The Questlove Show - Black Music Month QLS Classic: Q-Tip
Episode Date: June 9, 2024In a variety of eras, forms, and styles, Q-Tip has honored Black Music's past and piloted its future. In early 2017, the legendary MC, producer, and DJ spoke about the historical firsts and classic Hi...p-Hop history he took part in and witnessed as part of A Tribe Called Quest, and so much more. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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When a group of women
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What's up, everybody?
It's Sugar Steve from Team Supreme.
June marks Black Music Month.
We often speak about it on Questlove Supreme, and we've had some of the legends responsible for the recognition on the show.
Every day this June, we are running a different episode from the QLS archives to honor the tradition and intent of Black Music Month.
This week, we are focusing on some of the great hip-hop conversations in the QLS catalog.
Our leader, Questlove, has a new book out called Hip Hop is History.
Check it out at Questlove.com.
Today, we are re-releasing an interview with Q-tip of a tribe called Quest, whose contributions shaped,
the direction of hip hop over the last 35 years.
Suprema roll call.
Suprema, sub, sub, sub, subprima roll call.
Suprema, sub, sub, subprima roll call.
Suprema, sub, sub, subprima,
rogall.
Quest love gonna ramble.
Yeah.
Quetip not leaving here.
Yeah.
He tells me that crooklyn sample.
Roll call.
Supriva, sub, sub, suprema role call.
Supraima.
Subima, sub, sub, sub, sub, sub.
My name is Fonte.
Yeah.
This is the squad.
Yeah.
Phone is ringing.
Yeah.
Oh my dog.
Oh, my God.
Suprema, sub, sub, sub, sub, supremo roll call.
Suprema, so, sub, sub, sub, supremo roll call.
My name is Sugar.
Yeah.
Sugar Steve.
Yeah.
I am so backwards.
Yeah.
I stop and breathe.
Roll call.
Suprema.
Suprima.
Sub.
Supreme a roll call.
Suprema, roll call.
I'm gonna pay bill.
Yeah.
Live in the dream.
Yeah.
Fucking Q-Tip, man.
Quest love Supreme.
Ro call.
Suprema, sub, sub, sub, sub, sub, suprem a roll call.
Suprema, sub, sub, sub, sub, sub, sub,
Supremma, roll call.
Good afternoon, yeah.
QLS fans.
Yeah.
This is Boss Bill.
Yeah.
Trap call Questan.
Rocall.
Suprema,
Submma, S, S, S, Supremma.
Supremal Roca.
Slyia.
Yeah.
I'm very excited.
Yeah.
You Tip is here.
Yeah.
No other ladies invited?
Roll call.
Supremia.
Subramal roll call.
Supremma.
Subramal.
Submina.
Superima.
Role call.
My name is Tip.
Yeah.
What's your appraisal?
Yeah.
I have a cold.
Yeah.
My voice extra nasal.
Roll call.
Supremma.
Submina.
Subm.
Supremma.
Subramo.
Surma.
Subramo.
Suprema Roe Call
Supremma
Subima Role
Ladies and gentlemen
Welcome to another edition
of Questlove Supreme
I am your host
Questlove
We have Fantigolo
Yes sir
What's up, brother?
Man
This is a beautiful day
In New York City
It's a little cold out
Yeah, it's then dropped
The Hawk then came out
January, what do you expect?
I'm glad, I'm glad
Because I was worried for a minute
But now I think winter is here in four four
Really?
Full force.
It's January, what you expect?
Well, no, no, no, for a while.
I mean, because, I mean, at least in North Carolina, I mean, up in like November, late
November, we had a couple 70-degree days.
So, I'm good.
Yeah, you're right.
I mean, December was cold as shit.
I remember one particular December.
It was like really, really cold.
But yeah, in January, it's even colder.
It's where it comes.
Yeah.
I'm glad winter's here.
You know, get to get my body right.
You know what I'm saying?
I'm about 40 pounds in a lot.
stomach virus away from my idea way.
I'm working on it.
Good luck with that.
That stomach virus is going to get you through that. Yeah, it's going to get me to my,
I'm in my Juryl Avert stage right now.
That stomach virus is going to get me to my Anthony Anderson.
There's always like smooth move tea or something.
Nah, man, that shit is for scammers.
Really, a stomach virus?
Oh, yeah, stomach virus will take you.
It'll get you through that.
You know that yogurt? How will you get the stomach rolls?
I don't know how I'll get it.
Hang around with kids.
There it is.
I'm about to say, I got kids.
I'm about to get bronchitis.
Just hold on a minute.
It's word of God.
Just like, it could be awake within the next five minutes.
You guys are basically saying that you will hope that your kids get you sick so that you lose some weight.
Well, no, that's him.
I don't necessarily hope it happens.
But if it did happen, I can't say that I would be mad about it.
It would help me get over this, like the holiday, the extra holiday weighed and all of that.
and just, you know, the stress weight.
But smooth move tea,
at least takes out like seven to ten pounds of...
I got some of that at home, two boxes.
Nah, I don't...
Nah, I don't do the detox teas.
I don't do the...
Diet plan.
Yeah, I just, you know, cut back, lift, and get a stomach virus.
Come on, man.
You know what I mean?
It's effective.
A little neural virus is just, hey, man.
Get those abs right for the spring.
I got a stomach virus a couple years ago,
dropped like 15 pounds and then didn't come back.
Oh, my God.
It's 15 pounds.
I'm glad you alive.
I think didn't.
Wasn't this a thing, like, in the 20s or something?
What?
Where they would give, no, like, tape worms, like, where people would get bled.
Do tape worms for...
People go to Brazil right now for that, like, and just...
What are you?
Seriously?
Yeah, dead ass.
Those was, like, people would eat tapeworms or do stuff to...
Not the cool sculpt, not the hot burning, not the LIFO.
It's like five different...
It's a lot of ways to...
Yeah, no, it's a lot of ways to lose weight.
Not the Beyonce lemonade.
Yeah, other than eat right and work out because no one wants to do that.
Why, fuck that.
Don't forget about the raps.
Yeah, the waist trainers
just gonna have all these people fucked up.
Nah, we don't do none of that.
Why don't we want to do that?
We could just, you know,
we don't want to work out of eat right.
So, yeah, if I get a stomach virus
and, you know, stay in the gym,
hopefully by springtime,
I'll be on my blackish Anthony Anderson.
I'm life Anthony Anderson right now.
But hopefully I'll be blackish Anthony Anderson
by springtime.
I hope to meet you there, bro.
Yeah, because you, okay, so you...
I've been abstaining.
This has been the, this has been the,
period of abstinence.
Okay.
How's going?
It's, I've made it through,
I made it through the, at least
what I call the, the underground tunnel,
which was the first 15 days of
avoiding sugar, avoiding flour,
bread, gluten,
fried foods.
Are you angry?
I don't, I don't know.
Just one day, I woke up.
It was not your usual way.
You know what?
You know what?
You know what?
The, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,
back to all that is I've been snapping at more people than normal.
Withdraw.
Like, I don't know if it's a clear mind or just what it is.
But yeah, I've been, like I feel like my boxing gloves might be in my future.
Like, I could.
Are you past the cravings phase or are you still craving?
I was dreaming heavily of food.
Like, you know that's bad when you're just.
you know, dreaming of a pound cake.
No, that's real, though.
Were you dreaming of it or were you dreaming of eating it?
I was just dreaming of it.
Like, you know, that Intimans cake that dad used to,
my dad was the kind of dude that would measure,
like, what the family would intake.
Like, he'd have the Sharpie mark on the lemonade bottle
and the tea bottle and the fruit punch bottle and everything
and how much Intimans cake was consumed before he got to it.
So, yeah, that's, that is some real black daddy shit.
That's real, though.
Yeah, I'm but you on that.
You don't measure your shit?
Nah, I don't.
I mean, most of the time, because for me with sweets, I particularly buy them in very small quantities.
And our whole thing with sweets is like, if I buy it, we got to kill it today.
So I let my kids go in.
Like, if I buy, like, cupcakes or whatever, it's like, all right, we're going to go in today.
And then that's it.
Because if you keep it around and you eat it day after day after day, then that's how you, you know,
Set the bad precedent.
Exactly.
How often?
If we're just going one day?
Maybe.
Maybe twice a month, maybe.
You know what I mean?
A little.
So even when you were on tour, now forget your kids, your bandmates.
Some of the worst roots, band fights ever.
Oh, a food?
Oh, in the name of food, bro.
Yeah.
Like, we would, I remember, I guess the period where we discovered almond milk instead of soy milk.
Vanilla almond milk was just as good on your cereal than soy milk was.
And I remember the shit was about to be set off
because it was like, I put my name on the milk.
I guess I didn't realize that it was either Hub or Kamal,
like they had put their name on the milk, thus they were claiming it.
So not realizing this, we kind of killed the milk and, you know,
and shit almost got set off on the tour bus.
Just caught those hands.
Yeah, it was fade, it was almost fade time.
So, you know.
Yeah, the tours would be, because,
particularly if you're on a bus and you've been driving
like through the middle of nowhere and you've been
thinking about food. Yeah, you've been in your bunk and you get up in the
middle of the night and go to the bunk, go to the
refrigerator and that shit ain't there.
You're basically describing Chicago to Denver.
For most touring acts, I mean, if you're a pop at
or you're a country act, there's some stops in between
Chicago and Denver that you can do.
But for most urban acts, especially if you're under the
toulage of
Kara Lewis
like the
first question
she proposes to you
is where do you want to
start now logic
she always suggests
that your hometown
should be the
last stop on the tour
because of all the things that you've
acquired on that tour
you know your home can be your last
stop so all the
serial that's on your rider
all of the records that you went
shopping with all the clothes
All the sneakers and all the sneakers.
Right.
You don't have to ship them home from, like, Mexico.
You can, you know, you're already in your hometown.
So you normally start off on the opposite.
So normally we would start tours like in Vancouver and then go counterclockwise.
Seattle, Portland, San Fran.
Make you wear down.
Down.
And then ease your way back to the East Coast.
But, yeah, with the touring dynamic, there's the whole.
being considerate of
food factor
that not many people get
I suspect that
that's probably one of the prime reasons
why they're more solo acts than group acts
oh man I can believe it
I mean I tell people all the time
if you ever want to get to really know a person
live with them or tour with them
because you can't hide
like whatever your vices are
whatever fuck shit you got with you
if you it's going to come out
It's going to come out on tour.
Oh, my God.
You can't hide, bro.
You can't hide.
So, yeah, touring was not enjoyable at all.
Well, Questlove, I think it's important.
You know that it's inspirational.
You're doing so much.
I can't tell you how many times I've seen your, like, social posts.
And I've been like, I'm going to eat some.
Well, now he's holding out.
I don't need this cookie.
So keep going.
It's hard.
I just look at it.
It's like more for me.
But you're naturally like a thin guy, boss, Bill.
Yeah, I don't think you, either you're a starving artist or you just don't overeat.
But then you talk about, like, checkers.
I have the worst diet in the world.
I have the Steve's diet.
Circular 96.
No one has Steve's diet.
You really want to lose weight.
I'll tell you how.
I lost 30 pounds.
We eat cigarettes and coffee.
Diabetes is, that will do it.
That's when I lost 30 pounds.
But for real, you write for those checkers?
Huh?
I mean, if it's late at night and nothing else is open, I mean, what am I going to do?
There's a checkers in the city?
Yeah, there's lots of them in the city.
What is checkers?
Checkers is fast food.
It's fast food.
It's not the burgers, fries, and cola.
It's like, cola.
Isn't that there?
That's what it says on here.
In most college town, there's a checkers.
The only one I know of is in D.C.
There's one next to that day's in on New York Avenue.
On New York Ave, yep.
Do you know about that day's in?
Wow.
No.
No.
No, I know.
I know what you're talking about, but I don't know what's the specific significance of that.
Oh, no.
Somebody got shot there or something?
No, yeah.
But it's just that.
Is that the Mary and Barry Hotel?
I feel like when you're default question.
No, no, no, no.
When you're touring, for some reason,
promoters will put their artist in that particular days in on New York Avenue next to the 24-hour checkers.
Like when we were first touring,
I think the first time we met
Old Dirty Bastard
He had just mastered
Returned to the 36
And they gave us someone from Electric
Gave us a copy of that CD
Like at that hotel
But now I've seen a lot of crazy shit go down there
Like with a lot of
1994-95 era hip-hop acts
Who's the girl that sing a
I think 5A on the corner
Not salon?
Nissela
Five o'clock on the corner.
Right.
Someone in her crew, I don't know how they ram their car inside of the room, but they did.
So thus, it was like, yeah, a lot of crazy fuck shit don't want down.
Damn.
But, you know, speaking of the group dynamic, today's a special episode of Quest Love Supreme.
and the reason being is that our guest today
is one of the most beloved members
of one of the favorite groups of not even hip-hop history.
I guess we had to take him out of the hip-hop context.
Yeah, he's transcended hip-hop.
Yeah, I think they've just become the group dynamic.
But ladies and gentlemen, give it up for a Q-tip.
Yes.
Johnny!
All right, so, brother Kamal.
You're there?
Before we get started, yeah, you're going to tell me what is that damn sample in Crooklyn?
No, no, no, no, no.
Don't get, for 20 years, 20 years.
But I don't remember.
I really don't.
Sampling don't matter no more.
You can reveal a secret.
I know it doesn't.
I'm not being like that.
I totally would reveal it.
Like, I really don't remember.
but I know it's like an ECM joint.
I know that for sure.
So check Steve Swallow.
Are one of those random library record things?
No, no, no, ECM.
ECM, you know, ECM, jazz label.
Yeah, so.
So it might be Keith, Jared.
It could be Keith.
No, well, it's definitely not that.
Let me see.
I'm feeling like it's Steve Swallow.
So.
He's a guitar player, yeah?
I hate that pause.
Can we talk about that?
You paused itself.
I know, but I just, it's just.
It's just.
Hove's fault. I think Paws is
Hoves' biggest contribution to
hip-hop. Well, it sucks.
Okay. I agree. I agree. No more pause.
Yeah. But I can't stop. But I
don't know, I can't remember, man.
Can't just, like, Shazam a sample?
It doesn't play long enough.
If it weren't, if it were, you know,
isolated.
If it were isolated.
The minute it hears, like, a vocal,
then it tunes into the whole song.
I've heard everything. I heard it was
red halt, I heard it was
It's definitely not that.
It's definitely putting you
in the right or the right
terrain there. It's definitely some
ECM shirt. Damn.
When I find it, I promise
you. If you saw
the album cover, would you know what it was?
No, I wouldn't. I'd have to listen to it.
Man. Do you remember the day you made it
or was it just like, oh, what do you think of this? What do you think of this?
I made it there in the studio.
This is one of those like mindless
five minutes. Yeah, yeah. I just can't
I just came from record shopping
and I went to Ed Studio
which was called Dollar Cab Lab
in Flatbush.
Wait, special Ed had a studio?
Called Dollar Cab.
Dollar Cabs?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So.
What?
What?
Yeah.
What was that?
Wait, seriously?
Yeah.
He talked about it in a source, like,
I mean, back then,
but I remember that.
Yeah.
Dollar Cab Lab.
That's where we did it at.
What did you?
You on the SP?
SP.
That was there.
And I had to break out.
So I just, like, do the shit on them.
Quickie, five minute?
Literally, like five, ten minutes.
P. Rock explained to us that he procrastinated on the shut-em-down remix.
So last minute that even when he was like, yeah, yeah, I'm 20 minutes away, he just, like, grabbed anything and just, here it is.
Yeah.
Now I'm realizing that some of the best beats and hip-hop.
We're just mindless.
We've got time to overthink it.
Just time to overthink it.
Well, okay.
Sorry.
Of course.
I need more help.
I'm going to find it.
I mean, you know, it's so much because he put it in the damn, the damn thing, the intro song.
So I feel really bad.
The world, yes.
Like, there's certain samples that.
I can find that shit.
I got every UCM worker.
Okay, great.
You do.
You got work to do.
All right.
We will find it.
Some coffee to this.
Well, wait, why weren't worn it?
Do you know the SkyPager sample?
Of course, that's Eric Duffy.
Off the same record that the jazz is, the prison?
No, well, that is, not Grand Green.
Yeah, that was, Grand Green was the Jazz.
Okay, I'm thinking of it.
So, yeah, SkyPager is Eric Dolfi out to lunch.
Thank you, Jesus.
All right.
All right, finally, something.
That's how to go.
Even the baseline, too?
Yeah.
All right, all right.
Forgive me, ladies and gentlemen.
Normally, I go through the chronological order of a person's life, but...
No, no.
This is a bird-in-a-hand, two-and-the-bush moment.
All right, so, tip.
Sir.
I know you're tired of answering these questions, and we've known it before, but...
