. Fear and love. And I had a big dose of both of those.

Yeah. And I knew that if I didn't get my [ __ ] together, this guy had his [ __ ] together

And he was going to replace me.

I didn't want that to happen.

Slaine1:36:39

So, you know what I didn't see coming is

What an asset it would be, I think, to my son. I think he could see it now that he's older. Like, our bond is like this. We're

We're tight. That's my boy. Um, but if something ever happened to me, I know he's got somebody else also in his life that's got his back, too. And he has double that, right? Like he has and I think the same thing about about my girls. Like, you know, I'd do anything for them. You know, I I wondered like, can I love somebody the way I can I love another kid the way I love my son? Like,

It's amazing like the resilience of the human spirit, but also like the space for love, the capacity for love that we have. You know what I mean? And I and and there's a part of me that thinks like addiction is is like a love and attachment disorder. Like so all these fears I have with like abandonment and not being good enough and like

You know I think like it's it's just like grief. It's like love with nowhere left to go, right? Like you have nowhere. But then like when you get sober and you know you build a life that's built on purpose and alignment

That like I have all this like love to like give not just to my kids to to my girl and all that but like how about to like to my community and to my city and to the people. I love this place. I I'm here because I love it here, you know? I love the people in Boston. I love I love my life, man.

Slaine1:38:47

Well, the hardest thing is to feel those kind of feelings, man, and not drink or use to numb them. Like I've I think the real tough guy [ __ ] is to actually

Show up when you feel like [ __ ]

Slaine1:39:01

Show up when things aren't going your way and to consistently

Show up with love for the purpose of like I knew like I'm showing up for my son.

Slaine1:39:11

I got to show up for my boy.

I got to be the best version of myself for my son. Yeah. I feel like I want to drink today, you know, early on. I I want to get high. I want to run away from the way I feel. I want to lash out, you know, I'm angry, you know, like, but at the end of the day, what happens if I go into that bar and I don't go to that meeting and I don't listen to what my sponsor says?

I mean, I would have probably, let me find out who this guy is.

Slaine1:39:40

Go have a conversation. Exactly.

Probably have a restraining order on me. I'd probably be dead.

Yeah. If I wasn't, I'll probably be locked up or I wouldn't be in, you know, and I wouldn't be in my son's life and I wouldn't be able to do all the things I could do today. So, when I say my sister said to me, like I said, I was with my mother. My mother lives in Pennsylvania now near my sister who has young kids and she's help helping uh her and her husband out and all that. [gasps] And my sister said to me, I'm playing with my niece and my nephew.

She goes, "How do you have so much joy? How do you have so much joy? you like you have so much joy in life that you're bringing to life [sighs] and I was like do I I love my life

You know like I love that I get to be there with my sister's kids and told her like you're doing it you got you got healthy kids

It's uh I think when you almost lose everything when you almost lose your life or when you experience loss to the degree that I've lost so many friends from addiction over the years

It gives you a gratitude, man. Like I tell my friends, I love you. Love you, bro. Love you all the time. And some people get weird with that, too. They're like, "What the [ __ ] Why didn't you tell

Like No, man. Like, I know what it's like to lose people that I love. I've lost friends and not told them I love them."

Slaine1:41:02

So, I'm not letting that happen again, man. Like, I've I love my life.

I love all the things that I get to do, and I'm [ __ ] grateful. Yeah.

Slaine1:41:16

I always have dreams that I already used them. Right. So I I I don't have dreams that I'm using the drugs that I'm getting high. Like I'll come to in the middle of a dream and it's [ __ ] I relapsed.

Slaine1:41:29

I'm not going to get to see my son. I'm not going to get to do the work that I'm doing every day. How like I'll have a dream like how how can I walk into Charles River? You know what I'm saying? Like in other words, it's a good thing. It's called a free lapse. I get to experience what it would be like

To use. My life is no longer built around drugs and alcohol. My life is actually built around the opposite. It's built around connection and family and love and purpose. It doesn't go together anymore.

