Interview with Roads Art

Interview with Roads Art

New Jersey has talent for days and there is no denying that. Queen Latifah, Redman, Tha Artifacts, Joe Budden and producer Cardiak put Nu Jeruz on the map reflecting on the diverse musical culture. Mercer County’s secret weapon producer Roads Art is starting to make a household name. Acknowledging his musical skills, he has also delved into graphic designing and videography which compliments the music aspects. Lacing tracks for Yasin, Johnii Lennon and produced the Capone track “I’m Just That Good”, Roads Art is putting his foot in the door and is considered New Jersey’s best kept secret.

Roads Art showed some love as he shared not only his experiences but his graphic designing and his videography skills, his work ethic and honing his craft while sticking it in the competitive hip hop business. Make some room for one of the nicest producers from New Jersey and get familiar with Roads Art; he is a force to be reckon with.

1)            What it is my dude? New Jersey, in the building. How did you get the name Roads Art?

Whats good fam, NJ up in here. The name Roads-Art comes from when I was around 12 or 13 I used to do a lot of skating and got called Robbie "Roads" since I was always out tearing up the streets. That really just stuck throughout my teen years, then when I started getting into production I took the name and made it an acronym so I was calling myself The R.O.A.D.S. "The Ruler Of All Digital Science" then I added the Art at the end to kind of play of Mozart and I was going to school for art at the time so it really just fit, so then I became Roads-Art.

2)            What producers did you look up to growing up?

Growing up the producers I really looked up to are The Rza, J Dilla, Dr. Dre. Those three I would say were my main influences.

3)            When did you first get into music and who was your first artist?

I would say around 11th or 12th grade I started getting into DJing then got introduced to the program Fruity Loops around 12th grade by a friend and then started producing ever since. I actually started with a whole crew of artists including myself, we would record on an old 2 track to tape in my basement, We called ourselves 202 click since that was the address of a couple of our houses. That was around 2000, 2001.

4)            How do you describe your production sound?

It’s hard to describe my sound because I'm always changing it and evolving but I would say definitely soulful and adaptable. I try not to stick with the same formula and depending on the artists I work with at the time I might change the sound scape from what i do on the norm.

5)            What equipment do you use?

Well I started on fruity loops used that for years, then moved on to a MPC 2000xl but my current set up is NI Maschine, Yamaha Motif xs6, Mikro Korg, 2 technic 1200s, some percussion instruments, a drum set, I use Pro Tools 8 to mix everything and I also use a ton of VST's and a crazy vinyl collection.

6)            When you decided to become a producer and get into hip hop?

I decided I wanted to pursue this as a career about 3 years ago, I’ve been producing for over 8 years but I would say around 2009 I really made the decision that this is what I'm gonna do as a career.

7)            You have been producing for a while, what motivates you to put out music?

The main thing I would say that motivates me is just the passion and seeing the effect that music has on people, there’s no feeling like it in the world it’s like a drug, seeing people nodding there head or dancing or relating to the music you put out, there’s nothing like it.

8)            You are also a director, photographer and a graphic designer. How you juggle and keep a balance on working with these jobs?

I'm not gonna lie it gets pretty crazy at times but it comes with the territory when you take on so many roles. At times I fall back on the video directing because it’s so time consuming and detailed, I still have so much to learn in that field but I’ll get there one day. With graphics it’s not as time consuming as videos but you just have to work on a per project basis because you can get lost in the hours. I try and make sure I do music
every day and always put that first and just squeeze in time for designing and videos. A lot of sleepless nights though I’ll tell you that!

9)            What made you decide to take on other roles of directing, photography and graphic designing?

I would say the music, at the time i wanted cover art for projects I was working on and didn't want to pay out of pocket for a designer, so I eventually ended up going to school for graphic design and the videography pretty much came right after. I had to teach myself the video editing but it went hand to hand with what I was learning with graphics. 

10)         Do you see yourself playing roles besides what you are doing right now?

Other than DJing for live shows with artists that I work with or maybe being a tour DJ for well-known artists i would say no, I got my hands pretty full as it is now.

11)         You produced tracks for some well-known artists such as Capone n Noreaga, Cormega and D-Block to name a few. What do you look for in an artist and how the artists you worked with influenced your music?

The main thing I look for when I'm working with artists is originality, passion and vocal presence. You gotta be able to catch the listeners ear right off the bat. I like to influence the artists and bring them into my world most of the time unless they have a certain sound that they’re looking to do for the album. I get influenced by the artists I work with when I hear how passionate some of the artists are or still are after doing it for so long, It just puts that fuel in the fire and makes you want to work that much harder.

12)         What does it take for an up and coming artist to get a Roads Art beat?

Well the first thing is you can't be wack so don't come at me saying you’re nice or this and that and not even have material properly mixed or sounding horrible. If you don't have any material recorded properly wait until you approach me or any producer in general that takes his craft serious, I get that all the time. If you’re serious about your craft it will show and I’m all about building and helping new artists on the rise out, I don't charge unsigned artists an arm and a leg for beats, I work with people’s budget all the time. All you gotta do is hit my email roadsart@gmail.com and I’ll get back to you.

