The powerpack West Coast hip hop duo GOOCH GANG began out of necessity. Just over 10 years ago, LA-raised, longtime Bay Area Cali resident MWNSTR recorded a single with WAES, “Brutalizin.” When they realized the cut needed another verse, they instantly thought of KALIBAN, whom Mwnstr had known since the late 90s. That’s when he would see the dude cutting his teeth at open mics at spots like Leimert Park, South Central, and Inglewood.

But Kaliban’s approach was quite different, and it didn’t include putting his name on a signup sheet. “My theory was like: everybody and their mom were signin up for these open mics,” he explains. “So I’d wait for you outside really like the bully and splatter shit over the sidewalk.”

Mwnstr can confirm this. “There was super-talented people that would sign on the sheet and then battle onstage in these places,” he remembers. “This dude [Kaliban] was just like a fuckin weirdo. He’d pull up in the parking lot… He would go up to like cyphers and just bomb people — I’m talkin about people that had a name at the time. And he was goin at people’s throats.”

As for the verse that Kaliban wound up adding to Mwsntr’s track? “He just killed it.” Then it came time to take it to the stage. But there was a catch. “I’d always been in a group,” says Mwnstr. “I was in a group with P.E.A.C.E. of Freestyle Fellowship, and my other homey Dranged. I’d always be on someone else’s stuff… So I said ‘man I ‘m shouldering this whole shit. I need a capable other rapper with me.” So he commissioned Kal to ride with him on the Vans Warped Tour.

Now it was on. And before they made it back home, they had already come up with the group concept: they named themselves after “The Gooch,” an unseen but often spoken about schoolyard bully from the classic 80s sitcom Different Strokes starring Gary Coleman. Immediately afterward, they went into the studio and recorded what is still one of their dopest cuts: “Gin Rummy.” 

Fast forward to 2021 and you got Gooch’s latest album, SWRVD, a banger that sounds like it was designed for live shows instead of a pair of headphones. And it shows both lyrically and sonically how serious they take their craft. Even more importantly, though there are most definitely no pop tunes on this release, the fellas exceed the expectations of your garden variety, present-day MCs.

In fact, for those who think they are entitled to hold a mic up to their faces, Kaliban offers some advice: “Don’t’ cheapen the sport because a lotta people put blood sweat in tears into this industry that we call hip hop. And I think what they’re doin right now is waterin it down and tryna act like anybody can do this. It’s like ‘No. Everybody can’t do this shit. ‘“

His partner in rhyme puts it a bit less diplomatically: “Man, fuck 99.9% of this shit,” Mwnstr surmises. “It’s not ‘cause I can’t relate or I’m out of touch… I just like originality—Period.”

In this candid and occasionally off-the-rails interview, Mwnstr and Ace discuss how they first met and became friends over 20 years ago, and Kaliban speaks on what it’s like having a brand new baby girl, aka “Super Poops.” The fellas also discuss the lack of diversity in today’s music industry, a future Gooch Gang/Funkanauts collaboration, how hipsters played out beards and face tattoos, and why Mwnstr wants to kick Adam Levine in the small of his back.

Produced & Hosted by Ace Alan
Cohosted by Jay Stone
Website & Art by 3chards
Engineered by Nick “Waes” Carden at the Blue Room in Oakland, CA

But we couldn’t have done it without Mawnstr and especially Scott Sheppard

Intro track “I Can Never Be” from Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth by the Funkanauts. Go get it wherever music is sold. RIP Brotha P.