Speaker 1: The Quest Loft Show is a production of iHeartRadio. What's
Speaker 1: Up everybody? Welcome back to The Quest Loft Show. And
Speaker 1: a few weeks back, I did a one on one
Speaker 1: episode with Pasta News of Daila Soul, the legendary day
Speaker 1: La Soul, and I want to thank you all for
Speaker 1: the comments and the shares and the likes and all
Speaker 1: those reviews. You know, as I stated, I always wanted
Speaker 1: to have Maco on for his own episode. And here
Speaker 1: we are in iHeart Studios in New York making good
Speaker 1: on that promise. Over the next few weeks, we're doing
Speaker 1: something a little different here on the show. We've teamed
Speaker 1: up with Levi's and they're behind every original campaign for
Speaker 1: a series of special conversations, and honestly, the name says
Speaker 1: it all. We're talking to artists who charted their own path.
Speaker 1: People didn't wait for permission, didn't follow the blueprint, especially
Speaker 1: when things got hard, and came out the other side
Speaker 1: having left an actual indelible mark on the culture. Levi's
Speaker 1: has been the uniform for people like that for over
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty years now. Extraordinary people who built
Speaker 1: their whole career on their own terms. It only makes
Speaker 1: sense that Levi's would be behind this.
Speaker 2: Two.
Speaker 1: Shout out to Levi's for doing this. This is a
Speaker 1: first of three conversations we're going to have called making
Speaker 1: of an Original and Dovetail perfectly and to my plans
Speaker 1: to speak with Maco as a producer, DJ and bigger
Speaker 1: than life personality, a living hip hop legend. Maco and
Speaker 1: his group are self made and we're here to talk
Speaker 1: about De La Soul and much more. Plug three Maco,
Speaker 1: my cousin Vinny, Welcome to the quest Love.
Speaker 3: Show my brother what goes on the intro?
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: There's a lot that you've done pioneered, just as yourself
Speaker 1: in this group that most people don't acknowledge. One is
Speaker 1: that the idea of the DJ actually having a voice
Speaker 1: on wax. You know, Furious five would address flash Flash
Speaker 1: two times.
Speaker 3: You just hear the band gooff.
Speaker 1: Public Enemy famously made terminator ex silent I later found
Speaker 1: out because he has the nerdiest voice of all time.
Speaker 3: That was one of the corner of the smartest.
Speaker 1: You said it not me, that's my man, Yeah right, yes,
Speaker 1: one of the greatest nerds of all time. You know,
Speaker 1: your contributions to the group like DJs didn't have equal
Speaker 1: my time. I mean, of course in the nineties, of
Speaker 1: course Pete Rock would do certain you know, people that
Speaker 1: would produce and rhyme at the same time. But it
Speaker 1: was it wasn't novelty, but it was almost like the
Speaker 1: DJ's allowed to rhyme too, Like the DJ was just
Speaker 1: supposed to be in the background scratch. Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: So I noticed on doing our Own Thing and on
Speaker 1: Peace Parts, you have some of the greatest intro stanzas
Speaker 1: and it never finishes. Because even last night I was
Speaker 1: listening to doing our Own Thing on the Jungle Brothers
Speaker 1: album and it's like me plug three. I was like,
Speaker 1: I baby, and after all the buddy, there's nothing else.
Speaker 2: I know, like Africa wrote that the mons for me too, okay,
Speaker 2: But even on Peace Parts, it was just like four lines.
Speaker 1: But in my head, I'm like, now, yes, legitimately you
Speaker 1: know afric connections and let me in all that stuff.
Speaker 1: You went deeper into it. But yeah, I was gonna say,
Speaker 1: why was your intro so short? Like did you not
Speaker 1: protest that I don't get at sixteen like the rest
Speaker 1: of you guys.
Speaker 2: Or first of all, I never really liked my voice.
Speaker 2: I really didn't. Honestly, you see it at that time too.
Speaker 2: Every time I would speak Africa q tip even pasta,
Speaker 2: it was like, oh man, you need the rhyme, you
Speaker 2: need the rhyme. And then also pass hurt me on
Speaker 2: some earlier stuff before we became a group, right when
Speaker 2: I was a part of another group. Okay, I just
Speaker 2: never really cared for my voice, but it was because
Speaker 2: you think you sound goofy. Yeah I think I sound but.
Speaker 1: You know I hate my voice too and didn't rhyme
Speaker 1: since the do you want more days? All right? So
Speaker 1: I'm the nerd that not only studies the records, but
Speaker 1: I also study the critical claim you get because I
Speaker 1: love journalism as well. And what I remember distinctively about
Speaker 1: the five Mic review of day Lot Soul Is Dead
Speaker 1: was them saying and goddamn like Macyo's rhyme and his
Speaker 1: ass off for me and Toka like what and it
Speaker 1: just so happens like that was one of the earliest
Speaker 1: examples of like and now I'm getting leaked way earlier
Speaker 1: than it should have. So somehow we had a connection
Speaker 1: to get day Los Soul is Dead like months beforehand.
Speaker 1: And actually you guys didn't know who we were like
Speaker 1: you did a trip to Philly and were performing it.
Speaker 1: We were like saying all the lyrics and you guys
Speaker 1: even look at us like, how do you guys know
Speaker 1: this shit?
Speaker 2: I was.
Speaker 1: So yeah, But I mean for you though, was it
Speaker 1: hard to talk you into taking so much?
Speaker 3: Versus one day I sould is dead?
Speaker 2: Or the people around me gave me confidence? I think
Speaker 2: I was surrounded around a strong set of him sees
Speaker 2: that saw something in me that I didn't see in myself. Okay,
Speaker 2: the way we all supported one another, you know, you
Speaker 2: felt the need to take heed. Why is he saying
Speaker 2: this or why is she saying this? There's something I
Speaker 2: think I need to be listening to because no one's
Speaker 2: really making fun of me. No one's they actually really
Speaker 2: taking these years and taking me seriously. So let me
Speaker 2: step into it, especially when I'm I feel like I'm
Speaker 2: being guided about by real credible You.
Speaker 1: Know, when you're doing your vocals, are you cutting? Like
Speaker 1: when I do that ship it's like Michael Jackson style.
Speaker 1: I want to I want to guard in front of me.
Speaker 1: I want to be in the dark. I want no
Speaker 1: one watching me. I want everyone out of the room.
Speaker 2: In the very beginning a lot of forty ounces.
Speaker 3: And it's coconut water.
Speaker 2: Was the courage?
Speaker 1: Okay? And then oh wait, you're talking about forty I
Speaker 1: was just playing this in the background.
Speaker 2: I think that forty was the courage. Really yeah, like
Speaker 2: you know, alcohol lessons and in ambitions, because.
Speaker 1: I did, I did wonder because the thing was, it
Speaker 1: was like I think because I have so much respect
Speaker 1: for Tarik as a wordsmith, and whenever people ask, like, yo, man,
Speaker 1: you you did like two verses on the first record,
Speaker 1: and then what happened And in my mind it was
Speaker 1: just like Tarik was so advanced math in his craft.
Speaker 3: I didn't want to insult that.
Speaker 2: I feel the same way, and I was like, you're
Speaker 2: nentwering God for the craft.
Speaker 1: But the thing is is that your word playing all
Speaker 1: that stuff, like especially on like with Afro Connections and
Speaker 1: let Me In.
Speaker 3: You kept up with them like it was an abstract rhyme.
Speaker 3: And I believe.
Speaker 2: Dress from Black Sheep helped me out let me In. Nice.
Speaker 2: I can't take full credit for all of that. Dave
Speaker 2: also helped me with my second verse on Afro connect Africnnection, Okay,
Speaker 2: but I think being around them a lot just rubbed
Speaker 2: off being in the whole native tongue wave of all
Speaker 2: the MC's that was around at that time. Especially that
Speaker 2: was also a time period I was I was hanging
Speaker 2: out with Grand Pooba a lot, okay, and Poob was
Speaker 2: putting the battery in my back as well. He's like,
Speaker 2: make you need the rhyme. And if Grand Pooba is
Speaker 2: telling you that, come on, man.
Speaker 1: Got you, got you? You know, especially with hip hop vin,
Speaker 1: A lot of your verses in your terms are now
Speaker 1: kind of in the roots every day vernacular.
Speaker 3: Like to this day, when I'm trying to duck.
Speaker 1: Somebody, I will respond, eog Passa is doing the producing, which.
Speaker 3: Yo, so this journalist is out here.
Speaker 1: No no, no, no, I'm like Passua is doing the producing.
Speaker 3: We probably drop.
Speaker 1: Shields, no hills, no bills, no, like oho, man, Like
Speaker 1: we probably stopped doing that maybe like right before phrenology,
Speaker 1: our expression of like oh shit, it's like, oh damn,
Speaker 1: shild hills, no bills, no. Like a lot of the
Speaker 1: things that you probably wouldn't think caught on to your
Speaker 1: fan base, Like a lot of that shit just became
Speaker 1: like our every day vernacular. But you nor your voice
Speaker 1: was awesome, man, and it gave me encouragement, like, oh
Speaker 1: so I just don't have to shut up and play ball,
Speaker 1: Like I don't just have to do the music.
Speaker 2: You said that to me on a video you made
Speaker 2: for my birthday. Yeah. I really appreciated that. I really
Speaker 2: really did.
Speaker 3: It was true.
Speaker 2: It had meant a lot to me.
Speaker 1: That gave a lot of us confidence, of those that
Speaker 1: didn't think they had a voice or any of that stuff.
Speaker 3: Where were you born?
Speaker 2: I was born in Brooklyn, Bedford Stoveson. Okay, same hospital
Speaker 2: as Michael Jordan, Mike Tyson.
Speaker 1: Okay, Okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's weird because I think on first look, we would
Speaker 1: look to you. I always thought you were the oldest
Speaker 1: member of Day Last Soul, and it turns out you
Speaker 1: literally are the baby.
Speaker 3: The baby. What was your house environment?
Speaker 2: Like a single parent home, pretty volatile environment. I've been
Speaker 2: robbed in my childhood, so a big part of my
Speaker 2: childhood is doing what we do for a living.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: This has been my dream since I started conceiving this thing.
Speaker 1: I could say, did you have siblings or no?
Speaker 2: One brother? One brother he's younger than I see you,
Speaker 2: old brother. Yeh, I'm the older brother. So that's another.
Speaker 1: Were you the leader.
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty much, having to take care of my brother,
Speaker 2: helping my mother out in different scenarios, you know. But yeah,
Speaker 2: I turned in. My nineteen seventy seven was when I
Speaker 2: actually saw this thing up close. And I used to
Speaker 2: get a big will every summer. Yeah, I used to
Speaker 2: get a big will every summer, and seventy eight I
Speaker 2: didn't want a big will. I wanted a DJ mixer.
Speaker 2: And I had got a DJ mixer for my birthday
Speaker 2: and it was a sparsonic up and down okay fader. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I was the first thing I gotten, and my uncle
Speaker 2: helped me put two component stereos together. My first my
Speaker 2: first DJ set was the component set with the if
Speaker 2: the automatic uh little belt nothing. My slip match was
Speaker 2: other records. No, it was other records along with the
Speaker 2: wax from the Chinese restaurant with the wax paper smart
Speaker 2: from the Chinese Restaurantkay. So the grease on the yeah
Speaker 2: it will helped me slide the records. And also, you know,
Speaker 2: you played records longer back then, so due to the
Speaker 2: fact that I have no pitch control, I would play
Speaker 2: records around the same tempo and kind of drag them
Speaker 2: or push them a little because I had the wax
Speaker 2: paper just so I could get the mix in on time.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so okay, most people who are not Bronx
Speaker 1: born that come on the show, I always asked them about,
Speaker 1: like as far as their hip hop experiences are concerned,
Speaker 1: because I think, to the outside world, not one of
Speaker 1: them people. I thought hip hop was just a Bronx
Speaker 1: thing and a Bronx thing like Brooklyn, Long Island stat
Speaker 1: like none of them were doing what they were doing
Speaker 1: in the Bronx. But I later found out that that's
Speaker 1: not the case. Like where would you see these block parties?
Speaker 1: And who was the DJ of?
Speaker 2: What was your come to Jesus moment? My coming to
Speaker 2: Jesus moment? Handcocked between Marsy and no String, right in
Speaker 2: the streets of Brooklyn two thirty one Handcock Street. They
Speaker 2: came one day, these DJs. I learned it was DJ's
Speaker 2: that day. These guys were just on my block till
Speaker 2: they started bringing this equipment out this one summer. And
Speaker 2: this was the summer after the blackout. Okay, the summer
Speaker 2: do you remember the blackout of the New York I
Speaker 2: remember the blackout in New York. I was scared as hell.
Speaker 3: Yeah, how long?
Speaker 2: How long did it last week? It was a couple
Speaker 2: of days. I can't even really remember. It was a
Speaker 2: few days. Oh yeah, yeah, more than twenty four hours. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was more than twenty four hours. I remember Williamsburg
Speaker 2: getting destroyed to shit around that time. Remember a long
Speaker 2: time Williamsburg was underdeveloped.
Speaker 3: Williamsburg is where date Night is for me.
Speaker 2: Now, But back then it was a desolate area you
Speaker 2: didn't want to be around, no time of day or night.
Speaker 3: The people live there.
Speaker 2: It was just like prior to the blackout. Yeah, it
Speaker 2: was businesses and everything, but when the blackout hit, it
Speaker 2: was completely destroyed, destroyed, when I tell you destroyed it.
Speaker 2: It was desolate nothing over there. You weren't even scared
Speaker 2: to take the train through there. It's nothing because I
Speaker 2: never heard people give shot out Williams. See Williamsburg to
Speaker 2: get turned around, like, trust me, A lot of what
Speaker 2: I see in Brooklyn these days are very shocking to me.
Speaker 3: You know, even now as you go through yeah, Fort Green,
Speaker 3: to see people over there, the greatest pancakes ever.
Speaker 2: Yo, see people over there with baby carriages and families
Speaker 2: and all of that. It wasn't that back then. Rol
Speaker 2: Fort Green a lot of people got ptst from Fort Green,
Speaker 2: you know, you know, but these was areas that were
Speaker 2: not so nice back then.
Speaker 3: So did you ever live in Long Island? Yeah, I moved.
Speaker 2: I moved to Long Island when I was fourteen. I
Speaker 2: had a huge fight in Brooklyn. And the last place
Speaker 2: I lived before I moved to Long Island was in
Speaker 2: Bushwick with my grandmother. And I grew up with Bushwick
Speaker 2: Bill a little bit too. Yeah, so he's from That's
Speaker 2: how he got his name. He's from Bushwick, Brooklyn. I
Speaker 2: knew that, yeah, okay, okay, And he went to Bushwick
Speaker 2: High School and he used to also hang out with
Speaker 2: these Zulu cats called Zulu Savages. It was a chapter
Speaker 2: of Zulu that was called Zulu Savages. They basically was
Speaker 2: the underworld for a Zulu nation. Okay, with the earners,
Speaker 2: you know, but for the most part I had gotten
Speaker 2: to a big fight with one of them dudes name
Speaker 2: his name was Mario, and everybody was pretty much scared
Speaker 2: as dude. I was scared of his dude. But the
Speaker 2: debo of kind of sort of what but he was
Speaker 2: a Napoleon de Boat short people, short but with a
Speaker 2: heart like a shop you know, and he was a
Speaker 2: supreme bully around this time. I had to have been
Speaker 2: like twelve, twelve thirteen. At this point, I was on
Speaker 2: my way to becoming a bit of a tyrant myself
Speaker 2: because I had some issues that turned me left, you know.
Speaker 3: So it was no more in terms of you had
Speaker 3: to protect yourself.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I had to protect myself, so it was no
Speaker 2: more bullying mace. I used to go to I used
Speaker 2: to go to bed Star Boxing Association. I used to
Speaker 2: go to Pao, so I'll started developing my hands. I
Speaker 2: also start getting familiar with the little weapons and all
Speaker 2: that I hear.
Speaker 1: And that for you though, as the oldest now, usually
Speaker 1: like around my way, if you went outside or whatever,
Speaker 1: very equivalent of wait till your father gets home is always, well,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get.
Speaker 3: My brother to fuck you up or my cousin to
Speaker 3: fuck you up.
Speaker 1: Like there's some people that always protected, but when you're
Speaker 1: the oldest one, like did.
Speaker 2: You not have I don't got nobody to go home
Speaker 2: to for that.
Speaker 1: Yikes.
Speaker 3: OK So it was on and.
Speaker 2: Cracking every time I lived in a fight or flight
Speaker 2: a lot.
Speaker 3: You know, it's traumatic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, so yeah it was one fight I had
Speaker 2: with this dude Mario that by the grace of God,
Speaker 2: I came out on top. You know, years went by.
