So Im in Amsterdam and I’m bored as shit cuz its freezing rain outside and I’m listening to beats and what not outta the laptop and I had my instrumental folder on shuffle and I hear a beat I never heard before. I usually know what’s in my ipod( cuz its mine right?) and for some reason its baffling me that I don’t remember where this beat is from. Then it hits me, Its Kanye’s. Then I sit at my laptop and start going thru my library. Now I’ve paid attention to what he’s produced and what he’s put out on his own. From Game to Cons to GLC to Alicia Keys to 88 Keys and to this day I have never heard anyone spit over this track. Why do I even still have it? So I hit the net and do a few more searches and the only thing I haven’t listened to is 808’s. Im sure this beat wouldn’t be on that album. So I come across a MTV blurb where this girl is talking about Ye and how he used to hang at MTV and how he always talked about music and his beats and what not. So that took me back to when I first met him. I was signed to Rawkus and from what I hear they had the chance to sign him and passed on him but shit those dudes passed on Eminem! Well it was a guy there named Howie, I still don’t remember what his title was but he was the one STREET cat that Rawkus had. He knew all the people who for the most part wouldn’t support Rawkus’s music but some how he got them to listen and sometimes play it. So once I got signed I remember he would always ask what VA was like. Yall got hoods down there? Do the Clipse really move white? All kinds of shit, but he was cool( then). Dude used to get head in the office and all kinds of wild shit. So one day he tells me he wants to take me over Kanye’s crib to get some beats. Im like ” Who’s Kanye’? He’s like That Mos’s man. He got some shit. So then on the way to Hoboken he tells me the songs he did and how he’s not really like Jay and them but Jay & then dont fuck with him outside tracks. So I’m like ” Oh, from the Chi, he did H to The Izzo! I remember him from the video showing off his tattoo( for some reason that image was the only one I had). So we get there. An Apartment building and he’s sitting in front of a Roland 1680. A hard disk recorder. I had the same one I had let my man E borrow it. He had headphones on and was doing something with the machine. The apartment had records, sneakers, you know the usual shit. He asked me what kind of shit was I looking for and I told him what I tell every producer …” I don’t know, I just know it when I hear it.” So he played like 20 beats and I only really liked four. They all had samples in em and most of em where those sped up soul joints he used to do back in the day. Anyway he talked about music and this new Hov shit and mostly it was him and Howie talking. I wasnt saying much I was just chilling and cold..the heat wasnt on. Now I aint saying he didnt pay the bill..lol. Im just saying it was cold. So he burns the cd and we get ready to bounce and we’re walking to the door and he says my name ..
ye- Skillz
me- Huh
ye- Can I ask you a favor ,yo?
me- What up?
ye- If you decide to not use any of the beats please don’t rap over em and put em on a mixtape or nothing.
me- Oh! iiight
Ye- I’m for real
me- ummmm..ok
We leave and I ask Howie What was that all about. He explains that niggas just take shit and rap over it and put it out and that has been happening to him lately. I mean I did it with Aaliyah’s song and got pub so I knew exactly when he was talking about. He drops me off at the Time Hotel( with them small ass rooms) and I pop the cd in and listen to the beats again. I came up with a mean hook for one( I don’t have it anymore) wrote something to the last beat on the cd. I remember riding the train back to VA two days later and really wanting to track the song, or at least what I had written. And back in VA in the studio I played the cd and my homies asked who made the beats, I told em Kanye West but I probably wont use em. My man Irv was like” fuck that, we using them joints, lets lay something to it and give it to P Cutta. I took the cd out and changed the subject and started talking about the game the night before. I remembered the look in his eyes(Ye) when he asked me not to do that. I didn’t really know homie but he asked me and I told him I wouldn’t. I felt like if I did then I would be taking food from his mouth ya know? I wouldn’t want anyone to do that to me. I just listened to a interview where he said he doesn’t even listen to rap in his crib. Wow. Things change, People do too. I lost my mom too, so I know his pain when he talks about if he had never left the Chi then she prolly wouldn’t have either. I wonder if he would even know if I rapped over this beat now. Or would he even care? But I said I wouldn’t.
