The "IdOMusic" Blog (Powered By PatchWerk): I dO MUSIC Interview: Pison Flo

Hello Fiends!

Local Atlanta rap artist shares his insight on what peace and dope means to him and his fiends.

Dale Lee Neal, or "Pison [PIE-zon] Flo",22, gets part of his stage name from simply falling asleep in church after a long day. Not always a rapper, Dale grew up writing poetry with a passion for film and acting. With his success in the Atlanta hip-hop indie scene, he's become a well known name in local Atlanta hot spots like Apache Cafe'. Flo (For the Lord Only) began his rap career simply free styling with his then roommate at Oral Robert's University in 2006. While in college, Flo majored in Film and Theater, not thinking about perusing a career in the music industry. Flo’s roommate, Dan, now producer KANEBEATz of Atlanic Records, would always make beats in their dorm room and Flo would write to them. After his freshman year at Oral Roberts University, Flo returned to Atlanta and continued doing drama at his church. Just by luck, Flo ran into producer/rapper "Mouthpiece" after a performance at his church where he just so happened to be rapping. Mouthpiece wanted to record with him and for the past three years, Pison Flo has been building his brand and his career keeping his values above anything else.

Q: How you came up with the name and the concept of "Pison Flo".

A: Pison is a river, in Genesis 2:11, one of the first of three rivers that were supposed to be around the Garden of Eden. It was where all of the gold and diamonds grew and then there was a stone called the Lapis Lazuli. It was the stone that grew around the river and it was blue. I researched it, Wikipedia whatever. After I found out all the things I needed to know about it, that’s when I said, “that’s gonna be my name.” I wanted something left field, to certain people like saying PISON is not something you would usually say. The FLO part just because the river flowed...You have it in the Bible and it’s the word of God. I try to take something from the Word and put it in my word and what I do that’s how FLO For the Lord Only came about and that’s what I came up with just falling asleep in church one day.

Q: Usually when people hear the word Fiend, they think negatively, so what exactly is a fiend?

A: The Fiends are you, the people who really dig what I’m doing and then I'M a fiend. So I’m like "The Fiend", the actual one and then the fans are the fiends. On the mix tape I have, there is this character, called "The Fiend" and he's explaining the concept of what it means for me to be doing "dope music" and the people being the fiends for the music and what consists of the dope. Like when I say dope, what do I really mean? Its talking about the music, the video's I may put out on Facebook, Myspace, ect.. that’s the dope. That’s the stuff you tangibly go out for [if that’s the type of person you are] basically the people who "mess" with me, that’s all it is. All the songs are based off of concepts from people that I know, or me.

Q: Earlier you said, "People wanna be into it, but not talk about it". Can you elaborate more about what you mean?

A: As far as any industry of any sort, like I was watching this thing on all the major powers of the world it’s like 120 of them and they are all from different places, [I forgot what its called] some of them from the media, some are presidents of other countries, just all kinds of people and they get together and talk about things that nobody else will talk about. They could be talking about world domination, I don’t know, so I figured if I can get a whole bunch of people from different genres of music and do music with people from different religious backgrounds, different cities, countries, regions...like that’s my biggest thing that I wanna do. I want to test my limits to what I can do and what I can't do. I don’t feel like there's anything I can’t do, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" which is a scripture and all that good stuff, but if you get a reggae artist who says I wanna make a song with you, you need to indulge yourself in music from the islands and whatnot. That’s what I want to do as far as making music everywhere and that’s what’s gonna make my voice sound bigger when all kinds of people listen to me. From Black people to White people, to the people in Tokyo to the people in Decatur to the people in Omaha. If I’m not making the type of music that the people in Omaha listen to, then I’m not doing my talent any justice.

LISTEN TO PISON FLO...

Flo-Hello Fiends! by Pison Flo

Interviewed and written by Jayda_B

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