This is a lol. Last week DJ Premier, Nick Javas & Panchi visited DJ Kay Slay’s show on Sirius. They ended up talking 90 minutes, including Panchi jokes and hood girls. What do you want more??? Hear it yourself:

[DOWNLOAD]

[MIRROR]

DJ Premier. The name alone evokes the sound of a generation of hip-hoppers in awe of the boom with the bap and the scratch. The last time we sat down with Preem, we established his Top 5 Dead or Alive Producers, but the time for his favorite emcees has come. Here are the fortunate lyricst to be deemed in DJ Premier’s Top 5.

1) Grand Master Melle Mel

“I always say Melle Mel from the Furious 5, just because he was one of the first MC’s to take it from just a party atmosphere and talk about what’s really going on in the world. And how f**ked up New York is and what they see in their hood, and you still can dance to it. To this day when “The Message” comes on you can dance to it but still the lyrics were incredible, plus he was just an ill performer. You know, you gotta remember I graduated high school in 1984. I got to see [Grand Master] Flash [DJ live]. And then Crash Crew, and even the Fab Boys, Rock Master Scott & the Dynamic Three, Nucleus, were all on the same bill. Dougie Fresh and MC Ricky D, you know, before he was Slick Rick. And UTFO was on the tour. Melle Mel, man, he’s a beast. He should be given some type of fuckin’ award.”

2) Kool Moe Dee

“I love Kool Moe Dee, I think he’s amazing because he actually made the [rap] battle become what it is, because he took battling to such a whole different level. And he’s such a lyrical f**kin beast. So I would say Kool Moe Dee.”

3) Big Daddy Kane

“I would definitely say Big Daddy Kane, because Big Daddy Kane was able to show the difference between being comical with writing for Biz Markie as a ghostwriter. He embodied Biz’s personality where when you heard Biz do the rhymes you felt like Biz wrote those rhymes cuz they were “Biz” rhymes even though Kane wrote and even through all the sounds in writing the rhyme.”

4) Rakim

“Definitely, Rakim. That’s a no brainer. We all just didn’t understand how could anybody be this original and different and then he had the look with the way he dressed, the mean look on his face, and he bragged but he was so so dangerous, and still is.”

5) KRS-One

“And KRS-One. Man, its always a big “fight” between Chuck D and Kool G Rap, but just as my favorites, I was just always a big time KRS-One fan. Criminal Minded just did it for me. Let me tell you, we used to study driving to Willowbrook Mall when I was in Texas going to college just to make sure I could remember the rhyme by the time I drove back home. Song poetry, its just song poetry. By the time we were driving back, I had it memorized because that’s how much I had to know KRS. Same thing with Rakim – you just had to know [the lyrics]. You had to know his lyrics because the tones, the words, and he kept making you go “Oh my god.” You know just like Kane said “I’m so full of action my name should be a verb, my voice will flow on every note, when I clear my throat that’s all she wrote.” Like how do you write that and then put the attitude right behind it too? And then Marley’s killin em with the beats? They need to change the topic to 10 Dead or Alive!”

source

WTF is this? Is this some leaked jail interview or what? 😀

TSS: Let’s start with the label, Year Round Records, I know you’re dropping the four singles more or less at the same time, let the people know the science behind that.

DJ Premier: Basically I just don’t want to follow the map of what the industry does because I’ve already lived the industry and I still live the industry so I already understand how it works. The industry doesn’t really like us around anyway once we get older because we know too much so, that’s fine—cut us off—and we’ll find another way to get it out there. Thank God for the ‘Net, and thank God for my fans and supporters still being excited about when I drop something. So I was like “you know what?,” if my own people are excited about me dropping something—and even if they weren’t, I’m excited about dropping something. So as a DJ who loves to buy music, who still really hunts down records like we’re hunting deer in the wild, I’m still that deep rooted in making sure that if I’m gonna do the same thing. Let me do it how I would do it as a consumer that’s different.

It’s like if someone is analyzing a football game, they’re like I wouldn’t have thrown that pass; I would have run the option instead; even though that’s only college ball, but still. I’m the same way with Hip-Hop. I’m like “damn man I would do it this way; I wouldn’t stay on one record,” that’s the standard. Why be standard, be different? So let me drop four records, all at the same time. Let’s do four videos and let’s do videos for the whole album and put it out as a DVD and that’s what we’re doing.

I have three artists on the label: Khaleel, Nick Javas and the NYGz, and they’re the only artists that I will ever sign to the label on that note of an artist signing. I have other projects I’m doing on the label which I call speciality projects like me and KRS-One doing Return of the Boom Bip, me and MC Eiht working on Which Way is West—which is a project he already had done—and I’m just adding a couple songs to the project. And I said yo, I’ll just put it out on Year Round [Records], no biggie and let’s just mix the songs down and get a better mix than what you gave me in L.A. And that was just from bumping into each other on a humble, and getting on a remix for one of my artists Blaq Poet who came out last year, so his record is gonna be a single called “Fine By Me.” They’re shooting a video Saturday, the NYGz video will be shot soon after, Khaleel’s video just got shot while I was at my homecoming in Texas and we filmed my whole homecoming and my school so I saw all my homies and everything. And I filmed all of that so people get to see me in my hometown, showing that I can go there at anytime and everybody showing me dumb love because I never changed my whole career; I still been the same ol Preme—Chris to most people down there.

