November 9th, 2009
Parts of this interview originally appeared in my Pop and Hiss article on Wale. More on Attention Deficit tomorrow, maybe.
So judging from the title of Attention Deficit, its wide-ranging sound, and interviews that you’ve given, it seems like it’s your commentary on the fragmented nature of the Internet world, with a million blogs, twitters, and dozens of mixtapes released daily, How hard is it for an artist to create something that has a life span longer than the next blog post?
I think a lot of the blogs are selfish, they don’t really care. There might be five or six really legit hip-hop blogs, your Rap Radars, your Nah Rights, your 2 Dope Boyz, and others, but some that are very minuscule, if you don’t give them what they want, they’re going to shit on you. I think that their visitors aren’t even 1/1000th of another blog that you’ve already done an interview for and they want one to do one with them too.
Q-Tip one time told me that 15 years ago, all people had to judge you on was your album, one or two interviews, your record for the radio and picture on the album cover. That’s it. The only way you can remain relevant is to give yourself up, unless you’re blessed every once in a while there’s a Drake situation, but that’s not even once in a while, that’s a once thing.
But that’s pretty much a different stuation unto itself. A lot of people watched Degrassi, a lot of girls watched Degrassi.
And now they’re more mature and can hear words like fuck and shit. Look, I’m happy for what happened to dude. But the game is just completely impossible now. You have to give yourself up. That’s why I’m so frequently on Twitter, it’s because I don’t have a big record out right now. I don’t have a lot of things to explain and prepare people for the person they’re about to listen to.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Wale, Interviews, LA Times | 21 Comments »
August 19th, 2009
When he’s not cooking up something marvelous in the lab, Disco Vietnam drops basic instructions before leaving earth via Twitter.
Three minutes after our interview with Austin-based producer’s Eli Elkin, AKA Memory Man, a tweet appeared on Twitter (as they are wont to do) from the Chef himself.
@RAEKWONICEWATER Ayo foreal i dont know who made that new mixtape “Cuban Revolution” been gettn alot of phone calls bout it but Salute who put it out! THANKS
The responsible party is, of course, Memory Man whose Cuban Revolution tape is easily one of the hottest releases to drop in the last … 18 hours or so. The tape succeeds in authentically reproducing the Wu-Tang’s elusive and unique sonic aesthetic, while elevating some perhaps unfairly dismissed Raekwon verses in anticipation of the forthcoming Only Built For Cuban Linx II.
Passion of the Weiss’ contributor Sach O enthusiastically posted the tape yesterday. Today we got to speak with its creator because we’re fucking nice like that.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Interviews, Disco Vietnam | 3 Comments »
July 15th, 2009
As Margaret Wappler aptly asserted, “the dirty little secret to ‘The Girls’ Guide to Rocking’ — a book by music scribe Jessica Hopper, ostensibly for teen girls — is that as a grown-up man or woman, you will learn something from every single page of this guide.” Real talk, but unsurprising to anyone familiar with Hopper’s work at the Chicago Reader, Chicago Tribune, and her blog Tinyluckygenius. If you have a sister, niece, or know anyone from 8 to 18 interested in forming a band, Jessica’s book comes highly recommended.
If you’re in Los Angeles, Jessica will be giving a reading today at the Santa Monica Public Library at 2 p.m. (with a performance from Mika Miko) and Skylight Books at 7:30.
Was there a Eureka moment that inspired you to write the book, or was this something you’d been thinking about doing for years?
I first thought about doing the book 16 years ago. I have this really specific memory of a conversation with one of my girlfriends—we were trying to start a band and had this succession of various bass players who we always looked to as some sort of authority. I’m not sure if it stemmed from that they were boys, or that they’d been in bands prior, but I remember talking to her on the phone about how I wished there was a book that explained how to do this.
When I was 16, I had all the eagerness and the passion and the energy, and the scrappy punk rock can-do, but had no idea how to put on a show, or keep a band together, or even how to write a song. It was so exciting but frustrating because all I wanted was to figure out how to sound like Drive like Jehu. I don’t know if that was a common desire in ‘92, but for me it was like, how do I play like that. I had a $90 dollar guitar, I didn’t play with a pick, I played with a dime. I had a Fender practice amp that I bought off street, that was my set up…pretty fancy shit. So I wrote the book that I needed.
It was something that I’d always thought I’d about. I’d been freelancing my ass off for the last few years and at some point, I always thought that I’d take time off to work on this book and work on my 33 and 1/3rd book about Billy Joel’s 40 greatest hits. Then one day I got an email from my future editor at Workman books, saying that she was looking for someone to write a How-To Rock Guide for girls. She’d asked a couple rock people at magazines who should do the book and people kept saying Jessica Hopper, so she asked her brother, who is Franz Nicolay [the supremely awesome keyboard player for the Hold Steady who looks like an 1890s French Unicyclist] and he had my phone number and that was how it got started. It was the biggest stroke of luck, if left to my own accord, I might have just started working on it now.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Interviews | 1 Comment »
June 24th, 2009
Interview starts with a perfunctory, “how are you doing,” and segues into:
Quik: Man, I’m feeling great. We just finishing up lunch—drinking these Italian beers, you ever had a Menabrea. It’s like a cross between an Amber and a coffee-colored ale. We Patron heads so usually don’t drink much beer, but we feeling great.
How did you guys come together to make BlaQKout?
