Ying Yang Twins On “Telling All The Miley Cyruses To Twerk” And Reclaiming “Hanh!” From French Montana

If the passing whims of a Disney star can be seen as a portent of American culture as a whole, twerking is back on the national scene in a major way. With Miley Cyrus shaking her booty on stage with Juicy J and flocks of young women jiggling their assets on YouTube and Vine, twerking is more popular than ever, capturing the imagination of our more prurient interests and scaring confused parents in the process.

Thirteen years ago, Ying Yang Twins dropped their debut single, “Whistle While You Twurk,” the first entry in a career that would feature multiplatinum plaques, top five singles and five million records sold. Though largely absent since the release of their last album, 2009's Ying Yang Forever, Ying Yang Twins have been keeping busy, steadily touring the world and bringing the noise to a new generation of crunk fans raised on their brand of raucous party music.

But now Ying Yang is back. Earlier this month, the duo dropped their latest mixtape, Ass In Session, filled with their signature style of dance floor-assaulting party anthems. Recently, the duo dropped by the XXL offices to chop it with us about the tape, their thoughts on Miley Cyrus and their opinion on famous rappers using their catchphrases. Hanh! —B.J. Steiner (@DocZeus)

XXL: Twerking is back in the headlines these days—on your new mixtape, Ass In Session, you even have a song called “Miley Cyrus.”
D-Roc: The one thing about it is, all the kids that was growing up and their parents was listening to us, now they grown. And they like you know, “Where that twerk music at?” So the kids twerking now, they off the chain.

The reason we named [that song] “Miley Cyrus” is because she is the biggest name that started twerking and it caught you off guard. So we’re saying “Miley Cyrus with it.” We ain’t telling Miley Cyrus to get out there and do it because if you listen to the lyrics, it’s a little too much for Ol’ Miley.

Kaine: Twerking has become a true mainstream thing—it’s not just in the urban community now. All communities are in on it now simply by the relevance of Miley Cyrus. Basically, we are telling all the Miley Cyruses to twerk.

What’s your opinion about that aspect of the culture crossing over into the mainstream? One of your earliest hits was “Whistle While You Twurk.” How do you feel about young women like Miley Cyrus adopting it?
D-Roc: There’s nothing wrong with it. No harm, no foul. Dancing is dancing. Now, however, all the little, young girls’ parents look at it that’s something they have to deal with when they are at home. We didn’t initiate that. The little girls at the high school that got suspended initiated the twerk phenomenon. There were girls on their hands, upside down, got suspended from school. They set off this twerk thing to where they [went] over to Miley Cyrus. Now, she’s twerking and now everybody wants to pay attention.

D-Roc: Well, everything is full circle, too. Really what they doing actually came out of New Orleans. New Orleans was doing that first.

Kaine: They don’t call it “twerk,” they call it “bounce.” They got this little typical beat like [Imitates pounding, bass-heavy beat] So down there in urban communities, they teaching little girls as young as six, seven years old how to p-pop. The mothers are teaching it to their daughters. It’s not a bad thing. It’s the perception your mind gets when you see them do it. It starts out as just having fun dancing. It’s like the 2013 dirty dancing. I guess this is how they trying to make it. And it’s not really dirty. It’s just shaking the lot o’ the bottom end. Making it double to the beat. Maybe slow or faster.

D-Roc: Really it is dirty. You don’t want your six-year-old [doing it], but where we from it’s all good. But in the white community, it’s like “GOT DAMN, HUH? You’re not focusing in school anymore!” (Laughs)

Kaine: And there is nothing wrong. We have kids ourselves but there is nothing wrong with our kids. This twerk thing is something that we’ve been a part of since we were introduced to the game. We thought it already had surfaced but I guess since we kind of brought up the new era with Ying Yang making the music…what we’re doing is nothing short of what the 2 Live Crew [did]. We have over ten years worth of hits and if you think about it, if kids 18 or 19 now, ten years ago, they were eight. And that’s how they know the rhythms of the songs now like “Salt Shaker.” [Laughs]

D-Roc: All the producers we were working with were like, “you guys gotta change your image,” and then right up under our nose, shit, twerk came right back. I had always said, “nah, we used to do what we used to do, and do a little bit of that.” You know, had to take it back to the originators, the innovators— we got back with Mr. Collipark.

Kaine: The innovators of the twerkin.’ The innovators of the “hanh.”

Let’s discuss your new mixtape, Ass In Session. What are you hoping to accomplish with this particular project?
Kaine: Music’s slowed down so much. It’s like been “swagging” for seven years. That’s one aspect of the genre. That’s not the only tempo or way to rap. Everybody’s been making good songs but ain’t nobody been fueling the clubs, though. Ultimately, when we first came into the game, our drive was to promote music for the strippers to dance to. The new artists are good but the songs are not making the people bombard the dance floor. What we do is cater to people moving to the dance floor. People want to dance. These young kids are not old. They want to have fun. I don’t see no other artist do what we do. Maybe people can’t do what they know they can’t do which is why we are out with Ass In Session.