Slaine1:42:17

There was a time where I couldn't imagine my life without drugs and alcohol. I thought I can't walk on stage. I can't create. I can't be the, you know, I can't be slain without it.

I can't be any of the things. I can't.

It's [ __ ] It's a [ __ ] lie, man.

It's a lie.

Yep. So, how did you start Charles River uh rehab? So, when I first got sober, I was in, you know, like I said, I felt like I got dropped into somebody's life and I was in a bit of a jam because all my music was about getting high and drinking. So, what the [ __ ] am I supposed to make music about now? I have a whole fan base that's like thirsty for

Slaine1:43:12

That.

Slaine1:43:14

And I did what I did in the beginning of my music career and what I had done all the way. I came to the realization like I've always written my lyrics based on where I'm at.

And I'm not going to change that now. Yeah.

I'm not going to lie. I'm not going to try to live, you know, this is going to be part of the evolution and the story is I So I just started. It was hard in the beginning creating and I was trying to find the thing and you know like I think when you first get sober you want to change, right? Like so I like grew my hair out. I'm combing my hair to the side. I'm like trying to find myself all over again. I was trying to learn how to do my craft again.

But [snorts] what happened is like as I started being transparent with my sobriety, people started to reach out to me. Yeah.

Hey bro,

How'd you get sober?

I'm really struggling bad right now. I just lost this. I just lost that.

And I would try to help connect people with resources or find them a detox bed. Started with one person, then a second person, then a third person. And then as I started to be more transparent and music coming out and people started to understand like, "Oh, he's sober now." And people started to see the change in me, like they say, it's a program of attraction.

Slaine1:44:28

Now all sorts of people are reaching out. So I was really willing to help people just like everybody who's in early sobriety and it's part of like keeping it is you got to give it away. That's what I was taught.

That's right. So, I started to do that, but then it started to get bigger and bigger. And then I started to have to find like, all right, not all this fits in one box. Like, what do I do for a guy in North Carolina who [ __ ]

Has no health insurance or is on Medicaid? Like, and how do I find a detox bed in North Carolina or in [ __ ]

North Dakota or in [ __ ] Arizona or whatever. So then I started like compiling a list of all these places that I could get people in and hospital beds and free care and Medicaid and treatment centers and all that. So I had a stateby-state list. Some of them had like, you know, 60 or 70 options on it. Some of them had four. You know what I'm saying? I slowly started putting it together. And then I started to educate myself about the system and the processes.

And then I started to see like

Some of these places suck.

Slaine1:45:30

You know what I mean? I haven't had a chance to like go and vet all these places and see them all and all that. So then I started doing that and then I started going around and speaking at different places and all that. And then [snorts] I was presented with an opportunity in uh 2020 2021 where a friend of mine called me and he's like, "Hey, I know you're a big advocate in the community for recovery and I was thinking about opening a place. will you sit with me and be a part of it and tell me what you think would make it the best place?

Slaine1:46:03

And I did and I was like, if it was in network, if you took Medicaid, but you if you made the place so it was like the, you know, an elite level of care like some of these out of network and private pay places are, but you made it accessible to the bluecollar guy

And you made like a incredible clinical program and all this

And that was how we started putting Charles River together and we're celebrating the four-year anniversary this week of it. We've helped over 7,500 people.

Slaine1:46:32

We have 170 people that show up for work there every day.

Slaine1:46:37

Yeah. We have 111 inpatient beds. We have about 60 people on the outpatient census typically there. So, you know, we have anywhere from like 120 to 140 people in there daily for help.

Slaine1:46:50

It's on the Weston Wallam line. Yeah.