Good. All right. So the name of the high school that you guys...
Murray Bertram.
Yeah. I hear so much about this school. Was it a business school? Was it a trade school?
It was a business school.
So you aspired it. Like, when you were in first grade, you're like,
yo, I want to go to Mary Bertram to learn?
No, no. Actually, where it happened was. My sister was older than me.
I just met her. You did.
I met her for the first time at 30.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So she's like super duper brain girl, right?
And she took the SAT, which is the standard test back in the day.
I'm pretty sure.
Did they still do that?
They still do that?
They still do the ACT now when she's the new SAT?
So she got like one of the top scores in the city, and she got accepted to Stuyvesant,
which is like the top high school, like specialized high school, whatever.
So my dad wouldn't let her go.
My dad was working for trans.
He was a token booth clerk.
Transit.
And during the time, you know, there was a rash of incidents where
girls were getting pushed off the platform.
So my dad was like old school.
He was like, you're not going to no Manhattan.
We were living in Queens.
So I was like wanting to be like my sister.
I'm going to take the test too.
I want to go to Stuyvesant too.
So of course I didn't make it to Stuyvesant.
So I got accepted though to Brooklyn Tech.
I went to their orientation, and it was just like all these Decepticon dudes,
which was just a New York gang back then.
I was just like, okay, I'm not going there.
I'm definitely not going to my own school.
So my average was good enough, and I had some recommendations that I got accepted to Bertram,
which was a business school.
It was like a specialized school.
And there, I met Queens was safe?
No, it was not safe.
That's why I was getting the hell out of there.
Okay.
You know what I'm saying?
Because my zone schools out there was like, it was just crazy.
I probably would not be sitting here.
Right.
Yeah, it was that bad.
But so I would hour and a half, two hours every morning to school to Murray Brogstrom High School,
which was ironically enough in that time.
It was right across the street from police headquarters.
So, but it was, they would still, trouble would still manage to find.
himself
in here
regardless of the proximity
of that but
yeah it was a great time
man
it was a great time
I remember
you know
before we started
freshman
freshman
year
we had the opportunity
to go
to do an early orientation
so I went
a little bit earlier
in August and shit
and the first person I met
was Brother Jay
because he went to our school too
from X Klan.
Brother Jay.
Oh, wait.
That was Professor Egg.
Brother Jay was the Abercatabra.
Brother Jay is the rapper.
Did he always talk like this?
Oh, no.
They were like 40 years old in my head.
They were just like the old guy.
Like, I don't know why I've thought them as old guys and not like.
But Jay is nice, though.
Jay, Jay, never lost it.
Jay still got it.
He's nice.
His voice just cracks.
You know what I'm saying?
So he was the first dude I met.
And then I met Ali.
and then as the school year went on
I eventually met Africa and all of them
and blah blah
Kieran always jokes that Ali
Yeah, Kieran Amo.
Yeah, Kieran A mayo.
Had the fur?
Yes, but she always jokes that
Ali always had the Gucci clutch.
Yeah, like...
With the forefinger rings.
But she called it, she called it the Pulp Fixier Briefcase
because what was in that bag?
Like, he just wanted...
Now it was a clutch.
He had a burner and he had.
Yeah, like a, you know.
Really?
Yeah.
Alicia Muhammad.
Yeah, from bedst, I do or die.
Okay, I'm sorry.
I mean, that's how I was back then.
In my head, Alicia, Muhammad is like the 14th disciple that wasn't mentioned in the building.
Like, you hear angel noises.
I'll be like that ass up.
Oh, okay.
I don't know.
You know, he used to carry all sorts of stuff in here.
Oh, okay.
I hope I didn't out.
Ouch, Ali.
But, yeah.
School was fun, though, man.
It was just like, I don't know how it was for you guys, but back then, like, that was, for us,
that was like our kind of coming of age thing.
It was a true place, especially for me, just geographically being that far away from home,
it was a place that I could really etch out, you know, what I want to do.
to do or who I wanted to be.
Yeah, you know what I'm saying? Because I went to school for computer
science because I wanted
to just like
be a program designer.
Did you miss them like lifelong friends too?
That's where you start. Yeah, man.
It's like there's everything.
You're probably one of the figures
one of the few figures from
the
Renaissance hip-hop period
that doesn't have a
I dropped out of school narrative.
It's like, pretty much 80 to 90% of all of our hip-hop favorites have a story that leads to,
and now I just dropped out at high school and went straight to the pros.
Well, Mercing them were in school, Pais and those guys.
Well, yeah, I'm just saying that.
Oh, well, Mace, I think, dropped out.
Okay, I see.
Mace may have dropped out.
But it's just weird, it's rare that you hear of, you know, liking high school.
and, you know, I actually enjoyed this experience
because for most people, I'm in high schools,
none but a precursor to prison for some.
Yeah, yeah.
For some, you know.
So how, I mean, obviously, you and Fife were childhood friends
and you and Ali were high school friends.
Like, how did, well, how did Gerobi enter the picture
and how did the Twain meet?
Like, how did you guys?
Jerobi was, he lived on, uh, Fife,
his mom's crib was like on my side of the tracks you know
so track thing so and um his grandparents's house was on the other side of the tracks
and um when he would go to the other side of the tracks that's with jerobie that's where he met jerobie
so that was like around 12 13 so i knew jerobie when he was probably like
12, 11.
That's when I first met him.
Okay.
So at this point,
even though you're going for,
like in high school, was it just like,
okay, we're just
fans of music, but
you know,
there were no grand designs to
start a band or become...
Yeah, they was.
I mean, we were pretty,
um,
we were pretty resolute in what we wanted to do.
By what point?
Like 9th, 10th, 11th?
Well, I mean, I've said before in other interviews,
you know, Fife put the bug in me.
We was like 9.
Wow.
You know what I'm saying?
We were 11, 12, like, just rap.
I mean, we were goofing.
But we was definitely rapping and definitely,
like, you know, I don't know if other kids would do this,
but, you know, you have your pad and you write out
what the name of the group was and who was in it.
Oh, yeah.
You always.
You remember that?
Yeah, Taree used to draw album covers.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
We did the same thing.
Little brother, we did the exact same thing.
Right, right, right, right.
We would be on death gym one day, watch.
Yeah, yeah, that whole shit.
Like, we did a little, I remember one time we did the day.
We did this demo.
Okay, this was freshman year.
No, it was 10th grade.
It was 10th grade, so we were like 15.
So Jerobie was going to Tech.
Fife was going to Springfield in Queens.
And me and Ali was in brunch, whatever.
So on the weekends, you know, I would hustle a little bit.
And for my money, I would like scrape up.
And I would, I looked literally in the yellow pages for like a rehearsal studio.
So I found this one in the city on 14th Street called Giant Rehearsal Studios.
And saved up the money.
And every weekend, we'd go there and Ali would bring his four track that belonged to
Uncle Mike.
And Uncle Mike used to work at Columbia and stuff.
So we go there and we would record like our little routines.
So my sister was dating Scaf Anselm.
He gets props too.
And Scaf and Jazzy used to come by the house.
Like see my sister, whatever.
Jazzy Jay?
Jazzy Jay.
Okay.
So I was like, damn, I want to be at Zool-Lay.
Oh my God.
And I, you know, it was just like, we'd be in there working, working, working, working.
And we had like this horrible, these little fucking wretched little fucking songs that we worked on.
Everybody has those songs.
Oh, my God.
All right.
What was the loop?
What did you rhyme over?
Payback.
And we had a drummer.
His name is Anton.
Shout out to A.
Boogie.
That's the OG A Boogie.
from the Bronx.
Right.
He was,
because he was
drummer in school or whatever,
so I was like,
yo,
so you're going to play the beat
over this?
And it was called
a routine.
Routine!
Brutte,
and here's your ruby
with that beep pop.
So you all just rhyme
over the peepet?
Yes.
It was pretty bad
and jazzy and skeff
through my assistants.
and Bucking my sister, they came one Saturday.
They looked like they were hungover.
Like they had, I don't know, maybe Harlem World or something was the night before.
Right.
And they came by and listened to it.
And Jazzy was like, yo, that shit was kind of wack.
Y'all got to keep working on that shit.
Wow.
Really?
He said keep working.
Like, he saw something.
He heard something.
I hope so.
Oh, maybe he was just being nice because, you know.
We wanted to bang one of my sister's friends.
Ah.
But that was kind of like, but we weren't discouraged by it.
We just said, okay, like, we were some really industrious little bastards, man.
So we kind of, like, had an idea to answer your question.
So was this 86, 87?
This is 85.
Okay.
85, yeah.
Wait.
85, 86.
Yeah, it was probably like 86, 86.
It had to been 86.
Because I was like, even the idea of rhyming over a record, was that even an idea back in 85?
Like, well, and by 86 samples were like, yeah, that was all you had.
I think you had to, if you didn't have a drum machine.
I mean, I remember, I mean, look, so what year was the biz dance?
86, 87?
Yeah, 86.
Okay.
Okay.
Yeah, it was like 86.
Yeah, 86.
Yeah, right.
Okay.
So what was the first step to seriousness as in, I'm going to save up and get this drum machine?
Or, because what I didn't know, I only found that recently, that you guys actually were thinking about signing to Geffen.
Yeah.
Back in 89.
Yeah, I forgot where I read that.
But.
Because Jeff Fenster gave us.
Well, Glenn Friedman is really the orange pin to the whole thing.
So, you know, I have worked with Jungle.
You know, we were in high school and they were finishing up the album.
So they were the Jungle Brothers in high school.
I mean, Jim Brownski era like...
Was in high school.
Yeah.
So while they were in the high school, Jim Brownski's album?
Yes.
What was like for them to...
Crazy.
Because even for us, like in Philly, like...
It must have been crazy.
Yeah, so I can imagine in high school.
In high school, having a record out.
The Jungle Brothers is going to, yeah.
Yeah, that was kind of ill.
It was, wow, because we were finishing up the album
while, I believe, we were in 12th grade.
Finishing up the debut album, Future of the People, so wow.
No, no, no, finishing up.
Straight out of the Jungle, gotcha, okay.
So, you know, I did some shit on it.
I did promo.
Well, I did promo.
Well, I did promo that was 11th grade.
And then time
And then time, yeah
And then
Promo 2
Yeah, promo 2
And time
That was for the album
And Black is Black
Did that
And
The first record I ever mixed
Was straight out the jungle
So it was me
And Red Alert
And Tony D
And Mike
We actually mixed that record
I was the first time
And I remember
Tony D was there
Yeah
And Red was like
So this what you do
Tim
So these
are the faders, so
I already EQ'd it,
we got to sound the right.
So,
we're going to do a couple of takes,
and I want you to ride this up,
and then when we hit this, I need you to
ride the next fader up.
But don't bring it
to, don't bring it past this point.
They had the tape on it. Don't bring it past this point.
And then after that, I'm going to let you do
one way. If you want to do a different
one, then you just do a different
book for the first couple. Like, Red was
just like red alert was just like you were the automated system well it was you were the
automated well i had never did it before right you know what I'm saying Mike had did him and
af were doing by himself that was like my first time actually mixing a joint right I'm saying
I was crazy like intimidated but excited about it because I felt like wow this is fucking
red alert and you're in high school at this point high school so he was of legend status
already by this point oh man he was I was just telling um
my assistant, as we was talking about, you know, the history of this studio, like, right
across the street was Latin Quarter.
There's a parking lot on 48th Street.
I was like, wow, that's what Latin Quarter was.
FI, everybody was listening.
We're in Quad City, right?
Yeah, old Quad Studios.
I call this Tupac Central.
Yeah, no, really.
So right across the street was Latin Quarter, and that was where Red was like, he bought
the whole Harlem and Bronx shit to Midtown, and he was ruling shit.
Like that was, I mean, even though Magic and Marley and them was like on the radio, they was the did it to d'antan.
The thing that kind of took to me in my just opinion that had Red Elevator is because he had a place to play.
Literally after he went, after he was on the radio, everybody would flock to the quarters or go to the square.
So that was up the block.
So Red was, yes, he was supreme status like, ah.
So you would go to the Latin Quarter?
Yeah, hell yeah.
I got a lot of Latin quarter stories
Yeah I was going to say everyone that's when I've been
Trying to get the definitive Latin quarter story out of people
Right
And but the thing that amazes me the most about the legend of the Latin quarter
Right
Is the fact that you go there
Knowing that someone's going to
No
Well I mean that was his old joint
Latin quarter
I didn't know that.
So it transformed into something different.
Okay, so you really know shit about it that we don't know.
No, but I'm sorry.
But no, no, I'm just saying that, like, our Latin quarter in Philly was a place called After Midnight.
Okay.
Of which my parents were like, hell no.
People get shot there.
No, you ain't going.
But everyone that has done this show has a Latin quarter story.
Whose house was it, though?
Was that, like, a schoolie D?
Yeah, I mean, it was it?
It was the reason why...
The reason why after midnight was so special
was because at the point where MSG
stopped hosting hip hop after the death jam tour...
The stuff.
The closest you could get.
You couldn't even get to the spectrum.
Sometimes you could, but like the East Coast mecca,
Lisa and Chuck These Eyes, was like always after midnight.
Lady B hosted that spot.
Right, right, Lady B, okay.
Yeah, exactly.
That's awesome.
But it's just that.
People don't talk about her enough.
But sorry.
That's folks in Philly.
But every person that talks on the show about Latin Quarter,
I guess the rewards of hearing hip hop far outweighed the risk that you can lose your life.
The risk of getting shot or getting your chain taken or.
It was exciting, no.
You know what I'm saying?
Like.
Well, you went with red, obviously, correct?
Yeah.
So were you like carrying his records?
Red and the violators, we'd be carrying his records.
The first time I met Chris Lighty was carrying his records.
So later I became, you know, after I was became a dude who would always carry Red's records.
After Red.
Yeah.
Well, it was Chris, and he would do that for a while.
Then as Jungle started popping, I was still around, so then I eventually became Reds.
But it wasn't like you had to wait outside for an hour to get in.
Nah, nah, I would meet.
up with AF
and
the first time
I went to
the last quarter's
right
there was
a Sabaro
across the street
Sabarro's pizza
still there
was probably
the scene
out of the
All you can eat
yeah
Yeah
right right
Right
exactly
I'm just singing
about that
when I'm
on the way
It's still there
you can eat
I go
so
boo-hoo
boo-hoo
please
exactly
so we're on
a quarter
So it's hot
It must have been 100 degrees that day
So we're out there
It's like 1230
So Afinan standing the corner
He was like
Yeah I'm waiting for my man on Greg
He was about Greg Nice
He's like
Now at the time
Greg Nice was the beatbox
For MC Search
And they were on select
And the first I see they've come around the corner
Search has this crazy high top
And he's eating watermelon
from, you know, those, you know, when you go to the delis
and you go to the fruit bars, he got a watermelon.
He's like, and AF was like, yo, this nigga crazy.
Yo, this is Couta, Couto, this is search.
This is Greg.
Greg was like, what on?
What up?
He's like, what up?
He's like, there's a search.
And we're all kids.
You know what I'm saying?
And searches, they're like, yo, what up?
Homeboy?
And the waterbellet juices fall out.
It's my mouth and shit.
I'm like, yo, this dude is, wow.
I didn't ever see no shit.
Then D. Nice comes up.
He had his BDP shit on it, whatever.
His little leather BDP dapper Dan joint.
He's like, ah, ha, ha, ha, Derek.
He's like, yo, what up?
What up, y'all?
He's like, yeah, he's just a Q-Tip.
He's like, what up?
Slight pause.
Yes.
If D. Nice, who...
Okay, I'm sorry.
No, my fault.
D. Nights is Team Red Alert.
Yeah.
I'm getting my...
Yeah, well, he's BDP.
Right, right.
It's just in me.
I'm thinking, wait, D.
Nice is not supposed to be there.
That's the wrong territory.
No.
He's family.
He's family.
He's family.
He's family.
Because all of the juice crews,
I mean, it wasn't really like,
that was more of an instigation of magics.
Okay.
They always kind of like fucked around.
He kind of said that when he's, we talked to him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So go ahead.
So, D.K.
And Aft was like, okay, we're going to go in.
And Derek was like, no, I'm about to meet Kane.
And I was just like, I just straightened up and shit.
Because you know Kane is.
Kane.
at the moment. He's tearing shit up.
And it was just off of
just rhyming with biz
and then you would always hear about this dude
cane like in the streets, whatever, in the circles.
So
we
go across the street on the side of the block
where Latin Quarter was. We leave
us to borrow all you can eat station
and we go to that side.
And then about 15 minutes later
we smoke or whatever, 15 minutes later
a limo pulls up in his cane and he's in the limo
and he's like, what up, Derek?
What up, y'all?
Everybody's like, oh, what up, what up?
And we're just like standing back and he was like,
yeah, yeah, so play me that joint.
