E-40 is recuperating from a hangover and talking very slowly as we chat about his 12th album, “My Ghetto Report Card,” which came out in March. He speaks using terms popular in the Bay Area, where he’s from, as if I have a clue what he’s talking about.

“Adam, what’s up pimp?” (“Pimp” I am familiar with.)

That may be the first time anyone’s ever called me a pimp (and about damn time).

The album was his most successful debut on the Billboard charts, coming in at number three overall and number one on the R&B/hip-hop chart the week it was released.

He wasn’t looking for a certain level of success with the album’s release; he left that in God’s hands.

“Whatever it is, whatever it ends up being, is what it was meant to be,” says the Yay Area rapper (that’s what he calls the Bay Area). “All I could do is stay gripping and grinding.” (“Gripping” means making money; “Grinding” means selling drugs; but he probably didn’t mean that literally.)

Although the album is on pace to be his highest-selling ever, it’s not like E-40 is meeting success for the first time.

He’s had gold and platinum albums, but it’s been a while since he’s had something “in their face.”

“I will say that this is my biggest record in along time,” he says. “You smell me?” (“Smell me” means understand me, which I do in this case.)

It’s his biggest record in a while, and Jive Records may be to blame for why the MTV crowd hadn’t heard his name lately. His old label was focusing its time on promoting Britney Spears and ‘N Sync, leaving E-40 without much marketing and promotion.

If they had spent more money, he says, he would have been further in his career than he is today.

“For the first three albums, they were into handling their business,” he explains. “But you have to realize, we already had a built in fanbase. Jive didn?t have to spend a lot of money to sell records in the mid ’90s. As competition became more and more in the industry, there was a point in time where they had to kick in some money. They had to advertise and get me out there. They was lacking and they macking on that.” (Macking has something to do with sex, but again, he didn’t mean that literally in this instance.)

So he left Jive and decided to sign with Lil’ Jon’s label. The King of Crunk meets the King of Hyphy. (I’ll let him explain what hyphy music is, but the term means hyper and fly.)

“Crunk is like a cousin of hyphy because it’s party music on the music side of it. Crunk is a little slower and hyphy is more up-tempo,” he explains.

“My Ghetto Report Card” is his first album in nearly three years. E-40 says he just needed a break.

“I had to press reset and start all over. For a year I kind of kicked back and wanted to see what direction I wanted to go to. It took me a year to do the album and it’s gratifying.”

Coming up next for E-40 may not be another CD but rather a book. This summer, he plans to release a book explaining all the terms he uses.

You’ll learn the meanings of such words as: acting a rectum (showing your ass), Flamboastin’ (rising up) and jacking your slacks (like popping your collar, but for pants).

In fact, E-40 says he was the first one to use “popping your collar” in a song.

“A lot of people had been doing it but they didn?t have a name for it,” he says. “My words are contagious like a yawn,” he says.

His latest term? “One hun’ed” (which I would write and pronounce as “One Hundred”).

“It’s like I’m gone, I’ll holla at you later on,” he explains.

In that case, One hun’ed.






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