Category: Interview

Interview: Brother Ali

Few musicians are as wise, spiritual and deep-thinking as Brother Ali, which certainly makes him somewhat of a rarity in the world of hip-hop. The Rhymesayers Entertainment artist recently took time out from his European tour to speak to Gingerslim.

It’s coming up to a couple of years since you released your last album and we got that single last year; is there a new project looming?

There is…

*line goes dead then reconnects*

Sorry I lost you then, man.

Okay, are we back?

Yeah I think so, all I heard you say was “There is”, then the line went dead

Oh well maybe that’s for the best [laughs]. But yeah I started working on a new project and it’s very different from the last project – the way I’m writing it is different, the production is different, really the whole approach is different and so I’m excited about it. I’m not really wanting to say too much right now cos it’s still taking shape, but I hope to have it out by the end of this year.

That’s good to hear, man. Now, you’ve been quite vocal in previous interviews about some of the problems you’ve faced as an American Muslim; I was wondering how noticeable the impact of Trump’s presidency has been from that perspective?

For me personally it hasn’t really changed anything. The security people at the airport always gave me trouble and they still do sometimes, so that hasn’t really changed. I think the differences are for my wife, my daughters and for the community that I’m a part of. You know my ancestry is European and I’m an albino, but I was raised in African American and black culture, so sometimes people are unsure of my racial makeup, but for the most part if I have problems it’s because of the work that I do.

But for black and brown people, and those who small-minded people think look like Muslims, it’s dangerous. I mean not only from the authorities but from regular people who are from the dominant group, you know they’re poor, they’ve been financially oppressed, they’ve been used, but they’ve always been told “oh but you’re white and this is your country”, so pride in America is really pride in their group.

But now they’re losing that hope of whiteness and being an American, so when they say make America great again, what they mean is make white people great again. And then they see black people being proud as a direct threat to them, and also Muslims, you know anyone not completely bowing to them is a direct threat to what they want their life to be about. So it’s really difficult and because the president now is one of them, they feel completely confident acting really horribly – really bad character, really bad manners, being really violent. There’s a video that’s on Facebook of this grown man in a parking lot and he’s just screaming in the face of this black woman who’s pregnant. It’s really bizarre how empowered people are feeling now to be horrible cos they think they’re fighting for their country when they do that.

And how powerful a role do you see music playing in the act of resistance?

Honestly I’m not that impressed with it. I love hip hop music, I feel like I’m a part of the culture, but me being an underground artist who is a little bit of an outsider in certain ways, I’ve always looked at the landscape and wondered what’s the next thing? What should we be doing next and what are we not thinking about? What should we be focusing on? So when I came out in the early 2000’s, the popular narrative at that time was about triumph over adversity, so Jay-Z was leading it and 50 Cent, people like that – I came from nothing and now I’m cool and I’m rich and powerful – and that’s great, that’s a great story cos it’s true and it gives people hope, so I appreciate that.

So I was never against that, I’ve always okay, but what are they not saying? And so I made music about being vulnerable and then in the late 2000’s, I would say 2010, I put an album out and at that time people were celebrating extravagance and being really successful and rich, that was like the Rick Ross time, Watch the Throne, that type of thing. Kanye and Jay-Z were talking about black capitalism and black consumerism as a way out. So then I came out and said look most of us are poor, let’s just start from there. Were not living extravagantly, we’re actually going to tell the truth and we don’t just want to beat the capitalists at their own game. Not that I’m a communist but I’m saying hyper-capitalism, hyper-consumerism, that’s not a win for me – for us to be able to buy more than other people can buy and then say that that’s freedom.

But you’re still stepping on people and people are still suffering, so that you can have more; that goes against the grain. And now that Trump is the president, so many of the artists are now talking about prisons and all this stuff, but to me it just feels really anaemic, man. It’s not powerful to me, most of what’s being talked about. I mean Lowkey has always been talking about this, Akala has always been talking about this, Immortal Technique, Mos Def, you know you have artists who have always been speaking on this stuff. And I like hearing Jay-Z talk about it, I’m a big Jay-Z fan, but I just don’t think it’s really impacting the people.

So what do you think they could be doing, could they be doing more? Do you think it needs an alternative voice?

I don’t spend any time thinking about what I wish other people would do differently, but I really do like a lot of the emerging voices and so that’s really cool. But in terms of all the public political thinkers in America, I probably align most with Dr Cornel West. He’s a Christian and I’m a Muslim, but his idea of justice comes from a loyalty to being moral and there’s a spiritual dimension to being a moral person because the unseen virtues have to be more important to you than anything worldly, including power. So if it’s a pure Marxist idea about power, that basically starts with the same epistemology, the same metaphysics as secular capitalists, that basically say the world is all goods and resources and power to control those goods and resources, that’s what life is. So then we just fight over how to get power over those goods and resources, and that’s what winning is. I’m sorry, but I can’t with that. To me the unseen world of virtue is more important, to me virtue is more important than power. They’re both valid ways of looking at things, but that’s what I believe in. So that’s why when everyone’s making this political music that I already did, now I’m focusing on spirituality, which is not instead of or in lieu of, it’s not a bypass for the political and social reality, but it’s like how am I going to become the type of person that will deny myself material things because it’s the right thing to do.

It’s going to take something spiritual to do that and you’ve got to have the type of heart that can put virtue and other people before yourself. The modern conversation around power and revolutionary power, is not talking about that. Even modern spirituality, kinda like internet spirituality, it’s not about breaking the ego and that’s what real spirituality is about in all the traditions – in Hinduism, in Buddhism, that’s in authentic Christianity, authentic Judaism, indigenous peoples’ religion. It’s like look the human condition is we have beautiful hearts but we have ego. Ego will always command us to take from other people and to oppress other people, the ego is always going to want more, so we have to discipline the ego. But most modern spirituality doesn’t do that and so basically without doing that outer work, or the inner work to get your heart right, if the oppressed people got power now they would just become the new oppressors. And to me that’s not a victory, to most people that’s not a victory, but what’s the road map to be able to live with dignity in a way that is also virtuous? Virtue requires us to deny ourselves things that our ego demands. Like I should be able to have sex with whoever I want, why can’t I just grab a woman and have sex with her? Because that’s rape! Well okay then I have to tell my ego that this woman’s right to freedom of choice and freedom over her body, is more important than my desire, but I’m going to have to discipline my ego to get to that point.

And it’s the same with what’s wrong with consuming gold, if I want gold and it looks good on me? Well then you say what’s gold doing to South Africa, what are diamonds doing to West Africa? So if I had the money to buy gold and it looks good on me and people seem to think it looks good on me, there’s something spiritual that’s going to make me think that those people I’ve never met are more important than how good it feels for me to wear gold. So to me, that’s what my focus is and I can’t say what other people should do, but I listen to my heart and that’s what I believe.

That’s a really good perspective to have though. Now you’ve said before that each of your albums has been the result of the pain, growth and eventual healing that you’ve experienced, and to me your last album sounded like your most joyous one to date, so I was wondering if you feel fully healed now from whatever you went through before?

No, I think it’s always a process and I think that’s one of the things about real, genuine spirituality is that we know it is a never-ending process. But I will say when we’re early on that path, sometimes the narrative that spiritually immature people have is that they were once lost and now they’re found, or they used to damned and now they’re saved, but it doesn’t work like that [laughs]. Once you start going on the path it’s just like anything else, like now does Venus Williams think she’s the greatest she can ever be? No because she’s always going to be working on it until she can’t anymore and it’s the same with anybody who is really dedicated to something. Once you solve one problem, you just move up in problems and you realise there’s a much more nuanced problem that you couldn’t even know about because you weren’t wise enough to see it.

So do you feel like that sort of complacency is a problem elsewhere? Because that’s how I see it in music, I see some people who feel like  they’ve achieved everything they can so they get complacent and then their art suffers as a result.

It can be a really traumatic experience to create without fear cos the reality is there is fear. So you do something that is really creative, you pour your heart into it and then people might just ignore it, or they might hate it. And I mean hating it is better than ignoring it honestly, but I know I’ve been through that and then it’s like why did I do all that? I kinda died internally to make this album and now it’s just another one with all the 50 million albums that came out and so I think at a certain point some people are like I’m not going to plunge the depths of my soul again if it’s not going to be received.

So people who have done that in the past, or they’re no longer in the spotlight, it’s really hard work doing that and so the average person isn’t going to keep doing it. I believe that’s a spiritual practice too, even if people don’t think that they’re religious. Like you listen to someone like James Baldwin talk about what it really means to create from a true place – it’s a death. So I think with musicians, maybe they did that once or twice and everyone celebrates them for it, but it’s hard to keep doing it. You know you can make a living off the spiritual war you fought 20 years ago and so you could just keep touring that album, people still like it so you can make a living doing that and honestly I feel like a lot of those people go to Europe, but it’s not fair to Europe and the UK because the artists from over there can’t do that. They gotta keep creating cos they’re basically being ignored on the global stage. How come everybody all over the world doesn’t know Akala, or doesn’t know Lowkey? Everybody should. There’s a million of these artists and I probably don’t even know most of them, but I really think it’s unfair because European people know what real music is. So I think it’s unfair that a lot of old skool hip hop artists just keep going over there and doing the same old songs over and over again. I mean I’m glad they’re making money, people seem to like it, that’s cool but it’s like they’re still living, they’re still learning, they’re still being a human being, what’s going on? We want to hear that, we want to hear what it feels like to be 55 year old and trying to figure out how long you can keep rapping.

