Ma Dukes Speak On Dilla’s Childhood, The Foundation Goals, & Him Meeting Q-Tip
February 9, 2011
No spoilers here. You’ll simply have to check the footage. Props to The Hip Hop Chronicle UK.
Kane Beatz Lists Nas, Lil Wayne, & Bei Maejor As His Favorite Artists To Work With
February 9, 2011
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH KANE BEATZ from DERICK G on Vimeo.
Well that’s a collaboration I didn’t see happening. The Lupe/Kane track made sense as the majority of Kane’s bigger placements have either been for Young Money or an artist on Atlantic Records. Considering Nas doesn’t have the best ear for beats and his style hasn’t really changed I’m curious to hear what this will sound like.
Mike Jaggerr Put A Thousand Days Into “The Eleventh Hour”
February 2, 2011
If you name your first project The 11th Hour, it stands to reason that you know a little bit about biding your time. About five years ago a high school kid in Delaware was tenaciously on his pre-Twitter hustle blowing my phone up. He was one of hundreds of producers vying to get into Scratch magazine’s Hydrosonics column. He was making music as part of a program called Bassline Entertainment and was rapping under the name Miraculous. Thankfully, his crew had music good enough to warrant his persistence, so after finally connecting we arranged the interview. In his profile he told our good friend Celia San Miguel about making beats using allergy pills. “I didn’t have a shaker. I had what I had and knew what I wanted it to sound like,” he said in the article. “I was just using what I had at my disposal.”
Back in the day...MP Fiend and a young Mike Jaggerr (Miraculous)
Five years later another mutual friend, MTV’s Jayson Rodriguez has arranged a reunion of sorts. Rechristening himself Mike Jaggerr, the rapper/singer/producer has packaged all of the experience he’s gained since his days part of Bassline into a mixtape called The 11th Hour. While the buzz about his new project has been quite…well…miraculous…he had to let that name go.
“You know how when you’re thirteen you think that stuff sounds cool,” he confesses with a chuckle. “I went to college and started looking at the name and telling people the name and seeing the reaction. So I had to switch it up.”
The new name is fueled by as much youthful indiscretion as the former. “My friends and I, we had this slang for getting girls like I’m bout “Jagg” her and I guess I did the most Jagging,” he explains. “I went along with the Jaggerr thing once I realize it stuck more then the name I had prior. I wanted another alias anyway so it was perfect.”
As for a certain long-haired rocker Mike doesn’t even see him. “No relation.” He’s building his own legend on his own time.
“Rainy Days”
Nodfactor.com: I didn’t know at the time that you were rapping and singing back in 06. I thought you were just producing.
Mike Jaggerr: Nah I was rapping first then started producing out of necessity. ‘Cause when I was in Bassline where we had this lady in the group named Aisha, who is an artist I still work with right now. You’re going to hear from her soon. She could sing exceptionally well when we were younger so all the beats we were producing would be for her. R&B Usher-ish and Beyonce type beats. That’s not what we wanted so I was like fuck it I’ll start making my own shit. That’s basically how it started. Then I wanted some respect so I started blowing your phone up.
Nodfactor.com: So what were you starting off with on the technical side, as far as production?
Mike Jaggerr: I was blessed because University of Delaware they kind of sponsored us. So we had everything in advance before I even knew what we had, like the MPC. We had Pro Tools, every type of module you could think. But I didn’t know what it was. It was sitting collecting dust for at least a year or so and then I started realizing what we had once I started researching. I’m like wow and we had people really grace us. Like they gave us space, practicing space studio space. The grand opera house in Delaware specifically gave us that and once I realized what we had I was in there everyday winter, spring, summer, school, school holidays, days off. I was in there while everybody else was playing ball watching Cartoon Network, I was in there making beats, making songs and just perfecting my craft.
Nodfactor.com: So you were self taught for the most part
Mike Jaggerr: Yeah self-taught for the most part. I took music theory in school but otherwise trial and error.
Nodfactor.com: This is more of an argument for bringing music back into the schools. A lot of people don’t even get those programs anymore.
Mike Jaggerr: Yea they definitely need it. If my music teacher specifically told me it was wack you know that made me want to refine it more. She helped me find arrangements and learning how to do core progressions and just how to put a song together. So it definitely helped me.
Nodfactor.com: So how did you get from there to here? From 2006 to 2011. What happened?
