The Mobb Deep co-founder and Queensbridge native opens The Bridge in Astoria this weekend, with The Alchemist, Funk Flex and Kid Capri on the bill. He calls it ownership, not an endorsement.

Havoc has repped Queens for more than three decades. This weekend, he plants a flag in it. The Mobb Deep co-founder and Queensbridge native opens The Bridge, a licensed adult-use cannabis dispensary at 25-15 Broadway in Astoria, with a grand opening weekend on June 6 and 7.

What separates it from the usual celebrity cannabis move is the structure. Plenty of artists lend a name to a strain or sign a licensing deal. Havoc is an owner, investing directly in one of the country’s fastest-growing legal markets, in the borough that raised him.

“Hip-hop gave me a platform, but ownership creates a legacy,” Havoc said in a statement. “The Bridge is about building something lasting in the community that raised me.”

The opening doubles as a New York hip-hop reunion. Producer The Alchemist and radio fixture Funk Flex headline Saturday’s reception, with The Alchemist scheduled from 4 to 5 p.m. and Funk Flex from 5 to 7. Kid Capri joins the public opening on Sunday, when doors open at 11 a.m.

The move lands where New York’s market keeps heading, with legacy culture and licensed business colliding in real time. For a borough that helped build East Coast rap, a Queensbridge legend behind the counter of a legal shop is about as full-circle as the new market gets.

Watch Our Conversation With Havoc

High Times sat down with Havoc earlier this year. Watch that conversation below.

<p>The post Mobb Deep’s Havoc Is Opening A Dispensary In Queens. The Alchemist, Funk Flex And Kid Capri Are Coming Through. first appeared on High Times.</p>

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In the music video for “Ram Pam Pam,” Venezuelan artist Micro TDH put older women smoking weed front and center. Asked about it, he doesn’t push a position. He describes one: “It’s part of my day-to-day. I’m just reflecting my lifestyle.”

Fernando Daniel Morillo Rivas, known as Micro TDH, is one of the more interesting artists to come out of Venezuela’s urban scene in the last decade. He’s from Mérida. He started doing freestyle in the street with no label, no investors and no plan beyond the next bar. He’s now collaborated with Yandel, Pablo Alborán, Piso 21, Lenny Tavárez, Myke Towers and Rels B. His 2020 single “Cafuné” passed a million streams without a real industry push behind it.

In October 2025 he dropped Segundo Acto, an album with eight interconnected music videos that play as a single story. He’s now touring it across Latin America, the U.S. and Spain.

And weed is part of the picture. Not as a brand. Not as a stunt. Just as it is.

‘Ram Pam Pam’ and what older women smoking means

The image is unusual for the genre. Cannabis in urban music videos usually skews young and party-coded. Here, the women smoking are older. They’re at home. The visual is calm.

Asked about that visual choice, Micro TDH doesn’t push a position. He describes one.

“I don’t want to push cannabis use on anyone. But it’s part of my day-to-day. So what I’m doing is reflecting my own lifestyle.”

Micro TDH

He has thoughts about the plant, he says. Some positive. Some negative. He’s not declaring it a virtue and he’s not condemning it. He’s showing it the way it shows up in his own life.

A second act, and the rules he learned without a label

The album is called Segundo Acto. Second Act. And he means it literally, in the screenwriting sense.

“The second act is where the hero has to remember who he is, reformulate his identity and let go of false beliefs to keep going.”

Micro TDH

That’s not the kind of answer most artists give when asked about a tour. He’s framing his life as a story he’s still inside. The conversation around the record is about identity, not the merch table.

The route here was unusual. “Cafuné” broke without a major behind it. The lesson he took from that is the same one he repeats now, years later.

“What connects with people the most is what’s real. The genuine. What comes from the heart. You can feel it when something is authentic.”

Micro TDH

He won’t put it in marketing terms. He puts it in craft terms: whatever you make, the substance of it has to be honest. Otherwise it doesn’t travel.

Rap, then everything else

Micro TDH’s catalog is hard to categorize. Rap. Trap. R&B. Reggae. Dembow. Ballads. Segundo Acto adds a first hardcore rock track, “Mi Primer Rock.” It also has the R&B introspection of “Ángeles,” the lightness of “Wendi” and “Duraznos,” and the deeper introspection of “Tu Reflexo.”

Asked where he feels most himself, he doesn’t dodge. “Probably rap. Because that’s where everything started.” But he likes being challenged. He likes leaving the comfort zone. And he leaves the door open: at some point, he says, he’d like to marry one musical line again.

Lost Soulz: the acting detour that wasn’t a detour

Micro TDH acted in Lost Soulz, an American independent film. He treats the experience as connected to the music, not separate from it.

“Music is one art. Acting is another. And acting is like music’s older brother.”

Micro TDH

He says acting forced him to embody a character, to feel what that character feels. It also taught him respect for performing arts in general. Which fits, given that he talks about his life like a screenwriter.

The cats

In the video for “Quizás” there’s a cat. Not random. He’s had cats his whole life.

“Pets aren’t just pets. They’re family. I think anyone with a pet at home has a happier and calmer heart.”

Micro TDH

Honest about the music, honest about the plant

The throughline in the interview isn’t cannabis. It’s honesty. “Cafuné” worked because the feeling was real. Segundo Acto works because the identity questions are real. The acting in Lost Soulz connects because it asked him to inhabit someone, not perform.

Cannabis fits the same pattern. He didn’t make it the campaign. He didn’t make it the controversy. He put it in the frame because it’s there, and he answered the question the same way: not selling, not condemning, describing.

Micro TDH is at the start of his second act. He’s choosing what to show. He’s choosing what to keep.

<p>The post Meet Micro TDH, the Venezuelan Artist Putting Older Women Smoking Weed in His Music Videos first appeared on High Times.</p>

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Conan O’Brien, a self-described straight edge who “keeps cutting things out” of his life, is being gently talked into edibles by his own assistant. Two weeks in, he has managed to nibble a quarter of one gummy. The High Times connection goes back 20 years, to a bong he accepted on live TV.