Now speaking about Europe, you’re about to touch down over here for your tour. Do you feel any sort of different connection with the fans here, compared to those back home?

I don’t think that they’re different, but when we go round Europe and the UK, or around the world in general, there’s an understanding that our experiences aren’t identical and so like the interviews I do with journalists over there are always the best. Because they’re thinking I don’t really know what this person is about so let me really pay attention and listen to them, where as in the US there is this familiarity that I think can make us a little complacent and can make use feel like yeah I know what you’re about, we’re part of the same group and you’re probably saying the same things that someone else is saying, so it’s just a different level of attention. And artists are driven by a few different motivations, so some of them want control, control of their life and environment, they want to be able to do what they want to do, not what someone else is making them do. Some artists want power and that’s different cos power is the ability to be able to control other people.

Some artists, and it’s true with people too not just artists, some of them just want fame, they just want to be known. It doesn’t matter what they’re known for, it doesn’t matter if it’s true to them or not, they just want a lot of people to know who they are. For me – and again none of these are necessarily good or bad, it’s about what you do with them – fame is the one I respect the least. For me it’s about connecting and it’s about being understood, like I want to genuinely communicate and exchange with people. I want to listen and be listened to, so going to Europe there are smaller crowds than anywhere in the States and I don’t make much money, so the main reason for me wanting to go is because I know that people are listening! [laughs] You know what I mean? And ultimately I’m going to care more about that than making money.

So you’ve got the tour and then you’re working on the album; is there anything else on the horizon?

So my wife and I teach Islamic spirituality at home in Minneapolis, we have a weekly gathering that we do. I basically split my time between writing, recording and performing music on the one hand, then studying and teaching the spiritual path on the other and I’m really fortunate that we live a really simple life. Slug gave me really good advice when I bought my house, he said buy a house that you can afford to keep up even in a slow year, so you’re never a slave to your living expenses. So my family and I live in a small, simple house and I make enough off music so I can do the spirituality thing half the time and I don’t have to worry about getting paid to do that. I don’t have to try get donations or something like that, not at this stage and so it’s a really good life, man. I’m really happy.

Yeah that sounds very fulfilling, man. Well I know we’re running out of time so I’m going to leave it there, but it’s a pleasure to talk to you.

It’s a real pleasure to talk to you too, man.

I’ll be at the Bristol show next week, so maybe I’ll see you then.

Yeah that’d be great, I’d love to say hello to you in person.

Okay, man, well take care.

Thank you, brother, peace.

***

Brother Ali is on tour across Europe until the end of March. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.

Gingerslim has been a hip-hop fan since 1994 and has written for various blogs and websites since around 2006. During that time he has contributed to style43, Think Zebra, Headsknow and Front Magazine. His main interests in rap are UK hip-hop and the underground movement in America, with a focus on Rhymesayers Entertainment and the once mighty Def Jux label. He lives in Bristol and has a beard. All other details are sketchy at best. Follow him here. 

Interview: Producer KutMasta Kurt on working with Kool Keith and Dr. Octagon

KutMasta Kurt has produced some of the most acclaimed hip-hop albums and 12″ singles since the 90s indy boom. He’s worked with everyone from Dilated Peoples and Planet Asia to the Beastie Boys and Linkin Park, but is mostly renown for his collaborations with Kool Keith. We spoke to him about Dr. Octagon, his label Threshhold Recordings and more. The responses and insight we got were a lot more honest, humorous and candid than we expected. Interview by Matt Horowitz.

[The following has been lightly edited for clarity].

How did you initially get involved in the creation process of Dr. Octagon’s Dr. Octagonecologyst? Did I read that your early demos essentially helped create the whole concept of Dr. Octagon and then got edged out of the album?

For the answer to this question you’ll need to wait for my forthcoming book “My Adventures with Kool Keith” by Kutmasta Kurt.

How did your 2013 Dr. OctoTron 7-inch with Kool Keith & Del The Funky Homosapien come to fruition? Do you have any immediate plans to record and release any more music together?

Del and I were  texting in 2012 – he’s a good dude. We were discussing different things and one day he was expressing frustration about working with Fat Toni and Dan [Editor’s Note: We assume Kurt is referring here to producer Dan the Automator]. I said yeah, Keith could tell you a lot about them. He was asking if Keith would want to do a collabo and mentioned how that would fuck-up Dan’s ego. I said yeah that’s true and the two of you together is a dream team type of project that will get some nice attention; let’s do some songs. So that was it, we just did a few songs, dropped a 45 and then Del went back to finish up the second Deltron album and touring with Dan and Keith eventually bent over to take it anally and did Moosebumps which by that time was such a joke of a sequel due to so many previously failed attempts at a follow up. Surprisingly it got all these great reviews, but let’s be honest, the press needs to take Dan’s cock out of their mouths – it was weak. I do give Dan credit for one thing – he found out how to get Keith to perform the lyrics (Keith would always say he couldn’t remember them) – with a teleprompter!

When did Threshold Recordings first acquire their lathe-cutting machine? So far, what note-worthy releases have been cut/recorded using the Neumann VMS-70?

I’d been directing and later assisting the cutting of my own stuff for a while and started cutting others since mid 2000’s. I obtained a lathe that needed to be re-built and that was finally completed in 2013. I’ve been doing projects for friends labels and random stuff, most noteworthy would prob be my own projects as I haven’t really done anything too high profile, but perhaps one day after I get better known and sharpen my skills further.

Did Threshold Recordings have some sort of involvement in recording Zach de la Rocha’s long-rumored solo material. Any idea if it included material produced by Questlove, El-P, or Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor?

I wasn’t involved, haven’t seen Zach since the big day out tour back in the days, but would be cool to link with him again sometime.

At one point in time, you were “Grand Royale’s In-house Remixer,” correct? Now, what exactly did that entail, in regards to your direct relationship with The Beasties?

That was just a running joke since I did so many remixes for the label and was friendly with a few of the staff. Mike D used to call me from time to time for MPC advise so we made that MPC tutorial movie – which is still floating around out there on YouTube.

What are you currently working on recording and releasing on Threshold Recordings in 2019?

I have a unreleased project – songs with Motion Man from the early 90’s that will probably drop in 2019. I also have a comp I’d like to drop, but  I’ve been more focused on my farming.

How did you first meet Kool Keith and what initially prompted you to start collaborating and releasing music together?

I was doing long hauls for my cousin’s trucking company (during the farming off season) and Keith was hanging out at this strip club us truckers like to frequent in Hunts Point. We got to be friends and used to smoke crack together and listen to E-40 and Mac Mall records in my cab (I had 2 15” subs). he was telling me he wanted to make a new sound, I played him some of my beats and he was hype to record, so he hitched a ride back west with me. the rest is history!

Of all the projects you’ve recorded with Kool Keith over the years which one was your absolute favorite and why?

Masters of Illusion, cuz he stepped up his style and skills and Motion Man got to show he could go toe to toe with Keith. Plus some of my fav beats I made are featured.

What are a few of your personal favorite KutMasta Kurt projects that you don’t exactly think garnered the initial attention they deserved?

A good example is Dr. Dooom 2. Keith predicted it perfectly on the song mopped up “First thing you gon’ do as a journalist is compare this to the first Dr. Dooom Fuck you!” Another which I executive-produced and mixed but presented is Dopestyle 1231. MC Dopestyle is ill with his and goes toe to toe with all of his guests (even when they try to diss him on his own song). But yeah we just released our first recordings from the 90’s, the MC Blabber demos and it stands up lyrically today. DS 1231 is also how I met Tom c3 who I later connected with Keith for the Project Polaroid collab album, which iMHO is one of Keith’s most cohesive works while Tom’s beats were mad saiko, and the last one I’d mention is Motion Man’s Pablito’s Way album.

How did your latest project with Kool Keith, Your Mom Is My Wife EP, come to fruition? These tracks were originally recorded in-between Sex Style and Dr. Dooom, correct?

Yes, originally recorded after the Sex Style sessions and before the Dr. Dooom sessions. It came to fruition when I was playing some of the tracks to Keith and he was bugging out remembering them and said, “hey, why don’t we release these now?” Chino XL wouldn’t give us his permission to include a collabo track that we really wanted to include. I think he takes himself too seriously. Keith and I view lyrics as comedy. Like Eddie Murphy and his Mister T “come her boy and fuck me up the ass” routine is just super funny, and Mister T never shot Eddie over that. But for some reason rappers lyrics can’t be viewed in a similar way and some people get all butt-hurt about ‘em and wanna kill. That’s some dumb shit, no doubt. Hopefully one day Chino changes his mind, but for now remains a private/personal track, only Keith and I can laugh at.

It seems like, these days, most producers have acquired a Prince-sized “vault” or digital archives full of unreleased material. If you could put together your own compilation of as-yet-unreleased material, what type of gems might be included within?