Kurupt: We was working on this record for Snoop’s album, and it was so banging we figured we should just make a whole album together. Quik was like, we can really do this, so we just locked up in the studio whenever we had the time and were off the road. It’s definitely got that classic Quik production, but I like that he took a different turn with his sound, and there’s just that chemistry between us that’s so good.
Quik: The first thing that I remember hearing from Kurupt was this song called “Sooo Much Style.” I was like this dude is hard. I knew Dogg Pound was going to blow and we toured and did all those shows together with 2Pac. But then it really hit me when I heard his collaboration with Battlecat on “We Can Freak It.” I had a $25,000 sound system in the trunk of my Ford Explorer. I think that record busted all the sub-woofers. I was a little mad at Battlecat for that.
I never lost that respect for him. He makes the kind of records that get better with time like a Pinot Noir, a real dope red wine. You can’t catch lightning in a bottle twice, so we tried to make our own Tesla Coil and bottle our own lightning.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Interviews | 5 Comments »
May 18th, 2009
There’s something sad about watching a once-great group sing old songs because nobody wants to hear the new ones. Except The Pharcyde don’t have new ones, even though they’ve been “reunited” since last year’s Rock the Bells–which means that their performance at at the Santa Monica Pier last Friday was solely to cash a check. How do I know? Because it was for an event called The Coors Light Cold Front Jam–the only other option is that they were paid in kegs.
Still, I could listen to “Passing Me By,” “Ya Mama,” “Runnin,” “What’s up Fatlip?” “Drop” et. al, performed until I have a glass eye with a fish in it–even though the quartet was rapping next a stand that sold mackerel bait. I spoke with Imani and Slimkid3 for the Times, about everything from the inspiration for “Passing Me By,” to their love of Korn (?), to the amount of hallucinogenics they ingested in the early Clinton years. As usual, the B-Sides are after the jump.
LA Times: A Reunited Pharcyde Discuss Breakups, Makeups and J Dilla
MP3: Pharcyde-”Westside 242″
MP3: Pharcyde-”Y (Be Like that?) (Jay Dee Remix)
MP3: Pharcyde-”Passin’ Me By (Fly as Pie Remix)”
MP3: Fatlip-”What’s Up, Fatlip?”
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Interviews, LA Times | 5 Comments »
April 30th, 2009
Photo borrowed from LA Weekly, because it’s too good not to re-run.
Only a handful of rap groups can be bandied about as G.O.A.T: Wu-Tang, Outkast, EPMD, Tribe Called Quest, Public Enemy, Run-DMC, UGK, The Geto Boys, and De La Soul. If you need an introduction to Posdnuos, Dave/Trugoy the Dove, and Maseo, you obviously haven’t listened to their seminal first four albums.
Since the release of their last full-length, 2004’s The Grind Date, the trio has largely kept quite, save for receiving a VH1 Hip-Hop Honors Award, playing last year’s Rock the Bells, and turning the Gorillaz’ “Feel Good Inc,” into a Grammy-winning, radio-conquering smash. This week, the Plug Ones announced their return, with Are You In?, an iTunes-only, Nike Run Mix, that finds them following in the footsteps of Aesop Rock, LCD Soundsystem, and A-Trak.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Interviews | 13 Comments »
April 8th, 2009
Rivaling Fela Kuti, King Sunny Ade, Franco, Tabu Ley Rochereau, and a handful of others, Mulatu Astatke ranks among the most influential African musicians of all-time. The father of Ethio-Jazz, the Berklee-trained Mulatu, was the first of his countryman to fuse American jazz and funk, with native folk and Coptic Chuch melodies. The leading light of the “Swingin’ Addis-”era, Astatke is often acknowledged as the star of the epic Ethiopiques Series, At least, according to filmmaker Jim Jarmusch, who included songs from the Mulatu-arranged and composed, Vol. 4, in his ode to midlife melancholia, Broken Flowers.
His latest album, Mulatu Astatke & The Heliocentrics-Inspiration Information 3, finds him collaborating with the titular UK-based jazz-funk eight-piece. Born out of a serendipitous turn that led to the band backing Mulatu’s first UK gig in 15 years, Mulatu and the Stones Throw-signed outfit decided to record a new album composed of originals and re-worked older compositions. Released yesterday on Strut, the finished product ranks among the year’s finest, and adds another succesful chapter to Mulatu’s unimpeachable legacy.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Interviews | 3 Comments »
November 21st, 2008
No introduction necessary.
Q: So what brings you out to LA?
A: Just business brought me out here. I have an office set up out here and we’re just out here networking and keeping our minds at peace and just working on the album, staying in the studio. I’m doing a lot of things—dealing with other projects on the side. I’m working on a big documentary about Only Built 4 Cuban Linx, but basically, we just lovin’ the air.
Q: Do you find LA more conducive than NY in terms of handling industry business, networking and all that stuff?
A: Absolutely, there’s just more stuff popping out here. When you think of Hollywood, you think of land the land of opportunity. I always want to have the opportunity to do things conducive to my career. But I’ve spent a lot of time in Cali before.
Q: You guys had a Wu mansion out here for a while, right?
A: Yup, but even outside of the Wu mansion, I lived out here for a year. LA’s always been good to me.
Q: Where do you spend most of your time these days? Manhattan? Do you still have a place in Staten?
