Hammer & Co. Are Gettin’ Hammered in ‘Oaktown’

Todd (Too Short) Shaw lives true to his “In the Trunk” rap: I’m not a tongue-twisting’ rapper with a funny stack/Don’t dress hip-hop and dance real wild/But I do sell records like a motherf-----.

Shaw’s street raps and just-another-homey attitude--T-shirt, jeans, running shoes, Bill Clinton lunch--combine to give him extremely high approval ratings around Oaktown. By contrast, Hammer’s hip-pop act, TV commercials and flamboyant lifestyle (“high-sidin’ ”) have put him in the Oaktown doghouse.

Hammer gets little sympathy from his hometown peers over the problems at Bust It Records: Recent news that Capitol/EMI “dropped” Hammer’s company had some around Oaktown calling it “Busted Records.”

In June, 1990, when “Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em” was on radio stations across the country, Capitol Records announced a joint venture with Hammer’s Bust It label. Capitol paid Hammer’s company an undisclosed amount to produce albums from such Bust It acts as Oaktown 3.5.7, Doug E. Fresh, B Angie B, Ho Frat Ho!, David Black and Special Generation.

Two years later, word quickly spread around Oaktown that Bust It--with corporate offices in Oakland and a recording/rehearsal studio in Fremont--was cutting back its staff after the break with Capitol.

Hammer, on tour in Europe, was not available for comment. Jonathan Moseley, Bust It’s vice president of operations, would not specify the number of layoffs. “Mostly, it was personnel on the tour that were let go--a lot of background dancers, some of the support staff here,” says Moseley, from the Oakland office. He adds that the New York and L.A. Bust It offices are still open, but have been similarly “restructured.”

“It’s no different than what any other major company has done,” Moseley says.

Moseley says Bust It will still go out under Capitol’s CEMA Distribution, but “as far as the relationship between Bust It and Capitol, we decided to go our own ways. . . . What our expectations were and theirs were didn’t totally meet on common grounds.”

Several Bust It acts have done well on the Billboard R&B; chart, where Black’s “Lovin’ Ain’t Easy” was as high as No. 43 this year and “Ho Frat Ho!” peaked at No. 63.

But none of these acts have even scratched the surface of Hammer’s crossover status; combined, the non-Hammer Bust It acts might have platinum sales, but not individually.

The Capitol-Bust It divorce has added fuel to a popular Easy Bay sport: Hammer dissin’.

Robert Lee Green Jr.--Spice 1--says Hammer is wack (crazy) for not putting to better use the money Capitol gave him two years ago. “(Hammer) was at the pinnacle, and he sold out his people in Oakland,” says Green. “(Hammer) had 30, 40 million (dollars)--you tellin’ me he couldn’t sign a single street rapper?”

Green much prefers the down-to-earth Too Short approach to the way Hammer and his posse “flash their wealth . . . (Hammer is) runnin’ around here in 10, 15 cars. Nobody cares about him, not the real brothers. As far as the real people out here . . . Shorty’s been around forever. (Hammer) didn’t put Oakland on the map, Short put Oakland on the map.”

While Hammer is being disrespected up and down the East Bay, Too Short is getting his props (proper respect) from just about everyone in Oaktown--particularly the younger generation of street rappers. “He was the first rapper to a lot of people,” says Mhisani, a 23-year-old Dangerous Music rapper. “He made me want to be a rapper.”

Shaw says the rivalry between himself and Hammer “is just a joke, really. The Hammer thing, the Too Short thing, I don’t know what it was. I think it just happened because we both came out and signed with the majors about the same time. . . . One thing I like about Hammer, when they do say Hammer, they say (he’s from) Oakland. That brought a lot of attention to the city.”