Speaker 2: That was the fight that got me to Long Island.
Speaker 2: My mother was like, my mother wrote a letter. My
Speaker 2: mother grew up a foster child most of her life,
Speaker 2: so yeah, my mom ended up writing her foster parents
Speaker 2: and her foster father and telling him the story. And
Speaker 2: I end up finding a letter later. But come the
Speaker 2: end of that summer, after that fight, because it was
Speaker 2: a really big thing, everybody was like my nickname at
Speaker 2: the time, to anybody from Brooklyn that calls me fat man,
Speaker 2: know me, really knows me? Okay, yeah, yeah, they were
Speaker 2: like fat he having a fight, fat fighting Mario fat
Speaker 2: fight married and that was a really big thing. Everybody
Speaker 2: was coming out their house and I just happened to
Speaker 2: I was scared. I don't know, he had to been
Speaker 2: much older. It just he appeared to be older, so
Speaker 2: I don't really know. I was all but thirteen. And
Speaker 2: then it was all over a centipede game.
Speaker 3: Dude, it's always over video games.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, this was one of the days. I was
Speaker 2: having a great day. I was killing it this day.
Speaker 2: Any other time I'm losing I'm killing it on this quarter,
Speaker 2: this day, getting a free man every time. All that,
Speaker 2: and he came over and he was like, yo, hurry
Speaker 2: up and get up off of this, and I looked
Speaker 2: at him like he was just crazy, and I just
Speaker 2: kept playing. I'm rocking the stores watching me play. You know,
Speaker 2: when you got having a good one, everybody's rallying around. Yo.
Speaker 2: He came over a few more minutes later and he
Speaker 2: pulled the plug. Instinctively, I just pushed him, like, what
Speaker 2: the fuck are you doing. I didn't mean to push him,
Speaker 2: but that it was an instinct, like fuck is on
Speaker 2: your mind? And then we started going at it, and
Speaker 2: he pulled out like a spike belt. He got a
Speaker 2: spike belt on. He wrapped around, swung on me. I
Speaker 2: caught it. Next thing, you know, I'm on him. The
Speaker 2: hands I was earning the last two summers came to
Speaker 2: life and I was lighting his ass up, and everybody
Speaker 2: was like, yo, fat man's fucking up Marrio and they sure,
Speaker 2: everybody was sure that, Like I just felt like I
Speaker 2: had a victory that day. But everybody was like, yo,
Speaker 2: he got to get out of here. He's got to
Speaker 2: get it, because they felt like and then he was
Speaker 2: gonna come back and murder me, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: Because they were on that type of time Bushwick. Bill
Speaker 2: used to God rest his soul. He used to tell
Speaker 2: his story all the time, but he used to tell
Speaker 2: his story differently. He would tell his story all the
Speaker 2: time because Bill thought I went to school with him,
Speaker 2: and it didn't happened at Bushwick High School. I lived
Speaker 2: in the neighborhood, but I didn't go.
Speaker 1: To be beating the school bully or the counic neighborhood
Speaker 1: bully got around.
Speaker 2: Bill was around every day. Like we all played in
Speaker 2: Bushwick Park. So we either played softball or we played
Speaker 2: we played softball, we played basketball, or we was on
Speaker 2: the swings and all of that on the other side,
Speaker 2: you know, back then the swings used to be used
Speaker 2: to kind of you know, the swings was a real
Speaker 2: thing back then. Yeah, I'm busting my skull a few
Speaker 2: times doing that ship. But yeah, that was the park
Speaker 2: and we would play until they cut the lights off
Speaker 2: in the park.
Speaker 1: Do you have a fond memory of growing up that
Speaker 1: neighborhood as well?
Speaker 2: Or the only best memories I could say I had
Speaker 2: was getting up in the morning early mornings and everybody
Speaker 2: going to find each other to either play softball, stickball
Speaker 2: or basketball and kid or yeah, I was a Skelly
Speaker 2: kid also, I was a Skelly Skelley was Those were
Speaker 2: my best moments until somebody did something stupid till somebody
Speaker 2: it was either somebody in my crew or some somebody
Speaker 2: who's coming to mess with my crew, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So when you get to Long Island, like what
Speaker 1: is your are you rejecting to this or is it
Speaker 1: like you just put them in and what are you thinking?
Speaker 1: Like it's like out there Long Island for you.
Speaker 2: I didn't know what to expect living out there. We
Speaker 2: used to go visit when I was younger, so I
Speaker 2: kind of knew where we were going, you know, I
Speaker 2: knew it was. I felt like a world or yeah,
Speaker 2: it felt country. It felt very southern like, you know,
Speaker 2: it felt like you were going down south. That's what
Speaker 2: Long Island used to feel like. Okay, you know, although
Speaker 2: it was maybe but an hour ride, but as a
Speaker 2: kid at that time, that seemed so funny forever. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and you get out there's grass, trees, crickets. We were
Speaker 2: even barely picking up kiss up bls. You know. My
Speaker 2: uncle had an FM booster for us to even pick
Speaker 2: up radio like that, you know, yeah, it was super quiet.
Speaker 2: And then also I dealt with the new kid in
Speaker 2: town issue. You know, I'm dealing what do you have
Speaker 2: to do to get there? A whole another level of
Speaker 2: bullying that I'm dealing with, the same thing, just a
Speaker 2: different environment. But now I got some new skills. I
Speaker 2: got some skills out and came with and then I
Speaker 2: also learned quickly. Around that time period, wrestling was a
Speaker 2: big thing on Long Island, not boxing. I had an
Speaker 2: advantage on a lot of cats because They're coming and
Speaker 2: I'm tapping, and I'm tapping two different fighting styles going on.
Speaker 2: So I'm coming up and learning people learning about me
Speaker 2: really quick. Other other behind fighting, playing basketball or DJing
Speaker 2: eventually music.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what do you think your first musical memory was?
Speaker 1: Your first time that you remember hearing music or like
Speaker 1: it having an effect on you.
Speaker 2: My earliest memory of it having an effect on me,
Speaker 2: and I muna say DJing more specifically than than just music.
Speaker 2: Dj had an effect on me when my mom used
Speaker 2: to date this guy from the from the I think
Speaker 2: he was from the bronxaw A, Harlem and he had
Speaker 2: a daughter and she was actually much older than us
Speaker 2: and her boyfriend Rick. I remember Rick to this day,
Speaker 2: and he had a DJ set. He had a DJ
Speaker 2: set and I was so fascinated with DJ in for
Speaker 2: some time, but I could never touch anybody's set. I
Speaker 2: also had. I had an uncle who had a DJ equipment.
Speaker 2: He wouldn't let me touch it. So it was Rick
Speaker 2: who let me touch his equipment for the very first time,
Speaker 2: and for some reason, for the very very first time
Speaker 2: I touched it, I knew what I was doing. And
Speaker 2: the record I was cutting up was Captain Scott Super Spun,
Speaker 2: Super Sprung. Okay, yeah, that was the first one I
Speaker 2: got to touch that one and Frisco Disco. Those are
Speaker 2: the two records I really remember.
Speaker 1: Like, how would you know I need two copies of
Speaker 1: Frisco Disco, like pre year career.
Speaker 2: Like it's what I saw. I didn't even have those records.
Speaker 2: It was already with the guys that I was studying
Speaker 2: at that time. Okay, whether it was Rick, ron C Loki,
Speaker 2: these are the guys that was in the neighborhood.
Speaker 1: Well, the reason why I'm asking is all right, So
Speaker 1: a great example is James Brown. Okay, so let's take
Speaker 1: the good Foot, Now, Get on the Good Foot comes
Speaker 1: out in seventy two and is a genuine hit, And.
Speaker 2: That wasn't popping in Brooklyn. That's what's crazy.
Speaker 1: What I'm saying is that even the period in which
Speaker 1: James Brown is trying to sell us on the original
Speaker 1: disco man and get up off that thing, like the
Speaker 1: Mustache era James Brown, hip hop is still staying in
Speaker 1: between seventy or sixty eighty, right, But it's not like
Speaker 1: you guys had a network or texting, Like, how would
Speaker 1: you guys know this song will never die? Like, as
Speaker 1: far as I'm concerned, Goodfood never died ever in since
Speaker 1: it's it's released in seventy two. But like, does someone
Speaker 1: tell you, like you got to pick the records that
Speaker 1: have at least a good break in it or a breakdown.
Speaker 2: Or by the time I got really got into James Brown,
Speaker 2: it was behind listening to Mally Okay, it was just
Speaker 2: rhyming with BIZ.
Speaker 3: I think what I'm asking you is, did it seem old?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: Okay, it's nineteen eighty two, eighty three, I don't know
Speaker 1: if you're thirteen fourteen like starting to DJ and I'm
Speaker 1: reaching for a record from nineteen seventy two. Like for me,
Speaker 1: it took King Britt once brought a DJ muro to
Speaker 1: Philadelphia from Japan, and when he pulls out his records
Speaker 1: and I'm looking, I'm like, wait, my dad has these
Speaker 1: records in his thing, Like why is he spending this?
Speaker 1: Like I couldn't grasp that this roy Eras record and
Speaker 1: this Commodore's records from seventy four was going to work.
Speaker 1: I didn't know about the rhythm kitchen, and I know
Speaker 1: about giant steps like the idea of nostalgia culture, but
Speaker 1: even in pre eighty five moments like it isn't that
Speaker 1: once seem odd? That wait, why are we going back
Speaker 1: fifteen twenty years to play stuff for us instead of
Speaker 1: I mean, what was popping in eighty three?
Speaker 3: Oh? Did you ever touch the nineteen ninety nine record?
Speaker 2: Or right right, I get your point. I didn't touch
Speaker 2: anything current.
Speaker 1: I was going like, at least with sampling, then it's like, okay,
Speaker 1: I see the connection. But without even the context of sampling,
Speaker 1: did not seem odd to you that even in the eighties,
Speaker 1: I'm playing a song from like nineteen seventy seven and
Speaker 1: it still works, or.
Speaker 2: I didn't connect with it like that. Then I was
Speaker 2: really going on of what I was taught in my environment.
Speaker 2: So it was innately a part of me, and I
Speaker 2: didn't know nothing to wise her. I knew and my
Speaker 2: mom through some parties here and there. So these was
Speaker 2: also records that was in her collection as well, records
Speaker 2: that she would have when she's cleaning up the house.
Speaker 2: So it was just a part of me like that
Speaker 2: where I just knew it would work because it was
Speaker 2: it was working in her little parties, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean?
Speaker 1: Like, how old were you when you did your first.
Speaker 2: My first party? You're gonna You're gonna twelve? I was twelve.
Speaker 2: Where was mother's house woman party? We had moved the
Speaker 2: Crown Heights. We moved the Crown Heights. This is the
Speaker 2: first time we had lived in something really nice. And
Speaker 2: we lived on President Street. Actually I lived a couple
Speaker 2: of doors down from Stephanie Mills. Really, she wasn't no
Speaker 2: longer living there because she was doing the wiz. Her
Speaker 2: parents were there, gotcha, And well it's crazy. Ben Marine's
Speaker 2: daughter had lived down the other corner. Yeah, it was crazy.
Speaker 2: I lived on President Streets between Albany and Troy and
Speaker 2: Stephanie lived a little more close to Albany and bember
Speaker 2: Ring's daughter a little more closer to Troy on the
Speaker 2: other side of the street. But yeah, my mother's housewarming
Speaker 2: party and on President Street, and it was whoever the
Speaker 2: DJ was. He let me get on and I was rocking,
Speaker 2: and he was dancing with some girl like right, because
Speaker 2: this is when the music would be in one room
Speaker 2: with all the lights on and the speakers is out
Speaker 2: with everybody else, so nobody knew this twelve year old
Speaker 2: was playing. You know, So I'm playing and I remember
Speaker 2: the record that I really got off was Do I Do?
Speaker 2: By Steven That the way I dropped it. I will
Speaker 2: never forget that moment. My mother came and took a
Speaker 2: picture of me. I was standing on a milk crate
Speaker 2: out of a white, white, white collar shirt. It was crazy.
Speaker 1: Is there anything like the adrenaline of when you play
Speaker 1: the right record and motherfuckers go ah.
Speaker 2: Man, that's some of the best feelings ever. Sometimes the
Speaker 2: time it takes to even build that out, you know,
Speaker 2: you hope and that it'll have the impact that you
Speaker 2: think it's gonna have when you when you're trying to
Speaker 2: put it together and yeah, that's some of the best
Speaker 2: feelings in the world.
Speaker 1: I used to be amateur hour with it. Like when
Speaker 1: I first really started doing it professionally, I would just go.
Speaker 3: H h h h hit hit it and be like.
Speaker 2: Ah, oh, yeah, it's cool, he's killing it.
Speaker 1: And then like I realized, I overstimulated them. So then
Speaker 1: I had to learn like the art of highs and lows,
Speaker 1: Like a record like don't stop till you get enough,
Speaker 1: which you know, should you know, provoke like some sort
Speaker 1: of orgasmic scream. It's almost better if it comes from
Speaker 1: something that is lesser, so that it feels.
Speaker 2: It's feels much bigger later.
Speaker 1: So for you, in your all your years of DJing,
Speaker 1: what is your preferred starting record?
Speaker 2: Do you start with a monster? Do you build to
Speaker 2: a monster? I build to a monster. I like, I
Speaker 2: come from the eerror of sound system culture, so there's
Speaker 2: always been like a build up. You know. I actually
Speaker 2: started from being the DJ who actually brought the equipment
Speaker 2: in and packed it up. So yeah, I had Yeah,
Speaker 2: so you know that beginning of the night, it was
Speaker 2: always something monotone, slow, something to warm everybody up. You know,
Speaker 2: I'm warming up as they warming up, you know, I'll
Speaker 2: play for the people at the Bark more than I'm
Speaker 2: playing for whoever's rallying around the and your yeah, pretty much.
Speaker 2: Me and another DJ I would share this with, and
Speaker 2: his name was mister Bugs, and he he and I
Speaker 2: we had a great relationship because he would play most
Speaker 2: of the time. He would play the reggae and I
Speaker 2: would play the American music. What would make it eventful
Speaker 2: is when we would switch out and they'd be like, oh,
Speaker 2: Mason's playing reggae tonight. So that would be the performance
Speaker 2: part that everybody would be like, Wow, these guys are
Speaker 2: switching out tonight. He's playing reggae and he's playing American music.
Speaker 2: And then then I would They would call me Yankee
Speaker 2: Bear and all kinds of Jamaican dudes, all these titles
Speaker 2: Yankee Bell, Yankee Ball, bumba clod.
Speaker 1: What is so?
Speaker 3: What if?
Speaker 1: Right now?
Speaker 3: What is for you?
Speaker 1: The Bulletproof will Never Fail opening song for you?
Speaker 2: The Bulletproof opening song. I can't even say that, man,
Speaker 2: I don't even.
Speaker 3: See for me murder, she wrote, will never die?
Speaker 1: Okay if not, I don't know, especially now where it's
Speaker 1: like different generations and I don't know who I'm entertaining.
Speaker 1: I could be entertaining a bunch of rich cats. I
Speaker 1: could be entertained around the way people kids today, people
Speaker 1: that know who the roots are. Whatever Murdercy wrote at
Speaker 1: least buys me five minutes to figure out. Well, for
Speaker 1: one thing, it's like, I assuming you subscribe by the
Speaker 1: theory that women rule the dance for like, if they're
Speaker 1: dancing to it, then you know it's good. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: song for me will forever work, and then that'll buy
Speaker 1: me enough time to figure out where I go. What
Speaker 1: is a has never failed me once, never failed me,
Speaker 1: never failed me, Like I gotta wake this party up?
Speaker 2: Uh, never failed me. Galaxy by War has never failed me.
Speaker 2: Whether I started the party with it or I mixed
Speaker 2: it in, it's just the way it even starts off
Speaker 2: with the.
Speaker 3: Are you playing the intro and everything?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah. If I'm playing it from the beginning,
Speaker 2: if I'm playing like the beginning of a party, I
Speaker 2: could play it from the intro if I got if
Speaker 2: I'm mixing it in, then it's you know, it's definitely
Speaker 2: a build up. But that's the record that never failed me,
Speaker 2: that never failed me. And what's the name never failed
Speaker 2: me either, hijack the Herbie Man version.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so weird, like well, of course what the
Speaker 1: beat Nuts did to it, well.
Speaker 2: At least version they used. The other version, the one.
Speaker 1: Was more disco for me, and you liked that Brooklyn.
Speaker 2: Was a I can't even lie, like Brooklyn was a
Speaker 2: lot more disco than other Burroughs.