They know me, I used to get crazy and wild and silly and get into a lot of shit, but I was also so serious about music and with the NYGz, Khaleel and Nick Javas and all these other projects that I wanted to drop this year, since I wasn’t ready. I said let me just drop a compilation and take a bit of every project that I’m doing and just make it a quick album, so we have something for the fourth quarter, before 2011 rolls around. That way, we’ll have all the albums lined up and ready to go, and like I said, four singles I can work in so many angles. I can work Eiht on the West Coast, and if everybody jumps on it past that, then everybody else is welcome to it, then I got Khaleel in Texas, I can work him, and then I work NYGz from the New York side, and then Nick Javas is a whole different scale; he’s more of an artist that can go a little mainstream quicker, because that’s his goal, and he has a different package from the other artists. Plus he’s Italian, so I have different ways of approaching him from my street artists and the MC Eiht record.

And all of this comes from my DJ know-how and then also knowing radio. And I have a show that’s very very dedicated to breaking new records like the way I broke records in 1992 when I was on WBLS with The Thunderstorm. So I’m doing the same exact thing now, only with 21st century records, that I think people need to hear. We make the map instead of following the map.

TSS: You mentioned your college experience, I know personally for me college radio was a big part of my DJ evolution. I was wondering if you could speak on your experience with Hip-Hop in college; if you did college radio and how that affected your trajectory?

DJ Premier: Nah, I didn’t do college radio, I didn’t even know how to scratch until I went to college because a DJ named RP Cola taught me how to scratch. We became very good friends and he used to DJ at a club called the Rhinestone Wrangler, which was South Main over by the Astrodome in Houston and it was the club, like, I guess like how New York had The Roxy and The Fever, and all that stuff. Well in Houston, if you ask anybody back in that era, the Rhinestone Wrangler was the place to be. If you wasn’t up in there, you really wasn’t down with nothin’ that was happening in Hip-Hop and it was the rawest! Like RP would be playing Stetsasonic, “Nobody Beats the Biz” and Mr. Big Stuff, and everything had the heaviest 808, and you had the Beastie Boys, you know “Hold It Now Hit It“, you know, Mantronix “Fresh Was the Word;” just records like that, and you’d hear a couple Texas records, cause it wasn’t that many records from Texas. You had Captain Jack—who was a radio personality—and had records called “Don’t Do It Like That Baby.” The Geto Boys were on the scene before Scarface or any of them was even in the group. There was no Willie D, there was no Scarface, there was no Bushwick Bill. It was Jukebox, and Prince Johnny C and all them, and it was just a whole different era, and there was just no other thing to be guided by than New York, or Philly.

I had family in New York anyway; I already knew that when I’m able to get on my feet by myself, I’m moving there, and I’m gonna take care of myself and crack this industry and make a name for myself. And that’s still the way I am now, I’m like a Brett Favre, I mean I’m not as sensitive as Brett Favre, but as far as my staying power, and my passion to play, and be a part of this, that’s the reason I do it.

TSS: Speaking of New York, and speaking of staying power, we’ve got Fat Beats closing recently, what kind of effect does that have on a label like yours, and what do you think, if anything, will come up to try and replace what Fat Beats was to the record culture and Hip-Hop culture in general?

DJ Premier: Well, there’s still diggin’ spots. If you’re in that world like I am, you know the spots, you see everybody—Just Blaze, Alchemist, Large Professor, Pete Rock—we still pop up in those spots. You got Big City records, you got Turntable Lab, you still have A1, you got Academy, you know. I’m not gonna tell you all the digging spots, but even those guys are gonna start taking all the vinyl and CDs and start carrying ‘em in their stores. I talked to my man about it a couple of weeks ago and he said he’s in the process of doing that, because if he cares about what we’re doing, he should do that and when I made the suggestion, he was like “Oh yeah, I’ve already talked to Fat Beats about it” because Fat Beats still operates; it’s just that they are doing it from the Internet and from their warehouse.

There are other people that have taken up the slack, even shout out to my man Siddiq from Rhymesayers. He has a record store in Minnesota.

TSS: Fifth Element.

DJ Premier: Yeah yeah, that’s based on the same style as what Fat Beats does. It’s almost like how it used to be back in the days when we were coming up in the 80s when I moved to New York. You had to find and hunt that shit down, and it’s gone back to that. Now it’s just our own little world, and it’s not oversaturated anymore like it was, and the ones that ain’t got staying power, they’ll be gone soon and we’ll be right back in the position we deserve to be in in a matter of days. I’m in a good place and I feel good about what’s about to happen.

TSS: What record labels do you see doing the type of music that you’re trying to do with Year Round, and that you in a way want to pattern what you’re doing after?

DJ Premier: Well, you got Statik Selektah with Showoff, with Termanology’s stuff with ST;I love what they’re doing. You know, Raekwon got Ice Water, N.O.R.E. has Thugged Out Militainment. Duck Down’s still doing their thing, with 15 years deep of putting out record; they signed Black Rob, put out the !llmind and Skyzoo album, and they got the whole Black Moon, Smif-N-Wesson, Pharoahe Monch, on and on, they’re going at it! I’m happy with what they’re doing.

As far as just the rawest rawest gritty-gritty, it’s me. Year Round Records.

TSS: No doubt. Do you have any horror stories with record labels? I know everyone has their stories of an A&R trying to pressure them into something, or force them into an unfavorable contract, you got any stories from your past dealing with record labels that might have pushed you into starting your own situation?

DJ Premier: I have some horror stories that everybody knows from like 1990 that got really violent, that made MTV News and all that, but that’s when I was ignorant. Pulling guns on executives and stuff like that, but I’m not really like that anymore. It was an ignorant thing, I don’t really feel good about it, but at the time, it was to have them do the right thing because it was the executives who we helped get the job at the label. We voted that he should be the guy to make all this money, and be the one to run the label, and have a better life, and be a part of a bigger system, because he came from a smaller system, a successful one but then he moved on to a major label with us, and the fact that we put him in position and locked in and he started trippin’, I lost my cool. Plus he threw my mother in the mix. And once you put my mother in the mix, there’s no turning back; I’ma do what I’ma do. My mother has nothing to do with my issues that I do outside of my family. The fact that he crossed that line, I showed him what type of guy I was, or no, that I am, and it was a horror story for him, not for me. So I stayed on the label, and Gang Starr continued to grow and grow, and we got bigger and better, and we had a very successful career, and made lots of money, got cars, houses, all of that stuff, while staying underground our whole career. We stayed consistent, and we always made sure we took care of the underground heads. And I do that exact same thing now.

I’m a little older, but I still have the exact same know-how as when I was younger, and I’m just a lot more wise on how I deal with things, but, just the fact that major labels started to act funny with “Oh, now you’re 30 now, and we don’t want to sign you because you’re a little too old,” that definitely makes you want to do your own label. Because you’re like “man, let me just go back to what I know now,” because when I got in, I didn’t know and now I know, so it’s like shit, “why not start a label?” It’s nothin’; you gotta get a proper staff, and really we’re just a two man staff, but we know what we’re doing, and we do things carefully. And I’m very calculating, that’s why I move how I move, but at the end of the day, it’s time to get some product out on the steady, and get these guys’ careers off the ground, and then I’m gonna grow into the next phase of my career.

TSS: I don’t know how familiar you are or aren’t with TSS, but we do album reviews, and instead of stars we do Cigs, like, cigarettes cause it’s The Smoking Section. Basically a 5 Cig album, we just mean classic, and we just wanted to get your perspective, what qualities does an album need to have to be considered an all-time classic, as someone whose had a hand in making classic albums?

DJ Premier: You definitely gotta have beats, because, I’m a DJ so even if we don’t like the lyrics, we like the beats. You gotta have a dope beat, I don’t care if it doesn’t have kicks and snares, it’s just a loop, is it hot, and who’s judging it. As a street DJ, I’m judging it from a deeper point of reference, and that is all the stuff that I was brought up on that I like was just raw, man, from even the song “Raw” from Big Daddy Kane, that’s raw man! That’s hard. I like the hard shit, Just-Ice, Eric B & Rakim, and Run-DMC, and even Whodini was hard, even though they wore suits and nice outfits, their shit was hard.

De La Soul is hard to me! They have original beats, original lyrics, they’re artistic with this Hip-Hop shit. I know that they are, and I never count them out. If I know De La is dropping an album Tuesday, I can’t wait to get it because I know they’re gonna hold me down with some dope beats, and rhymin’ is not gonna be the same old bullshit; it’s creative. So I grade everything off that, you gotta have dope-ass original beats, if you want the streets to like you, you gotta make gutter shit for the hood first. You can always make a radio mainstream record that’ll take you to the next level, but whenever you drop an album, whatever way you came out to be recognized is the way you keep comin’ out when you drop a new record.

Being that we wanted the streets to like us, that’s why we did “Just to Get a Rep.” “Words I Manifest” was the first record, but we wanted to go a little bit rougher than that, and we fought the label until they understood finally that we know what we’re doing, and that’s why we did “Just to Get a Rep” and Step Into the Arena, and “Check the Technique,” and I do the same thing with advising people on what makes a classic.

And then your rhymes gotta be ill. I mean I wanna be rewinding your shit over and over just to really make sure I heard your rhymes right and most of these peoples’ rhymes are just too basic. And even if it’s a basic rhyme, there’s still a skillful way to do it and a wack way to do it. But I know the difference and the fact that I know the difference, you can only debate me so far unless you’re a veteran that I look up to that can school me even more on your reasoning to knock mine down. Otherwise, I’ll fight you ’til the end.

TSS: One thing I know a lot of people want to know, and I’ve had these discussions with people in the past but I’d love to get it directly from you. What is your favorite record with a few of the artists you’ve worked with…like, what’s your favorite record you’ve done with Royce Da 5’9″?

DJ Premier: “Boom.” Hands down.

TSS: What about Nas?

DJ Premier: It’s a toss up between “New York State of Mind” and “Nas is Like.”

TSS: How about Jay-Z?

Primo: “D’Evils.”

TSS: KRS-One?

DJ Premier: Ummmm…

TSS: I know your catalog is deep with Kris, you’ve got a lot to choose from.

DJ Premier: I like “Rappaz R. N. Dainja.”

TSS: Hard to argue with any of those choices for sure. So, you’re legendary for wanting to put your own mix on everything you put out, and making sure everything is 100% down to the tiniest detail…is there any records that even after all the tweaking, you put out, and you wish you could go back and touch up a little bit?

DJ Premier: “Project Boy,”—a record I did with Joell Ortiz—I still never got it right, I was trying to put the sample vs. the vocals, and the one we got is the one we got, but I still wouldn’t mind going in there and messing with it again. But we’re moving forward, it got to do what it had to do, and I love that record, I love what Joell did to it.

“Friend or Foe” from Jay-Z, is another one I wish I could mix better, I thought it wasn’t a good mix, but that’s just me being super meticulous, and being really into my final product of the quality of vocals meets beat, and meshing together with the right EQs, reverbs, delay, and all the outboard gear. So yeah, “Friend or Foe” I wish I could touch up again.

TSS: Word, speaking of that era, your name is kind of synonymous with the production from that era, what producers from taht era do you feel like don’t really get the props they deserve from the early-to-mid 90s?

DJ Premier: I think The Beatminerz—Evil Dee and Mr. Walt, they make some really really gutter ass beats, and then they make hits for Black Moon and Smif-N Wessun, I mean, and Heltah Skeltah, and Originoo Gunn Clappaz. The string of stuff they did was always so gutter, and muddy, and just…evil. And I don’t mean Evil Dee either I mean just the sound of it.

I used to love “No Fear” by O.G.C. and it’s just a muffled ass bassline, with some moody keys in the background and it just bounces. All the remixes they did for Black Moon off the 1st album, and the whole Smif-N-Wesson Dah Shinin album was just insane. And they’re very very simple and basic but they stay funky with the bounce. Walt and Evil man, they’re very underrated.

I’m a big Nottz fan, I love his stuff, I love Havoc, you know, from Mobb Deep, I’m a big Khrysis fan, 9th Wonder, !llmind, I like Oh No; it’s so many of these peoples. I like Kanye, he’s definitely another style of beatmaker and producer.

TSS: You mentioned Kanye, most people heard you were supposed to do some scratches on the record, and it didn’t really come to fruition. Now, you being you, and pretty much everyone in the game looks up to you and admires what DJ Premier has done, why do you think these collaborations sometimes don’t really materialize? Because I know in a lot of the fans minds, it’s like why wouldn’t someone bend over backward to make sure Premier gets on their record?

DJ Premier: Ay, You’ll have to ask the artist! I did a bangin’ ass beat for Kanye, and he said he was gonna use it, then he asked for two more, and I attempted to make two more but I never could get in timewise to do it. When I saw him at the cipher for BET Hip-Hop awards, I was like “yo what’s up? You using that beat?” He was like “Nahhh I’ma move on and do something else.” I didn’t ask him why, and I don’t need to know why. I just know the beat is hot and I’ma use it for something else. It was really slow, but tempo is not really an issue with me—a dope beat is a dope beat! He did have me scratch on that record called “Mama’s Boy,” so we did do that. I don’t know what he’s doing with it, but he took care of me on the business so, he’s obviously using it for something.

TSS: A lot of people were surprised when you did the Christina Aguilera project, do you have any other left-field collaborations coming up that people wouldn’t really expect from a DJ Premier?

DJ Premier: Me and Chaka Khan spoke, and she’s trying to work on a new album, and I really wanna be a big part of her project so we’ve been talking. Right now it’s just been scheduling issues, she had shows, I have a tour I always do at the end of the year, so maybe at the top of the year I can get down to L.A. And big shout to Christina; she’s got a studio in L.A. that she said we can work out of, that’s how close we are, I can just go to her house and work out of her crib.

I really want to do that, and I really want to work with Mary J. Blige so bad. I already gave her some beats and we’re still working on trying to get it right. I gave her some bangers but we’re gonna keep banging until she gets the one she wants that fits her album. She played me some stuff, and it sounded really good, and I’m looking forward to her album coming out too, so hopefully I make it. She’s just starting so I have a little window where I can work on some newer stuff, but people fail to realize everything I do I make em on the spot, I don’t give you 20 beats and you pick one, I make ‘em for you. So if there’s 20 beats, I went in and made em for you.

TSS: You just spoke about a couple female artists…why do you think there is so few female producers in the game, even compared to female rappers?

DJ Premier: It’s really up to the person that wants to dive into this shit. There’s a lot of young kids who aren’t even in high school, even when you look at the kid, Keenan—the one that just did the video with 50 Cent, the Jeremih record, you seen that video?

TSS: Yeah.

DJ Premier: Look at how young that kid is, I think he’s 15; he’s all up on the lyrics and everything, and now he’s like a sensation already. And you got Fif in the video! A lot of young kids are making beats now, and I don’t know where the females are that’s in that world. We haven’t even seen female DJs in a while, like Spinderella, or what’s the female DJ’s name from the Coup?

TSS: Pam the Funkstress.

DJ Premier: She’s nice on the wheels too.

TSS: Yeah, she’s real dope.

DJ Premier: You got Coco Chanel—who’s one of the illest—so they’re out there, but you don’t know what everybody chooses as an occupation or getting it out there to make a name in production, so I couldn’t really answer that question. But if they do come through, I’m on the lookout. I’m on the lookout for anybody that’s just coming with some dopeness.

TSS: No doubt, well I know you have a lot of interviews today, I don’t want to take up too much of your time. Let the people know where you can be found.

DJ Premier: We will be having the official Year Round Records website launching in a couple weeks and it’s also gonna have the DJ Premier store on it where I’m gonna be selling all types of DJ Premier merchandise. It’s gonna be very original shirts that I designed myself, and it’s gonna be mainly music and DJ oriented but it’ll be official shirts. It’s my store so obviously they’ll be official and then on top of that, we make quality gear. We don’t make those thin shirts that rip when you reach to turn the light switch on. We make the type that when you wash it over and over and over it still comes back the same way.

We really give quality product, not just music but physically, you know, with the CD and everything else. So the album dropped on December 7th and it’s called Get Used To Us. It’s action-packed with just dope beats and rhymes. It’s gonna be an incredible journey with this product and I’m looking forward to the whole thing.

source

“Yo, let me see that?” DJ Premier asks. He was just talking about the changes he made to the old D&D Studios—now rechristened HeadQcourtez Studios after his late friend—since buying the space in 2003. Then he got distracted after seeing a copy of Kanye West’s new album, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. Premier rips off the plastic packaging, opens the booklet and goes silent for the next five minutes, immersing himself into the esoteric rap-nerd world of liner notes. At times he mutters to himself, almost as if he is memorizing the list of cleared samples and production credits.

