2000's 'Donuts,' J Dilla - that's like the manual of hip hop production.
The music industry is more singles-driven, and the attention span of culture becomes shorter and shorter, but we still grew up in the era where buying an album, looking at the artwork, putting it on and listening to it top to bottom, those were the experiences that really changed our lives. That's what we aim to make.
Growing up playing the drums, I idolised Questlove from an early age. 'Phrenology' was the first Roots record that I ever heard, and that was like my introduction to hip hop.
When I listen to 'Workinonit' or 'Two Can Win' or 'Anti-American Graffiti,' it takes me to another place and gets me out of my head.
Songs are special. Songs are like trees. You plant these seeds and watch them grow, and you never know how people are going to respond. That's one of the most beautiful things about music.
Our songs, we construct them and deconstruct them so much, we kind of forget exactly what we contributed to them. They just start in a certain place, and then, all of a sudden, they finish, and OK, wow, that just happened.
On 'Sid & Nancy,' it was originally this atonal kind of beat that you hear in the verses, like an atonal dance track.
I lived in Boston for four or five years and would commute to New York to play gigs. New York City became so expensive, all the recording studios started shutting down because they couldn't afford rent anymore.
For us, an album is the highest art form - an album or a really incredible film. We're musicians, not filmmakers, so this is what we can do.
