The Low End QnA: Pete Rock Part 1

About a year ago Super-Producer Pete Rock invited me into his home to talk beats, his upcoming album, New York’s Finest, and why some people said he didn’t make “T.R.OY. “More…

It’s late January 2006 in the city that never sleeps and a restless gathering of fans and critics are waiting to meet their doom. In the cavernous belly of the Nokia Theatre Pete Rock is charged with moving the crowd between performances by Little Brother, Big Daddy Kane and MF Doom. After spinning some of his requisite classics Soul Brother #1 brings things back to the future with “G’s Up,” a track he’s produced for Jim Jones. But as the broken piano comes through the speakers, the anti-establishment crowd isn’t drinking the Dip Set Cap’s Kool-Aid. A smattering of boos echo throughout the venue but Pete is undaunted, “You gotta respect it cuz it’s me though!” he counters from the stage, headphones dangling off of his neck. Reluctantly, the haters about-face and give the legend his due props.

“They probably didn’t like Jim Jones, but it’s all good. He has a following that’s incredible,” Pete says months later from the comfort of his home studio in Spring Valley, NY. “It’s good to diversify. I’d like for the fans to support anything they see my name on.”

Judging from his recent output, Mr. Phillips is like Dondi in the rail yard trying to put his name on everything moving. Dipset, 50 Cent and The Black Eyed Peas have all gotten the soul glow in the past year, along with Ghostface, Raekwon and the BCC. In an age when the phrase “bringing New York back” has become cliche, one of the architects of that sound simply wants to lead by example. So after 2004′s Soul Survivor 2 Pete is readying his latest project, New York’s Finest.

Pete Rock: I’ve been working on this album for almost a year now. It’s called New York’s Finest. I did a song with Styles and Sheek called “914″ a song with Jim Jones called “We Roll.” Gotta joint with Papoose, Red Café, Slum Village, my man Rell. I always liked the way he sang. And I gotta couple of solo joints. I’m also working with DOOM, Ghostface and Inspecta Deck. Plus I have a song with Raekwon and Masta Killa called “PJs.”

JLB: I noticed for that one you flipped the same sample Large Pro did for “Mad Scientist.”

PR: Yeah, that’s from the album for the movie Dune, David Matthews did the scoring. I just felt like when I did the beat, I had the CD and Rae heard it. He really did his thing on that.

JLB: You have a lot of collabs with Wutang cats…

PR: It’s a respect thing. They love my music and I love the way they spit. Plus, I’ve always made beats like that, but I didn’t stress the Al Green and Anne Peeples like RZA and TRu Master and 4th Disciple. We was always on that same level of thinking.

JLB: Right, on “Head Rush” from Soul Survivor 2 you really channeled that Shaolin sound.

PR: When you’re a connoisseur of records you know what they use when it comes to making a Wu street record. So I found this old Mavis Staples record and chopped it up. It had those sounds like what they use. I EQ my stuff bugged out, just to bring the sounds out.

JLB: How did you make it?

PR: That actual beat was made in the SP, so before I sample the music I EQ it first, so it sounds fatter once it goes in the drum machine. When I mix it in the studio I add a Tube Tech EQ or some effects to make sound more ‘out there.’ It was perfect for RZA and GZA to get on that.

JLB: What about the Flaming Embers joint you flipped for “One MC, One DJ”

PR: I was just having fun with it. I like Skillz and we were way over due to do a joint. I think Diamond heard it.

JLB: I want someone to do Diamond’s “Sally” over.

PR: I got that record. I could definitely re-do that. I got the drums, the loop… I’m making over Dougie Fresh’s “Rising To the Top” for Jae Millz and he’s trying to get Doug E on it. I’m just perfecting the beat, making it sound like it did. You have to sit and listen to the record for like a month, study it. Get the elements and arrange it. It was a bad beat.

JLB: What hardware did you start out with?

PR: I started with the SP 12 first, with no disc drive or anything. Saving sounds on a separate disc drive. Then I got the 1200. I used that until 2000 and I started buying new equipment. I bought the MPC 2000, 3000, 4000; but I liked the 2000 the best. It’s like the SP with more sample time.

JLB: How did you manage to get so much sample time out of the SP?

PR: Just spinning records on 45, then slow it down in the SP. But when you do that this ringing sound comes out, I had to EQ it out. I’d sample it on 45 then slow it down. I would sample it, chop them into little pieces then save them all. That gives you a little bit more time. The SP has a crunchy sound in itself. The drums and kicks hit really heavy coming out of the SP, more so than the MPC. But I’ve got my MPC sounding like an SP. With a lot of EQing.

JLB: Do you think having all of that sample time in the MPCs and computers now has made it too easy?

PR: They don’t know what to do with the time. [laughs.] They just find the loop and keep moving.

JLB:Do you remember the first beat you made?

PR: It was some James brown shit and taking his snares and kicks. I worked on Groove B Chill’s album when I was 17, the Starting From Zero album. That was the first shit I did by myself. Then I started doing remixes, then All Souled Out, Mecca and the Soul Brother, Main Ingredient, Soul Survivor, Soul Survivor 2 and Petestrumentals, now N.Y’s finest

JLB:That’s a lot of history you just glossed over lol

PR: That’s just to let people know that I have a passion for this beatmaking. I ain’t going nowhere.

JLB: Are you incorporating more software into your set-up?

PR: I [use] Pro Tools and Logic. It’s fun and fast. Very different from working on a two-inch, but it cuts through all that work. My MP is hooked straight into the Pro Tools. I don’t mix here in my house. I have an engineer ten minutes from here or in Manhattan at Chung King. I’m still a vinyl cat though when I DJ. I think Serato is a cool new way to do parties, but I’d rather a record skip on me than something totally just freezing on me. There’s nothing like vinyl to me.

JLB: How important is the DJing in your production?

PR: Very, it’s like A to B to C. DJing is just another form of producing. You scratch and the beat is going back and forth, it’s manual looping.

JLB: A big part of your career is doing remixes like “Shut Em Down,” “Jump Around,” and “Jussummen.” How do you approach it?

PR: First I get the tempo of the original beat and then I’ll mess with stuff I have and see what sounds the best. I had the bassline and drums of “Shut Em Down” already, then I just started adding [things]… I had those “Long Red” drums, the “clap your hands to what he’s doin…” I used that a lot, maybe four or five times, like “Return of the Mecca,” but it sounded so good. I had that in a crate of records. Bambaataa and them used to [use] back in the day. No matter what snare you have…if you have a dope kick and snare with “Long Red” behind it, it makes the beat sound bigger.

JLB: I was just listening to David Axelrod’s “The Smile” and there was so much stuff you could use in that record. What made you take the very end of it for “Strange Fruit.”?

PR: I was on some gutter sh*t and those pianos sounded so eerie. When I sampled it I turned up the gain at the end where it’s fading out and eq’d it so it would sound like it was still going. I loved those pianos that much and they weren’t anywhere else in the record.

JLB: Now Large Professor said flat out that you produced “T.R.O.Y.” Why do you think a controversy was started over who produced it?

PR: People just put stuff out there. Haters. I know [people] wish that they heard what I heard. Cats had the record before me! He put me on to the record. He was like ‘yo, you got this?’ I took it home and heard the “Similak Child” loop but I was like ‘they ain’t use this.’ I even had Tom Scott tell me that was dope.

Coming up in Part 2: The Difference between Jay Dee and Dilla, why he’ll never sample “Lodi Dodi” again and what happened with CL Smooth.