Rappers Kanye West, Chuck D and Chali 2na are among an eclectic group of entertainers and artists featured on The Spirit of Apollo, a new album from North America/South America (N.A.S.A.).
Created by producer Sam “Squeak E Clean” Spiegel and Brazilian turntablist Ze “DJ Zegon” Gonzales, N.A.S.A. is geared toward bringing entertainers from the East and West Coast together through music and art.
Artists featured on The Spirit of Apollo include Kool Keith, Del Tha Funkee Homosapien, KRS-One, Method Man, George Clinton and the late Ol’ Dirty Bastard, who appears with Karen O and Fatlip on a track titled “Strange Enough.“
Despite having a slew of guests on the album, Spiegel maintains the collaborations came naturally, as he credits the music with dictating who would eventually be featured on certain songs.
“We never said, ‘let’s make a track for this person,’” Spiegel told AllHipHop.com. “We’d usually make something we liked, and then as we were starting to write the song, it would tend to go in a direction that we’d be like, ‘this sounds like George Clinton,’ or ‘this sounds like Method Man.’ We would start to feel the song out, and feel the artist through the song as we did it. Basically, we’d sit around as we were making these tracks and say the nuttiest combination of names, like our dream of who we could get on the song. It’s crazy, a lot of times they actually happened.”
The Spirit of Apollo, which features the Chuck D-assisted single “Money,” is part of a series of projects coinciding with the album’s release.
Among the ventures is a full-length behind the scenes documentary on the making of The Spirit of Apollo.
Highlights also include a fun look at reggae superstar Sizzla’s compound in Jamaica, Method Man performing magic tricks and a glimpse at Clinton’s recording session.
In addition to the documentary, N.AS.A. has recruited artists such as Shepard Fairey, Sage Vaughn, Mark Gonzalez, Barry McGee, The Date Farmers, Splunny and Marcel Dzama to bring images from their original artwork to life via animated music videos for songs off The Spirit of Apollo.
Artwork from the artists will be used for the album’s cover art and packaging.
The video for “Money” is scheduled to be released in December.
N.A.S.A’s The Spirit of Apollo is slated to hit stores February 17, 2009.
