(AllHipHop News) Few producers over the past 10 years have been as revered while relatively reclusive than Madlib. In a recent interview with Benij P on BBC Radio One, Madlib spoke on sample digging with Dilla during his final days, what is holding up a new Madvillain and how he figures out what songs he sampled for his beats.
I’ve seen him on his last days, n’ahmean. Digging for records, and finding everything we wanted to find. He had to go out, sit in the car ’cause he was too sick. When he would come back he would find these records that we weren’t. Then he would go out and sit out for a while. That’s how deep he was in the music. Even when he was sick, he still had it.
Madlib also revealed that he “freestyles” when creating beats so he does not keep track of what songs he has sampled and that has led to him being sued quite a bit. To overcome this problem, Madlib says he uses the smartphone app Shazam on his own beats to find the samples.
The elusive beatmaker also gave an update on a new Madvillain album, reasoning that it’s roughly half way finished:
Right now it’s up to DOOM. He’s not obligated to do it, he just does it when he feels it. I know how he feels, you have to do it when you feel it. You can’t just do anything at anytime when somebody tells you to do it. You have to do it on your terms. We’ve recorded about 10, 12 songs but usually we record about 20 and pick the best one. So we have to wait until we get to that mark.
Madlib recently released a new album under his alter-ego Quasimoto this past June entitled Yessir Whatever.
Check out the full interview below: