The date of the highly anticipated and long awaited The Seventh Seal by Rakim is almost a reality. The project's first single Holy Are You is forcing hip hop heads to seemingly gravitate and salivate for the next prime selection. The album is being released by Ra Records, which is Rakim's own label and being distributed by the all powerful Universal Music Group. Hip hop enthusiasts are already feeling fortunate to experience the next dosage of influential content in this rapping world full of platitudes. From the days of Eric B & Rakim onto his current markings, to call it a journey would not be justice.

The rapping legend has not commercially released an album in nearly a decade, which no doubt creates many questions among fans and inquiring minds. Many thoughts are looming rapidly to know not only whether the project will pierce through today's recording industry slumps, but can this album replenish the game in totality. The last some of you may have heard on Rakim was through his much debated move to and away from Dr. Dre's Aftermath label, so in the mean time what's kept this musical pioneer afloat? There is only one personal authority gifted enough to shed light on these matters, so Yo! Raps reached out to the God MC himself for such enlightenment.                                                               

Today's landscape of hip hop materialism has almost substituted the value of being in sync with one's own community. From an artist's  viewpoint, has the in genuine lifestyle over shadowed the essence of the culture?

You've always seen some of that in the culture...how many dookie chains you got, whereas your sneaker game, the dubs on your rides and who throwing the most lavish party. I remember rocking out my jeeps and my first white Mercedes rolling through the hood with a certain sense of accomplishment. As hip hop got bigger, those prizes got bigger and Mercedes became Bentleys or G5s. Gold went platinum just like the record sales and I never knock someone who's getting paper for the first time - sometimes first in generations - wanting to show it off a little.

But with most things hip hop, if you let a certain trend start taking over the whole game and the game becomes the trend itself, you definitely lose something. If all we are talking about is cars, clothes, clubs and c-notes - we ignore a lot of the other force behind the culture. For me, I can balance that. I still got my pieces, but now they reflect things more intimate to myself - the right piece with symbolism behind it. Same thing with the music I create. Sometimes, I'm going to bring that party song and I'm gonna talk about some of the material accomplishments, but it's not going to overtake the conscious parts of my album. Life is 360 so our music should represent that too.

That's a lot of what I'm doing with this record. I'm not ignoring any element of hip hop, past, present or future - but I'm making sure it's got the right balance. The title The Seventh Seal reflects on the end of the world and rebirth of the kingdom of God taking all the best we have to offer and rebuilding. If we take those best pieces of everything, incorporate all around us and don't just follow the next guy, I think the culture is going to prosper for a long time.

I know you're coming back from a 9 year hiatus, but I also know you've never really stopped being an MC. Just to give people a clear perspective for those who may be confused that you're coming out from some type of retirement, can you let the people know what type of moves you've been making behind the gleam of mainstream.

Yeah, it's been a minute, but I've never stopped grinding -just maybe not always in the public view. When I came back from those few years in Cali with Dre, I knew the first thing I needed was my own label situation and my own control -creative and business.  So I took a minute to put it together -put it together correctly -with the right investors, building the right team and finding that situation where I could do what I do unimpeded but when it was time to throw some of the major label muscle behind it we had that.

And we've always been making music -we put together some great tours -live bands, big halls, small clubs -everything to stay in connection. I got involved with some other projects -video games, commercials, some work with Ecko and Nike and other things that fall a little out of the scope of the music but stay true to the culture. Most of the time when my CEO cap wasn't on, I was in the booth crafting an album that isn't just a collection of songs but a complete work. You see a lot of artists coming up and finding success putting out track after track and it's a proven road -for me though, I just didn't want to throw pieces out there until I knew I had a whole album that would live up to the anticipation. There's a lot still locked down there in the lab though, so you'll be seeing this and more.

You're a brand that's familiar with licensing. You did some work within the gaming realm by being featured in All Pro Football 2K8 can you tell other artist the importance of song placements or licensing as another means of a potentially lucrative opportunity as opposed to simply waiting on radio or ring tones to produce income?

