Jbutters: I want to talk a little about the album you’re putting out now that you’re actually rapping on. Since when did you decide that you were gonna start rapping? Is this something that you were known to do in the studio and just never put it down?

AS: I think when we were doing “Skypager” on the Low End Theory I wrote a rhyme like yo let me get on this track and Tip heard me and was like nah, nah, naaaah. He didn’t say you should do anything but touch the mic but that’s how that nah felt. It was brutal. It was a cool no but I’m telling you he wrote a novel in that nah. So I just left it alone. And then when we were finishing up the Lucy Purl record, Raphael had did this hip hop beat and he was like Shaheed I want you to write a rhyme for me real quick. I was like aiight. I wrote like four bars and then I started freestyling with the next two lines and it was just wack. We were just fooling around anyway but that was really it. When I was thirteen I dreamt of being a rapper but for some reason I never pursued it. I used to always have a problem with writing four lines and stopping. That wasn’t just for hip hop it was anything like the song “Good Love”. I wrote four lines, Raphael was like keep writing but I was like I’m stuck. I felt writing wasn’t for me. Although when I was fourteen I got a scholarship to go to Phillips Exeter based on my writing but it was just something I never fully pursued. But when I sat down to do this record it just all kinda came together. I guess that’s what the creator had planned. I felt like if I’m gonna be rapping now I approached it like a producer. I was harder on myself than probably any other producer would be and that’s just cuz I know what I like to hear. It was definitely an exercise for me and singing is just a whole other can of worms. I’m nervous about that because I’m no singer and I’m just trying to vibe my way to something. I really hope that people just receive what I’m doing. I know it’s a shock for a lot of people. I played it for people and they were like whose that right there and I’d be like it’s somebody I’ve been working with and they were like oh that’s kinda hot I like that. So far I’ve gotten good feedback on it.

Jbutters: It is pretty weird because I told somebody today that you were rhyming on the record and they were like Ali Shaheed? I never even heard him say anything. I was like yea he’s on five or six tracks.

AS: I didn’t want it to be goofy. If I’m gonna do it I want people to understand this is not a game. This is a serious movement and I took my time with it. There are cats that have been doing this for thirteen years and I’m just now starting. So I know I have a lot of growing and I’m embracing that.

Jbutters: I was reading about how you and Tip helped each other by introducing each other to different types of music. I remember you saying he introduced you to a lot of jazz records. How did you each influence each other as artists?

AS: I don’t know how I influenced him but I know how he influenced me. We liked the same records when it came to George Clinton, Earth, Wind, & Fire to anything except for the Spinners. We liked the same one hit wonders and so many other things, but when it came to jazz he had been exposed to it and I was not. He influenced me by playing certain records and showing me this and that. His approach to making music is dope. I learned a lot from being around him.

Jbutters: How was his approach different from yours at the time?

AS: He would purposely go out looking for something real different. I don’t know if I really went to look for something majorly different. It’s kinda hard to explain. Whatever I learned from him I learned it and now we think alike when it comes to making music now. I go for that different sound now but I’m trying to think of something different that he would do. Like he would just take a kick and spin it backwards. Something out of place that nobody would even think about doing. He was just doing abstract things. But I don’t know how I’ve influenced him you’d have to ask him that.

Jbutters: Were you guys of equal skill when it came to production when you came together?

AS: He used to make pause tapes and I used to sample because my uncle had a sampler. He would find a loop…oh man this is so old school. Haha. He would find a loop and get it right dub it onto another tape and bump it back until he had a long song. For me I was around studio equipment. I had drum machines, a keyboard and four tracks. We had two different approaches. I had more of a programmer’s approach and he just had more of a feeling approach.

Jbutters: I did an interview with Hi-Tek recently and he said he learned things by doing what he thought you guys were doing. He said he thought Tribe was chopping everything so he learned how to chop but then it turned out ya’ll were just finding really ill loops. Its funny how people try to emulate you and by doing so learn their own abilities.

