Trae Tha Truth and Mysonne Speak on New Album and Standing on the Front Lines for Justice

Trae Tha Truth and Mysonne came together to create a killer project entitled If You’re Scared Stay Inside which dropped at the end of February and speaks to the myriad of ills being experienced by people of color across the nation. The two also temporarily uprooted their lives and moved from their respective communities to Louisville, KY in support of the Breona Taylor protests which became the spark for the album.

I asked the pair about the project and what it means for them,

Trae Tha Truth: I believe the title is self-explanatory If you scared stay inside, there’s a lot going on, well a lot has been going on over the course of time but specifically last year there was a lot going on and there were times when people needed to get out even though we’d be risking our lives or it might not even go in our favor, you know a lot of people decided to shy away so that’s where the term if you scared just stay inside. There’s no point in you even coming to fake with us, if you scared stay inside and we’re alright with that.

Mysonne: Pretty much the same thing, as he said, it was a lot going on especially over the last year and me and Trae understood the seriousness of the times and we understood how serious COVID is and we understand the time we were in. But we understood that we were facing so many epidemics and pandemics at that time that we had to choose what was worse. Either we were going to stay in the house and allow our people to continue to die or we were going to go outside and risk our lives with COVID to be able to save lives and be on the front lines for our people so we understood that everybody wasn’t going to take that approach. There were a lot of people that were just scared period to approach anything so you know when we made that title I think those were the things we were thinking about because we said to ourselves man we ain’t scared regardless of what, we livin’ on God’s time. You know when God says it’s time to go, but we ain’t going sitting down, we ain’t going staying inside, that was our motto.

In discussing their front line activity during the protests they were both very matter of fact

So as a collective set of ills you were dealing with covid, dealing with the police brutality and the injustice and the streets, being the stars that you are being surrounded by people, how did you decide to trust the process and get out there on the front lines? How did you feel as you walked down the street surrounded by people of like minds and facing the people in blue…what was your gut feeling?

Trae Tha Truth: Well first and foremost we ended up going out there (to Louisville), the idea came from Mysonne, Tamika, Linda and Angela as a whole through Until Freedom because we were fresh off coming off of dealing with the things we needed to deal with for George Floyd but right before that they had actually went out there to get on top of the stuff for Breonna but after everything that was going on with (George) Floyd, Breonna started to get lost in the shuffle and of course everybody being stand-up people and of their word, it was like we can’t let this one slip away so the plan came from them. Once the plan came we had to decide who was going to be our front line and who was going to be our people who touched the turf. And who’s willing to sacrifice family, who’s willing to sacrifice everything that they live for to stop what they’re doing and come here to fight for the family that need it and with certain ones like me and Mysonne it’s a no-brainer. You know, don’t get it twisted, we’re both amazing fathers, we love our kids to death but even our kids understand, which is good, they even understand that when we fight, we’re not only fighting for family, we’re fighting for the future of them in the process so I think our families get it.

As far as how was it out there, it was normal. When you come from the hood and the environments we come from we adapt to any situation so we’ve always had issues with police and we’ve always moved around with like minds. But I feel it was more of a family thing you know, our circle was our circle.

Mysonne: It’s pretty much the same. We just understood the times. Like he said we were coming fresh off of George Floyd but we originally came to George Floyd, us at Until Freedom, we were in Kentucky for Breonna Taylor for Memorial Day and we had connected with her family, her mother, to do a ceremony and a celebration for memorial day since she was an essential worker and we wanted to honor her and bring some light to what was going on and had a press a conference out there and fresh off of that is when the George Floyd situation happened and we decided to drive from Kentucky to Minneapolis and Trae was out there because of his relationship with George Floyd. We had always knew each and respected each other and I think at that point, we connected in that situation and we decided that we were who we were looking for wasn’t nobody else going to come save us, wasn’t nobody going to come fight for us, it was up to us. And I think that at that point we just formed like Voltron and said like you know what this thing that’s happening with George Floyd and it was crazy what was happening with Breonna Taylor it was falling by the wayside and we can’t allow that to happen. So like he said, we understood the sacrifices, we understood our family, I had to sit down with my wife and explain to her how serious this was and she supported that. It was tough it was tough just being out there but we understood the seriousness of the times.

Isn’t it unfortunate we are still in the same kind of times as when Martin Luther King Jr. and John Lewis had to March. Compare this day and age to and the mindset this day in age to those times in the 60’s and what it means for you.

