Joe and Jada - The Real Report - A-Trak on Kid Cudi's 'Day 'N Nite' taking over the world, touring with Kanye West, Fool’s Gold records, playing at the FIRST Coachella, becoming DMC World Champ at 15, & G-Unit Going Global

Episode Date: July 8, 2026

This week on The Real Report, Tony Yayo and Uncle Murda sit down with legendary DJ, producer, and Fool’s Gold founder A-Trak for a deep conversation on DJ culture, hip-hop history, and the records that changed the game. A-Trak breaks down launching Fool’s Gold, helping introduce Kid Cudi’s “Day ‘N’ Nite,” touring with Kanye West, forming Duck Sauce, winning world DJ battles as a teenager, playing the first Coachella, and why G-Unit’s global reach was different. The episode also dives into classic DJs, crate-digging, overseas club culture, independent artists, technology changing DJing, and what still keeps A-Trak passionate about music.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Millie Bobby Brown. We talk about her new movie, Anola Holmes 3, Family Life, and all the amazing things she has going on right now. out what she really feels about the stranger things ending. You have over 60 animals. I don't know where the number is 60. I really got to figure that out. There have been plenty of sheep in my bed. It's a big bed.

Literally sleeping in the bed. Listen to Hey Jonas on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. You know, one thing I remember too is there's a point in time when GUNIT was really touring internationally, I think a lot of people in North America might not realize that there wasn't that many rappers or rap crews that were really international like that. Because when I started working with Kanye and we were going international a lot, and I was already doing those overseas circuits as a DJ, and then I was working with Yeh, and we were going to Japan and Nigeria and anywhere.

Everywhere we went, G-Unit had been. It was G-Unit, M&M, A-Con. There was a point in time where even Hove hadn't started doing the international. Then he became international. I remember I was locked up, but Rihanna was overseas. Yes. She just came out. She was opening for the G-UID.

Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, I was, I remember that you guys really went and hit the whole world in a way that at that point of time, not that many artists had. He didn't get staffed. Right. Shut the fuck. Brooms! Role!

That's that point you can't move his way. Oh! Bram! Well, come to get a . Yeah, this is the boy, I guess I don't want to put it out. That's out my Lenton. Yeah, this is Turbulance, Tony.

And this is the boy, Lid Jett Lennie. And welcome to the real report show. Make some noise for DJ A-track, man. Your A-track in the building. We got the legendary A-track in the building. Thanks for coming by, man. We doing it. Make sure y'all like, share, and subscribe.

We got one of the fastest. growing shows on the value. You heard, we about to get that plaque. We got the, yeah, hopefully we get that plaque. We're about to get that plaque. We're about to get a hundred thousand. Yo, and you know what A-track? What's up?

We bring different things. Like on our show, we have like our mogul segment. Okay. When we talk to, you know, all kind of moguls and stuff like that, like you too. Because you're a mogul, you're not only a DJ. Right. But you have a record label. Yep.

Not too many DJs have done it. Who? Call it. Who else? Whatever DJs had a record label? There's a few that had one, but it's a lot. There's a lot, but as far as the success that this guy right here might have had, maybe not like that.

Definitely it's on another level, but what I'm saying to you guys is a lot of DJs had like albums, like Clue, Flex. Well, you know what it is? And we can get into that too, but like I've bounced around like different pockets of the DJ world, you know what I mean? And like, mixed tape DJs is one thing, but I mean, I even bounced around between hip hop and electronic music. On the electronic side, it's more common

for DJs to have labels. Yeah, I mean, DJing just becomes so broad. You know what I mean? That there's certain DJs that do the compilation album type of thing, like, Clue, like you said. Right. But you know, there's- Talk about the electronic music,

because when we overseas- Yeah. And you know- That's so big, that music is the biggest thing. In the world, hold on. Yeah, right. We're dancing the music that we would never dance to ever in our life. Music that only got no words. Yeah.

Yeah. But the thing about that is because it has no words, you could bring together like the whole planet. Like, and people from every country all get down, you know what I mean? Look at that. Yeah. So how was it, how was it? Because for, I know touring for us, we love like going to Europe.

Right. Right. Yeah. Oh, come on you guys. Oh, come on. Thank you for coming here, my brother. Thank you for coming here. My pleasure.

Yeah. My pleasure. Same to you. Both of you. Definitely. Yeah. Now, when you talk about electronic music. I wasn't working with like a big, a big guy like Duck Sauce.

So Duck Sauce, yeah. I know he produced for Barber Strice in, is it? All right, so Duck Sauce is kind of a group name for myself and a guy by the name of Armand Van Helden, who's a legendary house music DJ. He also came up in New York. So like in the mid to late 90s all the way to 2000s, Armand Van Helden's one of the most famous house music DJs. And, but he's kind of like me in the sense that he,

He grew up a hip hop kid and then got into house music just from being in clubs and stuff. But we kind of speak the same language. Like when we met, we clicked. We're like 11, 12 years apart. He's older than me. But we kind of clicked because we both grew up in hip hop and then make house music. So we got together and around 2009, we formed kind of a duo. That's another thing you see a lot in house music and EDM is DJs, you know, the same weather like daft bunk is a duo or like basement jacks,

the Chemical Brothers, there's groups like there's, you know, DJ. Yeah, so we formed duck sauce and we made music like that as a duo. And in 2010, we made a record, the title of the song was Barbara Streisand. And that song, that song went crazy. Oh, Lord, so he always said you worked with Barbara Strasin. No. I thought Barbara Streisand. No, it's okay.

Oh, all right, cool. The title of the song is Barbara Streisand. The title of the song was Barbara Streisand. And we didn't even think that much of it. But that was good promotion. Naming the song, Net. That was a good idea. Eventually, eventually it got to her.

I'm told. I'm told. But really, it was just one of those, like, you know when you make a record and you don't even think that's going to be the one, you think it might be a B-side. It's just something that you made casually, like just for fun. It was one of those, but it had like a contagious sort of catchiness to it. It ended up being a record that charted. And it was like number one in 12 countries or something crazy.

I'm going to say, I'm still going to say, fuck, Edding with these cute cards. Why you always do that to the cute cards? He's the one that says he worked with Barba Streisand. That's good. You should have looked. I would have looked it up. Got my hair, yeah, looking crazy. I would have looked it up and said the song is called Barber Stride.

It's all good. You know what I mean? I don't know too much about the electronic music, but just give me the right information. Well, on the hip-hop side, I do know you had, um, Kit Cuddy. A lot of people might not know from Kit Cuddy's record, Day and Night was on. Who's on full school on my label. Yeah. That came on.

So how that whole prize. All right, so I founded this label Fools Gold with a couple friends around 2007. And I had just moved to New York. So I grew up in Montreal, Canada. Yeah. You know, I was supposed to be from Montreal. My family first came from Haiti. My mom's came to Montreal.

There's a lot of Haitians there. I know. I was going to talk to you about that. I could go, I've been on tour all over Canada. I've been to Sassetoon. Oh, wow. Montreal Toronto. I'm sure you've been to Vancouver, Toronto.

Yeah. Shout to my man Peter Jackson. I went on a whole show. Peter Jackson. That's my man. And Montreal has the best Haitian food ever. That's for sure. Yes.

So I know you know about the Haitian food. Yeah, I grew up with Haitians in Montreal for sure. That's what I. Back to the Kid Cutty. How that whole. Okay, so I moved to New York. I had already established myself as a DJ. I got known as a battle DJ when I was younger.

But I moved to New York in 2006. I started this label called Fools Gold. And that was a point in time where like the scene around the DJs was changing. And DJs were starting to play a lot of different music. And DJs were starting to branch off and do their own thing. You know, the same way that now you might hear about like a Diplo or a Scrilex or, you know, Calvin Harris. They do their own thing. That was a point in time where, one, DJs were really coming into their own as DJs.