A: We spread out right now, I got a couple places in different parts of the country. As far as Staten, no I don’t have a place there anymore.
Q: So let’s talk about Only Built 4 Cuban Linx 2, it’s been in the works for a long, long time now, what made you decide to come out with it now?
A: I’ve never been the type of person to jump up and throw out the album without it being what it’s supposed to be. I was doing my thing on other projects that were successful in my eyes, but we decided now to release the album because it’s finally done. I wanted to make a sequel because it’s so highly requested from the fans—and it’s a classic. I’ve assembled the best producers in the game and I felt that now was a good way to come out shining. Rza did his thing on the project, the formula’s still where it’s supposed to be. A lot of people around me are excited and I feel like I know it’s a classic.
Q: It was long slated to be released on Aftermath. What happened there?
A: Well, me and the Label, we couldn’t come to the right terms. Dre had a lot of projects he was working on and you know me, knowing how important OB4CL2 was, I needed him next to me the way I wanted. And at the end of the day, I’m still a big fan of Dre, that’s my dude. We couldn’t come to terms within the company, but we kept a mutual respect and friendship. We both big fans of each and it wasn’t a big thing. I decided to go another way with it because I figured why go somewhere if you know that you’re not going to be the key player in the situation. I can’t afford to do that with this type of record and hey, at end of the day, Dre is on the record.
Q: Did you do any recording for Detox when you were on Aftermath?
A: No, no recording for Detox, not at the moment. Dre is somebody who’s very busy and who works hard like me.
Q: Who contributed beats?
A: I’m just going to give you a brief summary: the Rza, the legendary J Dilla Dr Dre. and just those three elements there, that’s really dangerous, the heat is crazy. But there’s other cats that’s powerful: Pete Rock, Marley Marl came in to do a a crazy track that I love.
Q: When’s the release date?
A: The release date is going to be in March—definitely. We feel good about that time because it’ll give us enough time to spread the word out there globally, not just in the States.
Q: What label are you going to release it on?
A: I’m going to put it out on my Ice Water Inc. label. I’m my own biggest marketing tool. I know the history of the business and I might as well capitalize on it. We built the brand and now we become the new industry. I wanted to have full control of the project and have it be what I wanted it to be. It’s hard to deal with labels who don’t understand you—these guys is looking for ringtone artists and I’m more than a ringtone artists. I’m an icon.
Q: What made you decide to do a sequel to the original OB4CL in the first place?
A: Just based on the fans, people have so much love for that album and the fans said they know I’m one of the top guys in the game. People wanted me to go back to that formula of the drug game, rapping about the dreams that we was having before we made it. And I’m a fan of the original too, it made me who I am today.
Q: So are the themes between the two records similar? Is it a continuation of the original’s loose story line?
A: All I’m going to say is that it’s an underground record. I kept each producer in the zone. We’re going back to what we did before the commercial success, to the early years. I’m still Raekwon on the album, the tracks is so authentic, we went back to the eerie, the stuff that made you look at Wu Tang in the first place. You’d never know that the record had all these different producers if I didn’t tell you, because they came with gritty beats to make a gritty album. We came with a couple energy boosters to get the stadiums jumping but for the most part, it’s the same type of storytelling.
Q: What about guest spots? Is there a lot of Cappa and Ghost like the original?
A: When you think about the old Wu albums, you think about lyrics, strong flows, and production. I wanted to make this a well-rounded album, but not a commercial album. It’s what the people wanted, me back in the kitchen and going back in the pot, that’s what y’all, that’s what y’all gonna’ get. We don’t have no crazy features. I had a good friend come through and do his part, the Game is on the record, he’s a good friend of mine.
Q: By a good friend, did you mean Ghost?
A: Well you know, I’m not trying to copy the first one. I didn’t want to try to be identical, it’s not about me trying to replicate the same album. But yeah, Ghost is on the record, Cappa is on the record, the whole Clan is on the record. That was the first formula we came with when we marketed it the first time and we have same level of respect, they’re all doing their thing. This is the second one, you have to allow new space for new ideas. I made sure that I had my brothers there. You might hear an highlight from someone new and unexpected, someone else who might go off. At the end of the day, that’s what people gotta’ do, open their minds up to creative music. When I look at my favorites, I can’t expect them to make the same shit all the time. You gotta’ see where their head is at, see if they’re still being the same intriguing artist. It’s about staying on top of your game and I think that’s what this album shows. Being game for 15 years, it’s tough to stay coming with a breath of fresh air, but I think I did it.
Some people only may think Cuban Linx is only a classic. I think all my albums is a classic, a lot of those albums got overlooked because of marketing. I might not the be the best commercial artist or the one that’s gonna’ be on the hot remix, but when it comes to albums, I’m in a lane of my own. The crew sounds flawless on the album. I take this lyrical stuff seriously, we’ve always been high conscious, high conscious, a bunch of 007 niggas. Overall, Wu-Tang is always going to be in their own box, that’s what we created. Today’s hip hop, that’s cool but Wu-Tang is Wu-Tang.
Q: Have you gone back and listened to 8 Diagrams since it was released. Are you still disappointed with it?