A few weeks ago, Conan O’Brien’s executive assistant, Sona Movsesian, brought several tins containing cannabis gummies to the Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast.

“I don’t really do anything,” the redheaded host said about using marijuana, other substances or alcohol. “I used to enjoy some wine, but I don’t even do that anymore. I just keep cutting things out of my life.” Then, to Movsesian, he explained: “I’ve been a little intrigued lately because you’ve always preached the positive qualities of edibles. I never did it, never tried it. But you have said that more than anyone you know, you think I would benefit from these.”

She brought a bag full of her “favorite brand,” Camino gummies. “This one is for energy.”

“Do you think I need energy?” O’Brien asked.

“They taste good,” Movsesian said. “Some just make you feel good.”

“I’ve never felt good,” O’Brien joked. “What’s that like?”

“Things will be funny to you that have never been funny before.”

“Things are always funny to me that no one else thinks is funny.”

“You make comedy for potheads,” Movsesian maintained.

She passed him a “chill one that will mellow you out.” O’Brien did not sample them on air and took them home.

O’Brien Updates The Gummies Saga

In Conan Vs. Edibles, Part 2, O’Brien offered an update:

“I have turned taking gummies into a chore. I have nibbled on the corner of the sleep one. I want to say less than half. First of all, they’re delicious. They taste great and paired with the right wine, fantastic. What I’ve managed to do in two weeks is nibble a quarter of one. I’m a redhead, so I’m very tolerant, so of course I’ve felt nothing so far. But I haven’t gone whole hog. Chill is the one that interested me and I have not tried one yet.”

“You’re overthinking it,” Movsesian pointed out. “Are we peer-pressuring you?”

“That’s the dictionary definition of what you’re doing,” he retorted. “Yeah, I guess I’m feeling a little bit of pressure. But I’m going to do it.”

O’Brien Details His Lack Of Experience With Drugs

“My dad was a doctor, he was against us taking anything,” O’Brien said about his microbiologist father. “Aspirin was a big leap. My dad was an authority on antibiotic resistance. He was in favor of the right antibiotics. That’s the culture that I come from. We’ve got to go to Catholic Church, we have to stay on it and that has been my way. It’s forbidden fruit, so you don’t go there. Now, I think I made a big step by eating a quarter of a sleep gummy.”

Movsesian called him “straight-laced, straight edge,” noting: “It’s not a bad thing.”

When O’Brien suggested his size (6-foot-4) was partially why the gummy didn’t affect him, she replied: “That’s why I thought a half or maybe a full 5 milligram would work.”

“I’m not ready for that yet.”

“That’s OK. Baby steps.”

“I’m going to get to this,” O’Brien insisted, “I promise.” So, stay tuned for Part 3.

Conan O’Brien And High Times

O’Brien actually smoked a joint provided by Seth Rogen on Late Night with Conan O’Brien on TBS during the last week of the show in 2021.

Fifteen years earlier, when I worked at High Times and was producing the Stony Awards, we decided to give O’Brien the award for Best Late-Night Talk Show. Cast member and former Stonys host Brian McCann cleared the way for me to present the award in O’Brien’s 30 Rock office (he couldn’t attend the Stonys).

From my article at CelebStoner:

When I got there I met Conan, but it quickly became clear he wouldn’t be participating in the acceptance sketch on the set.

Brian dressed up as Preparation H Raymond and was joined by HempBot, Smokey the Bong, the Masturbating Bear and their “constantly wasted announcer Joel.”

“We have no idea why we were chosen, but we will treasure this fully functioning trophy for years to come,” Brian drawled. Then he instructed the bear to “go ahead, masturbate.”

Cute, but no Conan. The show took place at BB King’s in Times Square. Redman hosted. NORML’s Allen St. Pierre announced the Late Night award. All went well. But no Conan. Of course, we didn’t expect him to attend the show; that’s why they made the video.

A week went by and I was watching Late Night. During the first segment after the monologue, sitting at his desk, O’Brien deadpanned:

“Last Wednesday night, Late Night won a prestigious award. That’s right. There are a lot of awards out there that might be worth having, but this seemed rather special. The good people that publish High Times magazine [audience laughs] held their annual Stony Awards at BB King’s right here in New York. It was a big event. Apparently, we won for Best Comedy Program. High Times magazine thinks we’re the best comedy program. And they gave us this trophy.”

He took the glass Stony Awards bong from behind his desk and placed it on the desk to laughs and wild cheers. “We want to thank you, High Times,” he continued. “It’s nice of you to recognize us and we will put this award on display in our lobby.”

Then band drummer Max Weinberg broke in: “Hey Conan, the band and I were thinking maybe you shouldn’t leave that statue in the lobby. Maybe we should keep it in our dressing room.”

“Hey, if you want it, it’s yours,” Conan replied.

“Hey guys,” Max yelled, “we got a bong!”

Conan held it for a minute and stared at it. “So that’s a bong.”

More High Times Stonys

• Seth Rogen Confesses His First Award Wasn’t An Emmy, It Was ‘Stoner of the Year’
• Ethan Hawke’s First Acting Award Was a Bong From High Times. He Has Not Forgotten It.

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ScHoolboy Q says he’s done smoking weed and, according to him, the decision came after years of heavy use, a sense that the habit had stopped doing anything for him, and a desire to set an example for his children. Still, he recognized its health benefits —distinguishing it from habits like alcohol— and how it works for some people… just not him at the moment. 

The TDE rapper opened up about the decision during an appearance on the Par 3 Podcast with J.R. Smith and Stephen Malbon, where he explained that quitting was not just about health or discipline in the abstract. It was personal. More specifically, it was about his daughters and old habits leading nowhere. 

“Me, personally, I feel like I got everything I got out of it,” he said, according to KBXT. “I’ve been smoking so much, and smoking, like, 20 times a day. At some point, it ain’t really doing nothing. You just got this oral fixation. You’re just constantly doing it. … But it was mainly for my daughters, my kids. Just to let them know you can do anything.” 