But two, also the music that we were all. all playing was changing. It was like the genres were coming down and became very eclectic. And we were all just like, I say weeks, I was connecting with a lot of DJs at that point of time. We were all experimenting. And there was even like this sort of like, like fun club music was coming back. You know how sometimes club music will be kind of cheesy and not that exciting? And then there's other time periods where club music is fun. We started Fools Gold as DJs. It's a label run by DJs. We speak to DJs first.

If other people get down, that's cool. But our audience is the DJs around the world. And real quickly, we found a lot of new music that was just different, exciting. It was just, you know, you probably remember if you think at 2006, 2007, 2008, like everything was changing. It was kind of a changing of the guard. So mind you, we were just an independent label. You know, we didn't have like a big machine, but we had a lot of. of people's attention because people knew that we were tapped in to like the next thing right we

were down with um it's a group called the cool kids that are still down with fools gold from chicago they were doing some new stuff a couple artists like flostradamus kid sister just it was just everything was different and new so meanwhile at that point in time i was djing for conier so okay yeah i toured with so yeah i toured with connier from 2004 how you ain't know this stuff man i mean i didn't i didn't know it's Let me talk. Go ahead, go ahead. Okay, so that's good. We're going to get through all of it, right?

So I was touring with Yeh and from basically from right after college dropout. You know, I was involved with late registration. I did scratches on Gold Digger. I was involved with those common albums. You know, commons record Go. Commons record, Shai City, I scratched on that. And then when Yeh worked on graduation, I helped out with some of that stuff, the daf punk sample and, you know, stronger that record.

And so there's this guy playing Pat. He was Kanye's A&R. And Plain Pat pretty much discovered Kit Kadier. He was definitely, you know, the first person that helped connect some dots. Shout out to shout out to Dot the genius also, who, you know, really was probably the first person that, that, you know, gave Cutty time and day. and gave him some beats. But between that, the genius, and Plain Pat, Cuddy was unknown.

He was just working at the Babe Store in New York, right? And Plain Pat, who I knew from my work with Kanye, because he was Kanye's A&R, he knew that I had this new label that had the ear of people that understood new stuff. So Cuddy was starting to make music and it sounded like nothing else. It was just different.

So Pat sent me these two records. maybe two, maybe a third one. I'm not sure it was a while ago. He definitely sent me day and night and that new, new. And pretty much right away, I was like, I want to, you know, let's do a single on Fool's Gold. So we put out day and night and, and we just built it, even though we didn't have this big machine. No, no, Dot the Genius produced Day and Night. Oh, God the Genius.

Shout out to Dot the Genius. And shout out to Cutty himself. When did that record, it had to go diamond, right? Man. So, it had to go multi-bite. There's a point when Cuddy signed his album deal. he signed to Motown Universal a couple months after that. And then they ended up buying that master.

And whatever the plat, I don't, you know, we don't have the plaque ourselves. But we got it off the ground for sure. Yeah, got to go to. That was like, that was like day and night. When I dropped. It was huge. And the thing that was really special with day and night is there was a, there was a remix because we were talking about that EDM thing just a minute ago, right?

There was a remix by these Italian guys, the crookers. They were also on some different shit. Yeah, I was playing overseas crazy. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. So that was one of those, that was a rare record. Exactly.

There was a rare record where the original version was popping off and making its way in North America, especially. And then the Crookers remakes was blowing up, especially overseas. So you had two versions that were blowing up at the same time. Right. But that was on Fools Gold. I remember because we was going overseas at that time. It was everywhere. You hear it every club.

But it was organic. a thing that's special. We didn't have, and we didn't have a, Cool School was like five people. We didn't have like an overseas department or whatever, but we just, we just had people's ear. That's what, but this is how I feel, because you don't see murder, this is the thing with DJs like him, DJ Snake. Yeah, that's my homie. On dead mouse. You know what I'm saying? Right. Remember when we went to Snake and he was DJ? You've seen the crowd and he'll have like millions of dollars of pyro and fire and their drones. It's a show.

They do put it on the show. Another big DJ we met is Lada Rumpa, Rumpai, right? That's what I'm saying? Rumpa. Rumpa, I told him, murder, he had his big chains on. This guy had the littlest chain on in the world. Yeah. So this guy, y'all guys get million a show, no jury.

I'm like, this guy's crazy. But back to my, he mad because he had a little chain on. Okay. I had the big chains on. Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm talking. I told you. No, that's more point.

But it's levels with the DJs. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. The question I wanted to ask you was like, like how do you feel like being here versus being overseas? Because my experience is like, like I remember that song, we're a whole doing.

Yeah, Bob Sinclair. Yeah, that's my homie too. Yo, listen, when that used to come on, like we was overseas and like the vodka's flowing, like I really felt free overseas. Right. People are still dancing. Yeah. While it feels like in the U.S., it's more, yo,

bottles and everybody. Well, it's more to it than that. And by the way, Bob Sinclair, who made that record, World Hold On, you know, we look at it kind of from the outside from a North American perspective. And we just think, oh, yeah, he makes house music, dance music. It might seem like we're all from different worlds. But I've become good friends with Bob Sinclair. And this guy, all he wants to talk to you about is like DJ Premier Records from the 90s.

He just wants to talk about gangstock. Look at that. Look at that. But Tony Yale was in the truck world. Right. And Bob Saferon wants to be like, yo, but Jaru's album, Jeru's the damage his first album or this guy with these harmonies be having me, bro. I'm just saying, the world.

He's hitting the notes. He's hitting the notes. You got to understand. This is what people understand. Music bring back what? Memory. Yes. So there's wow.

And that year when that dropped, we was in the club, like overseas. Yeah. Oversease party. And number one, you feel free overseas because it's less pistols. Yeah. So you're feeling like, all right, let's just going to be a fist fight. You can relax a little bit more. Or somebody might pull a knife for a night for a lot.

raise on me. Might be fit fight. No, but so to your question, what I would say is the same way, even though hip hop traveled the world and now house music travel the world and everything's everywhere now, for a long period of time, the way that hip hop was youth, youth music in North America, you know, in the 90s in 2000s, most if you find a teenager somewhere, they're probably listening to, depending what period of time, either 50 or whatever it might be, or Fab or Lil Wayne, or you know what I mean? Wu-Tang, right.

Any of that, that 14-year-old in Spain or in Italy, they were listening to House music or Techno or trance or whatever. Like that was always the youth music or not always, but for a long period of time, that was the music of the youth, especially in Europe and even other places too. but so that's why it's so big when you go to Europe is like that's just what they grew up with that's why I always like who kid because who kid was like always prepared when we went overseas yeah he would know which records like all the big overseas records yeah like for instance Afro beats we was in London one time this is one song that came on I forgot how I go you know what I'm saying you know he's got to know he's going to know he's murder you know what I'm saying when you had a song you was in London yeah it was an

Afro beat, it's like the club shut down when I came on. Yeah. So when you go overseas and you hear different music, it makes you open to the world. For sure. So for me, I had better times overseas than the audience in the U.S. Yeah. For me, you know what I mean? There definitely was a point in time where clubs in the U.S. became more about the

bottle service and the sections and all that. And that's not fun. I mean, there's money that comes in that way, but like for me as a DJ, I don't really like playing a club that has a bottle section. I want people to be on the dance floor. Got you. Right. And for you, you might be looking at it in a different way, but I'm sure it's less fun too,

but overseas, it stayed a little bit more about the music. And that festival culture is really from Europe, too. Now you find it in North America, too. And now, even since the pandemic, but really, like, gradually in the last 15 years or so, there's a lot of clubs that opened up in North America that are back to being about the music. So it's less separated, but yeah, for a long time, I, man, I started going to Europe.

My career started when I was a teenager. In 97, basically, I started traveling to DJ. I was 15. The way that my career started, I won the DMC World Championships. Scratching and all that. Runs DMC? No, DMC, it's the most known DJ battle, right? So I said this is out and Canada out?

No, it's, I mean, the elimination is like. like the first round that I did was in Canada, but that took me to Italy. It took me to France. It took me to the UK. But yeah, at the age of 15, I mean, I came up idolizing DJs like Rock Raider, rest in peace. You know, you guys probably remember the X-Men executioners and a bunch of other DJs like that. Obviously, Jazzy Jeff, people like that, you know? So I got on winning this big DJ battle.

