Travis Porter "The New Kids On The Block"

Lexilex: I’ve checked you out on the MySpace and YouTube. I’ve heard about you all on the radio, but for the people who haven’t heard of you, who is Travis Porter?
Travis Porter: Travis Porter consist of three members: Strap the fu-fu, Ali, and Young Quez to be exact. Travis Porter is basically a lifestyle and it has a meaning behind it. It’s not just a name.
Lexilex: What’s the meaning?
Travis Porter: Living life to the fullest (all three say at once). It’s about having fun and learning how to be yourself.
Lexilex: Now, where did you come up with this name Travis Porter?
Travis Porter: Um… you know how most white people have serious fun, they do what they want, and they live life to the Fullest. Travis! Travis… I’ve always wanted to be called Travis, too. You know how everybody else has names like Swagged Out Boyz, Gucci Prada Boyz, we have Travis Porter.
Lexilex: Your style is very animated, you bring so much energy. How do you stay that hyper to put that same energy into everything you do?
Travis Porter: We’re just having fun with it. We love what we do and you just have to have fun. Well, to tell you the truth, I don’t know how we do it. I just watch cartoons a lot… shout out to Sponge Bob (they all say).
Lexilex: (laughter) You guys are in all throughout Atlanta, making a name for yourself. How’s that going for you?
Travis Porter: It’s going well; we’re getting a lot of positive feedback. We’re starting to get recognized in the mall. ‘Oh, my God! That’s Travis Porter’ (they say in high-pitch feminine voices all at once). ‘Let me touch your face’!
Lexilex: (laughter) You guys are very animated, what’s the chemistry behind all of this? Do you just go with the flow or what? How do you record a record?
Travis Porter: It’s whatever comes to mind. We don’t think we just do it; if you think about it you will fuck up. Just let it out. Don’t think, just do it!
Lexilex: What’s the fascination with white boys? I saw that Black Boy White Boy trailer. You named yourself after them. What’s the obsession with the white boys? Are you going with the trend and how people are dressing? Where did that come from?
Travis Porter: It’s really the way we do it. We’ve been black boy white boys. We’ve been making our music like that. Just go to a white person’s park. They are out having fun throwing Frisbees, flying kites, skateboarding; black people just don’t do that. They just sit around drinking beers and shit. (Strap) Aw, man! Come on! Don’t do that to the black people!
Lexilex: Now you know I have to ask this: are you being racist and prejudice against your own.
Travis Porter: (Strap mumbles) Oh my God, he’s fucking racist! (Quez clarifies) No, not at all! I’m black as hell. We’re bringing Martin Luther King back. We’re bringing people together; shout out to Martin Luther King! (all three say one after one) Shout out to Martin Luther King! We come as one.
Lexilex: Are you guys related? Are you brothers?
Travis Porter: We’re step brothers (Quez & Ali say). His daddy be talking to my mama. (Strap) Naw nigga his daddy doing more than talking to yo mama! (Ali) Aye man, don’t be saying that shit. (Strap) And he and I go back, we’ve been boys…
Lexilex: (laughs) About how old are you?
Travis Porter: We’re eighteen and nineteen; sixteen in industry age.
Lexilex: Okay, so sixteen!? (Laugher erupts) What type of audience are you trying to reach? I had that Black Boy White Boy song stuck in my head all day. I had to take a nap to get it out. I saw the video with the big tittied girls dancing and singing and I’m like feeling left out like ‘where have I been?’ They knew the dances and the words, what’s up?
Travis Porter: Naw, it’s no specific crowd. We make music for everybody. My grandmother listens to it. She said we do well.
Lexilex: Going back to your songs… I was listening or watching the Sex Education video. You say you’re sending a message to the kids. Yet, you’re calling the women hoes. What’s up with that? How are you sending a message to the kids?
Travis Porter: You have to relate to the kids. They are talking like that now. They know exactly what you mean. You can’t say ‘Listen Billy, you can’t talk to this girl,’ no, you have to talk to their asses. Don’t mess with that hoe.
Lexilex: Are the videos that you’re doing on YouTube scripted or free styled?
Travis Porter: Everything is free styled. We don’t write anything accept raps.
Lexilex: Wow! That’s pretty interesting.
Travis Porter: Matter of fact, Sex Education wasn’t even supposed to be like that. It just happened like that. As you can see, something was scratched out (laughter) so we mess up. We just saw this dude and was like, ‘yo, let’s talk about him’. For real.
Lexilex: Wow, that’s pretty neat! Who are the artists that are starting to recognize you? Are they different artist, DJs, producers, what?
Travis Porter: I don’t really look at it like that because all of the industry people have heard of us by now. We are just cooling right now, we’re worrying about our in house first; DJ Teknikz, Street Execs. We’re good. We’re cool.
Lexilex: You have several mix tapes out, what’s the goal – like you have I’m a Differenter. What’s the meaning behind it?
Travis Porter: You know how some people say I’m different? You have to be differenter than those who are different. Like the record Black Boy White Boy, that’s differenter. You can talk about Polo, American Eagle, whoever but you don’t talk about it like we do.
Lexilex: Forgive me, but I heard on the radio in Atlanta someone saying they came up with the whole Black Boy White Boy movement. Do you call yourselves the originators of the movement?
