In my humble opinion I think that it changed
the whole vibe.
How these young dudes coming out, how they
moving, and just the sound.
It is the New York sound.
Things happen for a reason.
These younger kids look at Bobby Shmurda as
a legend in a sense, and I think that when
he get out, he’s gonna have a crazy wave.
My father was a producer.
He got certified as a recording engineer in
1988.
That was the year I was born.
I did my first little rap in his home studio.
It was like, “My name is Jah-Jah, I got
a mom, I got a dad, and I got six brothers.”
I was like, three, four years old.
By the time I was 10 or 11 years old, he introduced
me to this software called FruityLoops at
the time, and they changed it to FL Studio.
After “Ima Boss” popped off, I was in
a bidding war with about four or five labels.
The origin of this record, I made the beat
for Meek Mill.
He loved the beat, but it sounded like everything
else we was doing.
I was doing mad records for G-Unit, and I
ended up sending it to Lloyd Banks.
Bobby and Rowdy Rebel, they were like big
fans of Me and Meek so they would do a whole
bunch of my instrumentals off my instrumental
mixtapes, and that’s how that came about.
So first we’re gonna start with the lower
brass.
Next, I ended up putting a choir in.
I wanted it to be a bouncy track, so the arpeggiator
came out of Sytrus and the choir did too.
Alright, so next we’re gonna go with the
kick.
So after the kickdrum I ended up adding a
low 808.
A lot of people don’t know that I actually
layer the 808 and put a kick over top of it.
A lot of people think that it’s an 808 with
a kick already on the one track, but I put
them together and EQ it.
Next I’ma add the snare drum in it.
Most of the time when you’re doing these
type of beats, it’s a certain type of hi-hat
that everybody uses.
I wanted to kind of use something that a live
band would use with a sock cymbal to support it.
So we gon’ start with the hi-hat.
And then I ended up going in with the sock
cymbal.
The siren is like, a big part of my build-up.
I’ma play it by itself, and then I’ma
play it with the low brass and the choir.
My favorite part about this beat is definitely
the crow sound.
My little brother had a beat pack of all these
special effects and he would use it a lot
too.
He was using it before me, actually put me
on to putting that into my beats.
I wanted to put the record needle because
I wanted to give it a warm sound.
I just thought it sounded dope at the time.
The last part I added was like a heavy breathing
scrape sound.
So with my tag, I ended up in the studio with
one of my good friends and her daughter.
And we had her in the booth.
The next day, I was just listening to her,
just cracking up off of her little rap.
And she said, “Jahlil Beats, holla at me.”
Sometimes when it’s compressed, it comes
out like “Jungle beats,” or “Jello beats,”
and that’s the most hilarious thing to me
because it definitely do sound like “Jungle
beats” but it’s saying “Jahlil Beats,
holla at me.”
It changed my life, financially, just how
the younger producers look at me.
Yeah, so you know it was a million remixes
to it, but my favorite one was Lance Stephenson.
This record is the next level, and I credit
all that to Bobby.
Just how he rode the beat and he had that
build-up, and then when the beat dropped,
everybody go crazy.
I was in weddings where they played that record
and then everybody, I’m talking about grandmas
just going crazy to that record.
That night he got locked up, me and my manager
was there right before that and he played
me the whole EP.
The first conversation I had with him, he
was like, “Yeah I’m just trying to get
out the streets and just stay out the way.”
He was like, “Help me figure this out.”
I think that the record is a classic and it’s
definitely the biggest anthem that I ever made.
I like to be in the studio by myself most
of the time.
I need some candy, I need some water.
Kayvan: What kind of candy?
I gotta ask.
Laffy Taffys.
I love banana Laffy Taffys though.