My vault is not Prince-sized by any means, but I do have a lot of dope unreleased material with Motion Man and a small amount of Keith tracks. There’s this one song with Motion Man and Evidence from Dilated Peoples that is quirky, and a track with Raph Boogie (from Australia) who made that producer photo book “Behind the Beat” that I’m featured in.

How exactly, in your opinion, was Kool Keith’s Dr. Dooom 2 orchestrated in direct response to OCD International’s widely-lauded 2006 Dr. Octagonecologyst follow-up, The Return of Dr. Octagon?

It was in direct response because we had booking agents getting us on tours like the big day out in Australia/New Zealand and other big festivals but did not enjoy performing those tracks. So we switched the focus of our touring to be Dr. Dooom vs. Dr. Octagon in 2009 which culminated in Keith’s first time touring in japan. As we’ve gone on record a few times, that old album was so far out of pocket to what Dr. Octagon was and very pop and  EDM sounding. They could have called it something else, but the label and producers were trying to capitalize on that name. FAIL!

***

Follow KutMaster Kurt and Threshold Recordings on Twitter.

Matt Horowitz has been a hip-hop fan ever since he first heard Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) back in the mid-90’s, which positively or negatively changed his life ever since, depending on who you ask. He single-handedly runs online music publication The Witzard, and has been fortunate enough to interview Eothen ‘Egon’ Alapatt, Guilty Simpson, Ice-T and Mr. X, Dan Ubick, Career Crooks’ Zilla Rocca & Small Professor, Cut Chemist, and J-Zone, amongst countless others. He enjoys writing about and listening to hip-hop, Punk/Hardcore, and Indie Rock on vinyl with his lovely wife, while drinking craft beer, red wine, or iced coffee. To paraphrase both Darko The Super and the Beastie Boys: “Already Dead fans, they want more of this… I’m a Witzard like my man Matt Horowitz!”. Follow Matt here.

Interview: Small Professor on making ’86 Witness’ with Sean Price

86 Witness is a deeply personal album for producer Small Professor. He and Sean Price were already working on the project before P’s death in 2015, making this a genuine Sean Price album, not something stitched together from disparate, archived sound files. Its a worthy tribute to one of the sharpest writers in music, and a fine addition to the catalogs of both artists. We recently spoke to Small Pro about how the album came together.

Considering it’s been three and a half years since we lost Sean Price, 86 Witness must have been a long time in the making?

The album wasn’t really that long in the making…most of it was done in 2015 before P passed away, and a few features and bells and whistles were added after his passing up through the end of 2016. It’s just been a very long time coming.

How was it put together? Did you get to work with P in the studio before he passed, or have you had to work through vocals and construct it piece by piece? 

The album was constructed mainly through the internet – sending verses and beats back and forth to P’s engineer. I’d send beats, he’d send back a rough demo, and I’d do additional changes once I got his vocals…that’s how the whole album was created.

There must be a certain amount of pressure that comes with producing an artist posthumously and making sure you do justice to their legacy?

I definitely felt a little pressure but this was a bit different than your usual posthumous release because I knew P thought what we had done so far was quality, so I felt like if it was good enough for him, I’d be ok with however it was received upon its release.

The album has 1986 as a running theme. How did that concept come about?

The 1986 theme was accidental at first… Matt Diamond (Coalmine Records, 86 Witness Executive Producer) and I started noticing the year popping up via references in P’s rhymes, and so we started to add our own 1986 ideas into the mix, including the title.

Sean’s widow Bernadette has been very hands-on in making sure her husband’s music is respected. Did 86 Witness get her blessing?

86 Witness was released as a partnership between Coalmine Records and Duck Down Music – the latter of which Bernadette has worked closely with since P’s passing, so her blessing was received.

Lastly, what are some of your favorite personal memories of working with P?

My favorite memories of working with P were our few phone calls, where we pretty much just talked about rap and our kids. Our relationship was mainly a musical one, so the most thrilling thing was getting new P verses in my email that only two other people in the world had heard to date. He also almost snapped at me once because I switched his verses around without his permission, but he liked the end result so much it didn’t matter [laughs].

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86 Witness is out now. Purchase here. Follow Small Pro on Twitter. Interview by Grown Up Rap Editor Ben Pedroche.

Interview: DJ 7L (of Czarface)

Czarface, aka Inspectah Deck and 7L & Esoteric, continue their run of impeccable hip-hop albums with the release of Czarface Meets Ghostface, a collaboration with Ghostface Killah. We caught up with DJ 7L to talk about his production duo The Czar-Keys, the Czar universe and more. Interview by Matt Horowitz.

How exactly did The Czar-Keys, with Jeremy Page, first come to fruition? 

I met Jeremy years back – he is part of/and produces my man That Handsome Devils band/music, plus Kendra Morris among others. So I def knew him going back 10 years if not longer actually.

Some time in 2016 our mutual friend Matt suggested we get up and work. I was mentioning that I wanted to get a sample reworked and he said Jeremy was the guy, and from there we been working ever since! Prior to that I was working with Todd Spadafore, another amazing musician who is out in LA now writing and producing. Me and Todd worked on 7LES stuff back in the day. To me samples mixed with live music is really the best possible way to make music. What Just Blaze was doing during those early 2000 Roc-A-Fella years was what I wanted for a sound.

As far as the name, around the First Weapon Drawn record I came up with the name The Czar-Keys (off the Mar-Keys album I had in the studio at the time) as a half joke, a fake band. So since First Weapon Drawn was treated as a soundtrack-based album it just worked. I was always a huge fan of production teams i.e; The Beatnuts, Bomb Squad, Boogie Men, Beatminerz, Hitmen…Ghetto Pros etc., so the name The Czar-Keys just kind of just worked.

How did your process on Czarface Meets Metal Face, Czarface Meets Ghostface, and Rast’s I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, differ?

For the Czarface Meets Ghostface I don’t think we changed anything as far as our recording process. I remember Deck saying early on around that no matter who we are working with “they are in our dojo” so to speak. We just keep things as loose as we can and just record records and see how they happen organically. For the I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings album, Misterman Cheers (formerly Rast) def wanted a particular sound. I think I dubbed it a “surf” sound half way through. I was chopping various Hawaiian/Exotica Records and Jeremy was killing it with the Hammond/Organ.

A lot of people may not realize this but Czarface actually dates back as far as “Speaking Real Words” from 2006’s The Soul Purpose and “12th Chamber” (credited to Czarface) from 2010’s 1212. What prompted you fellas to, ultimately, turn Czarface into a full-fledged super-group/villain?

While mixing the “12th Chamber” record (a song with Eso & Deck from 2010) I remember texting Eso (pretty casually in hindsight) “you and Deck should do a whole record together”. My suggestion was no digital, no CD, no cover, just do a white label EP, six songs. Something for just hardcore fans to find and treasure as this hidden record. Eso was like “I mean, I’ll talk to Deck but we def gotta do something more than a white label record lol”. We didn’t have the whole Czarface character even in motion at this point. We were just recording songs and having fun. Then a little over half way through we started throwing around names and landed on Czarface. I think we might have had a demo of a song named “Incarcerated Czarfaces” as a half joke, but we liked Czarface.

How exactly does Czarface cumulatively represent yourself, Inspectah Deck and Esoteric? At  what point in the recording process did L’Amore Supreme come up with the now-infamous character design?

Once we got the name I think we talked about having a character as the group figure head. That was one thing we all decided on from jump, was really having the project be different from each of our other records (Deck or Eso’s solo records).

I am the furthest thing from a metal person but I do remember as a kid starring at the Iron Maiden album covers and thought the Eddie character was so cool. I liked the idea of doing something similar and building off this character.

Eso saw L’Amore’s art and felt he would be the person to bring the Czar character to life. Eso came up with the character, the ideas and the direction and then he and L’Amore worked together on what Czar is today. Eso works hard on all the comic related aspects which I think moving forward is a big piece to the Czar universe. Same way I’ll obsess over a sample and staying to the fundamentals of why I got into making music I think he holds the same for comics.

How would you personally say First Weapon Drawn’s read-along comic book/album and Record Store Day Black Friday 2018’s Dog Days of Tomorrow relate to Czarface’s ever-evolving collection of music?

Well I think this was something we wanted to do once the Czarface character was developed. We liked that we could do comics or action figures and just other things based off Czarface that wasn’t specific to just making albums. When we did Every Hero Needs a Villain we touched on Czar as a character not related to the music per se. I think in the last few years that we been able to really make progress on both Czarface music and Czarface as a character.

Would you mind briefly explaining the various Get On Down packages and various merchandise to be associated with Czarface Meets Ghostface’s release? Are there any current plans to tour behind the album, as well?

Get on Down has always been ahead of the curve on the special packaging with hip-hop releases. Since the first album with the pop up CD they have always been a great partner to get our projects done in an interesting way.

I think with First Weapon Drawn we were able to split things up a bit, meaning more focus on making great albums while saving the extra packaging side for the comic/instrumental albums.

***

Czarface Meets Ghostface is out now. Get it from here. Follow DJ 7L, Esoteric and Inspectah Deck on Twitter.

