I’ve been hearing the name Black Noi$e more and more since this past Fall and after hearing his incredible production work on the Children of the Night album Queens…Revisited I was sure he’s a force to be reckoned with. Almost immediately after my first listen to Queens…Revisited I contacted Black Noi$e about doing an interview. We ended up talking that night.
Over Facebook chat–this is the first interview I’ve done that way and one of the only times I’ve ever used Facebook chat–we talked about Sun O))), “Bass-Induced Heart Problems,” how Drake might be a hippie and making rap beats, too…
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Nick Vogt: I almost always ask people this first: how’d you get started making music?
Black Noi$e: I started making music around 10 or 11. I had Hip Hop Ejay on the family PC. around the same time I discovered Napster. I would always make little loops here and there. I think I started playing guitar around 12 or 13 tho.
Oh cool. Have you put guitar on any beats you’ve made? I’m trying to think if I’ve heard anything that sounds like live guitar on one of your beats and not a sample…
BN: Well on that “Ellis” beat on the COTN release, I played bass over the track. The original sample didn’t have everything I was looking for in the low end, so I had to bring out my own shit. Other than that, I haven’t really combined the two worlds yet.
Do you play any other instruments besides guitar and bass?
BN: I can keep a beat on the drums, but those are my two instruments of choice. I also play a mean shaker. On some samba type shit. I always have shakers in my tracks, I don’t know what I would do without shakers. Haha.
Nice. You called making beats and playing guitar “two worlds” which is a cool way to put it I think. Have you played in bands and stuff in your non beat-making music world?
BN: Yeah man, I’m in a hardcore band right now called Face Reality. we have been a band since about 2008. Playing shows all over the east coast. Going to Cali in april for a few shows. I think that’s why I call it two worlds. I have been in and out of bands since around 2005 tho. I keep the guitar playing and my laptop separate.
That’s awesome, dude. I’ve been seeing a lot of cross-over between hip hop and punk/hardcore lately. Antwon has played in punk bands and Cities Aviv, too. At first glance it kinda seems like the genres don’t have much in common. Were you into hip hop or hardcore first? Or maybe both at the same time?
BN: Well my musical history goes back to like 1995. I was always going between things on the radio. Things like Bone Thugs, No Limit, 2 Pac. all that, but then on the other hand i was listening to things like The Smashing Pumpkins and Bush. it was all appealing to me. Hip Hop definitely grabbed me first tho. Punk/Hardcore didn’t come into the picture till middle school/high school.
Ok cool. Yeah it makes sense that you’re into hardcore. I remember talking with you on Twitter once about Sun O))) which is some pretty out there shit so I kind of figured you have a lot of interests is music outside hip hop. Do hardcore and punk and other music you listen to that isn’t hip hop influence your hip hop production at all?
BN: Oh yeah, I am influenced by everything I listen to. I like a lot of music just for the energy of it. So if it doesn’t show sound wise in my own music, then it is there in spirit. Damn, that sounds like some Drake/hippie shit haha
Haha no that’s not too hippie-ish. And that’s the first time I’ve ever heard Drake and hippie in the same sentence which is hilarious. What’s your process when you go to make a beat?
BN: Interesting sounds first. Always. If I find something that sounds interesting then I will zone out, and when I come to, a beat is done. But first step is open up either Logic or Reason.
Rising from the depths of the blue ocean and landing with an aquatic bang on the roiling waves of the information superhighway, Seapunk (or #seapunk, if you prefer) is a movement that continues to grow and spread like the turquoise liquid it so devoutly idolizes. With ever increasing coverage, including a write up in the New York Times, Seapunk and its font, the label Coral Records Internazionale, seems primed to leave it’s tropical mark on 2012 (a year that, as you’ll see, is quite important to Seapunk for other reasons).
Though participated in by many artists, the undeniable current heads of Seapunk, and co-founders of Coral Records are Albert Redwine and Shan Beaste AKA Ultrademon (Fire For Effect) and Zombelle, respectively. In town for some shows, the two were nice enough to swing by the 350 Broadway store, and then run over to Trophy Bar across the street to sit down with me and talk about topics as varied as Polish trend setters, the impending apocalypse and it’s possibly positive implications, the drama of Witch House, yacht parties, and much more.
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Whole Milk: So let’s start with the name: Seapunk was Julian (Lil’ Internet) right?
Albert Redwine: He coined the term.
Shan Beaste: He had a dream. A dream of a Seapunk on the shore with a leather jacket studded with barnacles.
I’m surprised no one has come up with a conflicting origin story for Seapunk.
