The Klasix
CHAMP MAGAZINE
The Boy Hollywood
CHAMP: What’s goodie Klasix. What are you guys up to at the current moment?
Dae: At the moment right now we actually ‘bout to record or artist The Academy, we working with Nico and we also working with this female artist named Cha-Chi
CHAMP: Now I got introduced to you guys definitely on the Joe Budden Padded Room album. You guys actually did a lot of placement on this joint, now did you guys take advantage of that open call he had or was their a relationship you guys had before that?
Dae: We had a previous relationship with Joe when we did Mood Muzik with him. We had eight tracks on there and from that relationship Joe wanted us to work on Padded Room.
CHAMP: The I couldn’t help it joint is a crazy crazy record. It must’ve been the easiest beat you guys made ‘cause there’s no snares or kicks in it or anything like that but you get that soul from it. Who came up with that beat?
Dae: The thing about that beat was. I went through a process. We do have a version with the hits and drums with it. The intro was kinda long and when we got it over to Joe the intro was just so dope just tweak it a little bit so we can get the intro without no drums. We shopped it out to Joe in 2004 and he was like “what’s that?” so we went in and did it. It wasn’t actually easy to produce. You can’t hear it but in the instrumental there’s a lot of orchestration going on, violins, and a lot of strings playing around just to try and make it more emotional and just capturing the emotional period.
CHAMP: On that joint, I don’t know if Budden told you guys but do you guys know which rappers wife he was hittin’ on that track?
Dae: We don’t know nothing about that!(lol)
CHAMP: Heeeeeey maaaaan (lol) I wanna get the names of the cats in the group so if all y’all can introduce yourselves invidually in terms of who’s reppin Klasix and what does each cat bring to the table.
Black Mike:I’m Black Mike aka Michael J Lots of The Klasix
Dae:And I’m Dae of The Klasix and there’s DJ B-Stee but he ain’t here right now. He’s also a Klasix.
CHAMP: Now do you guys all have individual tasks or is three producers fusing to be a three headed monster in The Klasix?
Dae: We come together to be a three headed monster, but we have our specialties. We all have a certain style. B-Stee’s whole style is straight early hip hop and you can hear Premier in his signatures and it’s evident. Me, I’m pop man, r&b.
Black Mike: We pretty much…we’ll a couple friends of ours say that we compliment each other with different styles. I might be on some pop shit, then the next thing you know Dae will be on some rap shit and it’s pretty much vice versa.
CHAMP: How long have y’all been producing for?
Dae: We’ve been producing since like ’99- 2000. When we started making music we were making that Jersey house type music. We moved on to hip hop at around 2001-2002 and that’s when we started The whole Klasix thing.
CHAMP: And you guys all hail from the same city or where you guys from different cities and connected?
Dae: Mike and I we’re from Newark and B-Stee is from South Jersey
Black Mike: Me and Dae actually met up when we was going to high school together, so we knew each other from high school and then we met up B-Stee and made the crew.
CHAMP: You guys were saying that you were putting together a pop joint or club records when originally starting, but what would you say would be the first beat that put you on?
Dae: The first track that really put us on was Joe right?
Black Milk: It definitely was yeah
Dae: The joint people know us from and people still notice us from is All of Me. A lot of fans be asking us about the instrumental and what were we thinking about. All of Me got the fans
Black Milk: We got some online looks from these beat competitions we did
CHAMP: Who else have you produced for?
Dae: We produced for Kat De Luna, we produced for Stevie Jones, Joel Ortiz, The Academy, we got Cha-Chi.
Black Mike: Neako, we got some stuff with him, big shouts to Quiet Boys
Dae: Yeah we was on some underground stuff, a lot of Jersey stuff and had up a whole bunch of remixes and that’s what we working on right now.
CHAMP: For all my producer heads, what kinda tools can we catch Klasix messing with?
Black Mike: We definitely rock with Fruity Loops, Reason, (gotta have the Reason).
Dae: We got Motifs, electrical drums,mp3s
Black Mike: Yeah…With a shitload of plugins
CHAMP: What are your thoughts and views on sampling? Some producers don’t like it some producers love it, what are your thoughts on the use of sampling in the game?
Black Milk: We love sampling. When your sampling it’s like creating a different kind of vibe to the original. The samplings the more inspiration to just go at it in a certain way. When we sample we incorporate the midi and add some other compositions to it, so it’s just not the raw sample like we didn’t add anything to it.
Dae: For the most part, we love sampling, we love the whole creativity of taking something that’s old and making it new. We sample and we do our original thing. It doesn’t matter either or if the song is hot, the song is hot. A lot of The Klasix records are samples so we love ‘em.
CHAMP: What’s your thoughts and views on E-Digging Vs. Crate Digging?
Dae: At the end of the day whoever does that conversion from the crates to the internet access music, I mean they know what they’re doing. If it’s out there to find then it’s definitely good, but at the end of the day you gotta pay homage to the crate digging, cause if you can’t find anything online that where they are. With crate digging, there’s a lot of things you can’t find electronically yet. Crate digging is nice, I pay homage but everybody doing the crate digging much love to you too.
CHAMP: Who are some of the up and coming producers you’re feeling right now if you had to pick like 5?
Dae: I like Mellow Madness, Ego is dope, Blastah Beatz is dope too,
Black Mike: My man Elmi is dope too
Dae: I think his name’s Move something he’s kinda dope. It’s something move I forgot but he’s a tough producer
Black Mike: Choir Boy
CHAMP: We’re in the second quarter of ’09. What else can we expect from Klasix for the rest of the year?
Dae: That fire!
Black Mike: That fire!
Dae: (Lol) But seriously we have a bunch of projects and ‘bout to change the look and show everybody what we about. Expect a song featuring our artist Idris Elba. Expect a dope amazing retarded track with Nico and more work with him, expect more Klasix placements with these major artists. We so far going this year. At the end of this year, this conversation is gon’ be so much more.
Black Mike: Definitely be on the look out for The Academy it’s gon’ be crazy definitely.
I COULDN'T HELP IT - THE KLASIX