Matt Horowitz has been a hip-hop fan ever since he first heard Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) back in the mid-90’s, which positively or negatively changed his life ever since, depending on who you ask. He single-handedly runs online music publication The Witzard, and has been fortunate enough to interview Eothen ‘Egon’ Alapatt, Guilty Simpson, Ice-T and Mr. X, Dan Ubick, Career Crooks’ Zilla Rocca & Small Professor, Cut Chemist, and J-Zone, amongst countless others. He enjoys writing about and listening to hip-hop, Punk/Hardcore, and Indie Rock on vinyl with his lovely wife, while drinking craft beer, red wine, or iced coffee. To paraphrase both Darko The Super and the Beastie Boys: “Already Dead fans, they want more of this… I’m a Witzard like my man Matt Horowitz!”. Follow Matt here.

Interview: Slug (Atmosphere)

As Atmosphere prepare to hit Europe for the latest leg of their never-ending tour, we speak to Slug about everything from Mi Vida Local to Dynospectrum and movies to Brexit. Words by Gingerslim.

Thanks for speaking with me, man. How’s everything with you?

I’m good, man, I’m good. I get up early to take the kid to school and sometimes I go back to sleep, sometimes I don’t. Today I didn’t and I’m feeling it right now. We were up late last night working on some music and I forgot that I had press today, so I was thinking I could grab some more sleep after I took the kid to school but then when I was driving back this morning I checked my calendar and I was like “Oh fuck!”. So here I am, all coffee’d up.

You released your latest album in October, Mi Vida Local. For those who may not have heard it yet, can you give us a bit of a breakdown? Has there been much progression from Fishing Blues?

You know, I don’t know if I’m in a position to answer that. There’s that bumper sticker that says all art is subjective and I think that the last opinion we should ever listen to about a piece of art, is the person who made it. I can tell you what certain songs are about – if I know – or I can tell you what I was thinking at the time, or what I was doing, but I don’t know if this record is any good, or if it’s any different. In my world it’s different, due to the fact it represents where I am right now.

Fishing Blues, or Southsiders, or Family Sign, they’re all kinda like snapshots of where I’m at in that moment. Where as if you were to try to hold my life up next to the person who made Family Sign, or Lemons right now, well my life has altered, it’s changed, it’s evolved since then; I dunno, however you want to word it, but it’s changed. Every two or three years we adapt to what’s been thrown at us. This record is made by the same guy who made You Can’t Imagine How Much Fun We’re Having, but that guy is living in different circumstances, there’s a different climate going on, you know what I mean? So these things all kinda shape whatever the fuck it is that I’m juggling, or that I’m dealing with, or struggling with in that moment and this record is a snapshot of that. So in my head, if I was my own therapist, I think this record represents a certain kind of frustration or confusion, but different to the one I was feeling 10 years ago, it’s coming from a different perspective. Now I have more children so I have more worry about things that maybe aren’t quite so insular, like the world is steadily flying towards its destruction you know?

These types of things inform the writing on this album, where as lets say 10 years ago, the things that informed the writing and the music then, might have come from the place of a person who was far more concerned about himself, or about the moments. Now I’m looking at my surroundings and I’m giving less of a fuck about the things inside my immediate area, with more concern about things that are out of my control. And that’s a weird place to be cos you’re not supposed to give a shit about things that are out of your control, but yet here I go.

It must come with the territory, as you said you became a father so that will increase your worries.

Sure, but even if you take fatherhood out of the equation, I find myself thinking about things like those reports you read that say things like “we have this much time to change our ways before we cross the tipping point and face mass extinction” and you’re like well what do I envision as a perfect resolutions to that? Because I don’t necessarily believe we’re going to change, I want to but I honestly don’t think humanity has the fucking strength to make the changes that are needed. So with that said, how do I want to see shit end? What I envision is that when people realise there is going to be extinction, they’re going to lose their shit and start doing a lot of bad stuff. But I don’t want to see that happen, so how about we blow this fucking place up? Let’s all die at once, let’s have a mass suicide and blow it up. Actually no, suicide is the wrong word because none of us want to be the one to end it, but to achieve suicide you kinda have to do it yourself so let’s just set a time-bomb. I don’t have to worry about my kids starving, or burning to death, they don’t have to be sad about me dying first; I don’t have to worry about you, or my friends, we can all just fucking go and then it’s done. But what kind of fucking depression is that?! Where am I? What the fuck is going on when that’s my fantasy? It’s like wow, I’ve come a long way in 10 years! [laughs]

And do you think you’ll find a way to come to terms with that?

I mean here’s the best part, I have come to terms with it cos at the end of the day I know that that fantasy is so far-fetched; it’s not a rational reality, it’s more like a movie that I haven’t seen yet, but it’s in my head. In real terms I just want to try to make life as fun as possible for the people that I care about – my family, my friends – I just want everybody to have a good time. That other shit is just something I would talk to my therapist about. The real world and how I really see things, is that I’m trying to learn to be less susceptible to other people’s problems and frustrations, and more available as a conduit to spread hope to people who are feeling pain or frustration, as opposed to being affected by their pain and frustration. I want to try to be an energy that can add a bit of good feeling to the people that I can reach.

Luckily I have a good job for that, I’m a musician, and in a weird way I’m thankful that I never became super famous in the sense of having to figure out how to communicate to millions of people because that’s insane. Instead I get to be in my lane and communicate with the people who have figured out how to interpret me, so that I don’t have to be careful of how I communicate. I can do it how I feel, I can keep it as raw as I want without having to worry about ‘hurting people’, or backlash, or being problematic. I can be problematic if I fucking want. Now what does that mean? I’m not a very problematic person, but I get to be who I am and who I want, and people allow that, they make room for me to be that, so I’m kind of in the perfect situation. Cos my bills are paid, my family’s got food, so that’s where I think well what I can do to focus on people who maybe don’t have that; I mean obviously I can’t pay everybody’s rent for them, but maybe I can just give them a little something to listen to while they’re self-medicating and trying to escape the day-to-day problems that they have.

I mean that’s kinda what got me into your music, back in the Lucy Ford days because it just felt accessible and relatable.

I guess maybe now I’m finally embracing that, because when you got into that I didn’t want to be accessible, I didn’t want to be the guy that people went to to escape – I just wanted to be a fucking dope MC, you know what I mean? No one ever gave me the ribbon that I wanted, that first place ribbon, they gave me this different type of ribbon and I was very reluctant for a long time. I think by the time I first met you (2008), I was finally embracing it and realizing that I had just been blind, that that’s what I had been doing this whole time. But I think that’s the big joke. You receive a place to stand and it’s always the right spot, the place that’s been held for us for each individual to stand, it’s exactly right. We all walk around and try not to stand there because we’re humans, we don’t like authority or being told what to do; so even when fate is the authority, or the world’s energy is the authority, we still try to push back on it because we know that authority also means dependency, you know.

Now talking about the album, there are a few guest spots on there that piqued my interest, in particular Dynospectrum. What prompted you to reunite for the Randy Mosh track?

Well people were in communication already cos the label were reissuing the Dynospectrum album. Kevin Beacham, who I guess you could say was one of the main facilitators at the label, was reaching out to all of us trying to get photos, lyrics and things like that that he could use for the campaign. So in the process of that we were all talking anyway and I’d flown out to Arizona not long before that where I got to hang out with Gene Pool (Swift), me and Musab talk on a regular basis, me and Chaka (I Self Devine) we get together sometimes and look through records. It was like an organic moment where all four of us were talking and it’s not like we ever stopped talking intentionally, but we all got older, had kids and different lives etc.

So in the midst of all this I’d been looking at some of the beats Ant gave me and there were a couple that reminded me of Dynospectrum beats, so I reached out to everyone to see if they’d like to make a song and they all agreed. I was going to send them a couple of beats but I sent them one first and everyone wrote to it immediately. Like I sent it to them and later that same night Gene Pool sent me back two different verses! So I was like oh fuck, well here we go then and once it started it was real easy, but then the question was – shall we make more? And the answer was, well yeah we probably should but we also know how hard to it get just me and Murs together to make a whole album, so to get the four of us together would be hard work, we’ve got to keep it organic. So if it happens, it happens but I don’t want to push it, or pressure it, because what are we really making then?

The thing that was special about the Dynospectrum album for me was how effortlessly it came together, it basically wrote itself. I’d be at the studio making Atmosphere stuff, then I’d hang out with Musab while he was making his stuff and then Chaka would show up, so somebody suggested we get together and write a song. That’s how the first album was built. I don’t want to use the mail order system to make a whole new album. If all four of us are in the same city, or on the same stage, then that’s how I would like to see the second one get made.

Now with artists like deM atlaS and The Lioness, did you have a plan to work with them on the album before you started making it, or did the idea only emerge as certain tracks were made that you thought they would sound good on?

I knew that I wanted to work with both of them and I knew that I wanted to take both of them on tour. In fact they both did a short tour with us last year through the mountains and when that happened I knew I wanted to make a song with these guys, I respond so well to both their energies. People tend to have different opinions of me, some people think I’m a sweetheart, other people think I’m an asshole and the truth is I’m both. I’m an empath, so I feel what people are feeling and I reflect that. In that sense, the energies that deM atlaS and Lioness both give, bring out the best version of me; I like who I am when I’m around them. I love the person that they pull out of me, it’s someone I don’t get to see that often. It’s almost as if they remind me of what it’s like to know what’s behind the curtain, you know? I become curious when I’m around them, I become excited about shit again. Like “Oh fuck look at that squirrel!”, but I don’t normally notice a squirrel.