Speaker 1: You know something, all right, So we just did a
Speaker 1: show together at the Hollywood Bowl and you made me
Speaker 1: realize something I have never ever like, this is a
Speaker 1: weird admission to make as a DJ. I've never ever
Speaker 1: played brad by Samande in my sets, and I didn't
Speaker 1: realize how fun it was until we started doing or
Speaker 1: change and speak right, And when we played it, I'm
Speaker 1: sitting on the set like, wait a minute, this is
Speaker 1: a bonifid classic. And I know it's a classic. How
Speaker 1: come I never want in my life ever play Bride
Speaker 1: by Simonde. And the way that you incorporated the original
Speaker 1: and like to bring in full circle with playing the
Speaker 1: sample and the version you did on three pi and rising,
Speaker 1: it literally made me. I remember having a note to
Speaker 1: myself actually saying at bra inside my notes. So for you, like,
Speaker 1: do you still like playing the traditional ingredients of what
Speaker 1: classic if I was, do you still like playing.
Speaker 3: Breaks or are you like what is your.
Speaker 2: I like playing everything. I like everything that really just
Speaker 2: feels good sounds good. Of course the breaks are in
Speaker 2: there because it's what we grew up on, you know.
Speaker 2: I incorporate what really just feels good, bro. And the
Speaker 2: more I learned, the more I incorporate, the more left
Speaker 2: I think I can go. I'll go so far left
Speaker 2: that I'm.
Speaker 3: Right, you know.
Speaker 2: And a lot of that stems from growing up in
Speaker 2: the New York area, with it being so much competition
Speaker 2: that I didn't want to be a part of the competition.
Speaker 2: There was nights I even played, you know, the Building
Speaker 2: and Palladium and you know the hot guys. Of course
Speaker 2: is Capri read at the time Clark Kent And also
Speaker 2: promoters had this thing too where if you played on
Speaker 2: the bill with these guys, you you kind of almost
Speaker 2: had to play the same records too, And because it
Speaker 2: was an audience that come in rotation, rotating throughout the night,
Speaker 2: that might have missed Capri when he played before I
Speaker 2: let go, so they want you to play it again.
Speaker 2: I did get out of that, and I started to
Speaker 2: play more boutique stuff.
Speaker 3: I felt.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, have you ever felt the pressure
Speaker 1: to be as eclectic as your canon catalog is?
Speaker 3: Like after Blue Mind.
Speaker 1: State came out and once I discovered and again this
Speaker 1: is the post DJ Mureau effect, like when he came
Speaker 1: from Japan and started playing all this like rare shit.
Speaker 1: Never once did occur to me, like, oh, I should
Speaker 1: play Evil Vibrations before I play a roller skating jamming
Speaker 1: on Saturdays. I should play the tramp break before I
Speaker 1: play let Me whatever, like that whole idea back and forth,
Speaker 1: But and then I went all the ways silly with it,
Speaker 1: like I used to always play the Peace Parts Break,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? Like, did you ever feel
Speaker 1: like the pressure that people might have expectations for you
Speaker 1: to be as eclectic as the idea of what Dai
Speaker 1: I sould was to your audience in the first few years.
Speaker 2: I never felt that pressure. I actually realized I was
Speaker 2: already there. And what made me realized I was already there.
Speaker 2: There was one tour I did with Mike g from
Speaker 2: the Jungle Brothers. We had did a DJ tour together.
Speaker 2: Sammy Bee wasn't well and Mike was like, Mace, let's
Speaker 2: do this DJ run you know and uh, that's when
Speaker 2: they were doing Jungle Brothers sound System and uh, this
Speaker 2: was my first DJ tour out the country because I
Speaker 2: really when it came down to DJ and I actually
Speaker 2: stayed local. I didn't go out on tour UNTI and
Speaker 2: I went with the group, so to speak. So it
Speaker 2: was Mike g who actually talked me into traveling abroad
Speaker 2: just playing music. And when we got out there, I
Speaker 2: saw Murdo, I saw everybody. I realized I was that
Speaker 2: I was already there. I was like, this is what
Speaker 2: I need to be doing, this is this is what
Speaker 2: I what I am. And it actually reminded me of
Speaker 2: a night that I played at Irvin Plaza because I
Speaker 2: used to play there a lot in the every beginning
Speaker 2: of our career, like and plug tuning days, plug tuning
Speaker 2: pothole days. I was playing at Urban Plaza and I
Speaker 2: used to play really off the chest. I never played
Speaker 2: any mixes, And it was one night. It was a
Speaker 2: lot of times I'm playing to even figure out what
Speaker 2: I want to use. It was like a lot of
Speaker 2: that kind of always in the creative space of what
Speaker 2: I want and and Urban Plaza was one of them
Speaker 2: eclectic spots. It was so I'll never forget. That's how
Speaker 2: I end up coming up with the idea for the
Speaker 2: remix of me and Myself and I is when I
Speaker 2: played I played GQ really slow. I played it real slow,
Speaker 2: and Chuck came up to me.
Speaker 3: I will never forget that, And Chuck D came up
Speaker 3: to me.
Speaker 2: He was like, yo, yo, I've been hearing this wrecking
Speaker 2: my whole life, and why does it sound so crazy?
Speaker 2: So it was I forget that moment, okay, Chuck coming
Speaker 2: up to me, And then next thing you know, it
Speaker 2: just started to click with me and myself for nine
Speaker 2: and figuring out what to do far as a remix
Speaker 2: for that.
Speaker 1: At the height of your sort of DJ craft, now
Speaker 1: you brought up Capri and my first time I giged
Speaker 1: with Capri, he arrives with thirteen crates.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thirteen, yeah, yeah, I've witnessed the days of it
Speaker 2: being twenty two or thirty crates. I remember them days.
Speaker 1: Yeah, at the height of it, like thank God for
Speaker 1: Serranto where you can now have like entire terabytes inside
Speaker 1: your computer. But at the height how many crates.
Speaker 3: Were you me for a gig you cared about?
Speaker 2: Uh? I was around the same around the saying you're thirteen,
Speaker 2: Yeah I was. I was around the same. How many
Speaker 2: people actually used to drive to a lot of my
Speaker 2: gigs because I felt like I needed to bring all
Speaker 2: my crates because you just didn't know. I didn't know
Speaker 2: what we're going to get into, what kind of audience
Speaker 2: it was gonna be. OU didn't want to not have anything,
Speaker 2: And you can have all of that and still not
Speaker 2: have something, you know.
Speaker 3: I can't even imagine that.
Speaker 1: Now, if you've been attracted to the lure of returning
Speaker 1: to forty five's only.
Speaker 2: I've done it too. I've caught the forty five bus.
Speaker 1: Does really needed.
Speaker 2: I caught it a long time ago. No, it's not needed,
Speaker 2: But if you catch the bug, it's kind of fun.
Speaker 2: It's just it's fun. Just still trying to uh meet
Speaker 2: the timing of everything and the balancing of the needle
Speaker 2: like we grew up on that, you know, and the
Speaker 2: imperfections of it, you know it. I even realized the
Speaker 2: audience likes that they're like the record just skipped.
Speaker 1: So I just discovered three weeks ago someone put me
Speaker 1: onto a YouTube account in which this guy literally has
Speaker 1: a collection of all live hip hop and I mean
Speaker 1: the early days, and this is post Cold crush, like
Speaker 1: the era of us collecting tapes. I'm talking about the
Speaker 1: Graham Ass and Flash and Furious five show once they're an.
Speaker 3: Established group type show.
Speaker 1: What twenty minutes Doug and Rick had, all the deaf
Speaker 1: jam shows like ll Public Enemy. I didn't realize how
Speaker 1: much the occurrence of a skipping record was back then.
Speaker 3: And you know, I'm iffy on playing.
Speaker 1: Other drum sets not my own, so usually I'll bring
Speaker 1: like my snare or something that's familiar that I know
Speaker 1: my sound and all that stuff. But for the most part,
Speaker 1: if you are just blindly going to a club for
Speaker 1: you guys to perform, and you're on what seconds left
Speaker 1: of knowing how to balance your turntables, like how much anxiety?
Speaker 1: Was it just dealing with the whole idea of like
Speaker 1: in the second verse there might be a skip there,
Speaker 1: so I got to catch it, and or any of
Speaker 1: those because even have you ever watched.
Speaker 2: Rundium see how much anxiety? Have you ever watched to
Speaker 2: know how much weed I smoke? Have you ever seen
Speaker 2: rundum Sea's live a performance?
Speaker 1: Yes, they're doing I don't know if they're doing uh
Speaker 1: uh succerum seas or whatever. But it just skips every
Speaker 1: and then eventually JA just has to catch it yep
Speaker 1: in a way so that it stays on beat. And
Speaker 1: it's almost like it's it's the world doesn't know what
Speaker 1: genius that is, but for you, like what basic anxiety
Speaker 1: things that you have to worry about as a DJ,
Speaker 1: because you're also like playing breaks and.
Speaker 2: In the beginning it was the soft spots in the
Speaker 2: stage and we had dancers and all of that, right,
Speaker 2: So my anxiety would be somebody walking a past a
Speaker 2: certain part of the stage and it skips the record,
Speaker 2: which ruins the whole performance. So I used to I
Speaker 2: used to do sound check where I would people, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I would actually play the record and jump around the
Speaker 2: different parts of the stage to see where it would
Speaker 2: skip the worst, and then I mark it, put exes
Speaker 2: down and let everybody know, look this is where the
Speaker 2: record skips. It skips over here and skips over here.
Speaker 2: If you actually see the performance we do at Tramps.
Speaker 2: I watched it this morning, you you will notice that
Speaker 2: is what's happening. You'll notice when they're doing the most
Speaker 2: energetic stuff that at the front of the stage or
Speaker 2: at the corner of the They know the hotspots, they
Speaker 2: all do. They all knew the hotspots, they knew the
Speaker 2: fly to this in, they knew the fly to that end.
Speaker 2: But don't come over here else you're going to ruin again.
Speaker 1: Question to ask you, and you see my face, I'm like,
Speaker 1: this is what I'm ask you. Have you ever been
Speaker 1: in this situation where black Sheep has been a guest
Speaker 1: on the show and you know engine engine number nine
Speaker 1: is gonna come and you're not using replay like.
Speaker 2: I used to warn dress, I would warn you know.
Speaker 2: It was a pet peeve mine, especially when we had
Speaker 2: this nightmare of a show at Beacon Theater. It was
Speaker 2: since that show we had at the Beacon Theater. All
Speaker 2: of that was a pet peeve to me. It was
Speaker 2: a destructive show. Ever, the worst right up in our
Speaker 2: lives here is this eighty nine. It was we was
Speaker 2: on the bill with slick Rick. It was us slick Rick.
Speaker 2: I forgot who Yeah, it was just us a slick Rick.
Speaker 2: When I think, yeah, this was slick Ricks. Days of
Speaker 2: the Ruler, Yeah.
Speaker 4: Damn ok, yeah, the Great Adventures of the fucking Ruler.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, yeah right, but yeah, it was a nightmare
Speaker 4: the dancers were bumping into each other, skipped the record,
Speaker 4: Dave was forgetting his rhymes. We had props on stage.
Speaker 4: This was around the era of having really nice props
Speaker 4: because you know when Ll used to come out in
Speaker 4: the Lamborghini and all that. So I'll come out in
Speaker 4: a baby carriage, you know what, days riding this bike
Speaker 4: or something, you know.
Speaker 2: And we had these balloons, and the balloons were supposed
Speaker 2: to have peace signs on them. Management messed up and
Speaker 2: they had Mercedes been side. I tell you, destructive matter
Speaker 2: is I wanted to forget that night. This is on
Speaker 2: my brain, Like, whe's the greatest laugh this show. Mercedes
Speaker 2: been side, all the balloons supposed to be peace side.
Speaker 2: Oh god, He's like, look the piece like me up,
Speaker 2: that's crazy, It's crazy. I was but that from that
Speaker 2: day forward, like that's when I pet peeve of like
Speaker 2: the sound, the parts of the stage, all of that,
Speaker 2: Like sound check is very important to me.
Speaker 3: When did you give into an instant replay?
Speaker 2: I gave into the instant replay.
Speaker 1: Reluctant to do this, I was, or you felt it
Speaker 1: was necessary.
Speaker 2: It was necessary for so the show can resonate ac quarterly.
Speaker 2: Sound wise, because I.
Speaker 1: Was gonna say, by sounded awesome. You know what, Tramps,
Speaker 1: I'm standing to the right of that camera. I watched
Speaker 1: that entire show in the sound booth next to the camera. Dude, like,
Speaker 1: I'm literally that was well, that was the third day,
Speaker 1: last show. I saw the New Year's show at the Palladium,
Speaker 1: like Tribe Dayline, Souls and Missions and the like when
Speaker 1: right before Dead came out, you guys came to the
Speaker 1: phillyate the track of Daryl. But yeah, I was there
Speaker 1: that night. And that was also the first time I
Speaker 1: saw most which I don't think the world knows that
Speaker 1: your instrument and sort of bringing him to.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, the word I forgot. I was an instrument
Speaker 3: to that. What was it about Dante?
Speaker 1: Yeah, seen What was it about him that told you like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is going to be a great fit for us.
Speaker 2: Well, I heard Dante before I met him, and I
Speaker 2: you know, this was a time period still where you
Speaker 2: can hear artists and not know what they look like.
Speaker 2: And our mutual friend was our dancer Asia, we call
Speaker 2: the Asia Demons, and she knew Dante. I found out
Speaker 2: that he was when he first started to do the
Speaker 2: poetry readings pre poetry jam. I was djam those poetry
Speaker 2: readings like New yor Areekan Cafe and the museum that
Speaker 2: they had his mother's basement and something they had in Brooklyn. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I do that. Moms used to be their rest of soul.
Speaker 2: I would do those events for him, bringing the equipment
Speaker 2: and everything. Most used to do this poem called Peter
Speaker 2: Pan African, and that was like my favorite poem of his,
Speaker 2: Peter Pan African. Peter Pan, you gotta ask him to
Speaker 2: do that one. It's a dope poem, so dope. And
Speaker 2: I was just fascinated with his artistry altogether, like you know,
Speaker 2: k very charismatic. I didn't know he rhyme until we
Speaker 2: got outside and all the fellas was having a little
Speaker 2: cipher and I was like, yo, he nice. Yeah, I'm like, yo,
Speaker 2: this dude is super nice. Like he's multi talented. He
Speaker 2: was freestyling and singing and all of that. So and
Speaker 2: then it wasn't a tune. I had been following this group.
Speaker 2: I heard this record. I knew I think Domind had
Speaker 2: produced the Rich New and and one day that ship
Speaker 2: came on. Now mind you, I'm hanging out with this dude.
Speaker 2: Then I sit came on a video music box and
Speaker 2: I was like, yo, right, and mind you. But prior
Speaker 2: to that, when I met Most, I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: Cosmester mysteries. Right when I met him, I was like,
Speaker 2: oh Cosby mysteries. But then when I saw that, I
Speaker 2: was like, as soon as I saw that, I called him.
Speaker 2: I was like, yo, man, why you ain't telling me?
Speaker 2: Like he was like, yo man. You know He's like,
Speaker 2: you know, I didn't want to be that guy. I'm like,
Speaker 2: now you are that guy. I need to know this guy.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, Like this confirms for me
Speaker 1: one of the biggest questions I ever had. All Right,
Speaker 1: I don't know if I should put this story all
Speaker 1: the way out there, but I will just say this
Speaker 1: much Most was dating someone that did not know that
Speaker 1: he was not only an extra like a main part
Speaker 1: of Michael Jackson's Ghosts. If you remember Michael Jackson in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety seven when Blood on the Dance Floor came out,
Speaker 1: really try to you know, do the lightning in a
Speaker 1: bottle twice thing, like I got an outdo thriller. So
Speaker 1: he made another sixteen minute scary film called Ghosts and Whatnot.
Speaker 1: And Most is like one of two black people. It's
Speaker 1: like a town of an old man that's scared. It's
Speaker 1: like a Tales from the Crypt type thing, and we're
Speaker 1: watching it and I was like, oh, damn, they're the
Speaker 1: most and she's like, well, no, that's not him.
Speaker 3: I said, clearly, you're his voice, like you.
Speaker 2: Talk like that that that Brooklyn Opra thing Brooklyn and
Speaker 2: he has dialogue in this thing and she calls him.
Speaker 1: It's like, yo, like, why don't you tell me you're
Speaker 1: in the new Michael Jackson video. And he was like,
Speaker 1: that's not me, And I'm like, it is him, Like
Speaker 1: we could clearly we're all an electric lady watching this thing.
Speaker 1: And it just escalated there almost into an argument, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, why does he always deny when he does
Speaker 1: these like mind blowing things. But I, you know, also
Speaker 1: think that's part of the lord, like he doesn't want
Speaker 1: to appear to be I do.