SB: It’s so well documented. That guy has so many followers. And Bridget (Lil’ Government), actually, apparently she tweeted it first. She tweeted his dream and then later he tweeted it so I guess technically she was the first.
So did you guys know him IRL before then?
AR: Yeah I knew him a couple of years ago. We were throwing warehouse parties in the city. Me and my friend Phillip (Beretta), we brought Julian out for a party that was actually really crazy. There were people literally hanging off the rafters and right before Julian went on the cops showed up, like twenty cop cars, so it was kind of a bummer. Did a bunch of ketamine. Didn’t really see him for a couple of years, then I guess we started talking online again.
Do you guys try to seek out the people you meet online IRL a lot?
SB: It depends, there are some people that you hang out with on the internet as much as you would with an IRL friend, so you wanna seek those people out. People seek you out, you seek them out. At the party the other night, there were so many kids from the internet coming up to us like “I know you on Twitter or Tumblr” so it works both ways. But I have an online group on Facebook called the Rave Cave, so there’s about a hundred people in that group and everybody is some sort of artist in some way like audio, visual. There’s a couple dump.fm kids and stuff like that, so you wanna meet those people. So we have video chat parties or people will DJ or watch anime together on Netflix. Weird stuff. Some of those people I hang out with.
Do you guys consider Seapunk – I know you mentioned Dump.fm - to be a part of that new media art scene, or is it a musical genre apart from that?
SB: I think theres a lot of confusion, because the actual term Seapunk was more something that was able to give people a word to define something that was already happening, with like a universal consciousness on the internet. A lot of people were kind of feeling the same vibe and producing similar content, but there’s definitely a separating point between tropical art on Tumblr and Seapunk, but people are mixing it together.
AR: I think mostly when Seapunk comes up people’s default thing that they think of is definitely like tumblr searching “seapunk” and a bunch of teens making stuff, which I think is really weird. I dunno. Seapunk is an idea embodying this sort of cyberpunk lifestyle with this modern aqueous texture – or meta-texture if you will – that applies to everything. As far as Ryder Ripps and that whole crew, we don’t have anything to do with them. I’m a musician, and that’s my job. I produce and I try to make money off of it.
So you have big plans for Coral Records Internazionale in 2012?
AR: I’d say there’s a plan. We want to expand into doing some cool merch, like limited run collectible stuff. And I definitely want to move to vinyl and get away from CDs and all that. But it’s like everything we’ve done so far is building up to that, and it’s working out. The releases are getting more deep now I think, or whatever you call it – textured or something.
Was the choice to do limited run CDs, was that a financial thing or is there an allure to the idea that “there’s only a hundred of these.”
AR: I mean, CD-Rs aren’t that expensive, but there is a control thing.
SB: We make them by hand, and a hundred is a lot to sit down and cut out and packaging and… we do everything by hand, so like it’s cool to have something rare that we don’t have to totally work our fingers to the bone like that. Moving to vinyl would be a relief. Maybe we should just buy a vinyl machine.
AR: Those are expensive. Like ten grand I think.
SB: But it would be cool!
AR: We want to do like swirled vinyls, like blue and white.
As far as the idea of handmade stuff – well, I know there’s a lot of reposting, retumbling, retweeting involved in Seapunk – but I think you guys have the luxury of being able to control your image really fastidiously. Is that a part you like: that you get to craft every aspect of it? Especially, y’know, since it’s bigger than just music and image and it’s almost like a world that is crafted?
AR: Definitely. Control is really important. Seeing the whole Witch House scene, how they were like really… they seemed to accept anybody to be a part of it, add their image, add their sound, and that’s kind of an internet based type of culture. With Seapunk we were thinking maybe do the opposite. Have like hyper control in some aspects, as far as having a really tight crew, and not just letting anybody contribute something and automatically be a part of it. Because we want to create really high quality content, so there’s a level of control. But it’s through a crew, its not like… a dictatorship?
SB: Exactly. In a way I think that holds true to, like, punk… in its really fucked up future way, because with everything as open as it is it can easily be tainted and like screwed over. So keeping it really close knit with people that you’re familiar with and who actually produce high quality content, it’s actually more punk I think in that aspect. Does that make any sense?
AR: Yeah! It’s a lot of midwestern kids. The people that were initially involved that were from the coasts, for the most part, have stopped being involved. And the people that have stayed tight are mainly from the midwest.
SB: And actually happen to be better producers too. Kids internationally, and then kids from midwest america-
AR: It’s like Russia and Kansas.
SB: The last release was this Russian kid (Vtgnike), he did our Valentine’s release, and it was really great. And the one before that was jungle drum n bass-
AR: Yeah, Curtis Vodka who’s… I think he used to tell people he was from Belgium, but he’s from Alaska.