Smoking 20 times a day sounds like a lot—at least to him. But the deeper point Q seemed to make was that weed had shifted from something he chose to do to something he was simply doing on autopilot. Not necessarily because he was getting more out of it, but because the motion itself had become part of the day.

For someone whose public image and personal story have long been tied to weed, this is a big U-turn. Q built part of his persona around smoking. But in this interview, he described a moment when the routine stopped feeling useful. 

His Kids Were the Main Reason

The clearest reason ScHoolboy Q gave for quitting was his children. In the clips, Q said he wanted to lead by example, especially for his oldest daughter, who is almost 17 and has been facing her own challenges. He described trying to teach her resilience, but realizing that advice lands differently when it is backed by action.

“It was just, like, me constantly telling her you can do anything. Like, don’t even trip,” he said… but felt that wasn’t enough. 

Q spoke about his daughter going through “ups and downs” and hitting adversity in her life, which made him think about the way he was showing up as a father. The message was not just “listen to me,” but more “watch me do something hard, too.”

The hard thing was not just any other life challenge; it was quitting weed. It was his way of showing her that he could also do those hard things, like stopping something she knew he had done all his life. “Watch this. I ain’t doing it no more.”

Q was trying to stop smoking for himself, yes, but he was also trying to make a point his daughter could actually witness: that discipline is possible, even when the habit is old, familiar, and deeply embedded in your identity.

“Now it’s like, ‘Now what you got? Give me something back,” he continued. “I’m doing it. We gon’ do this s*** together.”

From Survival Tool to Something That No Longer Worked

Part of what makes Q’s decision interesting is that he has spoken very differently about weed in the past. Back in 2016, he didn’t describe cannabis as a problem in his life, but as something that may have helped keep him alive.

“I’d probably be dead if I didn’t pick up weed,” he said at the time, explaining that before smoking, he was “a hyper person” who was always outside, always moving, and coming from “a life of gang bangin’.” For Q, staying out too much meant a greater chance of getting pulled into the wrong situation. Weed, in that chapter of his life, did the opposite: it kept him home, calm, and away from trouble.

“Because I’m a big weed head, I’m not even trying to go nowhere else outside my vicinity,” he said. “I’m high and feeling good, and I’m not even gonna get into any trouble.”

At one point, weed gave him something he needed: stillness, distance from the street, a reason not to be out every night. But years later, by his own account, smoking “20 times a day” was no longer serving that purpose. It had become constant, automatic, and less connected to any clear effect. It sounded more like a loop he wanted to break.

In other words, cannabis may have once helped him survive a dangerous environment. But eventually, Q seems to have reached a point where the same habit no longer matched the person he is now. He told the podcast he has not gone back since quitting, though the exact timeline remains unclear. 

He Still Acknowledges Cannabis Can Help Some People

Even after quitting, Q didn’t frame it as a blanket anti-weed message: “I got so much out of it, and I do,” he said. “I’m not gonna sit here and be like, ‘No, don’t smoke weed!’ ‘Cause it’s not alcohol, bro. It’s not. So I’m not gonna do that.”

He acknowledged that cannabis can help some people, while making clear that his own pattern had become the issue: “I will say that it does have health benefits for certain people, but the way I was using it? No.” 

His point, then, was more personal than universal. Medical cannabis and cannabinoid-based medicines do have recognized therapeutic uses in specific contexts, so Q was not saying weed is bad for every parent, artist, or person trying to get their life together. He was saying something narrower: for him, at that level, it had stopped working. And quitting became a way to show his daughters that even something deeply familiar can be left behind when it no longer fits the life you are trying to build.

Photo by Cal Laird, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

<p>The post ScHoolboy Q Quits Weed After Smoking 20 Times a Day. Here’s Why. first appeared on High Times.</p>

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Jimmy John’s Dream Rotation campaign doesn’t wink at cannabis culture. It hires Cheech Marin, lets him argue with a sandwich and makes Kal Penn’s ideal 4/20 a gym session and a book. The wall is down.

Cheech Marin is sitting, holding a sandwich. He looks at it the way a man looks at something he has decided to tolerate. “I try to like people,” he says, “but then they start talking.”

The sandwich grows a face and starts talking.

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This is a Jimmy John’s ad. It is also, somehow, the most accurate representation of where cannabis culture and mainstream America currently stand: fully in the same room, no longer pretending otherwise, and apparently ready to get weird about it.

The Dream Rotation campaign, which Jimmy John’s launched this week ahead of 4/20, is built around a simple and genuinely funny idea. The brand tapped a handful of celebrities known to partake, asked each of them for their ideal post-session meal, filmed the results and let the creative get strange. The lineup includes Cheech Marin, Kal Penn, Amanda Batula and Skylar Gisondo. Each has their own spot. Each brings their own energy. Together, they amount to something the cannabis world has not seen from a brand this size in quite this way before.

This is not a wink. This is not a green leaf emoji in a caption. This is Cheech Marin, one-half of the most iconic cannabis comedy duo in film history, having a full argument with a sentient sandwich on behalf of a national fast food chain.

The Cast Matters

The talent selection is doing real work here and it is worth slowing down on.

Cheech Marin is not a celebrity who happens to be adjacent to cannabis. He is, alongside Tommy Chong, the defining pop culture face of cannabis humor in America. Casting him is not a subtle nod. It is a statement.

Kal Penn is Harold of Harold & Kumar, the film franchise that brought stoner comedy into a new generation and a new demographic. He later served in the Obama White House, which gives him a cultural biography that almost no one else in the entertainment industry has. His presence in the campaign adds a layer the other talent cannot: the idea that cannabis and mainstream American institutions are not actually that far apart.

Skylar Gisondo, who appears in a series of memes Jimmy John’s has been posting alongside the campaign, brings the younger internet-native energy. His face sipping through a straw while captions read “me when my grandma asks me to garden with her” and “me when the sweet treat demon starts whispering in my ear” is the kind of content that travels. The “gardening” euphemism, deployed without explanation, assumes the audience is in on the joke. They are.