So yeah I wanted to do another tour with them and then I thought I should do a song with them, so we have something to perform. And I wasn’t necessarily interested in making a song to put on the album at the time, I just wanted to make a song so that we can all get on stage together at the same time. But then we made the song and it came out so good that we decided we wanted to put it on the album. There’s also another gentleman on there called Cashanova. He was the last one to come on board cos I needed a chorus for the song and I tapped him for the same reasons, because he’s another one whose energy is so beautiful that when I’m around him I feel beautiful, so I wanted him on the song as well.

Now by my count this is your seventh or eighth Atmosphere album. Do you guys ever find it harder to get things moving nowadays when it comes to starting a new project?

The hardest part is finding the time. We tour a lot still, plus me and Anthony both have families, children and so the hardest part is pulling ourselves away from other aspects of life, to make sure we’re still focused on creating projects. Making songs is easy, I make songs all the time, but when I have to focus my efforts and the material into some sort of galvanised movement like making an album, that’s the part that can be difficult.

I don’t like to make songs that sound all over the place; I made an album once where the songs were all over the place and to this day it is my least favorite album, I don’t ever want to make an album like that again. So I’m very intentional about the albums, I want them to have an overall meaning or an overall theme, something that I’m trying to communicate and that’s the part that can be difficult. Because it’s more than just sitting down and writing to a beat, it actually requires me to feel a certain way, to take a sort of temperature of where I’m at in my life right now. So in that way it’s not just a fucking mismatched plaid jacket, I don’t want to give people a plaid jacket, I want the jacket to look good [laughs].

Now I think it’s Rhymesayers Entertainment’s 23rd year as a label…

Holy shit!

I know right? Did you ever envision it getting to be this strong, in terms of its roster and its influence, when you started it was back when?

Absolutely not. You know when we started it, it was out of necessity. No other labels cared about rappers from Minneapolis, so we started our own label and when we did, I don’t think we even considered that the music would get past the borders of our state, much less worldwide. So no I didn’t envision it, but I don’t know if everyone working on it at the time would agree. Maybe Siddiq did have this grand goal of being able to do these things. And that’s not because I didn’t want things to get this big, I just never could have envisioned it. In fact if I ever did envision it, I probably did so as more of a naive or ignorant person – like “Oh this is going to be like Wu Tang, or this is going to be like Aftermath”; there’s no way I could’ve ever imagined it being what it really is, which is a very simple and humble situation that received the resources it needed to extend its wings.

And do you remember a point along the way where you realized that it actually was going to turn into something special?

I don’t think there was ever a single point, more like a series of little things here and there. Like when I finally met Open Mike Eagle, who I’d been a fan of and I realized he was aware of us, or when I finally met Aceyalone and realized he knew who Atmosphere was. It was one of those things where I’d come across people who I’m a fan of and realized that they’d been listening to my music for 15 years. Or someone would tell us they’d been really influenced by the things we’d been doing, those are the kind of things that blow me away the most. From my perspective I’m still sort of the guy from Minneapolis who’s trying to find my way through it and make it look easy, so I don’t always see the reverberations that it creates.

Now you mentioned earlier about how much touring you guys do and have done since the beginning. Do you think success would have been harder to come by if you didn’t get yourselves out there that much?

I do, yeah. I think touring was a huge part of the equation of how this became what it is, because we didn’t necessarily have the resources or the connections. The thing is as far as the music industry goes, I don’t have those connections, I don’t know any A&R people at labels. I made such an identity of saying fuck record labels, that record labels basically said well fuck you too, you know what I mean? So I never made friends with any of those kind of people – I don’t know the people who run the radio industry, I don’t know the people who run the video industry. So what I did instead was I got to know other bands and I got to know some booking agents, so I just stayed on the road and I connected with people one at a time. You know I think that if you were to poll our fan base and ask them how they first heard about Atmosphere, the majority would say word of mouth. That word of mouth came from people sharing our music, or going to our shows and telling people about them afterwards.

So a lot of our connections were personal, it wasn’t like they heard us on the radio and then went to look us up cos they liked our music. And so yeah, I do think touring played a huge part in spreading the word about who we are, as well as making us accessible cos we weren’t accessible like some of our peers were. We weren’t on MTV a lot, I mean towards the end we were featured here and there, but we never figured out how to break into MTV and give them the videos that they wanted to show – our videos were too lo-fi, with too much art from my own head.

Now sticking with touring, I know you guys are coming to Europe again in April, including London. Is it a very different experience when you’re touring over here, compared to back home?

There’s a huge difference in as much as in the UK territory, the European territory, we have even less connections there so it’s a smaller market for us. So you know, I get less PR over there, less press, so it’s a harder marketplace. I can’t just hop in a car and drive to Bristol, but I can hop in a car and drive to Tucson if I want to, or I can hop on a plane and be in New York in two hours. So it was easier for me to grown an audience here because of their easier accessibility to me. It’s been a lot more harder with Europe because it’s a lot more expensive to get there and then when I get there, there aren’t as many resources that I can accumulate. Our shows over there – well you’ve seen them – they’re not as big as they are over here. So we get there whenever we can and try to stay there as long we can, but I know that when I leave I’m not going to be back for a year to a year and a half, maybe two years, and so the momentum starts to slow down.

What I really appreciate about that though is that we’re not trendy over there. You know we’ve gone through phases here where it’s been cool to like Atmosphere, or it’s been cool to not like Atmosphere, then it was cool to like us again and so on and so forth. But in Europe, if you like us, it’s because there is a real solid connection between you and our music. So that means our shows are full of people that fucking sing along to every song, not just the five big ones. You know over here there are people at the shows who know the words to like Sunshine and Yesterday, but over in Europe you’ve got people asking for us to play songs like Bleed Slow and shit; it’s like fuck I don’t even know the words to that song.

I know you’re in the midst of your American tour at the moment and then obviously you’ve got Europe after, but what’s next after all that’s died down?

That’s a good question. We’re making more music currently, just because why wouldn’t we? I’ve been working on a few other things too… in fact yeah here’s something that I’ve not mentioned to anybody yet, but me and Anthony went out to Colorado to make a cameo appearance in a movie which looks like it could be quite exciting. It’s basically another Hunter S Thompson film that’s coming out, like a prequel to Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas. Just like the other Hunter S Thompson films that came out, they had cameos from loads of people and so one of the producers basically reached out to me and asked if we wanted a short scene in the film, and I was like “Fuck yeah!” [laughs].

So we flew out to Colorado and we played a couple of hippies in this scene, which is super cool and I’m really hoping they don’t cut it, so I probably shouldn’t talk about it too much cos I don’t want to jinx it! It only took like an hour to shoot our bit, so we were there hanging around for a couple of days and I saw other scenes that they were shooting and it looks like fucking fire, dude. I’m excited for these guys and I think it’s super dope that they asked us to be involved.

Yeah that’s really good, man. And I can totally picture you guys in that role.

[laughs]

And is film something you’ve ever thought about trying to get into before this?

I always wanted to, but I was too scared to. When I was in high school I took the typical public school style acting classes, so it didn’t get too deep or too heavy. But we wrote our own plays, then acted them and produced them, and it was always a lot of fun but I just never thought I’m that good at it. Like even watching our own music videos, I always feel like I look uncomfortable cos I’m not very good in front of the camera. So I just don’t feel like I have a lot of optimism about being able to do this shit. But if you ask me to come and do it, then I’ll fucking come and give it a try!

That’s a good outlook, man. Well that’s it from me, but thank you for taking the time to speak with me and I’ll see you at your UK show.

Well make sure you hit me up first and I’ll get you credentials, then you won’t have to pay. Cos shit’s expensive over there!

Yeah trust me, man. And it’s only getting worse. I don’t want to mention the B word, but yeah Brexit is going to fuck us up.

It’s crazy to me, I couldn’t believe that shit happened. I mean obviously I don’t live there so I don’t pretend to understand everything that matters, but I was still very… surprised [laughs].

I think a lot of us were too and now it’s just a big mess. But anyway it was great talking to you, man. Take care and we’ll speak again soon.

You too, man. Have a great evening. Peace.

 

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Mi Vida Local is out now on Rhymesayers Entertainment – get it here. Atmosphere hit Europe this April on these dates. Follow Slug on Twitter.

Gingerslim has been a hip-hop fan since 1994 and has written for various blogs and websites since around 2006. During that time he has contributed to style43, Think Zebra, Headsknow and Front Magazine. His main interests in rap are UK hip-hop and the underground movement in America, with a focus on Rhymesayers Entertainment and the once mighty Def Jux label. He lives in Bristol and has a beard. All other details are sketchy at best. Follow him here. 

Exclusive Interview: Rob Sonic

Indy hip-hop mainstay Rob Sonic recently dropped a new album named Defriender, released on his own label, Skypimps Music. We spoke to him about the new project, his studio process, the classic Telicatessen, his time on Def Jux and more. Words by Matt Horowitz.