8 Diagrams wasn’t one of my favorite Wu albums. It was cool, it could’ve been a little more hip-hop, more energetic in certain places. It wasn’t trash. Wu-Tang will never make anything trash. There’s just certain expectations that we all and at the time, we felt that Rza had to recognize it ain’t just you, it’s a team thing. If we weren’t recognizing it as being done, that it wasn’t fair. It did what it did and we still wound up supporting it but our hearts wasn’t in it. It’s like you wanna’ pass the test with a 100, not with a 75. If you get a 75 you pass, but if you ain’t getting a 98 or 99, what’s the point.
Q: Do the think the media blew your comments a bit out of proportion?
A: The media looks at certain things, they look for what they want to look at. They may want you to go somewhere else and wonder why you didn’t stay where you were. Or then, if you don’t chance, they’ll say you didn’t grow. But at the end of the day, it’s all constructive criticism. I know my record is very very important important to anyone who knows what Cuban Linx is.
Q: I’d say that this record and Detox are probably the two most anticipated records among hard-core hip-hop fans.
A: I agree with you on that. There’s something about those two albums—you got two powerful icons and they’re not just settling on just putting shit out. We know what it means to the fans, you can’t go off what someone else may tell you, sometimes you have to listen to yourself and dissect the situation. People sometimes look for what they want they, they might say there’s not enough Ghost or Cappadonna or Rza didn’t do all the tracks, but what does that have to do with it being a classic or not?
Q: I agree, 8 Diagrams might not have been a classic, but it was definitely a good album. I think people just had to adjust their perception of what they expected from the Wu-Tang, it was rap for the symphony hall, not grimey type shit.
A: For sure, that opera shit was cool, it wasn’t all it could be, but all I can be is the best that I can be. When you think of Rae, Rae is the chef. He’ always gonna’ serve all sorts of different dishes. All I can do when I get on the mic is be me. I don’t try to be crzay lyrical one, I’m not Rakim, I don’t try to be Rakim, Rakim’s always going to be Rakim to us. All I can do is be me on these tracks and give that to the world. And I think people is is going to definitely appreciate it.
It’s not about the sales—that’s another thing about fans nowadays. It ain’t about the music, it’s about the RBI’s with everything. That ain’t got nothing to do with hip hop. There were lots of artists back the days who made classic albums who never had a gold record. My thing is that yo man, we hard core forever, whether we on TV or not on TV, we make hardcore music. We make well-rounded music too. If we want to make you cry, we can. We might be a bit dysfunctional, but when it comes to making emotional music, no one can touch the Clan.
Q: So are you not ruling out another Clan album down the road?
A: I’m a fair dude. I’m always going to make it my business to be fair. The Clan made all of us and I’ve never been the one to say that I wouldn’t participate. We’ll see what the future holds.
Q: So are you going to make Purple Tapes of this?
A: I can’t speak on that, but I can tell people that we’re definitely making a Cuban Link bonus DVD for everyone to check out that’s worth a look. At the same time, we’re doing a book called the Purple Book, which is the memoirs of everything that I’ve been through in this game and what the significance of Only Built 4 Cuban Linx is. We definitely looking at this project as the launch of a new era. It’s important for people to go back and say, I remember that album and now he going to give us the new one. The younger generation, some may know about it and some may not. I’m doing this for the ones that believed in me from the door, this is for you and I knew I had to give 5,000 percent on this project.
Q: What do you think of the younger generation of hip-hop?
A; I like the fact that kids can make a couple of dollars to make their dreams come true, more than the actual creativity. A lot of it sounds the same, but I don’t want to hate on them. To be honest, I think the younger hip-hoppers are more hip-hop than the commercial artists we got out now. The commercial shit is about branding your name and your swagger. Everything now is about swagger, there’s not art to swagger. Swag ain’t one of my words. Swag vs. art? Stick to the art.
Q: Do you ever feel the need to keep up with the contemporary morays?
A: I don’t to prove it. I’ve always been a fly dude; I’ve influenced a lot people to be who they are. I see the resemblance, I’m one of the creators of that style. Nevertheless, I’m concentrating on giving the people a banging album so strong. I’ve got some of the hardest critics around me and everyone is really feeling it.
Q: So are you done recording?
A: When it comes to the chef, I ain’t never done cooking right until the food is served. I may make a few different changes here and there because I consider myself never. But as far as it not being done, it’s done. Who knows though. I might wake up tomorrow and write a hit Cuban linx. My mind fluctuates when it comes to making this shit. It’s a hard and colorful album.
Q: Is it hard for you to put a fresh spin on stuff that happened to show 20 years ago?
A: Not hard at all. It’s never hard when you experience something. It’s only hard when you haven’t experienced it. To me, it’s a trip down memory lane. It’s more about making sure my production can stand next to me like that.
It’s my thing that you don’t have to act hard to make a hard album and I think that my philosophy was never to make a hard album, I wanted to be Raekwon and make a good album, a tape that channels how I’m feeling, who I am and where I came from. So when it came back time to step into the zone, it took a little bit of time to get the right production. This ain’t no overnight album. I didn’t want to take nobody’s money. I wanted to give everyone a raw prestigious album. It was two and a half years of work and I looked at everything through a fine tooth comb.
Q: You’ve been rapping for 15 years now. Have you given any thought what you’d want people to remember you for?
A: I want people to know that I was a real hip hop fan…I was a real hip hop cat…he want the way he’s supposed to go, he stayed being himself, he didn’t sell his soul to be someone who he isn’t. I want my kids to know their dad was mean with it. I want the fans to remember that I wear many medals, I’m a veteran in the game and that I made good music.
