Classic Drug References

*photos by Kyla

Whattup tho, this your boy Elzhi. I rap with the crew SV, right now you rocking with the best, Detroit’s finest. I run with the Dreadnaughtz, run with Hex Murda, my man House Shoes and it’s like that.

What would you say were your earliest memories of hip hop?

Being over at my grandma’s crib, on the block, looking at my cousins break dance and making their own little rap records. My cousin Chris Bud he was rapping over a Milky Dee record, a little instrumental, and made a cassette tape and everyone was kind of tripping off of that. I got memories of my auntie playing back jack the ripper and trying to memorize the words by writing the words down and constantly playing the record back. So I’ve been listening to hip hop for years, it’s just a love of mine forreal.

Do you remember transition from just being a spectator to actually making your own?

That’s when I was listening to Rakim a lot, and just listening to him and unconsciously breaking down what he did. I knew it was a great thing as far as like the patterns and all that, I knew he was doing his thing. I honestly didn’t know until I was sitting by the speaker listening to it everyday and constantly breaking it down, the syllables, the patterns, the wordplay, the metaphors, the smilies, the whole nine.

What was your first project you released?

I did a project with House Shoes in 98 called Out of Focus. We didn’t actually release it, it kinda leaked out on the internet and a lot of people liked it and gave me a lot of respect for it. To this day people talk about songs like “Boomerang Slang”…

Yeah

You know “Horny,” on the internet they might call it “Passion Fruit,” or something about passion fruit..

This Out of Focus joint, it’s the one on cassette?

Yeah, yeah, cassette. Shoes and me did that, and from that point on I was doing my solo thing until I ran into T3 and got in a group with them.

How did that transition into the group happen?

Me and Wajeed was cool. Wajeed is actually a childhood friend of T3, Jay Dee and Baatin. He was one of the reasons they came together as a whole and put a record out and I think he also made up the name Slum Village…

I think he also did the photo for Fantastic Vol. 1, no?

Yup. Wajeed was basically producing tracks for me and I guess T3 was looking to manage an artist and at the time me and Wajeed was working together so he was like, yo, why don’t you try to hook up with Elzhi? So we hooked up a meeting, everybody was on the same page and he started managing me. Btu once they did the Trinity album, he just decided to put me in the group full fledged after we did like five songs, one of them songs was Tainted actually. After they heard what I could do with the group, I guess Baatin, T3 and the label had a meeting, a sit down, discussing whether they should bring me in the group. Once they came to me I was like, hell yeah. I mean I’ve been listening to SV for year, from “Fall N Love,’ to “Look of Love,” to “Chilling on a Mountaintop,” stuff that cats probably ain’t even heard

Damn, “Chillin on a Mountaintop,” I haven’t heard of that shit…
Yeah, “Gold Shoes.” I’ve been listening ot them for years, so for them to even ask me, an open mic cat who just battle and just loves this to the fullest, to even be a part of this, how could you turn that down, forreal?

How would you compare Slum from back then to Slum now?

Back then, wasn’t nobody tainted with the industry. It was just all love and experimentation. Especially in that era, that era was just so classic. You didn’t worry about putting nothing on the radio, you was just trying to rap. Slum Village now, as far as the style from Slum Village back then, it was more style-oriented, experimentation, creative ways to say things and make your voice into an instrument. It was just trying to break through and do some innovative things, Slum Village now is the same except we try to put a little bit more wordplay, a little bit more structure and patterns in the rhymes so we can write quotables for people to think is classic for years on. We still haven’t lost that experimentation, I mean we always try to flip and bounce. Even when we branched off to do solo things, you see Dilla and Dilla never kept the same kinda style, he always flipped and bounced it. That’s just the essence of Slum, just to bring a new innovative way to affect hip hop’s culture.

Now going from that, what was Witness My Growth about?

It was like a mixtape and reason why I called it witness my growth is because I have on there that date back to like ‘97. It’s just stuff that if I didn’t do that, wouldn’t nobody ever hear it. It was stuff from cassette tapes, old CD’s. it was basically material that was sitting in my closet. One day my boy came through and said, you I gotta put this all on CD. That’s how it was, let’s do a mixtape.

How was the response?

Form what I know, everybody was loving it. I’ve gotten a lot of props for it, which I was happy about just because a lot of that stuff on there was old and the quality wasn’t where I would have wanted it to be because it was old and it wasn’t in the computer like that. Form the response that I got I really loved it like, wow they still feeling it even though they’re listening to something I did from ‘98.