Mike Jaggerr: I went to sound school, I went to a school call Full Sail University in Florida. I studied film, initially I wanted to go to Berkley school of Music, and that didn’t work out. My audition was-you know what Kanye did at the VMAs right recently? Pulled out the MP? That’s what I did in my audition. I had the [MPC] in front of the stage, then I started playing the piano and singing at the same time. They were like thrown back. They didn’t know what to do with me. They [said] “We love what you’re doing but it’s not what we’re looking for.” They want you to play Bach and I was playing my own songs, that wasn’t cool. So I ended up going to Full Sail and I studied film. And I feel like music and visual should marry each other. When I’m making music I see things. I found out once I went to film school that [the] people that they make visuals hear music the same way.
From there in film school I was perfecting my craft making songs. “Rainy Days” and “Away” are songs that been around for like 2 yrs. Those songs survived those initial growth spurts that I was having as far as my production and song writing. “Away” was just a true story, to me it’s till raw to me. I listen to it and I want to mix it cause we didn’t mix the version you hear on the mixtape. That’s my straight raw version. I tried to mix it and it lost its essence. So I left it the way it was. “Rainy Days” is basically the same way. I went to numerous people trying to mix it and it just wasn’t right so I left it the way it was.
Nodfactor.com: Wow “Rainy Days” is one of my favorite songs on the mixtape. Why the name 11th Hour?
Mike Jaggerr: Because that’s where I’m at right now, like I need this to work. I invested all my time, energy and passion. I’m reading this book by Napoleon Hinu that was funded by Carnegie called Think and Grow Rich and the core ideal of the book is about desire and knowing what you want and not having a plan B or plan C. This is my plan A B C and D.
Nodfactor.com: How do you feel about the response to the mixtape. I saw a tweet the other day said Mike Jagger’s the new Internet it boy or something like that.
Mike Jaggerr: Yeah they said I’m the new “Internet phenomenon.” I’ll take that. I’m overwhelmed and appreciative also because the music it goes the a refining process with my circle you know like if it makes it through us then like generally everyone else can feel it too.
Nodfactor: On “Episodes” you rhymed “out in Hollywood buying food with food stamps” is that reality or a colorful story?
Mike Jaggerr: No that’s reality all the way. That was definitely real. The time period I went out there I was low on funds. I had worked at the Nike World Basketball Festival they paid me $700 for like a day. So I bought my tickets to go out there and I crashed with Jay Dixon. While we were out there and I [was] just networking and I was building with Will.I.Am’s engineer Dylan 3D Dresdow.I took a bus ride out to Burbank and I was just like a fly on the wall watching and learning stuff from him.
Nodfactor.com: How did you meet him?
Mike Jaggerr: Facebook and the power of the Internet. After a couple of weeks of building he told me to hit him up when I was out there. I didn’t think he was gonna respond when I called him but he did.
Nodfactor.com: What did you learn from him?
Mike Jaggerr: Watching some of the mixing techniques and I played songs that I had and he just gave me tips. It was a crazy time because Will and Nicki was practicing for the show and he was gone introduce me to them but that didn’t happen. But that’s cool [because] I got to sit and watch and learn. Once that door is open it’s always open.
Did you get any other mentoring
Nodfactor.com: So as a rapper/producer which do you do first?
Mike Jaggerr: I make the beat first. When I make these hooks I don’t put much thought into it. The words just come to me. It might not be coherent words, it’ll be like run on sentence [but] it normally pulls itself out.
Nodfactor.com: How did you make “My Hero”?
Mike Jaggerr: I made that beat when I came back from school, when I left Florida. I made that on the floor. I got these new instruments from a company called East West and I was just playing with them and that is what came out. They had this choir sound and it just struck me. I was angry at the time. The stuff I’m talking about on there is things that I went through. I remember my mom boyfriend told me I should get a job at McDonald’s when I was younger and I would stay late after school doing Bassline making beats or writing songs. He was a bad role model. During the summer I was interning for myself. I set up a program called Delaware Future. I got to make songs and beats everyday and I was making more money than him. My dad past away and the guys in my family was doing mostly negative so I only had myself to look up to.
Nodfactor.com: So what’s next? Are you shooting any videos for the mixtape?
We shot a video with Creative Control that should be out in another week. We finished it before the holidays and we are trying to get it out by the end of the month. And I directed a video for “Rainy Days.” Just pulling my resources and putting them to good use.
