ASM: Earlier, you talked about moving on to your next challenge. For you, that is the music industry. You started your own label, Akright Records, back in 1999. Tell me about your passion for music.
Bender: It's something that I've had my whole life. I've always been curious and interested in it. Once I was able to get blessed with the funds to make something happen, that's when I really started to pursue it. Back in 1999, I started digging around for producers and artists. Once I had the right producers and artists around me, that was all she wrote. Then it was all about learning the business.
ASM: Coming from a basketball background, I'm guessing you've had to prove yourself all over again in the music industry.
Bender: Yeah, but, it's just a challenge of — can you win? It's all about winning and it's all about making money in this business. That's what I'm set to do. It's not about going against the grain. A lot of people will stereotype athletes or they stereotype me. They're going to look at you and see how strong you are and say what business do you have doing music? You're supposed to be out on the basketball court somewhere. I'm going to pass all that and I'm going to succeed and shut everybody up.
ASM: How have you gone about proving yourself in the music industry?
Bender: It's all about working. They'll look at you and they'll stereotype you for a minute, but if you can stand in the studio alone and you know what you're talking about when you speak, you're going to get your respect.
ASM: What are some things that you've picked up in the music business that may have surprised you or maybe you weren't expecting going in?
Bender: Everybody's just cutthroat, everybody's out to get his or her own. It's an only the strong survive type of atmosphere and that's what I like.
ASM: How do you go about finding talent?
Bender: It takes a while. You have to find out who's hot in their areas. Is there really demand in their areas? Sometimes I can hear just right out of my ear if I hear somebody, a tape of somebody, a video of somebody. If I fall in love with an artist, I can develop the kind of artist that I want them to be.
ASM: What are your plans for the label?
Bender: We're looking to be the next Cash Money and No Limit out of the south. We want to be the biggest, single independent coming from down south. I think I have the artists to back me. We're looking for a female right now.
ASM: You currently have three artists signed to your label — Young A, Shawt and Nosa. How much bigger do you plan to take the label?
Bender: Once our machine starts moving, we'll start getting lots of talent and bringing a lot more people on.
ASM: Who are some people in the music industry that you admire?
Bender: I admire Jay-Z because he went from an artist to actually looking at it from the outside in — looking from outside the box. Now he's at another level. I also admire 50 Cent for coming up from being nothing to just blowing through all this drama and just keeping smart and planning, using all the other aspects. He's using rap as a launching pad basically. He's able to build his body up and get endorsements and all kinds of stuff. That's basically what it's about. This is only a stepping stone and then this just launches you into a whole lot of different things that you never knew you could touch.
ASM: Street credibility is something that is talked about a lot as being very important in the rapping industry.
Bender: A lot of my artists, when they speak, they speak about stuff that they have been through. I have guys with a lot of street credibility around.
ASM: I know that Hurricane Katrina devastated your hometown and that you were involved in a number of relief efforts. How is the recovery process coming along?
Bender: The Hurricane really set everybody back. It set the city back a little bit. Right now, everybody's pretty much molding back together and we're trying to pick everything back up. Akright's is going to be the biggest label coming out of New Orleans with its nice, new artists. Like I said, we're going to be the next Cash Money.
ASM: You sound very confident in the future success of the label.
Bender: As long as we're having success and we're making good music, and my artists are doing their thing, we'll be just fine.
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