And from that point on, I started traveling. So already when I was 15, 16, I was going overseas to play. I was going to Korea, I was going to the UK. And even though at that point in time in the beginning of my career, I was just a hip-hop kid, like I mentioned, like you said, I was traveling the world and I was observing like, oh, in Asia, they're into this kind of music. Okay, in Europe, they're like this.

And really, Europe's not just one thing. In the UK, they might like this, but then in France and it's, you know, and I was kind of picking up on that. So many years later, when I started expanding the styles of music that I play, and I started getting into the high. house music thing and everything else, I was already like absorbing that information for a while. And, and, um, but I, the fact that I started my career so young, it kind of put me in the position where there's not that many people that can, that know the roots of DJing, the roots of hip hop

and like, were like, like, I could talk to Grand Master Flash and like, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, but on some DJ. Yeah, but on some DJ. My best friend was a DJ. Right. So I could tell you, like, like the first house song that was playing like back then in the clubs was do-d-do-do-do. Yeah.

So I didn't even know where house music was because I was just hip-hop. Yeah. But when I came on, house music. So, okay, but I'll give you an example. So my, because my big thing over the years has been to try to like connect the dots between these different branches. Because really all house and techno and, you know, EDM and all of that and hip-hop, it's all branches that come from the same tree.

It all comes from planet rock. It all comes from Africa, Bambada, and all of that, right? Right? So, you know, we remember like the Sugar Hill and Planet Rock kind of stuff, Sugar Hill game. That was disco. And at one point, hip hop slowed down and got to the run DMC thing and everything and it became the hip hop. Queens. Shout out to Queens. Queens, baby. Right, but, but. Number one group in the world, run DMC. There you go. Get that. Right. You paved away. Right? Jamest to J. Rest in peace. But that. It's a family tree. So

If you start with Atlantic Rock and you start with the Sugar Hill and that kind of stuff, hip hop went to one branch and House and all that stuff went to another branch. But that song that you were just singing, Hot Music, by an artist called Soho, but he's also known as, it's also known as pal Joey, just to give you an example of my... No, but my thing about how hip-hop and house music are cousins, that dude that made that record, he was making beats for Karras I and B&P also. So it's always, yeah, pal Joey. So it's, it's always, pal Joey.

Pal Joey. Yeah, there's Caris won records where he shouts him out when he made the beat. Oh, look at. So, so. Don't tell me he may step into the world. No, he didn't make step into the world. I think Carus' brother made that, uh, made that beat. Really?

Yeah, yeah. I gotta get KRS on the show real hip-hop. Yeah. That's what I love about music and like DJ. Yeah. Because I remember like going to parties with my man Rough Hands, my best friend was a DJ. So we used to go to the show. Jamaica Avenue, hot wax.

Yeah. And that was, you know, there was no CDJs. There was nothing. So, you know, we used to do these whole-in-world parties. All of them got shot up. Right. But you know what? My man got 10 crates.

Yeah. Someone's got to help. Yeah, right. Ducking after the shootout. You don't need my crates. Not nobody's leaving their crates. Yeah. And he got everything in there.

So that kind of made me musically inclined to like listening to all kind of music. Right. Did you see that bind them to soul? Like, I think like they said a bill. Yeah. I saw, I just saw that today. That's kind of big. I was surprised when I saw it.

Yeah. Yeah, man. They go out there buying vinyl. They're buying them records. I said, wow. Yeah. It's a bit of a different thing where like people buy it almost like a collectible object. I was about to actually, why are they buying it?

Yeah. DJs is not using vinyl. Not as, barely, right? Everything's digital, whether it's, whether it's on the laptop with Serato or whether it's on CDJ. But they like this murder. DJ's got it easy now. Now, but, but yes.

Listen, back in the days, 12-hundreds, Him and our mixer, party get shot up, you got 12 crates we gotta carry. Yeah. Nigger got a computer like this now. So now you say if the party gets set up where they gotta do is grab the glass roll. Got the flash drive and go.

Fuck out of here. I'd have been in the clubs with the best DJs in Jamaica Queens, Grand Master Vick, DJ Rough Hands, Gold Fingers, the Rockaway Twins, DJ Dog Time, like, come on, bro. We, we talking DJ, Jay Dale Arello, For Merrick, this is when people was doing blends. This is before DJ Clue.

Right. No I'm saying? DJ, you know, you got your 1,200s, and they got the needles and all that. My best friend was a DJ. That's dope. We go to my man's house, rest in peace right now. He got about 100 crates.

Right. If you go through his shit, classics. Yeah. And he was doing this at 15. Yeah. I never even knew that about you. Yeah, yeah. Do you think social media help the game for the DJs

or hurt you a little bit? What do you think about it? both both i think you know now there's there's a newer generation of DJs that are able to get known off of social media and i love seeing there there's DJs there's young DJs that are honestly they're like eight nine 10 years old maybe their parents are hunting them out they're learning how to scratch and they're posting their videos on TikTok and on reels you know um that's that's a new way to get known and there's a lot of information get that gets shared but um at the same time that thing with the phone and everybody trying to create these viral moments is to a point

where that's a little bit artificial. You know, people are sort of forgetting just the feel of being at a party and just dancing to the music and not worrying about, oh, is someone going to see me on such and such a story tomorrow? Should I film this? Asking for requests, all that stuff. It's a little bit like, yo, you got to put the phone down sometimes and just enjoy yourself. So it helps in terms of exposure, but it hurts in the way that it just feels artificial. It feels like the feeling's not quite the same. Yeah. Yeah.

What are some of the biggest festivals you did? Because I've seen. Yeah. Man, I mean, I played the first Coachella ever. I played Coachella a bunch of times. Seriously? Cochella. Yeah.

I played it a bunch of times. What year was that first Coachella? 99. What? What? Yeah, I was like 17. It was a rave, really. It was just a party in the desert.

And then they built into this, they built it into this thing. And then I've got to play it many times since, whether it be solo, a track set or duck sauce or collaborative stuff. But yeah, that one I played a bunch of times and Lollapalooz I played a bunch of times. Yeah, but overseas. The first time I was until I was like, God, day. Yeah. I mean, but he's 17 years old.

That's what I'm saying. What gives you the drive in the smarts to win your first? big battle contest worldwide at 15 years old. I was motivated me. Man, yeah. Like, yeah, it's like a worldwide tournament. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh yeah.

Oh yeah. I was, yeah, I was going up against, you know, DJs that were France, UK, Japan, whatever. So like I mentioned, I grew up in Montreal. Right. I got an older brother, we're super tight. We still make music together. My brother Dave, anybody that knows my stuff. Dave.

You know? He's also in a band called Chromeo. They're well known for their music too. But if you- In Canada? No, they live in New York too. Oh, okay, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

When we were growing up, we were just fans of hip-hop, fans of the music. We would go to the record store, buy the vinyl, study the liner notes, see who produced, oh, you know, who's Havix engineer or who makes that Pete Rock thing or that, like just trying, you know what I mean? Oh, what's this feature?

Who's big noise? Like just looking stuff up, you know? And so we're just students of the game, grew up in Montreal, idolizing this music. My brother wrote graffiti too. He would come down in New York and get into that. Actually, we had family in Queens, so he would stay in Queens. And, um, you know, I'm from Brooklyn. Hey, I live in Brooklyn now. All right. Every time I say queen, you see this guy going to go ahead. So, but basically, we both fell in love hip-hop and to the point where like, if you think

about 90s hip-hop too, like, it's more than music. It gave you like a code of how to live your life. Facts, right? You know what I mean? And as a kid that was from the outside of it, from Montreal, I feel like we both paid like extra attention to it. We would buy the magazines, whether it's the source or XXL or even before that ego trip on the go, rap pages, all of that. And absorb all that information. And we were just passionate. And my brother was making beats and I was scratching and DJing. And he was kind of like my coach because he was a couple of years older. So I'd be practicing every day coming home from school and learning my scratches and learning these routines. And at that point in time, especially if you were into scratching and whatnot, there was these

videotapes of the DMC battle, like I mentioned. There's a couple other ones, but that was the main ones. You go to the record store by these VHS tapes and just watch those DJ routines, watch Rock Raider and DJ noise and Kubert and all these incredible DJs and study them. And there was a point in time where I felt like I was ready to enter a battle myself. Because it's, you know, that was what I watched was battles. So once I got, and I got good pretty fast. After two years, I was like, all right, I'm ready.