On your new tape, you have a song called “Sayin’ My Word.” On it, you are taking some shots at some major rappers, French Montana, Kanye, Jay Z, for allegedly stealing your adlib, “Hanh!” Why go there?
D-Roc: Nah. Nah. I’m not gonna call it taking shots. It’s called telling the truth. If you know we said “Hahn!” first? You should never get on T.V. and said Kanye stole it from you because you started it first. No. You give props where props was due. Kanye ain’t never said he started it. He’s just using it. Who do you see raising all the fuss, right now? It damn sure ain’t Kanye. He’s out there with his baby taking him shopping.

Kaine: It’s not throwing shots. We are the innovators of that word.

D-Roc: You can’t take anybody’s shit and think nobody would address it. That’s just like if I took your shoes and you was wondering where the hell your shoes was and one day, you know you was the only person with them shoes and you see me walking in with them shoes. Are you gonna say something?

Kaine: Basically, he’s saying, “Check this out. We know what Dr. King did for the South? For the people, right? Its like saying me and D-Roc saying we, Martin Luther King, Jr. You understand what I’m saying? We can’t do that.

D-Roc: Hold on. I got this. I start my magazine and call it XL but you know where I got it from?

Kaine: But here comes some more media asking, “Ah, man. You got that XL. What’s the difference between XL and XXL?” We’re not feeding into anything. The “Hahn!” thing is relevant to French Montana using it here now. It’s already been done. And all we’re doing is coming into the game and picking up where we left off. And we’re going to carry on.

D-Roc: You can’t use somebody’s shit and expect a motherfucker not to say nothing. It would have been better if he said “Big Shout out to the Ying Yang Twins. They started it first and I’m just carrying on.”

Kaine: That’s all we getting at. No harm. No foul. No beef. It’s the truth.

What are the origins of crunk music?
Kaine: The crunk music was Lil Jon. It actually came from the way we were kicking it growing up in Atlanta. It was all a hype thing. “Hey man, let’s go to the club.” The lyrics that Lil Jon puts on a track is what we were actually doing to our favorite songs. Let’s say if we are at a club and they would play Eightball & MJG or UGK, we would be in the club and playing our favorite songs. “WHAT! WHAT! WHAT! YEAH! YEAH! HAHN!” and Lil Jon his form of...rap style. He made that his form of rap style but that was every inner city kid's charisma.

D-Roc: That’s just Atlanta. That’s how it is in Atlanta. Every Atlantean. That’s when Atlanta was majority of Atlanta and now Atlanta is just like everybody else.

Kaine: Lil Jon has always been an asset to what the Ying Yang Twins have become. A lot of people don’t know this but Lil Jon, Mr. Collipark and D-Roc all used to be on the same label together back in Atlanta during the Booty Shake Bass Era, so Lil Jon has always been a partner to the Ying Yang Twins because he and Mr. Collipark have always been [coming] together for us to do the things that we been doing.

How has Atlanta changed in the last 10 years?
Kaine: I think that Atlanta is trying to go broad with a mainstream mentality the way of New York and California. I think the reason for that is that it’s the Mecca of the South. It’s the only southern city that you can come to and come out with music. Every other southern city, it’s hard to come with music. Florida and Georgia are the primary spots that you can try to emerge out of there.

D-Roc: Another way to see the change, too is that when we were growing up, everywhere, there was projects. Now? Ain’t no more. All of the projects are gone to build houses, beautiful houses that make you come on and move to Atlanta.

What’s your favorite moment of your career?
Kaine: I remember this one particular show in Indianapolis. It was in a dome and it was supposed to be Scarface and Lil Wayne and Scarface bagged out at the last minute. So they call us and say “Hey! Can you guys come in and fill in? You can do thirty minutes and we’ll pay you 20 grand.” We say “Cool.” We get to the stage. We play “Whistle While You Twurk.” Crowd went in a frenzy as soon as we hit “Salt Shaker.” Lil Wayne’s manager told the sound crew to pull the plug because the juice was being drained. When “Salt Shaker” came on that motherfucker (Imitates dome losing power) The dome? (Imitates crowd losing mind) and they ran up screaming “Noooooo!” Quickest 20 grand we ever made.

D-Roc: We weren’t the headliners and we would have the headliners come to us and say “Can y’all go on after us?”

Kaine: It went from going “I ain’t going on before no Ying Yang Twins.” To “Hey! Can we go before y’all?”