HHP Interview with R.A. the Rugged Man (20 mins)

hear snippets from the album, and BUY IT here: R.A. the Rugged Man

alright… we’re good now…

So what’s good R.A.? Let me know first of all, how’s Nature Sounds doing with the album?

- Everything’s goin good, you know, we’re a small operation, but we’re not tryin to do, ya know, interscope numbers. We’re just trying to do enough (to) where we can make a profit and get back in the studio and pay bills… and you know, keep music coming. We’re doing really good.. the music game is hurting right now, and we’ve actually knocked out a lot of copies and cats are buying the records, and we’re doin i. We’re doing what we want to do.

Ya, that’s for sure.. “Lessons” is actually bangin on the college radio right now, its probably one of the hottest ones on radio. I also heard there’s a lessons video out.. so what’s Nature Sounds doing with this.. are there any updates?

- well the lessons video is banging… and it’s got a cameo from Vito Antuofermo, the ex middleweight champion that fought marvin Hagler twice. He’s from the Godfather part 3, and Goodfellas, he had a little part in it.. we had Mitch Blood Green in the video, Sadat X in the video, and we wrapped that up a week ago.. we had a rough version out there, but the real version just got wrapped up, .. its a dope ass video with alot of visuals in it, and it’s not rated X for god damn sake, you know? read the full article…

Click here to stream the audio of this interview (10 minutes – 5MB)

Hello Defari, my name is VOiD, on behalf of HipHopProduction.com -

First of all, why did you and (DJ) Babu decide to form the Likwit Junkies?

Defari: Well, primarily it was because we had done such good work in the past from him being on focus daily, doing the scratches on these dream, to producing Joy Ride for me, producing both for All my Lifes,

I thought it was overdue, so I came to him with the idea and 10 months later we had an album, the LJs

So how was that whole experience?

Well working with Bab is kind of like working with myself, we’re kind of two of the same individuals in terms of our musical background, and the fact that we both have roots in DJs and etc

Working with him was a real pleasure, it was just a natural organic experience and I thought it was about time that the entire world got to experience his whole prod value because he mixed the record as producing the beats, and it showcases his whole production talent as well as my songwriting abilities on a whole nother level

When shopping around for beats, what do you tend to look for, what turns you on?

I’m into melodies, you know? I’m into melodies, I’m into a beat that makes the car knock, you know? Primarily that damn near makes the windows break on the car, you know? SO I’m into heavy heavy kicks, snappy snappy snares, of course I love the west coast clap… and I’m into melodies. read the full article…

click here to stream listen to the audio of this interview… (20 min)

V: My name is VOiD, and I’m from HipHopProduction.com… First of all, I know you are working on the Beat Kings DVD

M: Yeah…

V: tell me a bit about that

M: You want to know what it’s about, or …

V: Yeah, tell me what it’s all about.

M: Well what I did (is) I went around interviewing producers, so it’s a producer to producer type talk. That way, I mean it’s like you can have people that interview producers easy, but at the same time, coming from another producer it’s like certain questions, and certain things (they) are more equipped to ask than the average interviewer. It’s a lot of information for people that want to get into the business. It shows the business side as well as the creative side, you also got a few people giving you a few little tricks and things like that.

I went around interviewing people like RZA, Marly Marl, Premier, Havoc, Kanye West, Just Blaze, Swizz Beatz, Trackmasters, I went to all different types of music, you know what I mean? It’s bangin, and it should be out in the Fall.

V: It’s safe to say you were basically mentored by RZA right, around the same time he was still making the Prince Rakeem video. How did that start?

M: You talking about the “Ohh We Love You Rakeem” video?

V: Ya.

M: Well back then, I was just DJing, I was DJing for GZA. I knew RZA already, (and) I didn’t even know him and GZA was cousins until he was filming that video. It was like hip-hop was in a different state at that day and time, and everyone was just trying to come through basically. Him and GZA being cousins and everything, and being tight, they were just trying to come through. RZA was on Tommy Boy, and GZA was on Cold Chillin’ at the time, and it was just a good experience to be apart of all that, and just watch the development. From there the whole Wu-tang thing actually formed and came together into what it is now. read the full article…

My man right here needs no introduction if you have been listing to music what I like to call “free of industy manipulation” then you have hear of Illmind.

Coming out of New Jeru, he has blazed several different projects over the last few years. So me and him connected to chop it up about his current project that just got scoped up by BBE his beginnings with the black lung brothers. His mission to change the current state of hiphop and where does he see the game and the current explosions of bedroom beat makers read the full article…