And so then he was like, his man, I guess,
was sitting on, it was a super stretch.
So I guess the tape player was
towards the partition.
Right.
Towards the front.
So his man presses play and it's raw.
Wow.
And it's rushing out of the fucking window.
And everything just got, just that moment,
like how we just had just a second,
how everything kind of got still,
was like that for like four minutes.
It just got still.
So you heard pre-Raw like.
Yes.
And Derek was like, as soon as it came on,
shout out to D, that's my brother.
He was like, oh yeah,
that's to beat the Sandy and the muse.
Talking about I'll take your man.
from salt and pepper.
Okay, okay, okay.
He had said that, and Kay was like,
yeah, but it ain't this shit, though.
And it was like, that shit rock.
Yo, I couldn't think of nothing else.
And then he just drove a eye,
I got to go to the show, whatever.
And he just drove off in the night.
He met him near to play him raw.
And that was just, that was one of my Latin quarter moment.
Sorry.
No, that's exactly.
That was a Q-Tip exclusive.
Wow.
So, wow, okay, that was a happy, a great, you know,
where search each watermelon.
He makes it out.
Nobody got to change.
Because I was waiting.
Searching water.
It was a happy moment, right?
Yeah.
Oh, sweet.
Y'all too was waiting for.
Yeah, I was like, oh, man, see, please don't let me say he said,
nigger, please.
Don't do it.
Don't do it, search.
Not search.
A win is a win.
A win is a win.
I don't care what you're saying.
Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th.
You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football,
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There's two golden rules that any man should live by.
Rule one, never mess with a country girl.
You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes.
And rule two, never mess with her friends either.
We always say that trust your girlfriends.
I'm Anna Sinfield, and in this new season of the girlfriends,
Oh my God, this is the same man.
A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist.
I felt like I got hit by a truck.
I thought, how could this happen to me?
The cops didn't seem to care, so they take matters into their own hands.
I said, oh, hell no.
I vowed. I will be his last target.
He's going to get what he deserves.
Listen to the girlfriends.
Trust me, babe.
On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
All right, if you're just joining us, we're chatting with the rapper, actor, producer, DJ.
Member of a legendary hip-hop group, a Tribe Hall quest, Q-Tip.
The group released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album.
We got it from here.
Thank you for your service in November of 2016.
Have you guys ever performed at the Latin Quarter?
No, we didn't, no.
Okay.
I saw a lot of performances there, though.
What did you see?
I know you saw like a lot of first.
Yeah, well, I saw emcee light to,
a cram to understand you.
And then when she got off stage, I tried to kick it to her.
She was kind of happening, and we went on a date and shit.
Damn.
I'm sorry, but who?
You said MCLite.
MCLite.
Oh, okay.
Damn.
Yeah, just, okay.
That's what's up.
You got that.
Hey, hey, hey.
No, but that, no, but that was, it was, it was, it was early.
I mean, you know, it was like Kranos and she was, that was the first, one of the first.
Then I saw audio two do.
Top Billing.
Before they did, they did, I like cherries because cherries taste better.
That was first?
Milk and salt.
Was it grape sauce sour?
Oh, boss and more.
Yeah, yeah.
Wait a minute.
Wow.
Did that fly over with y'all, though?
Not really.
Was there a little bit of powerful?
Have you seen a legendary act perform at the Latin quarter that didn't have their shit together at that moment?
I mean, I've heard conflicting reports of public enemies first time.
Yeah, I didn't see that night.
I didn't see that night.
But I heard that that was shaky.
Chuck, about Chuck's own admission, he said that was, it didn't go well.
And he said it was actually melly Mel in the back was like hollering them.
Yeah, he's like, male has.
Like, the big people are, yo, these niggas is wax, son.
Yo, Mel, Mel?
It was ill because you.
Was you like, Hornoff and Sadler?
Yo, Mel is, I mean, we all know Mel and Mel is like,
Mount Rushmore, architect.
Absolutely.
But at that time, it was like a generation.
Right.
The old guy in the back.
But it wasn't, but we never viewed him.
We always looked at him as, yo, that's Melie Mel.
Like, your mayor, Busy B, got suicide
He's ringing off, like, we were still
kind of fucking with him.
I feel like Mel kind of...
Felt slighted.
No, when he would always instigate the fact
that he was older and we were young niggas.
Y'all young, y'all young niggas,
and your young boys, I'll be seeing him in the quarter
be like...
Like, with the muscles, I'm flexing out for everybody.
Wait, wasn't this...
Yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, y' y'all young, y' young...
Your young niggas don't know what the...
you know, all this shit.
And I saw the battle.
Yeah, the $1,000 battle.
Yeah, with KRS.
And he got up on stage.
This is Mellie Mell versus KRLS.
Yeah.
Okay.
I saw that shit.
And Mel was on stage doing push-ups and shit.
Like Jack Palantz?
Like the ostrich.
Yo, it was an Easter, it was an Easter Sunday.
And, you know, he was like,
I'm the real nigga from the Bronx and shit.
You know what I'm saying?
You know, yeah.
I'm not trying to play.
I'm just telling me how to the blood off.
No, no, we get it.
I'm just saying it because I don't know what Melo be like.
It sounds just like him.
That's why I'm laughing.
It's my voice.
Yo, tip.
Because that nigga's 60 and he's still like.
He's still like that old man's truck.
Like a jill.
Right, right, right.
He is.
He ripped the fucking can open and shit.
One, one time.
One time I.
One time I.
I did a documentary.
I did a documentary in which...
One time?
Really?
Really?
Only once.
I was in a documentary once in my life.
Wait, wait, we need a sound effect for that.
I was in a documentary once.
No, Mel had admitted that when he was doing white lines...
He was on coke.
That he was cooked up.
So I have to mention that...
Wait, do you remember this light of you?
I did not know this, no.
Oh, oh.
No.
So at Tasty Treats.
Oh, he came to Tasty Trey?
Dog.
Okay.
Like, I mentioned in the documentary, well, yeah, you know,
the ironic thing about white lines was that it's an anti-drug message.
But yeah, no, male shoulder.
Dog.
No, I got a better one.
So it was that moment where I was DJing.
And then, you know,
Yeah, I mean was like, hey, yo, Melly Mel.
Mellie Mel want to talk to you one second
because he said that you said that you said him
because you said he was on crack.
And I was like, what?
I looked to the right.
It was this Mel with like, Missile and Man status.
Tank top, it was winter though.
Yeah.
Right, right, right, right.
So this is how Mel, like, wound up being around
for like two or three years at every event?
Yes, yes.
Yes.
We squashed it.
Okay.
But then he just came to every event at every okay player event.
I noticed that.
Wait, he was there at the Christmas party with the...
He used to be seeing Meli Bell in here like...
Yeah.
In back, like, wearing lime green suits.
I love Melo.
Shout out to Mel.
Mel.
This is a legend.
Oh, my goodness.
Yeah, so, all right.
See, I want to stay at the Lack.
No, we got more.
Lank, we got it off.
We got a lot quarter.
We got enough.
I think we got enough.
But anyway, I'll finish this up.
All I'll say is that, KRS, you know, Mel has said some rap, whatever,
and he was like, yeah, oh, Supreme.
And he hit the floor, was doing, like, push-ups,
and they threw the beat on it.
I forget what the beat was.
And all I can remember is KRS was hitting that rhyme from poetry.
Right.
How did this start?
Let us begin.
No, no, no, no, no.
That's my philosophy.
Poetry.
Poetry.
Do, do.
I'm not gonna teach it at the lesson.
Classes, you can stop guessing.
Yeah, he hit that.
Say something now.
He put the mic down to him.
He didn't say shit.
Thought so.
Really?
I was like one of them.
It was over.
For real.
Niggas start fighting.
Noges got, they shut the shit down.
Wow.
The normal Latin quarter story.
It was just wild.
It was wild.
Were you there for the last, the quote,
Last night.
That was the last night.
Oh, everybody's got a last night.
One day, one day we were describing a cabal of the last night.
It was that Easter Sunday when that shit happened
and niggas, the violators got into it
and I'm telling you that was the last night.
Everyone has a last night at the Latin Quarter.
Like fake Newman had her is last night.
Yeah, like her last night.
Yeah, it's like.
What was her last night?
What she said?
PE, right?
No.
I think it wasn't.
I can't remember.
No, she said she was there for the last night of the Latin Quarter.
She said a fight, broke out.
I remember she said it was like all this stuff happened.
All we need is Heather Hunter to finish the story.
Oh, was she there too?
Damn.
She was a coach at girl.
That's why I want to get her on the show.
She knows Mads stories.
Oh, progress.
That's amazing.
Yeah.
Wait a minute.
That was not a stab.
I love Heather Hunter.
So do we.
Janet Jack, me too.
Anyway.
All right.
So, all right.
Wait, I feel like there's more.
What other historical first and classic
hip-hop history have you been able to witness?
Let me see.
Oh, well, I remember when Biz
was working on
just a friend.
I heard you're the reason that it even came to be.
You told him, like...
Well, it wasn't that.
Like, I knocked the reason.
He said, Q-Tip told me to do it, or some shit like...
Well, he played it for me.
We were in Kalapie Studios.
and the original was you
you must be on speed
If you say he's just your friend
You must be on speed
I was like biz you cannot say that
Word
He said I know I was thinking about doing this other one
You
You got what I need
I was like
That's the one
You must be on speed
Yeah, that was...
That's another...
Yeah, a juice crew
interpolation.
Didn't Big Daddy Kane
do a perfect combination
or...
You're on your menstruation.
He had a whole routine with biz
where they used to do
Johnny Gil and Stacey's last all.
That was like live,
it never made it for a record, okay.
I could believe that.
I mean, it was so routinely done,
like, I feel like somewhere
in history there...
It exists somewhere.
It has to be somewhere on some demo tape.
I could believe that.
Somewhere.
I forgot to ask Marley that question.
All right, so your record collection.
See.
Before your career, and I guess during, at least up to the Jungle Brothers,
like at what point are you going through your father's records?
Like, how are you?
Well, I'm going through my father's record.
Before all of it, like, as a kid, it was my father's records.
Let me
Okay, what I really wanted
Okay, like the Bronx had their beginnings of hip-hop
And going to party jams or whatnot
Was there a story of that in Queens?
Of course.
Were you seeing the disco twins?
Actually, of course, Brooklyn and Queens
Actually there was a lot of this
It's a lot of even recent recollection
about the beginnings of literal hip-hop.
You know what I'm saying?
Like jams and shit.
You know, Grand Master Flowers was doing it.
Queens Dave?
Brooklyn.
But he would, but the Brooklyn and Queens guys, they would always be, you know,
the parties would kind of be overflowing there.
That was the territory, much like Bronx and Harlem.
You know what I mean?
That connection.
Because we only hear about the Bronx.
And I know, like, all these other girls.
There's a lot of, if you look, it's funny because one night,
Somebody sent me a link, and one night I just got into this whole YouTube.
Rabbit hole.
Yeah, exactly.
It's a labyrinth.
And you see all of these OGs from, like, Brooklyn and Queens.
You know, they had infinity sound out of Queens.
You had the albino twins, disco twins.
And an infinity machine was a pretty big sound system.
At the same time as, you know, the Hercules, which was Ku Hergs and Sasquash,
which was Gene and them.
shit.
So Queens has some big sound systems
and Brooklyn has some sound systems
as well too. So the first time I went
to a jam
I must have been about six
seven and I believe that Grandmaster
Flowers was DJ and it was
actually
one block off where
Fife's mother lived on that side
for the tracks. And that was the first
time I've seen
a DJ bring a...
It was not any scratching, but
it would just be like, you know,
bringing it back, kind of.
And it was a hot shot.
Yeah, I think it was hot shot.
Hot shot, hot shot, hot.
Two, three, thing.
Yeah, that joint.
Exactly.
And that, it was just,
that was like the first recollection of that.
Everybody was like kind of on the freak line.
No, okay.
I remember that break.
Yeah.
That was early.
That was early.
And that was like an instigation into getting records for me.
But, you know, luckily, you know, my dad had a pretty substantial record collection.
And he would trade with my aunt Effie, was up in Harlem.
And my other, my cousin lived a few blocks away, and they had like a bunch of records.
And then my friend who lived across the street, he was much older than me, Eric Sala.
Oh, wow, bomb squad.
No, no, not that one.
Oh, okay.
It's another saddard.
another Sadler family.
So they had a bunch of records.
So I'd be like raiding everybody's joints
and just listening to music.
Then by the time, you know, I start 13, 14
and the breaks and all that stuff,
you start hearing all of that,
I started putting two and two together.
Because at first it was just like a family hobby
to collect records.
So it wasn't really from a position
of like grabbing break beats,
but then that, that,
I had kind of between from when I was seven up to ten,
it was just about a record collecting thing.
And then when I got to like 12, 13, 14,
I started realizing, put two and two together
and made the connection of what it was.
So that's kind of how I kind of got into the whole.
So your dad encouraged, didn't discourage you
from touching his record collection?
No.
You didn't have a, don't touch my stereo, dad.
My mother was more like that,
but my dad is.
Your grandmother was more like that,
I would do that and fuck the shit up, yeah,
because you know you'd have the whole,
the one system with the,
you open the wood cover and shit.
Oh, the coffin, yeah, the coffin.
And you'd be like,
do, do, do, do it.
What you're doing?
I don't know that thing.
You know, that type of shit.
Yeah.
It was the belt drive,
they were like they wouldn't even go back.
It was just straight the belt drive.
It wasn't direct drive.
Yo, what y'all think,
how do y'all think that out of face music now
that the era of your parents' records is over?
Like, kids today don't get to go through their parents' albums.
Like we all did.
Yeah, because now there's 90,000 records.
But do they go through their parents' iPhone?
No?
Like, how do you?
They get it in the car.
My boys get it in the car.
Like, when we go on road trips and stuff and I'm playing my music, that's when they get.
You control the music, though, right?
I control the music in the car.
The car is a lot.
Much to their chagrin?
Sometimes, I mean, they'll purposely like.
They got headphones on.
Yeah, they'll put on headphones and they'll do whatever.
But fun, do you find that in the car when you having those chips,
that they are a little bit more open to hearing it.
And I was like, oh, wow, Dad, I like that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, I think.
Give me an example of someone from our era that they really dig.
Someone from our era, I mean.
That you put them on to you like when they was like five or six.
Yo, no, no, dead ass.
And I'm not saying just because he was here when the new record came out.
I was just playing it in the house.
And my son came home from school.
He's like, oh, dad, is that the new tribe album?
Oh, wow.
And he had him, oh, son.
I had him on.
Like, you might be a kid.
You might get a job.
But no, my son, he's 15.
And so he was, I mean, I had him, I was playing, when he was a kid,
I made him like a tape of just some of my favorite music.
I had some tribe on there.
Machundegio cello, like, can.
I mean, I just made him a tape.
And so he would go to sleep to that as a kid.
And so now, I will say, man, I mean, and I see it,
I think this generation of kids, they're the most open.
Yeah.
Because everything is free.
So whereas back in our day, like, you want to.
might want to take a chance on a radio head or some shit,
but it's like, okay, Nick, I can buy a radio head.
I can buy Cuban links.
Yeah, nigga, I'm buying Cuban links.
Right, right, right, right.
But now everything is available.
So those kids now, my boys, they listen to everything from, like, the most ignorant trap shit
to, like, tribe, to king, you know what I mean?
Like, they listen to it all.
Right.
Because they have access to it.
Rik's daughters that way, Salia, when she was born, I made her an iPod of just random stuff.
and to this
like she's 11
but she loves the police
she loves do do do
da da da da and my son
for last Christmas
he asked for
he wanted me to buy him a CD copy of
Metallica's Injustice Falls
because he we used to play one
on guitar hero
and so that like
led him that
so like that shit Queens of the Stone Age
like all that kind of you know rock
He's into that.
It's funny because, you know, my little cousins, they're like 1415.
And, you know, they're not necessarily what everybody deems, what the millennial or whatever.
I feel like that that crew is a little bit more open.
It's like, okay, I feel like the millennials or whatever when they had streaming and all of that stuff and it hit for them, it wasn't, you know, the functionality of what's
streaming really was to be, which was to cross-sectionalize all types of music, hadn't really
came, hit its stride with them or hasn't really fell on them with that younger generation
through watching them, the sees that it's really, hey, it's about all of this shit.
Everything, yeah.
You know, because I was surprised, like, a year and a half ago, we had, like, this in-store,
we did this collaboration with Stusi, and the line was like around the corner.
It was like, yo, nigger, I, and I was, like, yo, nigger, I,
Prior to this, I was cutting my lawn in my New York jet socks and my fucking Nike shorts.
I had my tank top on, you know, smoking weed, yelling at my dog, scratching my back.
Like, I ain't been out.
