Last week, Meek Mill released mixtape DC4. The fourth installment of the Dreamchasers series, which began in 2011, finds the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania MC in a completely different spot than when he began. In the years since, Meek has two gold solo albums, two platinum singles, and his own roster of talent. With that, came controversy. Since summertime 2015, the Maybach Music Group artist has been involved in battles and beefs with Drake, The Game, and Beanie Sigel. In the first example, Meek launched a 2015 smear campaign against Drake for allegedly using ghostwriters, including on their platinum collabo “R.I.C.O.”

One year later, another collaborator in Game ambushed Meek with accusations of cooperating with authorities. In other words, Game called Meek a snitch, and had records ready, most notably “92 Bars,” an album single that publicized the new feud at the exact same time it hit the streets.

Awaiting DC4 for the first interview on the crazy last six weeks, Meek sat down with Taxstone for the Tax Season Podcast. A statement Mill makes midway through the interview serves as a thesis to his point: “Somethin’ ain’t right. That Internet ain’t tellin’ y’all the truth.”

Meek recalls his non-music bond with Game, accuses Beans of “jealousy,” and argues why he feels he’s an elite lyricist—and Drake’s “Back To Back” poked at things that should be admired. Claiming he refuses to live his life out on social media, this nearly two-hour discussion (taped inMeek’s $300,000-plus Rolls Royce Wraith) is a rare chance to hear another, lesser-available side of things.

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The discussion gets in gear near the 28:00 mark. Taxstone asks Meek Mill his thoughts on Game shooting the “Pest Control” video in South Philadelphia, including a symbolic stop at Geno’s Steaks. “What type of move is that, though? Is that [what O.G.’s do?] What’s that? [I am] not even bein’ funny. ‘Cause if I roll through and take a picture on Rodeo Drive, I ain’t takin’ nothin’ from Game,” said Meek. The rapper argues that Game being a few miles away from his onetime stomping grounds is irrelevant. “That’s Downtown—that’s [a] white people neighborhood. You ain’t taking nothing from me. Even in [my] neighborhood, [Game could have gotten closer to me]. So many niggas out here don’t fuck with me out here; you could shoot a video even 20 blocks [from where I represent]. There’s a lot of opps’ in my ‘hood.” Meek is aware that he is a polarizing figure, even in his own city—a point that Beanie Sigel has used against Mill during his own Tax Season Podcast appearance. Meek asserts that he is not about symbolism as much as reality. “I be lookin’ at real shit. In real life, we in a [Rolls Royce] Wraith [right now]. In real life, I came from the streets. In real life, I’m felony’d up. In real life, I caught cases that had 10 [co-defendants]. I been in so many situations with niggas and stood up. In real life, that’s who I am. In real life, I be [bringing] my whole ‘hood on a jet. In real life, I wake up and Nicki Minaj is my lady. And let me stop even saying ‘Nicki Minaj’ like that in an interview, it don’t sound right. But that’s my real life.”

Moments later, the rapper updates his status following at least three major conflicts in the last 15 months. “Meek Mill is unscathed. I been to prison. I ain’t have no entourage with me; there wasn’t no guns. Meek Mill was runnin’ the block; I’m a top dog on the block.” Later, he debunks Game’s accusations of snitching, demanding more facts. “Told on what?” While Game accused Meek of cooperating in an alleged Los Angeles, California jewelry robbery of rapper Sean Kingston, no evidence corroborates with that theory. Meek tells Tax Season that when he’s been incarcerated in the past, he has been housed in general population—a situation often avoided by informants through plea bargaining. In 2008 and 2009, the artist—then under T.I.’s wing and Grand Hustle Records, was sentenced for a weapons and drug trafficking offense. He violated parole for another incarceration following release.

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Moving on to the subject of Beanie Sigel, Meek Mill asks the public to look closely at one of Beans’ accusations. The State Property rapper accused Meek of showing disrespect over a Reading, Pennsylvania opportunity for a concert that placed both artists on the same bill as Game. Reportedly planned for August, Meek refused the proposal that would allegedly earn him $80,000 for the set, and Beans $10,000 for his appearance. Meanwhile, Sigel grew upset with the fellow Philly artist after texts went unanswered and the agreement could not be met. Meek explains, “The show and stage wasn’t set up right. There’s a lot that goes into this.” The artist also said that Game’s involvement in the show was irrelevant, given it was a month before “92 Bars” released.

Furthermore, Meek uses the fact that $80,000 could not sway him to remind skeptics that his career is in tact. “I’m Meek Mill; I’m supposed to be finished.” After having a longtime acquaintanceship with Beanie, Meek says that if that issue is what caused the conflict, it says a lot about Sigel. “That 10 grand really determined how you feel about me. That shit you said, you [must have] really wanted to say that [for a while].” The MC also points that Beans started releasing diss verses almost immediately after the apparent ally turned against his hometown neighbor.