Producer CHOPS On Making “The Creep”
January 31, 2011
On Saturday those fools from Lonely Island dropped another viral gem with Nicki Minaj called “The Creep.” The sample-free backdrop for the hilarious stalker hand-book, monster mash was produced by beatsmith CHOPS.
“It was the kind of thing where my manager sent them a gang of stuff and that one just clicked,” says the former member of Mountain Brothers who has laced beats for Bun B, Young Jeezy and Chamillionaire. “It really fits the topic of the song too. We knew that they picked the track but it wasn’t locked down that Nicki Minaj was gonna be on it til Wednesday.”
CHOPS, who uses a program called Nuendo to make his beats, says he’s been doing the TV music hustle for the past five years or so, but is no stranger to diversifying sources of income. Back in the day the Mountain Brothers won a radio contest for Power 99 in Philly where they recorded a Sprite commercial that was played nationally.
“There’s money in other avenues besides records,” he says. “Now that CDS are dying you really have to be creative and find different avenues if you want to make a living. It’s not all just album sales wise.”
His advice to new producers looking to get into TV is not to delete any beats. The beat for “Creep” was not the “newest track in the world” so you never know who will find interest in something you’ve created.
“I definitely feel fortunate. I’ve worked with people that are bigger, but they’ve never picked my joint to be the single. I’ve always had album cuts,” he says of Lonely Island, whose last single with Akon, “I just Had Sex,” has over 45 million views on Youtube. “We’ve talked about possibly more stuff with LI and of course I’d love to get some work in with Nicki Minaj. She’s one of the biggest out and not afraid to be herself and have fun with things.”
Check out the video for “The Creep” below:
Producer Double-O On Pros And Cons Of Sampling [VIDEO]
January 31, 2011
In the next part of Nodfactor.com’s interview with Kidz In The Hall’s Double-O he shares how he got started DJing and producing, then gives us the skinny on why the group strayed away from sampling on The Land Of Make Believe album.
DJing for me starts with the movie Juice and GQ in the bedroom with the fingerless gloves on not really scratching but scratching. Going back to watch that movie is hilarious because you’re like “was hat mixer even on?” [laughs] That whole vibe is just really what put me onto it. There were a couple of older cats that took me under their wing that let me open for them when they did backyard parties etc. It’s funny because during that whole time I was doing blends before they were known as mash-ups. I might throw Jodeci on a house record, mixing instrumentals with acapellas. That’s what happens when you only have one copy of a record, you gotta figure out how to use them in different ways. That was my initial foray into creating something newer than just playing a record.
My freshman year of college I met this kid Jeff that was a rapper from the Bay who wanted to do an album. He’d come over and play instrumentals and stuff. I worked at AT&T that summer doing data entry and I saved up for a DR-550 drum machine and an Optimus keyboard from Radio Shack. We had this extra room in our house and all of sudden it became a studio. I used this thing called a bursar card—don’t do this unless you’re going to pay your student loans back- that you could buy your books with. But they had a computer section and the computer section had Cubase and all this other [software]. So I bought all that for the computer too. But I had no clue what I was doing. I think the way I made my first beat-because I couldn’t make drums back then-I played a melody into the sampler, saved it, and then took a punk rock break that was on the drum machine and slowed it down from like 160bpms to 82bpms and it sounded like a Master P record. So I was like “yeah, this is doep.” For whatever reason I flipped the “Beverly Hills Cop” theme, I think it was the only thing I knew how to play on piano. Made a whole beat out of that. I only made three beats that whole year because the process was way too difficult. Never knew how to use midi, never knew how to use any of that stuff.
Then I saw this thing on line called the Yamaha QY70 all in one production…it was like $400. It had all the instruments in it and the sequencing was easy. Plus it was battery powered so I’d be sitting in class or at lunch banging out beats. Jeff and I were making a bunch of records on that.
Then I got an internship at Sony doing all the fun grunt work setting up Rodney Jerkins midi set-up and all that. That is where I cut my teeth actually learning the equipment. Somebody there was like “If you don’t know how to use an SP or an MPC then you’re not a real producer.” So me being stupid listened to them. So I was back there just learning how to chop stuff on the SP-1200 and the MPC because they had them there. I took a liking to the MPC-60II so when I went back to Philly 8th St. music had one. I had it on lay-a-way forever trying to get it out. I think I got it for like $800. I put down a $100 and returned some DJ equipment and then I borrowed a keyboard from my friend. I guess I really stole it cuz I never paid him for it. I was supposed to—Apologies. That was when I met Naledge and he came into what me and Jeff were doing. Our relationship built from there and became Kidz In The Hall years later.