In that vein, is the solo still in the works?

Yes, yes. I got so many tracks man. My whole thing is I’m just tyring to make classic records. I have a bunch of songs but I don’t want it to be too long, I don’t’ want it to be too short, I don’t want it to be too dark I don’t’ want it to be too light. I want to make sure I’m giving you the best of me. I’m still cutting, I just did a cut with Guilty Simpson and my man Fat Ray. I just did a cut with Royce for my joint already, which you may hear on the internet soon.

Oh yeah?

Yeah, we might leak that out. I’m still working man, I’m still working but the new album’s coming.

Speaking of new albums, what’s up with SV? I know there’s been talks about two albums…

Yeah. One of the albums is just gonna be, you know, the new SV album. What SV do but to a whole nother level, as far as lyrics and music, creative direction, the whole nine. The other album we are supposed to be doing with Nature Sounds. Ms Yancey and the label Nature Sounds set up a situaion where they wanted to come out with a collective of records where an artist or a group of artsist rap over all Dilla tracks. They talked about us, they talked about MF DOOM, they talked about Ghostface doing it, but were gonna be the first one’s to do it. Taking it back to where it was.

Now, realistically, what’s the timeline for these projects to see the light of day?

To be honest with you it’ll probably be in the middle of the year or late in the year. Slum has got to do a lot of things low-key to make sure veryithing if right and everything is moving at a right pace. But till then you’re gonna hear a bunch of stuff form us, wether it be little mixtapes or us leaking five songs, you’re gonna hear stuff before the album.

Do you feel the D has been getting more exposure as of late?

I think people have been recognizing Detroit. It’s a few people that have came out to the D like Freeway, you know, B.G., they know what the D is about. Little Brother done came through Detroit, messing with Denaun Porter. Straight up and down I feel like more than ever, we’re really starting to get our shine. With cats like Proof and Dilla, without them who knows how long it would have took, they played a huge role in making people notice what Detroit is about. It’s getting there, it’s not there yet, forreal, forreal. You got Black Milk busting through, he’s still busting through, to me he’s like Detroit’s Dre. He got so many projects coming out too, I’m on a project with him and Fat Ray, Caltroit, I’m on that as well, as well as the new Black album, as well as the Guilt album, as well as my joint. But with all that, he’s still busting through, it’s coming though.

Damn, to me that like there is a community in the D musically, would you say that’s true?

Yeah, I feel like more than ever we done really came together and became family. I work at the same studio as Guilt, Guilt work out the same studio as Black, Fat Ray, Royce. It’s crazy, it feel like an open mic in the studio, but it’s not, we recording records. I recently did a song for my man Jake One, a song called “Glow.” I had two verses already laid down, I was supposed to go do my third but I go in and they tell me Royce put a verse on it. I’m like, forreal, they play it for me and I’m loving it. It’s crazy, it really feel like an open mic but it’s the studio. It’s almost like, I dunno man, it really feel like some super hero ish, the top MC’s is together now. That’s why I feel we bout to move like a force, like a meteorite forreal.

What kinda shit are you checkin for, what are you listening to?

I’m a big fan of MF DOOM. My people putting me up on Jay Electronica. Shout out to my man Blu, that album is crazy. I dunno, I’m just looking for some innovative stuff, whatever’s innovative, it don’t’ even matter, the new Radiohead album is crazy. Hip hop, rock, jazz, blues, whatever, I’m on it.

What to you makes…I guess, nah, easier question, what makes the other shit so wack?

…What you mean?

I’m tryna rephrase that question…damn, nevermind. Fuck that.

laughs

You’ve been out here in Cali for a couple days now right?

Yeah I got out here a few days ago, I’ve been hrere for a minute. I did a couple songs, I did a song for a Jay Dee mixtape by my man Dave NY. I also did another cut for his other mixtape and I’m supposed to do something with Bishop Lamont. I’m just trying to work, whoever’s trying to work let’s do it and get this hip hop up.

Anything else you’d like to say before we wrap this up?

I’d like to say this, as long as you got cats like me, my man Blu, my man Guilty, shout out to my man Kweli, Common, shout out to my man Big Pooh, Phonte. As long as you got cats like us trying to do this forreal, hip hop ain’t going nowhere , forreal. Its’ actually gonna be put on a bigger scale than it has been for a few years, we about to bring 96 back. Straight up, Elzhi the magnificent, peace.