Premier, born Chris Martin, is a rap savant. He spent his formative years in Houston, Texas but is synonymous with New York hip-hop, and in the late 1980s, he joined the late Keith “Guru” Elam in Gang Starr. The duo released six albums and never went platinum, yet they were beloved by fans. Outside of the group, Premier produced songs for Biggie, Jay-Z, Nas, Fat Joe, Rakim, M.O.P, KRS-One, Group Home, Mos Def and Jeru the Damaja. In short, any East Coast artist that mattered in the 1990s worked with DJ Premier.

Nowadays, his collaborators aren’t as high profile; The NYG’z, Khaleel and Nick Javas are the featured artists on DJ Premier Presents Year Round Records: Get Used to Us, Premier’s new compilation highlighting his label, Year Round Records.

Premier is wearing his de facto uniform—a champion sweatshirt and baggy jeans—as he sits down for the inaugural XXL Icon Interview. Over the next two hours, he will discuss every major moment from his long career. He will talk about the end of Gang Starr, his role in the short, but super entertaining, beef between the Notorious B.I.G. and Jeru the Damaja, the real reason why he hasn’t landed a track on a Jay-Z or Nas album in nearly a decade and why he cursed out Chuck D in a 7-11. Mostly, however, he reminisces about Guru, who passed away on April 19, 2010. Even though they hadn’t spoken in over six years, almost every topic leads back to Guru. Premier has his own way of coping with the loss. “When I miss Guru, I bump one of our records,” he says. “Then I shed a tear and get back to work.”—Thomas Golianopoulos

CLICK HERE TO READ DJ PREMIER: THE XXL ICON INTERVIEW

source

Since it seems we’ve become obsessed with lists, here’s a topper: DJ Premier. Hailing from Houston, but more famously half of Brooklyn’s Gang Starr, Primo helped pioneer New York hip-hop alongside MC Guru, and has worked with nearly every emcee worth mentioning since 1990. But after the death of Guru back in April, and the subsequent controversy, 2010 just didn’t turn out the way the producer had anticipated.

The legendary producer maintained a steady stream of talent through his studio, but the vast majority of the tracks have yet to be released. That is, until Get Used to Us dropped this week (December 7th) via Primo’s own Year Round Records. Featuring Blaq Poet, NYGz, Freddie Foxxx plus newcomers Khaleel and Nick Javas, the album is just one of at least three Primo will be releasing in the next few months. With a few minutes to spare during a stop in Chicago, Consequence of Sound caught up with Primo to discuss the releases, future collaborations, where he hides his Grammys, and if there is still any emotion left in hip-hop. And in the time CoS shared with Primo, is was clear there was an honest humility, and respect for the game, prominent in his thick, raspy voice.

So, when was the last time you rolled through Chicago?

It was the last Red Bull Big Tune Event. Na, Na, Na. I remember it was with 9^th Wonder, and we went in through the back way.

Road Manager: No man, that was [the Nationals] in Atlanta.

Have any of the contestants landed on your label, Year Round Records?

No, right now the only three artists I have on my label are Nick Javas, NYGz, and Khaleel. I want to start slow, and grow independent.

You’re introducing some of the guys on your upcoming compilation. Is the title Get Used to Us a challenge to the rest of the hip-hop community?

Shabeeno from the NYGz says it all the time, ‘Get used to us, get used to us. There ain’t nothing you can do than just get used to us.’ And I was like … really sticking out my head, because that is what I really want all my people to do.

And you’ve known the guys from NYGz for years now.

Yah, they’ve been friends for a while. Even though it is business when we do music, they were already friends of mine because I lived on Panchi’s block on 183^rd St in the West Bronx – which is really where hip-hop started, not the South Bronx. We were where it was all getting started.

The new compilation album contains tracks from everything that you have been working on during 2010. How have you gone about compiling the tracks, and artists for your label?

Good music, period! What it is … I have always tried to be different. And I really think that is what I got some fame from. With the label, instead of having strictly East Coast, I have one New Jersey artist who happens to be Italian (Nick Javas). I have one street-gutter group, NYGz, who are from the Bronx and Uptown. Then I got Khaleel, (looking at phone) who’s hitting me up right now, from Texas. They are really the only artists I got right now, but I also got what I refer to as “specialty projects”. Projects like KRS-One and Premiere: The Return of the Bap, Pete Rock vs DJ Premier, and Freddie Foxx’s The Kolexion (The Collection).

And really that is a collection of stuff we already did years ago. Freddie and I did a lot of throw away beats in the past, stuff that just never went anywhere. Freddie asked for what we did, so I gave him a whole batch of ‘em. And like the next day he had six or seven songs. But it’s like, take whatever you want, because I want to keep workin’ on the newer stuff’. And then I have Beats That Collected Dust, which is my instrumental series. Volume II will be dropping the first week of January.

With that Pete Rock joint dropping soon, you have multiple releases on the horizon.

Yah, that we’ll be wrapping up early next year. That was really easy to do. We’re each doing six tracks with six underground artists. But we’re not telling each other who we got.

I know! But can’t you give us any more details?

I am teasing with GZA from Wu-Tang and Beatnuts. But the other four I am not going to say.

With all the releases and your own label, you must be getting more demos than you know what to do with. Everyone wants Primo to be their producer. What drew you to the initial recruits?

With NYGz, it’s just picking up the slack where Guru left off because they are Gang Starr Foundation to begin with. And then on top of that, they were signed to Guru’s Ill Kid label first and they came out as Operation Ratification. They were NYGz to begin with, and then went back from Operation Ratification to NYGz.

What struck you about Khaleel?

Khaleel actually, is really a look out deal. He was signed to another label called 24 Hundred Records. He had done a record with Lord Finesse and Showbiz while he was in New York visiting to do some records with us. He paid us a heap of money and everything came out good. Then after that label folded, and after I had just done some production for them, the owner asked if there were anyway I could help him get in the business or find a deal with somebody. But since I liked him, I agreed to do one album. We already wrapped up the recording, and of course the entire Year Round family will be on it.

