# TRANSCRIPT REWRITE - NY HOOD JOURNALISTIC STYLE

Yo, when this cat first got put on to the crack game? Man, he was young as hell, but that hustle became straight business real quick. Nah, he ain't never touch the product himself—crack cocaine? That wasn't his thing. But slinging it? That's what he did. Fourteen years deep in the drug game, moving weight. Fourteen years, and the count's still going if you ask him. His accountant's the only one who knows the real numbers. If shorty could do it all again, would he still be a drug dealer? Hell yeah. It's a dream rush, son. Ask anybody who was really in the thick of it—that adrenaline's addictive as the product itself. That's what makes this occupation so dangerous, feel me? The rush you get when it's finale time, when you sitting up in the trap house counting bread, knowing the whole block hot and them boys could come through any second, guns blazing. It's a whole different type of energy. What's the favorite part? Counting stacks? Cutting up the work? Serving fiends? Nah, it's the whole lifestyle, the complete package. Being in the game is like being a rapper—you're a star in whatever hood you holding down. You're that big man on the block.

Sean Carter—better known as Jigga, J-Hova, or just JAY-Z these days. Right now the name rings bells as one of the illest MCs to ever touch a mic. The sharp businessman. The husband to the baddest chick in the game. But before all that fame, all that wealth, all them titles, JAY-Z was just another shorty from Brooklyn's Marcy Projects. Like so many project kids, his story starts out the same way—good student, doing his thing in school, until his pops walked out. With that void left behind, young Sean turned to them streets, and his path into the hustle started taking shape.

Who you look like more—your moms or your pops? His father, deadass. Looked just like him. That's what broke his heart, yo. As a kid, you look at your father like he's a superhero—ain't nobody touching your pops, right? So when the person you looked up to most in the whole world just removes himself from your life, that's traumatic. After that, you got no male role models except for them dudes on the block, them hustlers. That's what happened. After that, he hit them streets, and there's nobody else to guide you through that maze that is life inside them projects except for them drug dealers. So he's looking up to them, and that's how he got into the street life.

Now a preteen with no father in the crib and drugs all around them projects, it made it mad easy for JAY-Z to get into the drug game. But yo, how'd he really get into the business? It was fairly easy, honestly. Growing up during that era, you gotta remember the time we talking about. We talking Reaganomics, we talking about crack cocaine being everywhere. It just swallowed everything whole. You could smell it in the hallways, you'd see them little empty vials on the curb, floating by in the water. It was just everywhere, son. So it wasn't difficult at all. It was one conversation. It was his man who was his age who introduced him to somebody else who was maybe two years older than them. They had a conversation—it was basically like a job interview. Dude was like, yo, you gotta be serious about this. You can't be playing around. This is serious business. You gotta know your supply, you can't touch your own product.

That friend he mentioned who put him on was De Haven Irby. De Haven introduced him to the game, Spanish Jose, Anthony Cruz, introduced him to Kane. Now he's a hustler. He was going to IS 59, and his man Kane lived in his building at the time—couple years older than him. Kane used to be out at Marcy all the time because he had people in the projects. Seeing JAY in the building, Kane was like, yo, you go to 168 too? He was like yeah, I seen this dude on the fence all the time lined up. Kane used to tell him, yo, come to school, walk with me. But JAY wasn't fucking with it. This was third, fourth grade when they met, right here in this neighborhood—this is where it all started.

JAY and his best friend were more like brothers than anything—inseparable, doing everything together, even running a paper route. But soon that paper route shifted gears and became a drug route as they got older and the hustle changed. JAY's love for music never took a backseat though. One pivotal moment came during a talent show in Queens where he performed in front of none other than LL Cool J, one of the judges that night. They went to a talent show and JAY did a battle up there. LL was like, yo, you nice, shorty—gave JAY his flowers right then. This is before anything, you feel me? Really, JAY won that joint, but they just gave it to a Queens dude anyway.

