Joe and Jada - BEST OF Fat Joe & Jadakiss 2025: Clipse, Cardi B, 85 South, Nelly & Ashanti, Aries Spears & MORE

We kick it off with that old-school energy, singing Bone Thugs hooks, remembering Biggie’s cadence, and how I pushed to connect Big with Bone when nobody in New York was rapping like that yet.

Real question for you: four wives—how’s that work in real life? Is it pressure, equal gifts, same bags, head-of-household stuff, or what?

It only works with women who share the mindset that it’s a family unit, not a flex; everybody contributes, I’m honest about everything, and we set boundaries so arguments don’t spiral.

After my ugly divorce I refused to lie; I sat them down, introduced them over dinner, and made it clear love can include more than one person, but only if the structure and respect are there.

Call it polyamory if it’s not marriage; polygamy’s illegal in most places.

Switching gears—what happened with the label politics and your project?

We turned in the Clipse album with a Kendrick verse, and they balked at the optics during their lawsuit, so we bought our way out; shout to Hov and Roc Nation for helping us land and keep moving.

Tour life every night ain’t for my knees anymore, but we still bring it on weekends; either way, we carry a responsibility to look right so younger kids see a future in this.

Fans ask what Clipse will talk about in 2025 and why some of us still paint heavy pictures—I write what’s in me, even in paradise.

When you’re nice, the challenge is saying it with craft as life evolves; people claim it’s the same talk, but they’re not listening to how it’s done.

I make the music I want to hear for the people who want that; I know my audience and I’m not chasing everyone.

On this week in history, DMX’s debut dropped and changed our lives; he pulled us in, took it to Woodstock, and helped us shift our families’ fortunes.

X was already a star when he did wild things right in front of us, and later he even tested early stash boxes like a movie—pure legend.

Mama Love, we love you—how proud are you of your son and that iconic hair-braiding moment?

I first braided the back when it was coming loose, and I’ve been proud since the moment I saw my eyes in his; he told me this year he’s not done making me proud, and he meant it.

Thank you for putting me in your video—and for real, you saved my life once on the West Coast when old tensions flared and money was on the line.

I begged serious people to leave you be—sometimes you’ve got to jump in the middle and turn a bad night into peace, even when the room is full of monsters.

Jail felt like a third-world country in America; I took a table day one, built a kitchen on commissary with an Italian chef, recruited the outcast “Hong Kong’s Mongolia,” stunted on pizza men by cracking real eggs, and caught heat for wearing Jordans—trust me, you don’t want to go there.

What’s the difference between an MC and a rapper—and where do Big and Hov fit when Clark Kent says Jay’s the MC?

A rapper strings words; an MC commands the room and does it all—like when we watched Big and Hov build I Love the Dough in the midi room, Angela Winbush cutting the hook, and later X reluctantly taking Ruff Ryders’ Anthem that became the loudest thing in every car wash in the Bronx.

If I’m gearing up for a big game, I want that DMX energy, and I was saying how Wayne’s sound cut across regions, then told the story of dragging him to the studio for We Takin’ Over only to watch him torch the track so bad I left like, damn, why’d I invite him.

Tell that Mike Tyson and Eve story, because that night was out of pocket and you had to step in.

Mike was on demon time, even opened the door naked, tried to tempt us with a brand-new Benz to leave her, and I had to check him and leave as a unit because we weren’t abandoning nobody.

You were in the lab with Big; did he write on paper, and do you still have some of it.

I saw him do Hypnotize with nothing written, and that session made clear how special he was.

I remember Daddy’s House and those Branson jars, Havoc beats knocking, and I still feel like Big shouldn’t have been in L.A., even if he looked happy that week.

He wanted to be there, and nobody forced him, but looking back we all wish the risk calculus was different.

Back then rappers felt like superheroes; today the energy shifted and the streets bleed too close to the artists.

We always loved battle records—the exclusives, the anticipation—while forgetting how that hype can spill past music.

Hip-hop police don’t just watch the star; they watch the entourage, and one reckless move can turn into a RICO.

For biggest records ever, I threw out Hip Hop Hooray, Still D.R.E., Empire State of Mind, Hypnotize, and a Pac anthem, while agreeing In Da Club is an automatic hall pass everywhere.

I needed one from Snoop and Dre, plus Run-DMC and an N.W.A joint, and I told a story about My Mind’s Playing Tricks on Me literally stopping the block when we first heard it.

On that Pusha conversation, I live by ‘on the record’ versus ‘off the record,’ I didn’t think that part was private, and if I overstepped, my apologies because I don’t chase clicks and my work stands on its own.

I’ve had a ton of deep talks with him he’s never repeated, so if he knew it was off-limits he wouldn’t have touched it.

JD, what zone were you and the team in making that Usher run, because it felt like you planned a global takeover and nailed it.

We cut Let It Burn first, hit L.A., I got stuck, then drove down Melrose grabbing details like movie clues until Confessions took shape as a straight-up admission, which then led to Part II.

L.A. gives me writer’s block too, so hearing you map the song in your head made perfect sense.

L.A. Reid made the final calls, and the wild part is All Bad didn’t land on the first drop, so folks met Part II before the setup.

Before we wrap, I’m not capping about the tiniest fly guy in Morocco and our late homie Nelson; we even pulled up pictures and cried laughing at him perched on a watermelon in a suit.

Once the photos surfaced, all I could say was he had on the little button-up and sneakers, and that’s how we’re ending it—joking, grateful, and still arguing over who’s bigger, the pineapple or the legend.