We back again. This time we got A&R/Producer for Soul Temple Records and Senior Art Director for Koch/eOne Music Mr. Andrew Kelley (aka Mr. Hat Trick). We get into all things Wu and discuss the sound of the latest Ghostface Killah album “Twelve Reasons To Die.” We talk about the amazing…
6 Monday night I had the privilege to see Ghostface tear it down with Adrian Younge & Venice Dawn. To see them perform live for the first time, songs from an album that I had an intregal part of producing, was surreal, humbling & totally rad. I think the tour only has a couple shows left, catch it if it comes to your town. Ghostface Killah & Adrian Younge “12 Reasons To Die” in stores now!
representing is illmatic
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Critics & fans have spoken. What are you waiting for? New Ghostface album is in stores now!
iTunes Link—-
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/adrian-younge-presents-twelve/id630092753
Amazon Link—-
http://www.amazon.com/Twelve-Reasons-Die-Ghostface-Killah/dp/B00BMEF7GK/ref=zg_bs_38_6
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check the video directed by Raafi Rivero for Ghostface Killah’s “Rise Of The Black Suits” from 12 Reasons To Die “The Brown Tape” produced by Apollo Brown. Get “The Brown Tape” for free next tuesday at participating Record Store Day retailers or pre-order the album now at SoulTempleMusic.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OVPTbyz4RIU
1Ghostface Killah’s & Apollo Brown’s “The Brown Tape”, free alternate version of Adrian Younge’s “12 Reasons To Die”
Greats
version one of the #12reasonstodie cassette tape is now online; photo courtesy of the @strictlycassette website… #Wutang #ghostfacekillah #adrianyounge #venicedawn #RZA #soultemplerecords
#ApolloBrownTape
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Back in 2000 while I was working at Rawkus Records, we were sitting around BS’ing about different industry rumors going around at the time. One that came up that stuck with me was about GZA’s album “Liquid Swords”. The A&R telling the story was saying he heard from a “reliable source” that GZA recorded the entire album’s vocals to RZA’s drum loops. Once the vocals were recorded, RZA built the beats & music around GZA’s verses.
Fast-forward to 2012. I reached out to Apollo Brown to submit beats for an upcoming Wu-Tang project & I thought the 12 or so beats he submitted for this unnamed project were incredible. He went in and made classic sounding Wu-Tang beats. Very soulful & grimey, they would have made even RZA proud.
After talking about different ideas for the Ghostface Killah & Adrian Young 12 Reasons To Die deluxe package, Bob & I and came up with “The Brown Tape”. Based on that rumor I heard about GZA’s “Liquid Swords,” we sent Apollo Brown only the vocals from Ghostface and Adrian’s 12 Reasons To Die. We also sent mixed down versions of the vocals & drums (none of the music) so he knew where to place the vocals on beat. We asked him to create his own interpretation of the album, only going by what Ghost & the other Wu members were saying in their verses and the overall storyline.
He never heard what Adrian did (or any of his beats), so we can not cheapen this by saying it is merely a “Remix.” This version of the album was inspired solely by the lyrics and it really shows. It is nothing but grimey/dusty, boom-bap head-nodders from front to back, a throw-back to the original classic “The Purple Tape” (aka Raekwon’s Only Built For Cuban Linx).
Apollo will be the first to tell you that it was one of the most difficult projects to execute, but also one of the most rewarding. It also sounds nothing like anything he has ever done before. It is the perfect compliment to the genius of Adrian’s album.
Later on while in the studio with RZA & Adrian putting the finishing touches on 12 Reasons To Die I asked RZA about the “Liquid Swords” rumor I heard over a decade ago. He laughed and said “Nah… We didn’t do it like that; GZA loves drums, but nah that’s not how it went…” So although the rumor I was told was false, I’m still glad how things worked out. Because of it, on April 16th Wu-Tang & Ghostface fans are going to get a lot of incredible music & art to digest.
from Left: Apollo Brown, Andrew Kelley, Jaguar Jeff (engineer) & Lil Fame
Pre-order Ghostface Killah’s “12 Reason’s To Die” produced by Adrian Young here: http://soultemplemusic.bandcamp.com/releases
No one could get iller
I got a gold record plaque from my work on Big L’s album “The Big Picture”, RIP
Check out the first single from GhostFace Killah’s new album “12 Reasons To Die” called “The Rise Of The GhostFace Killah”. I A&R’d the album. More info and download here: http://soultemplemusic.bandcamp.com/track/the-rise-of-the-ghostface-killah
this is a great monday morning, drag your ass to work song…