Speaker 2: Remember in the beginning he was even he was saying,
Speaker 2: he was like he was keeping the acting.
Speaker 3: Like kind of monotone Search and State.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And he he was also turning down really huge
Speaker 2: projects because he's so in love with this hip hop thing.
Speaker 2: He's famous, yes, and he I think he did the
Speaker 2: best job at not crossing the two, bouncing the two?
Speaker 1: Yeah where because he could have easily went the will
Speaker 1: Smith route and just been.
Speaker 2: But then we I don't think we would get the
Speaker 2: records we got. We wouldn't. We wouldn't got the artistry
Speaker 2: we got from him. I'll tell you most of our constituents,
Speaker 2: comrades that have lean that went the acting route and
Speaker 2: music either vanished or they started to make it a
Speaker 2: certain thing that cater to Yeah, a movie.
Speaker 1: Once they're once, they're trapped into it. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: I got it A question I didn't ask. You give
Speaker 1: me your version of the origins of how Da La
Speaker 1: Soul got formed? At what point are you meeting Paul
Speaker 1: and Dave and kelvin Mercy?
Speaker 2: I met Pass, Dave and Charlie He should be a
Speaker 2: fourth member. Yeah, before we even had a name, I
Speaker 2: met Pass and Dave do a guy named Charlie. We
Speaker 2: call him Charlie Rock. I met them in summer school.
Speaker 2: To be exact, okay, we all were in English and
Speaker 2: math together in summer school of eighty five, and somehow
Speaker 2: we clicked in school.
Speaker 1: And I also love the smartest group I know was
Speaker 1: always all of you were in summer school, of us,
Speaker 1: all of us, all us summer school.
Speaker 3: We clicked and I actually lived right across the street
Speaker 3: from the school.
Speaker 2: So as our relationship developed in class, next thing, you know,
Speaker 2: we started to end up at somebody's house. You know,
Speaker 2: more than likely would end up at my house or
Speaker 2: Chuck's house. You know, and then things just start to grow,
Speaker 2: like we you know, some some about this connection just
Speaker 2: kept bringing these odd four people together. You know, I'm
Speaker 2: still new in the neighborhood, so I'm just still relative
Speaker 2: relatively making new friends. Like anybody I'm kind of thinking.
Speaker 2: I got a certain kind of connection with I'm developing.
Speaker 2: So we were I'm just meeting still new friends at
Speaker 2: this time, and it was definitely over the music. Somehow
Speaker 2: we ended up at Chuck's house. Then we started ending
Speaker 2: up at my house. Link make a long story shut.
Speaker 2: Chuck was getting into things that nobody else was into,
Speaker 2: and you know, he pretty much exed himself out. You know,
Speaker 2: I'll never forget the big argument we all had. It
Speaker 2: was almost like a breakup to make up, because we
Speaker 2: initially broke up. We were like, we weren't even a
Speaker 2: group yet, but we were.
Speaker 3: We knew we had something.
Speaker 2: All I knew is we knew we had something that
Speaker 2: the vibe that was coming together had me going to
Speaker 2: buy Doctor Rhythm, Drummer Shine, and he had me just
Speaker 2: getting what I can afford to even lend to what
Speaker 2: we're trying to create here. Past was buying more records
Speaker 2: and stuff, and we studying rat and more, you know.
Speaker 2: And when he brought home Ultra Magnetic, that was like
Speaker 2: the light bulb that went off, you know. I was like, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 2: we could do this, you know. And then the frustrations
Speaker 2: behind meeting the fake mc shan, a fake BDP and wait, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I knew Corey Rooney really well. We grew up with
Speaker 2: Corey actually went to high school with his sister and
Speaker 2: a lot of.
Speaker 1: Us using Corey Rooney. His father, Herb Rooney, Yes, synthetics institution.
Speaker 2: Like Herb was that guy. Herb was like, I knew
Speaker 2: her before I knew Corey. You got to meet Herb Rooney. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Herb was like the guy. Herb was like, I was
Speaker 2: like almost like a surrogate son to her. Why Corey
Speaker 2: could tell you that for real, I used to be
Speaker 2: over there a lot. Seriously, her was like I don't know.
Speaker 2: He had that spirit of like he welcomed the kids
Speaker 2: into his home, you know what I mean? Anybody like
Speaker 2: you know?
Speaker 3: Was he aware of what was happening with his record
Speaker 3: at that time?
Speaker 2: I'm not sure. I don't even know, Like, did.
Speaker 3: You ever play in the ultramate EGGX first single?
Speaker 2: And be like no, because even at that time I
Speaker 2: didn't know.
Speaker 3: Oh you didn't even even know either.
Speaker 1: He just organically knew HERB B Rney without knowing synthetic substitution.
Speaker 2: Nope, I got substitution, but I'm not.
Speaker 3: You didn't and you didn't connect with you together, and.
Speaker 2: I did not as crazy, not at all. It wasn't
Speaker 2: until after her past I put it together.
Speaker 3: Damn for real.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, But we used to be over there a lot,
Speaker 2: and Corey was the prodigal son. He didn't go to school.
Speaker 2: He got home schooled. He played drums all day. And
Speaker 2: Corey ran around with an army suit on with a
Speaker 2: rifle on his back. Corey to be crazy.
Speaker 3: Was he in the army at least?
Speaker 2: Nah? Corey used to be crazy. We used to be
Speaker 2: scared of Corey. I can't in front. Corey used to be.
Speaker 1: Off the hook.
Speaker 2: I know, I don't know, and I know kry R
Speaker 2: Cory is kind of wild. No, man, Corey don't play, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I don't know. Hes been solid too, Like you know,
Speaker 2: I watched him step away from the fam and go
Speaker 2: do his thing with Prince Marky D and watch him
Speaker 2: step from that.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: He even brought me into SO Convention. I had produced
Speaker 2: two songs from Mark. One of them made the album
Speaker 2: word Yeah. Mark robbed me though, Okay, I got to
Speaker 2: address it before he passed. Okay, okay, but I had
Speaker 2: a lowell Fulson record. Then the.
Speaker 3: Chorus I did not earlier.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I wrote the chorus, and I was like, yeah,
Speaker 2: Mark put my credit under Vincent Mason, not DJ Maycy
Speaker 2: or from Dayly. It was all like I was part
Speaker 2: of the Soul Convention family, but also learned at that
Speaker 2: time too, Corey was kind of on its way out
Speaker 2: from from SO Convention.
Speaker 1: I guess, wait, first of all, we're falling down a
Speaker 1: rabbit hole. How did you meet the fake and the
Speaker 1: fake bad people together?
Speaker 2: No, it was different. It was different days.
Speaker 3: How was that beef?
Speaker 2: It was different days. The fake mc shan came over
Speaker 2: Corey's house, so we end up getting an invite over
Speaker 2: there to because Corey knew what we was up to.
Speaker 2: You know, Corey also remembered me from being in a
Speaker 2: group called Hardcore and a song that I made with them,
Speaker 2: and he's still to this very day knows that song.
Speaker 3: Really he.
Speaker 2: Dude, I Won't to Rock Your Body. That was the
Speaker 2: name of his song. He remembers my verse for some reason.
Speaker 2: I don't even remember my first but but Corey remember that,
Speaker 2: and then he started to pay attention to what I
Speaker 2: was doing and me David Merse, he knew David Merse.
Speaker 2: He kind of knew what I knew. They nobody knew
Speaker 2: they rap. You know, it was like a closet thing
Speaker 2: we were doing for a long time. And Charlie lived
Speaker 2: right around the corner from Corey, so the back and
Speaker 2: forth was you know, it was especially with the invite
Speaker 2: from herb You know. This one day we go over
Speaker 2: there and this dude claimed to be Shan and I'm like,
Speaker 2: it was all suspect to me because I'm like, the
Speaker 2: way the dude talk and what I hear on the records,
Speaker 2: this don't sound like Shane. But I'm gonna rived this out,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, I don't even know how
Speaker 2: he got to herb's crib, I don't you know. And
Speaker 2: then here it is different queens also, so I don't
Speaker 2: know somebody got to herb and was faking Jack's oh guy.
Speaker 2: And it got to a point in that even in
Speaker 2: that day, Corey was like, this ain't no mc shane,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. And then the the BDP
Speaker 2: cat was Charlie's sister was dating somebody from that crew
Speaker 2: and the dude was hanging with BDP. He wasn't down
Speaker 2: with BDP. So that right there frustrated the hell out
Speaker 2: of Merce. I'll never forget that day. Merch was so
Speaker 2: frustrated with that shit. And then Charlie used to play
Speaker 2: around so much too. That was also another thing when
Speaker 2: we were really trying to get serious about trying to
Speaker 2: make some songs on Chuckler play too much. So that
Speaker 2: was all irkin Merce. And then it came one day
Speaker 2: put it like this is the day that we actually
Speaker 2: like Merce bassed out and he was like, I don't
Speaker 2: want to do this no more. I'm going home, taking
Speaker 2: my shirt home. I started carrying my equipment back around
Speaker 2: to my house because we end up bringing my equipment
Speaker 2: to Chuck's house. Dudes try to rob my house. And
Speaker 2: it's clear what they was trying to get because when
Speaker 2: they broke in my house, you could tell they went
Speaker 2: to the basement. Mind you, there's a sheepskin here, there's
Speaker 2: a sheepskin there, there's other Jordan's and all that. They
Speaker 2: headed to the basement. So somebody was trying to get
Speaker 2: my equipment, you know, and when my uncle ended up
Speaker 2: coming home, so they rushed out the window. They came in.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: They weren't successful.
Speaker 2: No, they were showing up getting my equipment and taking
Speaker 2: it to the Chuck's house. So we would be at
Speaker 2: Chuck's house practicing. Chuck had the whole downstairs. Chuck, he
Speaker 2: was the Ricky Schroeder and the crew. He had his
Speaker 2: house parents had the big old house. He had the
Speaker 2: downstairs to himself, separate interests. He can even have female companies.
Speaker 3: They ever trained in the living room.
Speaker 2: Now he could have you know, like he could have.
Speaker 3: Have you seen him since Dale I started popping off.
Speaker 2: Actually I tried to continue my relationship with him by
Speaker 2: helping him with another group. And I even try to
Speaker 2: put him down with my cousin uptown, remember uptown dope
Speaker 2: one plastic cousin. Well, we call each other cousins because
Speaker 2: we grew up from babes. I thought that was yeah,
Speaker 2: I know, I know, I thought that was I did
Speaker 2: not know that was your damn Okay, we grew up
Speaker 2: from the sandbox. So I put I put truck down
Speaker 2: with him, and he messed that up too, you know.
Speaker 2: Tommy Boy turned around and was like, we want to
Speaker 2: sign uptown, but we don't know about your man. And
Speaker 2: I was like, there's another opportunity and stup for himself,
Speaker 2: you know. Yeah, so I'll never forget poss coming over
Speaker 2: the house though, him and Dave, and it was really
Speaker 2: odd to me. He was like, yo, man, we see
Speaker 2: you serious about this. You know we are just as serious.
Speaker 2: He's like, we want you to be our DJ. Dave
Speaker 2: didn't say nothing the whole time, but hindsight me knowing
Speaker 2: my brothers to this day, they spoke about this beforehand.
Speaker 1: You know, I do admire that about you guys. I
Speaker 1: mean there would be moments like Tarika and I are
Speaker 1: just in this kind of therapy stage of making sure
Speaker 1: that we're connected because every time I be around you guys,
Speaker 1: none of that what we hear, like the idea of
Speaker 1: day La soul, Like, oh, this group that has this
Speaker 1: great chemistry they laugh at each other's jokes whatever. Like
Speaker 1: your laugh to me is one of the most infectious
Speaker 1: things and one of the most authentic things.
Speaker 2: This is what you don't know.
Speaker 3: Okay, we're gonna fall down serious rabbit holes. All right.
Speaker 3: I used to teach at NYU.
Speaker 2: I hate my laugh too, but I can't do.
Speaker 3: All right, so they're back.
Speaker 1: When I used to teach at NYU, Professor A Milliard
Speaker 1: shout out to you Hello. She once did a study
Speaker 1: about the history of black music and she made an observation.
Speaker 1: So the very first time that a black voice or
Speaker 1: a black song was released, it was a song called
Speaker 1: The Laughing Song by a guy named George Johnson no
Speaker 1: relation to the Brothers Johnson, and The Laughing Song was
Speaker 1: almost like an ironic song, the same way that Stevie
Speaker 1: Wonder's Village Ghetto Land. It's done, you know, in classical music,
Speaker 1: and he's talking about like he's talking about impoverished conditions,
Speaker 1: but he's doing in such an ironic way, with like
Speaker 1: a tuxedo sort of level, basically saying like, you know,
Speaker 1: we're still struggling in nineteen seventy six with poverty and everything.
Speaker 1: But yet you know the world doesn't care if common
Speaker 1: man is starving. And so basically, since the days of
Speaker 1: the Reconstruction, black people weren't allowed to ever express emotions,
Speaker 1: which is why we invented cool, because you don't know
Speaker 1: what we're feeling. You can't be angry, you might get
Speaker 1: dealt with. You can't laugh, you might get dealt like literally,
Speaker 1: anything to do with emotions you're not allowed to do.
Speaker 1: And what she did was she conducted a study on
Speaker 1: every song in black music that contains laughter, and and
Speaker 1: she's like her findings were like ninety six percent of
Speaker 1: those songs. Laughter was always for the most ironic reasons,
Speaker 1: like you know, like when it's like we bet motherfuckers haa,
Speaker 1: like it's a laugh for evil, or if it's a
Speaker 1: James Brown command like or whatever. But never even Michael's
Speaker 1: he he's are always after some depressing shit. He just
Speaker 1: did you know, I want to be starting somethings depressing.
Speaker 1: Billy Jean's depressing. And there's rare occasions of and we're
Speaker 1: trying to think of, like has anyone ever laughed on
Speaker 1: record where it was actually genuine like I'm expressing joy
Speaker 1: And I was like, well, shit, I know the end
Speaker 1: of Rafty Rap Show where you hear like Macio and literally,
Speaker 1: so you were like one of a very rare case
Speaker 1: of a person laughing because something's actually funny and you're
Speaker 1: expressing which is it's a weird study to find that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's no. There's like a three year study that
Speaker 1: she did on just the history of.
Speaker 3: Laughing in black music.
Speaker 1: But for you, like when you're crafting these records, and
Speaker 1: I asked Pas, like, how are you guys able to
Speaker 1: make these intricate skits sound so spontaneous and off the cuff?
Speaker 1: But I know to record stuff, it's like and go
Speaker 1: and it never feels that way. It always just feels
Speaker 1: like a tape was always rolling. And you guys, just
Speaker 1: like the night you guys did the twenty minute version
Speaker 1: skipped to my loop like you can't plan that, Like
Speaker 1: what happens yo?
Speaker 2: That right there?
Speaker 1: That is my favorite shit of all time, by the way,
Speaker 1: And I listen to all twenty minutes of that shit, like.
Speaker 2: Everybody came over with my house. This is the first
Speaker 2: time I think everybody was at my House, Granny, rest
Speaker 2: of the Soul, China jet Right. Dave came, Mike, his
Speaker 2: brother Mike. We were trying to just figure something out,
Speaker 2: so you put it on record, put on his record,
Speaker 2: and it just start to skip on beat and Dave
Speaker 2: started skip to my Lou, Skip to my Lou, skip
Speaker 2: to my love. It just kept going, skip to my live,
Speaker 2: skip to my little and it's just and then more
Speaker 2: from there, and it was like we got to skip.
Speaker 2: We're looking for we got it.
Speaker 1: If you guys can find what's the mixtape you guys did.
Speaker 1: It's actually one of my favorite day Lout records, but
Speaker 1: you guys treated it as a mixtape. It's on that
Speaker 1: mixtape No No, No No, before the Dial of Daisy thing.
Speaker 1: You guys did the Impossible Mission. Oh if you have
Speaker 1: the Impossible Mission mixtape, it's on YouTube. You can hear
Speaker 1: the entire twenty minutes. I don't know why you want to,
Speaker 1: but it's like one of my favorite moments ever because
Speaker 1: it's you guys just being silly. That was a risky
Speaker 1: thing to do back then, Like has there ever been
Speaker 1: a thing because I've seen you.
Speaker 3: Gotta think Paul for that. You know, Paul was there
Speaker 3: ever a discussion like, yo, we can't appear to be
Speaker 3: too happy, go lucky your motherfuckers you will.
Speaker 2: No, that was never a discussion. It was never even
Speaker 2: really a thought. It was us being our natural silly selves.
Speaker 2: But Paul having the idea of recording it. That's it, like, Yo,
Speaker 2: we need to record all of this. It's too good.