Q: Are your kids thinking about following their father’s path like GZA and Ghost’s sons?
A: My daughter and son are young my to decide where they want to be. If they want to get involved, I’ll support them to the fullest.
Q: Are there any goals you feel you have left to accomplish?
A; The first is to satisfy the world with a classic album. My thing is to uplift this hip hop thing again, maybe I’ll be able to set off another trend of sound. My thing is to really just keep the dignity where it needs to be at, my goal is to make 15 more albums. I feel I’m still at the beginning stage. I’ve only made four albums and I feel I still have a whole lot to prove. I still have the energy and I want people to check out the new project and look for the new mixtape we have coming out.
Q: What’s it called and when’s it dropping?
A: Burning bags; it’s dropping shortly…to be announced. It may come out on the internet
Q: Do you follow the Internet music world pretty closely?
A: Oh definitely, it’s where the masses are it. At the end of the day, I want to reach people from all shades and colors and let them know what’s going on. I’m deeply appreciative of the people. My thing is to keep it rounded, I stay hitting up the steeets, I’m always running around, pollying and bouncing.
Download:
MP3: Chef Raekwon ft. Ghostface-”Necro”
MP3: Chef Raekwon-”Treez”
Posted in Interviews | 13 Comments »
October 22nd, 2008
You can normally find Dan Love’s writings at the formidable, From ‘Da Bricks. A native of London, Love knows more about hip-hop than nearly anyone in Britain, as well as maintaining one of the island’s coolest nomenclatures. Take that Dizzee Rascal, if that is your real name.
In an age when rappers can come and go in the time it takes to create a MySpace page Freddie Foxxx represents a saddening anomaly in hip hop. Rapping and producing since the late ‘80s means that the one and only Bumpy Knuckles is now two decades deep in the game and one of only a handful of MCs who can truly lay claim to sticking to his guns throughout. Respect due.
In the wake of the release of his previously shelved LP Crazy Like A Foxxx I had the opportunity to chat to the man and reflect on a career in music, his overlooked work as a producer and the long-standing relationships that see him continue to release bangin’ material to this day. For a nice, middle-class white boy from London the prospect was admittedly a little daunting – a beatdown via telephone connection didn’t seem completely out of the question - but Foxxx proved himself to be a consummate professional and great interviewee. If you can’t be bothered to read the text then there’s audio on offer here too, just try to ignore the bumbling British idiot asking the questions and you’ll be fine.
As a fan I’m really glad that the Crazy Like A Foxxx album has finally seen a release so let’s start with that. What prompted the decision to drop that now?
Well, I was in the studio working on a video documentary that I’ve been working on for the last year and a half and I was looking at old footage of myself during that time, when I was filming ‘So Tough’ and it reminded me of the passion I put into the record at that time. I still had the love for it but I knew the music had changed, but then I started to get e-mails and MySpace messages and requests from fans and people wanted to know what had happened to Crazy Like A Foxxx. I think there was some kind of a leak of a cassette that made its way onto the internet and people were telling me that the quality was really bad. I felt like, you know what? The album is sitting in my studio, I have it mastered, I should give the fans the chance to hear the work and how my mindset was during the time that I recorded the album. So I just decided to put it back out, I thought it wasn’t doing any good just sitting in the studio so I just remastered it and put it out.
And are you happy with how it sounds fourteen years later?
Yea, I mean I didn’t change anything because that would have been fake, you know what I mean? You know I was happy with how it sounded when I was ready to release it: what I was feelin’, what I was talking about was personal so I didn’t want to cheat the fans out of getting what the ’94 experience was that I was having. So I left it just like it was, all I did was remaster the record and gave it to you just like I would have gave it to you in ’94. That’s what people were asking for so that’s what I gave them.
Given that you had the ‘So Tough’ 12’’ drop and the promo tape circulated it must have been pretty close to release. Was it MCA or Epic that pulled the plug on the project?
You know what, I think it was Epic. I wasn’t on MCA, they did Freddie Foxxx Is Here. Epic was the label and I think there was some kind of problem between Flavor Unit and Epic and at the end of the day they pulled the plug on the album and I just happened to have something scheduled for release when that issue happened. So it was cool, I had to do what I had to do and that’s went I went really underground and kept my movement going.
So how come they didn’t want to take the original DITC version? It’s great.
Yea. Flavor Unit was telling me that the album sounded too dark and I was a little offended because I’m a hardcore, underground MC and I was a huge, huge lover of the work of Diggin’ In The Crates at the time, you know what I mean? I was feelin’ Buckwild’s sound, Lord Finesse… I mean Big L was sitting in the studio with us all the time. When I was recording with DITC Big L was at every session. They were always around us. That’s how I learned to sell my music independently is by being around DITC. Then Flavor Unit pulled the project, I mean they paid everybody for all the tracks, but they didn’t use it because they said it was too dark. They were looking for something that was brighter and with a bit more melody in it so I ended up producing the album myself and that was the one they accepted. I was really into the DITC version.
Obviously the beat that was originally used on ‘8 Bars To Catch A Body’ ended up being hugely successful with ‘Sound Of Da Police’. You sore about that at all?