Defriender is your second full-length release on Skypimps Music, correct? After 20+ years in the business, what finally prompted you to start your own label imprint?

Necessity really. No body expressed much interest in getting behind my solo stuff after Def Jux and I wanted to keep releasing my music so I kind of had to release it myself.

Now, I’m sure you get this type of question all the time… but once and for all, what’s the current status of your groups Hail Mary Mallib with Aesop Rock & DJ Big Wiz, as well as Sonic Sum with Preservation, Fred Ones & Eric M.O.? 

Currently I am not doing any group projects, HMM was more of a fun side project and Sonic Sum was like 15 years ago or something like that.

I’ve read that an ARo Odyssey, ARP Little Brother, Mini-moon, Yamaha SK-20, Roland Juno-106, Fender Rhodes Piano Bass, Korg MS-2000, Akai MPC 2000 XL, and Technics SL-12000s were all used to help create your 2004 solo debut, Telicatessen. Would you mind briefly walking us through your production/beat-making process, at the time?


It has always been sort of more of a collage with me, I tend to vary the way I approach each song individually. It would be hard to summarize an overall process or theory as much as it being whatever works for whatever notes I have written down and what fits rapping wise, that is usually most important to how I make beats. It’s one of the pluses of making your own beats.

How would you personally say your overall sound, style delivery, production process, etc. has changed and progressed between Telicatessen and Defriender? 

I might have just answered this to an extent, but I’ve sort of just become more aware about what works for me best. I don’t consider myself a natural or even particularly talented so understanding what I was capable of was a huge part of my progression over the years.

What would you say would be the greatest lessons or most meaningful advice you received from El-P, Aesop Rock, Hangar 18, etc. during your time spent at Def Jux? 

We didn’t really give each other “advice” per se as much as look out for each other as friends. I think El (as the head of the label) told me to stop being a knuckle head and short sighted musically once, that was good advice.

You have previously mentioned within our emailed conversations that Defriender was close to not being released at all. Would you mind briefly getting into some of the specific reasons and circumstances why?

Because I’m older and have had some real bad experiences in the business, and I literally do not give a fuck about being the biggest turd in the cesspool anymore. The craft of rap music is what is and has always been the most important thing to me, making it public was… for a long time but not so much anymore. My focus has sort of done a 360. And that is not to be taken out of context or as to say I don’t want to share it with anyone. It’s just I don’t focus on that 100% anymore.

How exactly did Mr. Dibbs get involved to provide his “All The Drugs” (Ohio Dirt Mix)? Do you have any particular insight into his beat-making/remixing process(es)?


Dibbs is doing some amazing shit with Circuit Bending these days and I love it, so it was only right to ask him for the heat since he did the cuts for the song already.

How would you say, the Dave Correia-designed album cover and artwork Design for Defriender directly ties to the themes and matters discussed within?


I don’t really think it does, but that wasn’t the goal. I wanted him (and every other artist I’ve ever worked with) to interpret a series of basic ideas I gave them. I’ve always reached out to artists I’ve already been a fan of for my cover art, from Dan Lang, to Remi “Rough”, to Dave Correia because of those specific people’s existing artistic approach and style, I want them to do them basically.

Do you have any immediate plans to tour behind Defriender? Now that the album has been effectively unleashed into the terribly unsuspecting world, what you have planned next?

Indeed I am touring for it, ha, “unsuspecting” world,  it certainly does seem that way doesn’t it? It’s as if people never knew who I was at all. Pretty crazy but I’ll take it. As far as plans? I mean your going to get some very different stuff from me from now on, my approach to the business, people, my music, and the world has changed.

I’m always curious as to how featured artists and associates get involved in artist’s projects. How did you decide to recruit Mr. Dibbs for cuts and scratches throughout Defriender and Milk Gold with vocal assists on “All The Drugs (Do Nothing)” & “JJ SAD?”

I always wanted to work with Dibbs, he’s been a favorite of mine for years and we share a certain appreciation of raw sounding music. I’m glad he was down. Milk has a super unique, sultry voice, I needed that for both of those and luckily she agreed.

Aside from your solo discography and series of note-worthy releases with Sonic Sum & Hail Mary Mallon, what might you deem as a few of your most important/widely “slept-on” featured appearances? 

I don’t really do many features, I’m not sure why that is, nobody really hits me up for that (unless they already know me). Hell, judging by the response to Defriender, maybe my entire catalog is the “slept-on” feature.
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Defriender is out now and you can get it here. Follow Rob Sonic on Twitter.
Matt Horowitz has been a hip-hop fan ever since he first heard Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) back in the mid-90’s, which positively or negatively changed his life ever since, depending on who you ask. He single-handedly runs online music publication The Witzard, and has been fortunate enough to interview Eothen ‘Egon’ Alapatt, Guilty Simpson, Ice-T and Mr. X, Dan Ubick, Career Crooks’ Zilla Rocca & Small Professor, Cut Chemist, and J-Zone, amongst countless others. He enjoys writing about and listening to hip-hop, Punk/Hardcore, and Indie Rock on vinyl with his lovely wife, while drinking craft beer, red wine, or iced coffee. To paraphrase both Darko The Super and the Beastie Boys: “Already Dead fans, they want more of this… I’m a Witzard like my man Matt Horowitz!”. Follow Matt here.

The High Light Zone by Damu the Fudgemunk

damu vignettes

Just like the producers she’s writing on, Paris-based writer, Madeleine Byrne seeks out artists, forgotten, overlooked or not given the attention they deserve to work out their particular brand of magic and express it in words.

Grown Up Rap is happy to announce we’ll be publishing some of her writing on hip-hop – past and present –  as part of an occasional series of articles, starting with Damu the Fudgemunk’s The High Light Zone, the 12-minute plus instrumental from the Washington DC, Redefinition Records owner’s album he likened to watching a movie, Vignettes. 

We’re huge fans of Damu at Grown Up Rap (read our interview with him and Jason Moore, aka Raw Poetic, here) – a sentiment more than shared by Madeleine as you’ll see.

The High Light Zone by Damu the Fudgemunk (Vignettes, Redefinition Records, 2017). First published at https://www.madeleinebyrne.com/ July 01, 2017.

 

Extravagant, outlandish claim alert: this track, The High Light Zone from DC-based producer, Damu the Fudgemunk’s two-hour opus, Vignettes might be one of the best pieces of music, Madeleine Byrne writes, in any genre released in 2017.

If you think of hip-hop production as the assemblage of sonic elements, where the skill comes via the construction and use of contrast, Damu the Fudgemunk’s The High Light Zone goes against such easy categorisation. This music sounds like its flying, pure movement – to stop, start, stop and start again. And has a stunning drum sound, a killer beat.

When researching this piece, I had one key question to answer, one puzzle to solve: was this music sample-based, live instrumentation, a mix of both? I contacted Redefinition Records – the label co-founded by Damu the Fudgemunk (the artist known to his classical musician parents as Earl Davis). I asked my friends; one thought it’d be sample-based, another said the opposite, or that it was made up of live instrumentation sampled and spliced and found a clip posted on Twitter by the flutist, Seb Zillner as back-up for his hunch that showed him recording a part for the record’s track Solitary Refinement.

But then my trying to ‘work it out’ runs counter against the experience of listening to this music, which encapsulates such energy that it leaves you feeling transcendent, perhaps even breathless at times because of the essential swing of it, the kick of it. And it is this energy that sets it apart.

Many contemporary hip-hop instrumentals mine a similar territory, it often seems to me. Whether they are following the classic prototype set down by the great masters from the 90s, or burrowing into the super-soft fractured melody-driven style so popular today, you can recognise a formula: start with a dramatic, or mood-setting vocal sample (a comedic skit, or something from the news, the voice of a famous artist to set the theme of the music) and combine three, or so elements that appear/re-appear at set intervals. There is nothing wrong with following conventions, but sometimes it can feel a bit stale.

The High Light Zone starts with a sample, but the overall effect of the music is closer to a live jazz performance, or poppy electronic music from the 80s, say the extended remixes, or live performances of English groups, such as New Order – not so much for the sound, but the music’s essential exuberance.

 

What makes The High Light Zone so interesting though is that even if it might seem to be closer to other genres of music – the duration could be that of a live jazz band performance, the snazzy feel could come direct from disco – the hip-hop foundations are plain to see, mainly via the way Damu the Fudgemunk exposes the beat and then allows the music to stop completely at times.

The final two minutes of the piece where one instrument/or one part comes forward and the others recede: this resembles jazz, but whereas the expectation within that genre would be for a musician to let loose with some kind of solo, or improvisation, it’s controlled/contained. Here we find the direct point of continuum with the hip-hop aesthetic.

This has always been something that has appealed to me in hip-hop production, the way the manipulation of the various elements thwarts our expectations and desires, via the refusal of development and release; the various parts begin, then stop, or are repeated over and over. It’s a kind of anti-music, in essence, punk almost.

This music by 9th Wonder, Let me Talk – released, I think in 2011 – offers up an extreme version of this tendency, aggressively cutting it back at points leaving total silence when you expect the music to build towards its conclusion.