Recently I flew from Boston to Nashville to visit my mom. About a week before I left I had the idea to reach out to Tennessee-based rap duo (they’re way more than just that, but you’ll learn more as you read on) Dark Sister. I thought there might be a small possibility we could meet up for an interview. Since I first discovered Dark Sister’s Swag Hag EP via our Best Hip Hop of 2011 list, I’ve had it on serious repeat.
Dark Sister is Tiffany and Jessi. Tiffany lives in Memphis and Jessi lives about 20 minutes outside Nashville in Murfreesboro (“we’re straddling Tennessee” is how Tiffany put it). My email to them went something like “I know you’re not both in Murfreesboro, and I won’t exactly have a way to get out to Murfreesboro even, but maybe we could make something work?”
It turns out my trip to Nashville was perfect timing (and maybe keep this in mind when magic comes up later). Both Tiffany and Jessi were going to be in Murfreesboro for a show the week I’d be there and they were willing to drive into Nashville to meet with me.
Somewhat fittingly, I interviewed Dark Sister in the middle of the night. At around 1 AM they pulled up to my mothers house in Jessi’s Ford Taurus ( she called it “The Mothership” at one point) and we drove off to Café Coco, which I think is one of the few places actually open that late in Nashville
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Nick Vogt: How did you guys meet and start making music together?
Tiffany: We’ve told it a few times, but I feel like we can tell it better this time.
Jessi: Ok. Let’s try it. We met a few years ago. We didn’t really know each other for a while. We would cross paths. We were always cool with each other.
Tiffany: It’d be just like “hey, I like that jacket…” “yeah! I like those shoes.”
Jessi: we’d cross paths like “Go Dog Go” kinda.
Were you in school together?
Tiffany: She was around. She went to school for like a minute then dropped out. I’m the old one.
Jessi: Anyways, now listen: we started going to the club. One night we were at the club and we were having a real great time. We started talking about “cud.” And like the definition of “cud.”
Tiffany: That’s just something I said like “that bitch is so cud!”
Jessi: Yeah like from the fourth stomach. Already chewed. And then we started rapping about cud.
Tiffany: “You a cud ass bitch / Ain’t nobody want you / Comin from the fourth stomach / she already been chewed” when we were coming home from the club that night her car had a whole bunch of trash in it. She called it the compost pile that was in the passenger seat.
Jessi: Birthday cards, paper bags…
Tiffany: We started writing the “cud” rap on that stuff. Our friends thought we were really weird. They were like crying laughing.
Jessi: After that we parted ways. We were texting each other one day and I was like “hey, I thought of a song. It’s kinda gross. It’s about that period thing that you told me about.”
Tiffany: Yeah. There’s this thing I had read—I read a lot about magic and stuff, which I guess is kind of obvious—there’s an old Hodoo thing like if you feed a man your period blood then he’s yours forever. We thought that’d be badass. But, we were like “what should we call it though?” And then I saw she had this red velvet dress hanging on her door. And that’s “Red Velvet.”
We were riding in the car one day listening to this Xastur song and we thought “wouldn’t that be cool to sample?” So we asked her boyfriend Charlie to make us a beat sampling it. We recorded that and then “Haunt U” and “Strange” the next night. The idea for “Strange” was me just saying “what if we had a dumb song that was like a Soulja Boy thing like ‘Bitch You Know You Ain’t Strange Like Me!”
Soulja Boy is exactly what I thought when I first heard “Strange.” I’m glad that was actually what you intended to do.
Jessi: Oh yeah. We were like “Let’s make a candy, gooned-out beat.” Charlie’s great. If I make hand motions like “I want some beeps and boops like THIS” he can make that into a perfect beat. He’s really talented. He actually interned at this studio in L.A. for Gucci Mane.
Nice. Charlie did all the Swag Hag beats?
Jessi: Yep. And we did the whole EP within like two weeks.
Tiffany: Once we had it done we were like “Maybe this should be serious? Because it’s so fun.” And once we had played our first live show we knew we were gonna be serious about Dark Sister. And we’ve gotten to know each other really well through this. We are pretty much sisters now. We just tell people that now.
How much is the occult and magic a part of your beliefs actually? You get described as like “witches” often, but…
Jessi: We’re influenced by that and we put it in our songs. In “Strange” we put that in there to be weird originally.
Tiffany: I feel like I needed to pull back on that though because people were coming at us like “that’s witch house”
I first heard of Texas based musician and filmmaker .L.W.H. in Spring 2011 when I checked out the Chandelier album. That was some of the first music I heard by Main Attrakionz and it really made an impression on me. His and Juilan Wass’ production coupled with Squadda and Mondre’s groundbreaking raps was just amazing. Not only do I love his production work on Chandelier, but L.W.H’s Tape Hiss Hooligan album has been on heavy repeat for me since he released it.
