Dilla Time : The Life and Afterlife of the Hip-hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm (9780374721657) by Charnas Dan; Peretz Jeff (CON)

Author:Charnas, Dan; Peretz, Jeff (CON)
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Macmillan

* * *

In late 2002, MTV began airing a video for “Floetic,” a curious clip directed by Marc Klasfeld that used computer effects to convert the streets, buildings, and bridges of Philadelphia into musical instruments. The song was the product of another foreign exchange: two transplants from London, Marsha Ambrosius and Natalie Stewart, who called themselves Floetry. Ambrosius, the singer and songwriter of the duo, was an avid fan of neo-soul, and more specifically of Slum Village. She figured she had listened to the first ten seconds of “Hold Tight” more than any other piece of music in her life—something about the cheekiness of Jay Dee’s pocket and Q-Tip’s rap made her think: Finally. Someone understands me. Thus Ambrosius dove at the opportunity for Floetry to perform at the famed Black Lily in Philadelphia. In a room with people they’d only heard about—Jill Scott, Jaguar Wright, Bilal—with Questlove playing those lagging, dragging Jay Dee–type beats behind them, Ambrosius decided she wasn’t going back.

Ambrosius began working with James Poyser, but ultimately she made an enduring connection with Jazzy Jeff and his team at A Touch of Jazz, six guys working in three pairs: Ivan Barias and Carvin Haggins, Andre Harris and Vidal Davis, Keith Pelzer and Darren Henson. She took every opportunity they gave her to make demos for the guys’ projects, and for Floetry. One day at the studio complex on North Third Street, Jeff received a visitor: a short, quiet man in a long chinchilla coat, who cast an even longer shadow over Jeff’s crew.

Oh my God! Ambrosius thought. It’s friggin Jay Dee!

He was there and he was gone, an apparition of Detroit cool. But the man’s ideas were ever-present in her creativity. Ambrosius and Andre Harris recorded a song of hers, something she had written when she was only sixteen, and set it to a limping, conflicted beat. DJ Jazzy Jeff sent the demo to John McClain, the man who had signed both Slum Village and Janet Jackson, and who now worked for one of Janet’s older brothers. One day Jazzy Jeff called Marsha into his office and played her a voice message: it was Michael Jackson, saying that he wanted to record the song she had written, “Butterflies.” Ambrosius spent a surreal week in New York’s Hit Factory coaching Jackson through a perfect replication of her demoed vocal over her and Harris’s track. It was her first songwriting credit, and would be the last single released by Michael Jackson during his lifetime, in early 2002.

By the end of the year, Floetry landed a deal with DreamWorks Records, their album preceded by that bizarre video, the places and people of the City of Brotherly Love all vibrating together and apart in Dilla Time.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.