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The Orders Are the Bit

Part of what makes the campaign work is that the celebrity meal orders are genuinely specific in a way that feels real rather than manufactured.

Kal Penn ordered a toasted Beach Club, no cheese, horseradish sauce, salt and vinegar chips, and the new Cereal n’ Milk Crispy Treat. His described eating ritual involves alternating between chips and sandwich in a precise sequence, with the dessert distributed across both halves. This is not a man who casually threw out a sandwich order. This is a man with a system.

Cheech went with the Italian Night Club and salt and vinegar chips. He also picked Penn as his dream session partner, a choice that connects two of the most culturally significant cannabis films ever made in one meal order.

Amanda Batula took the J.J.B.L.T. with BBQ chips. Skylar Gisondo ordered the Spicy East Coast Italian, no mayo, with jalapeño chips.

The specificity is the joke and also the point. These are not sanitized celebrity endorsements. They are actual people with actual preferences, talking about getting stoned and eating sandwiches, on camera, for a brand with thousands of locations across the country.

What This Actually Means

For most of the last decade, mainstream brands approaching 4/20 fell into one of two categories. The first was the safe play: a vague post, a color palette that happened to include green, a caption that could plausibly mean anything. The second was the slightly bolder play: a joke that gestured toward cannabis without committing to it, often involving the number 420 placed somewhere in the content and nothing else.

Jimmy John’s did neither. The Dream Rotation campaign names what it is, casts people whose entire cultural identity is built around cannabis, films Cheech Marin being existentially annoyed by a talking sandwich and deploys Skylar Gisondo memes that use stoner slang as fluently as any dedicated cannabis brand would.

The reason this is possible now and was not in quite the same way five years ago is not complicated. Legal adult-use cannabis exists in the majority of American states. The cultural stigma has collapsed faster than the federal policy has moved. Brands that once worried about alienating customers by associating with cannabis now risk appearing out of touch by refusing to acknowledge what their customers already do.

Jimmy John’s read the room. The room, it turns out, is full of people who have opinions about chip-to-sandwich ratios and find it very funny when Cheech Marin loses an argument to his lunch.

<p>The post Cheech Marin Is Talking to Sandwiches in a Jimmy John’s Ad. Cannabis Culture Has Officially Gone Mainstream. first appeared on High Times.</p>

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Two West Coast rap legends are opening cannabis dispensaries in California within weeks of each other. Xzibit goes first. Snoop comes home.

West Coast hip-hop has always had a complicated, generative relationship with cannabis. Two of its most enduring figures are now making that relationship literal — and building businesses around it.

Xzibit opens the third location of his Xzibit’s West Coast Cannabis brand this Saturday, April 18, in Marina del Rey. Three weeks later, on May 9, Snoop Dogg opens S.W.E.D. Long Beach — his second California dispensary and his first business in his hometown.

Xzibit: XWCC Marina

XWCC Marina, located at 3452 W Washington Blvd in Marina del Rey, is Xzibit’s most ambitious retail location yet. The brand launched its first store in Bel Air in 2024, followed by a second in Chatsworth. The Marina del Rey flagship is designed around Xzibit’s creative vision — a lounge-style space blending cannabis, art and culture in what the brand describes as a one-stop destination.

“At all XWCC locations, we’re pushing cannabis culture forward,” Xzibit said. “Each store is uniquely built as a reflection of my life, creativity, and west coast culture.”

The grand opening takes place Saturday morning at 9 AM with a ribbon-cutting ceremony, brand activations and local vendor participation.

Snoop Dogg: S.W.E.D. Long Beach

S.W.E.D. — Smoke Weed Every Day — already has locations in Los Angeles and Amsterdam. The Long Beach store, at 2115 E. 10th Street, is a different kind of opening. Long Beach is where Snoop grew up, and the store’s design reflects that explicitly: street-inspired visuals, references to the Hood Rich Lowrider, retro arcade games, two live DJ booths, a personal lounge and a hologram of Snoop himself.

“Long Beach made me who I am,” Snoop said. “Opening S.W.E.D. in Long Beach is my way of showing love to the community that showed love to me. We’re creating jobs, opportunities, and a space that celebrates the culture.”

The grand opening on May 9 is a 21+ event, or 18+ with a valid medical recommendation. Snoop will be present for a ceremonial ribbon cutting.

Two artists, one industry

What both openings share is a deliberate rootedness — stores built to reflect the artists’ actual lives and communities rather than generic dispensary aesthetics. Xzibit has described XWCC as an extension of his creative DNA. Snoop is framing S.W.E.D. Long Beach explicitly around job creation and community investment, tying the opening to the city’s Grow Long Beach Economic Blueprint.

Neither is a first store. Xzibit is on his third location. Snoop’s Long Beach opening is his second California store. These are scaling businesses, not celebrity experiments — and both are landing in the same state, in the same month, as California’s legal cannabis market continues to find its footing against persistent pressure from the illicit market.

S.W.E.D. Long Beach opens May 9 at 2115 E. 10th Street, Long Beach. XWCC Marina opens April 18 at 3452 W Washington Blvd, Marina del Rey.

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From medical rumors to a possible upper-crust grow op, a new story is once again linking King Charles III to cannabis. This time, however, it has nothing to do with health speculation or the monarch’s well-known passion for botany. Instead, the connection comes by way of a police raid at a historic property tied to his royal past.

Police in North Wales discovered a large-scale illegal cannabis cultivation operation inside Plas Glynllifon, a 19th-century mansion that hosted the investiture ball for then-Prince of Wales Charles—now King Charles III—in 1969.

According to North Wales Police, officers executing a search warrant under the Misuse of Drugs Act uncovered what they described as a “significant grow operation” on the building’s top floor. Superintendent Arwel Hughes told the BBC: “We uncovered a grow, which was on the top floor of the building. We estimate around 12 rooms with grows in them and they were fairly mature plants.”

