Heads over a certain age will have noticed right away that the latest album from producer SadhuGold, The Gold Room, is themed around The Shining. We caught up with him to talk about the inspiration behind that, his work with Ohbliv on his other new album, The Ra(w) Material, and more.
You’ve described your music as “the soundtrack to the subconscious of the space-time continuum”. Break that down for us.
If reality had a working mind, as we know it, then my music would be the music that gets stuck in its head, that it listens to calm itself down, or that it tells its friends about.
The Gold Room is themed around one of the most iconic movies of all time, The Shining. Can you elaborate on the concept and why the film inspired you?
The film inspired me because it’s kind of isolated in what feels like a snow globe in a forgotten pocket of reality. The gold room specifically was such an abstraction from just simple isolation into a self-lead descent of madness. As dark as that may seem, it’s extremely artistic to me, a feeling I’ve always wanted to replicate. Look at The Gold Room as a sonic prequel, the first party where something went wrong.
You also just dropped The Ra(W) Materials with Ohbliv, as Czardust. Considering you are both producers, how was the album put together, as in who did what?
The Album was put together mostly by Ohbliv making chops/loops and sending them to me. I would then work with them for a few days to kind of rework them into what was heard on the final product. Kind of akin to alchemy in the sense of working with raw materials and putting them through the process of making gold.
The Ra(W) Materials has you emceeing on several tracks. What made you choose this album to step out from behind the board a lot more?
All of that music is older than it seems. I was rapping well before I took up producing full time, so I was more or less getting out stuff that the world should have been heard.
Will we get to hear more of you on the mic on future projects?
Only if I get to make it into a cartoon, like the Gorillaz.
You’ve worked with a varied group of emcees, from straight-up street rappers like Westside Gunn, to more abstract artists like Mach-Hommy, and stream-of-consciousness lyricists like Your Old Droog. Do you tend to make different kinds of beats for specific artists in mind, or just provide them with beats to choose from?
I definitely try to hit the mark as far as style matching goes. I actually have a bad habit of making beats to be rapped on instead of just making beats, but that may be because I’m an MC at heart, who knows.
I’ve heard DJ Muggs talk about how sometimes an artist will pick a beat he’d had never envisioned them on, and he’s always pleasantly surprised. Is that something you find?
Not often, most rappers are predictable. But when that does happen, it hits way differently, really resonates on a deeper level. Estee Nack did that to me. Sent son a batch, and the first beat he picked was the last one I expected (“EL BLABLAZO” on our joint album SURFINGONGOLD.WAV). And not only that, but I had never imagined that anyone would have thought to use that style on a beat like that. But now I can’t imagine any other style working any better, or at all for that matter.
Who’d be on your ultimate bucket list of people to produce for?
MF DOOM, Yasiin, Ghostface, Cappadonna, Roc Marci, Black Thought, Homeboy Sandman, and fucking Alchemist man, that nigga can RAP, ok?
What’s next in the pipeline from you?
Deez nuts. Lol just kidding. Me and Nature Sounds are going to be releasing my favorite beat tape I ever made, its called Golden Joe. And in the mean time I may be dropping small collabs here and there, I need to stop surprise releasing lol.
Lastly, returning to The Shining, will you be checking the new Doctor Sleep movie?
Yea I’m gonna for sure check it out. I was afraid of it being weird and bad, but I actually intentionally watch bad movies, I find them highly entertaining lol. So if it sucks, I get a laugh, if it’s fire I’ll pay to see it again.
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The Gold Room is out now on Nature Sounds. Get it here. The Ra(W) Materials is also out now – purchase from Fat Beats. Follow SadhuGold on Twitter and Instagram. Interview by Grown Up Rap Editor Ben Pedroche.