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Earlier in the interview, Meek spoke about his current feelings to the artist who appeared on his Game rebuttal, “Ooouuu.” “I don’t feel nothin’,” he waves. “I looked up to Beanie Sigel my whole life, as a young nigga.” While Beanie Sigel has stated that he validated the song, risking his own relationship with The Game as well as helped out in its writing. Meek sees it differently, while asserting Sigel wrote none of his bars. “I’m out here providing for my family; I’m actually blessing you [by including you on ‘Ooouuu,’ you on your [downward career path].”

Things grew complicated when Beanie Sigel was attacked at the Bad Boy Family Reunion Tour while in Philly. A Meek affiliate and relative of Beans named Teefy Bey took credit for what Sigel said was a cheap-shot punch landed on the former Roc-A-Fella artist. In interviews since, Beans has blamed Meek for the attack. It is here that Meek Mill questions Beanie Sigel’s whole character. “You gonna go on camera and say I had something done to you. That’s enough to put me in jail. First of all, you go on an interview and say [he told me something about Nicki Minaj]. That was just trifling. So basically, you trying to send me to jail. You’re trying to screw [up] my relationship. You’re trying to get close to me—basically set me up, rob me, kill me, bring me harm. You’re trying to say you wrote my shit. You’re basically trying to destroy me.”

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While this back-and-forth has played out online, Meek Mill says he does not hear the chatter. “I’ve been fallin’ back from that Internet world.” Of Beans, Meek uses rifts within the State Property collective to illustrate that he and Beans were never really the student-master dynamic that’s been presented to the media. “He don’t really know me like that,” says Meek, who admits he has a closer bond with former S.P. member Oschino (who has also criticized Beanie recently). “It’s jealousy, probably. Period.” As for the attack of Beanie Sigel last month, Meek maintains he was at the concert, supporting Bad Boy and taking in the stage show. “I don’t know about none of that though.” Meek adds that he was with his mother at the time. “I wasn’t even on the scene.” The artist does say he saw Beans upon exiting that night. Sigel took to the stage to proclaim himself the “king” of Philadelphia, an apparent shot towards the MMG MC.

While Beans has questioned Meek’s popularity in Philly and his street toughness, around 50:00 in (much later in the interview) the Dreamchasers head responds, “I ain’t have to sell no brick to get $3,000 profit,” he is glad that his Rap career took so other hustles did not have to. “I ain’t got no survivors remorse nigga, naw. So that’s what I’m on.”

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By the 42:00 mark, Meek starts to make way into the Drake conflict. He jokes that if Drizzy really “bodied” him, why were Game and Beanie Sigel—two MCs senior to Drake, so set on destroying his career. “When that shit went down with Drake, they said I was over with, right? They sayin’ that right now?” Mill compares the reports of his career being jeopardized to the early 2000s beef between 50 Cent and Ja Rule. “When it was fucked up for Ja Rule, I wasn’t [concerned] about when his shit dropped.” While Ja may have fallen from favor by the mid-2000s during Fif’s meteoric rise, Meek says the hype surrounding DC4 proves he is undeterred and in great standing.

On the subject of writing—whether accused by Beanie Sigel or Tory Lanez, or calling out Drake, Meek Mill declares, “There’s no nigga that could ever say they wrote for me, in my life.” Moreover, the Dreamchasers head argues that he’s a top rapper. “I don’t feel like any nigga can spit better than me. Niggas can make better songs than me, and spit with melody [and other attributes], but niggas ain’t got the reach like I got.” Describing his ability to give listeners goosebumps from his impassioned deliveries and vivid accounts of the streets, he professes, “I’m a chill bump nigga.” Meek says he learned to aim that high from listening to The Notorious B.I.G. “I never met a nigga I thought was flyer, realer, iller than me. Niggas make good hooks.”

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At 46:00, Meek says he believes the Internet particularly reacted to Drake’s 2015 diss-record-single, “Back To Back.” “That wasn’t even no shit that hit me crazy. I thought it was some shit; don’t get me wrong. Everybody was fuckin’ with it. But the way I seen niggas from the street react to it [was different than online].

In “Back To Back,” Drake famously jabbed, “Is that a world tour or your girl’s tour.” According to Meek, that’s not a shot. “Everybody speaks about Nicki…is that a bad thing?,” He adds, “What am I supposed to do, have a young starlet with me?,” referring to artists finding actresses to date instead of fellow MCs. “She on a whole ‘nother level in life, as a person, as an artist.” Coming back to his North Philadelphia roots, Meek says, “We wish for shit like this where we come from!”

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However, before moving the discussion to DC4, Meek Mill states why he never fought back more at Drake, and has let The Game and Beanie Sigel go recently unanswered—as both have multiple diss records aimed at him. “I ain’t got no time to be makin’ a rap about a nigga; that shit take too much time.” He says, “I don’t even know what to say about these niggas!” Clarifying that his famed late 2000s Philly battles were not about MC bravado as much as staying supreme in his city, Meek Mill touts, “I’m not no battle rapper.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Meek Mill states that he has never used a gimmick to succeed, why K Michelle has said unusual things in the media about him, and how DC4 is an important listen.

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DC4, released by Maybach Music Group/Atlantic Records, features Pusha T, Tory Lanez, and French Montana, among others.