Speaker 2: It's it's just too good. He would he would sit
Speaker 2: back like a real producer and just analyze everything and
Speaker 2: be like, yo, man, no idea, here is a bad idea.
Speaker 2: That's how he operated. We have to try everything.
Speaker 3: How did you make pluck tuneing?
Speaker 1: In the demo?
Speaker 2: The demo we made with the sk one, it was
Speaker 2: a Cassio drum machine and the sk one and the
Speaker 2: sk one we put up to the speaker the sample
Speaker 2: the written on the wall sample. Yeah, so that's from
Speaker 2: the s k one. That's the sk one did demo?
Speaker 2: The actual demo? I heard it.
Speaker 1: It wasn't It didn't feel that homemade, like perfect timing
Speaker 1: to do?
Speaker 2: Yeah, who was the person that we were sharing? And
Speaker 2: it was more pause tape vibe because whatever was off,
Speaker 2: And also you had to we had the drum machine
Speaker 2: to follow because the drum program on the Casio RZ one.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the drum pattern was pretty lock solid, so you
Speaker 2: could follow the pattern. You just get tired, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 2: Other than that, that was that was it, and we
Speaker 2: were overdubbing, overdubbing cassettes.
Speaker 1: I later found out that a line share of it
Speaker 1: Takes the Nature to Millions was also made the same
Speaker 1: way where they didn't read the manual to sequence. They
Speaker 1: literally like, that's triggered Flavor Flave doing all the eight
Speaker 1: o eights and Funky Drummer on rebels out of pause
Speaker 1: because he had a maculate timing, so Flavor play yes,
Speaker 1: right right, but he had a maculine timing with so
Speaker 1: he's the one that looped Funky drummer and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: So just to know that none of that was sequence
Speaker 1: and all put together by human is some mind blowing shit, you.
Speaker 2: Know, straight out the jungle is that album was all
Speaker 2: DJ Well.
Speaker 1: I figured like in a later listen that oh this
Speaker 1: is not triggered only because of you know, I'm also
Speaker 1: the guy like if you know Jazzy Jeff, He's taught
Speaker 1: me the idea of warping stuff and perfecting it, which
Speaker 1: sounds weird when you start trying to make things perfect
Speaker 1: sounding when it shouldn't be. So yeah, I learned the
Speaker 1: hard way of trying to I try to warp Jim Brownski,
Speaker 1: which is a nightmare.
Speaker 2: You know what I mean.
Speaker 3: Right, wait, I got to talk about.
Speaker 1: Style now. Of course we're doing this for Levi's, and
Speaker 1: it's just a coincidence that you guys are also style icons.
Speaker 1: I mean as far as like hairstyles and what you
Speaker 1: guys wore, which was unlike anything that I've ever seen
Speaker 1: anyone in the craft of hip hop rocking at the time.
Speaker 1: For me, I had an old Levi's jacket that I
Speaker 1: got when I we went to school with boys to men.
Speaker 3: So we did this motown Philly video.
Speaker 1: I'm like drumming and whatever, and I kept that shit
Speaker 1: on forever because Treik's like, you gotta wear the jacket
Speaker 1: every day because we can get girls numbers. They'll recognize
Speaker 1: the jacket from the video summertime me rocking this jacket
Speaker 1: or whatever. Was there ever an article of clothing like
Speaker 1: as far as like deciding what the personal style was.
Speaker 1: I know you guys said, like, oh, we go in
Speaker 1: our parents' cribs and wear their clothes.
Speaker 3: But was that really the case or.
Speaker 2: Like not, I really was the case, especially for them
Speaker 2: two guys. They were in their pops gear. Me, I
Speaker 2: had to go buy stuff to have a pop still. Okay,
Speaker 2: got that.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it was like your favorite art, cool clothing
Speaker 1: or like at least for the early days of daylight soul,
Speaker 1: like that never left you.
Speaker 2: I mean for the early days. What was cool about it?
Speaker 2: It was like the way they were hooking up their pants.
Speaker 2: Because I do come from an era of I'm more
Speaker 2: into the nostalgic where the classic where, you know, stuff
Speaker 2: that I always wanted to wear when I was younger
Speaker 2: watching my uncles and all of them, and I used to,
Speaker 2: you know, every now and again, my mom would get
Speaker 2: me a pair of shocks skins pants, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean. I used to rock shocks camp, Yeah, shock skin,
Speaker 2: the split Gabardine joints. Yeah, I used to rock that,
Speaker 2: you know. And then but they used to be pretty
Speaker 2: bell bottom. And then when I met Post and Dave
Speaker 2: David Mert excuse me, guys, I gotta call them Dave,
Speaker 2: they would kind of hem their pants, like almost make
Speaker 2: them straight leg. They would turn the bells into straits
Speaker 2: because they their father's pants were damn near the same,
Speaker 2: so they would make them straight leg.
Speaker 1: And I had safety pinning them together so they'd be
Speaker 1: more baggy.
Speaker 2: Instead of yeah. Yeah, And so when I saw Dave
Speaker 2: do that, I copied that. I was like, Yeah, that's
Speaker 2: exactly how I really want my pants to be. I
Speaker 2: don't want them to be bell bottom because I want
Speaker 2: you to see my shoes. I'm rocking too, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. So, but I did come from the
Speaker 2: split gaberdines, the shark skin, the mock neck iceed Dice
Speaker 2: used to rock that. That was my thing.
Speaker 1: Well, you also mentioned when your households got broken into
Speaker 1: you like sheepskin. Yeah yeah, so if you were aware
Speaker 1: street fashion of the time, yeah I was. I was
Speaker 1: heavily because when we heard take it Off, We're just
Speaker 1: like I was.
Speaker 2: A baby jem Master Jay straight up. Okay, Yeah, I
Speaker 2: was lother pants and all of that, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean? Yeah, I was relatively dressing like flashing the
Speaker 2: Furious five and run.
Speaker 1: Dmc gotcha, how long did it take you to creft
Speaker 1: cool Breeze on the rocks?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 1: I was heartbroken because of the new version, and of
Speaker 1: course that the clearest long but I love the way
Speaker 1: you guys handle it. It's even more hilarious. That was
Speaker 1: the most hilarious thing. If you can find the original
Speaker 1: cool Breeze on the Rocks on YouTube, listen to what
Speaker 1: it was and how my bow we were back then
Speaker 1: and compared to what they had to do now with it.
Speaker 2: But how long did that take to craft that piece?
Speaker 2: Made me hate engineering? It made me hate engineer. Now,
Speaker 2: don't get a twisted Now, I can engineer my ass
Speaker 2: off because I got no choice. But tell me about
Speaker 2: the punching. It made me hate engineering. Talk about it punching?
Speaker 2: How about spicing? Tape spicing? And I'm not talking about
Speaker 2: the spicing we do on able ten or tubes. I'm
Speaker 2: talking about tape, actual tape, spicing tape. I hate that.
Speaker 3: So wait, in my mind, you're in the studio with
Speaker 3: a two inch reel doing this.
Speaker 2: You're doing this on the second I did it on
Speaker 2: the half inch. I brought in all the records I
Speaker 2: found with the word rock with the word rock in it.
Speaker 2: And how long did it take you to do the
Speaker 2: research or did you just automatically know? I thought of
Speaker 2: different records off top and I went right to them
Speaker 2: and I was just, you know, go through making sure
Speaker 2: you know what I'm thinking is the correct thing, and
Speaker 2: then going down the rabbit hole of fine and all
Speaker 2: the stuff I wanted to say. Rock I knew.
Speaker 3: I always wanted to mess with kool Breese from Richard Pryor.
Speaker 2: I knew that. So it was like, cool breeze on
Speaker 2: the rocks. Okay, let's figure this out, you know what.
Speaker 2: And I went down every record that had rock. But
Speaker 2: then it was putting it together. It took two days, man,
Speaker 2: It took actually two days to do that one little piece.
Speaker 2: And I recorded all the rocks to the half inch.
Speaker 2: You know. I cut the kool bris, the koolbrees, but
Speaker 2: all the rocks I spliced. Oh so wait, it wasn't
Speaker 2: like you just added on to it, No, you just
Speaker 2: oh no, yeah, I just cut koolbrees. And then why
Speaker 2: did you do it that way? I didn't know no
Speaker 2: other way. I just it was come on. It was beginnings,
Speaker 2: the embryoic stages of what we were, what we were becoming.
Speaker 2: And I didn't Paul didn't know no other way. The
Speaker 2: engineer didn't know any other way. It was like we
Speaker 2: recorded to the half engine, then we're gonna splice it
Speaker 2: all together. But I was on deck learning to splice
Speaker 2: it because it was my idea. So I'm working with
Speaker 2: al the engineer, and I swear I hated that shit
Speaker 2: marking the tape trying to get it and then sometimes
Speaker 2: you're cutting over the part where you're trying to have
Speaker 2: so now you got to record it again again. I
Speaker 2: hated that ship man. I was like, I'm never doing
Speaker 2: this again. And I say, as an engineer, I don't
Speaker 2: want to be an engineer. I'll be a producer and
Speaker 2: I hire it. Man, we mixed this record. You don't
Speaker 2: even know, like no that I mean just and it's
Speaker 2: before automation.
Speaker 3: And all of that.
Speaker 1: Dude, like that made such a profound I know you
Speaker 1: probably think like this is a thirty second sketch.
Speaker 3: But just our collective minds were blown. I used.
Speaker 1: I worked at the Sam Goodies uh the week that
Speaker 1: that came out, and when we heard it, we all
Speaker 1: stopped in the thing like what the hell is this?
Speaker 1: Like we just I mean Nation of Millions was just
Speaker 1: one thing to take in, like seven songs coming at
Speaker 1: you at the same time out of key or whatever.
Speaker 1: But yeah, when that happened, the entire like white people
Speaker 1: stopped like what is this right?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Literally, yeah, I was working in sam Goodies when
Speaker 1: when that record came out.
Speaker 2: My favorite device in the studio was the even did
Speaker 2: the even why the harmoniza. It allowed us to, you know,
Speaker 2: to mess records together that didn't really work, you know, zealmonically.
Speaker 2: You guys did that, and I forget the example of it.
Speaker 2: Buddy Buddy was one.
Speaker 3: Buddy was example of that.
Speaker 2: What's the name was an example of it. Also say
Speaker 2: no go yes with the with the baseline, with the
Speaker 2: baseline also along with sliding the family Stone record. Yes, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: those records don't work together.
Speaker 1: You guys were the first to match your samples so
Speaker 1: that it's together. Can I ask something for three feet?
Speaker 1: Was Bob involved in or did he come full time
Speaker 1: during Daylight soula his Dead?
Speaker 2: He came up during day Los Sola's Dead in the
Speaker 2: begin and it was Bob Coulter who actually was one
Speaker 2: of the partners of Calliope Studio. It was Sue Fisher loudly,
Speaker 2: God rest his soul. I forgot the Shane favor.
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, you guys were also one of the first
Speaker 1: rap groups that I noticed that didn't rhyme over their
Speaker 1: album versions or rhyme over I came rhyme over his
Speaker 1: Recordlick Rick two?
Speaker 3: Was was that a purpose?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 3: And the closest that I did.
Speaker 1: See MC's rhyming to their instrumentals, you know, like Molly
Speaker 1: mal would I always have a dub on the B side?
Speaker 1: You allowed to hear the story, the story, the story
Speaker 1: way back when when like yeah, they would do and
Speaker 1: I think that was to say you know where you are, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: But you guys were the first thing I noticed was like, whoa,
Speaker 1: these are all instrumentals, Like because that GM didn't even
Speaker 1: start making instrumentals until eighty seven. So were you guys
Speaker 1: like already aware that instrumentals should be on the B
Speaker 1: side or was that a Tommy Boyd decision?
Speaker 2: It was stuff we learned from stet Okay, you know,
Speaker 2: I cant front Stecho. Sonic was a huge template for
Speaker 2: a lot of things we've became. You know, if you
Speaker 2: ever saw such a Sonic live show, it was one
Speaker 2: of the most incredible shows you can see.
Speaker 3: I have a wish in life.
Speaker 1: There is not I mean, the closest that you get
Speaker 1: to classic stet in their glory. It was some talk
Speaker 1: show where I think Ella was there to really promote
Speaker 1: Walking with the Panther, and I asked this with Chuck.
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is the era of least like the
Speaker 1: first generation of video cameras. Not one person in that
Speaker 1: circle doing those tours decided to record one Stets of
Speaker 1: Sonic show.
Speaker 3: All I will know is the folklore of.
Speaker 1: The craziest group and for me to be the sort
Speaker 1: of the back end of that, and having never ever
Speaker 1: seen Step like, I can't imagine a person not seeing
Speaker 1: a Root show once at least before they say, oh,
Speaker 1: they're the greatest group, Like I would love to say
Speaker 1: that myself, but there's no record whatsoever of their performance,
Speaker 1: Like does Paul have anything? Does he?
Speaker 3: I'll ask It's even harder to find you guys.
Speaker 2: If anybody would have picked up the camera back then,
Speaker 2: would have been Paul. But if he's in the show,
Speaker 2: he can't do it right. Maybe New Kirk rest of
Speaker 2: Soul might have recorded. Maybe somebody around Paul might have
Speaker 2: I'm gonna ask him, though.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say one of the one of the
Speaker 1: greatest things that I got to see kind of been
Speaker 1: reflecting on Dave's life.
Speaker 3: Was the footage of you guys recording.
Speaker 1: The day I sold his Dead album, which I mean
Speaker 1: any of those things that's like gold to me. Now, Like,
Speaker 1: how do you recall like CAMRA's being rolled often during
Speaker 1: like at least the first three records when video cameras are.
Speaker 2: Really conscious of the camera being on. You know, you've
Speaker 2: seen his footage, right, I've seen I saw the footage
Speaker 2: of Dave doing Johnny's Dead, Yes, yes, to see that
Speaker 2: Vincent Mason, right, what is the basis of that?
Speaker 1: He's just having to be.
Speaker 2: In a pan at the piano, got a freaking fool
Speaker 2: And it's one of them days where I call home.
Speaker 2: Work was done. You know, Paul would give us homework,
Speaker 2: so homework was done, so we had time in the
Speaker 2: studio just to do whatever. That's how the skits would
Speaker 2: even come to life, because once we took care of
Speaker 2: what was for homework, right, yeah, and then we got
Speaker 2: more time to just either come up with a new
Speaker 2: song or just mess around.
Speaker 1: You know, I always wanted to know this question, So
Speaker 1: I meant for us being as though instruments are a
Speaker 1: big part of what makes a roots album, that stuff
Speaker 1: was part of the budget. Hey, I want to get
Speaker 1: more an extra microphone for this particular sound. I want
Speaker 1: to buy these symbols or whatever.
Speaker 3: Was record shopping and digging part of the record budget
Speaker 3: or was that just like.
Speaker 2: Nah, that was naturally part of it. You own it.
Speaker 2: And I couldn't wait to go on tour so I
Speaker 2: could hit every city, go dig and go digging. I
Speaker 2: couldn't wait, especially going overseas. It was one time I
Speaker 2: went to some store and I damn the boy half
Speaker 2: the store and I got two tickets to a Prince concert.
Speaker 3: Behind that.
Speaker 2: Really, when Prince came out with Batman, I was in
Speaker 2: this record shop and I just like, this record shop
Speaker 2: had almost everything I my heart desired. I you know,
Speaker 2: first of all, the turntable was in there and so
Speaker 2: you could play everything you was checking for. And I
Speaker 2: was just I had a day. It was a gold
Speaker 2: rush day, and I damned brought half the store. And
Speaker 2: the dude was like any typical he kept it open
Speaker 2: for me. You know, I was in there after hours
Speaker 2: and he was like, yo, just because you bought so many,
Speaker 2: I got two tickets tonight for Prince at Wembley. Stop playing.
Speaker 2: He was like for really, I want to give you
Speaker 2: these two tickets and me and my at the time,
Speaker 2: my security at the time we went to the concert.
Speaker 2: It's crazy, I lost my voice everything else. It was
Speaker 2: the best. It was the best.
Speaker 1: Wait, I would say probably my era, like starting in
Speaker 1: ninety five, once record dealers became aware that, oh I
Speaker 1: can sell him this Golf McDermott record for fifty bucks.
Speaker 3: I could sell you know this this.
Speaker 2: Year Mark ups on us because they see us coming.
Speaker 1: So you were there for a magic period where people
Speaker 1: really didn't know the value of stuff and you could
Speaker 1: get something for a dollar or five dollars.
Speaker 2: Quarter even a quarter.
Speaker 1: What was the wild, wild gold rush days of record conventions?
Speaker 1: Like when I'm hearing these stories of like hotels being
Speaker 1: oh man, like, were you ever part of that madness?