Nah, not at all. You know KRS-One is a very good friend of mine and when they turned the beat down I’m glad that he was the one who took it and made it a success. It’s just an attachment to the ears that I had in the day, like those beats that they were playing me I was thinking that I had the ability to listen to certain things and know what’s good and what’s not. When KRS-One picked that beat I was actually happy for him that he got that track.
I did notice that were still some changes from the hissy promo copy that I got off the internet. The version of ‘So Tough’ with Queen Latifah on it got dropped for the new one, why was that?
Yea, I actually I put a different version on because that was released as a single but I wanted to give you what wasn’t put out, you know what I mean? The one that was put out was the one I didn’t put on there. What wasn’t put out is on the album. So everything that people missed is on the album and then I gave you some special versions that people wouldn’t have expected me to put out to compensate for the fact that that record wasn’t on there.
There’s also the addition of ‘Killer’ with 2Pac that wasn’t on the original promo. Was that recorded during the same sessions and just left off the original album?
Nah, what happened is that 2Pac came to the studio and asked to record that when I was doing ‘So Tough’. Everyone that’s on that album showed up in the studio to record that record, you know what I mean? I still have 2Pac’s lyrics that he wrote down, he signed the paper that he wrote his lyrics on. I always have rappers who do a collaboration with me give me an original copy of their vocals and sign it. I have two different versions of the vocal that he did, you know he said the same rhyme but he said them two different ways. I kind of keep all of that stuff and I did for so many years because I knew that one day I would release this album and I was actually keeping the extra vocal for a remix of it. When he passed away I was like wow, this is a really good friend of mine, a very close friend of mine and I was still able to have his hand-scribed vocal and also have two versions of the rhymes. It wasn’t like an e-mail thing, Pac came to the studio, he performed in the booth that I performed in and that’s why the record is passionate to me because he was actually there, we worked together to do it.
So did you know him from the Digital Underground days?
I met him when he was just leaving Digital Underground.
And it must have been amazing to work with him.
Ah, absolutely, I mean Pac was incredible. Just to sit with him in the studio and see his energy and feed off his energy was incredible. He always had great ideas and did what he had to do and actually got involved. You know there’s a skit before the record ‘Killer’ with him Stretch and everybody and everyone made sure that the vocals sounded right, he really put a lot of energy in there. He was a leader in the studio, not a follower at all.
You’ve got a track with Kool G Rap on there as well and I can’t think of any other collaboration between you two except ‘Money In The Bank’.
Yea, G Rap came in to do that with me and he actually gave me my first chance to collaborate on anybody’s record, the first collaboration I ever did was with Kool G Rap on ‘Money In The Bank’. Me asking him to come and do that for me was definitely a good look for me because G Rap has always been one of my favourite MCs. We worked together, right there in the same studio. I did every record in that same studio, Powerplay in Queens, Long Island City.
And I gotta ask about the Ultramagnetic diss on ‘Crazy Like A Foxxx’. What was that routed in?
My history as an MC was really about battling. I forget what the initial incident was about but there was some kind of a statement made by Ultramagnetic in an article somewhere and I ended up switching the ‘Crazy Like A Foxxx’ record and just dissing them on the record. I know Kool Keith probably came through with some subliminals here and there, but I always have fun with those guys, now when I see them we shake hands and we laugh about it because it was part of our make-up when we were coming up as MCs and scrapping for position. I always show people that if you want to battle with me then bring your A-game because I always bring my A-game when I get on records with people.
The great thing about it now is to be able to see those guys and we can laugh about it and talk about it, you may still hear me get at Kool Keith once in a while because he likes to play those games with me but I got much respect for Ultramagnetic all day.
And things are all settled with Rakim now? I know there was a little beef on the internet.
You know what? Me and Rakim have a history and a lot of people don’t understand our personal history so they gonna make assumptions about what this beefing and battling is about and they’re not gonna be right about it because he and I have a personal history outside of the music business that’s gonna set off a different tone. We may express it through music because that’s what we both do. I actually haven’t spoken to Rakim and I kind of got the vibe from the people that he’s around and the people that I know that it’s not really a problem. Like I said, it doesn’t matter who you are, whether you consider yourself to be the best or in the ranks of the best, there’s nobody beyond catching it. If you’re an MC and you nice then you shouldn’t have a problem with somebody coming at you, body up and keep it moving. That’s how it works. Some guys just try that shit for no reason. I’m not the kind of guy who will start frivolous shit for attention, that’s not how I am. If I say something I have a reason for saying it.
I haven’t spoken to Rakim. He’s definitely legendary in the eyes of hip hop and in the eyes of a lot of MCs, as he is for myself. I see him as a legendary MC, but I also know that he and I have a personal relationship and we’ll deal with it how we deal with it but he better know, just like everybody else better know that I will show up for the battle. No problem. I respect Rakim and I’d like to see him come out with a nice new album because he’s an amazing MC and I wouldn’t battle him if he was wack. If Rakim wasn’t dope I wouldn’t say nothing to him because it would be a waste of my time. He and I are very good friends and I’ll always respect him.
With this material coming out the vault I’m intrigued to know if you have more stuff ready to break out. I’d heard you had a load of stuff on DAT with Pete Rock, any chance of that or other stuff getting released?
Oh yea, definitely. I got another version of the Konexion album that I didn’t use because at the time I was looking to put out a different sound. Pete Rock had recorded the whole entire Konexion album, it’s really about twelve Pete Rock tracks and then I switched gear because at the time I felt like I was ahead of myself. Those tracks are incredibly underground hip hop records and I do plan on releasing ReKonexion which is the original version of Konexion.