The only release you have coming up that is 100% Primo-production is for NYGz. Have you made a conscious decision to focus on singles?

They came to me with the idea of an all-Premier album, that way we wouldn’t have to do it again. And given that our friendship is that close, I agreed to it. Both [the releases] by Nick and Khaleel are 90% me. Marco Polo is helping out doing a couple tracks on each album.

M-Phazes did a lot of Nick Javas’ album. You ever heard of M-Phazes? He’s from Australia, and he’s dope. He was doing all the beat battles here in the States. We actually did a show recently in Australia, and we brought him out on stage. The crowd gave it up for him, because I guess he is popular out there for making beats.

Yah, you just got back from an international tour. How are you received by international fans?

It’s insane. It’s like a pile of ants… I’m from Texas so I’m used to seeing ants. They are never laid back, their always moving. Not like here, where the entire audience is just chillin. Even in the early days, fans here were more into it. In the days that I came up in, when you said ‘Say Ho’ the crowd would be like ‘HOOOOO’. Now it’s hard to get that response.

So, you still find more of that connection internationally?

They just don’t get as much action over there. Here everybody is spoiled by it, so they don’t think that they have to move and dance.

So, do you plan on continuing to produce all your Year Round artists or do you see yourself more as a label manager in the future?

I want to keep my hands on everything. Just like [Dr.] Dre over at Aftermath; he’s the label but he also produces a lot … and he let’s a couple of other cuts come in.

Back when you started, you crafted verses unlike any other producer out there. You could chop hooks from multiple artists, then bring them all back together and still be super-smooth. Now, producers can just cue it all up in the computer. How do you feel technology has changed the landscape – who comes into the game, and the quality of what is coming out?

My main thing is: Just respect the music and where it originated from. If you’re into hip-hop, you have to know what was out there before you. We didn’t have rap records to use as a guide. It wasn’t even called R&B yet, it was soul music that we were finding in the bins. When it was soul, it sounded like Gladys Knight and the Pips, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield, Barry White… that was soul. Then we had James Brown and funk, guys like Parliament, Ohio Players, and Rick James. This is all we had to build hip-hop. All we did was take the records we partied to, and extend the parts that we liked. Then the emcees would find the beat they like, and just start saying a little something. That’s really how it happened.

You’ve mentioned in the past about a possible joint with Chaka Chan.  Do you two still plan on working together?

I would love to. We haven’t talked in a while, but for a minute we were communicating on the regular. I know that she has been doing some shows, and I had to tour a bit, but next year we definitely want to lock in with her. She mentioned that she needed a studio to work in, so I called up Christina Aguilera and asked if there was anyway I could use her studio for ten days. And she agreed, no problem.

She might owe you a little, you two did win a Grammy together.

Yah, for “Ain’t No Other Man”. That was my first Grammy for a single. I won album Grammys for Jay-Z’s Hard Knock Life and D’Angelo’s Voodoo. But to get one for a single means a lot more. They single out everything else, and say that one’s a Grammy winner.

So, do you have them on display in your crib?

Right now, we hung up a lot of my plaques at the studio, but we still have a bunch more to do. I got the Grammy frames that they give you that I might hang up at the studio. Everything else I just keep at the house.

Any young guns out there that you could see bringing into your studio?

I like J. Cole and Drake. They come to mind right away, but there ain’t that many out there. I would like to work with Lil Wayne, he’ll do something ill. I’d also work with Nicki Minaj. I like when people dare to be different. I know people are calling her the Lady Gaga of hip-hop, but you know so-what. She’s not afraid to jump outside of the box, and you have got to love that.

Last month, Jay-Z said that hip-hop needs to find true emotion. What has been your reaction?

That’s the reason why the album I’ll be dropping in December touches more on the ghetto perspective. The music came from the ghetto, it’s more of a latino and black oriented music. I’m glad that it has spread worldwide, and now white, black, pink, yellow, and everyone it doing it; I think it’s dope. But when everyone has taken the grasp of it, someone still has to keep the core in existence. And the truest emotion is the core. So, being that the core is that straight, gutter-hard beats and just hard ass rhymes and talking about how shit still is. But you don’t want to just rap about bad times, there can still be fun. But, I like to let the have-nots know that we are still thinking about them. I can’t take care of them all financially, but at least I can take care of them musically. It’s like creating a medicine that makes them feel better. I’m making and giving the prescription.

Do you see yourself in another long-term collaboration, something similar to Gang Starr?

I don’t think I ever want to be in another group after losing Guru. I wouldn’t mind doing collaboration projects. Like me and Royce (da 5’9”) do a whole album, or Jay-Z and Nas do a whole album. But not, where we are a group. I won’t say never… but I don’t see that.

Can fans expect you to hit the road the spring/summer with the new recruits?

Yah, sure. I would like to start off with a Year Round Tour, where they can get their feet wet. I know that I’ll draw and that can help them get set up. And then they can branch out and help new artists, and I can just stay in the studio and record some more shit.

source

While making his rounds doing press for his new album (Year Round Records Presents Get Used To Us, out tomorrow), DJ Premier has revealed a lot of interesting things. His sit down with TheWellVersed was no exception, where he spoke about Jay-Z original plans for the The Black Album and on working with Eminem.