Recently I found out .L.W.H. also is part of the team responsible for the ultra hilarious “Unforgivable” videos from back in the day, and that was a crazy surprise. What a small world we live in. I interviewed .L.W.H. over the phone and it was beyond cool talking with him about finding beauty in dystopia, the movie Chinatown, the game Xenogears, the best way to use a sample when making a beat and more…
Nick Vogt: How did you get started making music?
L.W.H: I actually started in High School. I played in a lot of punk rock bands and things. I recorded my own albums on an old 4-track machine I had. I listened to rap throughout high school and stuff. Especially East Coast stuff. I liked the real grimy stuff. I never felt like my music was hard enough to be rap beats until I got an MPC. I actually started really trying to make rap beats in like ’08 on Frooty Loops. The next year I got the MPC and started putting different drum sounds together. I finally got a sound I liked. But, I still think I’m improving though. As time as gone on I’ve gotten better. I used to want to do too much, put too much on beats. But, I’ve gotten more minimalistic. Working with rappers I trust like Western Tink and Main Attrakionz has helped a lot too.
Is that because you can really create beats for specific rappers?
L.W.H: Definitely. You know their cadence. Sometimes rappers can totally surprise you. But, I like that.
Right. How did that all work out for you? How did you first end up collaborating with rappers?
L.W.H: Me and Julian Wass were big fans of that Space Age Hustlecompilation – that cloud rap tape. I listened to that more times than I can count. Eventually I reached out to Squadda online. It turned out he was a huge fan of the old movie shit. The “Unforgivable” shit. Squadda’s like one of the best producers in the game I think. I was nervous about even sending him anything. But I did. We met in L.A a couple months later. We did Chandelier while we were L.A.
Oh right. Julian Wass lives in L.A, right?
L.W.H: Yeah.
How did you first link with Julian and start up Executive Series?
L.W.H: I’ve known him since 2008. He got at me on the Internet. He was a fan of the movie stuff. We had some joke music stuff in the works, but Chandelier was really the first serious thing we worked on together.
Chandelier is a big deal for me in my Main Attrakionz listening because it was one of the first things I heard by them. What really struck me at first was how much the beats reminded me of old videogames. I think Julian makes similar beats that have that videogame vibe. Your beats and Julian’s beats really remind me of Final Fantasy games. Is that intentional?
L.W.H: I don’t think we go for that sound as much as that was a part of our lives growing up. Like you said RPGS and Final Fantasy were huge for us. The music in RPGs really creates a world and the soundtrack has to be something you can listen to over and over because you hear it so much in the games. I think videogame music really has an influence on us because we spent so much time with it and because they’re so fun. We respect the shit out of videogame music. I think producers like Matsuda are up there with some of the best film composers.
I can’t remember when I first heard Killer Mike. I feel like he’s always been there. But a quick look on Wikipedia (the article could use some editing byt he way if anyone feels inclined) reminded me that the first time I heard him was in 2000 on Stankonia. But it wasn’t until 2006 that I really connected with Killer Mike’s music. “That’s Life” fell into my lap thanks to the goons at Soul Strut, and it felt like I was eating a fresh perfectly-ripe papaya in the middle of Antarctica.
In 2006 hip hop was in such a barren phase. There was still plenty of enjoyable music coming out, but content was at an all time low. For a long time I had divided my tastes between the underground and the mainstream. Underground for content, and mainstream for the vibes. There was very little overlap, and at that point they’d both exhausted their range. There was not much worth listening to in underground hip hop, and the mainstream wasn’t providing any food for thought.
But when I heard “That’s Life”, I knew that Mike had somehow found a middle-ground. I spent a good deal of time with Pl3dge, and Pl3dge 2. For me it was very exciting to be listening to someone with a mainstream outlet addressing the topics I wanted to hear addressed. And then bringin the vibe that I’m tryin to live in. The problem with old time backpack rap is that it doesn’t open up the room, it just drives everyone into their minds. The problem with old time radio rap is that it leaves little to no room for thought. And here was Killer with the totally unexpected balancing act.
At the time I was getting my MA at NYU, and I quickly posted the track to a discussion list. Now, while this may have been an unexpected thing for most of the subscribers, it was by no means out of place, as the topics Mike discusses are the same topics we were addressing in our classes: issues of race, issues of color, issues of economic status, issues of labor, and most importantly he was a singular voice speaking out and critiquing the dominant power structure, and calling for unity in the community. Well, needless to say all anyone wanted to focus on was the color of Mike’s language, and so no real discussion took place. But that was in a stuffy ivory tower, where people don’t know or care to know what it feels like to keep a gun in your waistband because of what’s in your pocket and where you’re standing. Mike kept it too real for grad school.