And I won a world championship. Listen. And you're there for heart-wrenching knockouts. The world's biggest stage. And breathtaking triumph. Let's the Davis! 2026 FIFA World Cup. The knockout stage.

Every match, every moment. Listen on TSN Radio. Join the globe. On the road to the July 19th final. 2026 FIFA World Cup. Stream it all live on TSN Radio. Available on IHeard Radio. Hey, I'm Hoda Kotby, host of the podcast, Joy 101 with Hoda Kotby.

Okay, if you know me, you know this. I'm always searching for inspiration, for support. and useful tools to help maximize joy. So this podcast lets us uncover all of that together. We're going to have these meaningful conversations with the world's most fascinating people. Like when actress Olivia Munn shared how she overcame fierce health challenges that she never saw coming.

I've gone through breast cancer and then helped my mother through breast cancer, and that was more difficult. There's a lot of people who understand postpartner depression. I was not prepared for postpartum anxiety. Olympic champ Sean Johnson revealed why she had no choice but to be a gymnast. There was something about gymnastics that was intoxicating to me. It's given me a belief that we all have one of those treasures inside of us. We just have to find it.

Listen to Joy 101 with Hoda Kotby on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My first guest is Harris Holton, Shakira, Luke and Yerrin. Samira and Gracie! I'm so excited for it! You have surprises? Many surprises. Welcome to Sweet 305 where the group chat comes to life. What a f***

It's like a way Amiga, oh my best amina, Oh my brother, What a . Look, I've never ever had to be about with nobody. Except with my children, my my mom.

Ooh, Oof, that's incredible, yeah, the telenovela. You're the only person I know that love. You're the only person I know that love. loves the yellow starburst. It's lemonade. And no there's someone that you

like to collaborate with this person. This is Sweet 305. Listen to Sweet 305 with Lele Pons as part of my Culture podcast network on the Iheart radio app,

Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. My husband is currently on a vacation with his mistress and I'm confronting them. Tell me, Sophia, how did she even catch them? One Amazon shopping receipt. He accidentally sent her a photo of the kid's Christmas

gifts with a delivery to another woman at the bottom. He exposed himself? That's a rookie move. Couples massages, monogrammed bath robes, and lingerie he then moored her for. So she spent four weeks gathering evidence and taped a 10-page letter inside his luggage before he flew out. In his luggage, she came to play. And the second he landed, he blocked her. So she called the hotel room directly and got the mistress on the phone.

Ooh, she got the mistress live on the phone. That is a bold move. move, let's see if it pays off. Then it gets worse. He took the mistress on the Bahamas honeymoon trip he had planned with his wife. And then the mistress tagged him on Facebook, outing the affair to her entire family. That's like a whole public confession. And spoiler, two years later, karma hits him so hard he's calling his ex-wife in tears saying about

the mistress. What a mistake that was. To find out what happened, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Since you talk about battles, give me your top five hip hop DJs and then we're going to go to other genres. But give me your top five hip hop DJs and I'll give you my top five. All right. If you want to go first.

You got to let him talk, man. You're going to ask him. Go ahead. You're right. All right. I like you. You crazy too. Go ahead.

My top five in the order, just five, just five. All right. No order. All right. He won like all the craziest battles. Around the same, we were in a crew together. So we were kind of like, all right, we're both killing shit. We're not going to go against each other and we're going to.

So shout out my man crazy. Yeah, he beat me once, but it's all right. I'm going to say Jazzy Jeff, he's big bro for life. He laid down the blueprint. He even laid down the blueprint of how to go from battles to having a career as a solo DJ, to producing to everything. I feel like he slept on a little bit? I mean, those who know, no, but I think nowadays, I want to make sure people know that Jazzy Jeff is the king.

Are you talking about Jazzy Jeff, Will Smith? Yeah, definitely. For people that don't know. They might know them from even just being the character on the fresh friends. They might not know. They might not know he's the illest DJ. All right, so we got crazy. We got Jazzy Jeff.

I'm going to say my man, Jay Rock from the beat junkies. I don't know if you know the beat junkies in L.A. Yeah. Come on, right. Was that the right melody, man? I'm not sure, but it's cool. All right, I'll be okay. Be junkies.

Be junkies enough. We go after we and. Right, cool. Okay. So Jay Rock, all right. I'm going to say Premier, even though he's a little more known for his production, but Premier scratches will always be the funkiest scratches on any record. Everybody always wanted to have the DJ Premier Scratch on their record.

Right? And that's Big Bro, too. So shout out to him. And then the fifth name that I'll say, if I'm still thinking within hip hop, I'm going to say Rock Raider, rest in peace. And he was a mentor to me. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

You know what my father? Yeah. Yeah, go ahead. All right. First, I got to go with Jamaster Jay. Yes. And I'm going to tell you why. Queens.

I'm going to tell you, I felt like Jazzy Jeff has slept on because Will Smith was more of a commercial rapper. Right. I say that. It's more of like a hardcore rapper. Yeah. So for me, I'm going to go with Queens. I'm gonna go with GM Master Jay because he set trends. Yeah.

Deeters with no laces. You know what I mean? And he was, they just set trends, run DMC. Oh, for sure. So next. He made everyone want to be a DJ. Next, I'm gonna go, Terminator X. I gotta go with Terminator X, man.

You never can forget Terminator X. He had the big glasses. Yeah. Fight the power, he screech. That's what I'm telling you. When the DJ was more in the 80s, the DJ was. They were up on stage with the rappers. They were, yeah.

Yeah, this is what I'm saying. Terminator X. And he was always quiet. He never said shit. Yeah. He was like the scary motherfucking nigga in the back or something. You know what I mean? Then I definitely got to go thinking about, I would say D.

Nice. Oh, hell yeah. Because D. Nice was, he was DJing for KRS 1. Yeah. Until he came out. What my name is D. Yeah. I was rapping too.

I like that record. Yeah. I just wasn't used to him being a rapper right there. And then, what do you think? Lost that number five because I gave him more, right? I think you're on three, man. No, I gave you on four. You gave four?

Yeah, I said to- I said- What about, what about DJ Scratch with EPMD? Oh yeah, I got to get him. He's incredible. And he toured with Busta for a long time. Because I want to put Scratch as like my honor roll mention, so you could just put him in your top-lis. Yeah, because I said, I said Jam Master J, Terminator X,

D. D. Nice. Okay, okay. And Scratch. And Scratch. Yeah, I gotta give it to Scratch. Oh, no, whoa. Whoa.

Oh. Love Scratch. But I gotta give it to Cutmaster C, rest of peace, Cut Mastor C. Big Daddy came back in the days. There you go. Come on, nigga. Yeah, the flat top chain and all that. Okay.

Because you gotta think for me the DJs was as fly as the rappers at that. Well, I feel like-C-Maz-a-C or Mr. C, you mean. I mean, Mr. C. Okay, Mr. C. Rest-in-piece, Mr. C. Thank you. I was bugging. I'm tweeting. We lost too many legends.

But Mr. C, Brooklyn on that. But Mr. C, when he was doing Hot 97 at that point, he was killing radio that. Back in the day she was playing and all that. But I remember him being with Big Daddy came back in the day back. That's a fact. For sure. And how the DJ kind of looked like the drug dealer too.

Like Eric B. Come on. That nigga looked at as much jury as fucking Rock Kim. Right. And Mr. C just rep so hard for Brooklyn. He did. He got meant to Mr. C used to go so hard. Yeah.

For Brooklyn. I mean, he DJ for Big Daddy Kane and he found Biggie. He had said it was Biggie. And you know what, rest and peace to Clark Kent. Yeah. Oh, come on. That's why we got to have a top ten. Okay, okay, cool.