I’d love to hear the material with Pete Rock, I think you guys sound great together.
Yea, Pete is an incredible producer, you know I’m a very good friend of his. He’s like one of my favourite producers of all time along with Premier, they’re my two favourite producers of all time.
I mean you’ve worked with an incredible list of producers. Who do you think you’ve moulded with best and what collaboration has produced the best music?
I get a little something different from each one of these guys. When I work with Pete Rock, he’s the type of producer that when he brings me music he already knows that it’s for me. He doesn’t just play me stuff that he’s given to a whole bunch of people, he’s like, “Yo, this is definitely Bumpy Knuckles.” He’ll put together maybe ten or twenty tracks and bring them to me and leave them with me as long as I wanna keep them and he’ll just say, ‘Rap over them and call me when you’re ready to mix them.’ What I get out of that is that he trusts me to be creative in my own space with his product.
Premier will play me a bunch of stuff that he did for everybody else, because if Premier plays somebody some stuff and they don’t sound good or they don’t want to use it then he’ll put it in the trash and he won’t play it to nobody else. When I’m digging for Premier music it’s in his garbage can! I’ll take them and make them underground hits, ‘Part Of My Life’, ‘R.N.S.’, all those records were beats that other people had that he either didn’t like the way they sounded on them or they just didn’t do them. So I took them and made them classic underground, and that’s what I love about Premier is that he produces those records and then when I get in the booth he’ll say, “Foxxx, this is what I’m looking for here from you, I’m looking for this from a vocalist.” He’s a real producer like that. He’ll often say that he wants to produce something custom for me, but I’m always say no because I don’t want to ruin the chemistry that we have. The chemistry comes from the fact that he’s giving me all these joints that other people turned down and then I’m challenged to remake them and I have a ball doing them. It’s Premier anyway, so it’s always a banger to me. Everything he does I love.
He posted a couple of beats on the released version of Konexion, so I’m assuming that’s going to continue as a working relationship?
Oh absolutely. Premier is all over American Black Man, I got a whole album called Music From The Man featuring DJ Premier where all fourteen tracks are produced by Premo and I also got Pete Rock, Kev Brown, Oddissee, Clark Kent… a whole bunch of guys man.
Tell me a little more about American Black Man.
I was actually gonna try and drop it in ’08 but I fell back because I had to do some revamping because Nas ended up dropping the Nigger album. It just felt like for me to put it out whilst that was out wouldn’t have been a good idea. I have my reasons for feeling like that because they kind of go in the same direction so I wanted to change a few things. Anyone who knows my history knows I’ve been talking about American Black Man since Industry Shakedown and there was always gonna be a trilogy: Industry Shakedown, Konexion, American Black Man. One thing about me is that I’m not on anyone’s timeline, so I drop records as I feel they need to be released. I’ve got the luxury of doing that so I decided to pull back. Maybe sometime in mid ’09 it should be ready.
You’re someone who has endured your fair share of industry strife. How has that affected you as an artist and how have you managed to turn that around and still be so prominent in the game?
What’s amazing about that is that as an artist I’ve always had the idea that music has to consume time and space. If you’re a real producer and you sit down to make a track for someone or yourself, the passion that you put into your work should be indicative of who you are. I know that every time I’ve put a record out I’ve tried to give people who I really am, I’m not a gimmick or the kind of guy that just wants to tell people things that are made up. Even though we are MCs and part of our work is storytelling, I try to give you passion in all my music. Sometimes that passion may come out in a way that people may not understand, so me having the freedom to work in my own space… I look at it like this: me being on a record label that doesn’t share the passion for my music means there’s a problem with the marriage.
The blessing was that the internet became so relevant. I like the fact that people have to look for my music sometimes because it keeps it classic, everything is not so expendable. Some people that are real lovers of underground hip hop are like, “I gotta find this Freddie Foxxx record,” and because I’m the one that controls my own music, I’m the one deciding what does or does not get released. If I leak a record then I leak a record. No-one comes in my studio and takes my music and leaks my music and I’m very much in control of that. The control factor is more about passion than anything else. When you make passionate music you want people who handle your music to have the same passion or else it’s not gonna work out.
Has there been any fallout from going down the independent route or do you have no regrets about that at all?
It’s not something I’ve always gained from on a financial level like I would want to but it is something that I know that I have to do. It’s an option for me that I have to take because that’s the road I’ve made and I always stay in my lane. I’m not good at going to record company meetings and trying to sell myself to people who don’t understand what hip hop, me or the music is about. You know, people who are following the concept of mainstream radio where everybody’s got one favourite rapper… these fair-weather fans and record companies. I don’t want to be a part of that. That’s their thing – to make money – but as an artist I’ve always made that lane to have control over my work. That’s what it’s about. Sure I want to make money doing it but I’m not poor, far from that. Nowadays things are different because the internet is so relevant and popular.
I think it’s interesting that people always think of Freddie Foxxx as an MC but in fact you’ve been producing since your very first album. How do you approach that process differently from the rhymes?
