DMX walked out of a West Virginia state prison on January 25 after serving almost a year for tax evasion.
During a recent interview with Angie Martinez, Swizz Beatz — who just collaborated on "Just In Case" with X and Rick Ross from "The Godfather Of Harlem" soundtrack — revealed X is back on Def Jam Recordings.
“Certain people, I gotta cross the water,” he says around the 15-minute mark. “I’m like, damn. It’s raining out; I ain’t even bring my raincoat—but we gotta go. X is one of them [people].”
"I know who he really is. It’s a difference, if he was what people probably kinda think he is—maybe a bad person, maybe this, maybe that. I know [DMX]. Like, we slept on floors together. Right? So just making that, alone with him, is an honorable badge that I gotta always—I used to say ‘hold him down,’ [but now I say], ‘lift him up.’ The difference between now and then is that he wants to lift himself up also. And that’s why we’re [currently] getting this different type of X, with the consistency, and [activity], and even the way he’s rapping on the Ross song.”
He added, "You know, [he] got his deal with Def Jam now. He’s got a bunch of movies on the table. When it’s right, it’s right. But it’s only right when he wanted it to be right. This has been the most consistent I’ve seen [him].”
X was signed to Def Jam between 1998 to 2003.
Check out the full interview below.