But now his set-up has gone back to being more software based. Check out our clip of him discussing the pros and cons of sampling.
“Our biggest success (“Drivin Down The Block”) was with original records so going into the third album we said lets do an entire record without them. And I think that’s where we lost people, honestly…”
Ali Shaheed Muhammad On Making “Scenario” Remix, Tribe Documentary [VIDEO]
January 24, 2011
Sumit of The Hip Hop Chronicle UK caught up with Tribe Called Quest member Ali Shaheed backstage at his Doctor’s Orders event. Sumit asks Ali about how Tribe got their fat sound in their drums and their production. Ali also speaks on his memorable studio moment when recording Midnight Marauders and Tribe’s first time in London. They also speak on the Tribe Called Quest Documentary and the back and forth between Director Michael Rapaport and Q-Tip.
[Spotted at Cratekings]
K.O. Beatz On Homeboy Sandman’s “Strange Planet”
January 10, 2011
I started producing when I was a senior in high school. I started out with DJ equipment along with a sampler and started making loops. Shortly after that, I got my first keyboard, it was a Yamaha. My friends and fellow artists recognized my potential skills so they put money together and purchased me a drum machine. I didn’t have any personal mentors, but there were people that influenced and inspired me. My mother being one of them, the creativity side comes from her. Musical inspiration started when I heard Eric Sermon’s production with EPMD, Timbaland, Premo, Dr.Dre, and Pete Rock. They are all real inspiration of mine, just to name a few. I also love classical music including Bach, Mozart and Hayden..
3) How did you make the HomeBoy Sandman beat for “Strange Planet”? What was the inspiration?
5) Have you been in any beat battles, showcases or competitions?
The song, “The Journey’ will be starting this album and each song is going to take you on a voyage. Every track is going to be its own composition. This is going to be a soundtrack of instrumentals that the listeners can enjoy and create their own stories using their imagination. I’ve been working on this album for several months, the process has included working with musicians, instrumentalist, and new tools to bring something different to the fans.
7) Anything else coming up in 2011 that you want to share?
Yes, Chivalry Music Group. A collective of like minded musicians working to make music we believe in and supporting those outside of the collective as well. Along with writing and producing music other goals are to host events for the music community and mentoring young musicians. For beats check out http://www.kobeatz.com those looking for complete songs, hooks, and production check out.. http://www.chivalrymusicgroup.com and email us at [email protected] follow me on twitter at http://twitter.com/kobeatz and http://twitter.com/chivalrymusic
Have you recently had a track placed that you want us to hear? Hit us up on Twitter @Nodfactor and @JLBarrow.
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Saigon: “We All Need Just Blaze!” [VIDEO]
January 7, 2011
Saigon’s The Greatest Story Never Told will finally be coming out in February. My history with Sai goes all the way back to my days at The Source magazine when my fellow editor Gotti would bring him by the office and bump “Favorite Things” ten times a day. Then when I became EIC of Scratch I recreated Gangstarr’s Daily Operation cover with Saigon and Just Blaze. I’ve been waiting THAT long for this album and thankfully much of what he played me then made the final cut and still sounds new.
Recently I interviewed him for my other site TheUrbanDaily.com and saved his conversation about Just Blaze for my Nodfactor fam.
I asked him about Just Blaze’s alter ego Red 5ive, how it came about and how his sound evolved as a result.
“Just Blaze created a sound with ‘Believe It…he ended up using it again on ‘Live Your Life’ and ‘All The Above’…”
Thisis50 Interview With Nick Speed [Producer Of Lloyd Banks' "Home Sweet Home"]
December 30, 2010
Thisis50 recently sat down with Nick Speed, Producer of Lloyd Banks’ “Home Sweet Home” off of HFM2.
He talks about his upbringing and where he is from, how he got into music production, making tracks for 50 Cent and Lloyd Banks, songs he produced and who else he produced for, how he felt when Pusha T and Lloyd Banks spit to his beat, his album “This Side Of The Speaker” & much more!
Bangladesh Talks To Vibe About Pusha T [VIDEO]
December 30, 2010
Bangladesh and his scarf talk to Vibe about making beats for Pusha T’s new solo album that is “totally different” from what he does.
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