And that’s what’s great about Mike, he keeps it too real. I spoke to someone recently about interviewing Mike and they said, “Damn you know I fuck with Killer Mike, but dude ain’t got his proper shine. It’s like he’s too honest, he says shit that’s true, but it’s not the stuff people wanna hear.” I’d say that’s accurate. And so, in what is perhaps the strangest move in hip hop since I started paying attention, Killer Mike and El-P‘s R.A.P. Music (Rebellious African People’s) album has an oddly expected element to it. This record closes the loop between two originally-divergent but recently increasingly-indistinguishable veins of rap (underground and mainstream).
It is the keystone in a chapter of history in the United States that, while most obviously musical, extends well-beyond the confines of art. I can’t lay out the myriad implications of this record, because that is what is left to the listener when great art happens. But, if you keep up with my writing on here then you know that I am constantly tracing a very strong stream of Americana, and the conversation I had with Mike was incredibly inspiring. I hope that you’ll enjoy reading it, but more importantly I hope it will give you a sense of the simultaneously celebratory, and outright responsible music Mike and El-P made.
Zachg: So how did this project with you and El-P (R.A.P. Music) come about?
Killer Mike: Me an El? I did, if you remember, I did a record called Swimming last year and it was produced by Flying Lotus. And I got a question from a friend of mine, well he became a friend, named Jason Demarco and he works over at Turner and Cartoon Network. He was like “Mike would you be into making a record for us? I know we don’t have, of course, the type of budget that traditionally record companies would bring, but you would you be willing to do it?” And I’m always interested in doing new and kinda independent shit. Like no one would work with SMC on the East Coast before
me; No one had really – outta Atlanta – really championed independent. So when I got the opportunity to do this with Williams Street, which is based out of Atlanta, I was like hell yeah this shit will be hella cool.
And I really liked the beats that he had brought me. So originally it was supposed to be beats from El, beats from Flying lotus, beats from people such as Clams Casino, who I’ve also rapped over before and who I love. But El and I got in the studio together first and after we made say the first five – two of which we kept and three of which we scrapped – I called Jason back like “you think he’ll do the whole album?” And El was in the process of making his own album doing his own
shit. But he ended up liking to work with me so much we actually – I consider it – got paid to become friends. He really has become a friend and the corporation payed us to make a dope ass record and build a friendship and that’s always cool. That doesn’t happen as much anymore. It really just came out of serendipity. I was really just at the right place at the right time. At the right place in my musical career. I’d always wanted to make a one producer/one rapper album.
When I put Nem on that 15 producers to know in 2012 I had a tough time. There wasn’t much to be found by way of information on him, and it seemed that most folks I spoke to about Nem felt that he was purposely reclusive. Well, it turns out that isn’t the case. I didn’t have trouble tracking Nem down on facebook because we were already friends on facebook. The only trouble that came up was me and my schedule. I missed our scheduled times twice before I was able to catch up with Nem on Gchat. But once I did what I found was not a dude who is reclusive, but actually perhaps the total opposite: a dude who is separated from the center of a group that plays a central role in his life.
Nem was born in Bosnia. At the age of 6 his family relocated briefly to Serbia, and then Saskatoon, Canada. I don’t want to play up the circumstances of Nem’s childhood, but they can’t go unmentioned either. His family is where they are in large part because of a war that, while one of the larger crises of our generation’s time on Earth, is not really recognized in our culture. And what I mean bares specific relevance to hip hop music in particular.
When you think of frequent Nem collaborator Squadda B, you know how to interpret his tale. When Squadda says, “I’m from Oakland, I smoke a lot of weed, and I maybe used to be on the block,” you hear more than the words. You see the picture of Squadda’s life because we all are familiar with it to a greater or lesser degree. After all, it’s from the same country we grew up in. But, when Nem says he lives in Saskatoon but he’s from Bosnia what do you see?
Do you see a young Nem born in the time of one of Europe’s most brutal conflicts, and then forced to leave his homeland, and relocate to a far away place with long bitter winters? Probably not. I didn’t. But it’s there, and the history of how New got to Saskatoon isn’t even the important factor at play. That history just sets the tone for the recurring tale of hip hop to ring true easier. Nem described his local scene (ellipses his):
“Never been that good for music..definetly not the music that gets attention here. sometimes you meet people doing underground shows and what not. it can be cool, but ya.. ppl kind of do their own thing. its cold for a good 6 months or so.”