It's like, come do this.
I'm like, oh, okay.
And you go to it and you see this.
And it's these 15, 16 year old kids.
Like, oh, my God, you don't know it.
And I'm like, huh?
Yeah, pop-up stores are now the new black.
Do we feel good, too?
Yes, it's encouraging.
It feels encouraging.
I'm encouraged by it.
No, I will say, Tim, you were one of my favorite producers in the sense that you always,
the way I've always described is like you always kept a foot in both worlds.
Like, you could do Midnight Marauders, but then could do the infamous, you know what I'm saying?
Or you could do like a Craig Mac remix.
And like, you always found a way, even when you worked with big mainstream acts of the time,
you still found a way to put your stamp on.
on what you were doing.
And I think that's, in my opinion, to me,
that always kept you kind of,
you never, to me, never came across
as like that bitter guy, like a lot of older cats,
you know what it is, you know why?
And he could tell you, it's not really a big secret,
it's DJ.
Right, don't you find that, Amir?
Like, DJing.
Well, I'm probably, I'm smart about it now.
Mm-hmm.
Because I wasn't DJing as heavy
since maybe the last three or four records
where I'm now aware of it.
it. Now, now I know why Dre, like when I saw straight out of Compton and realized the environment that Dre was DJing at that roller skating rink, where it's like you play the wrong record. That's your ass. Now I realize, oh, that's why all of Dre's stuff is take no prisoners with his singles and stuff. Like, it has to. It's got a hit. Grab you by the throat. Now I realize that, yeah, that's the advantage of it. The other thing about it too is that it's, it's a, you know,
you get to see what works and why, you know.
Because I, you know, I think that you and I, we maybe,
I think we come from the same philosophy when we spend.
You know what I'm saying?
It's like, you know, current, current, a little bit back,
another one throwback, tempo-wise, tempo match, baseline match,
then boom, now current, you know, current, you know,
just to try to mix.
And then sometimes you know that the crowd may not know the throwbacks,
but you just want to see the reaction if it's one of it.
See if it works.
Yeah, because if it doesn't stop the groove and you see who's moving it to it, it's a great study.
Yeah.
You know?
Psychological stuff.
Yeah.
If you're just tuning in, we're getting a hip-hop history lesson with rapper, actor, producer, DJ, a member of a Tribe called Quest Q-tip.
The reason why I brought the record collection is because in the era of when you guys finally get your debut record out,
First of all, the long-ass title,
People's Instinctive Travels, and the Paths of Rhythm.
Why?
I mean, Captain Beefhearten.
I mean...
It doesn't be difficult.
Yeah, I mean, you know, it's like...
Yeah, we need a long-ass title.
We need to stick the fuck out.
What were the other options for the debut album before?
Was the other...
I wanted no other option.
You never...
Either or...
We always had, like, three to choose from it.
Really?
decide like, okay.
No, we was just like, yo, this is what it is.
Really?
You know.
Okay.
So in the era of you guys making that record,
well, as a music producer, the first thing, the reason why I have a dividing line between
the Renaissance era of hip-hop and the classic era of hip-hop and the thin line that's in
between is the fact that you guys managed to miraculously avoid James Brown.
Well, using anything from Breakbee Lou's Ultimate Beets and Breaks collection, which,
all right, for our listeners, Breakbee Lou, shout out, what's up, Lou, Lou Flores,
wisely came up with a Wikipedia or a Cliff Notes, if you will.
of records.
And Street Beat Lenny,
uh,
Street Beat Lenny too.
Yeah,
Street Beat Lenny.
Shout out.
Uh,
of all the records that Bam and Herc and,
uh,
Flash and Theodore would spin back in the day.
And when this compilation came out in late 1985,
uh,
through 1989,
uh,
pretty much,
I'll say 60% of most hip-hop relied on these breaks
for their daily diet.
it. Right. All these, you know, synthetic substitution and impeach the president. God made me funky.
It was just to the point where the average record, take like, take a producer like Herbie Lovebug,
his productions on, say like a filler cut on a kid and play record. Yeah. You could,
comprise those. You can instantly tell, oh, that's volume made. He used the drums from here and the loop from there
and the baseline from there, you know, all on the same record where you really didn't do any
heavy digging. So this is the first time
or at least with
the native tongues
this is the first time that I'm hearing
loops that aren't
on that compilation and it's
like oh god I got to do some work
to figure out what they use what this is.
Was that already a rule that
like no substitution
no funky drummer no impeach
the president? Yeah we
were um it was
it was a crew of us
right like it was me
Africa
juju juju
yep
okay answer this real quick
of the beat nuts
who is the music head
of the beat nuts
they both are
but who's your go to
well juju
gun to the head
I mean
I would juju
because juju
because that was my man
like in senior year
high school
like we were all
me him
Rashad
um yep
oh wow
wait they all went to the
No, no, no, we all went to different schools,
but we were all, like, meet up at the hubs and shit.
Like, we just knew niggas from when, you know,
we was getting up, getting beats and shit,
and you'd see dudes, you'd be like, yo, that dude got,
because we all was, there was a small group of us
who was, like, anti-breakbeat.
You know what I mean?
Like, we had to have the right shit, you know what I mean?
You feel once like, all right.
The substitute.
The substitute.
The substitute is kind of good.
Huh?
But not once did you feel like, all right?
Oh, yeah.
Well, after, after, you know, after we've established ourselves in that way,
you then come back.
There's been times I've used substitution kicks and shit like that.
No, that's not really.
All right.
Kick, you can't tell.
Yeah.
Okay.
Or, like, you know, and like Pete would use, he would use substitution a lot, you know.
Right.
Some of them shit's just as a producer, you'd be like,
yo, that shit is still, that James Brown's sneer is still rocking.
and we got a boot.
You know what I mean?
But back then early on,
it was just about,
it was about the hunt, nigga.
You know what I'm saying?
It was the hunt.
You know, that shit just had to fight.
It was just like,
and then we got so on it,
we would travel out of town,
get flights.
We and Paul would get fucking rent cars
and be driving.
Pittsburgh?
Yeah, all types of shit.
You would go to Jerry's in Pittsburgh?
Yep.
I went to Jerry's.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, if any beat digger, there's seven pilgrimage, like mecca pilgrim.
But Jerry's, you'll never get past like the letter D or C.
Right, right, right.
That's how large his warehouse is.
That's crazy.
But the crew was, it was like juju.
And this is the crew.
Like we all would know each other.
We all would go to spots and shit.
It was juju, diamond.
Large, myself, Africa, Pete, I said Paul, right?
Paul.
Is Prima around this time?
Prime had already bought a store.
He already had everything.
Wow.
He had a store.
Oh, Latif.
Okay.
I said Rashad.
No slackers.
Nah, we was, we was, we was.
And now is Mark the 45 king in this?
Mark already had, he's an OG, so he was already.
So Prime had the record store that he bought when he was in Texas and came.
And they just shipped him every like 40,000 records of some crazy shit.
So he had everything.
And Mark had everything.
So we were all putting our shits together kind of at that time, you know, at the same time.
You know, but it was the hunt.
It was the hunt.
It was like Game of Thrones and some shit.
Dude, I'm glad you're saying this because
even though my career came in the tail end of it,
many a record dealer had the fear of their eyes when like,
because I would just straight up ask them.
Like record dealers will do this thing where it's like,
all right, they know what kind of money's walking in.
Right.
So they'll look at me in like, okay, Amir's good for $10,000.
So they have a system where it's like they'll give you,
all right, that's 10, that's 20, that's 10, that's 20, that's 10, that's 20, that's 10, that's 20,
no, that's right, but then they know you're itching.
And I'm like, so that's it.
And they'll be like, well, you know, I got a shipment that just came in last night.
Or the warehouses up the block.
Right.
Oh, oh, take you over the block.
Yeah, that kind of De Niro.
I got some dresses over here.
Yeah.
No, but that's what it's like.
And then there's just a point.
And then they're running more expensive, those records?
Well, I would tell them to just cut to the chase.
Like, and that's the thing.
As a record collector, you never tell them like, look,
only got a thousand.
Just cut to the chase and give me the good shit.
Because no, they'll just do the same shit.
The tens, the 20s, the tens, the 20s, the tens, the 20s.
Where are you out there?
And then they'll be like, they will usually say,
like Pete Rock was always the thing.
Like, well, yeah, we were holding.
some of this stuff for Pete Rock.
You know.
I'll give you an extra 10 for it, right?
Yeah, but then you get desperate and I realize.
Some of that shit wouldn't even be true.
No, no, no, no.
I realized, then I realized that was the hustle.
And then finally, I found a guy where he's just like,
look, this is worth 100.
This is worth 150.
You know, and those type of things.
So, of course, those prices would be jacked up
because they would use it.
like stuff already.
So like a,
all right,
prime example.
The Monty Alexander.
Loving happiness.
All right.
So before you use that for gangster bitch,
how much?
I got a for $10.
I know that.
The album was worth like $10.
Now.
But because gangstabit,
like he,
Q-tip single-handily
brought up the stocks on all.
I'm sorry.
Why not because the stuff he was sampling.
I feel bad a little bit because it just happened.
Like, okay, boom.
Yeah, my generation is now paying the extra.
Look, on the new tribe album, right,
I use this for whatever we would be.
It's the Nairobi sisters.
Nairobi sisters, that's right, yeah.
Like, that shit is skyrocketed already.
But give me an example of like from once it came
to once it got once tip touched it.
No, all the time.
Like, oh, Jesus Christ.
I paid.
Ramp.
Ramp is a $5 record.
Well, ramp used to be.
I don't even think there's an original Ramp record.
Like, every Ramp album I've seen is, I just felt like they finally just printed it in the name of the interest of finding the Benita Apple Bum sample.
So how much is that now, Rant?
$300?
Well, you.
For an original present?
I've never seen an original pressing of Rant.
But Eugene McDaniels.
Oh, Haleighal.
I've never seen a headless
heroes under 200 bucks.
Original.
They landed at a plum.
Dude.
Smile on the face.
I played that for my kids on Thanksgiving.
I played that shit.
I played that shit.
Side note.
Side note.
The first argument Stacy and I ever had
over music.
First argument.
Tasty Tasty Treats Stacy and I ever had over
music was over that record.
She, by the time we got to
that song, she was like,
could you play a little bit?
This is the last song on Eugene
McDaniel's debut album, Hellless Heroes of Podcast.
I played everything Thanksgiving.
I played everything for my kids.
You do, you do.
No, no, no.
The sample that they used for this,
for the tip used, it was
a jagger the dagger.
It was jagger the dagger.
You know, we was having a ball.
That's good on the mic.
And actually, weird enough, Jagger the Dagger was such a dig at Mick Jagger.
Like stealing black music, but the loop was so dope.
One of the last dates that we did on when Lauren released that.
Did you play that as he walked out?
No, no, no, no.
Oh, man.
You know what?
He can't.
Yes, he was scheduled to be on the show.
We prepared that song.
and then he...
Oh, okay, okay.
He can do it.
But, yeah, when he comes,
we're trying to turn him into the Michelle Bachman.
Part two?
No, dude, he's dragging the dagger.
Like, what are they going to do the research on it?
Anyway.
Wow.
Thank you, though.
The last date of this Lauren Hill tour
when she did that unplug record.
Oh, smoking groups tour.
I remember that tour.
Right.
So it was Thanksgiving night in Seattle,
and I played the parasite and blasted it
because I would DJ before she came on.
Dog, the look on the art.
It was the best.
I might have to play you.
Yes, I got to, can I play a whole song please?
The whole song is like nine minutes, man.
That's like, nah, we can't.
Not right now.
I mean, if you can play it on the show.
A little bit, a little bit.
Just skim through certain points.
I think it's a good close.
We'll close the show with it.
Okay, stop.
All right.
We will close the show with the, yeah.
That's fair.
Right down on.
Can we talk over it while he goes the show?
Like, I'm like mystery science theater.
I mean, that is kind of what we do.
That's all we do anyway.
Okay, great.
Awesome.
That's all we do.
All right.
So
what,
making this,
making the record.
Yes, sir.
The debut.
Yeah.
People's,
or I call it PETA,
Peter Petour.
Peter Poet.
Peta.
Peta,
making that record.
What is,
because this is a group
of super producers.
I mean,
it's a group of multiple MCs,
but it's also a group of super producers.
How,
what is the,
what is the agreed upon
method of making
joints? Like is it just
yo I got this loop
yo I got this loop
oh I like that loop
okay let's work on that
or is it
you know do you just come in
with the finished product like I like this
does Ali say
yo what do you think about this
yeah that joint's nice I'll do that
it's kind of both
okay in the beginning
what's it like on the first album
like in the beginning
a lot of it was demos that I'd done over the prior,
I'd say five years maybe.
Okay, I'm calling an audible.
Storytime with Q-tip.
All right, I'm just going to play 10 seconds of random tribe joints.
Okay.
And you tell me, like, what comes to mind when you made this?
Like, if you remember any details.
Okay.
I mean, running away my
I mean
Running away Roy is
You know what?
It was one of my favorite
This shit catches a lot of slack
Like I'll read
I'll read
You know like
A list
Like ego trip list or whatever
Right right right
Where of course this didn't
Description didn't
Was it Benita?
Right, of course.
So it catches flak as in
Weird debut songs by groups that will later become God.
Right, right, no doubt, no doubt.
But there's nothing wrong with this loop ever.
This is not my go-to song to spin.
Right.
But I was never mad at this loop or the place.
The ending, it felt like a good ending for the album.
Yeah, I used to run that joint.
Actually, the B-Side was even funnier.
What was the B-Sy?
Pubic.
Pubic enemy.
No, no.
B-side description.
Oh, yeah, the long joint.
You guys, just talking smack.
It was like some comic shit.
It was funny.
It was like it was just skipped in my loop.
No, you know what it was, too?
I had two years earlier,
there was a store on Bleaker Street where you get all the fucking prints
unreleased joints.
Oh, Blika Blinken bobs.
Well, not bobs, but it was another joint.
Okay.
Generations?
What?
Generations?
I think it was.
Not on bleaker, but it's off-Blaker.
When I'm Red Bull,
you know where all the
the chest stores are?
Yeah, I think it was...
Across the street and down the block
from Mahmoods.
I think there's a story where Prince
actually walked in to the store.
To that store and walked out.
With all his...
All his shit.
Yeah, that had...
Yo, it's ill because
I was in there, I would always
hit there after school
because Kierna and I would always be
in the village and shit,
and I would always go get...
I was a huge Prince fan.
So I'd heard movie star,
I heard Bob George.
Super Califraud, whatever that fuck, you know.
All of that shit, like, I was just, like, stuck.
I remember playing movie star for Africa.
He and, we were in, like, 11th grade,
and we're, like, mocking the shit
and listening to all this unreleased print shit.
And this was, like, kind of like,
one of the ones, yeah, what, hey, who's that?
You know, it's just like.
You're Bob George.
Yeah, you know what I'm saying?
Okay.
We're, like, doing all that silly shit.
Underneath it is the BT Express beat,
You know what I mean?
I mean, it's clearly tuned out.
But it was also still an overage of disco kind of house parties that was still going on.
You know, you still have Frankie Knuckles, IP.
You still have Larry LeVan doing parties back then, even though their houses had closed.
And maybe Frankie was doing back and forth from Chicago to New York.
So body and soul was being established, reestablished.
So it was still a disco thing that was happening.
Have you ever got to see Larry spin?
Yeah.
Or his systems?
Yeah.
Well, I saw him at Limelight.
Okay.
Did he control the system there?
I don't think so.
This is towards...
Because when you DJ, you have the world's loudest base cabinets ever.
I know that you're always...
Me?
You?
You're always aiming for a Paradise Garage.
Yeah, I'm trying to go for that, man.
Yeah, okay.
I'm a stickler for that sound.
But the first real big system I think I heard was in the world.
As we discussed.
A, A, A.
Vice favorite song.
Wow.
My favorite song.
I haven't heard this shit forever.
Slide a family stone.
Advice.
Take my advice.
A.
That was Scott Pageer from the 91 album.
Classic.
The Loewin Theory.
When I made this beat, I was like,
yo, this is like one of the most perfect beats I ever made.
Just because you hear the brushes.
You hear the brushes on the drums playing,
like playing right in between that fucking monstrous-ass snare kick.
That fucking Gregor Rico is rocking.
and then when the flute
with the fucking phone and shit
I was just like
damn
I wanted to make the shit longer
but I was like
you fight we should keep this shit short
like this like he was like bird
bird
he said this is my shit
even though I would love to
but we got other joints
we need to make this short
like because this one
I just
I just love this record
I think this is my favorite
I think I've said
before the butter was my
favorite on the album, but it's really this.
I haven't heard this in a while.
Wow, see? This is what
we haven't come. Because
I don't know.