Speaker 2: And I was for a second, and then I started
Speaker 2: to notice the competitive behavior this is where and then
Speaker 2: I stopped going the.
Speaker 1: First time I'm hearing blah blahs and ass or blah
Speaker 1: blah blah, like you found out who cats really were
Speaker 1: during this period. And the one thing I always heard
Speaker 1: though was that Prince B was such a nice figure.
Speaker 3: Prince VI from.
Speaker 1: PM doing was that the dealers will always let him
Speaker 1: come in like at one in the morning, like eight
Speaker 1: hours before you guys even get a chance to get
Speaker 1: to it. Either he paid them extra money or is
Speaker 1: this extra nice to him or whatever.
Speaker 3: And then like come nine am when it's time to
Speaker 3: let everyone else in Capri used to be there the
Speaker 3: night before.
Speaker 2: Really he if you get a book of room in the.
Speaker 1: Hotel, smart smart, smart, so.
Speaker 2: It catch them while they's setting up.
Speaker 1: Really, let me see that. Let me so I'm an
Speaker 1: add its height? Like was it really just like the
Speaker 1: search for gold, the search for the perfect break? Not
Speaker 1: knowing what's on this or that? Like would you roll
Speaker 1: by yourself or would you guys roll as a group?
Speaker 2: I would go by myself. In the beginning, it would
Speaker 2: we would rally up and go together, you know, it
Speaker 2: would be kind of part of our day when we
Speaker 2: met up at the studio or something like that, you know.
Speaker 2: But then yeah, after a while, I start going by myself.
Speaker 2: I start even traveling different places just alone. Got you
Speaker 2: just how can focus? Okay and don't feel that pressure?
Speaker 1: Yeah okay, So I mean I've heard enough folklore behind
Speaker 1: you being responsible for me and myself and I all
Speaker 1: the way that we hate the song too.
Speaker 3: I guess okay, we like the song again.
Speaker 1: Now it's a legacy song from Suit the Nuts. What
Speaker 1: is your version of me?
Speaker 3: Myself and I? And also the three sided twelve inch idea?
Speaker 2: Like, Okay, let's start with the three sided thing with
Speaker 2: the double groove, right, I'm gonna give credit to Tom
Speaker 2: Silverman for that. Okay, I gotta give it to him
Speaker 2: for that. You know, I will always say, after whatever
Speaker 2: we decided to do business wise, you know, whether we
Speaker 2: liked it or not, whatever we decide after that creatively
Speaker 2: working with him was always pretty funky, you know. The
Speaker 2: so that double groove I did, I thought it wasn't
Speaker 2: I wish I thought of that, you know what I
Speaker 2: mean that. I was like that, well, we do give
Speaker 2: you guys credit for it, but I get it, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. Why didn't come to me like
Speaker 2: you know, but I was up to him for that.
Speaker 2: You know. I had sat on that sample put it
Speaker 2: like that. I sat on that and more bounced to
Speaker 2: the ounce for a long time and more bounce broke
Speaker 2: my heart when e d And came along, because it
Speaker 2: was it was just a matter of time, especially when
Speaker 2: it's a dope loop, you know what I mean. It's
Speaker 2: just when it's in the ether, it's like somebody gonna
Speaker 2: get to this is out there. I grabbed it, somebody
Speaker 2: else grabbed it. It's all about who's gonna put it
Speaker 2: out now, you know. And sure enough they did an
Speaker 2: incredible job. I thought they you know, I wouldn't expect
Speaker 2: anything less. And then I sat on the Knee Deep
Speaker 2: record and I played with that for a while and
Speaker 2: they hated it.
Speaker 1: I'm saving people didn't catch on and like eighty nine
Speaker 1: for Knee Deep to finally make his debut and hip
Speaker 1: hop terms, that would have been super captain. That would
Speaker 1: that to me, would have been more obvious than anything
Speaker 1: James Brown did. But were you shocked that? Oh my god,
Speaker 1: not one person is bothered to go here yet to use.
Speaker 2: I was shocked, like put it like that. I felt
Speaker 2: like Eric Sermon was on my heels. I did feel that,
Speaker 2: you know, like he's a funk he knows, he knows.
Speaker 2: You know. I knew Paul was onto it because we
Speaker 2: both as Funkadelic fans. You know, I gave Paul, not
Speaker 2: even knowing, I gave Paul the Maggot Brain album with
Speaker 2: the joint we used for Millie. Yes, I didn't know
Speaker 2: that was on it like that. I gave it to Paul.
Speaker 3: I was do your homework.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so damn.
Speaker 2: I'm like Lisa is for us, like lisas for us,
Speaker 2: and yeah, the knee deep joint sat on it for
Speaker 2: so long. I even tried it with another artist and
Speaker 2: he didn't like it wasn't too fast or just I
Speaker 2: guess it was. Yeah, it was. This was around the
Speaker 2: era too, it was getting more up tempoed with things
Speaker 2: and it becoming more dance music hip hop, you know.
Speaker 2: So David Merse wasn't in it with me like that.
Speaker 2: They just was not there with me, you know. And
Speaker 2: I was like, shit, man, I was like, yo, we
Speaker 2: need to use this shit. I didn't know how to
Speaker 2: convince them in any way until we was at Tommy
Speaker 2: Boy and.
Speaker 3: They were fine with Hall of Newts and Steal he Dan,
Speaker 3: but this was like to.
Speaker 2: Hall of no that was past's idea, you know. And
Speaker 2: I could see, you know, conceptually, lyrically, I can understand
Speaker 2: those songs coming to life the way they did, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, especially for what he had in mind,
Speaker 2: the anti drug song song about the Girl You know
Speaker 2: what I mean, Like this, when ellll was I Need love,
Speaker 2: King was with smooth operating, we need a girl's song,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So you saw this ass Oh, we need this song
Speaker 1: that the girls can get down to you.
Speaker 2: And that's what I saw him trying to do, like
Speaker 2: we need a As you evaluate in the records that's
Speaker 2: coming out around you, these are the templates we're going
Speaker 2: off of, you know, like listening to ELL's album, listening
Speaker 2: to pees album, listen to this one's album, listen to
Speaker 2: King's album, listening to slick Rick's new album. You know,
Speaker 2: cause slick rick album was like we needed to record
Speaker 2: two more songs. When we heard the Greatest Avinceres slick
Speaker 2: Rick that oh he came with a living in a
Speaker 2: full time era behind that trip, that that trip we had.
Speaker 2: We took a trip. We had some shows with forty
Speaker 2: five King and and like him Shabbaz and we was
Speaker 2: in a limo limo listening to the Greatest Adventures of
Speaker 2: slick Rick, and we was like, yo, we gotta come
Speaker 2: with it. We was like, okay, already off the gate.
Speaker 2: We was like, okay, this album already scrapped. The record
Speaker 2: was like our album isn't gonna not gonna do well.
Speaker 2: We we was already like, we're just thankful for the
Speaker 2: opportunity of making an album, you know what I'm saying. Also,
Speaker 2: when something when the labels also telling you, uh, we
Speaker 2: really think we got a great record here, but we
Speaker 2: only sell it. We only think it's gonna sell like
Speaker 2: fifty thousand units. We're being told these things. So I'm
Speaker 2: really thinking about going to the military and all that,
Speaker 2: all the things that was on my list before that
Speaker 2: album deal came along. I was pretty much I was
Speaker 2: about to put it. It was all back on my list, like, Okay,
Speaker 2: after this album, I'm probably going to the military or
Speaker 2: into the work force something, because I don't see this
Speaker 2: music thing really being successful for us. You know, I
Speaker 2: swear to you know where you at when you just
Speaker 2: got two singles out and you know, you're just happy,
Speaker 2: you know, And I'm just happy, Like, yeah, we were
Speaker 2: embarking upon this thing called sampling, and we got people
Speaker 2: who supposed to pay for tearing the samples. So we
Speaker 2: thinking we get permission to do all these things we're
Speaker 2: actually doing. So the body of work and the opportunity
Speaker 2: we're like every day was happy to be in the moment, right,
Speaker 2: you know, when is it gonna end? That was the question.
Speaker 3: At what point do you realize that you've caught lightning
Speaker 3: in a bottle?
Speaker 1: Like, oh shit, not only is this gonna work, but
Speaker 1: this will be as impactful as raising hell.
Speaker 2: After the marketing meeting at least with me myself or not.
Speaker 2: After the marketing meeting that we had that Tommy Boy
Speaker 2: and they were like, we feel like this is a
Speaker 2: great record. The feedback that we're getting back is phenomenal,
Speaker 2: but what's going on out there. We don't know if
Speaker 2: this is gonna do well. So we're guessing around fifty
Speaker 2: thousand units. We also have you guys got great records.
Speaker 2: You know, the music that you chose, the sample, you know,
Speaker 2: it was definitely white oriented, you know. So they was
Speaker 2: also like, we don't really have anything we can go
Speaker 2: to black radio with. Remember black radio was a thing then, yeah,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. So, and I never forget
Speaker 2: at Strickland, remember ed being one of the main people
Speaker 2: feeling like there was nothing quite there yet to go
Speaker 2: to black radio way, And what ended up coming up
Speaker 2: was me myself and I and also the remix for
Speaker 2: Buddy that those were the two records that landed it
Speaker 2: for Black Radio. How I end up me myself and
Speaker 2: I end up being the record that we finally decided
Speaker 2: to say. Well, Paul called me up and was like, yo,
Speaker 2: may spring that to the studio. It was when I
Speaker 2: want to say it was the same day that evening
Speaker 2: we went to a Zulu Nation party at Hotel Amazon
Speaker 2: and I don't know if it was Bam or Jazzy
Speaker 2: J who was DJing, one of them was on at
Speaker 2: the time, and they dropped me deep. They dropped knee deep,
Speaker 2: and then it went crazy in there and I hit David.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I'm telling you this just right, Yeah, this
Speaker 3: is the one, and.
Speaker 2: He was looking at me like like gave me that
Speaker 2: look like I think he right, But I don't want
Speaker 2: to do this, you know.
Speaker 3: Dave was always the hardest one to convince.
Speaker 2: Always hardest one to convince. Sure enough. I don't know
Speaker 2: what made them. They must all had a discussion with Paul,
Speaker 2: and then Paul calledban was like, Mat, bring that to
Speaker 2: the studio, bring that drive to the studio. And then
Speaker 2: when I brought it to the studio, I just had
Speaker 2: a basic loop with the drum tap running a little
Speaker 2: bit more than what you hear on the record, some
Speaker 2: drum programming behind it, and Paul came with the wrapper,
Speaker 2: Dapper Snapper, the Dougie fresh cuts, got the He had
Speaker 2: the idea of running the loop, the running, running the
Speaker 2: loop from the tape into the DJ mixer back onto
Speaker 2: the tape so we could transform all the Yeah because
Speaker 2: a crazy on it. Yeah okay, and the Dougie first cuts.
Speaker 2: We were going back and forth with that boom. So
Speaker 2: it was me and Paul going back and forth like
Speaker 2: on some DJ ship in the studio developing the track.
Speaker 2: These two dudes sitting in the back and you can
Speaker 2: see the look on their face like this shit is
Speaker 2: coming out good, like oh shit, like it's working, Oh
Speaker 2: my god. And then all I can remember is these
Speaker 2: two guys spoofing black as Black Botto Jungle Brothers, and
Speaker 2: it was just they were just in the never because
Speaker 2: they was back there bucking out. And the more and
Speaker 2: more it got clownish in backfired, and I think that
Speaker 2: was also the revelation of the humor and.
Speaker 1: What we do is gonna work, gotcha, you know, Okay,
Speaker 1: I gotta ask this question, and maybe this is me
Speaker 1: bridging two Day Las Soul is Dead and kind of
Speaker 1: be even though steeped in humor, it did come a
Speaker 1: little defensive. But you know, for the record Day Lost
Speaker 1: Souls there is my all time favorite record, not even
Speaker 1: in your can, but just that's what made me tarik
Speaker 1: when I started group when we heard this. But can
Speaker 1: you give me what is your average memory of the
Speaker 1: Nitro tour with LL and Wa public enemy you guys.
Speaker 3: My average memory? Yes, I don't think anything was average about.
Speaker 1: What was it like?
Speaker 2: Oh man, it was uh okay, I'm trying to see
Speaker 2: where I could go with this without uh.
Speaker 3: Ah, you're right, right, right, okay, let me ask this
Speaker 3: is yes you no question? Okay.
Speaker 1: So one of the main positions on De La Soul's
Speaker 1: Dead is like, yo, cats are trying to test us
Speaker 1: and again to hear you guys were getting in the
Speaker 1: scuffles in various cities based on people thinking that you're
Speaker 1: a certain way or whatever, soft or whatever, like whatever
Speaker 1: the thing was in eighty nine to ninety Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean irony that it's coming from you guys who in
Speaker 1: our heads were like.
Speaker 3: Wait this day all saw as the last group weeks back.
Speaker 2: This was also a time period We were still young
Speaker 2: and fresh on the scene, so being backstage and all
Speaker 2: of that wasn't all of that important to us. We
Speaker 2: enjoyed being around the people, but not realizing the danger
Speaker 2: we would be out in the audience. Man, we would
Speaker 2: be hanging out like we was hanging out at Club
Speaker 2: Mars or something like that Irvian Plaza, you know, like
Speaker 2: if we were just hanging out in the city, you know.
Speaker 2: And the way the tour was, it was like we
Speaker 2: all had camaraderie, you know. It was a real brotherhood
Speaker 2: out there, you know, like LL's and his pops. They
Speaker 2: all looked after us, you know, Kine's crew like you know.
Speaker 2: And this was also although the tour was marketed as
Speaker 2: LL Day Lost Slick Rick Kine, it was n w
Speaker 2: A on that tour too Short every now and Again
Speaker 2: Special led EPMDPE. It was hip hop from east to
Speaker 2: west all over this tour. Yoyo was on the tour
Speaker 2: like just a little bit of everybody. Every city had
Speaker 2: something body different or or you know, a string of dates.
Speaker 2: They was on Ghetto Boys every now and again, So
Speaker 2: it was like just a lot of love. Man.
Speaker 1: Is it true that you guys are there for the
Speaker 1: infamous Detroit Night with Yeah.
Speaker 2: Actually, but you see in the movie happen on that
Speaker 2: tour and really how it went. Wren dedicated the song
Speaker 2: to pas it was Passa's birthday. He dedicated the song
Speaker 2: the pass and then Cube went into it, you know,
Speaker 2: and it als maybe about less than sixty seconds the
Speaker 2: hoopla jumped off. Yeah, the police throwing eights. We I mean,
Speaker 2: obviously we all thought it was gunshots, but it was
Speaker 2: police who lit ads throw them towards stage as they
Speaker 2: went off. Of course, the soilid gunshot, so that created
Speaker 2: the chaos. You know, it was a big thing because
Speaker 2: of the police around the country had an issue with them,
Speaker 2: you know, FBI had an issue with them. So the
Speaker 2: actual officers on the scene really didn't have an issue.
Speaker 2: They were just following the job because when they got
Speaker 2: finally got to them, they asked them for autographs. When
Speaker 2: Easy came back to the hotel, he was like, oh man,
Speaker 2: they just wanted our autograph and they just seem embarrassed
Speaker 2: because of the song, and it's just it's just feel embarrassed.
Speaker 1: Like as a DJ, I hate speaking on the mic.
Speaker 1: I'm still on the this is this thing on your
Speaker 1: phone's here in the DJ booth and whatever. But like,
Speaker 1: how did you learn to do something with authority but
Speaker 1: actually make it fun and not? Is it just years
Speaker 1: and years of communicating or yeah?
Speaker 2: I think it's years of communicating, years of watching and
Speaker 2: remaining a student to this and watching the highs and lows,
Speaker 2: and also that having that feeling of knowing that there's
Speaker 2: somebody out there who may have never ever seen us before,
Speaker 2: you know, I guess also watching paying attention to the
Speaker 2: barometer of the business of day lasso and knowing when
Speaker 2: you're hot and knowing when you're not, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean, And knowing that every time you get up there,
Speaker 2: you're introducing yourself to somebody who may have never encountered
Speaker 2: you before. And I think a lot of that comes
Speaker 2: from also the early days of being on these festivals
Speaker 2: that are so alternative. Especially I think when we did
Speaker 2: define Young Cannibals to her, we were like a fish
Speaker 2: out of water, you know, and we got booed pretty bad,
Speaker 2: and two him, we did me myself and I it was.
Speaker 1: Like, damn, I would have thought that would have been
Speaker 1: easy reach.
Speaker 2: Until we did that song is when we got the love.