“I’ll give you a funny story. Jay-Z reached out to me when he was going to do The Black Album — this was years before he put it out because he postponed it, ended up working on other stuff, and then he came out with the album and decided to retire. Way prior to that he called me and said he was going to do an album and that he wanted me to do the whole thing. But he said, “I know how busy you are, Premo, but I want you to not have anything to do with anybody for the whole time we make this album. I need like a two week window, and we just do it.” And I understood where he was coming from, because he knows it had to be that deep of a situation to get it to be right and to call it The Black Album. Prince already made The Black Album. If you’re going to make one, it better be top notch. There’s a lot that goes along with that. So to approach me about that? That’s the same way I look at the Cold Crush, Fantastic, Kool Moe D, all that. LL and I have tried two or three times to work on stuff. He’s somebody you gotta sit down with and really focus on because he deserves that type of attention. And I’m proud to give him that type of attention. I wouldn’t want to do a quick little rush job. And then you have ones like Termanology that can do a one night thing because they’re the new hungry artists that are ready to just write on the spot and get it over with. You know Jay always just writes on the spot off his head, and then he leaves the work up to me. A project like that is just that delicate. I treat my stuff based on the level of what it’s going to take to really make a masterpiece. I’m proud of all my work, but there are certain artists that just deserve a whole different special attention.”

He also spoke about the Eminem collaboration that was supposed to happen in 2008 when Slim was making Relapse. “Me and Eminem spoke about a year ago when he did the ciphers with BET and we finally got to kick it face to face,” Prem said. “We had a good conversation. There’s a uniqueness about certain artists, so with him? I have to put certain things aside to work with him, and I gotta be realistic with what my schedule already allows me to have going on. I knew if I was going to work on Eminem tracks, I can’t be working on anything else. Strictly Eminem. That’s how much I want to give him the illest, what-the-fuck-is-that type shit, where everybody is like “yo, did you hear the Eminem and Premier shit?!” I know it will be great. But he’s still alive, I’m still alive, and hopefully I will keep breathing, and in that time frame we’ll get around to that.”

source

In Part 1 Premo gave insight on his wish list of collaborations, critiquing the critics and an unreleased Jay-Z record. For the second half of TWV’s exclusive sit down with DJ Premier, we get the goods on the producer working with Eminem, Gza, Jay-Z‘s Black Album being an entire Premo production and continuing Gang Starr‘s legacy.

TWV: How do you feel about Hip Hop now as opposed to it, say, fifteen years ago?

DJ Premier: I miss all the styles that made me great and made me want to do it. There are a lot of old school artists that are constantly complaining and are mad. But what are you doing to make hot shit? We need y’all to make hot shit too, and the stuff y’all make is corny. I can’t do everybody’s record at one time, even though I want to…I’d love to do a record with Cold Crush or the Fantastic 5 to this day, and make it still classic with the break style. I would know how to orchestrate it because I understand and respect what they did. I know their rhymes and what type of breaks they use, just as a fan and a consumer and someone who respects those guys. Those projects demand your undivided attention. All projects do, but to do an album with say, Slick Rick or Cold Crush? You gotta set everything aside.

I’ll give you a funny story. Jay-Z reached out to me when he was going to do The Black Album — this was years before he put it out because he postponed it, ended up working on other stuff, and then he came out with the album and decided to retire. Way prior to that he called me and said he was going to do an album and that he wanted me to do the whole thing. But he said, “I know how busy you are, Premo, but I want you to not have anything to do with anybody for the whole time we make this album. I need like a two week window, and we just do it.” And I understood where he was coming from, because he knows it had to be that deep of a situation to get it to be right and to call it The Black Album. Prince already made The Black Album. If you’re going to make one, it better be top notch. There’s a lot that goes along with that. So to approach me about that? That’s the same way I look at the Cold Crush, Fantastic, Kool Moe D, all that. LL and I have tried two or three times to work on stuff. He’s somebody you gotta sit down with and really focus on because he deserves that type of attention. And I’m proud to give him that type of attention. I wouldn’t want to do a quick little rush job. And then you have ones like Termanology that can do a one night thing because they’re the new hungry artists that are ready to just write on the spot and get it over with. You know Jay always just writes on the spot off his head, and then he leaves the work up to me. A project like that is just that delicate. I treat my stuff based on the level of what it’s going to take to really make a masterpiece. I’m proud of all my work, but there are certain artists that just deserve a whole different special attention.

TWV: Speaking of people you’ve been working with, there are a couple rumored collaborations I’ve heard about. For instance Eminem…

DJ Premier: Me and Eminem spoke about a year ago when he did the ciphers with BET and we finally got to kick it face to face. We had a good conversation. There’s a uniqueness about certain artists, so with him? I have to put certain things aside to work with him, and I gotta be realistic with what my schedule already allows me to have going on. I knew if I was going to work on Eminem tracks, I can’t be working on anything else. Strictly Eminem. That’s how much I want to give him the illest, what-the-fuck-is-that type shit, where everybody is like “yo, did you hear the Eminem and Premier shit?!” I know it will be great. But he’s still alive, I’m still alive, and hopefully I will keep breathing, and in that time frame we’ll get around to that.

TWV: You keep saying that you need to give your undivided attention to things, and that’s understandable since you have your hand in a lot of projects right now…Teflon, Freddie Foxxx?

DJ Premier: Well with Freddie Foxxx, he’s always taken my beats that people won’t use or turn down. Our collaboration is a collection of all the stuff we’ve worked on that have never seen the light of day. Some have been on his albums before, then we have seven new songs that will be on there. It’s a compilation, a collection of stuff that I’ve made specifically for him and things that he took that had been turned down by others.