Maybe it was the beast being the beast side
of Check the Rhyme or whatever,
but this just hit
me at the right moment. Like we brought
the Check the Rhyme single.
It's like a Friday night,
Tower Records, and
when, like, we already
knew Check the Rhyme. So when we heard,
the B-side for SkyPager
in on a loud-ass car system
on a Friday night
like we sat there and listened
that shit like 20 times in a row
like I was so mad there was no
instrumental over this shit but
this is like one of the songs that like me and
Tariq bonded over
like just... It may be hard
to maybe you understand it
Amir but don't sometimes
it's like you take yourself out of it as the
actual artist
and then you as the DJ or as just a listen to you
You know what I'm saying?
And you just hear it.
And for a minute, you'd be like, oh, shit.
You know what I'm saying?
I sure you have to have time, I think.
Like, you have to have distance away from it.
You know what I'm saying?
Yes.
Because, like, while you're working on it, while I'm working on stuff, like, I hate it.
I can't.
Right.
I'm like, oh, my God.
But I'm certain that you make records that younger you would want to buy as a consumer or...
Correct?
Do you not make rhymes that you,
wish your id would like now?
You mean like now?
Or just in general, I thought that was the whole goal
of a musician to make the stuff you want to hear?
Make the stuff that you would buy as a music fan.
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Making the stuff that you want to hear and pretty much,
well, at least for me, just making the stuff that, you know,
the stuff that I felt was missing, like a record that,
man, I wish I could buy this record.
I make the record that I want to buy.
But I think it only gets to that point for me
Like kind of going back at what tip was saying
While you're working on it
Yeah I don't listen to none of it
Yeah it's like
Like I don't have to listen to this out
Like when I put it out I don't listen to it
And the only time I'll go through it
Is if I'm DJing
I listen to the shit
Because I really try to stay away
From playing my own shit
But
When you're reading a crowd
Or if you're in a play
You know sometimes you may hit
A little bit
bit of it. And then you see your work in the context of other people's in the club
just to bring it back to the DJ hitting and it makes you go, ah.
What was the last record that you played yours in the club? And you was like, ah, that's
same feeling.
You play what? You play what? Yeah.
Wow. See, now that's weird. I have a rule against playing our shit because every time
I play the root shit is the fastest floor.
That's the go to this. Get a drink.
It's like, I call my story.
Yeah.
I don't lean on our shit either.
Speaking spin.
But no, but I'm saying they got dance more records.
It's already established that you're the establishment of that level.
Like, you know, there's at least five tribe songs that are the Mount Rushmore go-to songs of a party started.
So even when you were DJing, like, is it embarrassing to play?
What's the Captain Avi's one?
Like scenario?
I don't play none of the obvious shit.
So even when you were DJing in, let's say, 1993 and you put scenario on,
knowing the motherfucker's going to go out of their mind.
Like, is it still like a weird thing?
Like, is it too?
Yeah, I don't, I don't do that.
I can't do that.
I'll play.
Oh, you'll play some obscure shit?
I'll play something more if, like, especially if it's like a, I have a groove rolling or whatever.
Like, let's say, okay, so what is somewhere like 105 BPM or some shit?
I know what you're going to say.
Do what, what?
No, I was going to do it, do it, do it, do it.
I was going to say you would probably play, uh,
Sir Duprints.
No, footprints.
Oh, footprint, love it.
I feel like you would play footprints.
A not club song, but, okay, you taught me this term, pardon my French.
Niggins.
Nigga what?
Niggins.
Niggins.
Niggins.
Niggins.
Niggins.
Niggins.
The niggum.
Like, nigga ears or what we do?
Nigger drums.
Nigger drums.
Oh, I need some examples of some nigger drums.
Nigger drums.
No, he's just, it's just, he taught me that term.
He's just like, it's, like, that's the secret.
Like, the music's smooth, but the beat is so cracking and hard and just hard.
Like, it's, it's like Freddie Fox punching you in the nose.
It's, I would have to smooth this shit over on top of it.
While, like, Celine Dion seems to you.
In my head, why I was Freddy Fox?
Yeah, the hip-hop.
I like that.
Yeah.
Like, damn it.
Like, beat.
Ew!
Or getting a pound from Buster Rhymes, you know.
Right.
Like, it's, yeah, no, when Buster picks you up, it's, you got to hide your hands.
Like, him and D.
Him and D'Angelo are the two.
D has the super grip.
Like, pulls your finger, like, Arsenio fingers.
But, D is a relentless.
D will do it all night for two hours.
Every sentence, Primo says the same thing
He has his death taste for
Like he adapt you every two minutes
I'm sorry
No more
I agree
No, D&Buster
The reason why I give pounds now
Because they will pull
Your joints out of so hard
Touching you a pound so hard
Touch your manly hood
It's just
No it's just
Pounds man
It does
Um
Jesus
I feel like each album is like
Nine hours worthy of
Right
Right
So we got any
Any people
was instinctive questions I missed.
Well, I mean, I'm trying to think.
I just remember, it's funny you played description of a fool
because that was the first time I can recall
my older cousin of mine
pointing out to me that it was a sample
because I didn't know the Roy A's record.
And I remember him playing, you know, the typical old school
like, all y'all do is still, all the elbow, y'all's stealing.
That's still like, I'm like, what's about?
Let me say something about that.
And I was like, oh, shit.
about this whole sample shit
speak on it please
I mean
and you guys know this
I mean
there's fucking
12 notes
you know
right
and it's like
you have different varying degrees of voicings
and shit that you can use so
everybody has sampled
private joy by prints
yeah okay
could you play that real quick just a little bit
we're not allowed to
oh
okay
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
All right.
Do you have Frankie Valley, who loves you pretty baby?
Not in my.
Okay.
You ain't got no Frankie Valley in your Cerrado?
Nice reference, nice reference.
But my point is that it's the same voicing, just different keys.
You know what I mean?
Like if you listen to them back to back, it's the same shit.
Like, it's like people, you know.
All right, I'm playing it.
It's Frankie Valley.
Yes.
This is Who Loves You by Frankie Valley in the Four Seasons.
Just a highlight and illustrate my idea.
It's private joy.
I didn't realize that to this.
No, he is.
Yeah, that's private joy.
That is private joy.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
I never realized that.
until now. It's like
that
shit goes on.
Some people can rearrange and
re-voice certain chords and
you know
re-approach the
melodies and stuff like that.
But sampling is something that has been
done for it. How many times you've heard
the chord changes from Cherokee
in regular shit? You know what I'm saying?
Like it's such a stupid.
It is. Yeah. When y'all were
in terms of
You were talking about Juju.
It's funny that you mentioned that because I always...
It makes total sense now hearing it that you and Juju ran together
because I always thought, like to use a Stranger Things reference,
I always thought that the Beat Nuts first album was like the upside down version of Midnight Marauders.
Yes.
Like that was a real Black Seep album.
Oh, man.
Dead ass.
Dead ass.
I love that.
There you go.
There you go.
There you go.
There you go.
There's a little.
Get down south, bro.
You let me hang it.
No, I get my dance on.
That's you.
Yeah.
Yo, you're right.
You're right about that.
I love, I love that.
You know, they don't get their props, man.
Never.
Their fucking albums are always fucking fucking crazy.
Yeah.
There's no album that doesn't have like...
No, when I first heard that fucking...
That Diamond Bird shit that a...
Do do do do do do...
Do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do.
Do do do do do do that I was like, oh, Jack!
See, the Juja's crazy!
I was like, you motherfucker, goddamn hell!
Have they ever worked on, like, how does that work with ideas or whatever?
Like, have they ever worked on...
No, we never, like, did that.
The only thing we did was we started this group called the Fabulous Flee's, you know, Reyes, Juju.
How far did that go?
The fabulous flea!
How far did that go?
And why didn't it materialize?
I don't know.
We had two records.
Wait, what?
Wow.
So the existence actually made?
Yeah.
Wow.
Shout out to POS and I'm still waiting for my fabulous fleas.
Paz has a lot of shit.
Yes, he does.
He has a lot.
I DJed his wedding for free to get some fleas.
Yo, he has a lot of stuff.
He does.
He is.
He's doing the low.
He's like, so, yeah, that was.
was the, I was, you know, Juju, man, and light and less, sorry.
And I remember when fashion was with them for the first couple of joints, right?
Fashion joined in the second, because was fashion on the first one?
He was on the first one.
It was the first three, right?
No, no, no.
He was on the EP, and then he was on the album, and then he left when they did street level.
That's right.
Because he did the God Connections album.
That's right.
They had a couple joints on, too.
Fashion is dope.
Yeah.
When you talk about sampling,
one thing I wanted to ask you, like, from
Marauders to Beats Rhyms and Life,
how did the sampling laws, like,
was it harder to sample at that time?
No. Beets Rimes' Life had a lot more
live stuff on it.
You didn't pay attention. Well, he especially didn't pay attention
because this record, like,
I thought it was
bomb squad territory that I was listening to it.
It's like, so much, I was like, how do they clear
all this shit? Yeah, the laugh from
driller and shit.
Speaking of which,
Sir, Kamal.
Yes, sir.
It is time for a moment.
Get your pen, get your paper.
That's why I gave you a pen and paper.
I know.
We're going through round one of...
Bitch you guessed it.
So, all right, to be fair, because I wasn't fair to Pete Rock when he did it.
He's still dancing over there.
Let's go.
Here we go.
I'm going to test your gangster.
I'm going to test a gangster on samples.
My gangster in Gile.
Yeah.
I'm going to lose this horribly.
No, you're not.
No, you're not.
Because I'm going to give it to you twice.
I'm not that good.
I'm going to play you a slew of samples.
Okay, come on.
Ten samples.
And you name them.
You ready?
I'll lose, y'all.
No, you got it.
You can do better than me.
Come on.
Here we go.
I'm going to do this for you twice.
Okay.
Here's the first round.
Name these 10.
You might want to have a pin because they're
gonna come quick. Oh shit, like that.
You ready? Yes, sir.
Part one, here we go.
Oh, man.
Okay.
Tip is singing. He's not writing.
There you go.
The last one is my favorite song.
I'm not gonna, I'm never gonna win.
All right. You gotta get
closer to the mic. I'm not gonna win.
It's too much. It's too quick.
You didn't even try. He's gonna go again. Yeah, because I was like,
I'm not gonna do this. This is too crazy.
You're gonna get played.
No, this is a, this is a
staple.
Okay, come on.
This is a staple of
bitch you guessed it.
I'm ready, I'm ready.
I'll give it to you
one more time.
And I got to write these
this, Amir.
Just write the artist.
What the fuck?
Everybody that's right as
as quick as you and just write
the artist down.
You don't have to write the song.
I know he concocted this shit too.
Come on now.
It's fun.
Bitch you guessed it is fun.
All right, come on.
All right.
Music Geniuses.
Ready?
Yeah.
All right.
Just name the artist.
Don't know.
I know that.
Don't know.
Eddie Kedjinks.
Yes, you do.
You know this.
I don't know.
Don't know.
It's not enough for me.
Eddie Kedrix.
Okay.
You're singing the song.
Next.
That's easy.
Eugene.
Is that Marvin Holmes?
No.
Uptiters?
You know the songs.
Yeah.
That's a shit.
Is that Phoenadella?
No.
Close.
That's Habekin.
That's Hamilton, Bohan.
That's Brenda Russell.
Okay.
A little bit of love.
We got a little bit.
Okay.
We missed Tyrone Davis in the movie mode.
Tyrone Davis.
Brick fun.
Brick fun, yes.
And our farmer's soul sides.
Beat does use that for Lick the Pussy.
That was right.
Exactly.
Well, that's when he mentioned.
I was like, the night lighters.
Nightlighters, there you go.
And Detroit Emeralds was.
Detroit Emeralds.
That was close.
All right.
So you sort of guessed it.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
It's car, yeah, yeah.
Give me another wing.
Do you have another?
Oh, yeah, I got a band.
Give me Pete.
Give me Pete.
No, I got advanced rounds.
We'll get you a little bit later.
You got advanced rounds.
Give you a breather.
A win is a win.
A win is a win.
I don't care what I'm saying.
Yep, that's me, Cliver Taylor the 4th.
You might have seen the skits, the reactions,
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Well, somewhere along the way,
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I vowed.
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Listen to the girlfriends.
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On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
So did you, were you satisfied with, how did you feel the general reception was for the debut,
record going into the second record like I had a little bit of a chip on my shoulder
coming from like who did Chuck Eddie Roland Stone the three star review I was this like I never
yeah fuck you motherfucker and then that's when I slowly but surely got on my diet of which I'm now practicing
of trying to you know look at any kind of articles or any kind of reviews anything at all
of good, bad, I don't want to hear nothing.
Because, you know.
You and I took it personal.
That's weird.
It's not even my record.
And I, to this day, Chuck is on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame thing.
He, him and Alan Light, profusely apologize to you for, I never.
When?
I'm literally one.
All right.
I'm on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame board.
So basically, the Rolling Center.
Stone editors of the 80s
and the 90s are in the same room.
Trust me, they realized that
them reviewing hip hop
10 years ago was the equivalent
of vegetarians reviewing
a fried chicken contest. Exactly.
They need to make a statement then because that's in a room.
No, even with Allen
with with Alan with with out,
Alan light has regrets over
America's most wanted. Chuck Eddie
has regrets over
people's his city. He said it was
the least danceable
hip hop out.
dude, when I read it, I was just because I got the source review.
Tribes debut record was the first album to get a five mic review in the source in the summer of 90.
And they, because I had it already, they were saying everything I felt.
I was like, wow, this is like real critics actually are reviewing.
That's when I realized like, oh, the source might be on to something being like our Bible.
But then, because I was collecting all those Rolling Stone reviews on the back of the...
Who's the main review?
It was someone else that I think...
Was it Neil Young?
I don't know if it was freedom.
Whatever it was, Tribes was the thing on the back.
And I was just like, how can critics be so out of touch it?
And then I realized, oh, there's a double standard between hip-hop experts and rock experts.
like Salange and Brandy.
Yeah.
What happened with them?
I'm unclear.
Well, Salonge
gave Just Due to Brandy's work
and kind of the
pitchforkian
or John of...
John Caramacca.
Yeah, John Caramacca.
I can never get his...
I don't even know if I said it right.
I think, yeah, you got right.
John Caramacca.
You know, there's kind of like a snarky...
They said stop caping for Brandi.
something.
Basically, right?
Yeah, like a snarky, like,
what do you know about, like, real music?
Brandy's high art to you.
That sort of thing.
It wasn't for grizzly bear,
nobody would buy your record.
Yeah, that shit.
Oh, shit.
Exactly.
So, but she did the salons thing,
got in their ass.
Oh, yeah, well, you know.
Yeah, exactly.
So it's...
I remember when she was talking to me
about doing a record,
she was mad about...
She was so mad that it was a little bit
unintelligible, so I didn't really know.
Like, I was like, just like, I was like
looking at her feet, like,
make sure the motherfucker
stay on the ground. Right, so she
proposed to you the idea of what the album was going to be
before you guys started working.
Yeah.
Yeah, when she came, that's the first thing.
Like, she's like, come out of the studio, whatever.
I want you here some ideas, see what's up.
And then, like,
then she gave me the pitch.
And Sanfa's there, too, and I'm looking at Sanfa,
like, help me.
Help me.
Why?
What was your word?
Dang, now y'all got me one.
Well, no, no, it was just like, she was just like,
I'm making a manifesto, and I'm tired of this shit.
You whip me or not?
My girl.
And I was like, two, three, and fall in your way.
You're like this.
Dude, that's exactly.
You're like, is that okay?
Did I do okay?
You're joking, Fonte, but that's exactly what the fuck at.
I was like, she was not playing when she made this record.
Yeah, she knew what she wanted and was like,
she was not gripping me by the neck, like full force and crush groove.
Thank God.
To get the result.
Thank God.
So I love the records you did on her, too.
That was one of my favorite joints in that one.
Thank you, man.
That joint is dope, man.
Her and I have about about 10 records together.
Damn.
Yeah, because she's been working forever on the last one, yeah.
Yeah, and we were working on this shit, and then she went to Raphael and
And at one point she came back to me.
She came back to me.
But I've been working with cilantro.
I've always encouraged her to, like, go.
Like, she's like a dear, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear.
Like, we come to the crib, cook type shit.
Like, that's my sis right there.
And I'm just really happy for her, for her.
So how good is that album?
Oh, my God.
So fucking good, man.
So good.
Yes.
And she's all.
I'm so happy for her.
You know, because it's like, like, just not to digress,
but, you know, obviously her sister is queen.
You know what I mean?
And it must be, you know, you know, nepotism aside,
it must be hard to be.
But she's so fucking hit and nailed her own voice here.
Free.
And stuck her foot in it.
And it's just, I'm just really happy.
