Your kind of upbringing is quite unusual in the Hip Hop community from which you are coming from. What I would like to know is something about your musical background, your first exposure to music, and particularly beat-making.
One of the earliest memories I have is being in my uncles garage, at age of four or five, in San Diego where his band would rehearse. I gravitated towards the drumset more than anything else. Whenever we would leave his house, I would take all the pillows from our living room couch, set them up like a drumset and pretend like I was playing to whatever song was on the radio. As the youngest of four, my siblings were always listening to a mixture of 90s rap and r&b. We were relatively avid collectors of cassette tapes throughout our childhood. Some of my first tapes were Wu Tang Clan and Kris Kross. During middle school, thanks to one of my sisters, I was exposed to gospel music when she urged my mother and I to start going to a baptist church for a change. It wasn’t until my transition into high school, my older brother as well as a few peers, showed me how to make beats with FL Studio aka Fruity Loops.
How did you get in touch with Stones Throw and start working with them?
Thanks to some really good friends, Jonwayne and his label Authors, Sofie of SOS Radio and Matthewdavid boss of Leaving Records, my work was able to be heard by Peanut Butter Wold and the other folks at Stones Throw. Yawn Zen was originally made for Leaving Records, however, Wolf showed interest in releasing it directly through ST. So, it was through Matthew’s blessing that the record was able to shine even brighter than it would’ve already had on Leaving.
Which are your favourite releases, or favourite acts, out off the Stones Throw catalogue?
Lootpack, Dilla, Madlib, Doom, Georgia, Dam… They’ll always be favorite classics to me. All the recent artists on Stones Throw now are incredible too. Hard to have a favorite to be honest.
Would you tell us a bit of the making of the new album “Body Wash” and the circumstances in which you produced it?
The record was all written, recorded, produced and conceptualized in Los Angeles, specifically in the Highland Park neighborhood. The Yamaha DX5, Roland Juno and Moog Opus were the cast of synths I predominantly used, tracking everything into Ableton. There was something very essential about staying local that really provided a cohesiveness to the final record. Although the change has been rapid in these past few years, there´s parts of this neighborhood that are still raw and true. I definitely allowed that to bleed into the music.
In your opinion, in which way it differs from the previous “Yawn Zen”?
More vocals, more dynamics, more narrative… There’s a subtle story in there that people can extract in their own way.
Technically how do you work usually on your tracks? Do you still go down the “crate digging and sampling” traditional path or you prefer to record your own stuff and then manipulate it or else?
I don’t listen to records the same way anymore. I enjoy listening to the entirety of a song instead of only searching for a part to loop. Studying the arrangement and chord progressions is my way of sampling whats lost and forgotten.
Can you tell us something about the monthly Boiler Room web show Breakfast with Ringgoand more in general if the djing side of the Hip Hop is something that appeals to you at all?
BWR is currently on hiatus due to my record, so it is not running on it’s intended monthly schedule. If anything, I’m more of a selector than a DJ. I enjoy digging and playing records. Would love to learn to scratch one day though.
What´s your plans for the rest of the year, are you touring or will you tour promoting the album and , are there any chances to see you in Europe too?
I gotta tour the US this time. I’ll be doing the east coast in October and the west coast in November. I definitely plan on coming to Europe shortly after!!