Rest in peace the DJ Carc was my guy, man. The sneaker addict. Yeah. Definitely, man, definitely. That's why we get DJs like you on here. So we talk about these classic moments because it's like, yo, the DJs meant so much back then. Of course. Man, rest of the Lord said being that we have been.

Oh yeah. Yeah. We mentioned them before. We definitely got to mention them all the time. And then we got to say rest in peace case slate. Yeah, you ain't lying about that. That's right. Yes, right.

Yes. See, you got your different genres and DJs that are all historic. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. But like when you hear A-Track and like a loud mouse and DJ Snake and I'm always thinking overseas. Yeah. Even Who kid? Like who kid loves it overseas.

I love the U.S. too. Ain't nothing like doing grimy. Of course. I just got back from, I got back from. Ain't no place like home, man. I got back from Europe on Monday. I was there for 10 days doing a little tour. Where you went?

I went to Poland. I went to, uh, to Paris. And then I went in the south of France to like in the Alps close to Geneva. And then I had something in Stockholm too. So I did those. Stockholm, German, yeah, Sweden. Now tell them how I'm sure. Love it, don't.

Yeah, man. How you like the food? I love the food. I love the food. I don't understand when people say, you don't like the food. It feels like it's more, I don't know, it's more, I feel like it's more healthy. Yeah. Yeah, you, for sure.

The ingredients are more fresh. What's our spot in Australia we love? We're addicted to. Oh, Nando's. Nando's is good. Yeah. I got that in the evening. Nando's, Nandoz, Nandoz, down.

Shelt to like the barbado or not. Nizos, Nindoz. Barbecue Perry sauce. The Perry Perry sauce, yeah. That's right. But I feel like you're, like, you're so, like, the ultimate hype man. Like, your energy and what you bring to the live show as, you know, with that voice that you have, it's not that, it's not very different from a DJ.

You know what I mean? You're kind of, you're almost like a DJ. Like, we're probably like, this is, you know, that's, you're, you're almost like, This guy be taking over parties DJ. That's what I'm sure. We all you see, he'd be taking over parties, man. I used to do that with my man Rough Hands. So like I said, I come from a real hip hop background.

You know what I'm saying? Like I could tell you 50's first freestyle of my man Rough Hands baby. Yeah. Like we used to be down there, mixed records. That's what's up. New Wu Tang instrumentals used to come out. I wasn't the best DJ. I was just, just playing around.

I could put a blend together. Yeah. But my man, Rough Hands, Goldfingers. They was, you know, they was the nice ones. Superfly. They all, like, they were. all could kill a club. You know what I mean?

Back then it was a little more special because... Goldfinger is incredible. I'm gonna give you a perfect example. Rest in peace, Misty, not Cutmastercy. Cut Mastercy is still alive. He's still alive, yeah. Shout to him too, though, right? He's still alive.

Even though 50 shakes with a knife on that. We talked about this woman. Allegedly. He was talking to cut master's. So look, so with that, look, so with that being said, with the Mr. C, he didn't even know, and rest of peace, I called him, we were talking on the phone, and he, he called him. He didn't know about the gap being. Okay.

He had a share of troubles. That's like the South Side Anthra. Many more than others. Like every time Grandmaster Vic used to come on, like the South Side. That was like when Grandmaster Vic came back. You hear that. It's like, oh my God. Okay.

People start paying homage Grandmaster Vic with these projects. You know what I mean? Even Ron G. Ron G. Of course. I don't know if murder no about Ron G number 10. Of course, man. The mixtapes and all that.

Of Lentee. No, I know you know. but I didn't know if you know about Ron G number 10 though was a class that was the one to me if you ever go back and you you could Ron G have plenty of dope tapes but Ron G number 10 was like a drug dealer's anthem people on the block all the drug deals is Ron G number 10 that's what was playing that was a blend error yeah for DJ Klu came shout the clue too yep because he's one of them do he changed the game it was they went from mixtapes because I'm still listening to dirty Harry and um all them do yeah yeah I'm still Listen to it. Yeah. Seriously. And then when I go overseas, it's a whole other element of music. Of course, of course.

But that, yeah, Ron G. Change the game with those blends. He influenced the production. I feel like him and then Kit Capri with the blends too. And the next thing, you got, you got, yeah, we got to talk about. What are you watching right now that you think people sleep with them? The cool kids for sure. Like I mentioned them earlier, they're from Chicago and they just starting in the blog era, like,

Even a little before that, like from like 2006 or so up until now, they just, they set trends all the time. And from the beats, the rhymes to style, they changed the way a whole generation dressed. Them, shout out to Chris Crack. He's on my label, Fools Gold. Yeah. There's a whole bunch for sure. But I think what's cool about hip hop now is like it's so broad that it's probably like 10, 12 different lanes of types of rappers. You know what I mean?

Like, I think we could sit here and reminisce about how great the 90s was. And at the end of the day, that's the era that shaped me. But I love the fact that now you can have so many different types of rappers that coexist. And they find their fan base just directly online. You think it's too many rappers now? Yes. I just think there's too much music that comes out. Because it's so easy because of social media now.

You know, there's too much music. What I love about the music now is it so much lanes. Like one day I might want to do old school. Roberta Flack, Lee, Simone, fucking, I don't know, anybody. Shadde. And then one day I might want to do, you know, the ratchet shit, like fucking Poo Shitey and, because I'm listening to that. Hell yeah.

I'm not, I'm Keglock and sexy red. She wanna fuck with that beat. Take key, for real. Killing. No matter. That's what sexy red is just ratchet. It's good. music you know what I'm saying like take key on the beat it's always the beat for me

yeah so when I had take key on the beat and then she got key Glock on there so to me key Glock is still up there with Dolf he's like holding his own so I might want to listen to some YN shit and then I might go to all the dead rappers pop smoke nipsy of course too pop biggie my mind just be all over yeah now so I like the fact that at the same at the same slice of time you could have like all the all the stuff that Alchemist is producing

right and the Earl shout out to Al he's spoke to him the other day he's yeah he's a legend and and you know it's amazing that he's kind of at the biggest point of his career now because we all remember the stuff he was doing 25 years ago yeah he's doing a record

an album with Erica Badu right right yeah I make sure I check that out with you there but the stuff that he's doing with with Earl or like surf gang Mike artists like that you got that pocket you got like v's and like i swear vezo and the detroit guys you got kodak doing his own thing you got you know all the la stuff that's been popping you know i like all the artists that kendrick

put on that last album like as chike and people like that yeah right but so so you know all those different pockets and then the ratchet stuff too like you said and and and and the memphis shit and all that like that can all coexist there's a period of time where i think everybody was trying to work with the same producer and everybody was trying to make the same kind of record. But now everybody can do their own individual thing and that's dope. But the flip side of that is as a DJ, I'll tell you there's less records that bring everyone together. There's way, it's way harder to find, you know what I mean? Like the way like put it true, like I think some of these artists, and not I'm not saying the ones I just named, but some of the current rap artists, because

they can just go straight to their audience and their niche, they're a little bit less three-dimensional. Because when you think about the way that in the height of you guys' stuff, in the height of G-U and it, but also like a a Nas record would be lyrical for the heads, but it would be in the

clubs too. The girls liked it, the guys liked it. You know, the beat heads liked it. It was for everyone. Whereas now, lyrical is one thing. The club is one thing. The girls is one thing. Right? You know what I mean? But who's making-

Nobody's trying to put it all together. Right. Because in a sense, like, Kanye at his height, Wayne at his height, because that's even after you guys' era in a sense, they were still making records that ticked many of those boxes. It's a little bit harder to find those records now that for me as a DJ, where at any record I know,

I'd be like, yo, this is the record of the year. Like this is the, like, what's the biggie hypnotize of, of last year this year it's hard to find those you know what I mean got too listen and you're there for heart-wrenching knockouts the world's biggest stage and breathtaking triumph in 2026 FIFA World Cup the knockout stage every match every moment listen on tSN radio join the globe on the road to the july 19th final

WorldCust. Stream it all live on TSN Radio. Available on IHeartRadio. Hey, I'm Hoda Kotby, host of the podcast, Joy 101 with Hoda Kotby. Okay, if you know me, you know this. I'm always searching for inspiration, for support, and useful tools to help maximize joy. So this podcast lets us uncover all of that together. We're going to have these meaningful conversations with the world's most fascinating people,

Like when actress Olivia Munn shared how she overcame fierce health challenges that she never saw coming. I've gone through breast cancer and then helped my mother through breast cancer, and that was more difficult. There's a lot of people who understand postpartum depression. I was not prepared for postpartum anxiety. Olympic champ Sean Johnson revealed why she had no choice but to be a gymnast. There was something about gymnastics that was intoxicating to me. It's given me a belief that we all have one of those treasures inside of us. We just have to find it.