Happy for her, man.
I'm still clapping for salons.
So happy for her.
So happy for her.
So happy for her. Well, that's why I wanted y'all clap with me, so it didn't sound like, like that.
So for you, it was like, the chip on your shoulder was, yo, wait till they get a little to me.
I always, see, I didn't know if you read your, like, if you read reviews or not.
And so when you can't.
I got another little chip after this one, too, though.
But I can't say what it is yet.
For Lowen Theory?
No, for...
This new album?
Yeah.
Woo.
I don't know who reviewed it.
Well, it's not, you know, it, I just...
All right, what's the name of the periodical?
Does it start with the P?
I kind of get mad.
Is the rating good?
You can do it.
Damn.
Anyway, so...
Saloon and then.
Because about three seconds, it's this.
Science.
Murdering that.
Was it a magazine?
Like, was it a publication?
Was it a peer?
Was it like someone, like peer review kind of thing?
Good questions.
It's all good, man.
I'm just going to fuel it into the music.
All right, for sure.
There you go.
You better not let one monkey stop your show.
I'm sorry, was that an auntie mom?
That was such an auntie moment.
I'm sorry.
Come along here, baby.
You got to bring some chicken in here for us?
I can't have some chicken.
Go on great some chicken.
Cherry pie.
So was there a meeting or a manifesto of like,
what should we do this record?
It was just like...
Allowing theory?
Yeah.
Um, yeah, I think it was more like,
come on Fife.
You know what I'm saying?
And I was just like, yo, let's go.
So did he, was it that he didn't feel...
No, it was just...
Like, even with the last record,
like, should he have...
Was he late to a few sessions?
that, like, what's on sort of
should have Fipe been on
on the first album that he wasn't on?
There was just like, all right, well, you're not there, so.
Probably go ahead and rain, rhythm.
He should have been on going the rain?
Yeah, rhythm.
Push it along.
Wait, he's on that.
Push one of the Fiper.
It's time to decipher.
The situation which...
Oh, yeah, wait.
The situation which in private.
They'll push it on...
Push it along.
You made me think I was crazy.
Right.
I mean, I mean, footprints.
He should have been on that.
Damn.
Okay.
I mean, there was a couple.
But when we got,
when we was going to make low-end theory,
we was just like.
We need more of you.
With that,
and we was just like,
yo,
now it's time to,
to,
you know,
we put all the colors on the canvas
with the first album.
Now it's time to go,
cubism
you know like sharp
you know distinct
exact
like show
now we got to show our lines
you know I'm saying so it was more
it was more about that
and luckily the timing
was just I mean it wasn't our time and it was
just like the environment was
kind of heading towards that
um also so you guys
like you broke it down
more simple for
the people
whereas my idea
of a tribe called Quest
was definitely
like whatever the back cover
the Benita Applebum 12 inch was
like my version of tribe
is the abstract
kind of artsy
looking kids or whatever
whereas now the same group
is now on the Tarek's side of the fence
and just rocking
because the first thing I noticed I was like
oh they're rocking champion
Right, right, right.
We started that.
We kind of was doing that purposefully.
By the time we got to the Cannot Kick It video, we was like, okay, now we got to start,
we got to start phasing it in fashioning it as a precursor.
So you wanted to look more like the people?
Well, yeah, well, we came out, like, the first album was like about, the first album was more about the,
the spirit and more about
just philosophically
kind of the thing
you know the vastness
the all inclusiveness
nature of the record
you know
the idealism
the youthfulness
the naivete
like it was important
you know
much like if you look through phases of childhood
you know it's important to keep
a kid's imagination
intact and incited and you know you definitely want to step in with certain lessons there but you want to be
more encouraging so the spirit was more of a child spirit whereas the low end theory was a little bit
more of a coming of age like i said very specific minimal like bare bones like stripped down like that
was like all purposeful like disgust designed by the time we got to the can i kick a video
you know, mixing a little bit of Kintay Kloff with polo.
Right.
Like, and then full on by the time the album came.
For me, one of the most important musicians on the low-end theory.
Ron Carter?
No, Bob Power.
Oh, well, yeah.
So how did, tell the story of how Bob came into, uh, to, uh, to,
be. We were working in the studio, Goliopee.
Shane Farber was like the head
engineer, right?
It was the other cat there too.
They were all kind of like, you know, rock or do's
like rock and roll, whatever.
And it was a beautiful studio.
And Shane was doing the Jungle Brothers.
He was doing biz.
He was doing a lot, right?
So we started to work on our shit.
This was the first album.
and I remember Africa and them
had to have a sub one day
like Shane couldn't do the session
so there was a guy in the back who would do jingles
you had like the perfect jingle of ways
and da-da-da-da-da-da and
before we get there
when you go into the lobby
or into the front desk room of Calliope
they'd have all of their records that were done
at the studio up on the wall
12 inches and shit
one of them being Stetsa Sonic
Go Stetsa
That was one of the Latin
Quota staples
You know
When that shit would come on
With those fucking drums
Rumbling
It was a fucking problem
If you had anything on nice
You would want to hold on to it
All of that shit
So you're saying the heart of the drums
Can you play a little bit of it please
Are you trying to insinuate
That the heart of the song
The more like
Giant Insighting it was
Yes it was back then
And it was exciting for that
Yes it was exciting
Really?
It was like, yes.
Because you were in the DJ booth.
You know that, how do you say the Jiff with the battle kid?
And he's standing with his glasses.
And it was like, yes.
And everybody was like, oh, yo, where do you find that?
How do you find that Jif?
Because I look for that Jif and can't, I don't know what you call it.
I don't know what you call.
Battle rap.
Really?
Yeah, battle rap.
So you heard Go Stetsza by Stetsa Sonic in the Latin corner.
So this was like,
Your smells like team spirit.
This was your smells like team spirit at the Latin quarter.
That record was so crazy that it inspired them to make this other crew came out
The Mighty Mike Masters.
You ever hear that?
No.
No.
Word.
It was like an answer record to go to stets
kind of.
And that shit is banging too.
Freddie being Mighty Mike Masters.
The Mighty Mike Masters.
Yeah, that's the name of the song.
I think it's called Word.
It's just Word?
I'm the real McCoy.
I'm the real playboy.
Ladies, man.
Look at me for a tour.
You remember that?
It's on Tough City.
Yeah.
Oh, oh.
All right.
Airfuge alert.
Oh, yeah.
Airfuge's alert.
Turn it up.
Aaron Fuchs alert.
Arnie Palmley Alert.
Oh.
That's Daylai sampling these drums on swing a location.
Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.
This is in the compression.
Wow.
What year is this?
What year is this?
Pumpkin was on drums.
Pumpkin's a motherfucker boy.
Pumpkin was the house drummer of Enjoy Records, ladies and gentlemen.
What Keith LeBlanc and Doug Wimbusch were in Sugar Hill Records.
Uh-huh.
Pumpkin.
I always wanted to know where these drums came from on Swing a Low Cape because I thought this
was a print.
Like this is like a Prince ball beat to me.
Like every Prince ball beat in my mind is this.
And I thought he programmed it.
I'm not saying that.
What studio was that done in?
The information is not here.
Wow.
I wonder if that was done.
Freddie B.
the Mighty Mac, Mike Masters, born Aaron Fuchs's,
Tough City.
Toughs.
Ninety-six.
Wow.
It was crazy.
So Bob, so I looked,
I was like, wow, Stetsa,
because I remember always looking into credits
and it said, recorded him.
mixed by Bob Power.
Jump Cut 2.
You know, the sub is in there
and it's the engineer for
Africa and for a session on
Dunbarter Forces, I think.
You know the song?
I can't remember. I can't remember. I was about to say
it has to be doing the own thing.
No, J.B.'s coming through?
Hard.
It could be.
Because that's one of the...
It was the hardest, yes.
It's one of the... In terms of
arrangements for hip-hop songs,
It's either the first or the second for me.
Like, Jay B's coming through, you listen to the fucking arrangement on that record.
Yes.
And what's going to, that shit is like a queen record.
Yes.
It's insane.
It's criminal.
It's criminal that that was not even considered the first single off.
I feel like if that came first before Beyond This World.
Yes.
Oh, my God.
They would.
No, I agree.
And if I liked Beyond This World was still.
And the video of that shit could have made a difference.
Yeah.
It could have made a difference.
I swore it was going to be like.
I mean, that shit is to this day.
It's like.
Yeah, because that was never an official single, was it?
No.
And then the fucking.
No, no, no, it was.
It was.
Because the B side is what Farrell based nothing on for Nouri.
The George Michael father figure.
Ah.
That was his Noree.
I'm just, you know.
Kind of like
Giminoizing it, you know.
But that fucking jungle.
So anyway, so this guy is like,
this engineer guy is like
recording vocals on Africa.
And he's like, Africa's rapping,
rap, rap, rap, rap.
He messes up.
Then the engineer goes,
oh, that's okay.
I think that take was good.
Did you want to get another one?
Are you ready to do another one?
And AF is like,
what the fuck is this motherfucker is?
He's like,
okay, clear, stand by.
Like, he was just,
okay, clear.
It's like, this motherfucker
sounded like a fucking
airline pilot or some shit
and he would say,
or whatever the fuck, right?
So,
I liked his efficiency.
I liked the fact that he was just like
on it and just
accommodating and nice
because Shane was a little
old rocker guy
no rough
a little rough not old rocker guy but he started
because he had a few hits
he was doing pneumonia shit he was feeling
himself right you know what I'm saying
in the most unlikely space
with a bunch of black kids
so now he's bawling
he's feeling himself feeling himself
and Bob was just like
okay
I was like
so then we had to have the session we were supposed
to use Shane and Shane couldn't do it because
I guess Shane was in Costa Rica balling
I hear the regretful vacation
So then Bob Power was available
I was like, we didn't Bob Power
Is that the guy who was doing the Jungle Brother session
Two days ago
And the guy who did
And he was like yeah I was like book him
And that was it
Wow
That was it
Ever since then
Ever since then
He told that exact same story
Yes he did
Bob was our second guest on the show
It was amazing
Literally that exact same story
That record
That's the Sonic record
That was it.
And I saw him work.
Because he and I, like, that's how, like.
I wonder if Shane regrets it now.
Like, in hindsight.
It would have been different.
If he didn't take that vacation, like, Shane could have been on so much hip hop history.
What did he end up doing, Shane?
Um.
Records that he ended up working on.
I saw his name.
He did just a friend.
He did just a friend.
He did stuff.
Monies in the middle.
He did.
But for a lot of the mid-90s, late-90s generation cats, like, we,
all read
the engineer credits to our favorite
records and it was like
Bob Power, try it, Bob Power, De La Sol,
so that's who we roll with.
We wanted a person that sounded crisp and clean.
So how
many mixes would you go through?
And I know how meticulous Bob is
as an engineer. But for the low-end theory
to get the bass frequency
that fucking loud
and to get the snare drum
that, like, to get the
the bass frequencies that you guys use,
and the snares that you guys use,
and the voices, and you guys don't have
Chuck D. Preacher Voices.
So to get 33 and a third
of the bass with the kick,
the snare to punch through, and your voices,
which aren't Teddy Pender Grass,
come in a woman. It's none of that shit.
That was good.
Thank you.
I'm from Philly.
I'm from Philly.
But I'm just saying
what was the mixing process like?
I mean, how much damage did y'all do to...
Well, I know, first of all,
if you know Bob Power,
he never uses the big speakers.
So that's even, like,
he mixes everything on, like,
clock radio status, like, the worst speaker.
Well, because these...
So we can hear it.
If it sound good on that,
it's sound on everything.
That was his big rule
Like, and I must be quiet.
To this day, he's so right.
Because if you could, if you can,
if you can.
If you sound good on your phone.
Here and you hear everything and it's an articulation,
then you know that you're 75, 80% there.
And he would always say, so being that you can hear everything,
then it's about what, you know, the person,
what kind of personality you wanted to have.
Like, so if it's going for this or that.
He, he leans more to what's naturally there sonically.
you know what I mean
so how did you all achieve that because
as simple as the record sounds
drums bass voice
minimum samples
that is some hard shit
to achieve to be that loud
it's it's louder than the average
hip-hop record like you take an album
like nation of millions
yeah and put yeah which is crammed with everything
and it's a sonic assault but it's not really loud though
but it's not loud it's not heavy
it's light it's loud
in the in the high end sense
the word, but...
Do you feel like it has a lot of compression?
Takes the Nation moon?
A lot.
Right.
Yes.
So how did you guys...
It's a falsified loudness.
How did you guys cheat that?
Because that's some hard...
Because Bob, because Bob, I mean,
his thing is about placement, too.
Like, a guitar should kind of naturally
be in, like, anywhere.
If it's a rhythm guitar,
it should naturally be in kind of like a,
you know, low mid.
The bottom.
end of a low mid, so anywhere from like 300, you know, up to kind of maybe like...
But I was so scientific with it.
You know, two.
You know, it should be there.
And then the bass has its section, like, depending on it.
He was more about the natural placement of music and vocals and the sections of it, not too much compressions.
And he really liked to use a lot of, you know, going through, like, we worked on that, the, on the low end there, you work.
on the John Lennon Neve.
That was in battery.
What?
Yeah, that was in battery.
Damn, that was before my time.
Yeah, that was in Studio B.
Really?
Mm-hmm.
So we did a lot of shit going through that Neve.
And then we wind up mixing an A on the SSO.
So the actual recording of it, the shit I was giving him,
the sources I was giving him.
Yeah, it was going to do.
So you were record that battery in the B room?
Yeah.
Damn.
Do you miss going on a battery?
Just to feel enough.
I do.
I do.
It was fun.
It was fun.
When did y'all go?
Because y'all was record.
We started December of 93.
So what's weird was, okay.
But the first joint y'all did, y'all did home, right?
Well, we did Organics home at some spot in Nepal.
That sounded great.
Well, that was like in a garage.
We didn't know what we were doing.
So all of Christmas of 1993,
and this before automation
this is on two inch tape
so like
you know
I regretfully like the guys
would get mad at me
if I'd say like
okay I want to echo on this part
which would mean that Bob would
rewind
rewind and you know
when you rewind the tape
that's already
90 seconds worth of time
now we're trying to perfect it
any any request I had
of Bob Powell was a 20 minute exercise
so
we're taking
eight to nine hours
per song per day
and you know
we were used to just knocking shit out
like okay now our song's done
but now it's like
but Bob explained like
this is the meticulous process
and you have to go to guys
I need some quiet
if you guys want to talk please guys
you go in another room
did you hear that a lot
did you hear that a lot?
He said that a lot
boss bill has alerted me
to the fact that what's the website
all music
all music dogs or discogs
Oh, yeah, discogs.
When you go to discogs and you look up someone's information,
because I gave Bob a new moniker title for each song.
It would be like mixed by Bob, guys, you really must take this in the break room.
Power.
He has over like 60 alias credits.
Guys, really, I left you guys some food in the fridge.
Go check it out while I mixed this song.
Literally.
Yeah, Bob was, it must be quiet.
There was no, like none of that.
None of the shit that I thought was going to happen when you make a rap record, like girls and parties and all that stuff.
None of that was going on at root sessions.
Like we were quiet and focused.
Guys, I just need a little bit of quiet, please.
That sounds like, Tim, why don't you come in and take a little?
You know, I, you know, I know, I know what you didn't get.
Right, right, exactly.
He would talk you down.
And a non-condescending.
Yeah.
In a way you feel like, yeah, you are doing this for the greater good, Bob.
Okay, let me take all this weed and hookers in the next one.
Yeah, right, right, right, right, right, right.
A win is a win.
A win is a win.
I don't care what I'm saying.
Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th.
You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football,
or my career in sports media.
Well, somewhere along the way, this platform became bigger than I ever imagined.
And now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show.
This is a place for Raw.
unfiltered conversations with some of your favorite athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated.
One week, I'll take you behind the scenes of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment, and the next we'll talk about life, mental health, purpose, and even music.
The Clivert Show isn't just a podcast, it's a space for honest conversations, stories that don't always get told, and for people who are chasing something bigger.
So, if you've ever supported me, or you're just chasing down a dream, this is right where you need to be.
Listen to The Clifford Show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok.
This week on the Sports Slice podcast, it's all about the NFL draft.
And we've got a special guest.
The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galko, joins the Sports Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects.
From hidden traits teams look for to the biggest mistakes franchises make to the player.
flying under the radar. This is the insight you won't hear anywhere else. If you want to understand
the draft like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode. Listen to the Sports Slice
podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more,
follow Timbo Slica Life 12 and TikTok podcast network on TikTok. There's two golden rules that any man
should live by. Rule one, never mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid
surprises. And Rule 2, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends.
I'm Anna Sinfield, and in this new season of the girlfriends, oh my God, this is the same man.