Authorities also confirmed that the operation relied on illegally tampered electrical systems and diverted water lines into the building—common hallmarks of sophisticated clandestine grow sites.

No arrests have been made so far, though police say forensic work and digital evidence analysis remain ongoing as the investigation continues.

A Royal-Era Mansion Turned Into an Indoor Grow

The story quickly drew attention across the UK not only because of the operation’s scale, but because of the property itself. We’re talking about Plas Glynllifon, a sprawling aristocratic mansion with a dramatic history, decaying interiors, and its own local folklore. Most notably, the estate hosted the official ball following King Charles III’s 1969 investiture as Prince of Wales, tying the now-crumbling property directly to modern royal history.

Alan Fryer / Plas Glynllifon

Built in the 1830s near Caernarfon in Gwynedd, the Grade I-listed neoclassical mansion once belonged to Lord Newborough and was long considered one of North Wales’ grandest private estates. In recent years, however, the largely vacant property has fallen into disrepair, its decaying halls becoming a magnet for urban explorers and paranormal enthusiasts.

The sprawling estate has reportedly earned a haunted reputation over the years, with visitors claiming eerie phenomena inside its deteriorating corridors. One of the mansion’s most enduring legends centers on Maria Stella Chiappini, an Italian-born aristocrat tied to the property whose dramatic life later inspired ghost stories surrounding the estate.

Those same historic halls, stone walls, and aristocratic interiors have now been overshadowed by a far less ceremonial scene: entire formerly ceremonial rooms transformed into clandestine grow spaces.

Another Odd Coincidence Linking King Charles III to Cannabis

there is no indication that the current British king is connected whatsoever to the operation or to the property’s current use, the story inevitably revives memories of another cannabis-related headline that circulated widely in 2025: rumors claiming that Charles had explored medical cannabis as part of his cancer treatment.

Those reports, never officially confirmed, claimed the monarch had considered cannabinoids as a therapeutic complement, consistent with his long-documented interest in integrative medicine, organic agriculture, and plant-based therapies.

Though the two stories are entirely unrelated, this latest development adds yet another chapter to the strange and recurring pattern of headlines linking the British Crown to cannabis.

It also highlights a uniquely British paradox: while medical cannabis has been legal since 2018 with a doctor’s prescription and regulated access continues to expand slowly, the illicit market continues to meet substantial parallel demand, often through increasingly sophisticated clandestine operations set up even in historic properties and heritage buildings.

In this case, the contrast could hardly be more British: a mansion once used for royal pageantry has, decades later, become the site of a massive clandestine cannabis grow.

<p>The post From Royal Balls to Weed Walls: Massive Grow Found in Mansion Linked to King Charles III first appeared on High Times.</p>

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B-Real, Xzibit and Demrick have spent decades around rap and weed. On “This Thing of Ours,” the Serial Killers trio sound loose, sharp and fully in command. In this conversation with High Times, B-Real and Xzibit look back on first smokes, touring in the pre-legal era, building cannabis businesses and why age still means nothing if the hunger is there.

“We still can rap circles around half the motherfuckers that are doing this shit right now who are younger than us.” B-Real is filled with aplomb. The Cypress Hill frontman, now 55, has been pumping out albums and rocking stages for nearly 40 years, giving him the hard-won wisdom to school even the cockiest younger rappers. The same can be said about Xzibit, whose résumé includes multiple collaborations with Dr. Dre, most notably on 2001, an era-defining run on MTV with Pimp My Ride, and a spot on the legendary Up In Smoke Tour alongside Eminem, Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Westside Connection, Ice Cube, Warren G, Kurupt, MC Ren and Nate Dogg.

Together with Demrick, B-Real and Xzibit are also part of Serial Killers, a side project they’ve been building since 2013 with albums like Day of the Dead and Summer of Sam. Their latest set, This Thing of Ours, is a master class in lyricism and, in many ways, a flex. As the title suggests, it’s fully theirs. They rap about what they want, pick the beats they want, this time courtesy of Scoop Deville, and make the music they want to make. There’s no pressure to chart, no label breathing down their necks and certainly no urgency to sell a million copies.

Both B-Real and Xzibit also have other ventures bringing in revenue, and some of them involve weed. B-Real has championed cannabis his entire career. In 1993, Cypress Hill made a stop at Omaha Music Hall, where a hilariously large fake joint dominated the stage and burned throughout the show. The group repeatedly pushed for legalization through activism and, today, B-Real owns Dr. Greenthumb’s dispensaries in California. Xzibit, meanwhile, has launched his own cannabis business, West Coast Cannabis, with locations in Bel-Air, Marina Del Rey and Chatsworth.

During the interview, Xzibit makes a stop at one of his facilities and walks through rows of marijuana plants waiting to be harvested. It’s a surreal sight. In the 1990s, when Cypress Hill and Xzibit were omnipresent, recreational and medicinal marijuana were still illegal. It wasn’t as easy as stopping by the nearest dispensary to stock up on your favorite strains. You had to rely on random fans in whatever city you were in, or have a plug. Here, B-Real and Xzibit look back on those early days, the current state of the cannabis business and ageism in hip-hop.

High Times: Cypress Hill’s relationship with weed goes way back. I want to ask you about a story that Sen Dog told me. He said one of the first times you smoked weed as a kid, you smoked a joint with him on his porch, then he had to go to work. When he came back eight hours later, you were still in the same spot and hadn’t moved. Can you corroborate that?

B-Real: That’s his exaggerated story. Of course he doesn’t tell people that he bullied me into smoking my first joint. But yeah, no, that happened. But it didn’t happen the way he said it. We smoked before he went to work, and we had a whole bunch of homies in the neighborhood, so I went and hung out with them. Then I came back to his crib when he was getting off work. That was the normal get-down. We’d link up with Sen before he went to work security at JC Penney, then we’d meet up with him to smoke him out after. So the story wasn’t exactly true. I’ll tell you that. I’ll smoke his ass under the table, hands down, today.