Speaker 2: But throughout our performance. It was a struggle, was like,
Speaker 2: and you had to learn. You had to learn how
Speaker 2: to figure out what songs work for what audience, what territories,
Speaker 2: you know, start really thinking like a DJ, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying, and connecting with what's gonna work, what's
Speaker 2: not gonna work. Implement more crowd participation. Okay, for somebody
Speaker 2: who don't know us, we could still have a good time.
Speaker 2: Let's try to get them involved. So that's where a
Speaker 2: lot of the crowd participation come in because you'll find
Speaker 2: people going I never heard or say you guys before,
Speaker 2: but I had a great time, and that's only because
Speaker 2: they were involved.
Speaker 1: So to go from Fyan Cannibals to now you guys
Speaker 1: have been doing a lot of rotation with the gorillas, Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: first of all, I didn't even properly introduce you your
Speaker 1: Grammy Award winning Vin's Amazon. So cand you talk about
Speaker 1: working with the gorillas and even touring with them, and
Speaker 1: how that because by looking at the footage of what
Speaker 1: I see like nightly when you guys do gigs with them,
Speaker 1: you know, do you just talk about like the whole
Speaker 1: collaboration that feel good?
Speaker 2: I think by the time we got to the Gorillas,
Speaker 2: we were already well groomed, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: It was for me before even the group even heard them.
Speaker 2: It was something I wanted to do, and I was
Speaker 2: already fascinated with them. When Dell worked with them, I
Speaker 2: was like, oh man, when Dell worked with them, I
Speaker 2: wasn't even thinking about working with them. I just really
Speaker 2: wanted the record. I was like, Yo, this record, It's crazy.
Speaker 2: I gotta have this. It was one of them I
Speaker 2: wanted under my belt. Here it is. I felt like,
Speaker 2: I played this record, they gonna want this from Massio.
Speaker 2: If I play that record, you know, they might not
Speaker 2: want it from Kupree, but they don't want it from me,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, right right? So, and I
Speaker 2: was in love with it and then chasing it around
Speaker 2: for about a good year under the assumption that Danny
Speaker 2: Automator was the Gorillas. Come to find he wasn't. He's
Speaker 2: just a producer of that song. But I more and
Speaker 2: more I got closer to it. I forgot who. I
Speaker 2: met a cat. I met Matt, a cat named Matt,
Speaker 2: and then Matt ended up having a conversation with Remy.
Speaker 2: Remy is Damon's best friend. As I hear the story
Speaker 2: from the other side, Remy was the one going, Damon,
Speaker 2: you need to mess with Dayla. You need to mess
Speaker 2: with Dayla. Dell is like the sun of Daylight.
Speaker 3: I'm saying because I thought the same thing.
Speaker 2: He was like, you need to do this. But I
Speaker 2: could see Dell's intro was Dan, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: I could see Damon and probably know much about Dan
Speaker 2: Dell either. So but Dan being on deck, you know,
Speaker 2: especially after doing you know, handsome boy modeling school, that's
Speaker 2: all in Damon's lane, you know what I'm saying, the
Speaker 2: corky projects, that's in his lane. So I could see
Speaker 2: how their relationship developed, and Dell got a part of that.
Speaker 2: But as I was fighting just to get the records,
Speaker 2: it landed up on his ears like yo, you need
Speaker 2: to mess with Daylight. And then we got a call
Speaker 2: to come be a part of this project. And it
Speaker 2: was supposed to be a completely another song altogether.
Speaker 3: How did they come together?
Speaker 1: Because actually you're laughter and all that stuff, like that's
Speaker 1: the most memorable part of it, Like how did that
Speaker 1: come to be?
Speaker 2: It was a different track altogether. I think the track
Speaker 2: now the track we were supposed to do is now
Speaker 2: titled Kids with Guns. When we were working on the track,
Speaker 2: it was like no one was really feeling it, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, we were just kind of doing
Speaker 2: the job. It became one of the moments that I
Speaker 2: didn't like about us. You know, Let's not do this
Speaker 2: for the money, you know what I mean, Like, Okay,
Speaker 2: this money on the table, but if it ain't really clicking,
Speaker 2: let's not do this, you know what I mean. And
Speaker 2: somewhere in the session, Damon just stopped the session. He
Speaker 2: was like, Yo, honestly, what do y'all think about the song?
Speaker 2: I said, Yo, man, I think we're forcing something here,
Speaker 2: I said, I don't think it's a real collaboration. I
Speaker 2: think we're just featuring on something. You know. I said.
Speaker 2: No one's really putting the spirit in it into this
Speaker 2: that I know, you know we could put into this.
Speaker 2: I said me personally, I think the song is. I
Speaker 2: think the track is cool the way it is. I
Speaker 2: don't think we need to do anything to it. I
Speaker 2: don't think. I don't even hear these guys on this track.
Speaker 2: Merce already had something for it. So it did frustrate him.
Speaker 2: You know what, I'm saying Merce had something for it. Alreright,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, I said, but I'm being honest.
Speaker 2: I don't even think I hit my cool on this track.
Speaker 2: And then Dave was like, Yo, why don't you play
Speaker 2: us everything you got you intend to put on the album?
Speaker 2: You know, just just play us with everything you you
Speaker 2: know you recorded that you think you're gonna it's gonna
Speaker 2: make the album. And they started playing stuff, and Merce
Speaker 2: was frustrated because Mer had his head, he had his
Speaker 2: tunnel vision for what was going on, and I knew
Speaker 2: that too, but I informed everybody. I was like, yo, man,
Speaker 2: let me know what it really is before I get
Speaker 2: on this plane. I said, Cuz I know I'm easy
Speaker 2: to upset the opera coot. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: If I ain't feeling it, I ain't feeling it. I'm
Speaker 2: gonna speak my mind. You know, right, wrong and different.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna speak my mind and we go and go
Speaker 2: with it from there. So as I spoke my mind,
Speaker 2: things start to shift. Merce was slightly frustrated. Then Damon
Speaker 2: started playing stuff. Next thing you know, Tequila's coming out,
Speaker 2: Weed's coming out, but he's spending like a good nine
Speaker 2: hours in the studio listening to stuff and kind of
Speaker 2: waiting for the you know, the inspiration and all of
Speaker 2: these this tension to settle. Once at tension settled, Damon
Speaker 2: got around to the feel good in't track right, and
Speaker 2: next thing you know, this is one of the days
Speaker 2: Dave decides to smoke weed. Doesn't normally smoke weed. You know,
Speaker 2: I always called Dave a holiday smoker, but he only
Speaker 2: he's the only one that knows the holiday. You don't
Speaker 2: know when, you'll know when it's coming. So this was
Speaker 2: one of them days. And set en off. We're in there,
Speaker 2: we're getting charged, and the beat comes on and he goes, Mace,
Speaker 2: why do I keep hearing doodle Brown? He's like, I
Speaker 2: keep hearing Dude Brown. As the track is playing, he's going,
Speaker 2: don't stop bop.
Speaker 3: That pussy, let me see you doodle Brown.
Speaker 2: The whole time, he's like, why do I keep hearing this?
Speaker 2: So he start to craft the lyrics, and that's where
Speaker 2: you get the the lukeadens and check out how I
Speaker 2: na that's all that. Yeah, that's all of that. That's
Speaker 2: where it came from. That's where it came from. Dude
Speaker 2: Brown literally literally and he was like, yo, when he
Speaker 2: came with the check out, how I Mace, I need
Speaker 2: to laugh, Mace, I need to laugh, I need to laugh,
Speaker 2: and I laugh. I did that laugh. I forgot when
Speaker 2: I started doing that. It was a show we used
Speaker 2: to do bionics. We used to end the show with bionics,
Speaker 2: and I started to do the laugh. The laugh was
Speaker 2: intentional because I forgot what tour we was on. We
Speaker 2: was on Rock the Bells before l got the Way Back,
Speaker 2: we was on that. So the ensemble of artists that
Speaker 2: was on there, this is that competitive nature. Were all
Speaker 2: out there trying to pull out our best, our best shit.
Speaker 2: So you know, our secret weapon was always Fife and Biz.
Speaker 2: Bring Fife and Biz out and then we would close
Speaker 2: bionics and then I would do the laugh and the
Speaker 2: laugh as you know, it just it mean, it was intentional.
Speaker 2: It was like in the Bionics it was ha ha ha,
Speaker 2: We're still here. That's what it really meant in that moment,
Speaker 2: and then we just held on to it. It was like, yo,
Speaker 2: you gotta keep doing that, you gotta keep doing that.
Speaker 2: And then yeah, I just kept rocking it for while.
Speaker 2: I did a Cornerstone mixtape using a laugh and then
Speaker 2: came up to go to the Gorilla's record. Dave was
Speaker 2: like the laugh or recalled him, was like, I need
Speaker 2: to laugh. I laugh, okay, So it went down in
Speaker 2: the studio. I just kept doing it and doing it,
Speaker 2: and they was all fascinated in the studio how I
Speaker 2: could keep doing it and keep doing it, and it
Speaker 2: was like, how do you do that? I was like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, man, that's my laugh. I mean it's
Speaker 2: a little bit more embellished because I'm forcing something, you know,
Speaker 2: but it feels authentic though, But that's my laugh. I'm like,
Speaker 2: my laugh used to get me into trouble. My laugh
Speaker 2: would get me into fights literally, So for it to
Speaker 2: turn out to be that, you know what I mean, like,
Speaker 2: it's a good turnaround, you know. I mean I used
Speaker 2: to get ridiculed by behind my life. I end up
Speaker 2: in bouts a lot of times just behind my laugh,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: You know, it's ironic because my first impression of you
Speaker 1: guys like, oh, that's the nerd, that's the happy, go
Speaker 1: lucky hippie, and he's one.
Speaker 3: Beat me up. But now it's like.
Speaker 1: David is a moody one. So for me to discover oh,
Speaker 1: the moody one is the one I thought was the nerd.
Speaker 1: Passu is based on his versus alone, and I think
Speaker 1: that's his his therapeutic thing. Pass is a low key player,
Speaker 1: like just when all this little like and I'm like, oh, okay, pass,
Speaker 1: I don't know you got downline and then you are
Speaker 1: actually the heart of day last soul to me. Besides
Speaker 1: getting your masters back, one of the most revolutionary things
Speaker 1: that you guys did was you were like first out
Speaker 1: the gate at least with using established group that I know,
Speaker 1: using Kickstarter as their business modus operandi, you know, like
Speaker 1: instead of relying on a record label. And I won't
Speaker 1: say the burden of wanting to take all that on yourself,
Speaker 1: how would you guys talked into kickstarting and raising funds
Speaker 1: for yourself? By the way, murs, I've not got my
Speaker 1: sneakers yet. However, what made you guys decide to do it?
Speaker 1: What have you learned about yourself as businessmen? And I
Speaker 1: guess I can also tie into having your masters now
Speaker 1: and what it takes to release the music that we
Speaker 1: want to hear again. So just like start with the
Speaker 1: whole kickstarter concept with what I would I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's a nightmare, or just like I'll sure we'll
Speaker 1: do it again, or not do it again? Like what
Speaker 1: was it like for you?
Speaker 2: It was a daunting experience, but an experience I wouldn't change,
Speaker 2: you know, well, because you give myself no pats on
Speaker 2: the back, But I pay attention really close to this
Speaker 2: business from the time we got in and all the
Speaker 2: different changes, the different fasts. I read Donald Passman's both
Speaker 2: of his books. You know, that was a great template
Speaker 2: for me to which book everything you know you didn't
Speaker 2: need to know about the music business. Yeah, and then
Speaker 2: he had did a second one that touched on the
Speaker 2: change with the Internet and know what, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying, Yeah, I'm data. Yeah. So those were great
Speaker 2: templates for me to continue to navigate through the business
Speaker 2: of Day Last Soul and the music business in general.
Speaker 2: Prior to that, it was always Prince Paul, you know,
Speaker 2: Prince Paul. When I was struggling with certain things, I
Speaker 2: went back to Paul and Paul was like, yo, I
Speaker 2: can't help you. Paul was like, I can't help you,
Speaker 2: he said, because you've had success that I never had.
Speaker 2: So that tripped me out. You know what, I'm saying
Speaker 2: it was like, yeah, yeah, it was like you had
Speaker 2: some success that I didn't have. He says, So I
Speaker 2: don't even know how to tell you how to navigate
Speaker 2: what you're dealing with, you know. So I started to
Speaker 2: pray a lot more, have study more, and have real
Speaker 2: discernment on different conversations I was having with different executives
Speaker 2: that like to manipulate and learning, they hustle and figuring
Speaker 2: out just just pulling this piece apart. And I know,
Speaker 2: the more waves you create, the more they want you
Speaker 2: to get out the way, you know. And that's one
Speaker 2: thing I did learn, like, oh, I'm creating waves. So
Speaker 2: nobody want to mess with Mace. They want to talk
Speaker 2: the past. They want to talk to Dave, they want
Speaker 2: to talk to who they think is docile, will be agreeable,
Speaker 2: and yeah, you know, not knowing that you might want
Speaker 2: to talk to me because my guys trust.
Speaker 3: Me that much.
Speaker 1: I do know.
Speaker 2: But in certain changes that were happening, you know, we
Speaker 2: are a little conflicting with one another based on the
Speaker 2: fact that some of us was paying attention to certain
Speaker 2: things that others weren't, you know what I'm saying. So
Speaker 2: this was another milestone in our relationship on trying to
Speaker 2: connect with one another's growth. For the longest, I've been
Speaker 2: the little brother, you know, I was like, here's for
Speaker 2: a better term. I was like, look, based on how
Speaker 2: we're growing in this, stop calling me the little brother.
Speaker 2: Call me the younger brother. Got you, you know, because
Speaker 2: the little brothers seems like the one you need to
Speaker 2: protect who don't know nothing, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: that's a connotation, you know, you know, And that wasn't
Speaker 2: what was going on between me and past I was
Speaker 2: going on between me and Dave. So once we established that,
Speaker 2: it was another growth in our relationship as brothers, you know,
Speaker 2: like Mace may be on to something here, you know.
Speaker 2: The kickstarter idea came up. It was a bit of
Speaker 2: a struggle because Dave Verbatim felt like, Yo, we look
Speaker 2: like we begging. You know, it looked like we this
Speaker 2: system looked like we begging. And I was like, it
Speaker 2: wasn't weird.
Speaker 1: Like when when Tommy boyd impluded, you just think like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we'll just go to another label or fine.
Speaker 2: That was that was the you know, that's always the
Speaker 2: was the well. When Tommy Wait folded, we did go
Speaker 2: to another label. Scary we went to Sanctuary.
Speaker 1: And it was went off.
Speaker 3: It was like, was that album considered as it was?
Speaker 2: It was a corporate owned company with shareholders, fell apart
Speaker 2: completely great album though, thank you brother, thank you. It
Speaker 2: was a first partnership I can say we were in
Speaker 2: outside of Tommy Boy. So everything after that ended up
Speaker 2: being partnerships are just independent, you know, And luckily enough
Speaker 2: with the Kickstarter, it was a bit of both. It
Speaker 2: was when we decided to do the Kickstarter, it was
Speaker 2: because the deals that were out there were not favorable
Speaker 2: for what we were conditioned to to what was being offered,
Speaker 2: and respectfully, I had to go, yo, man, we are
Speaker 2: ten years without a record and the industry is plummeting
Speaker 2: in a certain way where it's going digitally and all
Speaker 2: of that. So these deals they're not hot now what
Speaker 2: they offering, Yo, we could go out there and do
Speaker 2: some shows and raise that kind of money on our
Speaker 2: own and maintain our ownership, you know. Then the first
Speaker 2: I saw Kickstarter, I don't know. It came across my
Speaker 2: Internet feed, and when I was doing my research on
Speaker 2: it and tapping into the different artists that were doing it,
Speaker 2: the person I really focused on was t og people
Speaker 2: don't know that Edog did a kickstarter. He did a
Speaker 2: kickstarter and he met his goal. Reason why, we don't know,
Speaker 2: because it wasn't six hundred thousand dollars, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. It was like forty something fifty something thousand,
Speaker 2: But it was his goal. Oh so he met he
Speaker 2: met his goal. This wasn't newsworthy, That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Break it down, like I'm a first grader.
Speaker 1: So the thing is that you decide from the gate
Speaker 1: what budget you want to raise, and then you create
Speaker 1: this record, and then the album sells, and do the
Speaker 1: those who contribute to get their money back or.
Speaker 2: Is it just nah, this is good. They just want
Speaker 2: to they want to just see it happen. I couldn't
Speaker 2: even believe it myself, like it was too good to
Speaker 2: be true, Like they don't want nothing.
Speaker 3: You know, I was trying two pairs of sneakers ahead.
Speaker 2: You heard that. You heard that?
Speaker 3: You oh bro, you.
Speaker 1: You oh pook you, oh pook you good? You good?
Speaker 2: You got?