Trae Tha Truth: Honestly none of us can really say (anything about) that mindset because were weren’t there back then. We can say we in a sense followed their vision but I think it just become, it’s all part of sacrifice back then with Lewis and Martin Luther King you have to thing about how much worse it was back then where you had the dogs and firehoses and just the hate and racism. We are still dealing with that but back then it was super massive to where they put themselves on the front line to sacrifice thinking for what would make it easier for the generation after them and our generation. What we are doing is a similar thing because I’m thinking we’ve lived our life but I don’t want to live my life and leave and leave my kids or their kids forced to face the same things. So everything that they sacrificed for to make it a little easier for us is the same thing that we’re doing to make it easier for those who come after us.

Realistically, we’re not going to wipe it out overnight but if I can play our part as how they played their part from the dogs, the firehoses, the lynchings. If we can play our part from slowing down the police killings and being able to teach ours to protect themselves and stand fro what we believe, I’m willing to sacrifice that. One thing you have to understand, every time, and we don’t even hold a conversation about it but it’s understood, every time me and Mysonne we come out we know it’s a chance we might not come back home. You never know in the spur of the moment what a police officer might do especially out of fear. We aint no small guys and we stand for what we stand for so every time we leave that house it could be anything but I’m honestly comfortable with it because I know if something happens and we leave it’s going to move a little stress for our kids and the kids after them. I would feel less of a man to just turn my back and leave it for them to deal with when its something that’s directly in front of us.

What a powerful statement! The willingness to sacrifice your life is an amazing statement. But the difference between now and then is there are black and brown faces wearing the badge across these lines how do you feel when you look into their eyes when you are marching and asking them ‘Why aren’t you on our side?!’

Mysonne: We’ve had those conversations. Me and Trae have literally been staring face to face with officers and had to ask them “How do you sleep at night?” Face to face and they have pepper spray, batons out rubber bullets guns and they are standing there geared up like they are going to war against peaceful protesters. And they know what we are protesting about is right and a lot of them and stand there and are unfazed. But a lot of them are just confused.

We’ve had officers arrest us and be like ‘yo man I appreciate what ya’ll are doing, everybody on this force is not against y’all. A lot of us want to be out there with you but we just can’t’. And that’s the difference between what we do and what everybody else does. People know things are wrong but they stand complicit, they stand comfortable in shit that they know is completely immoral because either they need to make money or this is the way they survive and they‘ve become ok with that reality.

People say “I can’t go to these marches, I can’t do this, I can’t get arrested, I gotta do this or that” and I think that’s what’s different about our spirit and I just feel like we’re just living in our purpose because everybody is not going to make these sacrifices, everybody doesn’t understand whey we make the sacrifices. Sometimes we don’t even know why. Me and Trae have looked at each other and been walking into something and looked at each other ‘like this what comes with it.’ We don’t even know how we got here but we know we wouldn’t be anywhere else.

So when we look and see on the other side that there are people who look like us and come from the same reality and they are complicit in this situation, it hurts, it’s sad because when we have conversations with them, some of them don’t even want to talk because they know what we are saying is true. How do you sit there, how are you arresting us when you seeing them killing us and all we want is justice. How are you willing to take an order to harm us and do something against us when we have done nothing wrong and they just sit there quietly.

In order for this to really change, those people that they utilize against us that look like us have to make the decision that they can’t be utilized. They have to make that decision and hopefully, the work that we do and the sacrifices we make give them the strength to make those decisions.

While the protests have drawn global attention and even sparked worldwide support for the causes put forward by them, there is still a need to remember the REASONS behind them and for continued activism so that one day we don’t have to have conversations like these. Trae Tha Truth and Mysonne are people of action as well as people of considerably powerful words and their willingness to step to the front of the line in this struggle speaks volumes about who they are and what they stand for. It’s imperative that we celebrate these new-age leaders who so willingly step to the forefront to declare that these issues we are fighting for are worth our lives and they have paid with their freedom on occasions in the pursuit of justice for those who can no longer speak…the list is too long…even were it only one name…it would be too long.

The conversation continued beyond the highlights above and covered more on their thoughts and insights into the struggles. Listen to find out if they have hopes for the end of this nightmare and their salute to those that came before them and CREATED the front lines of this struggle!

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Tags: Mysonne, trae tha truth

About the Author

Dr. Jerry Doby Editor-in-Chief of The Hype Magazine, Media and SEO Consultant, Journalist, Ph.D. and retired combat vet. 2023 recipient of The President's Lifetime Achievement Award. Partner at THM Media Group. Member of the U.S. Department of Arts and Culture, the United States Press Agency and ForbesBLK.