Ghostface's Guide to Life: MC Gives Rolling Stone Readers a Peek Inside the Mind of Pretty Toney

During Austin Scaggs' recent chat with Ghostface Killah for the current issue, the Big Doe Rehab MC flipped through his new book The World According to Pretty Toney -- a sort of Chicken Soup for the Hustler's Soul based on a character he played in a series of MTV2 shorts -- and highlighted a few passages. Click here to check out a gallery of photos from the book, complete with additional explanations from Ghostface (his bon mots include "Take a shit before you leave the house -- nothing is worse than having to doo-doo when you have important shit to do" and "Why you gonna fuck up the crackheads?").

As a bonus, listen to Ghostface talk about finding happiness and forging his own unique style. "I don't want people to confuse me as an MC that talk about nothing. I've got stories on every one of my albums, big ones. I write stories, I don't just write rhymes, I write books. You feel me?"

Reading books like the Koran has changed Ghostface: "I don't do a lot of stupid shit I used to do ... [like] wilding out, punching niggas trying to interview me in their fucking face, that type of shit, feel me?"

Ghostface says he finds pleasure in the simple things: a good haircut, exercise, "beautiful shit."

Ghostface's gibberish-poetry flow was an intentional attempt to forge new ground: "That was a style. I wanted to be the first person to do that, and that's what I did. 'Scientific/My hand kissed it/Robotic/Let's think optimistic/Watch me dolly dick it' ... It wasn't meant for you to understand what the fuck I was saying, because I just wrote a rhyme."

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Song Stories

“Is It True”

Brenda Lee | 1964

As the British Invasion reached its peak in 1964, Brenda Lee went from Nashville to London to record one of her hardest-rocking hits, her perky vocal backed by a stuttering, squalling guitar. That guitar was played by session musician Jimmy Page, yet to skyrocket to fame with first the Yardbirds and then Led Zeppelin. "She said to me, 'I've come here to make a record with the British sound,'" remembered producer Mickie Most. "She felt she wouldn't get the same sound in Nashville because they're only just catching up on the British beat group sound of about six months ago."

More Song Stories entries »

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