No doubt. Keep that publishing money, keep those masters. There's a lot of paper out there for those projects and, more importantly, it gives us a whole new set of outlets for our music to be heard. We used to discover music through what was banging on the corner, on the radio, in the record shop, but now those corners have come indoors. I can sit down and play a game and hear something brand new that might never make it to radio but it goes in rotation right there in the crib. The streets are always fiending for new tracks and you've seen the ways they get them evolve from the club DJ to mixtapes to the radio to the television and now this. Everything still has its place but we keep adding on.

Most important thing about those things is keeping in mind what your brand is. Handle your business right and make that paper, but never put the short term money in front of the long term perspective because it's easy to flame out and the short money don't last long. I always go into a project looking at it for what it is - is the music right, is the timing right, is the image right, who am I working with, where's it going to air, what's the market place. When all of that seems to fit, then we bring in the heavy hitters to make sure the business and the paper is right as well. If you go about it in the opposite direction, it can have long-term effects. If you look at some of the projects I've been doing, I think those fit. Working with EA, 2K and Atari - each had there right place - a great new track on basketball that I'd been waiting to write for years, an update of one of my classics with Z-Trip and a great collab on a true street game - things I can be proud of when I'm cashing that check.

There have been many changes to the industry, as you already know. Do prefer the digital push of distribution verses having the product primarily on consignment, why or why not?

I just want them to bring vinyl back, my dude. Digital is a double-edged sword - I'm a bit of a purist so I can still hear the difference between an MP3 and a CD or vinyl and I still like checking out the cover and the liner notes when I play the tracks. And the industry is still playing contract games with things like breakage and return reserves. I mean, how do you hold my money in case an MP3 breaks? You've also got this whole return to 1950 where it's a singles driven market and sometimes the album is overlooked.

On the flip, you've got a lot more instant access to music and the ability to test out lots of different sounds without breaking bank. You've also got a positive pressure on the artist because if you want to sell an album and not just 2 or 3 tracks, there better be no filler on that...nothing but solid track after track or you're wasting your time.

Artist have always made it a priority to work with the DJs and record pools to break their records, but now bloggers are producing that type of priority exposure. How do you feel about that?

As I was saying, constant evolution is always positive. From the block to the DJ to the radio to the TV...each passing year or decade brings something new - a different set of tools - to the game. We got to work a little harder - make sure we're reaching out to everyone in everyway - but I don't mind it at all. Plus you've now got a worldwide audience on some of these blogs, so you're hearing what people think internationally. I wouldn't say there is a complete changing of the guard or nothing...what the radio do it do, what the club DJs do they do and they still break records...now we just have another piece to that puzzle.

Not too long ago Soulja Boy made a comment like he didn't initially "get" Jay-Z. With much of the youth at a distant from what some would consider to be a traditional form of rap music, are you concerned about gaining the nod from the youth market?

I can't really be worry about it from that point of view. If it ain't generational, people will say can it cross over regionally. If it ain't regional, people will say does conscious lyricism have a place in a party beat market. So and so on. . .I'm just doing me and at the end of the day if I'm making music to crack your neck to, to dance with your girl to, something that makes you stop in place and think for a minute...it's gonna find it's audience and the youth is going to find it.

You're on the road a lot so what is an instrumental difference in your stage show now verses when you first began to rock a crowd?

I try to do things a little different each time out and you always find new things that work and build on them. We'll embrace new technology without ignoring the standards that got us here. Sometimes I do it bigger with a full 12 piece band, sometimes I keep it intimate and sometimes I just vibe out on a sick DJ, but for the most part, my show is a reflection of the energy of the crowd and - for me at least - that energy has been consistent and growing.

What was it like knowing that you were chosen to bare the honor of the last performer at the historic club the Knitting Factory?