 

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Paris writer Madeleine Byrne’s interviews and articles on hip-hop have been published at The Wire Magazine, Passion of the Weiss, Okayplayer.com, Ambrosia for Heads and here at Grown Up Rap – we published her interview with Nolan the Ninja earlier this year. Check out her site, madeleinebyrne.com to read more.

Exclusive Interview: Big Twins

BIG TWINS GROWN UP RAP INTERVIEW

QB rhyme vet Big Twins drops his new album, Grimey Life, this Friday. We recently spoke to him about everything from his distinctive voice, his relationship with Alchemist, Infamous Mobb and the loss of Prodigy and his own brother, Twin Scarface. We’ve also had an early listen to the album, and trust us, its dope.

Congratulations on the release of Grimey Life. It’s a great album, and in my opinion your best work. Tell me about how the project developed, and what you hope people make of it.

Thank you. The project started when I started working on TNT with Twiz The Beat Pro, and working on another album at the same time. He introduced me to Beatnick Dee and Jaisu, and together they all had different styles of beats. To me, it’s the beats that make an album, so I rounded up the rest of the producers I met along the way, including Knxwledge who’s beat inspired me to write a dedication about my mom and brothers.

It’s all about me feeling the beats. People always say that I pick the right beats. Even Prodigy was gonna help me pick beats for the next album he was working on.

You have a very distinctive voice–gravely and raspy. Evidence has talked recently how he sounds different now because earlier in his career he felt he had to rap in a tone that people thought would be more accessible, but that what we hear now is his real voice. Has anyone ever tried to tell you to use a different voice, because they thought it might help you find a wider audience?

Actually, when I first started rapping in Infamous Mobb, a couple of people in QB thought that I wouldn’t make it because my voice was too raspy. But Havoc and Prodigy liked my voice and I wasn’t gonna change it. Turns out when IM3 came out, fans loved my distinctive voice. It’s pure and raw, and it’s what makes me hard.

In my opinion your voice is one of the best things about your artistry. It is raw and authentic, and helps to make the street tales in your lyrics way more vivid. How do you feel about it?

I feel like if I didn’t have this voice, I wouldn’t be rapping.

I’ve always seen you as an artist that’s fully in-sync with the producer. For them, they get a unique style to experiment with, and for you, adapting to the sound of different beatmakers allows your music to have variety. An example on the new album is Memories. It’s produced by Knxwledge, who doesn’t tend to work with that many hardcore rappers. But it works great – he changes to fit your style, and vice-versa, while each still maintaining each of your signature styles.

I first meet Knxwledge thru Chuck Strangers at my apartment in Hollywood. He came by with beats with accapellas over it. We started kicking it more and he had that sound that I wanted. And we was working on a album too, but I was doing two other albums and he was traveling a lot to Japan. I still got more sounds with him and hope to finish it with ‘em soon.

You have a long-running relationship with Alchemist, a collaboration that in my opinion first became great with the Different Worlds 12-Inch back in 2001. It’s great to see you have a track produced by Alc on Grimey Life (“Phantom of the Opera”). Describe the process of how you guys work.

When we work it’s kind of like war. He’s one of my best friends and we like brothers. He always pushes me harder than anymore else and of course I appreciate him wanting me at my best. In the process he’s annoying [laughs], but that’s how he gets the best out of me.

Memories, with Havoc, is a very poignant track. It talks about the loss of Havoc’s brother, Killa Black, your own brother, and of course, Prodigy. Can you talk about how these many different tragedies have impacted the inner circle of Mobb Deep and Infamous Mobb, and you on a personal level?

Growing up, my life was hard. I’ve been through more deaths than you can imagine. Losing my brother who was with me almost every day wasn’t easy. We did everything together, I was lost when he died. The whole Mobb was lost when my brother died. And that’s evident in all the Twin Scarface references made in their music. Losing my mother was just as hard. I used to talk to her every day, then one day she was just gone. Prodigy and I have talked about things I don’t talk to about with others. All the tragedies made me who I am. Basically I lost everyone that I can tell anything too. If you hear a lot of my tracks, it’s natural for me to have a dedication song.

The response to Prodigy’s death from people around the world was heart-warming, not just from the Hip-Hop world but everywhere. What are some of your favorite memories of knowing and working with him?

My favorite memories is our conversations. One time everyone left us in this club and we was stuck in North Carolina with no ride, so we spent the night in the club. We always find a way to have fun. We was deejaying, cheffin’ it up in the club, and drinking the whole bar up [laughs].

We always talked about everything and he helped me a lot on life in general. Working on music always got me hype. Prodigy helped me develop the way I rap. And recently when I was in Russia, and Brazil two years before that, he called me and said, “son you killing it and I need you with me.” Blue Note was different and out of the box for me and that’s because Prodigy pushed me on another level.

I was also pleased to hear Godfather Pt. 3 and Ty Nitty on the new album. Can we look forward to new Infamous Mobb material in the future?

We got tracks done and working on it along with all our solo albums. There’s more on the way!

Lastly, I wanted to talk about Queensbridge. Infamous Mobb is obviously part of a long lineage of classic Hip-Hop artists to emerge from the project. But what about the next generation? Do you see much new talent coming out of that area that could be contenders to keep the legacy going?

Yeah, but music is different now. It’s trap music and I know some of them are gonna pop off. JayRozayy, Shooter, Chef La, Ag Flow, Piif and more of the younger generation….

Anything else you’d like people to know about Grimey Life or what’s up next for you?

My next project is with Alchemist, be on the lookout. Along with TNT 2, Billy Ocean and Teena Marie. But go out and support that Grimey Life.

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Grimey Life is released this Friday. Pre-order from here. Follow Big Twins on Twitter. Interview by Grown Up Rap Editor Ben Pedroche. 

The making of Career Crooks’ ‘Thieving As Long As I’m Breathing’ remixes

 

CAREER CROOKS GROWN UP RAP PREMIEREAs Zilla Rocca gears up for next week’s release of his anticipated solo album, Future Former Rapper, we revisit June’s Career Crooks album Thieving As Long As I’m Breathing. That project included remixes of tracks from 2017’s Good Luck With That, by producers including Small Pro (aka the other half of Career Crooks), Fresh Kils, John Morrison and Shane Great. We recently spoke to several of the major players to find out how the project came together. Read on, and if you missed Thieving As Long As I’m Breathing when we premiered it earlier this year, catch up here. 

Zilla Rocca on how the idea for a remix album came about:

It started with Small Pro just remixing a few songs off the album to stay sharp. I think it was 3-4 he just emailed me one day. I know Least Important, Most Important (Trapped in the ’90s Mix) was in there after Smalls was listening to a lot of Reasonable Doubt. Probably Career Crooks Theme (Dario Mix) was in there too. I was in love with them and it inspired me to want to remix Newlywed to pay homage to Check Your Head era Beastie Boys.

After that, Small Pro and I talked about making it a full remix project like Black Moon’s Diggin in Dah Vaults, where it was a continuation of the album too. We talked about getting outside producers but we really stressed the need for only working with people that fit the aesthetic, or had close ties to our crew. We purposefully did not want to load it up with big names because those projects never have a vibe, just a marketing gimmick or disjointed sound to either get new listeners or show off a bigger budget. Since Small Pro and I both make beats, and Career Crooks is really based off our chemistry, we valued chemistry in other producers first.

 

Shane Great on his Crook With a Deal remix:

With listening to the original track, it had kind of a menacing feel with the bassline and the break loop. I went for a similar feel but with a different tempo, so I chopped up this sample with guitar and string melody on the MPC. It was an intro to this Spanish ballad from the 70’s. The sample had just enough elements where I didn’t really need to add anything except for a bassline and some one-shot sounds to fill out the space.

I played some string and piano sounds that I was layering over the sample but decided that it would be too much so I took em out. Kept the drums pretty simple too so you don’t get distracted from the hilarious punchlines lol. Definitely a nod to DJ Premier or Stoupe of Jedi Mind Tricks with the raw, stripped down production. Something for the DJs to juggle and the listeners to nod too!

 

Fresh Kils on his Steve Martin remix:

Damn it Zilla!!  You gotta send me the 140bpm joint… really? Of course. I mean, I guess I should’ve taken it as a compliment, in that, who else could handle it? Roni Size could handle it, Aphrodite could handle it… enter the Fresh Kils lol. Typically with remixes, you wanna try to take the song in a different direction than the original, but with a tempo that fast, there’s not a lot of places you can go. I didn’t want to keep the rhythm the same, but doing halftime trap wasn’t going to work, and a drum and bass approach was a little outta my wheelhouse.

In looking for inspiration, I went to the one place that’s never failed me, the funk. It’s the foundation upon which all greats things are built imo, and in that spirit, I forged ahead. I specifically channeled early Chemical Brothers material; dirty funk breaks with flashes of lushness. Truth be told, I threw everything but the kitchen sink at it, but that’s what stuck. And thank god, because between wanting to do my homie right, and showing and improving amongst the other heavies throwing down on this project, I was craving a ‘W’; DeRozan to Vanfleet for the game-winner. You’re welcome.