So it wasn’t like you were frozen there for eight hours and couldn’t move?

B-Real: [Laughs] No. Nothing has ever done that to me except maybe some mushrooms, but not no weed.

He said that his dad came home and was like, “I think there’s something wrong with your friend.”

B-Real: What was wrong with me was that I was friends with him [laughs].

What’s up, X? Welcome to the conversation.

Xzibit: What up! What’s going down?

Thanks for joining. We’re talking about weed origin stories. Do you remember the first time you smoked?

Xzibit: I was in high school. My friend Richard Harvey and I had a mutual friend called Wally, this short, white, redhead kid. We had some weed and I had never smoked weed. He had a green Buick Skylark that we went out and smoked in in the parking lot at lunch and, from what I know now about weed, it was some compressed, super-seedy, nasty motherfuckin’ brick weed, right? He broke it down and put it in the joint. He couldn’t roll very well and there were sticks coming out of the sides. I didn’t know what I was looking at, right? I smoked it and it was trash, but that was my first time.

High Times: Did you get high?

Xzibit: I don’t know. I was just like, “Damn, this is not a good experience.” But I didn’t know. I was just smoking weed. I was just happy to have the experience. But from what I know now, it was super trash. I didn’t really get high until I started smoking out of Philly blunts. Then we would just keep the whole thing. Instead of breaking it down, we would kind of squeeze the tobacco out, then pack it back and make it a full cigar again. I think that’s the first time I really got high. That’s how I started in the beginning. I didn’t know how to roll, so we would just dump out the tobacco.

But that first time, something about it made you want to try it again. Was it like, “Let’s see if this really works”?

Xzibit: You do things when you’re that young. Of course, I smoked it one time. Why not do it a second time? The second time was better. It was better weed.

Remember when bowls would pop because of the seeds?

Xzibit: Shit was popping everywhere. It was like, “What the hell?”

What about you, B? Do you remember your very first time?

B-Real: Absolutely. I was probably in the fifth grade.

Xzibit: Damn, you got me beat right there.

B-Real: I was a fast kid. I hung out with these four other kids and we all listened to metal, oldies and shit like that. We had one older homeboy who was a gangster to us. He was a young gangbanger at that point, but he was older than us. We looked up to him and, after school, we’d go to his crib and listen to either oldies or some metal. He’d break out this little acrylic bong, about eight inches tall, with big graphics. We’d smoke out of his fucking bong. I didn’t know what we were doing. I was just like, “Well, fuck, they’re doing it. Let’s go.” We’d all leave and go our individual ways. But when I got home, I didn’t realize I had the munchies. Every time I got home, I was asking my mother for food and she’s like, “Why are you so hungry when you come home from school all the time?” Because I had the fucking munchies and I didn’t realize that’s what it was. That was my first experience. I was hitting bongs before joints.

In the ’90s, we had to try really hard to get weed. I remember having to go to North Omaha to meet up with some shady individuals to get it, and now you can just go to a dispensary and get it yourself. When you were on tour back then, how did you get weed?

B-Real: It was a gamble because not everywhere had good weed. You had to know someone in that town or meet someone who knew somebody. It was hit and miss for the first six or seven years until we started cultivating our own shit and taking it on the road. It was stuff our friends grew because we didn’t trust what we’d be able to find. Once we ran out of whatever we brought with us, it got sketchy and you had to try to find people. Back then, there were none of these social media platforms to communicate with anyone. It’s so much easier now because there are so many cultivators out there in each state who are very talented, so even if it’s black market, it’s probably pretty good, whereas back in the day, black market was absolute shit.

[Editor’s Note: At this point, Xzibit pulls up to his dispensary and walks through rows of hanging marijuana plants.]

B-Real: Oh, wow. Damn, you got there fast. You were just in the car.

I take it you’re at West Coast Cannabis?

Xzibit: Yeah, I’m at my store in the Valley.

How many locations are there?

Xzibit: We have Bel-Air, Chatsworth and we just opened our store in Marina Del Rey.

I heard you just celebrated two years at Bel-Air, right?

Xzibit: Absolutely.

How did you go about getting weed on tour? Was it similar?

Xzibit: We always had it. We just illegally trafficked it.

When recreational and medicinal weed started becoming legal, were you surprised, or did you always think it would happen?

Xzibit: For me, it really didn’t change anything except now we’re just not getting in trouble for it.

B-Real: When we started going to places like Amsterdam in the early ’90s and seeing what they were doing, the structure of their cannabis culture and business, I knew it was possible for us. No one could call when, but as soon as people started getting into their activist and advocate bag and really wanted to make change, that’s when you saw the change happen. Like Xzibit said, it didn’t change much because we always had our own shit and we weren’t depending on anyone else, but it definitely made it easier to not have to sneak around or any of that shit. We could smoke freely and not have to fucking worry about it anymore, so it wasn’t necessarily a shock. It was more relief, like, finally these motherfuckers got it.

Is there any less allure because it is legal?

B-Real: Yeah, there is that, and for the thrill-seekers, the black market still exists. It’s out there for you if you want it. It ain’t going nowhere. And the work’s not done yet. There’s still a ways to go in terms of legalization. Until we’re federally legal across the board, there’s plenty of work to do. Because trying to be a multi-state operator with a licensing format is almost impossible to ensure that the licensees that, let’s just say, come under Dr. Greenthumb’s. Let’s just say I do licensing deals with Greenthumb’s, much like how Xzibit and the rest of us operate. We partner up with people through licensing unless we own a piece of that license. But in multi-state operations, you can’t necessarily supervise the shops everywhere and you can’t tell them what to do. You can only give them suggestions on how to operate. If they wanted to say, “Hey, fuck you, we got your name up here. We’re going to operate it the way we want. As long as we’re doing it according to the law, you can’t tell us how to operate.” When it’s federally legal and we’re allowed to franchise, then we could give them a playbook they absolutely have to follow. We can look through the books, we can do all the fucking things and make sure they’re operating the way all the others operate within the franchise. Right now, it’s too complicated.