That's one of those privileges that I'm incredibly thankful for. I've always considered myself an underground artist and when one of the venues...one of the original and only venues that gave stage time to other underground artists and supported the scene from day one comes to you with the welcome mat out and the opportunity to be involved in a passing of an era...that's like putting a stamp on a moment in time. And the show? I think they might have let a few fire regulations go on that one because from the front of the building to backstage in the greenroom there wasn't a spare inch. Bodies just moving to a killer line up until the place got so hot it was melting the snow across the street.

I'm told that the songs you previously recorded for this project with Dr. Dre have been stored away. Will those tracks see the light of day in the future or is it unlikely?

I don't know about that right now. A lot of them are unfinished roughs, some of them were beats we were working on with a production team that Dre hadn't blessed yet. There's probably a few things there for the future but right now I'm focused on bringing The Seventh Seal to the masses in November and Dre's been working hard on his project. 

So many rapper's cite you as a prominent influence, so what continues to inspire your musical journey?

Many of those same rappers. I keep my ear to the street and I hear what's going on and I get on the road a lot so I get to hear a lot of things from different places. I also get to see a lot of things out there and mix with all sorts of different cultures and personalities, so I'm constantly expanding my knowledge. Then I get to come home and my family is there to inspire me all over again.

Tell us why the album is called The Seventh Seal?

The Seventh Seal is taken from the Bible, The Book of Revelations but you can find similar stories of the apocalypse and the rebuilding of man in Gods kingdom in many religions. Every time a seal is broken, there is suffering and catastrophe but also wisdom is imparted. Most people have heard of the Four Horsemen that guard those. In regards to the album, I tried to take people through each seal, each segment of the listeners life from the young gun making a name for himself to the maturing man dealing with the consequences of his past actions and so on until we break the final seal with Holy Are U and find knowledge of self. Once we've gone through that journey, we can shut down Hip Hop and rebuild it taking the best of what's out there.

What was the selection process like when it came to narrowing down which features or producers would make the final cut?

There's a lot of things that go into it. First is the selection process...I got a committee of people like Nick Wiz, Kid Capri, my management team, my marketing partners and my musical peers who bring tracks through and we all kind of listen together. I'm gonna have the final say, but it's really a joint effort. Once that beat makes the cut, I start my writing process...sometimes it's automatic and I go right in, sometimes it's a house listener I got to play in the crib for a couple of weeks before it feels right. After I've penned it and done a rough vocal, we get back together and listen again seeing where it fits in the whole flow. I don't do a lot of features but something might grab you as perfect and we go explore that road. Things kind of move organically...you might have it 90% and then another track comes along that has to be on the album, but disrupts the flow and you start rethinking the rest of the tracks. I'll spend months just thinking about sequencing and it's really not until the business side of the team is banging down the door that I'm quite ready to give it up and then I'll usually let them bang for another minute until I'm really ready.

With the album taking this length of time to create, the public is expecting no less than a masterpiece. Do you also hold yourself under such a heavy load of pressure?

I probably hold myself to a higher level of criticism than anyone. The artist has got to because at the end of the day this is my mark on Hip Hop. The public, the business execs...everyone else has got the ability to move on to the next thing if this doesn't work out. My music is my bond, my life. There is no moving on, so I got to make sure I put out something that reflects me and I have high expectations of myself.

If you could pick up your cell and dial back to the past what would you warn Rakim of "Eric B & Rakim" of the future as in what should he avoid?

I ain't claiming perfection and I've got a sense of humility and maturity that comes with knowledge of self and the world, but there isn't a lot I'd change. There's been setbacks and legal issues and some bad decisions but I've built a legacy, I've provided for family, I wrote some of the illest rhymes ever and the thing that stands out to me is I'm still here.  Still doing it with more skill, style and success than most for 20 years and in this Hip Hop game where we don't remember who was hot last month that's got to say something.

- By Sha'Linda Jeanine