Listen to Joy 101 with Hoda Kotby on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My first guest is Paris Houghton, Shakira, Luke and Yerrin, Samira and Gracie. I'm so excited for it. You have surprises?

Many surprises. Welcome to Sweet 305, where the group chat comes to life. What a f***. It's like a way of saying like, Oh, my God, hello, my best Amma, hello, my Myrana.

Look, I never have I've evered to be with nobody. Except with my my children, my my wife. Uff! That's incredible! Yeah, the telenovela.

You're the only person I know that loves a yellow starburst. It's limited. No, I'm not. Like, you'd say, I'd like to collaborate with this person. This is Sweet 305. Listen to Sweet 305

with Lele Pons as part of my culture. podcast network on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My husband is currently on a vacation with his mistress and I'm confronting them. Tell me, Sophia, how did she even catch them? One Amazon shopping receipt. He accidentally sent her a photo of the kids' Christmas gifts with a delivery to another woman at the bottom. He exposed himself?

That's a rookie move. Couples massages, monogrammed bath robes, and lingerie he memowed her for. So she spent four weeks gathering evidence and taped a 10-page letter inside his luggage before he flew out. In his luggage, she came to play. And the second he landed, he blocked her. So she called the hotel room directly and got the mistress on the phone. Ooh, she got the mistress live on the phone? That is a bold move.

Let's see if it pays off. Then it gets worse. He took the mistress on the Bahamas honeymoon trip he had planned with his wife. And then the mistress tagged him on Facebook, outing the affair to her entire family. That's like a whole public confession. And spoiler, two years later, karma hits him so hard. He's calling his ex-wife in tears saying about the mistress.

What a mistake that was. To find out what happened, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Yeah. I mean, there's a point of time where I started messing around with house music. I think the production is different, Eva. Remember Daz effects when that beat?

Of course, yeah. Pongong on. I think it's the artist. You want to flex. I think it's the artist. I think it's the production. I think it's like you said, they can't even to, all right, they know I got this audience right here.

They're already fucking would be. They rock with me. I'm cool with that. I don't need to try to. No, but what I'm saying to anybody else. That's what I see right now. You know why I say it's the production because like back like in the 90s, 80s and early 2000, it be a beat like you have a beat like Method Man.

What was that? What was that? How high? Bring the pain. Yeah. I came to bring the pain. One person will have that beat. Yeah, of course.

You know what Biggie who shot you? It was like one person, you'll never hear a beat like that again. Right. You know what I mean? It's different. Like when I say, Da's effects. I get what you say a little. You know what I mean?

You know what I mean? You know what I mean? You know a lot of bees do it. It do a lot of bees do sound familiar. There's just too much of everything. There's incredible producers now. There's producers that are doing some shit. Shout out the great John on the beat by the way.

Right John. There you go. There you go. My God. Man. I'm just saying, EPMD, you guys the chip. I know what you mean, though. When certain things came on, it was just like, oh, God.

Right. Yeah. Look, every generation has their classics and people that are just going to the club now. They're 20 years old. They'll hear a record. It might be Osama son or someone like that. And they'll hear that record and be like, oh, that's my shit. Or the obviously Cardi and Uzi are super important to the last five, 10 years.

Right? So if a Cardi record comes out, People will be like, you'll react the same way as maybe you reacted to you got to chill. The big and the Jay Z's and the knives. Yeah, yeah, definitely. It's just the same way we felt about back then, it's how these young people feel about right now. But a lot of music is microwave music. Like, you could play, do you could, you could.

That's to us though. As I'm realizing now, as you said, that's to us because, you know what? Realize how the older, you remember the older generation used to hate on. Right, they would be like, ah, what's this hip-hop? This ain't real hip-hop. They talk about streets. This ain't real hip-hip. Hip-hop because they got away from the hip-d-d-d-d-d-dbid-d-d-d-d-d.

And they was a little mad at that time. They wasn't respecting the street music. Of course. All I'm saying is this, as a DJ, right? We're not just talking about hip-hop. When we go to Queens clubs, right, you could play hip-hop music, like when we was going to the hole in the world's shit. But it was a time where, nigger, you better have that Jamaican ready. You better have this ready.

Right. Like that, that, that, sorry, boom, boom, boom. And so all that. That was every block party. And baby, you know, we knew that record could play somewhere overseas and still knock. Yeah. Am I wrong or right? The difference is too much.

You had to have your back in time just now. But you still, as a DJ, you know you still have to have your shit together. Yep. Yep. You got to be able to show up at that party. You might think it's going to be one style and you show up and like you say, you said they might want reggae, they might want old school, they might want some regional shit. As we, we like, us DJs, we need to be able to like, we was overseas.

Get there and flip a formula. Shout to DJ Robbie Rob, not to disrespect him, but we went overseas. You sound like you're about to disrespect. I'm just saying. I'm just saying, you sound like you by the disrespect. No, but he thought he was going to go overseas and do all that American shit. Right. That shit was out the window. Yeah. Them overstra playing some different shit.

Yeah. You know what I'm saying? They're saying different shit. When you go other places and he learned this lesson, he's like, you're like, you're going for your first time coming overseas, you can't just think the American records is going to rock for you. I don't see that. Who kid?

I always give it to who kid because who kid will have the world hold on? And I'm like, how do he know? Yeah. We can see that's one of his joints. That's his joint. That's his joy right there. That's his joy. Yeah.

That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. For a DJ, you've got to be prepared because what's the words feeling? Throw a record on. And people are like, nobody moved. But you want that shit. You know, one thing I remember, too, is there's a point in time when GUNIT was really touring internationally.

I think a lot of people in North America I might not realize that there wasn't that many rappers or rap crews that were really international like that. Because when I started working with Kanye and, we were going international a lot. And I was already doing those overseas circuits as a DJ. And then I was working with Yeh. And we were, you know, going to Japan and Nigeria and anywhere. Everywhere we went, G-Unit had been. It was G-Unit, Eminem, A-Con.

There was a point in time where even Hove hadn't started doing the international thing. Then he became international. I was locked up, but Rihanna was overseas. That's when she just came out. She was opening for G-unit. Yeah. I just keep good. Yeah.

But yeah, I always, I remember that you guys really went and hit the whole world in a way that at that point of time, not that many artists had. My story is crazy with 50 because I remember opening up for cash money, Rough Riders to him. Okay. That's one 50, I had to Rob. Rough riders. Like Little Wayne, he was young, he was on stage.

I'm like, rich or ready. These niggas had all of the fucking props flying up on the stage. and million girls fire I'm like oh shit shout out mannie fresh that's my man that's my man who's my man whole cash money yeah turkle all of them come on you're gonna pass that or what what's next for a track he ain't look you hear what he said he ordered a question what's next for a what's next for a so I got a couple different projects that's one thing with DJs too is we collaborate a lot okay right so I mentioned my brother me and him have a project we're doing together

called the Brothers Maclevich. That's our last name, Maclevich. So Brothers McLevich, we're dropping a couple songs with that and we do, we go on the road, we do some gigs like that. I'm working on a new EP myself, but I'm always doing remixes and collaborations with other DJs. And I'm working on a new kind of concept of like a new live thing that I'm going to bring out on the road probably in a year or so. But I'm really just always churning out. Like the way that now a lot of the music industry is kind of coming around to doing singles and EPs rather than just albums. Us, the DJs, we've been doing that for years. DJs is all singles and EPs.

