No Limit Chronicles

How did No Limit Records get its start?

We start out the trunk of the car.

Greatest team ever assembled.

Master P, Silkk the Shocker,

C-Murder.

Kept on adding ingredients.

Mia X, Mr. Serv-On, stirring it up.

Beans, Mac, Soulja Slim.

How that taste?

This is real gumbo right here.

When they get Mystikal,

one of the greatest free agent moves in hip-hop.

And then, here comes Snoop. That was so big.

Problem is, he was signed with Suge.

Well, he's got guns, we've got guns, who cares?

He used to be a CEO, now he's just an inmate.

No Limit for life, baby.

Our machine was rolling.

23 albums, 16 gold or platinum.

Starting to make hundreds of millions.

We were building this southern Motown.

We got a shopping center, real estate business.

What's up, y'all?

This is Master P, and welcome to my crib.

Sports business.

They're gonna do some really big things here, and I wanna be a part of that.

I wanted a tank.

Film.

Uhh. Uhh!

The Charlotte Hornets suited up

with Master P in the lineup.

What do you wanna play basketball for,

all this money we making?

You gotta realize, everything has its climax.

Shit got weird.

There was clashing of egos.

Man, he lost peeps by the pound, man.

Everybody left. The love was gone.

I don't wanna hear that shit!

A dark cloud came over.

Kane and Abel indicted for cocaine...

Mac indicted for second-degree murder.

C-Murder wanted for attempted murder.

Nothing could stop us but us.

All self destruction.

But wait till the smoke clear.

I'ma be good.

Master P is the mastermind

of one of the most successful labels in hip-hop history.

Oh my God! Master P in his Hummer!

Master P, he was a game changer for hip-hop, period.

Master P, number-one song in the country.

Being this force to be reckoned with,

changing the outlook of music.

Master P's deal with Priority Records

was one of the best deals in rap history, period.

This man is the reason rappers are able to make millions.

If there wasn't Master P, a lot of the rappers

you see now wouldn't be here.

Y'all know who it is. Master P.

At one point, Russell Simmons,

Suge Knight, Jermaine Dupri, Jay-Z,

they all looking up at P like, "What the..."

Yeah, I don't give a... who you were.

Sorry.

My life was damn near lost,

and then that's when Master P stepped in.

Master P taught us the right way.

It wasn't just about me, it's about we.

Without y'all, there wouldn't even be No Limit.

One of the great dynasties in hip-hop.

No Limit Records.

That's Master P's legacy.

To understand me,

I think you have to understand where I came from.

This is New Orleans. This is where my story started.

There's no other place like this.

The greatest music.

The greatest food.

All these nice houses, nothing but riches and wealth.

But you walk over those steps,

you back in the Calliope Projects.

You see nothing but poverty.

I grew up in the Calliope Projects.

This is where my character was built.

When I was here as a kid,

this was the murder capital of the world.

Calliope Projects, they're at war.

One of the most violent places

in one of the most violent cities in the country.

You see a bunch of mansions around here?

No. But I bet you one thing.

Every person back here probably own a gun.

Calliope is the worst place this side of hell.

That's all you need to know.

You might not be doing nothing but going to the store... bop!

And that's how it go, man, in our hood.

The reasons most often cited

for the increase... Kids, guns, and drugs.

My first time seeing a dead body,

this guy was laid out in the street,

there was just flies around him and nobody was like...

It wasn't even like nobody was even acknowledging he was dead.

I had a best friend, and I'm sorry,

but she was murdered at the age of seven years old.

It just was bad.

People know, you come from here, you definitely seen hell.

You made it out of here, that says a lot about you.

If you gonna survive back here,

it's for real.

Like, a life ain't worth nothing.

I'm like five years old,

I hear these guys arguing over a beer.

I hear the shots.

Seen the guy on the ground dead.

For a five-year-old, man, that puts you in a cold place.

The fact that P is alive today,

the fact that he built an empire is a miracle.

In April of 1967,

Master P was born Percy Robert Miller.

Percy was the oldest,

he had three other brothers and a sister.

My mom worked at the Hyatt Regency,

she worked in the hotel business.

You know, my dad was out there

trying to keep a job in the French Quarter.

He was like the security guard for them.

When he was young, his parents broke up.

My mom and my dad separated.

My brother Corey, which is C-Murder,

my brother Vyshonn, Silkk the Shocker,

and my sister, Germaine,

they went to stay with my mom in the Magnolia Projects.

Me and my brother, Kevin, we lived in the Calliope

with my dad and my grandparents.

But we see each other every day.

My mom would bring us over there and pick us up later.

So, there used to be a lot of kids in the house.

So, even going back and forth,

all my brothers and my sister G,

one thing we were was together.

But my grandparents had 12 kids.

And me and my brother together,

and then there's big momma and big daddy.

So, that's 16 people in a three-bedroom project.

I'm sleeping on the floor.

Everybody ate before me.

I remember, sometime all I got to eat

was corn flakes and water.

We couldn't afford milk.

And my grandparents would tell me,

"Even though we live in poverty,

be happy and make the best out of what you have."

Despite the circumstances,

he had a really tight-knit family.

My grandparents used to have suppers,

and I was the DJ.

So me and my brothers,

all of us together, it was like the Jackson 5.

We was poor, but still happy.

AB, common mark.

We all sacrificed,

but we just came together like one big family.

We had our problems, but we all stuck together.

Everything that he had to fight through

and struggle through, that's what No Limit is.

It's breaking barriers.

And the whole military theme, it runs really deep.

It came from his family members who were in the Army.

Everything starts with my grandfather.

He was a real G.

My grandmother was a G too, man.

Like, drug dealers would be on the porch.

My grandmother come pour hot water on 'em.

His grandparents, Claude and Maxine,

gave him a sense of self.

My daddy was the man of the family.

He worked two and three jobs.

And my mama was a hard worker, too.

My grandfather, Big Daddy,

he worked at McKenzie's Bakery.

And Big Mama, my grandmother,

she was a nurse at the hospital.

My grandfather, my grandmother,

just work, work, work.

They found a way to provide for us.

That's where I got my work ethic from.

This is how it is. If you want something,

you got to work for it, you got to strive for it.

He went around cutting grass.

Recycling cans.

Popcorn boy at the Superdome.

He was doing stuff like that at ten years old.

Our family inspired us

to be better than what other people around us were.

My grandmother told me that

having a dream is the most important thing.

If you don't have no dream, then... why wake up?

I have a dream.

She made me keep reciting that "I Have a Dream" speech.