A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist. I felt like I got hit by
a truck. I thought, how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to care. So they take matters
into their own hands. I said, oh, hell no. I vowed.
I will be his last target.
He's going to get what he deserves.
Listen to the girlfriends.
Trust me, babe.
On the Iheart radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
Well, at this rate, I'll be lucky to get the Midnight Marath.
Yeah, we got to get him out of now.
Let's get to come on.
All right.
So look, so look, for me, I know this is nerd facts.
But it should be noted.
It should be noted that I feel like the scenario
remix ushered in
well
the chopping of
the chopping of blind alley
and what
it represented I felt like
that was the most
influential
move that you guys did as
producers
because pretty soon
when cats heard
Blind Alley
chopped in a way
okay I'm speaking of
the emotions blind Alley
ain't no half step in
Rumpshank
All these songs
Shions and Marley
And you brought it back for phony rappers on
I love that fucking song
Thank you man
So to
To chop it up in a way
In which
I feel like producers are like
Wait a minute
We don't have to play the complete four bar
phrase of a drum
We can now
Chop stuff in half
Yeah that you know what guys
Just to interrupt, that happened on Check the Rhym, actually.
Because I remember having a conversation with Large.
Because prior to this, and this is not like me trying to do it, none of that shit.
But just on some, like, producer shit, geeky, whatever.
But I remember having a conversation with Lodge Professor, and I was like,
yo, those drums on the EPMD album, you know that EPMD song,
it was...
Do you do...
Oh, the...
The Hydro, do...
Right.
It was on their album, right?
And they had the whole loop just playing.
And I had the record.
And I remember just...
Wait, you...
That's your drum?
Yo, I remember just playing it.
And I was like, yo, Paul.
Yo.
I could just get half a bar of these drums.
They're naked right here.
And I can extend it.
He was like, what you mean?
I was like, yo.
listen and it was like
Badoo doom kett
Dood do
Katt
Dood do
Friking me y'all
I said
I wasn't going to do this butt
Duh
Duh Duh
Duh
Duh
Duh
Duh
D Duh
D Duh
D D D Duh
Hydra
Oh
By Grover
Washington
Jr.
And then I just
took an
extra kick
off of the
Mini Rippet
and I was like
Yo look at this kick
Just translate for me y'all
because I'm just having a moment
Yeah that was the first time
Fucking Hydra.
Yeah.
If you could take half of a, half a bar,
to do do,
like it wasn't,
that wasn't being done.
You know what I'm saying?
So it was just like you would get the loop and loop it
or you'd have a program still to that point.
But to realize that you could just get a little
fucking piece and extend it, I was like,
oh, shit.
Now I'll take the rhyme.
It was so weird that you said that because
when you said check the rhyme,
I was going to say, well, that doesn't count it
because no one knows what those drums are anyway.
We knew them all along.
Two. All right. Philadelphia's
own, Grover Washington, Jr.
I, Dr. A.B.A. Ballsville.
Just go.
Side note.
Side note,
Lewis Johnson and the brothers Johnson
is playing bass on this.
Ah, wow.
And, Steve, you are the
master of all things.
Cree Taylor.
Yeah.
do.
Yes.
What album is it?
Is it feeling so good?
Yeah.
Feels so good?
Papa love it.
Oh, I hear it.
Papa love.
Then it does it.
You know what I'll go and check the rhyme?
I will.
I would still love to flip it to show our listeners exactly how it was made.
But, you know.
If I can hear it, they can hear it because, you know, my.
Yes.
If you couldn't hear poison.
Oh, man.
What's the hint for that.
If auntie ears can hear it.
Yo, where was Creed Taylor's studio at?
Creed Taylor Studio.
The CTI.
Like, where did he cut?
Rudy Van Gelder.
Oh, he cut it in Englewood.
Everything there, yeah.
All that CTI shit was cut?
Mm-hmm.
Yep.
I would do that.
All right, just for tip.
I'll do it right now.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
You're welcome.
And I forgot what I was looking for.
The Kudu stuff, too, mainly.
over there.
Some stuff at Electrical Lady, actually.
I realize that...
I mean, it should be a museum.
The reason why it was taking me so long
was because I forgot that rhyme was spelled.
R-H-I-M-E.
They cut Love Supreme in that room.
Wow.
They cut all that blue note, you know, all blue note.
You hear it?
I hear it.
Yeah.
Boom-boom-th-thum-th-th-boom-th.
It's fucking amazing.
A win is a win.
A win.
I don't care what you're saying.
Yep, that's me, Cliver Taylor the 4th.
You might have seen the skits, the reactions,
my journey from basketball to college football,
or my career in sports media.
Well, somewhere along the way,
this platform became bigger than I ever imagined.
And now I'm bringing all of that excitement
to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show.
This is a place for raw,
unfiltered conversations with some of your favorite athletes,
creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated.
One week, I'll take you behind the scenes
of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment,
and the next we'll talk about life,
mental health, purpose, and even music.
The Clifford Show isn't just a podcast,
it's a space for honest conversations,
stories that don't always get told,
and for people who are chasing something bigger.
So, if you've ever supported me,
or you're just chasing down a dream,
this is right where you need to be.
Listen to the Clifford show on the IHeart Radio app,
Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.
And for more behind the scenes,
follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network
on TikTok.
top. This week on the Sports Sliced podcast, it's all about the NFL draft, and we've got a special
guest. The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galco, joins the Sports
Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects. From hidden
traits teams look for to the biggest mistakes franchises make to the players flying under
the radar, this is the insight you won't hear anywhere else. If you want to understand the draft
like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode. Listen to the Sports Sliced podcast,
on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
And for more, follow Timbo Slice of Life 12 and TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok.
There's two golden rules that any man should live by.
Rule one, never mess with a country girl.
You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes.
And rule two, never mess with her friends either.
We always say that trust your girlfriends.
I'm Anna Sinfield.
And in this new season of The Girlfriends,
Oh my God, this is the same man.
A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist.
I felt like I got hit by a truck.
I thought, how could this happen to me?
The cops didn't seem to care.
So they take matters into their own hands.
I said, oh, hell no.
I vowed. I will be his last target.
He's going to get what he deserves.
Listen to the Girlfriends.
Trust me, babe.
On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcast.
Speaking of that,
speaking of the remix.
Yeah, speaking of the remix,
where did Hood come from?
Hood was from around my way.
You know, Sri K.
He was in and out of group homes.
He was really trying to get it together.
And I was looking forward to working with him
because kind of predating, you know,
a Redman or B-I-G
I thought that
like he kind of occupies something that I hadn't heard in a while
like a real real street energy that was now
but it was just real like
he has some rhymes
man he was dope
and unfortunately that was the only
he was from Hollis
that was the only joint
that he got to do
he didn't even get to see that come out
oh damn
How long was his demise after?
Well, after we did the record, he was murdered, I think, the week after.
Damn.
Jesus.
Okay, so how many versions of scenario are there?
And why did it go through so many drafts before we wound up with the final version that we have?
I think there's like one, which is original, two.
Do you know who was on each version?
Three.
No, I know.
There's one version where it's us again with...
There's actually four.
There's the one that's out.
Then there's another version with all of us
who are on the record with just different placement
in different little versions.
So there's a different where Buster doesn't end the song?
And...
He does...
Yeah, something...
Something different.
It was a rough about it.
I don't know if you didn't end it.
But I know it's a different rap a little bit.
Then there's another version with Jerobi and Paz on it.
And Chris Lattie, right?
Then there's another version with Dres, Paz, and Chris Liddy.
Damn.
How did y'all decide on with the final?
Was this like, this is our moment?
Let's not mess this up.
I already knew that it was going to be the first.
first one.
So the album version is the first one?
Yeah. I already knew that that was
going to be it. Wait a minute. Let me
make sure this straight. The version
that's on the album, was done
completely
as we know it.
And you're saying
that there was a discussion like
we could do better.
We did that. And
I kind of knew what it was, but
everybody was in there and heard it
and heard about it. It was like,
You, I want to come by rum on it.
Oh, everybody was like...
Yes, I was excited.
So here's the other million dollar question.
And you know what's coming.
Why wasn't De Laos on any tribe records?
And a war tour doesn't count.
Yeah, you know...
Or was just...
Native tongues just a fantasy in our minds.
No, no, no, no, no.
The first thing I wanted to do,
I had a record called...
Native Tones for the first album.
And it's sampled
Pride and Vanity by Ohio players.
I still have the beat, actually.
But, and I played it,
I told Daylon and Jungle, I said,
come by, I got the record for all of us.
And then I had, like,
on instinctive travels.
Shit!
Right? And so then I was playing it,
and Passenham was like, you know,
Merth was like,
you know.
Listen to it to all that shit.
Dave was just to see it.
And then, because when we walked in, when they walked in,
we were working on Mr. Muhammad.
Oh, man.
He was the first thing he heard it.
And he was like, yo, that's hype.
That's the hype.
That's the hype.
He kept saying.
That's like, yo, but let me play you the beat for native tongue.
And it's all like, do, do, do, do, do.
Bram, bam.
And, and, uh, and, uh,
and, um,
He was like, no, we're going to rhyme on the other one.
I was like, nah, that's Mr. Maras Ali's joint.
No, y'all not rhyming on that.
It's this one.
Nah, fuck that.
We're going to rhyme with the other one.
Come on, y'all.
Come on, pyes.
Come on.
Come on, let's do it.
We're rhyming on the other one.
And I was looking at him.
I was like, I was like, well, you're going to rhymeing on that.
So they never.
So that would never happen.
Then...
Well, I mean, her and ease, but that doesn't count.
Yeah, that doesn't count.
Ah, man.
That was the one chance, I believe, other than a war tour and the scenario things, you know?
Because, like, every native tongue entry has their own native tongue posse cut on it.
And it never happened on a tribe record.
And I just, you know, all right, so midnight.
There's a, there's a version of midnight with ad rock on it.
The night is on my mind?
Yeah, but before it was even that, it was just a beat.
I'm rhyming over that.
Wow.
I just found that shit.
The George Juke Joy?
Mm-hmm.
What album?
Ah, don't make you make me figure out what it is.
Is it the oral?
Prevail?
Is it?
Okay, yes.
That's it.
You sure you found it?
Well, I knew I was on it because it felt familiar.
I didn't figure out which chords y'all used, but it was just...
Who was the voice for the tour guide?
Rest in peace, Laurel Dan.
She just passed last year.
Oh, man.
She was the production coordinator at Jive.
Sweet lady, like just super nice.
and oh man she was so white white yeah but she was super cool man like she deserved a chibreude i feel like
she was dope and how did y'all EQ her voice to make it sound like that what you know we just wanted
to make it sound like a computer or a phone or something like that something that was just that didn't
fuck with the other frequencies and shit you know this is the voice on your own yeah i remember
writing all that shit out for her and telling her say it like this
No, no, say it like this.
And I was like, okay, now, Bob, you got to chop it.
I know, I know, I know, I know.
So he was like, this is on real.
I was all excited.
I was more excited about that than anything else in the record.
I was like, okay, now you got to chop it.
Now you got to make it sound of it.
Tip, I know.
And he's chopper.
This is on real.
Actually, that is hard to compute.
How do you do that?
Yeah, like he's chopping it.
Like, you mean like on actual real.
He's chopping a voice.
That was done on,
tape.
Yeah.
He would say
oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
I got to ask Bob. I can't remember.
I wanted to say it was either done tape
or it was a sample
or it was samples.
And I would fire off the sample
and fire off the sample
for the next phrase, like,
I am on the front of your
album cover and then
you're about to, you know,
and try
Like Girl Quest, you know, I think it was that.
Cute tip, yeah.
Was that the first time, so you carried that graphic over
into the beats, rhymes, and life cover?
And I've always wanted to ask you this.
Yeah, who is that person?
I worry.
Yeah, no, no, no, that was it.
Oh, no, that was it.
I'm sorry.
No, no, you was kind of completing it, right?
Who was that person?
And also, my theory, or how I always interpreted
the beats, rhymes, and life cover, to me,
it looked like
because this is around the time
this is like Biggie Pop
like all that shit was going on
and it just looked like hip hop
was just kind of in a state of emergency
and you know so you had like the
the red black and green the figure
was crying and the city was burning
and to me it just
that's what it represented it represented
hip hop kind of falling apart
I did
I mean
it was just like
the B rhymes in life period
it was an odd time
It was a little dark
It was because
I guess Fife and I were having our
Issues
And I converted to Islam
And then I met Dilla
And just meeting him
Was just like a bright spot
And bringing him in on the record
And I bought
Consequence on the record
So I guess everybody started feeling threatened
And my whole thing was like, come on, you know, I was all just all happy go like, no, it's a tribe.
Everybody can come on, yo, hey.
You know, and I don't think everybody was feeling that.
But I just wanted to kind of like be more expansive.
I felt like, you know, the way that hip hop was starting to shift, even though we weren't necessarily following the same course per se,
I still wanted to put something in there that still represented like a growth, if you would,
or some sort of like, you know, new elements.
Just we're changing in our own way, you know, at the same time that the genre is changing.
So, you know, it just bought, it was a lot of stuff that wasn't discussed, wasn't clear.
But definitely
People put us on this pedestal at the time
critically and all this shit
So sorry about that
But I mean but y'all had released like three perfect albums before
So it's kind of like
I mean
You can understand where that pedestal
came from
I mean it was a well-deserved pedestal
Well I
You know
After that first
It's like
Wait a minute
Why are we skipping a record
Like we know
We're not
We just ask the question
I was just...
He was talking about the figurine
and what it represents.
Wait, before we go to the dark place,
wait, go to the happy place.
Tim, please.
Tip, explain this.
Tell me this story.
All right, I'm going to play this for it.
I'm going to play you this,
and you explain what this means, Steve.
This is don't walk away by Jade
on Quest Love Supreme.
Enjoy it all.
You're in the comfort.
I'm the one with the braces.
Of course, no one...
I let that rock.
Let the rock.
You got the rock.
Come on, hold on.
Now, will you play this in your DJ sets?
There's a reason why I'm playing this, ladies and gentlemen.
Tip's going to explain why.
Shout out for the girls who have poetic justice braids.
Can I ask you some...
Tip.
Wait, you're an R&B head.
Head.
That's weird to me because it's like,
you live in a world where like Galt McDermott lives,
but then right now you're doing the Reebok.
I just took video this and it's going to be great
because there's no music behind it.
There's like Garfield minus Garfield.
Garfield minus Garfield.
Tim.
explain to me
why that song is so important to you
man listen to that record
that shit is so dope
but this is the thing though
in the bass line obviously
but I heard it
it didn't hit me that way
so how
where did it hit you
to the point you were like
yo
we gotta go there
well
dance too hard
no
it's a chorus
turn it up
wait it's it turn it up
hey
Hey, hey, don't walk away, boy.
See, I'm the only one that's followed the rules.
You only have the words.
Don't walk away, boy.
I said vibrate.
Put it on vibrate.
I'll be right there for you.
They got in a movie based off that song, Inc.
It's right.
Jay's in Inkwell?
Yes.
You got to let this play.
You gotta get to the don't walk.
Break it down.
Okay, this is the breakdown.
You can turn it down.
Oh, you don't like that one.
No, no, we just turn it down.
Every time we hear the chorus.
You can talk over it.
It's the bass line, though, that.
This is the hard.
When you make a love.
So can you explain our...
Do da-da-dum-dum-dum-dum-dum.
Don't walk away.
I was just here that shit in the club.
That shit would just be rock and stuff.
so hard.
All right. The chorus is back.
Well, no, not really.
Not yet. Oh, it's not yet. It's like a play.
I've heard you play this in the club many times.
You have? Yes, yes, I have.
I mean, my God.
It's still goes, man. It goes.
And it's an era. Like, the whole era.
It's summer 93 all over.
Yeah, that was a good summer. Oh, my God.
This shit was cracking. So when I heard it, I was like, I got to make a record, like, that
baseline. So I just wanted to, like, re-approach it.
So it was, um, do-d-do-do-do-do-do.
I mean, because obviously it was going against the Weldon Nervine.
Right.
You know what I mean?
I never would have gotten that.
Me neither.
Yeah, like, it took me a long time to figure that that's where.
Yeah.
How do you hear these music ideas?
Because I know the original...
I'm not.
Because I know, I think you the king, especially with songs like this, where you...
You will force a square and a circle peg.
Because the thing is, the horn line doesn't have anything melodically.
Actually, that is a guitar line from Charles Ehrlich.
I'm sorry.
Yeah.
So the guitar line from Charles Ehrlichin has nothing to do with Walden Irvine,
which has nothing to do with a J bass line.
Nothing.
Which has nothing to do with the.
The bridge
But you forced it to work.
That was fun, wasn't it?
Yeah, I love it.
The dance break is always fun.
Yeah, we don't have enough dance breaks.