Tef had a deal with Def Jam a few years back, then when the regime changed from Lyor [Cohen] to Kevin [Liles] to Jay, Jay gave me a new situation. I never did take the situation but Jay allowed me to take my music and do something else with it elsewhere, and I thank him so much for that. I ended up keeping it under wraps until I figured out what to do with it. Tef is a personal trainer now. If you ever need to get in shape he’s the man. He’s training Wendy Williams, getting her in shape now. He will knock you out, but he’s so into health and people getting their bodies and minds right. I’m so proud of him. That album sounds so much like what’s needed now, and I updated it. I got Joell Ortiz and a lot of new artists on it now. I produced majority of the album. He’s really into the personal training now, so I was like “I’ll put this out myself and really make it crack.” MOP is on it. They gave me a real good banger. Papoose, Saigon…Papoose gave us one of the dopest verses I’ve ever heard. He laced it on a song with him, Saigon, and Tef.

TWV: What about Pete Rock and KRS?

DJ Premier: KRS is on tour in Europe so when he gets back we’ll pick up where we left off. We did two songs already, so that album is going to be easy to do because I’m already used to how he works. That’s going to be the quickest album I do. He’s just so automatic. Pete vs. Premier we started already. We’re not supposed to tell each other who we’re working with, we’re supposed to just do it and surprise each other. He left one of the sessions in my studio and I got to hear it and I was like “oh my God, ok, that’s how you coming?” It’s a battle. But the artists I got so far? Oh man, I can’t even say the names. Only one I’ve already given up is the Gza. We gonna go in. We haven’t done the song yet, but Gza is such a lyricist. We’re only doing six songs each, so I got four, and have to come up with two more. I don’t know who to get. Everyone is throwing stuff at me. Whoever it is, it’s going to turn out to be bangin’ regardless.

TWV: Is Get Used to Us still looking at a December 7^th release?

DJ Premier: Absolutely. I’m very excited about the album. I’m definitely going to make sure it delivers. There’s nothing lightweight on it, it’s just nonstop bang, bang, bang.

TWV: As a child, did you always see yourself doing music?

DJ Premier: Nah, not until junior high school. I was just a regular guy doing all the same old shit kids do growing up. I played baseball and football when I was young. We did the Cowboys and Indians, Batman and Robin, Red Light/Green Light…all that stuff. Where I lived we used to have this open field where these ponds people would drown in used to be. A friend of mine died trying to play a game in one of those ponds. He lied and said he could swim and he couldn’t, and we didn’t know that. He jumped in there and we had already gone home. Someone had told us he was out there, so we went out to dive in and help him. When I was in the 8^th grade I took a class with my sister on how to save lives; I have certifications in lifeguarding. We went down there to go get him, but those type of ponds have a whirlpool that can suck you under, and you can drown from the current. We kept trying up until the wee hours of the night, and he ended up getting caught on some things underwater, so they had to call in the divers with the tanks to go look for him. I’ll never forget when they were like “I think I found something.” They dove one more time, and when they raised him up it was like when Jesus was born and they held the baby up before putting him up in the manger and all that. That’s exactly how they pulled him out of this pond. Mad mud and muck and stuff. I still remember how he looked. That was my first time seeing a dead body, at eleven years old. Bugged out. It just put a whole different perspective on valuing life, too.

TWV: Do you consider yourself successful? Are you satisfied, and what goals do you still have for yourself?

DJ Premier: To climb a new mountain. I’m more than halfway there but I’d like to be like Kevin Dillon on Entourage yelling “Victory!” I will be doing that soon. And I might make a song called “Victory” the day that I get there. Maybe getting into film and movies down the line. And continuing the Gang Starr legacy, too. I plan on doing a few Gang Starr projects that I’ll be in charge of along with [Guru’s] son and family, and we’ll do it right and make sure that we put all of our history out there. Guru always wanted a DVD. That was one of his biggest complaints in the last couple years of our career. When we came out with our last two albums he said, “Man, everybody got DVD’s, but we don’t.” So that’s when we started getting videographers to travel with us and collect footage. I had already been doing that for a while, really since day one. I have tapes from ’89 of us, of our Daily Operation tour — there’s just so much footage. We’ll probably do volumes of Gang Starr DVD’s, because we have that much stuff. It will be coming soon.

TWV: Is there still unreleased Gang Starr music?

DJ Premier: Not really. We did a few things that we didn’t finish that I have a few vocals on, but I have been getting calls from outside people saying they have vocals and they don’t even want money but would be proud to let me have it and to let me do what I need to do. So I’m working on communicating with that. They haven’t sent it to me yet, but if they do arrive and they’re official vocals that I can mess with? Then of course I’m going to make ‘em hot, that’s a no brainer. I do have one or two vocals that we didn’t finish that he had laid down, and I’ll see what I can do with them. There will be stuff down the line.

TWV: What do you listen to in your spare time?

DJ Premier: Rock. New Age. AC/DC, U2, The Cure, Psychedelic Furs. I like Iron Maiden, Pantera, classic Van Halen, Zeppelin. I listen to that a lot, more than Hip Hop, because Hip Hop is automatic. It’s like speaking Spanish. Like I can speak English one day and Spanish on another day. Hip Hop is my Spanish. Not everyone understands the language, but I do.

TWV: Where do you turn for inspiration?

DJ Premier: Anything. My parents, who are my biggest inspiration. And my oldest sister. I used to follow everything she did. She was very popular in school, very hip, she was always telling us what the new slang and dances were. To this day we’re really close. Honestly, I really have always been into watching people do interviews, on TV and in magazines, to see how they answer questions. I know Christina Aguilera called me the “tabloid whore.” I study it all. KRS said it on “BDP-Ism”, “I like to study, I like money, I like eating wheat bread with honey.” I love watching interviews. I don’t care if it’s an actor, a producer, I just love to see what makes other people tick.

source