Muskabeatz

Thrasher Magazine, Feb, 2003

CHILLIN' UP ON THE ROOF OF CHAD MUSKA'S crib in the Beverlywood Hills. You know, that dope spot between Hollywood and Beverly, down by the Hyatt and the Standard Hotel on Sunset. I gaze out across LA, past the beyond-huge Godzilla-size Sean John Diddy commercial on the Hyatt wall and all the way downtown. Shelblack finishes up a chill flick of Chad and breaks out downstairs to set up the next flick of Mr Muskabeatz in front of a wall of dope old beatboxes. Chad sizes up an ollie from the roof to the deck and we head downstairs to the recording studio. This is the same recording studio that was transported to New York this summer and set up in a room in the Soho Grande hotel for six weeks. The same studio that has a voice booth in the hallway outside, right behind the studio door. The same studio where KRS ONE, Prodigy, Guru, Jeru tha Damaja, Melie Mel, Special Ed, Raekwon, U-God, MC Lyte, Ice T, Flava Flay, the Diabolical Biz and Afrika Bambaataa laid down smoking rhymes and blessed flows, over raw Muskabeatz . Ghetto enough for ya? This ain't no fake MTV or BET shit. This shit is by the peeps for the peeps.

Aki-X

What got you into producing hip-hop beats?

Music has been part of my life since day one. Before skateboarding music was in my life. It's something I always have had a passion for. It gives me energy to skate. Whatever energy you get from skateboarding goes into music, and back and forth. From skateboarding I was able to get money and build and get a little bit of equipment. It just snowballed from there.

Skating came first though, as far as you coming up?

Skating obviously was my come up. It's what I loved to do. Even to this day I am trying to balance it. Not just because it's my job but because I love to skate still. Just as much as I love to skate I love to make beats and see an MC recorded on a track I made. It's the same feeling as grinding a 20-stair handrail. It's all the same to me, it's all creation. I like to create things.

How did you hook up with Prodigy?

Each person we hooked up with was a different story Each one was a mad hustle. Prodigy I hooked up with through Alchemist, who is my homie from LA forever, and he produces Mobb right now. He came through to the hotel room and he heard the Biz track and a couple of other tracks we just recorded. I let him know I was trying to get at P--I got a phone call that night. We had stayed up 'til six that morning recording the Biz track. And the next day we recorded like three tracks in one day, it was crazy Then P called us. It was 1:00am in the morning, and we were about to crash out, and P hit me up and was like, "You wanna' do this?" We had just done Bambaataa, U-God and Ice T in the same fucking day, in the hotel room.

For real?

In the SoHo Grande.

You took all your equipment out to New York and built a studio in the SoHo Grande Hotel?

I'm scared to fly lately, since 9/11. I am paranoid. So we drove to New York on a skate mission. I bought a laptop, an audio keyboard and an audio interface. We set it up and my man knew some peeps at the Sam Ash music store out there, and they connected us and loaned us some gear. We set up in the room and started making the hustle that way. Cats came through.

How did cats feel about coming to record in your hotel room?

Cats were hyped and they were like "This is what we need to be doing. We need to be on tour and recording albums. We are wasting time on tour." The way we did it, there was a good vibe and good energy in that hotel room. It was laid back. We could kick back, order room service, and do what we wanted to do. We went out there with some beats and cats would come through, pick a beat and write a flow. Then we would record it in the hotel room. We actually did most of the recording in one week. Some cats busted out in half an hour. Other cats would come and kick it all day and write and record.

What about Raekwon?

He came to LA and we made a hook here. I then sampled that and cut it all up, so all he had to do was come and drop his verse. In 15 minutes he came through, wrote and dropped his verse. It came out just so fresh.

Anyone freestyle their shit?

No one freestyled. Everyone wrote their verse.

Who partied the hardest?

I can't fuck with that. I don't have time to party. I wish I did. I spent the most time with Guru. Guru is a wild one. He's my dog right there. He is the god, the G. That's my homie. Whassup G. Dealing with Biz, he is wild too.

How did you hook up with Biz?

Biz was out here for the Grammies. My homies ran into him in the lobby of the Hyatt. They ran in there to get the ATM and they were like, "That's Biz." He was in the lobby so they said, "My homie Chad Muska is making an album and they want you to get down on it. He was like "Shut up, one for the Ghetto Blaster Grind?" He was always playing the Tony Hawk Pro video game. He already knew who I was, so he was down from the get go.

So these cats have been playing you in the video game?

Some cats knew and had been playing me as a character, some cats didn't know who I was, other cats called back and said, "My little brother or my cousin plays video games," or some shit. A lot of cats had some kind of connection from skateboarding. They had heard of it some way. Then I was letting them know that with skateboarding, we reach out to mad kids, there're mad kids that skate. Some of them are 13, 14, 15 and they might not know the impact Wu Tang or KRS or Afrika Bambaataa made on hip-hop. They might not know the impact of Melle Mel or even the newest cats like P had on the game. When Mobb Deep came out and dropped Infamous, like the impact it had on hip-hop. Without these cats there wouldn't be the Puff Daddys or the Jay Zs or the Nellys. All the people on this album are the people who made it possible for these cats. So I can sort of give back to these artists that inspired me by introducing them to new groups of people who are going to listen and appreciate their music for years to come. We affec t through skateboarding what goes on in this generation.