So I'm just churning out a bunch of music, keeping Fools Gold going. I got another. There you go. You got to say Fools gold. Fools goal. All right. And I got another label called A-Track and Friends. That's, again, that's singles.

Right? Because Fool's Gold is more projects. A-track and Friends is house music, singles. We do parties that are branded as A-track-and-Friends. So even just this weekend, I got an A-track-and-Friends event in L.A. Week after that, I got one in Miami. I'm going to do one in London this summer. So just building that and just keeping it going.

I love the EDM-B. All night. All the only people want to do is this. I love E-D-M-A-B. We know you made a bunch of money with this shit, right? Do you still love it? Do you still love it? Yes.

Yes. Of course. It was never for the money and it's, and there's a ton of stuff I could have done for money that I passed on if it didn't feel authentic to me. I'm still, like, I got into it because I was telling you, like, as a young, you know, 13, 14 year old in Canada, falling in love with the music and trying to understand, listening to records by the Beastie Boys and Farside and De La Sol, Tribe Call Quest, what are these samples? How did they make this beat? That, da, da, da, da, that passion. That's still why I do it. There's a point in time where I went from being the student to also being in a position where I could put other people on.

So that's even the Kid Cuddy thing that we talked about. Danny Brown. Shout to Danny Brown. I found Danny Brown. One of the nicest rappers. You were early on Danny Brown. I was early on Danny Brown. Danny Brown got bars and he's one of the things.

He's a machine. He'll sit in front of the computer. He used to be in my house. He won't even leave the studio. He'll record himself. They record 10, 12 records, you know. He record himself. He will report to any kind of beat.

You give him the sound of like a water dripping from a faucet. He'll find a way to flow around that. I can tell you one thing. Kid Cutty wasn't playing when Jim Jones said he had Sylvie do with that record. Motherfucker, that's my record. Right. He got gangstown. Hold on a second.

I like Kit Cutty though. You know, light cut up, like 50s bar, but cut him a couple of times. I'm about to say that. I'm about to go on tour with Cutty. So when you say West Hampton. You're still cool with Kit Cutty. Hell yeah. Yeah.

That's my bro. That's my bro. Come on, you know, he could tour forever. He got hit records, bro. But day and night, that had to go diamond, man. Yeah, that was. He's got probably a dozen classics. So in May, I'm going on a tour with Kit Kuddy and MIA and Big Boy from Outcast.

Oh, sure. We'll be, name a city, we'll be there. So that too. That's dope. Yeah. Yeah. Because you got to remember, day and night, I remember, like, being overseas, that had to be played every club at least 10 times.

a night. Yeah, and in every type of clubs. I'm always a fan of records that are just like that stand out that don't sound like anything else. Like there's, there's hits and classics that sound like their era that sound like other stuff that comes out. But the ones that really, really survive the decades are the ones that sound like nothing else. You know, I'm always just, I'm always looking for stuff that's kind of left the center, a little weird, a little, you know, stuff that doesn't really fit in the box because I know that that has the potential to reach even more people, you know, but I feel like even just like both of you as artists have always been clever and like figuring out ways to stand out because you, the way that you would always do

the wrap up records for every year. Like I feel like that's like, that's almost like a thought that a DJ would have. Like what could I do? What can I do that's different that can get noticed? Yeah. Yeah. every year had people talking things like that. Yeah. What year did you start? What was the first one?

I started in 2014. Okay. Yeah, 2014. Yeah. That's something a DJ would do. The same way a DJ would think of a bland, you were like, all right, what can I do that's not gonna be like everybody else's record? It's gonna keep it going.

Shut out the mask skills because I know he's gonna put like, that's the home. That's the home. Yeah. So how the mass scales can be and him cool there. Yeah. He just won a Grammy. He just won a Grammy or something like that.

Yeah, for like a spoken word album. Because he made a different type of album. It's poetry and it talks about it's some real like, fuck murder with the rap up. I want to go out to mad skills. Fuck murder, me. Got a Grammy. Say that to my God, bad. There you go.

There you go. He even acknowledged that he recognized that. Yeah, I'm sure. The wrap up is murder, murder kind of took that in. Both you guys did it. You know, of course. It's enough for everyone. I don't know he won a Grammy.

So he's just, shout out the math skills. Last month. How do you feel about the technology? Like how I said the crates. Yeah, that's different, man. Say, let me give you a scenario. Yeah. You got your computer.

Fucking, you're DJing. Somebody spills some shit on it. It's fried. What the fuck you do next? You got to be ready. You got to have like the flash drive in your pocket. Something. But yeah.

I mostly play off the flash drives now. It's even more portable. I show up with my headphones. Plug my shit in. Let's go. So you think that's like the equipment is better now, like the mixes and you know how they got like the echo chambers in the end of it. Yeah, for sure. You can do more with the equipment now.

You could do more effects and loops. And I'm a DJ that does tricks. Like I told you guys, I started with scratching and, you know, DJ battles. So all the new equipment that has all that technology, it just gives me ideas. So I'll be like, oh shit, I'm going to have a loop on this one and I'm going to have this one and I'm going to have this other thing underneath and then the drum beat. And I'll just come up with crazy tricks with all the gear that I get. But I do think that when it was just two turntables and a mixer and no effects

and just vinyl and the 10 crates that you talked about, you had to get creative. And you had to, everything that you were doing was really used, just from your hands to the vinyl and to those faders. and there's no way to cheat it. What was your mixer at 15? The Gemini? Gemini, yep. You know?

Come on, bro. When it come to artists, what you're looking for? Yeah. It's a sign. Yeah. What you look for? Well, it's kind of like the thing I was saying where, like, it needs to stand out, you know? Maybe there's other, you know, because at Fool's Gold, I wear many hats, like, you know,

but I'll be the A&R the same way that I'll organize the events, the same way, whatever else. So if I'm putting my A&R hat on, there's probably other A&Rs out there that are better at finding the quick hit, better at finding the thing that'll hit the charts now. But I just try to find stuff that stands out because I think that stands to test the time more.

And there'll be stuff that I'm excited about where I'll think about the different pockets of DJs that I could try and reach with those records. So the standing out thing is important. I mean, there's so many artists that I've been involved with that are just their characters, you know? They got that extra little thing to them. And the standing out keeps you torn. That too.

But you're touring now. Cuddy's torn. He still go make millions of dollars. You can go make millions of dollars. Look at Danny. He's on the road. Yeah, for sure. Look at Danny Brown. He's still touring.

That's like when we go overseas and we run into J-Rood of Damager or or Boys Demand or KRS 1. Yep. We ran in a Blasee Blaseie Blase. That's dope. That's dope. Yeah, we just written the Blase is in the house. You were the Isis in the house? Oh my God.

East New Gown. That's you. Yeah. East dude, y'all. That's why we bring DJs with you. Like, I looked at you as just EDM DJ. I didn't know you was like. Yeah.

In the hip hop, hip-hop, hip-up. Because I looked at him with fools-go record. Yeah. You know what I mean? And I looked at him like on the EDM side because, you know, he's like there with Diplo and their grumpah and- You know, so when he tells me these hip-hop stories and how he cutting shit up. I'm like, man, I gotta go fuck around.

So he looked up there like, you worked with Kanye? Yeah, what? What's going on? Not even the Kanye to me. But even before, yeah, we could sit here. To win a DJ tournament at 15 worldwide, you got to be, doing the shit by your head. You don't know.

I was in the parties. I told you my best friend was a DJ. Yeah, I had things, I know how it is when you bought, you go to your store in Montreal, and you know something Wu-Tang is about to come out. Oh, come out. I remember when they came out with a double album back then. Yeah.

Then they, it was an instrumental album too. Then did it, remember when that came, when that came out? Come on. And when Cuban Links came out, nothing sounded like that. You ain't lying. Rayquan had to smoking with that. You come on. And nothing sounded like that.