How could you not know how to produce when you got guys like Pete, Premo, Alchemist, Clark Kent and DJ Scratch as friends? My long time friends are some of the biggest producers in hip hop so I’ve always been a guy who knew how to make his own music because sometimes people’s schedules mean that they can’t be there. Instead of me waiting for somebody I sat down and taught myself not only how to become a musician but also a producer. I’ve been in the game for 20 years or so and I’ve been producing as long as I’ve been rapping. The thing is I’ve only gotten better at it and tried to figure out ways to enhance my talent.
I think I approach MCing in the way a boxer walks into a ring and looking at the track as my opponent. I have to figure out all the loopholes in the music to place my words to make sure that it makes sense. As a producer I try to produce a track as somebody who’s building a ring for boxers to fight in. I want it to be sturdy enough for whoever’s rapping on the record. I’m producing for Run DMC right now, I’m producing for KRS-One right now and I hope to produce for rappers who have been in the game for ten years or better because those guys understand what it is that they’re rapping on. Not to say that the new cats don’t, but I don’t have as much work to do vocally with those guys.
And do you still take a traditional approach to beatmaking? What equipment do you use and what’s the process like?
I still got SP 1200s, I got an MPC 60, an MPC 3000, I got a 950, an S3000… I use different types of keyboard stuff, I got a catalogue of drum sounds as well as still sampling kicks and snares from records. I got tons of equipment, I’ve always had equipment and I was never one to get rid of my old stuff because you always want to be able to go back to them. The only sampler I don’t like is the MPC 2000 because I’m used to the 4000, but I’m a guy that when Pete Rock shows up to make beats for me to rap to I want to have the equipment that he likes to make his beats on. That’s why I got the SP and a 950. When Premier comes I have to have the 950 ready and an MPC 60 so that he can do what he does. I like to be able to have what people use. Clark Kent is a masterful SP 1200 producer so I gotta keep that. I have two actually: one is for Clark Kent and one is for Pete Rock. I bought each one of them their own separate SP so that when they come to my studio that’s what they can use.
Can you clarify what other material we should expect to see from you over the next year or so?
Right now I got a mix CD out called The OG and the reason I did that was because I wanted to show people that there’s a problem in hip hop right now. The problem is that hip hop has been given its proper place considering the wide range of music that’s out there. You can’t tell me that just because somebody’s not on the radio that they’re not relevant to the game. I put The OG out because you got a bunch of rappers from the ‘90s that are trying to act like they’re not in their late 30s or early 40s and to me that’s wack: if you nice, you nice. If you got good music you got good music, it shouldn’t matter that you’re 38 or 39 years old because if you’re an artist and you love hip hop as a culture you gonna live it ‘til you die. You can’t get away from it because you grew up in that era. The OG album is indicative of that kind of a concept but it’s still banged out hip hop where I take other rappers’ music and I spit over their records. Don’t be surprised when I’m rapping over these records if I’m getting at them, there’s 50 Cent, all kind of cats on there where I got their music and I just laid my vocals over their tracks. I’m not trying to remake their records, I’m doing those beats with my voice on them and do what I do. It’s really about buzz. I’m dropping a conceptual series of mix CDs. That’s The OG.
Then I got a whole ton of stuff in my studio that I’m just mixing, mastering and remastering and I’m just gonna drop a whole lotta shit.
Download:
MP3: Audio Portion of Dan Love’s Interview w/ Freddie Foxxx (left-click)
MP3: Freddie Foxxx ft. 2Pac-”Killa”
MP3: Freddie Foxx ft. Kool G Rap-”Cook a Niggaz Ass”
MP3: Freddie Foxx-”Industry Shakedown”
Posted in Interviews | 9 Comments »
October 8th, 2008
Q: What was it like for you growing up in Los Angeles during the 80s?
A: It was the LA of the Reagan administration. Drugs were really heavy in the streets at that time…more crack addicts…crack babies. It was a good time simultaneously because there was more creativity within the music and it showed. You had Beat Street, Krush Groove, Wild Style, there was more rebellion and risk-taking and the music was great. Life wasn’t always great but I’m here and I’m happy and it’s a better time for me now.
Q: Did you grow up with brothers and sisters? Was your dad around?
A: I grew up with my brother Mike and my mom. That’s all we had when my father left. So that’s what it was then and that’s what it is now.
Q: Did you go to Carson High?
A: For a little while, but I was rarely ever there.
Q: What about Sports?
A: Not really, we’d play football in the streets, but I was mainly into the music… freestyling, that type of stuff, I was also into martial arts, grappling, crazy Capoeira , to stay out of trouble.
Q: Did you ever go the gang route?
A: Not really, I was always into the visual thing. I’m an idiot, so I partied with anybody, whatever local bloods I was down with, or whenever I’d go somewhere else, there was always just me. I do me, they do them. I loved to drink at that time, being 13 and 14 and I’d get fucked up on the blocks and they’d do what they do. Y’know they’d sell and they’d do their drive bys but my thing was to give them positive energy to keep them away from having to do that.
The most stone cold gang bangers in the hood were the ones that played Wu-Tang for me for the first time. You’d never expect that. They’d be like, ‘I listen to Wu-Tang cuz…I was like ‘Wu-Tang…What’s Wu Tang?’ And I remember looking at the cover and being like, ‘Yeah Right.’ I used to pass it all the time in stores, like ‘What’s this ‘Mystery of Chessboxin’ shit.’ But it all tied in. It’s always been positive and negative. Even out of the negative there was positives. The music and my mentality reflects that.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Interviews, LA Weekly | 17 Comments »