I don’t know maybe I’m just too loaded (not drunk) in the way I look at things, but this sounds a lot like Afrika Bambaataa’s description of the Bronx in the mid 70′s. So it makes sense that Nem wound up making hip hop as many young people today do. And like many other young people again, he played in Nu Metal, Punk, and Experimental bands before he wound up making music on a computer.
Over the last few months I’d been hearing the producer Silky Johnson’s name come up more and more associated with rap I’m into. I think his beats for Main Attrakionz and for Mondre M.A.N’s solo MAN EP are really awesome as well his beats on his collaboration EP with Zachg Prostitute’s Yardsale. We featured Silky Johnson as one of the Bloglin’s “Producers To Know In 2012” actually.
A few weeks ago I was talking with Silky and found out he goes to Harvard. I live a quick bus ride to Harvard Square in Cambridge. A few days ago I met up with Silky at his Harvard dorm a.k.a “Silky Johnson Studios,” where, over Indian food and some beer, we talked about Adult Swim, Blink 182, and his music, too.
Silky wants to stay somewhat mysterious and told me the picture above is the only one I should use for this post. He also at one point said “You don’t even know my real name, Nick. And I’m not gonna tell it to you.”
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What’s the Silky Johnson origin story? How did you get started producing and making music?
Silky: All the stuff with the rap music is pretty recent for me. I’ve only been making beats for like two years. I first started in 2009. I just kind of did it as a hobby for a while. I just messed around on the computer. I never did any tracks for any rappers until the Fall of 2010. I ended up doing a song for Lil B. It’s called “Hugh Hefner.”
Oh, cool. What mixtape of is that on?
Silky: Red Flame. You know, before that I didn’t reach out to rappers ever. I didn’t really want to be one of these guys selling beats to random rappers on Soundclick. I wanted to work with people I liked. I’m a big fan of Lil B. I sent him the “Hugh Hefner” beat on twitter and he ended up using it. That kind of gave me a little encouragement to start sending stuff to people.
And when you heard it on Red Flame it was probably really awesome.
Silky: Oh, yeah. Because I wasn’t expecting to hear it.
Really?
Silky: Yeah he didn’t tell me he was gonna use it. Lil B doesn’t communicate with his producers very much. I’m not mad at him at all, but he’s just not the kind of guy who’ll give you a heads up if he’s gonna use your beat. He didn’t credit me, but I’ve still gotten a lot of recognition for that. I put the song on youtube myself and credited myself in it.
Is “Hugh Hefner” what led to working with Main Attrakionz?
Silky: Sort of. Indirectly. I didn’t know about Main Attrakionz for a while. That was in October or November when I did the Lil B beat. In April of the next year I first heard of Main Attrakionz. Back then I didn’t have a website or Twitter or my music online really. I just had a bunch of beats on my computer. Before I got involved with Main Attrakionz I put work into setting up a Silky Johnson Twitter and Bandcamp. I took a bunch of my old tracks and put a few mixtapes together. Once I had done all that, then I reached out to Main Attrakionz. And this is where having done the Lil B track really helped. That was really what started my carreer. I was able to email someone like Main Attrakionz and instead of saying “Hey, I’m a random guy!” I could say “Hey! I produced for Lil B!” That helped me get my foot in the door. I started sending stuff to Main Attrakionz and Shady Blaze. My first song with Greenova was “Cold Heart” by Shady Blaze.
Shady Blaze is really talented.
Silky: Oh yeah. He’s got a lot of cool stuff in the works, too. I also sent this beat to Main Attrakionz at that time and that beat ended up on their 808s And Dark Grapes IIalbum. It’s “Nothing’s Gonna Change.” They actually let me know that my beat was gonna be on the album before 808s came out.
Who else have you been working with? Anyone else outside Greenova?
Silky: Yeah. I also got in touch with Western Tink back then, too. People haven’t heard a lot of the stuff I’ve done with Tink, but he’s gonna put out an EP at some point using all my beats. That’s probably the one project of mine I’m most excited about. It should sound maybe a little different than what you’d expect.
Have you really made an effort to change up your sound then?
Silky: Sort of. A lot of the beats for the Tink EP were supposed to be on my beat tape “Hater Of The Year” and they were some of the best tracks. But, I decided to save those for the Tink project.
I first found out about Bay area rapper Antwon from a tweet. A little over a month ago I saw Dark Sister tweet this bizarre statement: “We would buy the tears of Antwon.” I thought what? Who is this guy? Of course, that led me to Antwon on the wonderful world of twitter and led me to find out he’s a rapper and an incredibly talented one at that. He’s super passionate about music and he’s a very down-to-earth, cool dude.