Independent verse label. What do you think about that? I mean, I have an independent label. I'm very pro-independent. If there's an artist that's making records that, that are just made for radio, that need to hit those international departments, that are the majors can still do that,

like no one else. But everything else, I think at this point, it's independent because especially now, you know what, I was gonna say, the other thing I was gonna add to when you ask what I look for with the artists that I might wanna sign, I think now it's also important to have artists that are clever with the own marketing

and that know how to, to how to go and find an audience. You know, it's for better for worse, it's not just about the music anymore. You got to tap into social media. You got to have a following. And I'm not saying I'm looking for someone that knows how to do a TikTok dance, but it might be, they might not even look at it as marketing, but sometimes you hear someone's name, you see the way that they look, the way they dress, the way they get their friend to do their

artwork and everything just, it just stands out even visually. Even seeing how their sisters they are with doing something. Yeah, that too. They're not jumping on every trend, every six months. It's just, you know what I mean? Like that consistency is important too. So what we're saying just now about the independent thing, you know, every project now should be marketed in its own way.

There's no longer just one way to do things. And I think a lot of the majors stayed in that sort of cookie cutter thing where they just, those departments are doing the, they're trying to fit you in the same mold as an artist they put out the previous quarter. But the Indies, they'll custom tailor and they'll go straight to their audience and sell them the vinyl and do the, and take the email addresses from the tour pre-sell

and use that for the marketing on the album rollout. It's just more, it's more involved and more custom tailored. Do you feel like artists now that like, like a Tyler creator, you'll never be on the radio and be a young boy? you'll never hear on the radio. Danny Brown, never here on the radio.

These guys are touring, making money. It's totally different right now. Yeah, sorry. Yeah, it is different. And I think that that is where the culture is now. It's like, sure, if a record gets on the radio, will hit another plateau in numbers.

But there's a lot of artists that are on the radio that can't really sell out. The garden. Right. You're just selling out the garden. Or maybe they can only do. New York and L.A. or maybe their hometown, but you put them in Madison, Wisconsin, and it's not moving like that. But the artists that have their audience and that are, and

maybe the YouTube shit is popping or whatever it is, but they're, you know, they're going straight to their audience. They're reaching people everywhere and they can go overseas too and, yeah. I think, and I'm more a fan of that approach. Because the other thing that just, to sort of connect the dots is like when I came on the scene, even when I was just doing hip hop, like 97 is when I won that big DJ battle. 97 was also, we mentioned Lord Cyr, rest and peace, because I went on the Stretch and Bobito radio show that year too. Like, shout out to Stretch and Bob.

97 was a period of time where in hip hop there was a revival of that indie thing, raucous records and groups like company flow and dilated peoples and nonfiction and all of that. You know, it was, it was, there was indie labels, Stone's Throw, that's still a big label now. And they got known, they got even more known when they put out the Madlib stuff and mad villain with MF Doom and all that. Like that sort of alternative independent side of hip hop. That's, that's what I was into when I came on the scene. And that's what, like, just going to fat beats. And looking at all the records on the wall and being like, yo, I want to do this.

Like that taught me a certain ethos of, you know, if you and your friends are doing some cool shit, you and your friends are making music and it's different. Right. You could just put the shit out yourself, right? And I learned that by going to fat beats and by listening to Stretch and Bob and by listening to these independent artists that were just doing some different shit. And they knew how to get to their audience already then. You know? I mean, you was 50 I never knew you was 15.

Yeah, I'm 43 now, so it's been a minute. That's crazy. 15 years old? Yeah, that's crazy. That's dope, man. That's super dope. Yeah, appreciate it. You had to stand on the crates to DJ?

Ben, I had to. No, I'm not saying. Yo, because if you... What type of shit is you ask in my name? No, you're 15. I'm going to tell, look. I know you, I'm going to be... I'm going to go with it.

Brunchdale, Circle 1, Bow Wow, DJ. DJ, DJ, Joss? He was like seven, eight years old. On three? Yeah, like 10 probably. Like, so depending on how tall you was and I looked, I looked 11 when I was, when I. That's what I'm saying.

So the set, you know, back then, you had the core and everything stacked up. Yeah. All right. So did you understand on the craze? Sometimes. He's right. And if you go to YouTube and you look up 1997, A-track, DMC, you'll see the video me winning this battle and I looked like a child.

Don't worry. Eddie's going to edit that right. He's going to put it in. He's fucked up early with that click. So he'll do. Yeah, it's all good. It's cool when I'm at. Yo.

That's that's, that's where it all started for me. And yeah, I used to have to travel with, you know, I would go to some of my gigs and the bouncer wouldn't let me in and that was the DJ. And I would have, you didn't mean. I'd be like, I'm DJing and they'd be like, I'm not letting you in. For sure. You're a kid. Yeah.

I'm not on my watch. Yeah. And you'd still drinking milk, man. And then they would have to send out the promoter. And the promoter would get into an argument. The bouncer would be like, yo, if the cops come in and they see him, that's on me. Da-da-da. They have a lot of gigs when I was first starting out.

They would just have me wait like in the manager's office, like the club manager's office, wait for it's for it to be time for my set. They're like, all right, come up. Do my little thing. All right, come back. That's crazy. But I was just so passionate. That's, you know. I'm in the crowd, he's 15.

Yeah. He's doing festivals. That's when you know you're super dope, though. Yeah. Yeah. That's what you know you dope, man. That's fire. So real DJ right here.

You know, I thought it was just, you know, the EDM's. Yeah. And of course, fools, goals records. We know you for that. That's legendary label. Appreciate it. But I didn't know you, you know, the DJ battles back at 15 years old. Learned something new every day, man.

Definitely, man. That's what's up. But that, that's, again, it's also that thing about being students of the game, about just wanting to understand. and how these records were made and where the samples were from and knowing about your freestyles and your freestyles and the mixtapes.

Man, when you guys came out with that running mixtapes, no one was touching that. You know? And, you know, people could look at it now as marketing or this or that, but, like, it was just, like, the best, like, those, like, 50 Centres the Future and, and, come on, man,

that was better than, the albums that were coming out. That's what I'm saying. Like nostalgic, nostalgic moments, like I said, was going to Jamaica Avenue. Yeah. You're going to the bootlegger. Every mixtape.

The root leger. Yeah. And then my, like I said, my best friend was the DJ, rough ends. He'll go to hot wax. What record is there. What instrumentals is there.

Because you remember, you had your A side, B side, instrumental albums. All of that. You know, so that was dope because people wanted the instrumentals too. Yeah. And it was like, you know,

now you get everything on your phone. It's not a special no more. You have to get on the dollar bin. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? You had to choose. No, really also. We're having to get those instruments.

And you had to choose which records you were buying that week because no one had enough money to buy everything that came out. So maybe you might just have enough money in your pocket to buy three 12 inches. And you're like, all right, am I getting this beat rock and seal smooth and this, you know, tribe and this far side thing? But damn, this Rayquan thing is kind of different and cool. Or damn, meth the man, red man, how high? Damn, and that one's got an a cappella.

If I buy that, I can use the acopella to do a blend. So you're just sitting there. You're like, I got enough money for three records. Well, my man, bro, we're up here. Sold drug. We sell a drug. Okay, see, I didn't do that. I didn't do that.

It wasn't like juice. Remember, juice was still in the records? Yeah. My man had that crack money. We, yeah, give me every dime. Maybe I should have that. No, you made the right choice. No, you made the right choice.

No, man. But we, we're happy to have you here. Thank you. I appreciate it. DJ's shit. I learned a lot of shit about the culture. I looked a lot of shit about DJing. I learned a lot.

Shout to Fools Gold's record. You want to shout anything out? Yeah. You said it. What you got coming? What I got coming? The tour with Kit Ketty. Shout to Kik.

All these releases on Fools Gold and A-Track and Friends, brothers, Macklevich. We're going to do more duck sauce soon. In the meantime, my joints. Definitely, man. A-track in the building. Shout out the A-track in the building. Shout out the A-track-T-Fool-go records. You know what it is.

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