23:47Eve: Her new memoir, Ruff Ryders & hip-hop’s double standard
At 15, Eve was determined to leave her hometown of Philadelphia and become a world-famous rapper. She knew she had talent, but she decided if she hadn’t made it by the time she was 17, then she’d give up on her dream.
“I just always wanted [something] other than the life that I grew up in,” Eve tells Q‘s Tom Power in an interview about her new memoir, Who’s That Girl? “I wanted to get out of the neighbourhood, I wanted to get out of my city, I wanted to be on the world stage in some sort of way. I didn’t really know what that was until I actually really did fall in love with hip-hop.”
With her mother’s blessing, Eve opted not to go to college to pursue a career in music instead. After getting signed and subsequently dropped from Dr. Dre’s label Aftermath Entertainment, she eventually got a second chance when the New York rap crew Ruff Ryders asked her to come audition for them as their first female emcee.
“It was a cypher,” Eve explains. “I had to battle a few of the emcees that were already there that were signed to Ruff Ryders. It was basically rapping for my life.”
She remembers feeling nervous walking into “this room full of dudes” for her audition, but she managed to maintain her composure. It was the big opportunity she had been waiting for, and it was do or die.
“I had to go in calm and assured,” she tells Power. “[I had to show them] I’m not just good for a female. Yes, I’m female, but that doesn’t mean I’m weak. You’re not going to smell fear on this one.”
Eve got the job on the spot, but she was immediately struck with impostor syndrome. She says she had been so focused on impressing Ruff Ryders, she hadn’t really considered what would come next.
Hip-hop’s boys club
After joining Ruff Ryders, Eve’s entire life changed — both for better and for worse. At that point, she didn’t even have a full record out and she was already touring the country.
“It comes at you so fast, you have zero time to reflect,” she says. “You have zero time to sleep and you’re trying to keep up. I started drinking a lot. I was smoking weed — so much weed — and drinking and just not taking care of myself. I was, as they say, burning the candle at both ends.”
For some reason, they pitted females against each other.– Eve
For the first time in her life, Eve had to deal with a level of exhaustion she had never experienced before. With her newfound fame, everyone wanted a piece of her and she wasn’t emotionally prepared for it. Not to mention, she was devastated to learn that there was little sisterhood between female rappers in the male-dominated hip-hop industry.
“I think it was the nature of the business at that time where there was one female for the crew,” she says. “For some reason, they pitted females against each other.”
But there were a few women who looked out for her. Eve says hip-hop veterans Missy Elliott and Queen Latifah supported her as an artist and often gave her advice.
In 1999, when she released her debut album, Let There Be Eve…Ruff Ryders’ First Lady, Eve received a phone call from Jay-Z to congratulate her but also to temper her expectations. He told her not to feel disappointed if her record didn’t do well, since most female rappers at the time didn’t see much success.
“It put a battery in my back,” Eve says. “I know he wasn’t saying it in malice. It wasn’t him trying to discourage me. I think he was stating facts for that time in the industry. And that was the truth. Like historically, female rappers didn’t chart very well. As I say in the book, he became this symbol for me — and not just him, the industry itself, the men in the industry became this battery in my back of like, ‘OK, that’s cool. I see what the facts are, but I’m different.'”
The full interview with Eve is available on our podcast, Q with Tom Power. She also talks about some of her biggest hits and collaborations with Gwen Stefani. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
Interview with Eve produced by Cora Nijhawan.
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