Hezekiah Interview Transcription
DJBooth: What’s up everyone? This is Nathan from DJBooth.net and with me today is the biblically named MC/producer extraordinaire, Hezekiah. What’s up man?
Hezekiah: What’s up, what’s up? How y’all doin?
DJBooth: I’m doin fine, thank you. Word is you’re an international man of intrigue and you just got back from Europe. What do you learn from doing international shows that you bring back with you to the U.S.?
Hezekiah: Keep it brief! During international shows they don’t know the language, so there’s not a lot of talking to the crowd. What they understand is the beat and “put your hands up” and “make some noise.” It makes you rap your show up faster and keeps you on your toes. It makes you a more compressed and compact showman.
DJBooth: You gotta cut out a lot of the call and response?
Hezekiah: Yeah, but I like to keep it creative call and response.
DJBooth: What are some things you say? I go to a lot of hip-hop shows and the “oh yeah” and “hell yeah” is pretty played out. I’m always looking for new things to yell, what are some creative things you’d have me saying?
Hezekiah: I do some Cab Calloway type call and response. (starts singing) You know what I’m saying? Getting the people singing and moving with me, some playful stuff to keep people on their toes and me on my toes. You gotta keep it fresh and fun, it’s never the same.
DJBooth: You grew up singing in church and playing with your uncles band in the basement, now you’re signed to a legendary label, Rawkus, how much of that kid who just loved music is still alive in you?
Hezekiah: Man, that kid’s still right here. I’ve with my boy E. Shon Burgundy right now, he’s on the album, and we’re listening to his project. My whole crew, we always try to take it further every time. We’re always like, “let’s try this,” we never content. That was me as a child, always willing to learn and take constructive criticism. I’m a constructive criticism taker. Shoot me down. As a kid I always wanted honesty and I always wanted progression, that’s still me. I always like havin’ fun. I’m always trying to improve myself so that kid is still here.
DJBooth: Let’s get into your new album, I Predict a Riot, set to drop September 18th. What are some songs on the album that you feel you innovated and took that chance, that you pushed to the next level?
Hezekiah: Number one the music. The first album I was hanging around my MC cats, this album I was hanging around a lot of my musician friends more, along with the MC cats, so this album is musically a step up to me. Intros, vamps, bridges, it’s a piece of music. It’s a complete album with highs and lows that doesn’t stay in the same place the whole time. Musically and concept wise it’s all over the place.
DJBooth: Your production on the album uses a lot of live instrumentation. As a musician, what advantages do live instruments give you versus a producer who’s reliant on samples and loops?
Hezekiah: You can take it wherever you want to take it. You can build a live music track from a sample then you can just drop the sample out and make it your own. Switch a chord up here, switch a rhythm up there. Say you got a chicken guitar…(sings guitar line), that’s how the sample goes. Then you play it…(sings new line), you just change the rhythm up. With a sample you can’t do that because a lot of instruments are probably already in the sample gettin the way of you choppin it the way you want to. The sound being separated is another advantage on the mixing. It’s more work because you’re actually recording the music track for track, but if you have experienced musicians and experienced engineers you should have no problem making live music.
DJBooth: That’s a little production 101 lesson right there. You need to charge for that, we’ll see if we can figure something out. Now, I Predict A Riot is obviously a really catchy and drawing title, are you predicting a riot or trying to incite one?
Hezekiah: Pretty much both. I’m a drama cat, I love drama. I love excitement. A riot would be beautiful if it was incited by me, so I’m predicting a riot and inciting a riot.
DJBooth: Who are we rioting against?
Hezekiah: Whoever you might have problems with. You might be rioting against yourself, you might be rioting inside of yourself. You might be a time bomb inside of yourself and you might blow up. Or it could be a lot of people going through the same thing in different facets of life and everybody blows up at the same time.
DJBooth: One of the singles off the album is Looking Up featuring Bilal. I’m a pretty pessimistic person by nature, convince me things are looking up in hip-hop.
Hezekiah: Yeah, these riots are definitely gonna make a positive difference. Every song on the album, one thing they have in common in there are no really happy songs. Even the happy songs, like “Lookin Up,” I go through so much in the verses and focus on all the stuff I’ve been through but say keep looking up. And the song “Single Now,” it’s a celebration, like I’ve been through all that. You can get something good out of every one of these riots, out of every song.
DJBooth: It’s constructive rioting.
Hexekiah: It’s constructive rioting, yeah.
DJBooth: That’s copywrited, it’s official right now. On the title track I Predict A Riot you say “I’m a nerd but I’m dangerous,” what’s so dangerous about a nerd?
Hezekiah: I rhyme, “I’m a nerd, I’m a freak, I’m a geek, but I’m dangerous,” because I am. I’m a nerd but I ain’t a punk at all. I was a nerd in the lunchroom, they used to f**k with me because I was a nerd and they used to f**k with me even more because I wasn’t a punk. I was by myself and I was outnumbered, so they knew they could bully me, but when they caught me by themselves they would get f**ked up.
DJBooth: So you were that kid who just sat back and plotted and planned for the day you could get somebody one-on-one?
Hezekiah: I wasn’t planning on getting nobody, I was the dude chillin’ and minding my own business and people didn’t like that.
DJBooth: Hopefully you got a lot of people behind you now.
Hezekiah: Yeah, I got my whole crew with me now. Like my boy E. Shon Burgunday said, it’s like Columbine. There’s a lot of those kids out there, you gotta be careful.
DJBooth: You got a whole mob rioting with you now?
Hezekiah: Yeah, a whole mob, though we’re all peaceful cats, really.
DJBooth: I appreciate you taking the time, can you hit people up with a MySpace page or somewhere else they can find out more about you and your music?
Hezekiah: Yeah, go to okayplayer, you can go to Rawkus.com and Soulspazm.com, go to MySpace and just type in Hezekiah to the search engine, I think I’m the first one on there.
DJBooth: I Predict a Riot drops on September 18 on Soulspazm and Rawkus Records, go join the riot.
Hezekiah: Thank you.
Member Reviews and Ratings
Leave your Comment on Hezekiah Interview
There are no user comments. Please let us know what you think!
Submit a Comment
You must be logged in to post comments. Please log in below.