The taxes in every state make it practically impossible for the margins to make sense, so there’s a lot of work to do. We need to get it federally legal so all of us who want to be in this business, whether it’s just in our home states or we want to operate as multi-state operators because we feel our brand has that sort of strength in the market, can do it with fewer complications and get a fair shake. A lot of these states turned over a lot of fucking money in tax revenue through the cannabis industry. We bailed out a lot of state economies through cannabis culture, legalization, decriminalization and all that we have in place. The fucking nation needs to say thank you to this business that brought money out of nowhere.

I’m pretty sure Colorado taxpayers got money back from the cannabis industry.

Xzibit: There’s definitely a lot of work to be done in that aspect. There needs to be a tax when it becomes federally legal. It should be 3%, the same as alcohol and tobacco.

What’s the tax now?

Xzibit: Right now, it’s at 38%.

Is federal legalization any closer?

B-Real: No, not yet. I think there’s too many other things going on for any one of those politicians to be focused on cannabis right now. It’s actually up to the cannabis advocates to keep pressing, instead of sitting on their hands and just being thankful for what we got. We got to keep pressing because politicians ain’t going to do it. This dickhead president ain’t going to do it. The people got to keep pressing.

What are your daily rituals when it comes to smoking these days? What do you prefer: blunts, joints, bongs?

B-Real: Xzibit smokes tree bark [laughs]. He wraps his shit with Backwoods, and I call it tree bark.

Xzibit: [Laughs] Look, man, you get samples of everything. So I just kind of like to roll joints and concentrates together, sometimes in the joint if I have to, but most of the time I roll it in the wood.

Are we smoking all day?

Xzibit: Yeah, it doesn’t really slow me down. It’s good. A cup of coffee and I’m good.

B-Real: For me, it’s joints on papers with a glass tip, and sometimes we’re smoking hash holes. And for those that don’t know what that is, some other folks call them donuts, but it’s a joint with hash lined right in the middle. High Times folks know what the fuck that is. We smoke through the day. It’s part of who we are, and it’s not because we have to, it’s because we want to.

Cypress Hill has always advocated for cannabis. It’s cool to see that you turned it into a business. You too, Xzibit.

Xzibit: But it takes the team. It takes a lot of good people around you, and good people are hard to find. So once you’ve got a good team, you take care of them, and it becomes like a family.

April 20 is coming up. I grew up on 420 North 41st Street. My dad didn’t understand why somebody stole our sign every single year. Now he knows [laughs]. How do you guys celebrate 4/20?

B-Real: Every day is 4/20. It’s still the same.

Xzibit: Yeah, what do you mean? What’s the difference?

B-Real: Everybody else parties on 4/20 because it’s like every stoner’s birthday and shit.

Are you doing anything special at your stores?

Xzibit: Yeah, our grand opening is on 4/20 at the West Coast Cannabis Marina Del Rey store, but I’ll be going to the other locations as well.

Anything happening at your store, B?

B-Real: There’s specials, there’s flavor drops, there’s meet-and-greets and stuff like that. Usually we’re out of town. This is probably the one 4/20 in the last couple years where we’re actually at home, not doing anything. But I might stop into one of the dispensaries, maybe San Diego or something like that. We’re dropping music that day as well.

One of my favorite songs you did was actually “Dr. Greenthumb’s.”

B-Real: Yeah, that’s the calling card. It gets lit.

Cypress Hill just released a new single, too. You’re busy.

B-Real: I’ve been blessed to be locked in with two amazing albums: the Serial Killers album, This Thing of Ours, and this Cypress Hill Spanish album. Two completely different things. I’m blessed to be working like this.

Who would have thought all these years later that you’d still be doing it at such a high level? No pun intended [laughs].

B-Real: We try to stay busy. I think our school, the gold school, we were very young at heart when we started this but advanced in our years because of the street life we led before this. It sort of gave us an advantage in the mentality, like only the strong survive shit, right? We were very young at it, and we’ve kept this young, competitive mentality throughout the years, even as we’re now in our 50s. We don’t look at ourselves like we’re in our 50s. We feel like we’re in our fucking 30s and 40s and still doing it at the highest level. It’s about the state of mind you’re in. If you feel you’re fucking too old for this shit, you will sound and feel like you’re too old for this shit, and it’ll be done for you. But those of us in this modern age of it, we don’t feel that way. We feel like we’re still competitive. We still can rap circles around half the motherfuckers that are doing this shit right now who are younger than us. Although we do recognize the youngsters that are right there with us, too, because there are plenty of youngsters that get down. But, you know, it’s the competitive spirit. And as long as we’re taking care of ourselves, we’re right in state of mind, we could do this as long as we fucking want.

Absolutely.

B-Real: Look at The Rolling Stones. They’re close to fucking 90 and still doing shows. All of you guys, we all have such a spirit of youth. Like, it’s still there. And I think that helps us age very well. If Madonna could be a pop star at 60-fucking-something or 70-something, whatever she is, why can’t we still be cutting it up? And it’s about how much you put into yourself and how much you put into the art. So fortunately, Xzibit still has that passion. He’s not as old as us yet, but he will be one day. He’ll still have it. He’s got it in him.

The work ethic is insane, too.

B-Real: You got to want to do this, and we still love to do it. I think it shows when you hear or see us do the music that we still love it. If we were just going through the motions, you would hear that and be like, “Ah, this shit is kind of OK,” and you’d flip forward to whatever the next shit is. But when someone still has passion about it, I think you can hear it, and we still definitely do.

<p>The post B-Real and Xzibit on Brick Weed, Backwoods and Why They Still ‘Rap Circles’ Around Younger Rappers first appeared on High Times.</p>

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The artist is entering cannabis as co-founder and brand ambassador of Young Gong, a new venture with Dr. Sha-Ron Pierre-Kovler’s Glenmere Farms Enterprises.

YG Marley is entering the cannabis business.