We really don't do.
You need to have more dance breaks.
More dance breaks.
Or can Tip just be on every episode now?
Oh, oh, oh, how about this?
Tip, I was the first guest,
and now I'm on the show.
You can be the 50th guest, and now you're on the show.
Either that or
is this a proposition
or proposal.
and you guys can talk it over
the Chappelle level of proposal
this means it might not ever happen
Oh don't do that.
So crazy just like Brooke
Amir
You gotta trust me on this
Yes
So
I have a great idea
It's great
You don't get that
It's just an idea
Every time that y'all want to have
have a dance segue.
Just call it the tip dance segue.
Oh, you ain't gotta be here.
All right, okay.
We will now-
Mitz-Sept-Six.
No matter who, I don't care a nigga if it's a
nigga I have beef with, you have to say,
okay, this is the tip dance segment.
If we do that, you have to record an intro for the segment.
Oh, I'll, I'll totally, I'll do it.
Don't worry about it.
I'll record the tip dance segment music.
Give us the intro.
Like, interrupt.
We interrupt this for a tip dance break.
We interrupt this for a Q-tip dance break.
Dance.
This will, I will always have this.
One, Bill, wait, come on.
Effolus.
Effolish.
Effolish.
Effiless.
Effiless.
All right.
Wait, we all stop dancing?
No.
It's a Q-tip dance break, man.
It's a Q-tip dance break, ma'am.
Don't walk away.
Okay, let's talk about arguments in the group.
Good segue.
Great segue.
Spoonful of sugar.
Actually, Midnight Marauders is so overwhelming.
I don't know what to talk about it or how to praise it.
Electric relaxation.
Like, what that means?
Let's get to the dark.
You're three.
No, no, not even.
Because there's a lot of dissecting I want to do.
creative.
Can I ask what question?
It just can't keep popped in my head.
I don't know if it's ever going to come back again,
so I have to take advantage of it.
Okay.
The part on the album where you and you and rich,
and I think it's you rich and who is I arguing?
Was that real?
On the phone?
Who was that?
Yes, that was very much real.
What was that?
Okay, so we were.
It's talking about the intro to Rising Down.
The intro to Rising Down.
Should I play it?
Have you heard?
Play it?
If Laia hasn't heard it, then that means it doesn't exist.
Don't do that.
You know I heard it.
No, you did.
I want to hear it.
I feel like if a root song falls in the forest and it, Lai doesn't hear it, it never made a sound.
I'm good to Game Theory.
I am good to Game Theory.
It's like four albums after that.
I know.
I know.
I'm just saying.
Oh, I'm good.
It's the album after.
Oh.
It's like, Risen down.
Oh, yeah.
That was a good one, too.
had to go-go-dron with Chris at Michelle and why like that's anyway all right so
this is what tip is asking about like it is I mean that shit wasn't fun that shit was not
it wasn't no fucking busy trip it was fucking hard work and shit you know what I feel like I
bust my ass for you all I want to what happened before I bust my ass
and not get anything out of it well if y'all really that fucking unhappy all the
my problems with me that made me off your school so how fucked up like two years is what she was
really saying that and shit like that
screaming at me.
I'm telling you.
It sounds like that conversation.
We had a couple weeks ago.
That's Rich right there, right?
That is Rich.
You know that that nigga Rich?
You're kidding.
You're a kidnig ass up.
Tell him?
Don't matter what the nigga
look like.
I love Rich.
Rich?
RIP?
Rich got in that soul like Ether.
Yeah, man.
That was like
he was...
He was R. Peter Grant.
But that passionately his voice...
That motherfucker will bloody somebody
knows real quick.
Yo, he's son Kim Gamble.
Remember he's son Gamble?
I'm sorry, that was...
Rich will bloody your nose
and you will thank him for it afterwards.
Yeah.
I mean, but, yeah, so what you're hearing is...
So who was that talking at further?
That was Tariq?
That was...
Okay.
AJ Shine, who is the Stretch Armstrong and Bob Beto
of Philadelphia,
who discovered us,
and with his accident money,
settlement money,
made a demo called Organics for the Roots.
and we somehow nuanced that into a record deal.
So this particular...
He's coming back for some pay.
Next question.
No, a bootleg recently came back.
I was like, wait, where did this album come from?
It was like us live in London somewhere.
Anyway, so the scenario is we are doing our first promo tour down south,
and this is where we're slowly real.
that this is going to be a long, hard journey.
And that long, hard journey, you know, in our minds, we thought like, well, if we make
what's good to, like, we didn't know what a formula.
I didn't know about a hook and pop atmosphere and all that stuff.
And we didn't know that stuff.
So all we knew was that we went to a nightclub in North Carolina.
No offense.
Oh, damn.
We went to a nightclub.
in North Carolina.
And in hindsight,
the DJ probably
shouldn't have stopped
playing Warren G immediately.
Like it was one of those television segments.
It was like...
The roots are in the house.
No, it was like...
No, no, no, it was like...
Perfect example.
It was like the five heartbeats.
This next group coming on
say they better than the five...
Four tops.
Right.
The temptation is put together.
We shall see.
Set you up for the goddamn okedone.
I'm just saying, I'm just saying as a DJ who is DJ through the bad boy era,
like Puff is notorious, especially like, let's go 10 years back.
You beat DJ in a club, and then the bad boy street team commandeers your DJ booth
with, yo, here, play this now.
Right.
Like, and so this person obviously didn't have any nuance with the segue.
So it's like a very popular known song, suddenly he just,
takes it off and puts
on a song
maybe I should have put the
kick drum on the one and the three
so that the beat was more steady.
Storcian static. He just puts distortion of static on
and I literally watched
a dance floor
all stop and turn back
at the DJ like that.
It was like, no it wasn't
even that. It wasn't even that.
It hurt them to dance
to. They were just
like
that kick
Drum is a little disorienting.
I didn't know.
For me, I was just taking the second half of substitution.
Yeah.
I was taking the second half of subsidy.
I wanted to do off substitution,
but because those guys were like,
we'll get sued, we'll get sued.
And I was like, all right, well, I'll do the second half of substitution.
And I fought them on it because I said,
yo, Dale I already did the second half of substitution
on the last song on Blue Mind State.
Yeah.
And, you know, they're like, no, man, don't do substitution.
We're going to get sued.
So, I mean, I saw them struggle with it.
And then when they cleared the dance floor, it was like, oh, we're fucked.
We are so fucked right now.
And so just all that week, we go to in stores with just like three people there.
And those are like the employees.
We go to, we went to Florida somewhere and nobody cared.
It was like a week of hell.
And so we got on the phone.
It was Wendy Goldstein.
Joe
Wendy was on that call
Yes
Oh my God
She was
And Tariq
Quiet hell yeah
Had what y'all got them
Contract in the shredder
Like
Right
So
Right over that motherfucker
Tarreek
Toreek is fussing
And cussing
And like
He laid into it
Like you know
What the fuck
Like
We're out here
The street team
Doesn't know
Who we are
And da da da da
And we go to night clubs
And that's
Tareke right
At the beginning
No
Well that's
Okay
Yes, in the very beginning.
He's talking to Wendy.
Tarique called and cursed out Wendy Goldstein.
Wendy then called Tarique like,
I just got cursed out by Tarique.
What the fuck?
And then Rich called Joe and me and Tarique
was like, yo, like,
y'all can't be spazzed out at the A&R like that.
And, you know, you can't be spazzed out.
And Tarik would just like, you know,
it was just basically, we had,
had all these expectations to do well.
We thought...
Tarreek is a wild boy, too.
Yes. So, it must have been
like, I was listening to that shit.
I mean, when it first came out, I was like,
oh, I felt like, wow.
You know the group dynamic.
Yeah, I was like...
It sounds familiar, though? Y'all didn't go through anything.
Oh, yeah.
Every group. This is why, like, groups...
One thing, can I ask, did you guys just tape record every
conversation you guys had on the phone?
What made you tape that?
Yeah, right.
Did you, like, did you?
Oh, I was too...
Okay, the part that I'm leaving out
was that I still had a bunk bed.
Say what now?
Yeah, exactly.
Here's the thing.
I was...
I had...
I'm still in my childhood home.
This is how we're doing.
So, because I was on the top bunk...
Bunk bed, can we make bunk beds?
The message already went to...
Machine.
Amir, I know you there, pick up the phone.
You know, like old-school answer machines.
So machine recorded it.
Right.
So then, you know, I'm on the top bunk.
It's our region on the floor.
And I was too lazy to get off off the bed to turn off the machine.
Right, so I just let it go and stay.
But then, you know, it's.
So why was he calling out your name?
Like, Amir, tell to them and tell them.
Well, because it was, Rich was saying, Amir, will you tell them?
Because people think that they're talking to me.
No.
He was like, Amir, well?
Will you tell them what happened on the road?
Basically, it was kind of the two managers arguing with each other.
Whereas Joe, A.J. Shine was like, yo, don't mess up our good thing at Geffen.
And Rich was sort of on me and Tariq's side like, shit's fucked up out here.
And we were broke.
And when you're broke, you argue.
So that's, there was a lot of that going on.
But surprisingly, we stayed together for 25 plus years.
Can we get a sound effect for that?
key to that.
That's called clap.
That's a major thing.
Nah.
Well, this is what I want to know.
Like, why didn't y'all just,
not that you guys were road dogs as far as, like,
always on a tour bus.
But we knew from the gate that two tour buses would save this group.
And, you know, I joke about the whole Gryffindor and Slythering thing.
But, you know,
In hindsight, could a lot of the tension then avoid it?
If we had two tour buses?
Yeah.
No.
No.
I mean, it was just...
Like doing all the Lala Poulouza tour.
Were y'all on the same bus?
See, you got to remember, and it's probably like y'all, too.
Like, we grew up together.
You know what I'm saying?
We grew up, yeah.
So you getting separate buses to me?
Yeah.
I've seen a lot of rock and rollers say that, and that works.
and that was very well
but our shit was deep
you know
pardon the pun deep rooted
that had nothing to do
with any sort of physical separation
it was more
I mean
like it's it was really like
we were cool
then you get on
and then people start coming around
that you've never seen before
and they start working their way into your equation
and then
this starts to become separate groups
like
little factions
yeah the little factions
and you know how that shit is
there's the faction
we are all groups here
yeah
yeah there's this faction
this faction
and then
that couple with the fact
that you're still young
you are still
you know
fighting for
your own terrain
as an individual
and all that shit
and then
the new people are coming in like
yeah man you got to fight for your own terrain
nigga you gotta
don't fight for my own terrain
I want to know
You know
like that type of shit
I feel you
and especially for you
because there's nothing more awkward
when you get singled out
That's why I always said from the beginning
Like this is my tribe
Never put my face in the cover
And I was always
I wanted to ask you that man
Like to me you always seem to be
and let me know if I was reading it wrong,
you always seems to be like a kind of reluctant.
Very reluctant.
You know what I mean?
Like you never, I mean, you had the talent.
I mean, you know, cool.
You sound like James Brown, very reluctant.
But the thing, though, is at least there is.
You do sometimes, that's right.
At least there is justifiable understanding for the lead voice
to be the center of attention.
Right.
It's 12 more times awkward when,
the leader is the guy that's way in the back.
Yeah, the drama, yeah.
Yeah, it's like, oh, Jesus.
Like, I don't want this attention.
But your hair so big.
Thank you.
That's what she said.
No, but it's, it's, it's like no one understands
the group dynamic more in the shit that goes on with groups,
especially in your situation and in your situation.
more than me.
Like, it's just, I get it.
I think, at least in me and Tariq's situation,
the greater good of the group is probably,
I mean, we at least had that understanding ironclad.
You know, we've only had one fist fight in our 25 years.
And that was like maybe two weeks after the distortion of static video.
Who?
Who won?
Who won?
It's never...
I mean, I'm too big.
Like, I sat on top of him.
Like, let's...
Like, he threw a chair.
We wrestled in the office and then, like...
I think he'll get off, me, get off.
Well, here's the funny thing, though.
This is the thing that Rich later admitted.
Like, we, like, post...
Post-fights with anybody that you ever been in the fist fight,
I don't know if you've personally been in a fist fight.
Uh-huh. Uh-huh.
I'm big.
But, yeah, even even the person that gets hit and the person that does the hitting, they both are,
there's equal pain, like, you know.
And, but me and Tariq, like, didn't want to let each other know that we were, so we were, like,
limping in the hallway of our apartment.
Man.
But when we see each other, like, I'm not hurt.
I ain't hurt, yeah.
I'm straight.
Then, like, a month later, we just laughed.
out loud about it, like, yeah, I wasn't hurt.
I wasn't hurt either.
I'm sorry, man.
Oh, shit.
You know, so it's, it's, it's, it's, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I,
about a fight.
Fist a cuffs.
Oh, yeah, this is definitely, Tip Ali right.
Tip Fife right here
So Tip
Obviously
Your story is way more expansive
You're going to have to come back later
In the year
In the future
We'll speak about movies for the tip dance break
Is this part one?
Yes
This is part one
What did you learn, Fonte?
I learned that Q-Tip is still
One of the biggest music fans ever
To see you drop records
and him still be dancing to it
and, you know, for you to drop a record like
Ghost Tessa and him to reminisce on it
and it takes him right back to the last quarter.
You know what I mean?
That's just a beautiful thing to see.
It's a lot of brothers that, you know,
have been in the game,
have been in the game as long as you have,
you know what I'm saying,
but have become somewhat jaded
and have lost that passion for the music.
But then you know what fun?
Like, how could you,
maybe it's just me being naive,
but how could you not have that excitement for music?
It can happen.
Because some people, they take it personally.
So it's like if you have musical dreams and, okay, the dreams didn't work for me.
A dream.
What happens to a loan deferred?
You know what I mean?
It's like it's that kind of shit.
So like if your shit gets deferred, then all of a sudden it's like sour grapes.
I mean, I must not be that.
I can't even understand that.
Like seriously, like I can't even, I don't have a comprehension of that.
Like, I love music so much.
It's so much a part of everything.
Even when if I'm in a fucked-up move,
said, whatever, like, there's music to accompany.
Like, when Fife passed, you know, for, you know, days after,
you know, I'd have to put together some,
I'd have to hear some music to get me up or to give me going.
So what would you play? What was your stuff?
I mean, do you go to Stevie or Herbie or, you know,
EW. Webb or, you know.
The go-to.
Yeah.
And if you want to cool out, like just keep me up, keep me optimistic, keep me, you know, going.
And, you know, I don't know.
I guess I sound corny, I feel.
Nah, not.
Did you have any records?
Yeah, very human.
Did you have any records that you played for, like, the other stuff just to really get into the sadness of the moment?
Like, did you have any of those joints?
No, but it's funny because you know how it is, like, you always find something about, you always find something about.
about whatever it is that makes you sad.
It's just very relative or poignant to that moment.
You know, for a horrible example,
like if you have a breakup with a girl
and every song you hear is like relatable
to the breakup or whatever, you know what I mean?
So even in those joyous songs,
there would be points that would take you there
that, you know, to tear you up, you know what I mean?
So I just can't even fathom somebody not appreciating me.
Well, I'm going to actually take the liberty to say that I think we all learn something really important.
And that's the importance of a good goddamn dance break.
Ladies and gentlemen, yes, I've taken over.
You gotta go.
The awesome back swell.
No.
We're going to dance break right now.
This is the best Farnby song of 1993, according to Kamaupharee.
Don't Walk Away.
by Jade.
On behalf of Frantigolo,
boss bill,
sugar Steve,
unpaid bill.
Yeah, man.
Yeah, yo.
Yeah.
Margaret.
Your ass.
And Qip.
Yes, Questlove signing off.
Questlove Supreme.
I got you.
Questlove Supreme is a production of Iheart Radio.
This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
For more podcasts from IHeartRadio,
visit the Iheart radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
A win is a win.
A win is a win.
I don't care what I'm saying.
Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th.
You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football journey,
or my career in sports media.
Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifers Show.
This is a place for raw, unfills of conversations with athletes,
creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated.
So let's get to it.
Listen to the Clifford show on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok's podcast network on TikTok.
This week on the Sports Slice podcast, it's all about the NFL draft.
And we've got a special guest.
The director of the NFL's East West Shrine Bowl, Eric Galco, joins the Sports Slice podcast to break down what really matters when evaluating draft prospects.
From hidden traits teams look for to the biggest mistakes franchises make to the players flying
under the radar. This is the insight you won't hear anywhere else. If you want to understand
the draft like an insider, you don't want to miss this episode. Listen to the Sports Slice
podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more,
follow Timbo Slical Life 12 and TikTok podcast network on TikTok. When a group of women discover they've
all dated the same prolific con artist. They take matters into their own hands. I vowed. I will be his
last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves.
We always say that trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe,
on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.