And uh and then I opened up a primary mental health outpatient facility called Grand Rising Behavioral Health. uh about 16 months ago. That's in Norwood. Recently got licensed for substance use there too because I started to see it's co-occurring. There are so many people who are struggling with both. And um

Slaine1:47:16

Correct. Or you know when you have mental health issues like the symptoms of that can often be drinking or drug use. I mean that there are other symptoms too. It could be depression, anxiety, it could be cutting, it could be gambling, addiction, it could be there's a million things, you know, like it kind of shapeshifts. I've come to recognize it as

That was one of the things I I I've learned about addiction is it has nothing to do with the substance.

Slaine1:47:44

The drugs and the alcohol are my solution to the problem. You take the drugs and alcohol away, I still got the problem. Sometimes it's worse. That's what they say the difference between is between a heavy drinker and an alcoholic. A heavy drinker stops drinking and their life just gets better. An alcoholic stops drinking, their life can get worse. Yeah.

Right. Because now you're left with this [ __ ] spiraling mind and this depression and these underlying causes that if left untreated, even if you don't drink or get high,

They will manifest in other negative ways and different ways and still kill you.

Slaine1:48:16

I've just been down [clears throat] a journey with all that stuff, man. And and I want to leave people with this. Like people who are listening, don't let anybody put you in a box, you know? Like you don't have to fit a certain profile to to be strong in a certain area. In other words, like if I listen to everybody growing up about like white people aren't supposed to rap. You're a white dude. You can't what are you a wannabe? Like you can't do that. I never would have had that career in hip-hop that I think I did pretty well at and I think I've added a lot of value and made a contribution uh to the to hip-hop culture and and specifically definitely to Boston hip-hop.

And um you know I don't think that you know I I could have said like well I don't have a clinical license. I don't have a a fancy college degree or, you know, and how can I possibly open up centers that would help people or or to steer the ship or lead the way on some of those things. It's like very easily actually. I mean, not that it's easy, but I have other skills that are transferable, you know, like when I had to make a resume because to get licensed for Charles River, I had to have a resume.

Now, I had never made a resume. I never had to make a resume. And when I put a resume down, I started to see all the things I had done. The relationships that I managed, the brand building, the marketing, the, you know, community relationships and all these things that I done and they all transferred to this thing on vision and building brands and all this stuff like that's transferable skills. I actually have a lot of experience with that.

Yeah. I know how to bring people together and put them in different roles that that you know I understand where I'm not strong. I understand where I'm weak and where I need help. And that's part of building a team.

You know, like I've done these things for a long time. I'm actually very uniquely qualified to do those things and I'm confident in those skills. Now, I also don't get in the doctor's way or the clinical director's way and I let them do their thing and run a great program because I don't want to have a shitty place.

Yeah. I don't want to be like some of these other places. The whole reason I started is cuz I saw some of these other places weren't the best, right? So, I want to find who's the best in these specific areas and let them make my program the best. And I think we've accomplished that with Charles River and

And with Grand Rising and um

I'm very proud of those things. But I never could have done any of it

If I if I didn't have all those other things happen before it

And I don't have to fit into a box. I don't dress up like a CEO,

You know what I mean? I don't typically wear suits and ties or anything unless I'm in an event that calls for it. But,

You know, I'm able to be authentically myself and and and do these things and it's a beautiful thing.

Slaine1:51:20

You can reach out to me, uh, Slain's World on Instagram, uh, Facebook, Slaine. Official. Um, you can also call directly into Charles River Recovery. You can call directly into Graham Rising Behavioral Health. when people started reaching out to me in the beginning, I could answer every person myself. I still try to do that, but given and this is why I want to say this, given the life or death scenarios that there are sometimes we've been sitting here for 2 hours. If somebody was

Messaging me on Facebook, I need help right now

And I haven't looked at the phone in 2 hours. This is a life or death scenario. I have outreach teams. I have admissions lines. There is somebody manning those lines at all times. It's like you could reach out to Graham Rising Behavioral Health. You could reach out to Charles River Recovery and they will help you, you know.

Slaine1:52:32

Man. Thanks for having me on the show, Ken. It's a pleasure, man.

Slaine1:52:41

Thank you.

I love the city.