Travis Porter: We are the perfectionist of it. We do this shit! Oops! Excuse my language. We didn’t, like… if you made the movement, you should have made the song.
Lexilex: What’s going on with the video? Are those actors?
Travis Porter: No, those are our partners. We go back long ways with them. They are our personal partners. They are in the real video but the trailer is just the clips from the whole video.
Lexilex: Now you know people are going to ask, what the hell is going on?
Travis Porter: That’s the point of Travis Porter. People are like who the hell is Travis Porter? Oh, my God! It’s three people? (all together) ‘Oh, my God! It’s three people’.
Lexilex: How does that feel now that people are recognizing you? What’s the expectation? What’s the feeling as you go forward and what’s the expectation after that?
Travis Porter: It’s a great feeling but you really have to stay humble. You cannot get comfortable. You get fucked. People will take yourself and then you’ll have to stand up. You have to keep working hard.
Lexilex: What’s the goal? Where’s the point where you know you have successfully made it.
Travis Porter: The airport test.
Lexilex: The airport test?
Travis Porter: If nobody says ‘Oh my God, it’s Travis Porter’ then you’re nobody. If there isn’t an old white lady chasing after you with a camera, then you’re nobody.
Lexilex: Out of all of ya’ll who’s the most silliest?
Travis Porter: Ali – no all of us.
Lexilex: Who’s the most serious?
Travis Porter: Strap is the most serious right now.
Lexilex: Which one have the most girls coming up to you?
Travis Porter: I knew you were going to ask that!
Lexilex: No, I always ask this question because people are crazy. What do they do?
Travis Porter: Strap, what do they do? (laughter) They turn into different people, I don’t even know what, and aliens I guess. Like this girl came up to me in the mall, she said ‘oh my God, you’re Travis Porter,’ and I said something like ‘You’re cool’ and she said ‘Oh my God, say you swear to God!’
Lexilex: You have a lot of music on the MySpace. How many mix tapes do you have?
Travis Porter: Three. We have a mix tape coming out with G-Fresh. He’s a white boy producer so we’ve done a lot of songs with him. Hopefully by the end of the this year, we’ll sign to a major and sign to a major album.
Lexilex: Then we have another mix tape coming out which would be four. Looking forward to an album. That’s major. We have people doing dances at the club, we have girls screaming in the malls, we have four mix tapes, working on an album… does that put major pressure on you knowing that you’re trying to produce an album for the masses?
Travis Porter: Naw, it’s no pressure. We don’t think, we just do it. At first, it was pressure when we were in school with our work but we got that together.
Lexilex: Will you be making fun of white people on the album?
Travis Porter: Um…we don’t know just let what the sound will be. We don’t think, just do it.
Lexilex: You all remind me a lot of Outkast. Do you get that a lot?
Travis Porter: Yeah, that’s an influence. Andre 3000 is a personal partner of ours. That’s our partner and ‘em.
Lexilex: Anyone else that you get your style from?
Travis Porter: T.I. and Lil’ Wayne.
Lexilex: How did you get so good at free styling? It was so smooth and consistent.
Travis Porter: There it goes again, don’t think… just do it. If you think, you’ll be messing up. (Ali) I can’t free style. (Quez) Yeah, he can’t free style but he’s getting better at it.
Lexilex: In the video, it didn’t seem like it.
Travis Porter: He can but he can’t.
Lexilex: Do you freestyle all of your music?
Travis Porter: Some but not all.
Lexilex: Are you working with a lot of different producers or only DJ Teknikz.
Travis Porter: DJ Spinz, CSI, Duck, 706, everybody Donovan Clark, G-Fresh.
Lexilex: A lot of up and coming producers?
Travis Porter: Yeah, all of them are.
Lexilex: Are you going to get into writing for other people.
Travis Porter: Most definitely, we just have to get us straight first. Family first.
Lexilex: Wow… okay, cool! Any up and coming producers?
Travis Porter: Space Invasion and I’m a Differenter. We’re on DJ smalls mix tape. We’re on a bunch of mix tapes. We have Teach her how to ball video coming up. We have a DVD coming but we didn’t name it yet. We have a video for the Baddest Bitch coming up too.
Lexilex: What else is coming up?
Travis Porter: I’m getting a new tattoo tomorrow. We’re going to Augusta & Savannah – shout outs to them. Shout out to Teknikz. We also have a song called Shiiid. We have a show coming up with Gucci Mane and J-Money.
Lexilex: What’s that like doing a show with Gucci Mane?
Travis Porter: It’s cool he’s a regular person, like us.
Lexilex: Anything else you want to add?
Travis Porter: Yeah, you look like my sister.
Lexilex: Anything else?
Travis Porter: Twitter.com/IamTravis Porter. Myspace.com/WhoisTravisPorter. And we have WhoIsTravisPorter.com coming up.
Lexilex: Cool. I appreciate this, and I wish you all of the success as you go forward. You’re about to take over Georgia pretty soon! Now I know, who Travis Porter is.
Travis Porter: Can we get some grits and eggs?
Lexilex: yeah they have it!
Travis Porter: Where?
Lexilex: At the Waffle House!