I interviewed Antwon via phone recently and we talked about 90s R&B, Mortal Kombat, Joanna Newsom and more…
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Your whole album My Westside Horizon is produced by Bad Slorp. How did you meet him and start working with him?
Antwon: We have a mutual friend who’s his stepsister. One day she came to pick me up from my job and he was in the car. He was playing on one of those Casio samplers. He was joking around, cussing into it and then playing it. He showed me some of his stuff from a group called alter ego he had in highschool. I hit him up over the internet like “Yo, would you wanna come record some stuff?” and that was it.
And that led to you guys doing a whole album.
Antwon: Yeah that was a long time coming. We’ve been making music since like ’05, ’06. We’ve been making music off and on since then. For a while I stopped making music.
What were you doing when you stopped making music?
Antwon: I was painting. I was playing in this band in Philly. I moved out to Philly for a minute.
What did you play in the band?
Antwon: I was playing bass. It was a punk band.
Really? That’s awesome. Are you still into punk?
Antwon: Yeah definitely! Through punk I realize I could actually do stuff, you know? Like I don’t have to wait around for someone to give me an opportunity. I don’t have to wait around for someone to do merch or do CDs or anything.
I felt like I had to ask this question and a lot of people might ask you this all the time but…you’re voice sounds like Biggie quite a bit and you even quote Biggie as the first line on Westside Horizon “I grew up a fucking screw up.” What exactly about Biggie has influenced you? And, are you sick of being compared to Biggie?
Antwon: I think Biggie is fucking awesome. Ready To Die is one of my top favorite albums for real. I used to get high by myself, listen to that and create and draw. I think it’s cooler than being compared to someone newer, you know what I mean? Like, if someone said “you sound like Rick Ross” I’d be like “No. Do you say that because I’m a fat guy with a beard? No way.”
Yeah, Biggie’s a legend.
Antwon: Yeah a lot of the hip hop I’d listen to was rugged east coast stuff like Biggie.
That’s interesting because all the tracks on My Westside Horizon are chill and laid back. Like, you’re style is pretty far from “rugged” on there. Do you see yourself making more intense music ever?
Antwon: Oh yeah. I’ve got some new stuff I’m working on that’s some different shit. It’s not all gonna be Bad Slorp’s production. He’s on there for a few tracks, but there’s definitely gonna be a different sound to my new album.
Left Leberra is an up-and-coming rapper based in New Haven, Connecticut. Along with his sister, the rapper Stash Marina, and the 3-man Northern Lights group (made up of rapper Rod Fuego and producers/rappers New 9 Gs and Don D) Left is a part of a crew called AREB.
I found out about Left and AREB from one of Zach G’s “High Tide” posts last month and found their stuff quite awesome. I got in touch with Left and he, Northern Lights and Stash were kind enough to let me go to their New Haven studio so I could interview all 5 of them. It was a good time.
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How did you guys all get started making music? How did you meet up?
Left: They’ve been making music since they were like teenagers.
Don: We started back when we were 15. 15 or 16.
Rod: We all grew up together. We met Left last year. Daryl’s [a.k.a New 9Gs] coworker Dave hooked us up because we needed a graphic artist. We needed music and art.
Left: Stash is my sister. We’ve been rapping since 2005 or 6.
Left, you mainly work with Norhern Lights but you’ve collaborated with some other people recently, some pretty big producers. We were talking about ASAP earlier and I guess Beautiful Lou is most famous for producing for Rocky now. I mentioned Zach G earlier, too and you worked with him on your most recent mixtape. Has it been hard to connect with producers and collaborate?
Left: Nah, it’s been pretty easy. People send shit to me.
That’s cool. So, producers just discovered your music on your Bandcamp and sent you stuff?
Left: Yeah.
Have you guys [Northern Lights] been producing for anyone outside of AREB?
Rod: Yeah we did some stuff with Nemo Achida (not sure if you’re familiar with him) he’s out of Kentucky. He’s a pretty good artist. He came up here and worked with us. We produced about 35% of his last project. We did some joints for Trademark Da Skydiver.
Oh yeah. I keep hearing more and more about Shadow Runners.
Don: Yeah, they’re talented. We like them a lot.
I like how many nerdy references they make in their stuff. Like in that “Slimewave” video they talk about Power Rangers in the beginning.
9Gs: Yeah.
Don: Yeah we connected through nerdy stuff too. I’ve been talking to them about WWF. I was in love with WWF growing up.
Yeah. I feel like WWF or Superheroes or other “nerdy” things are a big, meaningful thing for our generation. I mean, I see that stuff come up a lot in music (in hip hop especially) but there’s something about it we all relate to. We had a lot of cool things to watch as little kids.