The artist is launching Young Gong, a new cannabis brand created with Glenmere Farms Enterprises, the New York-based company led by biomedical scientist Dr. Sha-Ron Pierre-Kovler. The official launch is set for April 19 with a “Countdown to 4/20” event at Partake NYC in Long Island City, during the 2nd day of NYC’s weekend-long Kanafest.

According to materials shared exclusively with High Times, Marley is part of the venture as co-founder and brand ambassador, giving the project a more direct connection to the artist than the usual celebrity licensing play. The brand is being positioned around cannabis, music and meditation, with the name “Young Gong” drawing on both Marley’s identity and the idea of sound as a healing force.

“I’ve wanted to work with Dr. Sha-Ron for a while now,” Marley said. “I saw that she is a creative genius. She understands this plant is more than just a feeling — it’s a frequency.”

Pierre-Kovler said Marley made sense as a partner not just because of his public profile, but because of his long relationship to cannabis culture and his instinct for pairing strains with mood, setting and experience. In her view, New York also offers the right backdrop for that kind of rollout, giving the brand a chance to build cannabis-centered experiences in a market still taking shape.

That language carries through the rest of the rollout. Young Gong is framed not just as a cannabis line but as a broader lifestyle brand, one that leans on the overlap between cannabinoids, sound and wellness. The company says packaging will include QR codes unlocking exclusive digital content from Marley, tying the physical product to music and other branded experiences.

The first products will roll out across New York on April 19, according to Pierre-Kovler, with a New Jersey launch expected this summer. The debut lineup includes Harmon-E, K-Lab, Melody Makers and Roads of Flames, each positioned around a different intended effect and audience.

Pierre-Kovler said her role in the venture is to help shape the science, formulation and broader vision behind the brand, drawing on her research background and a focus on giving consumers products that feel safe, consistent and grounded in more than just marketing language.

Pierre-Kovler, whose Glenmere Farms Enterprises is part of the joint venture, is described in launch materials as one of the few Black women operating at scale in legal cannabis and as a longtime advocate for cannabinoid-based wellness. Glenmere says its broader portfolio includes both Dr. Sha’s and Young Gong Cannabis.

For Marley, the move adds a cannabis venture to a public image already closely tied to one of music’s most storied family legacies. But the pitch here is not nostalgia. It is a modern wellness-forward brand with celebrity visibility, scientific branding and a launch timed for the cannabis industry’s most crowded week of the year.

The official Young Gong launch event is scheduled for Sunday, April 19 at 9 p.m. at Partake NYC, located at 10-29 44th Rd, Long Island City, NY. More details are expected through the brand’s Instagram account, @younggongcannabis, and its website.

<p>The post Exclusive: YG Marley Launches Young Gong Cannabis Brand first appeared on High Times.</p>

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After a European rollout last year, Sensi Seeds and Death Row Records are bringing five exclusive strains to the U.S., giving American home growers their first shot at running seeds developed with Death Row’s lead grower, AK.

Snoop is bringing Death Row into the grow room.

After launching in Europe last year, the Death Row Records collaboration with Sensi Seeds is officially landing in the U.S., giving American home growers access to five exclusive strains for the first time: B-Funk, Dough Boy, Studio Candy, Caramel Pineapple and Cereal Killa.

For Snoop, the timing came down to making sure the project was solid before opening it up stateside.

“We’ve been building this the right way: getting the genetics dialed in, seeing how people rock with it overseas, and making sure it’s something I can stand on. Now it’s time to bring it home. The fans been ready, the growers been ready, so we’re ready to open it up and let the people grow what we grow,” he told High Times.

This is not just a celebrity cannabis tie-in or another branded jar. It is a seed drop meant for people who actually grow.

Snoop also framed the release as part of something bigger than merch.

“We’ve grown Death Row from a music label into a full lifestyle universe and this is a natural evolution of that. This isn’t just merch or a logo on a package… this is the DNA.”

The project was developed with AK, Death Row’s lead grower, and the idea, at least from his side, was pretty simple: build five strains that each bring something different to the garden.

“When developing these strains, we prioritized flavor, effect and yield,” AK told High Times.

That comes through in the way he talks about the lineup. He’s not pitching five versions of the same plant with different names on the pack. He’s pitching five different roles.

“Our goal was to deliver five cultivars that each serve a clear purpose in a home grower’s garden, while showcasing the depth of modern and legacy genetics working together,” he said.

B-Funk sounds like the one they expect a lot of people to start with. AK describes it as vigorous, expressive and especially rewarding for growers who like to work the plant a little. He points to its Burmese Pie and Fruity Juice background, heavy resin production and lateral growth that responds well to SCROG and supercropping.

Caramel Pineapple goes in a different direction. Taller, longer, louder. AK says the SFV OG and Jamaican Roadkill Skunk lineage gives it a lot of character, both while growing and once it’s in the jar.

Dough Boy is the sturdy one in the group. Bushy, forgiving and built to deliver. AK called it the “foundation strain,” pointing to its Northern Lights and Durban background and the kind of structure that makes life easier for growers who want something dependable.

Then there’s Studio Candy, which he framed as high performance in a smaller footprint, and Cereal Killa, which he described as especially well suited for indoor setups and growers looking for something compact, efficient and deeply relaxing.

That’s probably what gives the whole thing a little more shape than the average celebrity weed rollout. There’s at least an attempt to speak to growers like growers.

And the pairing makes sense. Sensi brings the breeding history. Death Row brings the cultural gravity. Snoop sits right in the middle of that, which is probably why this feels more natural than a lot of cannabis collabs that start with a name and end there.

Whether these actually become favorites is up to growers now. That part always is. But this is a good move. It takes Death Row out of the abstract and puts it somewhere more tangible: in the tent, in the room, in the hands of people who want to grow the thing themselves.

That’s a much better place for it.

<p>The post Snoop Brings Death Row Seeds to U.S. Growers: ‘Let the People Grow What We Grow’ first appeared on High Times.</p>

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