AS: That’s the invention of hip hop. Everybody didn’t know how to play instruments or even know cats in a band. It’s like let me take this drum loop here and I got two records of it and I’m gonna flip it. That’s how hip hop evolved. I remember hearing U2 say the same thing, that they knew how to play their instruments but not how to play the music they were influenced by. So they were like this is our attempt at that.

Marcus: What’s your favorite Tribe record and why?

AS: That’s an easy one cuz I don’t have a favorite.

Jbutters: Ahhhh come on

AS: I know that sounds like a copout answer but I really don’t have a favorite Tribe record. I love them all because it’s almost like a journal of my life. Its so many different instances of my life that I reflect upon and they all have certain special meaning to me. So I can’t isolate one as being my favorite moment. Even some of the darkest things that have occurred to me in my life are still meaningful to me.

Jbutters: Out of the music that you’ve produced is there a moment you are most proud of?

AS: Yea, this joint on my album called “From DJs to Musicians.” My uncle taught me how to DJ. When I was little he played in a couple of bands and occasionally took his nephew. I don’t know if it was because of babysitter obligations or what but he would take me to some spots he was playing. He is like my biggest musical influence and on that song we got to rock together. That’s him playing bass on that song. That song is special to me because I got to sit with the person who got me started in the whole thing.

Jbutters: I know you have to go so we’ll run through that last questions. Is it relax yourself girl please settle down?

AS: Yup, that’s it.

Jbutters: What do you think of Q-Tip’s album that got recorded but never released?

AS: I thought Kamaal the Abstract was incredible. It was genius. I love the fact that he let the music breathe. There was instrumentation and solos as opposed to being strictly verse-chorus-bridge-fadeout. He let the instruments play and I love that. I like the fact that he stood out and did something adverse to hip hop and different from what everyone knows of him. So I thought it was a fabulous album. He has another one now that’s about to be released. It’s on the same vibe. I think he took it a step back for those who felt like he went too far but the idea of it is still the same. It’s edgy and I love it. I’m a fan and I love that brother.

Jbutters: And the last question, knowing that you are a devout Muslim have you been affected by any anti Muslim backlash as a result of the war in Iraq and do you have any reviews on that conflict that you are willing to share?

AS: Yea, I get it anytime I cross the border. People don’t want to let me back into the country I was born in because they are unsure of certain things. To me that type of discrimination is no different than what I’ve been receiving as a black man walking in certain areas in America. Besides that I can’t say anyone has done it to my face beyond the custom agents. The one time I experienced something wasn’t because I was Muslim. I think it was three days after the terrorist attacks and I was on the New Jersey side looking across the water at where the Trade Center used to be and there were these two Latinos. They were a little intoxicated. They were having a conversation and they walked up to me and said, ‘Yo bro ain’t that f’ed up over there?’ I was like yea that’s pretty bad and he was like we need to kill all of them Muslims. He was like look at that. I said yea that’s messed up and whoever committed such atrocity against humanity should be punished but how can you make a blanket statement like that. He was like do you support that? And I was like nah but how do you say we need to kill all of them? I was like I understand your pain but your country and people were raped and invaded upon by Europeans. They oppressed your ancestors and continue to oppress people to this day. So, I’m sure you have some disliking for that. You may be a couple hundred years removed from that but I’m sure somewhere within you have a problem with it. What took place is basically a product of that. Because something as devastating as September 11th happened does not mean now you go and flip on an entire group of people because you feel they are all associated with that. I was like I’m gonna leave you with that because I was getting angry. That was really the only thing and they didn’t know I was Muslim so he didn’t understand where I was coming from other than I was the only person at that immediate moment not saying let’s get them. I was really trying to let him know, as a Muslim and one of understanding, an African-American and descendent of Native Americans, I could really be on some hatred mission right now but I’m not. You have to be at a place of understanding and once we try to understand one another we could make some accomplishments. That really was where subliminally in some areas and blatantly where some of my lyrics come from. It’s the struggle of the Muslim in America.

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Posted by Jbutters on Thursday, March 16th, 2006 and is filed under HIP HOP ICON SERIES.