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16 Comments
iLLVibes
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You get major props for that kid. Most people, especially people in the industry, don’t keep their word about anything. VA stand up! Kanye’s new album (will be copping it on Tue) is dope and I think he really showcases his musical ability on tracks like “Paranoid”, “Street Lights”, and “Amazing”. I think people just need to listen to it with an open mind and realize that it’s not a typical(if anything he does is typical) “Kanye hip hop album”. Only then will people appreciate it for what it’s worth. I just really hope he can find himself and get through the pain he is dealing with because I know it must be tough. On some random shit, I was just listening to “From Where” the other day. “That shit would not come off the shelves if an earthquake hit the city…I am getting tired of DJ nobody and MC new nigga” = classic. Can’t wait until the wrap-up…Keep it Funky!
?amboni
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Good Story Skillz. You can bust on my beats and put em on a mixtape any time. Please?
MONEY MAKIN
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That is some real ass shit. I’m glad I read your paragraphs, real ass shit.
dara
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nice story skillz, we need another one of those real talk moment with skillz videos though, i need that in my life
Heinsain SwaggeR
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*starts the slow clap up*
simpleHIgh
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This was dope. I lost my Moms too. It’s amazing how real cats remember the promises they make and keep them. Says so much about the kind of men we are. Great story as well.
ODEMIC
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real nice story. it’s good you kept your promise.
yellowniggafresh
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haha…and the point is what is exactly?
you kept your word?
you seen homie wit his ribs touchin at one point?
noooooo doubt.
yeah i was on nahright and erroneously clicked this link and was immediately tickled.
heres my remembering skillz…
so i was back in VA for the birth of my son despite saying once i left i wouldnt return. copped a pad in the west end to be away from the madness even though i would commute downtown to do my IT hustle. anyway, i get some fam in town winter 07 maybe and decide to slide my young boys downtown. since the club scene in richmond isnt all that official outside of select events,(shout out to facejay and upscale) i take the fam down to the lil strip where paradise, cotton club, and pearl are. i slide in to pearl where the old homie AD aka danja mowf does his thing. hit the bar first is the ritual. done. proceed to the booth to say peace and low and behold, this yellow nigga is guarding the steps with his life. seriously. so i say something to the affect of “peace. excuse me brother.” which nets “what you need?”. sideways face. so i lean past dude, not about to be hindered and he tenses up. AD peeps around the cut and says what up. i acknowledge and keep it pushin. i turn back to see homie lookin at his sweater wit the salty face and it tickles me. all i can do is smile at him as i stroll up to round up the fam before making a final round in the club. sigh…good times.
avenger xl
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I still say beatmakers(not producers) who compalin about someone taking there music when they built their music off of someone elses music without permission is like a theif calling the cops and saying hey someone stole the TV that I stole and put it in a nice TV cabenit. Can you get it back because I put a color tube in it the old one went out. I just want to be paid for my labor. The original owner of the TV is like bitch you stole my TV to start with how you gone call the cops on somebody from stealing it from you and adding something else to it. The hiphop shit is so childish and out of perspective
alegion
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Cool post. Subscribing to your feed right now.
inthislife
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nice story- but Headquarters was the real street dude at Rawkus - r.i.p. Headquarters - eyes and ears open
Soweto
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@avenger:
you don’t make beats, do you? ’cause ppl steal styles, too. there are songs i won’t flip if i can’t find something completely new about them.
M* of SunriseSundown
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Interesting
I read tha whole Chapter and ish.
Butta,
So were those BEATZ to PRACTICE on
or
were they Beats to Be Used OFFICIALLY on a ALBUM??
-Love Ya ALbum, and much more success.
Peace.Love.Obama
M*
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Interesting
I read tha whole Chapter and ish.
Butta,
So were those BEATZ to PRACTICE on
or
were they Beats to Be Used OFFICIALLY on a ALBUM??
-Love Ya ALbum, and much more success.
Peace.Love.Obama
GB4Double
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boi… that’s deep… The one the nigga can;t hide from is his own character. The good thing is that it doesn’t even matter when that character is upstanding… And one thing you know from rapping and using words is that “if you don’t have your word to stand for, you don’t really have shit”…
two up, two down homei.
Rob Bates
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LOL!!! this mad crazy b, but I respect this. Big ups to that man Kanye and BIG BIG BIG! UPZ to Skillz