Speaker 3: I got five pairs of day Love dunks anyway, so
Speaker 3: we're good. But uh yeah, so you did it.
Speaker 2: We went for the money that was being offered. Regarding
Speaker 2: the record deals. You know, we was like, okay, let's
Speaker 2: be fair and trying to raise what we know we can.
Speaker 2: All we need is to record the record. So the
Speaker 2: offerers that was out there was like nothing more than
Speaker 2: one hundred and fifty grand. So it was like, yo,
Speaker 2: we rang it around one hundred and thirty grand that
Speaker 2: we could raise. I said, look, we could raise one
Speaker 2: hundred and thirty grand and we still own the rights
Speaker 2: to our record. It's avenue give it up to some company.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: That was the idea. Dave wasn't quite feeling it. Merce
Speaker 2: was on the fence, and it was really trying to
Speaker 2: come up with ideas of how we can give a
Speaker 2: little to the audience that's willing to support us. What
Speaker 2: can we It need to be a reciprocal thing. So
Speaker 2: we figured out how to do these tiers and come
Speaker 2: up with ideas of whether it's postcoing shopping, me going
Speaker 2: record shopping, somehow creating this relationship with the audience community. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so doing it, just doing something a little more because
Speaker 2: of what they're giving and documenting the sessions and all
Speaker 2: of that. You know, I think what sold us all
Speaker 2: on doing the entire ideas when we did an edm
Speaker 2: event in Miami, and somebody came to us and like, yo,
Speaker 2: you guys need to do a kickstarter. So of course
Speaker 2: I looked at.
Speaker 3: Both of them, was like jojie right right right nice?
Speaker 2: So, you know, but sometimes you got to hear from
Speaker 2: outside sauce, you know, for affirmation. And sure enough it
Speaker 2: wrapped around Dave's mind a little bit, wrapped around Mersu's
Speaker 2: mind a little bit. I think. Also everybody got wind
Speaker 2: of of what Spike Lee and Nelson George was doing
Speaker 2: us as well with raising money for the docs they
Speaker 2: were doing, right, you know what I'm saying. So it's like, yo,
Speaker 2: I'm telling you man, this is this got us written
Speaker 2: all over it, you know what I mean? You know,
Speaker 2: I like, look, there's an audience that actually just loves us.
Speaker 2: I'm like, be re late to the party is really
Speaker 2: what's going on? I was like, what's going on with
Speaker 2: the Internet and these nerds and the creators and all
Speaker 2: of that. Yo, they really are into heavily into artistic value.
Speaker 2: I was like, b and we not to pat OUs
Speaker 2: hoves on the back, but we had trust the sauce
Speaker 2: when it come to that. Yeah, I mean, I'm like,
Speaker 2: it's like y'all. It's a match me in heaven and
Speaker 2: Dave was still kind of hung up on it, but
Speaker 2: it looked like we begging for money, Mace.
Speaker 1: Not.
Speaker 2: If we approach this a certain way and it start
Speaker 2: to look at the tears of different things, we start
Speaker 2: to think we can offer in what they're given.
Speaker 3: So once you reach the finish line, like we superseded.
Speaker 2: The finish line because we always had looked to only
Speaker 2: raise about one hundred and thirty grand and it ended
Speaker 2: up superseding to being like six hundred grand.
Speaker 3: Would you want to do it again or is it
Speaker 3: just like just one project at the time?
Speaker 2: And I would love to do it again? And okay,
Speaker 2: let me, I don't know what for what project? It
Speaker 2: would have to be, uh, something special, you know something
Speaker 2: I think more than an album. Okay, you know something
Speaker 2: I don't know, something maybe musical and visual?
Speaker 1: You know all right? I have some nerdy, quick, rapid
Speaker 1: fire things to ask before I wrap up the show.
Speaker 3: Who stole your Pathfinder? In front of the studio?
Speaker 2: How wish somebody could tell me? Because I was ever
Speaker 2: find Nope, I had to chuck it up collect the
Speaker 2: insurance money ended up getting men did that.
Speaker 1: Happen as you recorded. Uh wanat to got to be
Speaker 1: where we were.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was in that session for real. It was
Speaker 2: a night session for not going to be where everybody
Speaker 2: came up to the studio. I was in there. They
Speaker 2: all went to some club or whatever. All I know
Speaker 2: is I was in the studio and I'll never forget
Speaker 2: money going. Yo, where's the truck? Think everybody knew I
Speaker 2: couldn't park my truck the way it sat up so high.
Speaker 2: I was sitting on forties like I really had off
Speaker 2: roads like it's up top. So if it wasn't an
Speaker 2: outdoor parking lot, I couldn't park park on the street away. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I didn't think it may have gotten towed away, But
Speaker 2: once I contacted towing, Nah, my ship got stolen. And
Speaker 2: this was a year Nissan was getting stolen left and right. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so I was like I was, I only had it
Speaker 2: all but two and a half weeks. I was feeling
Speaker 2: myself come outside and it was gone, and I was like, damn.
Speaker 2: Moonie was like, what we gonna do. We're gonna go
Speaker 2: to Heavy D's party.
Speaker 1: That's what we still going without without a ride.
Speaker 2: Because I'm like, I knew I gotta take the train
Speaker 2: home at this point, and the train is long Ala
Speaker 2: Railroad don't come back on until five, So we got hell,
Speaker 2: let's go to have party, and I got take the
Speaker 2: train home.
Speaker 1: What are your five favorite dail I soul records?
Speaker 2: Oh, that's like saying what's your favorite.
Speaker 1: And right, and this includes the mixtapes and all those things,
Speaker 1: because I would have impossible mission inside my top five.
Speaker 1: But go.
Speaker 2: Wow, I guess I could say the songs I do
Speaker 2: get excited about. Now I'm talking about albums or albums. Wow,
Speaker 2: I gotta say right now, Cabin in the Sky bro
Speaker 2: just the way it's hit me. You know, each one
Speaker 2: of them hit me differently. You know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Is Cabin in the Sky the culmination of the long
Speaker 1: rumored Primo and Pete Rock are gonna do our records
Speaker 1: for us like you just married the two together?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Pretty much? Okay, pretty much? Are there any songs
Speaker 2: left over that haven't no? Okay, no, I think you
Speaker 2: got everything from the pre premum.
Speaker 3: Are there any extra day verses that are just on
Speaker 3: ice for now?
Speaker 2: I got something on ice? Okay, got a couple of
Speaker 2: things on ice I would love to consider for ao.
Speaker 2: I three.
Speaker 3: Okay, AOI three is still going to be a thing.
Speaker 1: That's a thing. Okay, that's happening. What is your favorite
Speaker 1: Daylas Soul album?
Speaker 2: The first one would probably always be very special because
Speaker 2: it was it saved your life. Yeah, and it saved
Speaker 2: my life for so many ways, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: I was still a virgin, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Got you like you know pony Ride would be? How
Speaker 2: that idea come to be? That was Dave decided to
Speaker 2: sample him the direction in the record. Every Yeah, he
Speaker 2: sampled it just like that, you know how the tap?
Speaker 2: Yes like that?
Speaker 3: What five songs don't we know?
Speaker 1: In addition, when I asked me and myself and I
Speaker 1: question of you like helming it, what other four songs
Speaker 1: in the Daylight catalog did you helm that we might?
Speaker 2: I be aware of ego tripping? Okay?
Speaker 3: I know you did it in the woods, right in
Speaker 3: the woods. Okay, Out for connection.
Speaker 1: That was you. That is my favorite day La Joy.
Speaker 1: You guys opened with that when you did the Daylight
Speaker 1: Soul is Dead. That was your first song and we
Speaker 1: were we were right next to the speakers, so it's
Speaker 1: just like we weren't expecting that level boombastic. Okay, but
Speaker 1: I gotta ask, and I asked this to pass. In
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety one, no one in their right mind would
Speaker 1: even dare think of using mustache James Brown as a
Speaker 1: sample source. This is like a B side from the
Speaker 1: Get Up Off That Thing record, which again, no hip
Speaker 1: hop historian in that era would even think.
Speaker 3: Yo, what made you see the gold in.
Speaker 1: And otherwise unremarkable? Like you caught the best part ding
Speaker 1: ding ding ding ding.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I just happened to hear it.
Speaker 3: You just like James round record up for grab.
Speaker 2: I think it was also what I was using at
Speaker 2: the time. I was using this some eight second guitar
Speaker 2: pedal okay as a sampler. Okay, yeah it was, that
Speaker 2: was it was. It was my first real sampler, okay,
Speaker 2: for real, and I had it. I actually learned this
Speaker 2: from Paul, you know. I had that locked in with
Speaker 2: a sequential tom Lop thing my guitar player.
Speaker 3: Yes, that's the green box with the that's what you use.
Speaker 2: That's what I used for.
Speaker 1: Someone does not teach you here, is it? NBC sixty? Nah?
Speaker 2: Uh?
Speaker 1: You learned through a guitar looper?
Speaker 2: Yeah? At first I started out pausing tapes. Then I
Speaker 2: graduated to the s K one, then SK five got you.
Speaker 2: Then it was then I followed everything Paul was doing,
Speaker 2: and then you know, I was doing what I can
Speaker 2: afford pretty much. When I saw Paul, he had that
Speaker 2: pedal and he had a sequential toime drum machine and
Speaker 2: an eight track. I had a four track, okay, and
Speaker 2: he showed me how to lay sympty to the four
Speaker 2: track to get everything to trigger on time. Once he
Speaker 2: showed me how to lay sympty, I was off to
Speaker 2: the races. Wow, okay, and then anything after my first
Speaker 2: two or three samples that I got in time, then
Speaker 2: everything else was triggered. So that down, down, down down,
Speaker 2: that was because of what I was working with.
Speaker 1: That's crazy, Like in my mind, I love hearing unorthodox
Speaker 1: methods of making hip hop records in which knowing is
Speaker 1: just sequencing on a drum machine, none of that stuff,
Speaker 1: Like you're figuring out ways to loop and stuff outside.
Speaker 2: Of the outside of what we've eventually learned how to do.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 1: My last two questions, how long did it take for
Speaker 1: you immerse to really like, so we're doing this like
Speaker 1: for Dave, Like, how long did it take cause you know.
Speaker 1: I'll say that losing my manager Rich in twenty fourteen
Speaker 1: really put a good ten year pause on me in Tarik,
Speaker 1: like we did nothing without riches? What do you think?
Speaker 1: What do you think? And now it's like, oh, we
Speaker 1: got to be the adults in the room and do
Speaker 1: we trustee?
Speaker 4: You know?
Speaker 1: So we had distractions to and yes, it's still coming up.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, the album's still coming. I know you guys
Speaker 1: think I'm bullsitting you now, but it's coming, I promise.
Speaker 1: But how long did it take to get over the
Speaker 1: anxiety of how do we restructure the show now? How
Speaker 1: do we turn this body of work into a full vision?
Speaker 1: How long was it before? I don't want to know
Speaker 1: from from beginning to end how it came together?
Speaker 2: But I wrote on a lot of postive strength.
Speaker 1: Was there a discussion like, hey, we're just going to
Speaker 1: end it right now?
Speaker 2: Or no, it was I was lost for a minute.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 2: One couldn't even really find me. He had to come.
Speaker 2: This is when I was living in Florida. He had
Speaker 2: to come to my house and really grab me.
Speaker 3: Out here, literally find you. Yeah, how long did it
Speaker 3: take for you to process it?
Speaker 1: Moren like, how how many months.
Speaker 2: Are you still bro I'm still morning, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean. It just it hits me different every day.
Speaker 2: Like it hit me earlier today when I saw D
Speaker 2: I cried earlier before you came in. Like actually, when
Speaker 2: you was in here setting up, I saw a D
Speaker 2: and you know we can relate obviously, right and he
Speaker 2: showed me his jam J about it. Just it broke
Speaker 2: me down, you know what I mean. So you know,
Speaker 2: just it hits me at different times. Just times I'm
Speaker 2: laughing a lot on the memories and then I'm crying
Speaker 2: at times because of the memories, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: And I miss my dude. Man, I miss him. You know,
Speaker 2: there's a life partner. You know. It's probably the same
Speaker 2: feeling I'm gonna have if I lose my mom or
Speaker 2: my wife or somebody. You know what I'm saying. I'm
Speaker 2: never gonna get over that, you know, the ride of
Speaker 2: the ups and downs. You know, I miss everything, the arguments, everything.
Speaker 2: I miss him, man, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: I'm glad you mentioned like the idea not of tension,
Speaker 1: but like in trying to convince him of me myself
Speaker 1: and I are convince him of kickstarting or convincing of
Speaker 1: you know, I will say that I've been the passive
Speaker 1: member of the roots. Don't like confrontation, don't like the
Speaker 1: you like y'all are the same in that well, no,
Speaker 1: like I'll be I don't know. I'm sharing this now
Speaker 1: like freak and I really had a personal breakthrough three
Speaker 1: days ago. And I mean, like thirty four years under
Speaker 1: the belt, just like sound check, let's make an album,
Speaker 1: all right, peace, see you tomorrow. And every time I
Speaker 1: get around you guys, and I'm like, damn, like you're
Speaker 1: you guys are still like I always thought it was
Speaker 1: impossible for friends and business partners to even exist in
Speaker 1: one thing like what happens when? And for me, it's
Speaker 1: always like I don't like that beat, and like, no
Speaker 1: matter how hard I worked on that shit, like weeks before, it's.
Speaker 3: Just like, okay, here it is. It's cool and you say.
Speaker 1: And then right, and so I admire that. And for me,
Speaker 1: I just always wanted to know, like, how are you
Speaker 1: there for each other now? That keeps you going?
Speaker 2: We always been brothers, man. I mean I think what
Speaker 2: people see now you could that's very obvious, you know,
Speaker 2: I think that was the answer. Yeah, that was.
Speaker 3: Did you get that.
Speaker 2: It's very obvious. Man. We we we truly love each other. Man.
Speaker 2: You know, I think that's perfect. People could Actually I
Speaker 2: probably notice it more because we don't have Dave, you
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying, So it's a little bit more.
Speaker 2: I think micro people are paying attention to certain things.
Speaker 2: And I think the way we've been expressing our loss,
Speaker 2: you know, there's something relatable there. Yeah, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean. My family, man, we've been through a lot, man,
Speaker 2: and it's all about how you come out on the
Speaker 2: other side. You know, family fights the fact, but that's
Speaker 2: the testament of being family, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 2: how you come out on the other side. You know,
Speaker 2: it's always going to be some kind of conflict, some
Speaker 2: kind of confrontation. You know, it's how you get through it.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 2: I'm a praying man. Pray man. God is all I've
Speaker 2: had since my childhood. You know, I lived in fight
Speaker 2: or flight. You know.
Speaker 3: To have a friend like Kelvin Mercer is a blessing,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: True? My last question at one point, Ketchup was your
Speaker 1: angle and then you lost it? Why'd you lose the
Speaker 1: ketchup angle? High in sodium look, ladies and gentlemen. This
Speaker 1: is the first of three Behind the Originals. Thank you
Speaker 1: Levi's for for holding this down. Thank you Maceio Yo,
Speaker 1: thank you brother.
Speaker 3: I love you too, Man Levin, thank you for staying classic. Yes,
Speaker 3: y'all are classic.
Speaker 1: Yes, thank you levi O's for doing this for us,
Speaker 1: and we will see you on the next go round
Speaker 1: of court. Love Supreme. All right, Macie, thank you, I
Speaker 1: love you, Bro, love you too. And there you have it,
Speaker 1: Macio Man, myth legend correct on all counts, one of
Speaker 1: the best labs in the game. That's episode one of
Speaker 1: this very special behind every original run with Levi's. I
Speaker 1: want you to keep your eyes peeled to the feed
Speaker 1: and we'll be back soon with another legendary artist who
Speaker 1: did it their own way. Quest Loft Show is hosted
Speaker 1: by me Amir Quest Love Thompson. Executive producers are Sean
Speaker 1: g Brian Calhoun and Me. Produced by Britney Benjamin and
Speaker 1: Jake Payne.
Speaker 5: Produced for iHeart by Noel Brown, edited by Alex connrom
Speaker 5: iHeart video support by Mark Canton, Logos Graphics and animation
Speaker 5: by Nicko Bylowie.
Speaker 6: Additional support by Lance Coleman. Special thanks to Kathy Brown
Speaker 6: Special thanks to Sugar Steve Mandel. Please subscribe, rate, review,
Speaker 6: and share The Quest Love Show wherever you stream your podcasts,
Speaker 6: and make sure you follow us on socials.
Speaker 1: That's at QLs. Check out hundreds and hundreds of QLs episodes,
Speaker 1: including the Quest Love Supreme Shows, in our podcast archives.
Speaker 3: The Quest Love Show is the production of iHeartRadio.