This is his first American interview since 2006, because he has better things to do — engulfed in a ceaseless surge of creativity, sleeping only two or three hours a night and fueled by coffee and Lucas Valley OG, the strain of medical marijuana he’s currently incinerating. (…)
“He has records from almost every nation,” says his frequent collaborator, hard-boiled Detroit rapper Guilty Simpson. “He doesn’t just buy them to sample. He wants to understand each song. He doesn’t need to know the language to realize musicality.” (…)
“He’d make do with what he had. There was an upright bass with just one string and he’d still use it effectively. He was insane on the drums too. I’d wake up to the sound of him playing to jazz records for hours. He seemed to be doing it because he loved it, not because he necessarily wanted to improve.”
I’m getting Öyvind Fahlström vibes reading this interesting but overwritten interview with Madlib.
