Metal Lungies

(Image from Interview Mag)

Maybe I exclusively should start highlighting interviews that are worth reading or something. Here is an extremely likable brief profile & interview over at the illustrious Interview Mag conducted by David Shapiro. We learn that Wacka really likes to record raps, no matter where he is, that includes the back for non-flashy sedans.

After we’re done, Waka Flocka Flame picks up his phone and walks outside the tattoo parlor. We follow him out and find him sitting in the back seat of a red Toyota Camry, next to a guy with a Macbook Pro on his lap, with a microphone set up in the middle seat between them. Waka has headphones on and he’s rapping into the microphone in the back seat of the car while his crew stands on the sidewalk and marvels about the mobile recording studio in the car. He looks like he’s having a good time in there.

His favorite snack is also Salt & Vingar chips, how can you really hate the guy?

Read the full interview here.

If all rappers told stories as good as GZA, then there would be a lot more interesting interviews with rappers on the internets. Also, if all interviews were made into cartoons like this? I would probably watch every single video interview ever made. Props to Pitchfork.

New York City, come see Just Blaze field questions from Chairman Jefferson Mao of ego trip. These Red Bull sessions tend to yield serious gems, so if come by if you could go for some hip-hop stories. RSVP info is in the flyer. ML might be in attendance, so stay tuned for our detailed notes.

That was a Kayne and Justin Bieber conversation on the net – the two of them … I think a lesbian artist that been in the game for a minute, we need to embrace the younger generation and give them an opportunity to stand next to us and do great, great music.

–Raekwon

He might actually be referring to Kanye.

Here’s a great interview with DMV go-go sensation, Mambo Sauce, from the former co-host of ML Radio, Julie O. of JournalisticK Media.

Check out more of her work on her youtube channel!

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…a guy committed suicide on the train that we were riding. We saw him when he was dead, right in front of us. When you’re in fifth grade, that’s the story to tell your friends: “Yo, man, we saw somebody kill themselves on our train, and his arm was cut off and it was still moving.” I was like, “I’m coming back here. This is where I wanna live. This is exciting. I wanna see all the crazy action.”

–DJ Premier

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Two of my heroes, Madlib and J Rocc, both have hook-ups in whatever city they’re in, where they can have weed ready for them as soon as they step off the plane. That’s what I aspire to have.

–The Gaslamp Killer

Sudanese rapper/producer Bangs stole our hearts last year with “Take U To Da Movies,” a bullish use of a green screen that seized the online audience not unlike rising star Antoine Dodson. Aside from dropping a new smash, “Meet Me on Facebook” (above), and appearing in a Honda ad, Bangs recently gave a blowout interview where he broke down his creative process. Prepare yourself.

On “Take U To Da Movies”

I just make the beat, ya know, and I listen to the beat. Put pen on paper and listen to it for a while and I said, “Let me make a song about the movies.”

On the video

It was free for free ’cause I work with someone he’s a director. He got his office with green screen and all that so he told me, “I want you to do a short movie for me like two minutes or three minutes. I tell him, “Okay,” I did the movie and I told him I want to shoot a video clip ’cause I got a song. He tell me, “Okay, alright, we see how we go.” I let him hear the song and all that we shoot “Take U to Da Movies,” he edit it and I did the rest.

On 50 Cent

He called me last year, December or so. He tell him I want to shoot video with him, “Take U to Da Movie (Remix).” I tell him, “Okay.” Since that day, ya know, he ain’t call back yet.

On influences

Chingy, Sean Kingston, ya know, who else…?

On using the word “Thurr”

I’ll be singing it, “Shawty right thurr. I say right thurr, when I say right thurr it feel like it’s a better mix with the beat to be kinda good to make it hip-hop. Right thurr.

Girls he wants to take to the movies

Raven, like That’s So Raven. Or Eve… Keri Hilson, Jordin Sparks. Good kinda girls I go to movies with, if I go to the U.S. and collaboration [sic] with them.

Bangs is like the rap version of the crazy American Idol reject. Talking to a viral sensation is usually awkward, because you don’t know if the person understands why he’s so funny. See also our interview with Mr. Chi-City.

via XXLmag.com

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One day we were in the studio with Eminem and D-12, who we’d known from Detroit through Proof. And then Dre was there, and he and Dilla got to talking and hanging out. We left for a little bit and when we returned Dilla was like, “Yo, I ain’t using samples anymore.” The thing was that we had already made 10 of the 13 tracks on the album, but it didn’t matter.

–Frank Nitt

Dr. Dre inspired J Dilla to go sample free. This story is news to me, but I’m not the Dilla expert. Stan, yes. Expert, no. Dre, Eminem, and Dilla! If only someone had a camera in that room! This also brings to mind this quote from a May 2009 interview with Dilla’s mom Maureen Yancey:

And from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., Dilla had people coming daily to learn to do beats or for him to help with their music. These same young men who are big in the industry now — they would be outside my door at 6 p.m. every day, waiting. Eminem was one of them. Eminem and Paul Rosenberg — who turned out to be his attorney — Paul was rapping at the time, he wanted to be a rapper, too — they would be there at 6 sharp.

WHY aren’t there pictures from these historic meetings?

Via The New York Times

Melvin Van Peebles is a pioneer in black cinema, having directed, written, produced, scored and starred in what many people consider the first blaxploitation film, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasss Song. The New York Times recently published a fantastic profile of Peebles’s attempt to turn Sweetback into a stage musical that’s essential reading, if only for passages like this:

In person Mr. Van Peebles is a throwback to the era of Afros and revolutionary rhetoric. His beard has gone ash white, but he still sports black leather vests and pants, purple-shaded glasses and vintage high-tops. He is rarely without a soggy cigar — occasionally lighted — or a bellicose zinger, like: “If somebody messes with me, it’s not a lecture they need. It’s a brick.”

Read the whole piece here.

Hip-hop fans may be more familiar with Peebles from Madlib’s prominent sampling of his music on his two Quasimoto albums; allegedly ‘Lib and Peebles were supposed to do a double album together back in ‘05, I wonder what happened to it?

Download: Quasimoto – Bad Character

Get up on a little of Peebles’ music too. Here’s “Come On Write Me” from his 1974 album, What The . . . . You Mean I Can’t Sing?!