13)         Take us to a Roads Art beat session. Do you listen to the record and go for the loop or do you arrange the kicks and snares first?

To be honest I really don't have a set process. Some days I’ll go through some vinyl and chop up some records or ill play some keys or go through some vst's or I’ll start with a drum track and on too it, it really all depends, sometimes I also just cut a folder worth of samples and go back another day and build of that. Really depends on the mood of the day, but every session starts off with a joint or a bong hit I can tell you that.

14)         How do you know if the beat is done before you holla at artists?

Pretty much it has to just feel right, I’ll do a lot of beats that are just skeletons with not a lot to them just a basic 4,8 bar loop then send them out and if something gets chosen I’ll go back in and either touch it up add more to it or play along with the hook ideas that the artists has and so on.

15)         What is it like working with Capone from CNN?

It was a honor I grew up listening to CNN War Report is one of my favorite albums of all time and linking up with Capone has been a blessing and opened up so many doors for me, It’s a great feeling when you have artists you grew up listening to in your studio feeling your sound and movement. Thanks to my homie Yasin for hooking that up through mutual friends we were able to make that happen and we haven't been looking back since.

16)         You also worked with Yasin with numerous collaboration albums”. What was it like working with Yasin?

Working with Yasin has been some of the best experience in my musical career, we both have the same ear for music and we vibe out in and out the studio so well. We both have a common goal with our music, I actually grew up with his younger brother and once we got introduced we just been hitting the ground running ever since and have been making a lot of noise in NJ and we are ready to take over the world next!!

17)         Which do you prefer working with the artist in the studio or emailing beats?

Definitely in the studio, when I work with an artist I like to make the beat there on the spot in the studio, sometimes your forced to send it online because of locations or timeframes and it works fine but creatively you can get more out of being in the studio with the artist in my opinion.

18)         You produced a lot of instrumental albums. What is it about instrumental albums that distinguish from making a production album with artists and what made you decide to go that route?

I love doing Instrumental albums. When I'm doing an instrumental project I always put a theme behind the album. When I'm in the mind state for an instrumental project it’s really just creative freedom, not having to worry about how an artist wants the track set up and I have a certain sound in mind, plus it gives me the opportunity to experiment with my own creativity.

19)         What type of vibe was on the “Strawberry Letter 202” instrumental?

Well for the Strawberry Letter 202 instrumental that sample was used a lot but I was watching the movie Jackie Brown and there’s a part in the movie when Sam Jackson character is about to Kill Chris Tucker’s character in the flick and he puts that song on right after he puts him in the trunk and drives down the street to kill him. So once I heard that song again I went to the drum machine and chopped up a couple parts from the sample and just tried to change the vibe up a little bit, laid some drums down and that's about it, but the inspiration on making it came from Jackie Brown.

20)         Do you have an idea of which artist sounds good on your beats?

At times I have a general idea on who sounds right on a beat but it usually doesn't work like that, it’s usually the ones I wouldn't expect an artist to pick that they sound the best on.

21)         Any new artists, people catching your ear, which you’d like to work with in the future (indie and/or mainstream)?

As far as new artists there are a bunch of people out there that I'm really feeling. I’m digging the whole TDE movement, Dannie Brown, Elzhi (he's really not that new of a artist but one of my favorites out) Jay Electronica and the one artist that is definitely on my bucket list is Nas.

22)         Some producers critique about sampling too much. What are your thoughts on it?

I personally think that sampling is an art form in itself, taking something and changing it into something totally different and making it sound good is just another way of creating. Hip hop has always been "sampling" since its birth, that's how it started taking a break beat and looping it over and by making the turntables an instrument. The only downfall is that when you’re sampling and you land a big placement your cut is gonna be small depending on the circumstances because the original artist or owner of the music is gonna take their cut which is totally understandable. That's why i do a lot of "non-sampled" stuff also.

23)         Do you think producers face so much red tape to break into the business like hip hop artists?

Yea its hard nowadays for a good producer to break in because the market is so over saturated it usually comes down to 30% skill and 70% of who you know.

24)         Any advice to the producers on the come up who want to get into music?

Stay original, develop your own sound and stay dedicated, this isn't for everybody.

25)         Will we see a production album with artists in the works?

yea that's my ultimate goal is to make a production album but I won't do it until I'm in the right situation and are able to put the artists that I want for the album, definitely gonna be a classic when i do.

26)         What’s the future is looking like for Roads Art?

The future is looking bright, I just released a project, I did a chunk of the production on for my homie Johnii Lennon, you can check that out and support it here, He's currently doing a five year bid and is one of the realist artists out in my opinion, you can check that out here: http://roadsartproductions.bandcamp.com/album/heres-johnii and Yasin and I are dropping the 3rd installment in our trilogy The End Of The Road in December. Make sure you hit my website for new beats, songs, videos and graphics and updates http://www.roadsart202.com also check out my new instrumental album Return 2 The Classics here: http://roadsartproductions.bandcamp.com/album/return-2-the-classics-instrumental-album Peace to everyone out there. Salute.

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