 

John Morrison on his Angel Dust remix:

Initially, I reached out to my man Small Pro and asked if I could take a swing at remixing Angel Dust as it was my favorite song from the Career Crooks album. After he sent the vocals, I immediately knocked out this real trippy, psychedelic version. Kinda like when Scooby Doo and Shaggy would find themselves inside of a spooky Carnival or a house of mirrors. After sitting on it for like a week, I scrapped it and made the version that was released on the remix album. It’s more of a floating, ambient feeling piece, like The Orb, but rugged. It’s called the Philly Love Boat mix cuz that’s what folks used to call Angel Dust back in the day; “Love Boat”.

 

And finally, Small Pro on his various remixes on the album:

Escapism – This instrumental exists in its natural state on the 2017 Career Crooks EP Take What’s Coming. If my memory of this beat serves me correctly, Zilla sent me a recording of some tv show he was watching with his son and I flipped it into this, partly for Career Crooks purposes but also to show off, like Jordan shooting free throws with his eyes closed. Technically we should get a co-production credit like they used to do back in the day, but this ain’t back in the day.

 

Crook With A Deal – This beat was made tongue in cheek, as I actually sampled the original 50 Cent/Mad Rapper song for the baseline (it’s a song about stealing, duh) and added tons of stuff on top as I usually do. I didn’t originally intend for this to turn into an actual real thing; I remember playfully suggesting the concept of us re-doing this song to Zilla who then simply said, ‘send me the beat.’ So, I made it and the rest was Career Crooks history.

 

Least Important, Most Important – When I did this remix, I wanted to go the opposite sonic direction of the original. The line about being trapped in the 90’s always stuck with me, so for the beat I tried to put down some Reasonable Doubt flavor (which also inspired the cover art). The original beat is a straight up banger, but this one seemed to bring out some of the emotion in Zilla’s bars, as well as providing a good contrast to his hyper-than-usual energy level.

 

Corrupt Novelist – I called this one the SP Revenge mix because it’s DJ Manipulator’s fault I flipped some James Brown for this. He used JB for cuts on another track and I always thought it went so well with the Good Luck With That aesthetic that I brought it back here. Even the sound of his voice is a hit.

 

Career Crooks Theme – Both Zilla and I like the original beat so much (also originally on the Take What’s Coming EP) but this one was really just an excuse for me to flip the drums from the end of The Infamous Date Rape by ATCQ.

 

Midnight In The Garden Of Good & Evil (Interlude) – This track was simply meant to be the bridge between my beats on this project and the other producers featured. I’m not sure why I made it about Adam & Eve but in their story, they do some thievery and that’s what we’re all about, right? Zilla came up with this title, it’s ridiculous.

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Thieving As Long As I’m Breathing is out now on Urbnet. Future Former Rapper drops November 9 on Three Dollar Pistol Music/POW Recordings. Pre-order it here. Follow on Twitter: Zilla Rocca, Small Pro, Fresh Kills, Shane Great, John Morrison. Interview by Grown Up Rap Editor Ben Pedroche. 

Exclusive Interview: Rasheed Chappell

RASHEED CHAPPELL GROWN UP RAP INTERVIEW

Rasheed Chappell is back with his first new album in seven years; First Brick. We talked to him about the new project, working with Kenny Dope, and how it feels to be in the studio with some of the greatest hip-hop artists of all time.

[This interview has been lightly edited for clarity]. 

First Brick is your second project with legendary producer Kenny Dope (the first being 2011’s Future Before Nostalgia). How did your working relationship start?

Kenny and I met through a producer named Maleet – they were both producing for the same label at the time. They hit it off and he decided to play Kenny some of the tracks we were working on. KD liked it, we met up, had a conversation, and a few weeks later we had our first session which included Kenny, Biz Markie on beat box, and myself. That was 2008 I believe, and we’ve been working ever since.

What’s interesting is, Kenny is an icon of House Music, but not as known for producing Hip-Hop. Why is it do you think he gravitated towards you as a Hip-Hop artist?

Kenny’s from the era of the one producer/one emcee combinations, as he’s really just been waiting for a certain type of emcee to come around. All his favorite rappers he told me where Rakim, G Rap, Kane and all the greats. So his words were that until he found an emcee that could give him that feeling, he might do a song or two, but not a full project. I’m a student of the culture and all those that have come before me, so maybe he saw my deep love for the music and the homage I pay to all those that paved the way. I’m also very serious about my craft, I show up, I work…repeat.

And was the process of working with him this time on First Brick different from when you collaborated back in 2011? Have either of your processes evolved or changed since then?

Yes, this is actually, in essence, our third album. We already started a follow up to Future Before Nostalgia with a project titled Brick & Mortar. The process in putting that together has taken longer than expected and this is why we have First Brick, which serves as a trailer to Brick & Mortar. As men we’ve grown and evolved, Kenny is a father now. I’m more seasoned as an artist now, and know the process of putting out an album and how to create a balanced project. So my ear listens more for what’s missing than what’s present.

You’re part of a wave of artists who’ve mastered a new style of street rap, some of which feature on the album (CRIMEAPPLE, Hus Kingpin, Daniel Son). It has the hardcore talk of classic G Rap, and Roc Marciano, but usually with stripped back beats and minimal drums. But Kenny Dope’s drums on First Brick are pretty heavyweight. Which kind of beat do you think suits your style best?

I respect all of the guys mentioned and that kind of music definitely puts you in a vibe, gritty cold weather East Coast Rap, I love it. I don’t think my style is that or has ever been. For me, it’s always been about the drums and the movement. I am a fan of the drum. As far as what style best suits me, I think I can adapt to anything that pulls me to write.

That said, the drums on First Brick also sound like they were played live rather than sampled. Was there much live instrumentation involved? 

I don’t want to give away too much of KD’s magic so I’ll just say, he did his thing and there’s always room for live drums, horns, and instrumentation.

RASHEED BRICKSeven years between albums is a lifetime in today’s world where people move on to the next thing way too fast. Why such a long break? 

That break wasn’t intentional, we toured in Europe for two years after. We began working on Brick & Mortar and then life started happening. I promise all my supporters that I won’t ever be away that long again.

You’ve had a steady run of features on other projects in between, but does it feel like you almost have to start again from scratch after a seven-year break, to grab people’s attention again? 

Yeah I feel like a new artist in that regard, however with all the experience of a veteran. I enjoy it, at heart I’m a competitor, so I want to throw my hat in the ring and have my name mentioned with all the current artists, while creating projects that stand the test of time like the OG’s that came before me.

Even with the seven-year gap, I read how you wanted First Brick to connect to Future Before Nostalgia, but also stand alone as a separate work. Can you elaborate on that?

This is my natural growth, so anyone familiar with Future Before Nostalgia will see that I didn’t sacrifice any of the lyricism or sonics that they appreciated on that album. However, you see my evolution in storytelling and progression in our chemistry. If a listener never heard of me before this project, then has a beginning, middle and an end, so it’s a stand-alone project that you can feel and dissect. I write every line as if it’s the only one a person will ever hear, so I’m very conscious of what I want my musically legacy to be.

You’ve worked again on the new project with DJ Scratch, in my opinion someone who doesn’t get quite enough credit for his contribution to Hip-Hop. Tell me about working with him. 

Scratch is a genius, period. So working with him is an honor, he just doesn’t hop on any artist project or throw his support or co-sign on anything. EPMD is my cousin Lateef’s favorite group so being in studio with Scratch, Kenny and my cousin Marcus was surreal.

You also have a couple of rhyme icons on First Brick; Lil Fame and O.C. How did they become involved?

O.C. is in my Hip-Hop DNA, no way around it, Word…Life is up there with Illmatic, and Jewelz is as influential and DOPE as any “top five” emcee’s 2nd album. So when he said that the only two new artist that he listens to were Kendrick Lamar and Rasheed Chappell in an interview back in 2012 with HipHopDX, I was humbled and felt a sense of being knighted. Pushed me harder. We met at a Lord Finesse show and been OG/young lion ever since. We’ve discussed doing a project together. Now M.O.P., name a group that’s more live than Fame and Billy?! We had a song that just needed that energy, we reached out and he felt what we were doing, and hopped to the studio to help create this gem.

I’m intrigued to know what a successful album means to you. Not so much financially or units sold, more about the impact and how it resonates. How do you measure that? 

For me success is people talking about the project, and touring to bring the live experience to my supporters. There IS money to be made if you have the right plan and proper execution, so fiscal success has been there for us with sales and especially the vinyl. I want those to hear it know that I gave everything I had. If they walk away with that feeling, it’s a success.

What’s up next for you after First Brick?

MORE MUSIC!! That’s my word. A few things in the works, but definitely expect more music…and more frequently!

Any last words or anything you want people to know about the album? 

I just want to thank my team, the big homie KD, my team Wil and Dan from foundation DIGITAL FILMS. The amazing artist Wil Swink that created the album artwork. My graphic designer Kat McBride, my social media manager Steve Royster, and my manager DJ Eclipse, as well as all the work Diamond Media 360, has put in. For anyone that would like to support, click below.

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First Brick is out now. Listen below, and purchase here. Follow Rasheed Chappell on Twitter. Interview by Grown Up Rap Editor Ben Pedroche.