9Gs: Yeah it’s common ground. We all connect.
Speaking of that, I wore my Ninja Turtles shirt today because they come up in your songs, Left. You have a song “Oroku Saki” and you have album art that’s Shredder.
Left: Oh yeah. I just moved and when I was moving I noticed I still got my Michealangelo toy from when I was a little kid.
I have to shout out Northampton, MA because it’s where I was born and that’s where they created Ninja Turtles. When I was little I met the creators actually. So, Turtles are always gonna be meaningful for me. Switching gears kinda: Left, A lot of your music is kind of introspective. Like it’s slow-paced and well thought out. And the Northern Lights beats sound that way, too. The production is almost like we’re in space looking down on things.
9Gs: That’s the same way we think about it! That’s us, man! When we make our music We want you to feel like you’re in space. In a galaxy. And Left really complements that.
Don: He does take his time with everything. Not project-wise. He’ll drop a project every two weeks. But, Rhyme-wise. He always keeps the same pace basically. Even if he does speed it up a little Left keeps on that same metronome and always hits the same points. I think he stands out from everyone else by doing that.
Some of the Northern Lights beats are so different they seem almost un-rappable. I remember hearing one of Left’s songs where the drums are really bizarre and really all you do, Left, is repeat the hook on it. But, I think it’s cool you did that, that you figured out that way to be on that beat. Your work with Northern Lights is great because you’re able to rap over some weird, nontraditional stuff.
Don: That’s how we want everybody to look at us. We want to separate ourselves from other producers. We’ve been making beats like that for a long time. We’ve been making stuff we feel like “Nobody’s gonna rap on this. Nobody CAN rap on this.”
Left: They never think I’m gonna like the beats I pick.
Don: It’s always like “you sure you want this?”
He’ll pick like the most ambient, weird thing?
Don: Yeah. And it’ll come out great.
We were talking about producer collaborations earlier. And, on your newest mixtape you’ve worked with rappers outside of your team on there. You’ve got Tiffany from Dark Sister on their and Supa from Sortahuman. How did those collaborations come about?
Left: Through Producers. Party Trash put me in touch with Supa. This producer named Blown from Tenessee got me in touch with Tiffany.
I love that beat for “Left Hand” with Tiffany. It’s like a little kid keyboard trap beat. It’s goofy in a good way. Left, you and Stash released a mixtape of freestyles “Volcano Pyramid” Was there any reason for that in particular?
Left: I always wanted to freestyle. And I always felt like I couldn’t do it. But, the more I’ve been rapping and the more I’ve been fucking with these guys [Northern Lights] I thought I could. We took beats from oldschool stuff. We had an idea for a type of theme: like old thug shit.
Yeah I think you nailed the “Old Thug Shit.” I was listening to the mixtape and my roommate walked by. He was like “What is this? It sounds like old Ice Cube.” I think the freestyle project is good because it brings out some different flows from you and Stash. Do you think it helped you get into a different creative place?
Left: Yeah it helps you say things you might not normally say.
On the Mary Saves album I really love the song “Last Man Alive” where a Martian woman comes from space and you have sex with her. That’s a great story, Left. I think the imagination and the creativity on that song are excellent. There are so many people rapping that I feel like you have to be unique now and I think having songs is really what makes you stand out.
Left: That song was actually Stash’s idea.
Oh cool. So, Stash, how did that idea come about?
Stash: Well, Left’s always talks about how “girls ain’t shit” basically. So I told him he should do something different and was like “maybe this should be about like a bitch from Mars who can take over.” I went somewhere and when I came back he had finished the song I was like “Hell yeah.”
It’s pretty awesome. Left’s able to subdue this monster by having sex with it. It reminds me of those old pulp book covers (and I don’t know if you guys have seen those) like “Last man On Earth!” I can envision the cover actually where Left’s like the hero facing off against this martian woman.
Left: Yeah totally.
Okay. As a final thing: What projects are you all working on now? And that question is for everybody.
Left: Stash’s shit just needs to be mixed that’s “Black Master” and Northern Lights are putting out their shit on the 30th.
And there’s more Left on the way soon, too?
Left: Yeah.
Nice. Well, thank you guys. Is there anything else you want to say?
Left: Thanks for fucking with us.
Rod: Yeah. Love to Mishka.
9Gs: Love to Mishka and love to Zach G.
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After our chat we hung out for a bit and watched Rod’s old VHS tapes of ’90s TV. It was Mostly All That, Weird Al Videos and the 90s X-Men Cartoon.
We all agreed that Cyclops is the worst member of the X-Men.
