Wyclef Jean Talks To Chuck Jigsaw Creekmur & DJ Thoro About Clef Notes, The Quantum Leap Series, The Fugees And The Future Of Hip-Hop
Thirty years after the Fugees turned The Score into a global phenomenon, Wyclef Jean still refuses to let one genre, market or generation define him. The landmark album earned the group Grammys for Best Rap Album and Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group, while Jean’s 1997 solo debut, The Carnival, pushed Hip-Hop deeper into Haitian, Cuban, reggae and other international sounds. His career now includes three Grammy wins and ten nominations, along with landmark collaborations spanning Whitney Houston, Santana, Shakira and Mary J. Blige. GRAMMY.com has documented that legacy, while the New Jersey Hall of Fame credits the Fugees with bringing romance, playfulness and social consciousness into an era dominated by harder narratives.
But Wyclef is not interested in living inside a museum. Speaking with AllHipHop founder Chuck Creekmur and ever-present DJ Thoro, the preacher’s kid-turned-global musician discusses his seven-volume Quantum Leap series, the death of artist development, his unexpected country roots, the real story behind “Perfect Gentleman” and the spiritual warning he wishes the church had given him before fame arrived.
Chuck Jigsaw Creekmur: You’ve been in the cut, but you’ve also been all over the world. Which is it?
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Wyclef Jean: I’ve been all over the world. Coming up, I always said that a four-block radius is not what defines us. The world defines us. There is a Summer Jam in every part of the world. God is great, man.
Chuck: We were talking about church. I have a theory that church is why we may not feel music the same way anymore. What do you think?
Wyclef: I’m a PK, a preacher’s kid. My whole gift came from the church. I was a choir boy at a very young age.
They say PKs are the worst kids. I think what makes us the worst is that everything they tell us not to do in church, we end up seeing everybody do.
What we are missing is more of the real conversation. It is bigger than church. It is a God conversation. Are we steering further away from God? That is a different conversation. There could be more God conversations in the world.
Chuck: You have this Quantum Leap series. Clef Notes is volume one, and you have seven volumes?
Wyclef: Seven volumes. My mentor was Quincy Jones. I feel like I’m one of those boys, like Jimi Hendrix or the Marleys. I move very fast through the planet, and sometimes it takes people longer to catch what I’m doing.
Before the Fugees, my first music video was Eric B. and Rakim. Before that, me and Lauryn, Ms. Hill, were doing an Off-Broadway play. We did the first Hip-Hop Off-Broadway play.
I learned how to rap as a form of self-defense because I couldn’t speak English. When I saw battle rapping, I thought, “If I learn how to speak English and do this, the knife game could be less. I might have a chance to live in America. I might not become a statistic.”
While my boys were outside playing ball and Atari, I was trying to figure out the instruments.
Chuck: How does that history connect to the new project?
Wyclef: Look back and ask who did Hip-Hop country music before the trend. Go to The Ecleftic with Kenny Rogers. Who recorded an orchestra and put it inside the music? “Gone Till November.” Who worked with Destiny’s Child and brought them on tour?
Thirty years later, if I’m coming out with music, I’m not just coming out with an album. I have been working on seven genres for seven years. I’m going to present seven genres, and you pick the Wyclef you like.
Every two months, you’ll get another part of the world. The first is Clef Notes. Then comes jazz, and it keeps going. At our age, we can’t compete with a kid dropping a mixtape every two weeks. Take your time, build the music, then give people something all year.
Chuck: That sounds like real musicianship and a real rollout. The rollout feels like a lost art.
Wyclef: We come from the era when artist development was real. Now it is all about the algorithm. The A&R is the algorithm. Labels see 500 million views and say, “Give this person a deal.”
The money has moved to the tech companies, so I want to see more tech companies investing in art. Artists also have to understand that they are brands. If 10 million people are watching you and you get 1,000 real supporters paying $100, that is $100,000. That is how the new hustle starts.
DJ Thoro: When you talked about country and rap, did you draw inspiration from Rappin’ Duke?
Wyclef: Of course. Shout out to the king. But the country inspiration came from my mother. Country music was part of what we did in the Caribbean. Charlie Daniels, Alabama, Kenny Rogers. I remember being in the projects singing “The Gambler” while people were playing dice.
We related to country because it was storytelling.
DJ Thoro: You play instruments, produce, sing and rap. Where did that come from?
Wyclef: The church. When your father is the preacher and your mother is the deacon, anything that comes into that church, you are going to learn how to play. Then you are directing the choir.
We had a hymnbook, and one day I told my dad, “We’re out of songs.” He said, “Well, make up a song.” That is where the idea came from that we could create songs.
Later, Clive Davis called and said he needed me to write a song for Whitney Houston. When you hear “My Love Is Your Love,” that is the church. Once I get into that church headspace, it is over.
Chuck: Do you ever feel underappreciated? I think you’re a genius, but sometimes the algorithm and other metrics skip past that.
Wyclef: I don’t think geniuses get credit while they are alive. That is why they are geniuses. In a thousand years, it will be defined who I am.
I don’t wait for accolades from humans. That is like waiting for a check from somebody. I spread the energy through the music, and I see it working with every generation. At a Fugees show or a Wyclef Carnival show, the crowd goes from 16 to 60.
If I had paid attention only to what radio called “keeping it real,” I would not still be here. Whatever was not playing in the tri-state was playing in Nigeria. Whatever was not playing in Nigeria was playing in South America or Asia.
There is something bigger than radio. It is called the world.
DJ Thoro: You also have one of the biggest strip-club songs in the world, “Perfect Gentleman.”
Wyclef: That is wild that you know that! When I go into the clubs, the girls say, “Wyclef, we want to thank you for the stripper song. It gave us a different perspective.”
But that was a real song about a girl called Maxine. When I was in high school, there was a strip joint around the block called Go-Go. As a musician and a sound-system DJ, you understand that it is a massive world and music can touch all of it.
Chuck: Did you see Sinners? Could the preacher’s kid relate to it?
Wyclef: One hundred percent. I got kicked out of church for secular music. They told me, “You can’t serve two masters.”
The problem was how they gave us the conversation. They gave it from a scary point of view. My father thought I would become a minister. If they had told me, “One day you might be in a room with so much cocaine it looks like snowfall, with a million dollars in cash on the bed and anybody you want around you, but a voice will ask, ‘What are you doing?’” I would have received the message better.
We have people in our generation overdosing and committing suicide. If we are trying to save more of our youth, we need a straight conversation. Be religious. Be spiritual. But also be logical.
The church made everything spooky. “If you do this, you are going to hell and burning in the lake of fire.” I’m saying, can we have a conversation about logic? I didn’t say you’re not going to burn. I’m just asking for a middle ground.
We’ll have more from Wyclef.
