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G-Units Lloyd Banks, Young Buck Recording Solo Albums

Wednesday, 17 March 2004

| Written by Dave

Already buoyed by the success of last year's collective Beg for Mercy album, the G-Unit plan to spin off solo releases from Lloyd Banks and Young Buck before the summer kicks into high gear. Lloyd Banks will be first up with Hunger for More, due May 25. To set up the release, G-Unit will tease listeners with "Smile," the last single from Beg for Mercy, which features Banks rapping solo. That will be followed by a first single from Hunger for More. Though nothing has been decided yet, Banks said he likes a song called "On Fire," produced by Eminem.

"Eminem is crazy," Banks said recently. "I do a record and leave it with him, and then when I get the record back it sounds like he sat down with it for a month. You already see the video before it was shot just by hearing the music and the sound effects he puts in. He's a genius."

Meanwhile, Banks' counterpart Young Buck is also working on a solo album, Straight Outta Cashville, due in June. "Just like Straight Outta Compton," Young Buck explained, "but for y'all that don't know what Cashville is, it's short for Nashville."

Young Buck said despite being strongly tied to New York's 50 Cent, he had to represent his hometown and add a little Southern flavor to his first album. In addition to getting his G-Unit brethren as guests, he also recruited a cadre of Dirty South MCs like Lil' Flip, David Banner and T.I.

"I'm from the Dirty Dirty, so I kinda brought a few Southern artists into the picture," Young Buck explained. "We in the kitchen cooking. It's extra, extra, extra well done."

Young Buck also warned that the G-Unit hit parade will continue beyond him and Banks. The crew's newest member, Game, who hails from Compton, California, has an album due this summer. And soon they'll all welcome back Tony Yayo, who's scheduled to be released from prison next month ("Tony Yayo Pleads Guilty To Passport Fraud").

"Yayo's a good dude," Buck said. "In the beginning, a lot of people probably looked at me as someone who just came in because of his situation. But I was already here. So we touched bases for a minute, and him being away is like having a brother gone."