Madlib once picked his favourite producer of all time: “He was the funkiest”
California producer Madlib has been around rappers and neo-soul artists since the turn of the millennium and, during his career, has seen the rise and fall of many beatmakers. However, he has been a mainstay in the culture and is revered by many for his versatility.
Over the years, Madlib has worked with an array of artists. From Talib Kweli and Erykah Badu to MF Doom and Mos Def, he is known for his exceptional beats and ability to effortlessly fuse hip-hop and jazz. However, he has collaborated with many other producers, and he has acknowledged that some of them are even better than him.
It is rare that Madlib speaks about other beatmakers, and he usually keeps himself to himself, but in 2013, following the release of his album Yessir Whatever under his Quasimoto moniker, the musician visited the record library of Radio France to speak about his creative process and his favourite producer of all time.
While in the radio’s record archive, the Oxnard native unveiled that he has so many records he doesn’t even count, stating, “I only weigh them. I have four tonnes.” He also revealed that his vinyl collection is so large he stores it across “four rooms.”
Madlib is a producer who, like many old-school hip-hop musicians, makes the most of sampling. As a fan of jazz, one of the vinyl singles he selected was Sun Ra’s ‘Door Of The Cosmos’. He also expressed his love for jazz musician Nathan Davis and, in particular, the arrangement of his instrumental piece, ‘Theme From Zoltan’.
He spoke about his appreciation for older music and unveiled his parents were both musicians, explaining, “My uncle is Jon Faddis, who came under Dizzy Gillespie, so I knew jazz before I knew any other type of music, and I’m still learning.” Although he played some of his work with Tha Alkaholiks for the host Laura Leishman, a record that he picked up was the 2001 project Welcome 2 Detroit by J Dilla, with whom he worked extensively. In fact, he named him as the best beatmaker ever.
Explaining why that was his conclusion after years of listening to hip-hop, Madlib told Leishman, “He was the funkiest! How he programmed loops and didn’t quantise, it had a human feel and the selections that he chose to sample.” He added, “Every producer bows down to Dilla whether they like it or not because everybody took something from him, like [John] Coltrane. It’s crazy!”
J Dilla passed away in 2006. However, before his death, the pair worked on a project under the moniker Jaylib, and in 2003, they released their collaborative studio album, Champion Sound, to critical acclaim. The two even toured together in the spring of 2004.