At that concert, he met some girls. One of the girls, her father was like a big-time dealer. She came around with a whole bunch of drugs. He was like, yo, JAY, we gonna move this. That's when he came in. When he came in, dude showed him the same thing. They were just spending bread, shopping every day, not thinking about when the money run out, how they gonna get more. Dude ain't have none of them concerns. He was just like, yo, we about to eat, JAY, let's get rid of this work. Eventually, they ran out of drugs. He's like, yo, I don't know what to do next. He was going to the store and one of the OGs from the neighborhood that raised him—one of them Spanish cats named Spanish Jose—pulled him to the side. Was like, look, I hear you made a name, you making noise out here. I'd like to work with you. Once Spanish Jose came in the picture, man never looked back.

Life in them streets brought violence and crime, and JAY-Z wasn't no stranger to either. In one intense moment, he accused his older brother Eric of stealing from him, leading to a heated confrontation where JAY shot him in the shoulder. The gun he used belonged to his mentor and the one who first showed him the ropes in the rap game—Jaz-O, the originator. The day he shot his older brother in the shoulder for stealing his jewelry, he was twelve years old. Here's some lyrics he wrote about his brother: "Saw the devil in your eyes, high off more than weed / Confused, I just closed my young eyes and squeezed / What a sound / Opened my eyes just in time to see him stumbling to the ground." Nah, JAY ain't gonna talk about that on TV—that's not cool. It was Jaz-O's gun. Let that be clear. He ain't have the gun so he could go shoot his brother. It was just a thing back then—you got some arms, you got guns, you got a gun. That was the sign of being down with the streets.

Another incident went down in Marcy where JAY-Z got robbed at gunpoint for his chain. De Haven, JAY's close mans, nearly lost his life trying to get that chain back. Jaz-O, Tata, all of them was there. They come around asking who did this, who would come in the projects and do that—it's gotta be somebody in the projects. Coming to find out, it was a bunch of cats from some other projects that De Haven grew up in, 'cause that's where he used to live before he moved to Marcy. So dude's like, I'll go get it back. They all go back up there. When they get in Tomkins projects, they get surrounded. The group of guys surround them and everybody got guns except them. One of the dudes comes out like, yo, who y'all looking for? De Haven's like, yo, let me talk to him—'cause he knew one of the faces. So his homeboy comes over that he grew up with, thinking everything's all good. First thing dude says is, yo, why they here? De Haven says, yo, Jaz and Tata just came up here with me. Dude tells him to send them back. So he said, yo, y'all go back. JAY and Tata turn around. De Haven's the only one left. Now he's surrounded by them and they all got guns. He's looking at one, two of them like, yo, bro, we was in third grade together, we were in second grade together. And dude was like, nah man, it ain't like that no more. They let them shots ring out. De Haven took one straight to the chest. That's how deep it went down in them projects. Blood spilled over a chain. Bullets flew over pride. This was the real cost of the game—your mans could catch one any second.

But through all that violence, all that struggle, all them nights counting money in trap houses with one eye on the door, JAY-Z never forgot about his first love. Music was always there, waiting in the wings. While he was moving work and dodging the feds, he was also writing rhymes, studying the greats, learning the craft from cats like Jaz-O who saw something special in him. The streets taught him one game, but hip-hop would become his greatest teacher.

Years went by. The trap houses became studios. The corner boys became collaborators. Then one day, that same shorty from Marcy—the one who survived the streets, who lost mans, who held guns and moved weight—he stepped to the mic and changed the game forever. JAY-Z didn't just rap about the life; he lived it. Every bar dripped with authenticity because he wasn't performing a character—he was telling his truth. And the world listened.

From Marcy to Madison Square Garden. From moving ounces to moving millions. From ducking police to running boardrooms. JAY-Z's rise from the concrete to the penthouse is the ultimate testimony to the power of will, talent, and refusing to stay down. But here's what really matters about NY Goons 10 and the whole movement they represented—they showed us that your circumstance don't determine your destiny. These were kids from the projects with nothing, surrounded by poverty and violence, who could've died a hundred times over. Instead, they became legends. They didn't just survive; they transcended. And that legacy—that proof that you can come from the worst and become the best—that's what echoes through the hood forever. That's what inspires the next generation of kids looking out their project windows, seeing possibility where the world only sees limitation. NY Goons 10 wasn't just a crew; it was a movement that said: we matter, our stories matter, and our lives can mean something greater than the streets that raised us.