Entering the penthouse suite my thoughts were not on an upcoming interview but on the spectacular view from the hotel's windows. Sticky Fingaz greeted me and offered a set next to him on a velvet couch. Fredro softly turned up some Beethoven, Sonny Caesar handed me some silk slippers and poured me a crystal goblet of expensive champagne.
    Okay, okay, I'm lying. So what? So what if the interview took place in a windowless, dirty, graffiti plastered dressing room? So what if the "champagne" was really a warm, straight half pint of cheap Bacardi rum? Did you really believe I had it like that anyway? By the way, Onyx has a new album out. Buy it or I'll give these angry bald heads your address, and they'll take your money themselves, saving a tape.

I understand you used to be on Profile (records) back in the day. What happened?

Onyx: Yeah, but they weren't behind us. They weren't pushing us because they said they weren't feeling us. I bet they're feeling us now!

After that, you got your break when you met Jam Master Jay (Run-DMC)?

We met him, and he liked our shit. After shopping twenty-something demos, he picked one, which was "Stik N' Move." Originally when we went to the studio, we were just going to do a single. Then it was an EP, then it was an album. Now it's 1998 and niggas got to back the fuck up!

When you released your first single "Throw Your Gunz," there was some controversy. What if people had took the song literally and started shooting up your shows>

I would say that even if we weren't performing, people would still be shooting shit up. Don't no music make you do shit! Music might make you want to fuck when you listen to a slow jam, but when I went to see Terminator, I wasn't gonna kill no cops.

You've had some songs — most notably "Stik N' Move" — which are about pulling stick-ups. Do y'all have experience in that area?

That's right we got experience! No question. We had a life before this rap shit. We're speaking from true, actual experience. "Stik N' Move" is here. The world and all of its problems is here. We just wanna talk about it.

As young kids, were you into a lot of mischief?

Almost every kid who grew up where we grew up was into mischief. If you was outside being a street muthafucka, you was into mischief. We wasn't trying to murder niggas, but niggas got they ass whipped a couple of times.

Even though it should be obvious, what does the name "Onyx" represent?

"Onyx" comes from black. Onyx is a hard, black stone. We're Black twenty-four hours a day, and our music is hard as a muthafucka. That shit's in coordination with the mad face. The mad face is 'cause muthafuckas ain't happy. The Black man is an endangered species nowadays, so we got the muthafucking mad face.

That brings back a thought of once when I saw y'all on BET (Black Entertainment Television). Someone said then that Sticky Fingaz is always having a bad day. Of all the bad days, what was the worst?

The day I caught my girl sucking the next nigga's dick.

Is "Da Nex Niguz'" based on a true story then?

That's based on the day I had somebody else's girl sucking my dick. They was married so I guess she was sucking the next nigga's dick. Do you ever lose your voices from screaming so much?

Naaaaaah.

What's up with the bald heads for years? A crew thing, an A&R thing?

That's some ol' muthafucking rebel shit! The mad face don't got no hair, and we don't care!

I've read so many interviews of y'all. It seems like every question has been asked already. Is there anything no one's asked you yet?

Hmmm, that's a hard one. No one's asked us what kinds of guns we like.

Aight, what kinds of guns y'all dig?

(all shouting simultaneously) I like the chrome plate .45 revolver long nose! I like the muthafucking .44 Desert Eagle nigga! I like the 9mm sixteen shot clip! I'm like my nigga, I like the .44 Desert Eagle too!

What was up with "Slam"? Hip hop heads don't slam dance.

Let boys B-boys! That was for all the real B-boys who are into physical shit and ain't afraid to put down their pistols and throw hands. We're taking hip hop back to its original state, where it came from, which is the streets. We were telling all the B-boys who were originally with it to make some noise and slam!



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